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Q. How would you go about paying for education programs you propose, given the cash-starved nature of most government budgets?
A. By shortening sentences. Sure, that's a hot button, but the public must come to realize that it can't enjoy its full measure of vengeance and expect at the same time to reduce bulging inmate populations. The citizenry must determine the minimum amount of punishment that it is willing to settle for, and then channel the millions it has saved into schools and preventive programs.
Q. Given the level of public outrage, how would you deal with those who do commit serious crimes?
A. You don't go handing out 99-year, no-parole sentences all over the place. That's ridiculous. States can't afford to keep locking people away for eternity. It takes $1 million to house a lifer. Look at these convicts around me. They're old men at 50, like me, or even 40. The fire's been burned out of them years ago. Most of them you'll never have to worry about again.
Q. Isn't the notion of shorter sentences an incendiary idea in today's political climate?
A. Probably. But the public has been sold a bill of goods on prisons, just like it's been given a distorted, negative picture of recidivism and parole. Most of the guys in this prison will never return to Angola, I can tell you that from being here. And parole can and does work, and I would expand it. I'd much rather pay for parole officers to supervise nondangerous people than build $100,000 cells.