Anthony Graves' 2012 Senate Judiciary Testimony — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00thank you mr chairman
2. 0:03my name is anthony graves
3. 0:05and i am death row exoneree
4. 0:08number 138
5. 0:10i was wrongfully convicted and sentenced
6. 0:12to death in texas back in 1992.
7. 0:16like all death row inmates i was kept in
8. 0:18solitary confinement
9. 0:20under some of the worst conditions
10. 0:22imaginable with the filth
11. 0:24the food
12. 0:26the total disrespect of human dignity
13. 0:29i lived under the rules of a system that
14. 0:30is literally literally driving me inside
15. 0:32of their minds
16. 0:35i survived the torture
17. 0:37but i
18. 0:39but those 18 years was nowhere to live
19. 0:43i lived in a small
20. 0:448 by 12 foot cage
21. 0:49i had a steel bunk bed
22. 0:51with very thin plastic mattress and
23. 0:54pillow that you could only trade out
24. 0:56once a year i have back problems as a
25. 0:59result
26. 1:00i had a steel toilet and sink that were
27. 1:03connected together
28. 1:04and it was positioned inside of male and
29. 1:06female officers
30. 1:08degrading
31. 1:10i had a small shelf that i was able to
32. 1:12use as a desk to ride on and eat on
33. 1:16there was a small very a very small
34. 1:18window up at the top of the back wall
35. 1:21in order to see the sky
36. 1:23you would have to roll your plastic
37. 1:24mattress up to stand on
38. 1:26i had concrete walls that were always
39. 1:28peeling with old paint
40. 1:30i live behind a steel door that had two
41. 1:33small slits in it
42. 1:35the space replaced with iron mesh wire
43. 1:37which was dirty and filthy
44. 1:40those slits were cut out to communicate
45. 1:42with the officers that were right
46. 1:43outside your door
47. 1:45there was a slot that's called a panhold
48. 1:47and that's how you would receive your
49. 1:48food
50. 1:50i had to sit on my steel bunk like a
51. 1:52trained dog while the officers will
52. 1:54place their trays in my slot
53. 1:57this is no different from the way we
54. 1:58train our pets
55. 2:00the food lacks the proper nutrition
56. 2:03because it's either dehydrated when
57. 2:06served to you or perhaps you'll find
58. 2:08things like rat feces
59. 2:09a small piece of broken glass
60. 2:12when i was escorted to the infirmary one
61. 2:14day i was walking past
62. 2:16where they
63. 2:17fixed the food
64. 2:19and i watched the guy
65. 2:20fix his food and was sweating in it
66. 2:23that was the food they was gonna bring
67. 2:25me
68. 2:28there's no real medical care
69. 2:30i had no television
70. 2:32no telephone
71. 2:33and most importantly i had no physical
72. 2:36contact with another human being for 10
73. 2:38of the 18 years i was incarcerated
74. 2:41today i have a hard time being around a
75. 2:43group of people for long periods of time
76. 2:45without feeling too crowded
77. 2:48no one can begin to imagine the
78. 2:50psychological effects
79. 2:52isolation has on another human being
80. 2:55i was subjected to sleep deprivation
81. 2:58i would hear the clinging of metal doors
82. 3:00throughout the night
83. 3:01or an inmate kick
84. 3:03and screaming because he's lost his mind
85. 3:06guys become paranoid schizophrenic and
86. 3:10can't sleep because of their hearing
87. 3:11voices
88. 3:13i was there when guys were attempting
89. 3:14suicide by cutting themselves
90. 3:18trying to tie a sheet around their necks
91. 3:20overdosing on their medication
92. 3:23dealing with that with the guys that
93. 3:24actually committed suicide
94. 3:27i would have to live with these vivid
95. 3:28memories for the rest of my life
96. 3:31i will watch guys come to prison totally
97. 3:33sane
98. 3:34and in three years they don't live in
99. 3:36the real world anymore
100. 3:38i know a guy
101. 3:39who would sit in the middle of his floor
102. 3:42rip his sheet up
103. 3:43wrap it around himself and light it on
104. 3:45fire
105. 3:47another guy
106. 3:49who'll go out on a recreation yard
107. 3:51get naked
108. 3:52lie down
109. 3:53and urine all over himself
110. 3:56he would take his feces and smear it on
111. 3:58himself as though he was in combat
112. 4:02they ruled he was competent to be
113. 4:04executed
114. 4:06i knew guys who dropped their appeals
115. 4:08not because they gave up hope on their
116. 4:10legal claims
117. 4:11but because their conditions were just
118. 4:13intolerable
119. 4:16they would rather die
120. 4:19they could continue to exist on such
121. 4:21inhumane conditions
122. 4:24solitary confinement
123. 4:26it breaks a man's will to live and he
124. 4:28deteriorates right in front of your eyes
125. 4:31he's never the same person again
126. 4:34then his mother comes to see him
127. 4:36she can't touch him she hasn't touched
128. 4:38him in years
129. 4:39and she watches as her son sits right
130. 4:41there and deteriorates in front of our
131. 4:43eyes
132. 4:45this thing has a ripple effect
133. 4:48okay it don't just affect the inmate it
134. 4:50affects his family his siblings his
135. 4:53children
136. 4:55and most importantly
137. 4:56it affects his mother
138. 5:01i have been free
139. 5:04for almost two years
140. 5:07and i still cry at night
141. 5:09no one out here can relate to what i've
142. 5:11gone through
143. 5:14i battled with these feelings of
144. 5:15loneliness
145. 5:17i've tried therapy
146. 5:18but it didn't work
147. 5:20the therapist was crying more than me
148. 5:23she could not imagine
149. 5:26how inhumane our system were treating
150. 5:28people
151. 5:31i haven't had a good night's sleep since
152. 5:33i've been out i only sleep about two and
153. 5:35a half to three hours a night
154. 5:37and then i'm up
155. 5:39my body has not made the adjustment
156. 5:43i have mood swings that just causes
157. 5:45emotional breakdowns i don't know where
158. 5:47they come from
159. 5:48they just come out of nowhere
160. 5:51solitary confinement
161. 5:54makes our criminal justice system
162. 5:56criminal
163. 5:58criminal
164. 6:01it is inhumane
165. 6:03and by its design
166. 6:04it's driving me and insane
167. 6:07i am living amongst
168. 6:09millions of people out here
169. 6:11but i still feel alone
170. 6:14and i cry at night because of these
171. 6:15feelings
172. 6:17i want them to
173. 6:18stop but they won't
174. 6:23i watch men
175. 6:25literally self-mutilate themselves
176. 6:28they have to be put on razor
177. 6:30restrictions because if they're given a
178. 6:31razor they will cut their own throat
179. 6:33their own neck
180. 6:35whatever they could cut it on their
181. 6:36bodies
182. 6:38they just stand there in front of you
183. 6:39and cut themselves
184. 6:41and this one man in particular that i
185. 6:42watched do this
186. 6:44they took him over to what they call the
187. 6:45psychoactive war a few days later he
188. 6:49hung himself
189. 6:51all because of the conditions
190. 6:54there's a man right there sitting on
191. 6:55texas death row right now who's housed
192. 6:57in solitary confinement pulled his eye
193. 6:59out and swallowed it
194. 7:04all because of the conditions
195. 7:07solitaire
196. 7:09confinement dehumanizes dehumanizes us
197. 7:12all
198. 7:14thank you jim