Behind the Walls

After long-time Houston Chronicle courts reporter left the paper last month, he came back to sit down and look back on the highlights from 13 years covering the CJC - including the time he unearthed the emails that forced a DA to resign, and the time he covered a crazy love triangle case. To talk through it all we're joined by Houston attorney Patrick McCann. 

In this episode of Behind the Walls, cohosts Keri Blakinger and Lance Lowry sat down with Rep. Jarvis Johnson to talk about a bill that would create independent oversight of the troubled Texas prison system. The proposal comes on the heels of a number of officer indictments and firings, a drawn-out lawsuit over prison air conditioning and revelations about the system's longstanding refusal to give dentures to toothless inmates.

Attorney Mike Doyle represents the family of one of the two people killed in the botched Harding Street drug raid. Here, he talks with Keri Blakinger and her long-time frenemy and fellow reporter St. John Barned-Smith about the failed bust. Doyle tackles a few of the unanswered questions: Were they actually drug dealers? What haven't the police revealed yet? And who made that original 911 call that started the whole investigation? Co-host Lance Lowry is out this episode.

As a prison reporter, I get some weird things in the mail: dead cockroaches, paint samples, black mold. But this month I got something a lot darker — ashes. Of an inmate I liked. It left me with a lot of questions. Also in this episode: an interview with Philly reporter Lisa Gartner, who just did a deep dive into a problematic reform school. Juvenile Judge Mike Schneider joins us for the conversation.

In the more than a decade she spent working for the Texas prison system, former spokeswoman Michelle Lyons watched more than 200 men and women put to death in Huntsville. She left the department a few years ago in a swirl of controversy, but last month she sat down with Keri and cohost Lance to revisit some of the darkest parts of her 11 years on the job.

Episode 3: Ever been toilet paper-jacked? No? Then you've never been in prison.

In her seven years on the state's highest criminal court, ex-Judge Elsa Alcala became best known as the voice questioning capital punishment, even in the state most enamored of it. In this Behind the Walls interview, the recently retired judge asks whether it's time for a death penalty moratorium in Texas. She also questions the direction of today's Republican Party, talks about the high-profile Bobby Moore case, and offers a look into her childhood as an orphan raised by her older siblings. 

From the first night in prison to a Thanksgiving spread, join reporter Keri Blakinger and longtime corrections officer Lance Lowry as they talk about life behind bars, untangle stats about the number of so-called “violent” offenders and discuss why, exactly, prison hot dogs are green.