Michael A.

At the time of his crime, Michael was attending high school, participating

in an ROTC-like program, and living a typical teenage life in an affluent

suburb. "I was a fairly normal middle class kid. Wanting to impress my

peers-these were worries and concerns at the time." Before being

sentenced to life without parole, Michael had never been in trouble with

the law.

Michael shot and killed someone in the course of what, he said, was

supposed to be a robbery/drug deal. Following his conviction for murder, Michael was placed in a particularly violent yard to begin his life without

parole sentence. He described what it was like: "When you arrive there

are all these difference forces. Everyone tries to talk the younger kids into

their  camp-the skinheads, the Nazi Low Rides, or whatever other group.  That's why  these guys fall into it."

Michael said he decided not to engage with people he thought would negatively influence him. "I really wanted not to fall into that. I constantly tried to put myself far from situations that could get me in trouble. I very carefully separated myself from drugs." In such a violent environment, however, he said he was nonetheless faced daily with the threat of attack. "There was constant tension in the C-Yard-is there going to be a race war today? There would be 20 guys in that corner who have knives, and 20 guys over there with knives-and you were always wondering-what's going to happen?"

Indeed, Michael said, despite his determination to distance himself from corrosive influences, it was a challenge to mature in the prison environment. "It's a struggle to be able to mature here," he said. "Here, it's like an overcrowded, violent locker room of gang members and drug addicts. You have all these guys-even those who don't want to reform-all together." Grappling with the reality of the sentence, as well, is often overwhelming. "The years are just stretched out in front of you."

Yet Michael's efforts were so exemplary that he was chosen out of over 170,000 inmates in California prison to be placed in the Honor Yard, the only one of its kind in the state. "The change I've gone through is self-evident. If I was violent, I wouldn't be in the Honor Yard, I'd be in shackles," he explained. Michael insists change and growth-especially as a teen entering prison-is inevitable. "To say that someone doesn't change over time is a bizarre concept because everybody knows they are different from when they were younger-it's too obvious."

-Human Rights Watch interview with Michael A.,

serving life without parole in California, June 29, 2007