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that that prison population

does not drop one person,

because their economic model needs that.

Prison industrial complex refers

to the system of mass incarceration

and companies that profit

from mass incarceration.

That includes

both operators of private prisons,

which get a lot of attention,

as well as a vast sea of vendors.

From SECURUS Technologies,

that supplies telephone services,

that made $114 million

in profits last year...

Those calls to family and friends are

costing a pretty penny in state prisons.

They inflate the price that they charge

the inmate and the inmate's family.

For example, in Maryland,

if you earn minimum wage,

you'd have to work an hour and a half

to afford a ten minute phone call.

There's also Aramark,

one of the big food service providers.

In more than one state,

they have been accused

of having maggots in the food

that they've served.

Corizon Healthcare provides healthcare

services in 28 different states.

Multimillion-dollar contracts

for this service.

Huge incentives given to contractors

for very long contracts,

so it's actually a disincentive

to provide the service,

because you're going to be paid anyway.

One of the reasons it's so difficult

to talk about mass incarceration

in this country, and to question it,

is because it has become

so heavily monetized.

A little company called UNICOR,

that does $900 million

in business annually.

How do they do it?

Volume.

Also, prison labor.

Partnerships between

correctional industries

and private business

are a rapidly growing segment of

a multibillion dollar industry in America.

We talk about sweatshops and we,

you know, we beat our fists at people

overseas for exploiting poor, free labor,

but we don't look that it's happening

right here at home every day.

You have corporations

who are now invested

in this free labor.

It's all over.

It's from sports, uniform,

hats, Microsoft, Boeing.

Federal inmates are making

the guidance systems

for the Patriot missile system.

JCPenney jeans are made in Tennessee.

Victoria's Secret.

Anderson flooring wood products

are made in Georgia.

It's always been Idaho potatoes.

They're planted, grown, harvested,

packed and shipped by inmates.

Victoria's Secret and JCPenney

switched suppliers

once their ties came to light.

Simply put,

corporations are operating in prisons

and profiting from punishment.

Prison industries have gotten so big

that it's very difficult now

to try and do away with them.

Too much money out there,

too many lawmakers that support it

because they're being lobbied.

So, the public's got to stand up

and take it back.

It'll never get done if they don't.

And I can see it's all about cash

And they got the nerve

To hunt down my ass

And treat me like a criminal

Yeah, it is what it is

And that's how it go

Get treated like a criminal

If crime is all you know

Get greeted like a nigga

If a nigga's all you show

A public enemy

That's in the eye of the scope

The night of his arrest,

Kalief Browder was walking home from

a party with his friends in the Bronx,

when he was stopped by police.

Kalief was, um, charged with a crime,

a really petty crime,

that it turns out he didn't commit.

Then they said,

"We're gonna take you to the precinct,

and most likely,

we'll let you go home."

But then, I never went home.

- They told you that you could post bail.

- Yes, that's correct.

- $10,000.

- Yes.

- And, of course...

- I couldn't make that.

- Hmm.

- My family couldn't pay it.

There are thousands of people

in jails right this moment

that are sitting there for no other reason

than because they're too poor to get out!

We have a criminal justice system

that treats you better

if you're rich and guilty

than if you're poor and innocent.

Wealth, not culpability, shapes outcomes.

I think what most Americans think of,

'cause they've watched so many

courtroom dramas and things like that,

they think that the criminal justice

system is about judges and juries.

Well, that's really

stopped being the case.

This system simply cannot exist

if everyone decides to go to trial.

If everybody insisted on a trial,

the whole system would shut down.

What typically happens

is the prosecutor says,

"You know, you can make a deal

and we'll give you three years,

or you can go to trial

and we'll get you 30.

So, you want to take that chance,

feel free."

Nobody in the hood goes to trial.

97% of those people

who were locked up

have plea bargain.

And that is one of the worst violations

of human rights

that you can imagine in the United States.

We have, in this country,

people pleading guilty

to crimes they didn't commit,

just because the thought of going to jail

for what the mandatory minimums are

is so excruciating.

Kalief Browder decided,

"I'm not gonna take the plea."

So, you had to choose between

being in prison for up to 15 years

and going home right then by admitting

you did a crime you didn't do.

I felt like I was done wrong.

I felt like something needed to be done.

I felt like something needs to be said.

If I just cop out and say that I did it,

nothing's gonna be done about it.

I didn't do it.

No justice is served.

What you're not taught is that

if you exercise that right to a trial,

and you are convicted,

we will punish you more.

The courts basically punished him

for having the audacity

to not take a plea deal

and to want to take it to trial.

In that time, those three years

that he was sitting there

and not being charged for anything,

that's when, um, the mental health issue

started to deteriorate

and he started to get into fights.

After a while,

I kept hearing the same thing

from the whole three years,

and I just learned to cope

with just being in there,

and that was rough.

I already knew...

After a while, I just gave up hope.

Three years on Rikers Island,

two of that in solitary confinement,

and he was a child, a baby.

You miss everything.

Everything about being home.

The fresh air, your family,

certain events. You want to be home.

When they give you an offer

to go home right then and there,

it's like, "I want to go home,"

but then you know you didn't do it,

so you don't wanna plea,

take the plea and say that you do it,

it's not right.

I was scared all day because I didn't know

where it would come from.

I don't know where any harm would come.

Kalief suffered through

so many beatings,

both by the people he was locked up with

and the guards,

he ended up attempting suicide

on several occasions.

After almost three years in jail,

waiting his trial,

they dropped all the charges,

and he was set free.

He spent two years

in an environment that

people have argued

is designed to break you within 30 days.

I mean, I can't really tell you

what's next, but...

This happens every day.

Two years after

his release from jail,

Kalief Browder hanged himself

at his home in the Bronx.

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