Mr. Smith Goes to Prison
What My Year Behind Bars Taught Me About America's Prison Crisis
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
The fall from politico to prisoner isn't necessarily long, but the landing, as Missouri State Senator Jeff Smith learned, is a hard one.
In 2009, Smith pleaded guilty to a seemingly minor charge of campaign malfeasance and earned himself a year and one day in Kentucky's FCI Manchester. Mr. Smith Goes to Prison is the fish-out-of-water story of his time in the big house; of the people he met there and the things he learned: how to escape the attentions of fellow inmate Cornbread and his friends in the Aryan Brotherhood; what constitutes a prison car and who's allowed to ride in yours; how to bend and break the rules, whether you're a prisoner or an officer. And throughout his sentence, the young Senator tracked the greatest crime of all: the deliberate waste of untapped human potential.
Smith saw the power of millions of inmates harnessed as a source of renewable energy for America's prison-industrial complex, a system that aims to build better criminals instead of better citizens. In Mr. Smith Goes to Prison, he traces the cracks in America's prison walls, exposing the shortcomings of a racially-based cycle of poverty and crime that sets inmates up to fail. Speaking from inside experience, he offers practical solutions to jailbreak the nation from the financially crushing grip of its own prisons and to jumpstart the rehabilitation of the millions living behind bars.
Customer Reviews
Mr. Smith Goes to Prison
Truly a must read. Jeff captures your attention in the first few pages and takes you on a roller coaster ride that starts level, rides to the top, then takes on a series of lows, highs, twists and turns. All the while of giving you the feeling of being right there beside him, celebrating the highs and crying in the lows. Excellent story and having it all, losing it, then rebuilding yourself again. A true story of perseverance.
Mark Wilson