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I never thought I'd become a real reporter. In my first journalism class, other students were able to go out into the community and interview sources. But my options were limited. As a prisoner, the only people I could interview were other prisoners and guards.
In 2010, I was a 28-year-old alcoholic and cocaine addict serving a one-year sentence in a county jail in Wisconsin. I'd been convicted of theft for breaking into a bar and taking bottles of liquor. It was a felony, and it was coming at a time when it was the right time. My car was broken into, I'd lost my job, and I'd been arrested for drunk driving. The judge who sentenced me said I was the epitome of a “waste of human life.” And he wasn't wrong.
During my first few months in prison, there was no sun or night sky. I measured my time by the opening and closing of my cell's iron door. But as is often the case, halfway through my sentence, the judge gave me the option to work or take classes at a nearby university during the day.
I was so happy to be released from solitary confinement that I got a job as a cleaner in the community. One morning, while I was vacuuming, I grabbed a copy of Rolling Stone from the coffee table. Slipping out of it was a flyer for a college journalism contest. The winning submissions would be published in the magazine. Only college students were allowed to enter.
I knew nothing about journalism, but I had a strange feeling, a hunch, that I had finally found something I didn't even know I needed. That day, I enrolled in the college closest to the prison.
So a few weeks later, I was interviewing the corrections officer for an article in the student newspaper. We had never spoken before, with such care and rigor. At all other times, this man had absolute authority over me. But in that moment, as I interviewed him, I felt a subtle and tangible shift in power.
“I could sense he was calculating what he wanted to say, omitting words that might get him in trouble. I felt empowered to follow his significant silence, seek out the truth, and bring order to the world around me. The experience was liberating. I learned that even the voices of inmates can resonate, as long as they are backed up by facts and rigorous research.
After my release, I continued going to school, eventually earning a master's degree in journalism. And I continued writing, story by story, with the help of a patient editor, I learned how to report and write better and faster. I got sober. Eventually, I got a journalism internship and then a full-time job.
Since then, I've worked as a reporter in California before returning home to take a reporting job at Wisconsin Watch, which offered me my first internship.
Then, last June, 13 years after my first story from a Wisconsin prison, I began covering the state's prison system as a New York Times Local Investigative Fellow, a fellowship program designed to strengthen the power and influence of local journalism.
By then, I had received a mountain of letters from men incarcerated at Waupun Correctional Institution who had spent months in solitary confinement, without regular access to showers, fresh air, family visits or timely medical care. In August, under the guidance of an editorial team that included former Times executive editor Dean Baquet, I broke the news that the state was closing prisons due to staffing shortages.
In February, we revealed that state officials have known for years that they've been attriting guards faster than they can replace them, and in June we reported on the extraordinary arrests of nine prison officials, including a former warden, in connection with a series of inmate deaths.
Our latest story revealed another fact: Of the 60 doctors hired by correctional facilities in the past decade, nearly a third have been disciplined by state medical boards for errors or ethical violations.
My past puts me in a unique position. As a reporter, I purposefully distance myself from investigations and follow the truth wherever it leads. I value my independence. But like anyone else, I've been shaped by my experiences. I know the smell of prison and the constant hunger that inmates feel. I know what it's like to go without fresh air for months. And I've seen the unexpected acts of kindness that occur inside prisons.
My experiences influence who I talk to, who talks to me, and how I approach reporting. For better or worse, I'm forever a part of this community. And that's really the spirit of local journalism.