Is There a Right Not to Snitch?
Mark Burns swears he did everything right. Serving time in New York on a manslaughter conviction, he found himself working in May 2010 in the prison commissary when a can of spaghetti fell from a high shelf and struck him in the head. No big deal. He immediately reported the incident to prison staff, signed a medical waiver and an “injury report” promptly was filed on his behalf. An inmate with no evident history of material discipline problems behind bars, who had spent years behind bars training service dogs and helping other prisoners, Burns reported for work the next day ready to move on from the accident.
Case in Point In “Case in Point,” Andrew Cohen examines a single case or character that sheds light on the criminal justice system. An audio version of Case in Point is broadcast with The Takeaway, a public radio show from WNYC, Public Radio International, The New York Times, and WGBH-Boston Public Radio. Related Stories
Instead, nearly eight years later, the story of the falling can” for months. The guards didn’t just ask Burns to snitch on his fellow inmates, they also asked him to provide false informant testimony against another guard. “I couldn’t give them anything that I don’t know,” Burns said later.
