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for inmates to be seriously injured, losing fingers or limbs, after working long hours in brutal
and dangerous conditions.
For years, Angola—a slave plantation before the end of the Civil War—forced inmates to
work in the fields picking cotton. Prisoners who refused would receive “write-ups” that went
into their files and face months of solitary confinement. The horrible conditions of
confinement and their constantly being told that they would die in prison no matter how well
they behaved meant that most of our clients had long lists of disciplinaries. At the
resentencing hearings we were preparing, state lawyers were using these prior disciplinaries
to argue against favorable new sentences.
Remarkably, several former juvenile lifers had developed outstanding institutional histories
with very few disciplinaries, even though they did their time with no hope of ever being
released or having their institutional history reviewed. Some became trustees, mentors, and
advocates against violence among inmates. Others had become law librarians, journalists, and
gardeners. Angola evolved over time to have some excellent programs for incarcerated people
who stayed out of trouble, and many of our clients took full advantage.
We decided to prioritize resentencing hearings in Louisiana for the “old-timers,” juvenile
lifers who had been there for decades. Joshua Carter and Robert Caston were the first two
cases we decided to litigate. In 1963 , when he was sixteen, Joshua Carter was accused of a
rape in New Orleans and quickly given the death penalty. A condemned black child awaiting
execution in those days had little reason to hope for relief. But to coerce a confession from
him, police officers had beaten Joshua so brutally that even in 1965 the Louisiana Supreme
Court felt the need to overturn his conviction. Mr. Carter was resentenced to life
imprisonment without parole and sent to Angola. After struggling for years, he became a
model prisoner and trustee. In the 1990 s, he developed glaucoma and didn’t get the medical
care he needed, and he soon lost his sight in both eyes. We tried to persuade New Orleans
prosecutors that Mr. Carter, blind and in his sixties, should be released after nearly fifty years
in prison.
Robert Caston had been at Angola for forty-five years. He lost several fingers working in a
prison factory and was now disabled as a result of his forced labor at Angola.
I traveled back and forth between the trial courts in Orleans Parish quite a bit on the Carter
and Caston cases. The Orleans Parish courthouse is a massive structure with intimidating
architecture. There are multiple courtrooms aligned down an enormous hallway with grand
marble floors and high ceilings. Hundreds of people crowd the hallways, bustling between the
various courtrooms each day. Hearings in the vast courthouse are never reliably scheduled.
Frequently, there would be a date and time for the Carter and Caston resentencings, but it
seemed to mean very little to anyone. I would arrive in court, and there would always be a
stack of cases, and clients with lawyers gathered in an overcrowded courtroom, all waiting to
be heard at the time of our hearings. Overwhelmed judges tried to manage the proceedings
with bench meetings while dozens of young men—most of whom were black—sat handcuffed
in standard jail-issued orange jumpsuits in the front of the court. Lawyers consulted with
clients and family members scattered around the chaotic courtroom.
After three trips to New Orleans for sentencing hearings, we still did not have a new
sentence for Mr. Carter or Mr. Caston. We met with the district attorney, filed papers with the
judge, and consulted with a variety of local officials in an effort to achieve a new,