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In one case, police arrested a local drug dealer and led him away in handcuffs as his two young daughters watched. In another, a single mother was busted on a parole violation and taken into custody while her toddler was left sleeping in another room. In a third case, police officers raided a house and ordered all occupants, including the children, to lay face down on the floor while the place was searched for suspected weapons.... Read more

Anita Carbonell, superintendent of the Southeast State Correctional Facility in Windsor, has a down-to-earth description of life behind bars: "It's like hot lunch three times a day for two years," she says. "All of those elements of choice that we take for granted are taken away."

It's true that inmates don't get menus at meals. But at Southeast State, they do get movies on weekends — and even some say in what they watch. Which raises the question: How do you program films for a "captive audience"?... Read more

The wrong grub can provoke some visceral reactions — just ask anyone who was forced to clean a plate of liver and onions as a child. But can food — wholesome, nutritious food — taste so nasty that it constitutes a punishment in and of itself? Some prisoners doing time in Vermont think so. Most of them try to maintain a healthy distance from "Nutraloaf," a "loaf-style form of nourishment" that is typically served to prisoners who "misuse" food or "bodily waste."... Read more

VERMONT — Most of us don’t like to hear that a convicted rapist, murderer, armed robber or pedophile is being released from prison and moving back to town. But whether you believe it’s society’s job to rehabilitate dangerous criminals or just lock them up and throw away the key, most violent felons eventually walk the streets again. And the likelihood that those ex-cons will succeed in becoming safe and productive members of society is often determined by their ability to find housing, jobs and a network of friends and family that can keep them out of trouble.... Read more

Death row isn't known for its haute cuisine. So the infamous "special meal," to which residents are "treated" before execution, is an incongruous indulgence. It's a tradition going back as far as ancient Greece, although Socrates chose not to partake. In the modern U.S., inmates can ostensibly pick their own "poisons," but each state imposes certain limits. In Florida, the meal can't run more than $20 — after all, in some cases, the state is already footing a sizeable room-and-board bill.... Read more

BURLINGTON - Sarah Rose, 13, put down her paint roller to explain why she was helping decorate a house in downtown Burlington that will soon be home for 10 women newly released from prison.

"It's important because people deserve a second chance to get back on their feet instead of going back to their problems," the Hunt Middle School student said.... Read more

BURLINGTON - House Rep. Jason Lorber is not the next Jay Leno. But his new television show promises to turn heads - assuming anyone tunes in.... Read more

Paul Wright's entire criminal career lasted 60 seconds - just enough time for him to klll a man. It was Super Bowl Sunday, 1987, and Wright was a 21-year-old Army M.P. with a week to go before his expected honorable discharge. In his first and only run-in with the law, Wright botched an attempted robbery of Curtis Smith, a cocaine dealer in Federal Way, Washington. The jury rejected Wright's self-defense plea, and he was sentenced to 25 years, four months in prison.... Read more

Sal Dagnone is serving 36 years to life for killing a man during a drunken bar fight 19 years ago. A lot has happened in his life since then. When he entered prison at 18, Dagnone couldn't read or write. He's since earned a GED, two years of college credit and paralegal training, and has gotten married. Dagnone is now being held in Great Meadow Correctional Facility in Comstock, New York, but his stint behind bars has taken him through almost every maximum security prison in the Empire State: Attica, Sing-Sing, Downstate, Shawangunk, Southport, Clinton, Coxsackie, Sullivan, Elmira.... Read more

The weather is cold and miserable as our group of eight state senators -- seven Democrats and one Republican -- and two reporters leaves the Statehouse for a tour of three drug-treatment and correctional facilities. The trip, organized by Senate Judiciary Chairman Dick Sears and Senate President Pro Tem Peter Welch, was part of a legislative effort to "connect the dots" and see what's broken in Vermont's correctional system. Going in, the senators know what the picture looks like, and it's not pretty.... Read more