A man who broke into jail

80 pointsposted 2 days ago
by fortran77
(newyorker.com)

36 Comments

pavel_lishin

4 hours ago

> Friedmann’s infatuation with the game had continued after he moved to Nashville, becoming so intense that his psychologist stipulated in the terms of his parole that, along with being kept from weapons, he be prevented from playing fantasy games such as D. & D.

Now that's ... that's weird.

Verdex

4 hours ago

"Its not a fantasy game, it's far future dystopian post apocalyptic implied hyper technical ethereal augmentation science fiction."

"Very clever sir. But Im aware of what dark sun is. You'll have to come with me."

RyanOD

an hour ago

Should have banned him from playing Top Secret.

assimpleaspossi

4 hours ago

One of the Peter Sellers films (Pink Panther?), he goes to prison to visit an inmate only to have the inmate take his identity, fake beard, moustache and clothes, and walks out of jail. This happens several times. In the very last scene, he's walking out of the jail, a smirk on his face, and tries to pull off his fake beard and moustache but it doesn't come off. "Good heavens! The wrong man has escaped!!"

TYPE_FASTER

4 hours ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/After_the_Fox

I didn't know about about this film. Thank you!

dylan604

4 hours ago

Aw man, I'm kind of jealous of you. To be able to go back and see Peter Sellers movies for the first time again would be amazing. My dad absolutely loved him, and I can still hear him cackling at his movies growing up. As a kid, they weren't very funny, but as an adult I now get it.

TYPE_FASTER

2 hours ago

I watched the Pink Pather movies with my dad growing up, and re-watched them with my son a year or two ago. Watching them with him was kinda like watching for the first time.

He was so funny. I need to watch some of his other films.

js2

an hour ago

If you've never seen Being There, put it at the top of your list.

MrFots

an hour ago

Chauncey Gardiner

hollywood_court

4 hours ago

I thought this was going to be about someone that wanted to go to jail in order to receive meals and/or healthcare. But this article was far more interesting.

butterbomb

4 hours ago

> I thought this was going to be about someone that wanted to go to jail in order to receive meals and/or healthcare.

Tbf, there’s probably an easier way to achieve that goal that involves much less serious charges than breaking into the jail lol.

hollywood_court

4 hours ago

I'm sure there are. One of my mother's husbands — she had four, all cops — loved to tell the story about arresting a man outside of a Zippy Mart on Virginia Loop Road in Montgomery, AL.

The cashier called 911 and told them that a man had robbed the store. When he pulled up he found the man sitting on the curb just waiting for him. He had pulled a knife and stolen one pack of Big Red chewing gum from the store.

All because it was getting cold outside and he needed a place to sleep. And he also had a toothache that had been bothering him for weeks. So he hoped to see a doctor while he was in county jail.

qingcharles

3 hours ago

Out of all the places to be incarcerated, county jails in the USA have a pretty poor record on healthcare. They are run by the counties, not the states, and therefore it is open season on how they provide the services. Most [1] just contract to the lowest bidder private provider. These providers' jobs are to dispense the lowest amount of healthcare to the lowest amount of patients in order to maximize profits. Mostly providing only emergency care to those who are in immediate risk of death. Many also require the prisoners to use the funds provided by their family (for phone calls, letters, clothing, food etc) to pay to even put a medical request into the system in the first place.

In terms of dental, most county jails will only do tooth pulls, not any other type of dental work. They will not try to save teeth at all.

[1] some larger areas like Cook County have their own healthcare systems and can be somewhat more sophisticated and less constrained by monetary concerns

throwup238

2 hours ago

State prisons are usually only a smidge better than county. They’re a slight improvement in that they’ll give shitty prison dentures instead of just pulling all the teeth.

The other side of it is that prison is the first time many people get any dental work done at all so they cone in with large problems all ready.

uwagar

2 hours ago

im reminded of an o henry story where a guy tries that.

jbd123

5 hours ago

Jail is a unique place. If you break in, they’ll gladly let you stay or at least welcome you back at a later date. They may even insist on it. It is a deeper more interesting story, but that is the first thing that came to mind.

bstsb

4 hours ago

fascinating article. while i certainly sympathise somewhat with Alex - it is clear his actions are at least in part a consequence of mental conditions - i can't help but feel like being caught wasn't his plan as the article seems to suggest, and he wanted chaos upon the prison's opening, as some kind of strange payback or revenge

pluralmonad

2 hours ago

I like to think all of my actions are a consequence of my mental conditions.

bot403

15 minutes ago

Not a chance, all of our actions are disconnected from our mental conditions and have been pre-decided for us.

xvxvx

5 hours ago

Leaving keys etc. I could understand as a political statement, but loaded guns? Madman!

pavel_lishin

4 hours ago

He gives a reason for doing so, although the article points out that his reason is suspect.

NoMoreNicksLeft

38 minutes ago

More like the sheriff is butthurt at the explanation, even were it proven true he wouldn't be able to accept it as such.

Though, Friedman also does have a touch of the narcissim thing going on, in that he enjoys it that Hall says "he can't be understood".

mcswell

an hour ago

Otis Campbell was known for locking himself into the Mayberry jail.

amenghra

5 hours ago

TL;DR: "while a new jail in Nashville was still under construction, staff discovered missing keys and other anomalies. Surveillance footage eventually revealed that someone had repeatedly disguised themselves as a construction worker and entered the building many times. Inside, they hid weapons, tools, and escape items in walls and rooms around the facility."

NoSalt

5 hours ago

Reminds me of the US Embassy in Russia that was built, by Russians, who embedded thousands of spying devices within the building itself. It took 27 years to build, then debug the building.

peddling-brink

5 hours ago

And it was the person both least, and most suspected.

IAmBroom

4 hours ago

It's always someone you either do or do not suspect!

twohaibei

3 hours ago

I recommend reading on "Witold Pilecki" - old story, but pretty fascinating.

jareklupinski

4 hours ago

> reëlection

> reënacted

whats with the ree-s in the article...

nerevarthelame

3 hours ago

It's a diacritic marker that indicates how the word is supposed to be pronounced, with a syllable break on the marked letters - as though readers might get confused and think the word is pronounced "reel-ection" as opposed to "re-election." It's a pretty archaic practice, but The New Yorker persists. They have a lot of unusual stylistic preferences, like preferring the spelling "vender" over "vendor," which also occurs in this article.

A more common example of the diaeresis would be the name "Zoë" - the "ë" indicates the pronunciation is "zoe-y" (2 syllables) not "zoe" (1 syllable).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diaeresis_(diacritic)#English

jareklupinski

3 hours ago

til, thank you! i guess it's important for them we all coöperate on pröper spek :P

thought i was seeing this because some ebooks also have missing/poorly substituted ligatures for me

retrac

3 hours ago

Some style guides recommend the diaeresis over doubled vowels when they are pronounced separately. The idea is I believe from French: maïs, Noël, etc.

I was taught to do it that way in public school here in Canada in the 90s; it is the textbook proper way to spell words like coördination. I was also taught that no one actually spells it that way and that co-ordination and coordination are both fine and far more common.

enmyj

4 hours ago

that's the New Yorker signature style

jareklupinski

3 hours ago

i thought jaywalking was the new yorker signature style :P