Word: whitleys
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Enter John Whitley, a quiet-spoken Louisiana native with a lazy smile, whose cowboy hats and elephant-hide boots make more of an impression than his low- key manner. In just 32 months, he has turned Angola around, relying on little more than his sense of decency and fairness. The number of stabbings, hangings and escape attempts has dropped dramatically. The malaise has lifted. Security officers say Whitley has improved communications between the prisoners and the 1,545-member staff. Inmates credit Whitley with providing new educational and recreational programs. Most important, inmates feel they have an advocate in Whitley...
...inmates and security guards tell it, Whitley sounds like the hero of a Frank Capra movie. He is open-minded, impartial, considerate. In a closed society where everyone constantly scrutinizes everyone else, he merits the highest compliment: he is straight up. "With Whitley, what you see is what you get," says veteran inmate Wilbert Rideau, who edits the prison's hard- hitting magazine, the Angolite. "He's the best warden we've ever had." Whitley earns praise even from those who know he may preside over their execution. "The warden's pretty cool people," says Curtis Kyles...
...illustrate, prisoners usually start with July 22, 1991. At 12:10 a.m. on that date, Whitley presided over Louisiana's final execution by electric chair. Later the same day, orders reached the prison metal shop to construct the gurney that would henceforth be used for lethal injections. Two inmate welders balked; then 375 convicts joined their "work buck." Confronted by every warden's worst nightmare -- a prisoner rebellion -- Whitley did the unthinkable: he backed down. He publicly called the idea a bad one and said a private contractor would build the table instead. "He admitted he was wrong," says lifer...
Initially, some prisoners interpreted Whitley's reversal as a sign of weakness. But many changed their mind a few months later. After the state legislature imposed a strict October 1991 deadline for inmates to challenge their convictions, Whitley, alone of Louisiana's 12 prison wardens, helped inmates beat the cutoff. He authorized the prison printshop to run off 5,000 appeal applications. He instructed the prison radio station to hold a question-and-answer program, brought in a lawyer to field questions, then ordered all inmates to listen. He also made sure that illiterate inmates -- fully 70% of the prison...
...Whitley thinks otherwise. "They need to feel an advocate within the system," he says, "and that's the warden." To burnish Angola's image, Whitley started up a touring rock band and theater group. To help prisoners make better use of their free time, he added basic reading and college-level computer and paralegal courses. To encourage good conduct, he offered concrete rewards: increased visitation, telephone and TV privileges...