Search Results for life after prison

How hard is life after prison? This simulation in Birmingham offers a taste

Across the country, U.S. justice officials are hosting simulated experiences to highlight the barriers many people face after leaving prison.

Life After Prison: Victims Face Tough Road Too

All this week in our series Life After Prison we've been exploring the challenges inmates face rebuilding their lives after serving their sentences. It's part of a reporting project in partnership with AL.com and the Center for Investigative Reporting. But for every prisoner there's a victim and often victims face a tough road. WBHM's Andrew Yeager explores this through one crime victim's experience.

Life After Prison: Ex-Felons Often Struggle to Find a Job

Throughout the week, WBHM is reporting on the hurdles ex-felons face once they're released from prison. One of the primary challenges they face is finding stable employment. In addition to the external struggles ex-felons face when looking for work, many also grapple with internal ones, like drug addiction or mental health issues. But, issues aside, ex-offenders need a job to provide for their basic needs, in addition to money required to pay court expenses and restitution. The long path back to a normal life begins with whether or not an employer will give ex-offenders a chance. For WBHM News, Les Lovoy has more.

Life After Prison: Interview With Robin, Student And Tutwiler Inmate

All this week, WBHM explores challenges people face after being released from Alabama's prisons. One barrier is a lack of skills. But some educators are working to smooth that transition even before the inmates get out: J.F. Ingram State Technical College has a new program at Tutwiler Prison that teaches vocations and life skills, including getting along with others, with the goal of reducing recidivism. WBHM's Dan Carsen sat in on those classes then spoke with a student -- an inmate named Robin. We agreed not to use last names, but Dan asked her about her plans once she's out ... and about why she's in.

Life After Prison: Ex-offenders Face Many Challenges When Reentering Society

Alabama's overcrowded prisons currently house more than 25,000 inmates. The vast majority - about 97% - will one day be released and return to the communities they left behind. After incarceration, former inmates face staggering challenges. All this week, WBHM's Life After Prison series will explore the stories of Alabama's recently released prisoners struggling to reintegrate into society. It's part of our investigation into the Alabama prison system, in partnership with al.com and the Center for Investigative Reporting. To start this series, WBHM's Rachel Osier Lindley examines what stands between ex-offenders and a productive life outside of prison.

Purple Heart Army veteran self-deports after nearly 50 years in the U.S.

Sae Joon Park left for South Korea on Monday. His removal order was the result of drug possession and bail jumping charges from over 15 years ago — offenses that, he said, stemmed from untreated PTSD.

‘I literally grew up in prison’: Juvenile lifers share struggles, pleasures of coming home

Accounts of reentry are notable as juvenile cases continue to undergo review. Attorneys and advocates say progress on reviews is halting in some states.

‘You barely see people out’: How immigration raids are reshaping daily life in Puerto Rico’s Dominican enclave

Puerto Rico's Dominican immigrant community is on edge following a series of immigration raids, which started in January. People have stopped going to work, sending kids to school, or attending medical appointments. What was once a lively barrio is now mostly quiet in the wake of the crackdown.

Researchers say the true cost of prisons and jails is higher than many realize

A new report tries to capture the true cost of incarceration to families of people behind bars. It found it costs them around $350 billion every year – almost four times the government's estimate for the cost of incarceration.

Man who attacked author Salman Rushdie is sentenced to 25 years in prison

Hadi Matar got the maximum sentence for attempted murder. He was found guilty in February for repeatedly stabbing author Salman Rushdie during a 2022 lecture and wounding another person on stage.

Chiefs superfan ‘ChiefsAholic’ sentenced to 32 years in Oklahoma prison

A Kansas City Chiefs superfan known as "ChiefsAholic" was sentenced Monday in an Oklahoma courtroom to serve 32 years in state prison for robbing a Tulsa-area bank.

Brutality and humanity at the Angola Prison Rodeo in Louisiana

While the event has been criticized for its controversial and dangerous events, it also offers a chance for participants to connect to the outside world.

International students in Alabama fearful after researcher with no political ties is detained

Alireza Doroudi has been detained in an immigration facility in Louisiana for nearly six weeks. Doroudi’s detention has instilled fear in the small Iranian community in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, where he and his fiancee are doctoral students

Over three years after on-set tragedy, ‘Rust’ is in theaters and available to rent

A fatal on-set shooting killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins in 2021. Hutchins' husband became a producer as part of a settlement.

Bill would give give non-violent, aging prisoners a chance at freedom

Should the Second Chance Act be enacted, judges could review certain cases where an individual was sentenced to life without parole under the Habitual Offenders Act for potential resentencing. 

Richard Kind plays to the largest audience of his life in ‘Everybody’s Live’

Kind is the announcer and host sidekick on the Netflix show Everybody's Live with John Mulaney. "I don't know what the hell I'm doing. You must understand — it's anarchy," he says of the show.

Reflections after 43 years in an Alabama prison

James Jones is one of thousands of men who served life without parole in an Alabama prison. He spent 43 years at the St. Clair Correctional Facility before being released at the age of 77. 

More than three years after fatal on-set shooting, the ‘Rust’ trailer is out

Cinematographer Halyna Hutchins was killed when a gun that Alec Baldwin was holding went off on the set of the film in 2021. Last summer, a judge in New Mexico dismissed Baldwin's case for involuntary manslaughter.

After historic indictment, doctors will keep mailing abortion pills over state lines

Doctors who mail abortion medication pills across state lines have been on alert ever since Louisiana, which bans abortion, indicted a New York doctor for mailing the pills to a woman there.

John Kani risked his life to tell stories of apartheid — at 81, he’s still at it

The South African actor has been speaking out about racial injustice for decades, often in collaboration with the late playwright Athol Fugard. Kunene and the King is Kani's latest project.

Playwright Athol Fugard, who chronicled apartheid and its aftermath, dies at 92

The celebrated South African playwright was known for Blood Knot, The Road to Mecca and "Master Harold"...and the Boys. He said his job was to make "leaps out of my reality and into other realities."

A South Carolina prisoner is the first executed by a firing squad in 15 years

A South Carolina man who killed his ex-girlfriend's parents with a baseball bat was executed by firing squad Friday, the first U.S. prisoner in 15 years to die by that method.

New deputy FBI director Dan Bongino previously called for imprisoning Democrats

Before becoming the second-in-command at the FBI, Dan Bongino used his popular podcast to spread conspiracy theories about the Jan. 6 attack. Here's what else he said.

3 Israeli hostages freed for Palestinian detainees and prisoners

The exchanges are part of a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas.

Alabama profits off prisoners safe enough to work at McDonald’s, deems them too dangerous for parole

No state has a longer, more profit-driven history of contracting prisoners out to private companies than Alabama. Best Western, Bama Budweiser and Burger King are among the more than 500 businesses to lease incarcerated workers from one of the most violent, overcrowded and unruly prison systems in the U.S.

Challenges to forced prison labor gain steam, have resonance in the Gulf South

A lawsuit objecting to conditions on the Louisiana State Penitentiary's "farm line" is among at least three legal challenges percolating in the Gulf South.

‘Mississippi Five’ parole issues highlight the toll of ‘graying’ in Gulf South prisons

A campaign to free five women, known as the "Mississippi Five," shows how prison populations throughout the region are aging.

Families describe assaults and deaths behind bars during hearing on Alabama prison conditions

Family members of people incarcerated in Alabama prisons packed the public hearing held by the Joint Legislative Prison Committee, a panel of lawmakers focused on prison oversight. Some wearing T-shirts with photos of their loved ones, family members described assaults, rapes, extortions, deaths and rampant drug availability and overdoses behind bars.

Q&A: Prison reform advocate Terrance Winn on gun violence in Shreveport, Louisiana

Winn sat down with the Gulf States Newsroom's Kat Stromquist to discuss what causes Shreveport to struggle with shootings, and what could help.

After their son died in a Louisiana jail, a family struggles for answers

The case surrounding Jerome Stevenson's death highlights the barriers to information that families face when someone is hurt or dies while in custody.

New pilot program will offer housing, resources to people leaving prison

The Birmingham Reentry Alliance will provide wrap around services to dozens of men and women adjusting to life after prison.

Alabama executes man for the 2001 beating death of a woman, resuming lethal injections after review

James Barber, 64, was pronounced dead at 1:56 a.m. after receiving a lethal injection at a south Alabama prison.