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Photos: An Illicit Look At New York's High Security Prisons & Jails
Photographer JB Nicholas knows a thing or two about prison—in 1990, he shot and killed a drug dealer, earning him a manslaughter conviction and nearly 13 years behind bars.
Nicholas was released in 2003, and now, having lived more than a decade as a free man, he's ready to go back, documenting the austere, putty-colored world of the state's correctional facilities through the lens of his camera.
Initially, Nicholas began shooting closed facilities in the Hudson Valley, in an attempt to capture their chilling history before developers tear them down. (Several photos in the above gallery are of an abandoned maximum security prison for juveniles, in addition to shots of functioning ones.)
It was only recently, however, that he decided to expand his horizons to open prisons and jails as well.
"The thought of coming back and applying my skill set to open institutions appealed to me," he said, despite the considerable challenges therein: For instance, while it's legal to shoot a prison's exterior, it cannot be done on the property. The city denied Nicholas's request to photograph inside Rikers Island (he managed to do it anyway), but others have been trickier.
"Each prison presents its own problem in approaching it," he said. "For example, the pictures of Green Haven, that was all shot out of a moving car going about 50 mph." Sing Sing was easier because it is "smack in the middle of town." The Tombs are right in Lower Manhattan, and anyone can see prisoners being led through an overhead walkway from the street—only most don't take the time to look.
Nicholas has launched a Kickstarter to help him fund traveling to and from the state's maximum security facilities. As a tabloid photographer, he said he's gotten good at taking surreptitious, surveillance-style photography, and he thinks he stands a good chance of succeeding where others have failed in this pursuit. Check out his video and donate here.