this one spot unless you re going to the mess hall. it sucks. nine u on the count. you have to be very aggressive at times. sometimes it takes force, sometimes it doesn t. it is tough working with all men. a lot of men feel that women are inferior to them, so they don t have to listen to women, and that makes it a little tougher also. i haven t been on the job all that long to have anything really bad happen to me. since i ve been on the job, everything has been basically they keep everything pretty tight. we have officers who have been here for like 15 and better years, they ve seen a lot worse. because 15 years ago, supposedly it was really bad. msnbc first went inside one of the most haunting cell blocks at rikers in 1999. it s the cpsu, the central punitive segregation unit.
6510. today, the cpsu still houses the worst of the worst, but due to the re-arrest policy and its consequences, violent outbreaks are almost nonexistent. in the past when an inmate committed an infraction in the jail, basically he was just written up, he d go for a little hearing and he d go to what we call the bin for a few days. but now, they can get re-arrested. they get re-arrested for assaulting another inmate, they get re-arrested for assaulting a corrections officer. and when they re brought, we work with the district attorney s office. and when we tell the judge, and the judge knows that that person committed a crime in a jail, they re twice as hard on them. and the word got out. they don t want to commit crimes in jail no more. for the safety of the officers, there have been a lot of changes. like the food slots. before, they were just plain slots and now they added the full slots is what we call it. at one time, they used to splash a lot of officers. but with the new
on hearing the word of god. [ speaking in foreign language ] this is a privilege and a blessing. on fridays, there s a service for muslim inmates in a makeshift mosque. the devil is the thing that keeps you and i from being obedient to god. we try to encourage them to empower themselves and empower their lives by making a change, so that when they leave here, that they have acclimated in the right mindset back into society. don t get caught up into trying to build a castle in prison. that s not what prison is about. if you build your house in prison, you ain t going nowhere. up next, we revisit rikers jail within a jail. the most dangerous cell block, known as cpsu.
on fridays, there s a service for muslim inmates in a makeshift mosque. the devil is the thing that keeps you and i from being obedient to god. we try to encourage them to empower themselves and empower their lives by making a change, so that when they leave here, that they have acclimated in the right mindset back into society. don t get caught up into trying to build a castle in prison. that s not what prison is about. if you build your house in prison, you ain t going nowhere. up next, we revisit rikers jail within a jail. the most dangerous cell block, known as cpsu. [ male announcer ] some day, your life will flash before your eyes.
at rikers in 1999. it s the cpsu, the central punitive segregation unit. this is where the toughest inmates stay for crimes that range from the most violent, murder, to the more unruly, violating jail orders, such as talking back to staff. close 2-7. here, inmates are locked in their cells 23 hours a day. if i wasn t spiritual, i think i d probably kill myself. my goal is for the afterlife. i want to go to paradise. other than that, this is terrible. what we found, frustration and long periods of confinement can cause inmates to act up. inmate s about ready to charge. he was at the cell door with something in his hand this time. you guys ready? going in. officers had to restrain the