THE HARD CELL
WHY RAPHAEL ROWE’S VOLUNTARILY GOING BEHIND BARS…
INSIDE THE WORLD’S TOUGHEST PRISONS | Netflix FRIDAY
Most of us would do anything we could to avoid going to prison, but journalist Raphael Rowe – who spent 12 years in British prisons for murder, before his conviction was quashed and he was freed in 2000 – willingly steps into some of the world’s most notorious jails in this documentary, which returns for a third series on Netflix this Friday. We couldn’t help but ask him why…
“Because of my past experience, I have an understanding of what life is like being a prisoner,” Raphael tells Inside TV. “We like to think we know what goes on in prisons because of the sensational media coverage they often get, but I wanted to take people deeper, and meet the prisoners who have committed horrendous crimes and hear what they have to say about whether or not prison makes a difference to who they are.”
Raphael will be spending seven days locked up in Costa Rica, Romania, Norway and Colombia, where some eye-opening experiences await him…
“I’ve witnessed horrific incidents,” he says. “In one prison, a murder was committed while we were there. You’d expect an investigation, but the way the guards and prisoners talked about it, it was almost dismissed as a daily occurrence. It really was shocking.”