40 years in solitary confinement? What in fucking HELL have we become?

[DreamGypsy]

34. May he never dream of Angola again, in all his days...

Here's another true story about justice and Angola: Hayes Williams.

Hayes Williams speaks to reporters in front of the Federal Court House
in New Orleans, LA May 15, 1997, after his release from from prison having
served 30 years at the Louisiana State Penitentary at Angola
for a murder he did not commit.

In the end, I found it best to just listen. He was one of the most articulate men I had ever met, and put a face on his experience with a passion and directness I will never forget. "Take the most depressing moment of your entire life," he once told a journalism class at Tulane University, "and that's how you feel every minute, every hour, every day for 24 hours a day, 365 days a year when you're locked up."

It would be a mistake, however, to believe that Hayes Williams' life was wasted. Because from the belly of the beast he made an indelible mark on Louisiana history. Using what limited resources he had available to him, he and a handful of other inmates almost singlehandedly took on the brutal system that enslaved them. In 1975, a federal judge, shocked by appalling conditions at Angola — due in large part to their lawsuits — placed it under federal control. It was returned to the state only last year. But Williams' courage and determination made him a marked man, and he remained at Angola for another 10 years, long after his co-defendants, originally convicted and sentenced to death, had been freed.

Casey Neill wrote a song about Hayes' life.