"I'm here for murder, kidnapping, robbery, armed robbery, conspiracy." "We got sexual desires, and who do you think we get?" "Don't tell me each other." "See, coz I don't like nothin' in the first place and I don't like you." "You got your best shot man, one punch, punch me in my face, then it's my turn." "Now punch." "Man, get that fucking camera out my face!" "I told you to cut it off!" "I'm Danny Glover..." "What you just saw was the beginning of Scared Straight..." "A groundbreaking film that won an Academy Award and eight Emmys when it first aired 20 years ago." "The original film follows 17 teenage law breakers who are taken inside of Rahway New Jersey's maximum security prison." "In a raw confrontation, a group of hardened convicts called The Lifers tried to literally scare the kids into going straight." "Tonight, after watching Scared Straight we'll meet these same kids and convicts today." "What's happened to them over the past 20 years?" "Are any of the kids in prison, are any of the convicts out?" "We'll find out right after this special presentation of Scared Straight." "These teenagers are going to prison." "Nothing, from arrest to rehabilitation has worked to stop them from breaking the law." "So now at age, 15, 16 and 17, they're going behind bars." "Their sentence will be short." "Only three hours." "But during that time these juvenile offenders will come into direct confrontation with these hardened criminals." "They call themselves The Lifers." "Together, they're serving nearly 1000 years." "But the Lifers are through taking lives, they're now saving them." "In a unique crime prevention program created and run by the convicts their goal is ambitious... make juvenile delinquents go straight." "Imagine yourself the innocent victim of one of these youngsters." "How do you feel about your victims?" "I don't really care, you know?" "Whoever come I'm gonna get 'em." "You know?" "It's a challenge." "I feel sad about 'em for a while..." "Then I forget about it." "If you don't know the person, so you really don't think too much about it." "They shouldn't have been, you know, around me at that time..." "I don't, I don't give a fuck about 'em." "You know..." "Just laughing about it." "Today's prisons are filled with yesterday's juvenile delinquents." "Convicts who entered crime even before they entered puberty." "I don't remember how old I was when I first got in trouble." "Me?" "Around 9." "Around 6, 7." "About 10." "14." "15." "14." "12." "To be exact, 12." "12 or 13." "About third grade." "I was 8." "Right here..." "Monday through Friday, juvenile offenders from New Jersey and New York are sent to Rahway Prison by police, judges, councilors and probation officers." "From the moment they pass through the metal detector  these young law-breakers come face to face with the brutalities of prison." " My keys are in..." " Sit over there!" "Sit over there!" "I don't care where they are." "Wait over there." "Step through this machine." "Let's go single file, stop over here." "Stop right over there, by that radiator." "Single file!" "Let's go, follow the sergeant." "As the teenagers go deeper and deeper inside this maximum security prison  their arrogance and smiles fade." "...replaced by an enveloping uncertainty, ranging from tension to terror." "Hey, look at that guy right there." "That's a sweet motherfucker right there!" "Yellow shirt on ..." "Yo, you guys behave." "You be in here, you be my bitch..." "You know that?" "Sweet thing." "Inside an oppressive and noisy cell block called the Hole prisoners locked in solitary verbally molest the young boys with homosexual taunts." "Get out from back there t'you, both of y'all some pretty motherfuckers." "You look just like her." "Matter of fact, you look better than her." "I'd rather have you than him." "Lock 'em in here too." "You wanna come in here?" "...regular housing, man, God live up there." "It's a floor without..." "Bring 'em in here..." "You wanna be in my cell?" "You too, gimme that one over there too, that one over there with the big butt." "Yeah, I wanna do something real nasty to you." "Let's go." "Make me kiss you, you motherfucker." "Alright, take first four guys." "Let's go. 1, 2, 3, 4." "Lock it up." "In there, in there." "Get off that guy's bed." "Oh youse were tough, saw a lot of noise out there." "Come in here, don't say me, you, he." "All of youse." "Let me see how tough you are." "Open up the door." "I kick ass, you know?" "And if I get my ass beat, don't mean shit, coz hey I'm coming back you know?" "That's the kind of person I am, you know?" "I consider myself a tough guy." "That's what I consider myself." "I'm devious, you know?" "My hands is like mechanical, you know?" "I get into people's trucks, I hot wire 'em, I take everything, you know?" "That's what I'm about, you know?" "I'm about looking for trouble." "I'm serious, right." "Tell 'em, it is!" "Somebody ask me to steal something, I say "good," you know?" "I'm going into, security, security school to learn all about burglar alarms and things like that." "That way I know when I come out on the streets, I can disconnect the alarms and take what I want." "In my future I think I'll be a professional thief." "If you say if I commit a crime how do I feel?" "I feel alright, you know?" "I commit, I'm happy, I'm gonna do it again." "You know?" "I'll take everything you have." "If you give me the chance." "You talking about stealing possessions or hurting me bodily?" "Yeah." "Stealing possessions and hurting you if possible." "That's the way to go." "It's like, I never killed anybody, you know?" "But I did slice a couple, coz you know, I had to slice somebody a couple of times." "That's the worst I ever done." " Do you think you could ever kill anyone?" " Yes, I think I can." "Me myself, I don't care, coz you know, they gotta catch me first." "I don't feel that the cops out here are bad enough to catch me." "Jail is like, a thing they talk about to me, you know?" "Smell the toilet bowl." "See how it smells." "You can smell it from there?" "Well look at it." "You people, you come here with a one to two or a life bit put you in a cell of this size." "And I have a good mind to keep you in here for the two hours that we're gonna be on this tour." "Thinking that you're so tough..." "You ain't tough." "Why steal from people, you know, average an' which I don't." "If I steal from someone it would be someone, if I ever did steal, like the railroad, like I've been blamed for." "Because, they'll have the money right from their insurance..." "They just stalling the money." "It ain't hurting no one there." "The worst thing I ever done was rob this store." "I got caught." "You need the money that badly?" "No, it's just that I'm too lazy to work." "If my group's gonna do something like I'm the kind of person that'd probably do it." "Coz everybody's doing it..." "That's just the way I am." "I wouldn't rob no little old lady or nothin'." "Who would you rob?" "Somebody rich." "Three girls..." "let's go." "Throw 'em in there, they're no different." "Alright, lock it up, D." "Sometimes I did things when I was drunk." "And I didn't worry about it til next day." "Stealing... dealing drinking." "I got an assault and battery charge against me." "What I steal, I need and I want." "And I just do it to satisfy myself." "not to satisfy anybody else or to prove to anybody else that I'm cool because I steal." "I just do it to satisfy myself." "If these kids look like the innocent boys and girls next door remember why they're here." "Various youngsters in this group have committed assault and battery arson, auto theft, breaking and entering, burglary, purse snatching, shop lifting vandalism, possession of stolen property, possession and distribution of narcotics illegal possession of weapons, assaulting a police officer... larceny and bomb threats." "Their juvenile crime is hardly innocent child's play." "They don't scare me." "You know?" "They don't scare me." "I think it's gonna be great going in, seeing all them burn-outs." "I'm not worried about it myself, you know?" "Coz if they come to me talkin'..." "I feel I'll talk back, you know?" "I'm not gonna shut up for nobody, you know?" "For nobody." "You here for two hours." "You will only last for two hours." "Everybody see these cards?" "Everybody see these motherfucking cards?" "And let me tell you something, man..." "When I ask a question..." "I want answers from all of ya all." "Now, do everybody see these cards?" "Yeah." "I want you to look at one, man, and pass it down..." "I want you to see them all." "Motherfucker, what did I say?" "What did I say, motherfucker?" "!" "Now pick 'em up and look at 'em right." "Sit the fuck back." "Hurry up and pick them goddam cards up." "You don't get all them cards, clown, coz if I tell you again I'm gonna break your fucking neck." " Now did you see 'em all?" " No." "Try this the last time man, the last fucking time..." "Don't get on my fucking nerves, alright?" "You look at one and pass it down to him." "Look at all of em..." "motherfucker." "Come on, speed it up." "I show you them cards for one reason..." "To let y'all know that we ain't no social workers no councilors, no probation officers or no police." "We are convicts." "Every man you see behind me is doing over 25 years or life." "So y'all coming in here won't change nothing." " Now is that understood?" " Yeah." "When a man's up here talking to you, I want your eyes on him at all times." "That means if that man catch you looking at that wall he feels though you chumping him off." "And when you chump a person off in prison you got to deal with the consequences." "And we can get very physical up here." "So we can start this now, right?" " I asked you a question." " Yeah...yes." "If I ask you again, nigger, I'm gonna come over here and break your fucking neck." "Alright?" "Now I asked you a question, can we get this started?" " I wanna hear from all of y'all." " Yes." "Let's get one thing straight right from Jump Street..." "Ain't nobody up here to entertain you clowns." "You got a problem, man?" "You come in here laughing and joking..." "Look at me motherfucker when I'm talking." "Yeah, you wanna impress these bitches how tough you are?" "Any one of youse, you wanna impress 'em how tough you are?" "Well impress 'em with me." "I'm in this stinking cesspool ten years, clown and I ain't seen nothing funny." "You sit here and you seriously believe you ain't never going to jail?" "In the 10 years I've been here I seen 1000s of guys come through these joints." "And I ain't met anybody yet that planned to come to prison." "That's the trouble with you clowns." "As somebody's trying to give you something, you about chumping em off." "Well keep trying me jerk off..." "Keep trying me, man." "Get up, motherfucker, you think..." "Get outta here!" "Get up off that fucking bench, get outta here, nigger." "Get over here and kick his motherfucking ass." "Come on." "I'm over here." "Tighten it up." "Move the fuck over, man." "Move over." "I'm sure some of you guys has got girlfriends, right?" "I can't hear you." "You girls got boyfriends?" "I can't hear you." "Yeah." "Yeah." "I know youse all got sexual desires, right?" "Yeah." "Well, we got sexual desires too." "We're just like you." "We're made of flesh and blood." "You tough guy, take a wild guess, when we got sexual desires who do you think we get?" "And don't tell me each other." "Who?" " Who?" " I don't know." "You don't know, huh?" "Well, I'll tell ya." "We get young, dumb motherfuckers just like you." "I gotta tell you I've been down here ten years and I'm gonna die in this stinking joint." "And if they wanna give me these three bitches right here I would leap over them like a kangaroo just to get to one pretty, young fat-butt boy." "Mmm, tell em, God-damn." "And not only me." "There's a lot of guys in here do the same thing." "That's the way of life in these joints." "Let this dummy here sit down, man." "One day you're laying on your blanket and your mind is drifting over them 30 foot walls and you're thinking about who's with your girl." "When three guys will slide into your cell, wrap your ass up in that blanket..." "And I don't care how tough you think you are  or how strong you might be." "They're gonna kick your ass over the side of that bed and do bodily harm to your asshole by sticking a dick in it." "So what do you do?" "I'm gonna give you 5 options you could take and ain't none of them worth a Chinese nickle." "1." "You go to the cop." "You say, "officer, three guys just ripped me off."" "You come back with the cop..." "You say, "that white guy, that black guy, that black guy."" "See these three guys that ripped you off..." "Yeah, they're gonna go into the Hole for 30 or 60 days and then they be back in population." "But the administration, they know they can't leave you in population because one of these guys' associates will cut your ass from A to Z..." "So they gotta do something to protect you." "Well right up there on the fourth tier there's a place called "PC"." "Protective Custody, we call it Punk City here at Rahway and that's where you will go." "And if you doin' a one to two, five to seven, twenty to thirty, life bit that's where you will do all that time." "And when you in "PC", you locked up 23 out of 24 hours a day." "You get out for one hour for exercise, and that's it." "So see you can't rat." "But I know I got a lot of tough guys here." "So when you get ripped off, the first thing you're gonna wanna do is get even." "You're gonna wanna get revenge." "Now the best time to stab somebody in this joint is on the mass move." "When you got over 1300 wild, treacherous maniacs moving like a herd of fucking cows, going out there to the yard the mess hall, or prayer or to the movies." "So you strap down with your shank and you go in the yard and you see one of them guys that ripped you off." "So you slip up behind him, you pull your shank and you stick him." "And when you stick him, you kill him." "One of you smart guys tell me how much time you think the court's gonna give you for killing that man?" "Anybody?" "That's right, they're gonna give you life." "Not that they care about that guy you killed  or they care about you..." "But that's the way the system works." "See, there's no such thing as getting even in these prisons." "And that brings us to number 3." "When you get here and you get ripped off maybe you decide "Well, I ain't gonna say nothing to nobody."" ""I'll keep it to myself." But see it don't work that way." "See them three guys that ripped you off?" "They got associates, and their associates, they're about young boys and they're gonna come and rip you off." "And then they got associates, and they're gonna come and rip you off." "And if you get anything from home like a little food package, or some personal clothes somebody gonna take that too." "So your things will steady be getting ripped off." "And that brings us to number 4." "And this is the one youse all gonna take." "In the ten years I've been here, I've seen it a thousand times." "You gonna walk around this joint, or any joint you might be in and you're gonna find a guy that's real quiet." "Nobody bothers him and he don't bother nobody." "He's got all the respect in the world." "You gonna approach this guy and say, "Hey, my man, I got a very serious problem."" ""Can you help me?"" "And after you run it down to him, he's gonna tell you..." ""Yeah." And it seem like five minutes after he say "yeah"..." "It's like somebody got on the PA system and told 1300 wild maniacs not to bother you." "And now you're telling yourself..." ""Hey, this guy was alright." "He got all this pressure off of me."" "But nah, he ain't did nothing." "The only thing this guy did was he told population that you are his property." "You are his kid." "And when you become somebody's kid in one of these joints there are things you gotta do." "You gotta get up in the morning and get his coffee." "You gotta clean his cell." "You gotta wash his draws and socks and if he wants some head, you will give it to him." "And if he wants to fuck you in your ass, you will let him." "And if he wants to sell you to another prisoner, he'll do that too." "See they're gonna put lipstick on your lips, earrings in your ear and have you swishing your ass up and down these tiers hustling cigarettes for your man." "That's where you tough motherfuckers like you..." "See, when you entertain the thought of telling this guy..." ""Nah, man, I ain't about that bullshit." "I ain't gonna do it."" "Well, the only thing you're telling this guy is to take your life, clown." "Coz that's what he's gonna do." "Now, you can take number 5 and that just happened Christmas." "You probably all read about it coz it was in all papers." "Young guy, he didn't mean to kill nobody, just standing on a corner, ...smoking a little reefer, drinking a little wine." "So he was broke, but wanted to keep the party going." "So he went out to snatch a pocketbook." "But see, when he took that pocketbook from that little old lady she had a heart attack and died." "So he didn't just have a charge of mugging, he had a homicide to go with it." "And when he went to court, the judge didn't give a fat rat's ass he was 16 the judge didn't want to hear what he meant to do." "He just talking about, "fed up with this juvenile bullshit" and gave him life, right here in Rahway State Prison." "And he's here one week, and he became somebody's kid." "And he did that for just a little over a year." "And then the pressure of day to day living in one of these stinking joints crashed in on him." "So Christmas night he went back to his cell, took his sheet tied one end around a pipe and the other round his dumb motherfucking neck and he hung himself." "So now he's even..." "He ain't gotta do that life bit." "He ain't got to deal with these police, and he ain't gotta put up with his pimp." "He went out the back door wrapped up in a green sheet with a tag on his toe." "And when they stuck his dumb ass in the ground and give him that little wooden graveyard marker." "They ain't put his name on there." "They put his number." "Coz that's all you are when you come to somebody's prison." "Is a number... you lose everything." "But this is what you clowns want." "I personally don't give a fat rat's ass what you do when you leave here today." "But just remember this, when you get here, I show you better than I can tell you." "All you sit up, sit the hell up, man, and that go for you, sit up!" "And when I say something I want everybody to give me an answer, youse understand that?" "Keep your eyes on me the whole time I'm talking." "If I decide to jump up in that goddam ceiling you better have your eyes ready at the bottom of my feet." "Slide your goddam ass back." "Squeeze the fuck in there..." "I don't care if you uncomfortable." "I've been uncomfortable for 4 goddam years." "What the hell would I care about you feelin' comfortable now?" "You got something in your head you want out?" "...because if you move your hand one more time you ain't goin' have to worry about it ...coz I'm gonna kick that right off the top of your goddam head, do you understand that?" "See, coz I don't like nothing in the first place and I don't like you." "You move one more goddam time and I'll bite your fucking nose off and spit it in your damn face, you understand that?" "That go for youse too." "Coz just as quick as I'll kick him in the goddam ass, I'll do the same thing to you." "Put no damn tears in your eyes, what the fuck I care about some tears?" "Shit." "All of youse, all that junk you be's watching on TV, that's fantasy, that's bullshit." "You turn on the TV, see somebody get 20 years, life and you get up, then go the bathroom, and you come back, they on the streets..." "It don't work like that in here." "When you get some time in here, you do years." "And when you do years in here, you do that day for day week for week, month for month and year for goddam year." "The only thing that changes in here is the goddam calendar." "But youse wanna come in here." "See, coz every time one of your so-called friends out there tell you..." ""Come on let's go steal something." "Let's go rip somebody off."" ""Let's go mug somebody," all they doing is saying, "Let's go to jail."" "And every time you get busted, what did you get the last time you got busted?" "How much money did you get?" " 20 dollars." " 20 goddam dollars!" "Now you sound like a real dummy." "See when I was on the streets, I used to take people's stuff every day..." "Sell them drugs, any way there was to get some money." "See I was about that, coz see I didn't care." "Coz I didn't dig, you know, the end results of it." "Just like youse can't dig it." "Youse like that." "Now see you got a problem, my man." "Is your fucking arm broke?" "What you think you tough or something?" " What's your problem?" " He wanna fight." "Get up, that's what you wanna do, you wanna impress them?" "Get the fuck up!" "Tell you what, you tell me, you act like you know what is." "Stand up there and tell me what the fuck goes on in here." "Tell me, don't waste my time." "Tell me." "See, coz you not paying attention to what I'm trying to tell you." "I'm paying attention." "Oh, all of that moving is paying attention?" "Didn't I tell you to sit your goddam ass down there and don't take your goddam eyes off of me while I was talking to you?" "Just because you smaller than me I won't body slam your ass down here." "See this here's the class, clown." "See this is just like a lot of youse when you be in the goddam classroom." "Don't want nobody else to learn nothin'." "Want everybody to watch you and make everybody just as stupid as he is." "Lot of youse wanna be like that." "Sit your dumb ass down." "And if I gotta turn around and say something to you..." "I'm not, I'm just gonna slide your ass right up outta here." "I mean just what'd youse think you'd be doing, taking people's shit up here?" "Youse get a kick out of that?" "Wait a minute, do youse get a kick out of that?" "!" "No." "Do youse think this is a fucking joke or something?" "Take off them goddam, take them motherfucking shoes off, gimme them shoes." "Everybody take them off." "What the hell is wrong with you, you think I'm playing with you?" "Hurry up, take them motherfuckers off!" "You need some help?" "Yeah, you goddam right I got it, take them off!" "Gimme all of them shoes." "Kick them all out here on the floor." "Come on, goddammit!" "Act like you changing to go hang out." "You need some help or something?" "That's right, now I took that!" "And I know you don't like it." "Did you like coz I took your shoes?" "No." "Well, do something about it." "All you gotta do is get up and go through me to get it." "Nobody else." "See act like I'm that old man in the alley right now." "Or act like you wanna snatch my pocket book coz see that's in my pocket book." "Coz see I know you want your stuff." "How did you feel when I took your stuff?" "Did you like it?" "What about you?" "How did you feel?" "Huh?" " You can't talk?" " I can talk." "I said how did you feel?" "I didn't like it." " You wanna do something about that?" " No." "Why not?" " Coz." " Because of what?" "See, you thinking right now." "But see when you out there running up in somebody's goddam house you don't be thinking." "See, you don't be thinking about the consequences that you gonna suffer if you get caught." "See, coz you can't get away forever." "All you do is pound it up from day to day." "You don't think about them people out there got families just like you, that they out there working... ..try to bring that money home that you lay out there mugging, rip 'em off for." "You see, you thinking right now." "See, coz you know that if you get up and touch one of them shoes" "I'm gonna break my leg off in your ass." "See, coz you ready, you don't wanna deal with them consequences." "As if you really knew what was happening here, you wouldn't wanna deal with them neither." "Coz this ain't nothing." "You wanna be a smart guy, you wanna be a wise guy, let me tell you something." "The police can make a thousand mistakes." "You can only make one mistake and you're done." "You understand?" "What am I here to amuse you, did you smile, huh?" "I didn't smile." "Something's funny?" "Something's funny with you?" " No." " Huh?" " No." " Get that smile off your face, boy." "He's still smiling." "Let me tell you something, I'll break your fucking nose off your face and if you think somebody's gonna stop me from doing it, believe me they won't." "Coz by the time they get here, it'll be too late, it'll be all over with." "I got so much time they can't give me no more." "Do you understand what I'm telling you?" "So when you sit here, you keep that smile off of your face." " Coz I'm gonna hurt you, alright?" " Alright." "Don't make me hurt you." " Okay." "Please?" "I talked to you nice, right?" "We took your shoes." "How do you feel 'bout that?" "You don't like it?" "Well, the next time you take something from somebody, you think about that, you got it?" "You think about that, how you felt now because that's how they feel." "You like to steal?" "Huh?" "You like to steal?" "I got 11 uncles." "Do you know how big that makes my family?" " Big." " Big, right?" "Take something from my family let me read in the newspapers that one of my people was ripped off by one of you punks." "And I'll be waiting for you right here in this prison." "You got that?" "And then what do you think's gonna happen?" "Keep that in your mind, because everyone of us have family out there." "And if you think you're tough, you don't know what tough is." "I'm bad." "You see me, boy?" "I'm bad." "You see them pretty blue eyes of yours?" "I'll take one out of your face and squash it in front of you so you can watch." "You see, because I think that when I'm talking to you it's going in one ear and out the other." "I don't think you're listening to me." "What did I just say then?" "You said you'd take one eye out and squish it." " Do you think I would?" " Yeah." " You're damn right I would." " Are you ready to kill somebody?" " No." "You're ready to do that monkey business you're doing on the street though, aren't you?" "You're ready to hang out on the corner though, aren't you?" "Then you better be ready to kill somebody because when you're in this place you gotta kill if you have to." "When you wake up in the morning do you think about, "maybe I'll have to kill somebody today?"" "When I wake up in the morning I think about, "maybe I'll have to kill somebody today."" "Do you wake up in the morning and think about, "maybe I'll be killed today?"" "Or that maybe a guy like me will break your face for you, huh?" "!" "Well, when I wake up in the morning I think about that." "Is that paranoia?" "Yeah?" "!" "For you it's paranoia." "For me it's a reality." "This is prison!" "This ain't no playground." "We play for keeps in here." "The big eat the little." "And in here, I'm big." "He's big, we're big, because we're survivors." "You understand?" "You take something from me and I'll kill you." "I ain't hardly bullshitting." "Two of you guys I don't like." "I don't like you, and I don't like you." "You got one time to smile at me, I'm gonna turn your teeth upside down..." "Do you understand me?" "I just got out the Hole today and I will turn your teeth upside down." " Do you dig it?" " Yes." "I'm gonna tell you about the prison." "But before I do, show me your shoes." "Show me your shoes." "Show me which ones are yours." "Tell me." "This one here?" "Which one is yours?" " Which of what, what, who?" " Purple sneakers there in the corner." " This here one right here?" " Yeah." "You smiling at me again?" "I'll knock you in the motherfucking mouth with this shoe." "You smiling at me?" "Knock it off." "Close your mouth." "I don't like none of you." "This how I think about you .think a fuck about you." "Nothing." "Go home barefoot, you faggot." "Everything I tell you today up here I'm gonna show it to you in black and white." "I'm here for murder, kidnapping, robbery armed robbery, conspiracy, breaking a dude's jaw and breaking his fucking woman's both her goddam arms." "But fuck, what's happening to me..." "It's what's happening to juveniles we're concerned about." "It's pretty bad what happens to young boys when they come in somebody's prison, ain't it?" " Ain't it?" "!" " Yes." "You think that's bad?" "This is even badder..." "Girls beaten and raped." "18 years old, she been molested 11 times, by other women in the prison." "Don't you wanna be like her?" "They talk about getting tough on juveniles..." "Take your arm off the chair." "Get the fuck out, get up and get off the stage before I kill ya." "Get your shoes and get the fuck outta here." "Right now." "Before I slap your motherfucking hair off your head." "They talk about getting tough on juveniles." "They say if you commit a crime like an adult they're gonna send you to an adult prison." "But you don't care, man, you don't care, you wanna be here with me." "You wanna be in the cell next to me." "See, we know all about juveniles." "How do we know?" "We was juveniles one time ourselves." "Everything that you doing now we 'ready did it." "We didn't get away with nothing we're here." "So what makes you think you're gonna get away with it?" "Tell me, nobody know." "Listen to our men and the time that we're doing." "Listen to em!" "Give me some names over that time." "55372, 30 years." "56083, double life." "52149, life." "56090, 37 years." "51258, 30 years." "54936, life and from motherfucking now on." "Now who know what from now on mean, "from now on."" "Somebody tell me." "Forever, til the day I die, that means I'm never going to the street no more." "See I was like you when I came to prison, man." "I was wild, nobody couldn't tell me a motherfucking thing..." "I didn't wanna hear." "But you know how they showed me?" "By taking my motherfucking eye right out of my head." "Look!" "You see it?" "Stabbing me all up in the front and in the motherfucking back." "How motherfucking tough could I have been, tell me!" "See you got that fucked up attitude you wanna be like me." "And at first, sit up man, sit up!" "You ever seen a toy robot?" "Well, look at us, that's what we are." "But they don't plug us in no electricity, they make us move by bells." "I hear so many motherfucking bells that when they don't ring, I still hear em ring." "Why?" "!" "Because I was that tough guy." "They split my motherfucking head all open." "I got knots, bumps, stitches and everything." "They don't give a fuck about me." "If I haul off and hit you in your jaw right now you think the police'll help you?" "You goddamn right, he just wanna do his eight hours and go home." "The people that brought you here today..." "You think they'll have the kind of jobs they have and make the kind of money that they make if they ever did any li'l drug shit like you're doing out there today?" "Huh?" "But you can have the same kind of job." "You can make the same kind of money so motherfucking easy." "It's passing you by." "Go to school, get that education..." "and pills'll whup the shit outta you." "See, coz God ain't gonna tear that 30 foot wall down out there." "A pipe is not gonna tear that 30 foot wall down out there." "But an education just may tear that motherfucker down." "Come here." "Read the heading." " This one here?" " Yeah, read the heading up there." ""Rahway inmate stabbed to death in cell block."" "Okay, read from "he was stabbed."" ""He was stabbed about a dozen times, in the neck, chest, head and back."" ""Robinson, who was pronounced dead on arrival at Rahway General hospital, was serving a 3 to 5 year sentence."" "That's good, sit down." "Did the man lie to you when he told you 'bout motherfuckers dying in here?" "Did he lie to youse?" "!" " No." "So are we here to bullshit youse?" " No." " Then why are youse here?" "Them people that brought you here today..." "As well as we know, youse are here coz you're coming to fucking prison." "You know when your mother and father have a dog on the street  and that dog constantly pisses on the floor and they can't train it .what do they do with that fucking dog?" "They get rid of it." "Well don't youse motherfuckers have the sense to know that every time you go in that courtroom for a B and E shop lifting, stealing a car, whatever you're doing you're like a dog pissing on that judge's furniture." "Sooner or later he's gonna get tired of looking at you, ain't he?" "What's he gonna do with you?" "Send you away." "But youse don't think about that." "We know what youse think, youse think you ain't ever killing nobody to come to prison." "You don't have to kill nobody to come to prison." "And the papers showed you, you don't have to be doing 30 years to die in here." "That man was doing three to five years." "You wanna know what he died for?" "He died for a piece of fucking cardboard." "A picture of his woman that he had in his cell that another sick motherfucker wanted and killed him for it." "But youse don't think about that." "When you look at us what do you see?" "What do you see when you look at us?" "!" "Convicts." "You know what we see when we look at youse?" "We see ourselves." "We see ourselves so when youse look at us you better see yourselves." "Coz this is your future for youse." "Men on this stage don't know what it's like to hear a dog barking." "Men on this stage don't know what it's like to hear a fucking bird chirping." "We don't know what it's like to hear a car horn honking." "But if you ask us what it's like to hear a man getting stabbed to death we'll tell you about that." "If you ask us what it's like to hear a man screaming coz four dudes is fucking him in his ass, we'll tell you about that too." "Coz we hear that everyday." "Everybody sit up." "I said sit up!" "There will be no more of this motherfucking playing these games, all that's ceased." "Right now, you, come here." "Pretty big dude, ain't you?" " Six foot." " Six foot." "Dude this's it, you got your best shot, man, one punch." "Punch me in my face, then it's my turn." "Now punch." " You'll kill me." " Motherfucker, punch!" "Go ahead, dude." "If I hit you, you'll kill me." "Huh?" "You'll kill me." " Yeah, you need protection, don't you?" " Yeah." " Come here." "Ain't nobody gonna bother you, stay with me." "Grab that!" "Grab it, motherfucker, grab it!" "This is mine now." "This kinda shit here go on all day in the motherfucking prison an' shit." "A young dumb motherfucker that can't make it." "So he needs somebody to take care of him." "You got any cigarettes?" "Anybody got a cigarette?" "What you goin' get for that cigarette, man?" "You just bought this." "I can do bad by my motherfucking self." "Go over there with him, you belong to him now." "His motherfucking manhood, man, just been tested." "And he failed." "Because he should have punched my motherfucking head off." "That's what he should of did but he didn't." "Now he belong to somebody else." "Like I said before, man, this happens all the time in the prison." "The only thing that a prison has got to offer ...is aggravation, humiliation, degradation, alienation..." "That's all a prison's got to give a motherfucker." "Everybody up here, man, got a number." "And like, it's only fitting that y'all have a number." "And until you leave, because this is the shortest prison sentence you will spend, your number's one, you two, you three, you four, you five." "What's your number?" "Four." "What's your number?" "Three." "What's your number?" "WHAT'S YOUR NUMBER?" "!" "Two." "What's your number?" "One." "Okay, kick it all the way down." "What's your number?" "You!" "One." " KICK IT OUT!" " One." "Two." "Three." "Four." "Five." "Six." "Seven." "Speak it up." "Six." "I said speak it up, Mickey Mouse, speak it up!" "Six." "Seven." "Eight." "Nine." "Ten." "Eleven." "Twelve." "Thirteen." "Fourteen." "Fifteen." "And I want you to have that same number when you walking out that door going down there." "Coz I'll be there squatting on you." "We don't get paid for doing this." "We don't get no extra rewards, no extra benefits, no nothing." "We do this because we wanna do it." "Because we feel like we might could get to you and help you." "Now I'm gonna pass these cards out, they got phone numbers." "If you have a problem, if you feel depressed, if you need somebody to talk to..." "Then you can call these numbers." "If you don't want these cards, don't take them." "Because somebody will come down here who will want them." "Y'all man's too young to come in anybody's prison." "Because I don't wanna see none of y'all falling in this bullshit that I'm in." "I'm only 26 years old." "It stops right here." "My life stops here." "This is it." "So I'm saying, you got to listen." "Is that understood?" "I been here seven years." "Every grit, every fucking day I've been here." "Why do you think I'm stood up here putting everything into this here, you know why?" "If somebody would have done this to me, I wouldn't be here." "Y'all got the best opportunity in the world." "Y'all came in and talked to motherfucking convicts." "We telling you what it is." "And you guys would be a goddam fool not to take it." "You got to be a fucking fool not to take it." "I don't know, I was just so scared." "I don't wanna go to one of them things." "And they was saying like, you know they was so sure that I was gonna wind up in one of them like that." "And it just scared the shit out of me." "I didn't like it at all." "I think it will change my life." "And the way it's gonna change my life, I mean, I gots to cut some of that out." " I mean all is possible." " Yeah, I feel way different." "The minute I just stepped through the door..." "One policeman told me to stand straight..." "And I just said, "I know right now this ain't for me."" "It's just changed me all around I mean, when I stepped through that door." "Scared." "They had me very scared." "Shaky, scared." "It doesn't scare me like it's supposed to." "How did you feel during the session?" "I was thinking." "Were you scared?" "A little." " Didn't you just tell me two days ago that you wanted to be a professional thief?" " Yeah." " And now?" " I changed my mind." "You're really serious?" "You're not putting me on?" " What are you going to do now?" " Get a job." "It's a lot more scarier." "Think if I ever was here, I don't know, I'd probably kill myself." "We located all the convicts and juveniles shown in Scared Straight." "But the kids of Scared Straight aren't kids anymore." "They're now adults, and their lives have gone in many unexpected directions." "I take everything, you know, that's what I'm about, you know, I'm about looking for trouble." "Your whole life style should change, things you used to do you don't do no more." "Things you used to say, you don't say no more." "The boy who hurt people, is now a man who helps people." "Terence is 37, married with two young sons and loads baggage for an airline." "He served in the Navy, and now serves his Baptist church as a part time preacher." "Chances are, if I wouldn't have went to Rahway I'd probably be locked up." "I could have been in my grave." "I could be doing the same things that I was doing then." "Me myself I don't care you know, coz they got to catch me first." "Breaking the law, BE's, auto theft, broke uh, into stores and almost to a point of physical harm." "I was a person that you could be in your car and I could be in the back seat of your car." "What did you think the visit to Rahway Prison would be like?" "A thrill, you know first of all with all the pressure" ""You guy's going to Rahway?" And we were like "Yeah we're going to Rahway, the big prison!" It got a little sensitive when ...they start closing doors." "And you hear the locks." "And it's something else when you watch a door lock and you don't see a man with a key." "I walked out, realizing that if I can commit myself to a change in my life that I would never have to go back there again." "I went to college after, you know, a couple of years." "And I was in the auditorium when they had a film Scared Straight." "And I'm sitting here years later." "And people looking at the film and looking at me." "And looking at the film and looking at me." "And I said "Oh my God."" "And they said, "Wait a minute, that's him."" "He's in college." "Here's a tormented, deranged, juvenile turned straight." "I realized through Rahway State Prison from the age of 16 that the only person could make the change for you, is you." "Who do you really wanna be, and how far are you willing to search inside of you, to become the best you wanna be." "It's just something about the goodness of Jesus that helps remove and wash away the troubles of your life." "Stealin', dealing'." "Oh God." "I really wish you didn't have to show those things." "That's awful." "Lori is 36, married, and has a daughter 17, and a son 10." "She's a book keeper for an air conditioning company." "What I steal I need and I want." "Every time I see it, it's more and more disgusting." "It is, it's embarrassing." "It's not funny." "It's embarrassing, it's sickening." "I thought it was just gonna be a day away from school." "I didn't think we were gonna be in the same room with those people." "I didn't think they were gonna be right on top of me." "I could feel their breath still on me, when you think about it, how close they were." "And when they were yelling, I mean, the saliva coming out and hitting you." "That's how close they were to you." "I didn't put it past one of them to even hurt one of us girls." "I wanted to get out of there so bad." "But I was afraid to even breathe wrong." "I don't know I was just so scared." "I don't wanna go to one of them things." "I don't think I've ever been that afraid in my whole life, than I was that day." "And since then, I don't think I've ever been afraid." "It made me not want to be an idiot anymore, I guess." "I think that's when I just started like going to school more after that." "I started hanging out with different people after that." "It wasn't over night but..." "If you hadn't gone to the prison and it was just your parents, or the police..." "Oh, I would have, oh, God only knows, no." "Or police talking to you like that, do you think you would have changed?" "No way, no way, no way, uh uh." "I probably would have gotten worse." "Definitely." "It's not a life, it really isn't." "It's what I tell my kids, you know?" "You hurt everybody around you." "But in the long run the only one you're hurting really is yourself." "If you feel depressed, if you need somebody to talk to, then you can call these numbers." "If you don't want these cards, don't take 'em." "Lonnie was released from prison in 1996." "He's 47, and has spent 17 of his adult years behind bars." "Lonnie is single, and works as an apartment rental agent." "My mother died, she was 23, I was eight." "I had nobody to guide me, so I started drinking at a young age." "I would argue, carry a gun which got me in trouble because one day I shot someone." "If I had never started drinking, alcohol I would have never went to prison, I would have never been in trouble." "And I probably would have been a big success." "Because, um, I am intelligent." "But alcohol makes you unintelligent." "We do this because we wanna do it." "Because we feel like we might could get to you and help you." "Sometimes we would see 20, 30 and 40 kids." "We knew that we couldn't save all kids." "But if we could save one then we knew we done something right." "It helped us to turn our lives around too." "I'm not drinking, I'm not getting in trouble." "I have a son who loves me and every time I hear him say..." ""It's my dad." I mean it just...." "I just get a smile from ear to ear." "As long as he love me, then I'm a success." "The worst thing I ever done was rob this store." "That's an innocent little kid, I had the most innocent face I think." "And I was a terror." "Angelo, 37, is now a law-abiding family man." "Married with three children, he installs floor tile for a living." "I started breaking the law from the age 15.... ...up until, up until Scared Straight." "I didn't think of the victims, I didn't think what I was actually doing to them." "I think about it now I was in people's houses." "I was a 16, 17 year old crazy kid." "I was in people's houses." "I think of somebody being in my house now, and it would drive me nuts." "Come here." "Read the heading." "Yup, that's the guy I remember." "I didn't know what he wanted but I was prepared to do what he wanted to do." "He's telling you how a guy came into Rahway Prison and got killed in prison." "I'll never forget that." "I'll never forget that." "Yeah, I broke the law three times after I visited Rahway." "Twice right after, still at the age of 17 and 18." "And once about five years ago I had a disorderly conduct and I did 15 days in a county jail." "It was something that I'm ashamed of and my wife wanted to tell my kids I was working, my eldest daughter, I said no." "I made her come down and visit me at the county jail, with my wife to see me, in between the pieces of glass." "And told her, "Daddy got in trouble, and this is what happens when you do wrong."" "If I didn't go to Rahway I think that I would have done hard time." "If that one day didn't happen, I might not have my family." "And my family to me right now is everything." "It's the most beautiful experience in the world." "When you look at us what do you see?" "What do you see when you look at us?" "!" "Convicts." "You know what we see when we look at youse?" "We see ourselves." "Joe was in and out of prison most of his life." "After serving 11 years for armed robbery, he was paroled." "Four months later in 1993, Joe died of a drug over-dose at age 43." "He left behind one daughter." "Somebody ask me to steal I say, I say, "good," you know?" "39 year old Raoul is divorced, has a nine year old son .and lives with his fiancée." "He served in the army, and is now a technician at a chemical plant." "There were drug-related exchanges or weapon exchanges." "We were more, into uh, gang-type activities." "I want you to look at one man and pass it down, I want you to see em all." "Did you think you were gonna go in there and show those guys a few things?" "Well, probably go in there and mouth off a little and uh, you know laugh at them and joke about it." "Motherfucker, what did I say?" "What did I say, motherfucker?" "Now pick em up and look at em right." "Do you think you were scared during that moment?" "It's frightening, I think anybody would." "If I tell you again, I'm gonna break your fucking neck." "That was the turning point right there, Rahway." "That made the decision for me to uh, go straight." "If at that time I didn't go through that program in Rahway somewhere along the line I probably would be in Rahway, be probably in Rahway myself." "Luckily I uh, got my eyes opened up, through this program." "Met this lovely lady, I love her so much." "I'm very, very happy." "Very, very happy." "Can't ask for no more." "Now don't get on my fucking nerves, alright?" "I always remember him." "Well, if I met one in the street, if the one that smacked the cards out my hands..." "I would confront him and say, "How you doing?"" "We had a surprise for Raul." "Waiting outside of his apartment was Willie, the convict who scared him straight 20 years ago." "Now pick 'em up and look at 'em right!" " Oh, maaaan!" " 'Sup boy, pick 'em up!" " How you doing?" "You scared me, man." "I didn't see you, I saw them cards, man." "But I ain't picking them up, I ain't picking them up now, no way." "Yeah, yeah, I got you that time." "Hell yeah, man." "That's good." "That something really helped." "You been in any trouble since then?" "No, no, I'm straight up, straight." "That's it." " Well, we did our job." " Definitely." " Kept you strong, kept you out of there." " Definitely did the right thing, definitely." " Well, I got married, I'm doing alright." " That's good." "Just bought a home, man, you know so." "I learned a lot from it too, man but I'm glad to see guys really..." "It paid off, you've grown up since then." " Alright, it's good to see you." "Take care of yourself." " You too, man." " Make sure you don't go back in." " Never." "Never." "Never!" " You just stay cool." " You too, bro." "We are convicts." "Every man you see behind me is doing over 25 years or life." "Willie has been out on parole since 1995." "He's 45 years old and has spent 24 of his adult years behind bars." "Willie drives a truck during the day and manages a rug cleaning service at night." "He's married, and is devoted to his step-children and grandchildren." "I ended up throwing my life almost away." "I started using drugs and from drugs it went to armed robbery to get those drugs." "That's been my downfall all my life, you know, a lot of people have said to me if it was not for drugs I'd probably would've been somebody really important in this world." "What keeps you drug free now?" "Hard work, taking it a day at a time." "And, the love that I have for my family." "The latter part of my incarceration, I found my religion, which is Islam." "That has helped me a great deal." "I think a lot of these young kids, if they had some sort of God in their lives you know, they would, it would probably be a great improvement." "I mean it's, it's been moments where I've gotten weak, you know?" "But uh, I just keep pushing, I keep pushing and taking one day at a time." "Coz it's, it's rough, it's rough when you been doing that all your life and now you try to change at 45 years old." "It's rough." "The best memory I have of, of Scared Straight was..." "I think I was kinda upset that day about something." "It was something going on that I didn't like." "Get that fucking camera out of my face, I told you to cut it off!" "Right now today that follows me wherever I go, people who've seen that tape." "You know? "It's that guy that said get that effing camera out my face."" "The Lifers program was the most important thing that came out of my prison experience." "Because, through that, I became somebody, you know?" "Helping other kids, helping people get they lives together and not end up like me, you know?" "It was that experience through the Lifers crew, I think I'll cherish for the rest of my life." "Sometimes I did things when I was drunk." "And I didn't worry about it 'til next day." "I'm sorry I said that and I certainly don't feel that way today." "Marlene is 35 and married, and works as a waitress and hostess." "She hopes to start a family." "I'm watching these people and what's going on here." "I thought they would be nice to us, you know?" "And talk to us like friends you know, we're cool like them." "Get the fuck outta here, get up and get off this stage before I kill you." "That couple of hours was torture to me." "It really was." "It made me realize I wanna be somebody." "Not a drunk, not a druggy, not an inmate." "I don't wanna see none of y'all falling in this bullshit that I'm in." "I'm only 26 years old." "Robert was abandoned by his parents as a young child and raised himself in the streets." "He's 48, and has a fifth grade education." "If somebody would have done this to me, I wouldn't be here." "I wanted to be in the Lifers group program coz it gave me a chance sorta to give back a little bit to, to society a little bit." "You remember the day that we filmed Scared Straight?" " Yeah." " What are your memories of that day?" "The love, I guess, that the inmates put out for it." "How they, that took me a little by surprise." "So I'm saying you got to listen!" "Is that understood?" "We really came together, all in one common ground." "Stood as, you know, as convicts, came together as people." "And I think that's something that'll always stay in my mind." "Robert has spent his entire adult life in prison." "In 1991 he was released, only to be arrested six weeks later for sexual assault." "He's now serving a 30 year sentence." "After I accepted the lord Jesus Christ as my personal saviour, I pray hard to clean me from you know, what I used to be." "My worst fear is, dying here in this prison." "Each and every day I think about that." "You know you like a package." "You know, you die, a black bag comes, they throw you in a black bag." "Next day is someone else in the cell and you be gone." "I hope I left some type of impression on people they, you know they don't leave me die in here, you know, of all places." "How do you feel about your victims?" "I feel sad about them for a while, 'til I forget about it." "Ron is 38 and lives with his wife and nine year old daughter." "He served eight years in the Navy, and now works the night shift as a mechanic at a dairy." "I've robbed houses, bicycles, uh, we stole a car once." "You know, selling drugs." "The more drugs I did and the more I drank, the more of a daredevil." "And I didn't care." "I got caught for doing a bomb scare in school." "See you got that fucked up attitude, you wanna be like me." "I remember how they were always picking on me because they thought I was laughing at 'em, which I wasn't laughing." "I have what they call a nervous smirk." "I get scared, I, I smirk, and they think I'm laughing at em." "So I had em all, all of them in my face." "What do you think you're tough or something?" "Get out, motherfucker, you think you.., get out of here." "See, this here is the class clown." "The thing that scared me the most is, that they told us the truth." "About what life is like in there." "And they told me if I was there, I was gonna be everybody's boy." "They'd just pass me down the line." "And I knew I wouldn't make it, there's no way." "It's amazing the impact it does have, because you get to see first hand what's going on inside." "What a lot of these people don't see until they get there." "I wanted to show them that I could do better, that I could change my ways." "And if you hadn't gone, what might you have continued to do?" "I would probably, kept on, burglarizing." "Kept on with the drugs." "I did graduate." "It was four days later I decided to join the service." "I never thought about the Navy before that." "So yeah, it made me think about what my future was gonna be." "It definitely affected me... ..because I think about it still to now, even to this day." "Makes me wanna be a law abiding citizen." "Keep trying me, man, get up, get up off that fucking bench!" "10 years after Scared Straight, we interviewed Ed who was still incarcerated at Rahway." "Well, I do the best I can to serve my Lord and Saviour." "I know a lot of people might not want to hear that, you know, coming from a convict." "But that's the way it is and I have to be truthful about it." "I was carrying a gun and drinking at the same time." "I went of the deep end one day and I wound up shooting  and killing somebody." "I'm most proud of that I had an opportunity while in prison to do a film like this." "Like Scared Straight, to reach out to youngsters." "I mean it's really something to take a life, now you're trying to give back a life." "What I'm least proud of in my life is, I hurt my family by committing my crime and wound up losing my wife and my children  everything else that goes with it." "In 1996, after serving 22 years in prison for double murder and just three weeks before his release from a halfway house Ed was changing a flat tyre, when he suffered a heart attack and died." "He was 58 and left behind three children." "Not everyone was scared straight after the confrontation with The Lifers." " I said how did you feel?" " I didn't like it." " Do you wanna do something about that?" " No." "The visit to Rahway, did it change you?" "No." "Frank is 36 years old and married with three children." "He's now a shipping supervisor for a textile company." "For nine years after his Rahway visit Frank took illegal bets as a bookie, until one day, the law caught up with him." "All of a sudden some guy came by my house." "Before I knew it I was in my garage with like 10 guns to my head." "And I was just like, "Take me, take me, don't, you know, I give up."" "A lot of people were doing the same kind of stuff you were doing, a lot of your friends." "They went through this program and they stopped doing 'em." "You didn't, why you?" "I was doing it for so long, the money was coming in." "I was, living pretty good." "And, I didn't think I was gonna get caught." "I thought I was like invincible." "I was gonna get away with murder, whatever, you know." "Well, not murder, but, that's just the saying and, uh ... they got me." "What do you think would have happened to you, had you not been arrested at that time?" "I could be dead, I don't know." "When I faced it real life that's when I stopped." "When it happened to you?" "Yeah, I mean I would never, ever do anything like that again." "That's what scared me straight." "When a judge said 5 years Trenton, state prison." "Now, I just try to live a good life, watch my kids grow up." "Try to steer them in the right direction." "The only thing that the prison got to offer is aggravation  humiliation, degradation, alienation." "That's all prison's got to give a motherfucker." "Greg has served time for murder, armed robbery and other crimes." "10 years after filming Scared Straight, we did a follow up interview with him." "He was still in prison." "What hurts me the most is, since I've been incarcerated, I've lost my mother." "And she has been the greatest support that I've had." "Your mother could die, or your father could die, while you're locked up." "And that's the worst feeling in the world not being there." "Greg has been out of prison since 1996." "He's 46 years old and has been behind bars 20 of his adult years." "Greg now works as a councillor at a drug rehabilitation centre and is earning college credits toward a degree." "He has two teenage children." "Regretfully my first major crime was a murder." "I... destroyed a life." "I disrupted a family." "And I stagnated and tore my own life apart." "I think drugs was the primary force as to why I really got involved in all the things that I did." "I used heroin, cocaine, ah, I smoked marijuana." "In fact I did everything." "I've been shot four times, I've been hit with a hatchet." "I've been stabbed with a K-5, I've been in a running shoot-out with the police." "As you see here, I have a scar on my face that came from a shoot-out." "I've over-dosed three times, on drugs." "Hey, I've been in some close encounters, of the worst kind." "There's such a difference in you from the time I saw you 20 years ago, the time I saw you 10 years ago." "I've been free of drugs since 1994, on the streets since 1996." "This is the longest I've ever been substance abuse free." "And I'm having the best time of my life, clean and sober." "Since I've been, free of drugs, it feels ... exhilarating." "To try to find a feeling word is almost difficult to find coz it's such a new feeling." "But I'm getting used to wearing this feeling." "And I'm fortunate to still be alive today to give something positive back to somebody else that's going through the same path that I had went on." "Speak it up, I said speak it up, Mickey Mouse, I said speak it up!" "Patty is a widow raising three daughters." "She is 36, works as a waitress and hasn't been in trouble with the law in the last 20 years." "Put no damn tears in your eyes, what the fuck I care about some tears." "How likely is it that you would do illegal things now?" "I won't." "I'm happy I went to Rahway." "Even though I didn't like it, I think it influenced my life, made it better." "It did good for me." "Now punch." " You'll kill me." " Motherfucker, punch." " If I hit you, you kill me." "Roy is 38, lives with his girlfriend, and is an automobile leasing agent." "Yeah, I hung out in the parks, uh, drank a lot in the parks." "The only crime that they ever put me down for when they said you're on your way, was conspiracy to a bomb scare." " You need protection, don't you?" " Yeah." " Come here." "Ain't nobody gonna bother you if you stay with me, grab that." "Grab it, motherfucker, grab it!" "There wasn't much chance of my buddies bailing me out on that one." "I can do bad by my motherfucking self." "Go over with him, you belong to him now." "After the experience with the Lifers group I lost the girlfriend." "I had to put up with a lot of jokes that were not very pleasant." "I had to carry a pack of cigarettes just to show I was worth at least 20 of 'em." "Although Roy remained law abiding after Rahway, he continued to drink." "I had an arrest back in '85 for drunken driving." "In '87 I realized I had a drinking problem and, it wasn't gonna get any better." "I might need a little support so I did go to AA and things have gotten better." " How long has it been?" " 12 years." "Not a drop since 1987." "Yeah, I am going to no one's prison." "I've been through the Lifers program." "I don't want to be one of the Lifers in the program." " You need the money that badly?" " No, it's just, uh, I'm too lazy to work." "10 years after his visit to Rahway, we did a follow up interview with Ken." "What kind of things happened after the Rahway program?" "Oh, I did a lot of burglaries, uh, a lot of drugs." "Just a lot of trouble." "How do you think the Rahway Prison program changed you or helped you?" "I don't think it did." "To get money for drugs, Ken continued to steal." "He was sentenced to county jail numerous times." "But 10 years ago, he was trying to change." " Ken?" "How're you doing now?" " Great." "Ken had been married just three years when in 1995, he died... of an AIDS-related illness." "He was 34 years old." "I kick ass, you know." "And if I get my ass beat don't mean shit coz hey, I'm coming back." "John has transformed himself from a criminal to a Christian." "He works as a metal shop mechanic but he also preaches the Gospel and teaches Kung Fu." "John is 35 years old, married, and a father of six children." "I committed more crimes than I want to remember." "I had such a string of crime that if I didn't commit a crime the next day to me, I didn't feel good, something was wrong with me." "It was an adrenaline rush." "It was an escape, you know?" "But inside..." "Inside of here it was just because I had a lot of pain." "I didn't know how to talk about it." "What did you get the last time you got busted?" "How much money did you get?" " 20 dollars." " 20 goddam dollars!" "Bam!" "Wake-up call." "If The Lifers group was not there to talk to me that day that time in my life, I probably wouldn't be here talking to you now." "I probably would be dead." "I had bad habits, so deeply embedded." "For a while there I did just fine, but later down the road I had a relapse." "I'd started getting high again." "I started committing crimes again." "And I got wrapped up in a big mess." "Lost everything." "Lost my family, lost everything." "And then I came across the film Scared Straight." "Watching Scared Straight the second time, scared me enough again in my heart inside." "That's where I said, "Enough is enough."" ""It's time to stop playing games, you have to get right... ..or this is where you're gonna end up."" "And from that day on I started rehabilitating myself." "I love God above everything, I'm a Christian first." "I love God." "I love it." "Everything I do is flavoured biblically." "The chances that drugs or alcohol or anything else in that vein..." "Can we say zero?" "Zero, they have about a zero, minus zero chance of entering my life." "The desire is not even the same." "I would do those things because they would make the emptiness go away temporarily." "But when the high wore off, I was still stuck with the same old me." "But ever since I have my family, those who love me and the Lord is in my life..." "There is no point anymore." "There is no point." "Everybody bows to the king, bow to each other, shake somebody's hand." "I'll see you in the next day in class." "I have no worries." "Either way if they bother me I'll get 'em back." "Mike is 36 and a single dad." "He works at a milk factory." "Sounds like you didn't really listen to the other people who were trying to steer you straight, but when you went to the prison, you listened." "It gave me a kick." "Plus it was either that or go downhill and live like that  and end up there." "Now I have a kid, somebody to love, somebody to work for  and try to bring him up straight, and keep out of trouble." "Everybody up here, man, got a number, and it's only fitting that y'all have a number." "And until you leave, because this is the shortest prison sentence you will spend, your number's one." "Was getting a prison number so shocking that any of the kids still remember their number?" "What your number?" "!" "I think it might of been 12." "It was!" " Was it?" " Yes." " Do you remember your prison number?" " No, I don't remember the prison number." " You remember that after 20 years?" " Sure." "Why do you remember that?" "Coz that's how old I felt when I went there." "I believe it was unlucky 13." "You're right." " I think I was 15, I think." " You're right." " It was number 8." " You remember that 20 years later?" "I remember that number..." "It will burn in my mind, forever." " I believe mine was 11." " Right on!" "David smiles a lot, which got him in to trouble 20 years ago at Rahway." "What, am I here to amuse you that you're smiling?" "Something's funny?" "David is 37 years old and self employed as a floor installer." "He is a father to his son and daughter, and three stepdaughters." "At that time I had availability to the railroad tracks." "I would rob off the trains at that time." "Take things that don't belong to me off the trains." "If I steal from someone it would be someone, if I ever did steal, like the railroad." "Like I've been blamed for." "You weren't acknowledging at that time that you even did it." " You said, "if I did it."" " I just acknowledged that I did do it." "At that time, talking like that I didn't even realize I said all that, you know?" "They'll have the money right from their insurance." "They're just stalling the money." "It ain't hurting no one there." "The insurance company I am sorry for doing that to you." "I am paying the price today." "You smiling at me?" "Knock it off, close your mouth." "I thought going to Rahway State Prison was going to be a joke." "Go home barefoot, you faggot!" "The number one thing I got out of it was a wake-up call." "It showed me another side, another door that I'd never looked into." "I've been on the outside of that door." "I got a chance to see on the inside of that door." "They stopped me from stealing." "I mean, from that point I didn't steal." "Coz I wouldn't wanna be in their shoes." "Don't make me hurt you." "My whole life changed." "I joined the army." "And then the family, and then divorce, and another family." "I can give that film a lot of credit for helping me and my friends." "Because we all look at each other and we know who the Scared Straight people were." "From what I can see, it helped them very well." "It helped all of us." "So I always think:" "Scared Straight '78 I always remember." "Always remember that all my life." "Don't make me hurt you." " Okay." "Please?" "I talked to you nice, right?" "Dominic was a repeat offender." "His crimes ranging from drug distribution to murder." "10 years after Scared Straight, we interviewed him inside a federal penitentiary." "Does it make you feel good to know that Scared Straight has been seen by millions of people, ... really helped a lot of kids, and you were part of it?" "The truth?" "The truth?" " Yeah." "I don't care." "I don't care how many millions of people seen it, as long as the right people seen it." "In 1990, Dominic was released from prison." "Three years later, at age 42, he died of AIDS." " How old were you when you first got into trouble?" " About third grade." "Tony is 36 years old and single." "He has worked as an electronics technician and now owns a printing business." "Tony also is a licensed pilot." "We stole smaller things, whatever it might have been, car radios maybe a car here and there." "Beer was forbidden to us and alcohol, so we got as much as we could of it." "Once you pass that stage then you tend to go out and do these little malicious things that teenagers, in groups, tend to do." "Single file." "We were the tough guys on the block, we didn't expect anything to hassle us." "We'll go in here, it's a day off school, we're gonna laugh and, play around and you know, go back and tell everybody that we made these guys look dumb." "Take off your goddam, take them motherfucking shoes off." "Gimme them shoes." "I have never untied my shoes faster in my life." "And threw them out on the stage, and the guy said to us..." ""You've just been ripped off, how do you feel?"" "And I remember how I felt, I was more terrified from the size of these guys than just taking off my shoes." "Two things scared me the most about the prison scene." "They go hand in hand." "Size of the inmates and their sexual preferences." "And they go hand in hand... because if it was just the sexual preference, and you could fight it off it'd be fine." "But these guys seem to do nothing but lift weights all day and I don't think you'd get out of their grasp." "and I just don't travel in those directions." "I was humbled, you know, we thought we were tough they were much tougher than we were." "That was the most immediate, and somewhat profound effect, that it had on me." "If I had not taken the trip to Rahway State Prison I may not truly have understood the consequences of some of these crimes and I may have taken a chance at committing a higher crime." "And that, of course, would have destroyed my life." "If there is anything that I could really accomplish in life..." "I think I'd like to be a renowned novelist." "I would like to be someone who people can look at and say..." ""He was a kid and he was in trouble and look at him he actually reached the level of being one of the great litarists in the world."" "Well, of course I'm reaching, but that would be just something just awesome." "If the group's gonna do something, like I'm the kind of person who'd probably do it." "Ron is 38 and works as a long-shoreman and a landscaper." "He is also a newlywed." "The best thing about my life  probably finding happiness with somebody else." "That's a whole new life beginning now." "It was scary, I mean it was intense..." "I mean, we were young kids... ..and you know, you're getting whistled at and yelled at and told profanities that they wanna do to ya..." "You know you leave there with a whole different outlook." "Without a doubt going to the prison definitely kept me from getting in more trouble." "I didn't always think this either, to tell you the truth, that it was a good thing at the beginning, because of the negative reaction I got from other kids." "You had tears in your eyes, you know." "I would have went there and told them all, I would have spit in his face." "I had no idea what really prison was until that day." "It scared the hell out of me." "Only one of the 17 juveniles became a career criminal." "And he is the only one who is now a prisoner." "Ironically, 20 years ago, Qaadir predicted his future." "In my future I think I'll be a professional thief." "Qaadir's career of choice has resulted in 6 convictions totaling 15 years behind bars." "He's now 39 years old." "In 1994, he was sentenced to 10 years for armed robbery and burglary." "Although Qaadir has 5 living children, we were his only visitors in 5 years." "First time I've ever gotten in trouble I was 8 years old." "It was basically burglaries, stealing cars." "As a matter of fact when we met, I think I was attempting to steal your equipment." "I will take everything you have... if you give me the chance." "Of all the kids who went through the program the day we filmed Scared Straight you are the only one who wound up going into maximum security prisons." "Why you?" "Drugs." "It's always the result of drugs." "I've never done anything when I was sober, or clear headed." "So, I would have to attribute that to drugs." "I've been using drugs for over 17 years." "Be it cocaine or heroin or crack cocaine." "I'm not proud of it." "It was something like I just had to have it." "10 years ago, like now, Qaadir was the only Scared Straight juvenile in prison." "And at that time, Malik was the only Lifer out on parole." "Malik decided to pay Qaadir a surprise visit ...to find out what went wrong." "How are you there, my man?" "Do you know me?" "You don't know me?" "Apparently you must have forgotten me  and everything that I said to you as well." "Yes." "I never wanted to come back inside no prison, you know, under no circumstances." "But out of the fact that they said that you were here it made me a little bit like, "Wow, where did we mess up?"" "This is most definitely, my last time coming through anybody's prison." "I have six kids out there." "I want to be with them." "I missed their youthful years." "But I'm going to watch them and be with them in their teenage years." "What happened after that?" "That was my true intentions at the time." "I got out, I did good for about six months, and  I just ran astray again." "Today I'm drug free." "I've been involved with AA for eight years." "I'm gonna continue with it." "Malik once again is an inmate." "Now in the same prison as Qaadir." "We arranged for Malik to pay Qaadir another surprise visit." "They have not seen each other in over 10 years." " Oh, boy." "How you doin', man?" " I'm alright, how 'bout yourself?" "I'll tell you, you don't need to know." " I tried to make it." " I'm surprised to see you." "Same." "Thought you was out there doing well." "I was. 'Cept for I allowed for myself to be in the wrong place at the wrong time." "I know it's kinda hard for me to uh, tell you, "How could you?"" "And be sitting in the same place." "I can't keep doing this." "This is sheer madness." "We destroy our own families when we come to jail." "Though I said it 10, 12, years ago, today I know I'm getting too old for this." "I'm tired." "My children are grown." "I don't have this life in me no more." "I'm tired of it." "In 1995, Malik was sentenced to 5 years for possession of stolen property and violating his parole." "He's 49 years old and has spent 22 of his adult years behind bars." "This is his sixth time in prison." "When we came on the stage, the things we were telling 'em were life experiences." "All the brutality, the loneliness, right?" "The crying, ... the sorrowful moments, the longing to be other places." "All that is very real." "I think that's one of the hardest things about dealing, right, with prison life is for a parent to have children, and not be able to come to their aid." "Malik's two older sons are both in prison." "Jamal is serving 22 years at Rahway for aggravated manslaughter." "Ironically, he is now part of the Lifers group." "This is the first time a father and son have both participated in the program." "I feel real bad about my two sons." "I feel as though I failed them." "When I look back when they were younger, between the ages of 7 and 12 years old..." "I would take 'em places with me while I was doing criminal things." "Everything, I was involved in selling drugs, and for a period of my life, using drugs  doing armed robberies, carrying pistols." "So all the things they remembered me doing, and hearing people talk about me doing... they wanted to become a part of." "The first time getting caught, getting involved with the criminal system when I was eight years old." "Nine years old, malicious damage." "After that, attempted robbery, burglary." "By the time I realized that it was wrong and I was trying to steer them away from it it was too late." "That's how my father's so wonderful, because, he was reaching out to us even though he was locked up." "I'm grateful that my son has finally came into his self, Jamal.." "....and is working with the Lifers group because I knew that helped me immensely." "So I'm sure it's gonna be of some service to him." "Now in its 23rd year, the Lifers Juvenile Awareness Project is still going strong at East Jersey State Prison." "Formerly, Rahway." "See that wall over there?" "Stand the fuck back in line!" "I'm gonna tell you the reason why I took your fucking sneakers." "Because you motherfuckers is out there depriving people their motherfucking livings." "How do you feel to be told the fuck off?" "I ain't had no motherfucking gun, no knife or none of that bullshit." "Bitch ass motherfucker!" "It don't take no 5 motherfuckers to rape one of you punk motherfuckers." "And that's how this shit go, in fucking prison." "And I know you don't like me spitting in your motherfucking face... ..but there ain't a motherfucking thing you can do about it neither, ... punk motherfucker." " Some people may say, "Well, you overdramatizin'." No, we're not." "It's not a drama workshop." "It is a reality." "Things like that do take place in prisons  the murders, the suicide as well as the rapes do take place inside these human warehouses." "I'm gonna do this my motherfucking way!" "Well, guess what?" "Now I'm doing it the man's way." "I eat when he tells me to eat." "I shit when he tells me to shit." "I shower when he tells me to shower." "What we do is give them the true definition of prison, what we call the "real deal."" "That you're not gonna come in here and run the place, that the movies glorify prison." "They think this is a cakewalk." "This is why we are here to deter them when we tell them that this is no cakewalk here." "So when somebody tell you, "You ain't nothin'", just smile and laugh." "Coz you know, deep in your heart, man, that you are somebody." "The Lifers have expanded their program to include 1 on 1 meetings with boys who return to prison for follow-up counseling." "For many of these boys, the convicts are the only men who show an interest in their welfare." "Trust me, I got confidence in you." " Man, you ain't gon' fail me, you know what I mean?" " Yeah." "You might fail anybody else, you ain't gon' fail me." "I mean, a lot of times kids open up to us." "What it may take a parent years to find out." "We find out within hours, or within minutes about this individual." "Out of 384 young people, youth, that I've brought  there 've only been 57 so far, to continue any sort of anti-social or delinquent acts." "Over the years I've taken about 300 kids, to, uh, Rahway, to the Lifers group." "And of that 300 about 80% of them, turn their lives around." "If it wasn't for that Rahway experience, I'd say the success rate would be 20 to 25%." "Prison is like a big Monopoly set." "The only thing about this big Monopoly set, you don't get no "Get out of Jail Free" card." "Can everybody smile?" "Please." "Good." "Recently, a group of the Scared Straight juveniles got together for a reunion and photo session." "One thing they all agreed upon was the convict who scared them the most." "Ah, the one with the eye." "God, I remember that guy like it was yesterday." "I remember there was one guy who was missing an eye." "A guy who only had one eye." "Ah, the guy with the eye, because he was right on our face." "Do you know how they showed me?" "By taking my motherfucking eye right out my head." "Look!" "He has stuck in my mind, you know, seriously." "That one prisoner for 20 years, he's stuck in my brain." "Every time I think of Rahway or Scared Straight, that's his face I see." "His face." "If I saw him, I don't know, I don't know what I would do if I saw him." "I really don't." "I'm here for murder, kidnapping, robbery. ...armed robbery, conspiracy, breaking a dude's jaw and breaking his woman, both her arms." "Like I said before, I'm not your friend, I'm not your enemy, I'm not your mother I'm not your father, but I'm glad to see all of y'all today." "And I hope you feel the same way about me." "Alright." "Alright." "Alright." "You doing alright?" "You still in jail?" "No, sir, I'm not in jail." "I've been out of jail since 1990." "And I haven't been back to jail for anything." "Out of all the guys in the Lifers group I mean, you weren't anywhere near as big as some of those other guys... but still you came across!" "I mean in my memory you're the person I remember the most." "Well, it's because I had that anger in me." "Today I don't have that anger in me." "I couldn't stand nobody to look at me." "I asked 'em, "What the hell are you looking at?"" "And I'd be ready to fight." "I don't care if you 7 feet tall, I'm gonna try you." " You got stabbed or something right?" " I was stabbed, yes I was." " You can see all the scars, see?" " I remember that." "I'm not jivin', you know." "This is me, I'm for real." "Once I started dealing with the Lifers group, I started looking within myself, you know?" "Saying, "Damn, I can help them, but why can't I help myself?"" "I hope you realize, standing right in front of you is people you helped 20 years ago." "Me, myself, and I'm sure everybody, and I really wanna thank you." "I appreciate that, you know?" "By thanking me, what you do, is you talk to him." "And I know a few of y'all have kids and everything." "Please, treat em better than I did mine." "Coz I wasn't there for 'em." "You're here for them, man." "Please stay here for 'em." "Alright?" "Alright." "Bye bye, man." "Ali is 53 and has spent 20 of his adult years in prison." "He recently remarried and is the father of six adult children." "Ali works as a mechanic and volunteers his time helping kids in trouble." "I was a drug addict, I drank a lot of alcohol." "I used to stay high, all the time." "Stay drunk, getting into trouble, falling in gutters, spitting up on myself." "Everything." "But I stopped." "I don't do drugs, I don't drink alcohol." "So far, knock on wood, I hope I can stay that way." "54936, life and from motherfucking now on." "The saddest thing about a man being in prison, is when he lose his family." "You don't have nobody to come home to, nothing to really look forward to." "I know it sound like um, you know I wanna cry, but I do." "Coz it really hurts." "Jail is so easy to get into, but it's so hard to get out." "You're young one day, and at the end of 30 years you got grey hairs." "You say, "What the hell happened to me?"" "Ever since I came home everything has changed, you know?" "I have a beautiful family." "I have everything I want." "I have kids that I love..." "I respect, you know and, they respect me." "And I love myself." "You know, from the time then and to the time of now, I love me." "What are the chances that you would break the law again and?" "Let me tell you something." "If I break the law again, and commit another crime, you can hang me." "I'm not going to ruin my life, believe me, it's over." "My life of crime is over." "Go to school, get that education and..." "I was in The Lifers group for the complete 19 years that I was in the prison." "I think we touched a lot of kids, man, you know?" "And um, I have seen the results." "After 20 years, and uh, that made me feel good." "I'd still say the same thing I said 20 years ago..." ""Please don't follow in my footsteps." "If you have family, man, praise 'em, man." "Stay with 'em." "Keep 'em out of trouble." "Don't let 'em do the same thing that you did." "That's what I would tell you." "And I'd be right there in your face and tell you." "Even if I had to grab your shirt collar to tell you, I would do that." "Both the Lifers, and the kids we met, verify the tragic reality that drug and alcohol abuse play a significant role in crime." "So as violence, drinking and drugs continue to destroy our children we should use every resource available to stop young people from hurting themselves and others." "The more than 50,000 kids who have been through the Lifers program have shown that dedicated prisoners can help stop today's kids from becoming tomorrow's convicts." "I'm Danny Glover." "Good night."