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  • The Marshall Project

    Being a Prisoner is Like Being a Ghost

    Waiting to die, we haunt our loved ones.
    by Fernando Rivas Oct 25, 2019 4 minutes

    I still remember that moment six years ago when I became a ward of the state—a federal inmate. Shackled hand and foot, I arrived by bus at the penitentiary and was ordered to send my clothing and other personal effects home in a cardboard box. I had to fill out a form telling my jailers whether I wished to be resuscitated and what to do with my body and whom to notify in the event of my death. It was one of the first shocks of being in prison, the first loss of self.

    Life Inside Perspectives from those who work and live in the criminal justice system. to receive

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