I Saw Shocking Violence and Corruption Inside California’s Prison System

For the last two years, the California prison system has been undergoing a radical change. Inspired by prisons in Scandinavia, which treat incarceration as an opportunity to rehabilitate inmates, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (or CDCR) launched its own initiative. They called it ‘The California Model.’

However, according to the whistleblower and retired correctional lieutenant Hector Bravo Ferrel, the implementation of this new model has actually led to significantly more violence and corruption.

In this episode of I Was There, Ferrel exposes what working inside California’s new prison model is really like, including the shocking events that led to his early retirement, and CDCR’s attempts to silence him and discredit his story.

Watch the interview with Ferrel in the player below or over at the VICE YouTube channel.