Death Row 3 – Preparation

August 16, 2025

“I was in prison and you visited me.” ~ Matthew 25:36 NRSV

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When someone on death row is high on the list to be executed, time matters. Anthony hasn’t yet received an execution date but he was anxious to meet me in person. I felt the same way. We had to find a date at least 2-3 months in advance. I invited Clarence to schedule a visit as well. and all the necessary paperwork needed to be completed. That is not an easy thing to do. The imprisoned person has to request a visit through the Classification Office. The Classification Office sends an application to the visitor, which must be returned within 30 days of receipt. If you are a Spiritual Advisor, the paperwork includes two letters of reference. If the paper work arrives in time, the final step is a written request from the inmate for the visit, including the type of visit (contact in a visitors’ room where minimal physical contact such as a hug or holding hands can occur), or a non-contact (in a booth divided by a screen or window through which you can see each other and talk via an internal phone).

The paperwork had been processed, and the date was set, Sunday, August 3, 2025. I would visit Clarence in the morning (8:00-12:00) and Anthony in the afternoon (12:00-4:00). I flew into New Orleans on Saturday evening, spent a restless night in Alison’s (our contact person with the prison) guest room, and woke up at 5:15 so we could leave by 6 am for the 2.5-hour drive. We traveled along the Gulf coast, where oil rigs were interspersed with bayous full of denuded trees that held Eagles’ nests. The air was heavy with humidity and pollution as we headed northwest, passing petrochemical refineries with their distinctive flare stacks. I was struck by the irony of big oil companies’ TV advertisements for clean fuel and the visible grime of the refineries we passed. Another irony was the abundance of billboards advertising attorneys. The further away from New Orleans, the more poverty and fewer services we saw. We made a quick stop at the last gas station before the final left turn to get to Angola.

Angola is named for the place from which most of the enslaved Africans who worked the land were taken.  It sits along the east side of a bend in the Mississippi River. Before the land was granted to Europeans, it was the home of the Choctaw people. By 1830, the land had been converted into four different cotton plantations. The plantation owners were considered the leading long-distance slave traders in the country, credited with supplying two-thirds of all enslaved people transported to the South. After the Civil War, the land was used as a prison whose fields were worked by convict labor, most of whom were formerly enslaved people. Between 1870 and 1901, when the State of Louisiana took over the prison system, approximately 3,000 inmates died. Angola has been called the Alcatraz of the South. To this day, the general population of prisoners work the fields, shackled together, and overseen by armed guards on horses. For the first three years, they work for free; after that, they start earning $ 0.02 a day. A visit to the medical clinic costs $6.00. You can do the math.  Prisoners on Death Row are not allowed to work. They are indigent and rely on the kindness of friends and family to receive money for things like soap, deodorant, and phone calls.

That haunting history helps to explain the sense of dread one feels upon arriving at Angola, despite the trees lining the road. The sun was shining in a now-blue sky. There were few houses, and even fewer businesses. We were headed up a gradual rise when, over the last rise, we saw the entrance to the prison and its clear-cut grounds. We parked along the side of the road and stowed all our items, including cell phones and smartwatches, in the car. The only thing we carried with us, other than our clothes, was two pint-sized Ziplock bags that held our driver’s licenses and some cash.

Anthony had prepped me well for getting through the first security checkpoint. Each visitor had to stand inside a sophisticated scanner. Next, we were asked to step into a room the size of a closet. On the ceiling and side walls were two fans. In the adjacent room, I could hear the growling of a giant dog. The fans moved air from the human room to the drug-sniffing dogs.

We were then escorted to an area where we would wait for the bus to take us to the various “camps” with rows of folding chairs and a large screen TV on the wall. There were two children in the waiting area, one about 4 years old and the other about 9 years old. Daniel Tiger’s neighborhood was on. The show featured several cute bunnies in a cage and a boy and a girl playing with them. It seemed ironic since we would soon be visiting people trapped in human-sized cages.

The bus arrived with blaring rock music playing. We got on board for the drive to the various camps (complexes that hold a total of over 6,300 inmates) and a holdover name from plantation times within the 18,000-acre grounds. Visitors were dropped off at one of the five camps (complexes) spread over a total of 18,000 acres. The end of the road was Death Row. We had to pass through four locked gates to enter the building. Finally, we were there. We were checked in at the front desk and invited to take menus so we could buy food for ourselves and our loved ones.  We passed through four more locked gates, then walked down a hallway to the closed door of the visitors’ room. The room had four small tables with four chairs around each, and a desk for the guard. One wall was composed of windows that looked out onto the “yard,” which was surrounded by razor wire. A second wall was covered with a poster of a serene autumn scene.

So many locked gates, so many contradictions, such a terrible past; it is no wonder one feels a sense of despair upon arriving. Dante’s Divine Comedy includes gates of hell that are inscribed with the words “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.”

It was hope tinged with despair that I felt as I waited to meet my guys in person. ~ Anne