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Telephones

Interview with Jack, Jerry, Sarah, Jesse, Kristie, Tim and Judith

JM: Did you have regular access to telephones?
Jack: One a day if you could fight for them.
Jerry: yes, during each free time between 9:00 a.m. - 10:30 a.m., 1:00 p.m. - 3:00 p.m., and 7:00 p.m. - 11:00 p.m.
Sarah: no way! 90% of the time they were broken or being used/
Jesse: yES
Kristie: Yes we were allowed to use the phones whenever we were allowed out of the cells for free time.
Tim: No, I had no one to call but who can afford the extortion charged by the collect calls
Judith: In the holding cell there was one payphone that was free, but you had to wait your turn for it. Once you were put into population, your people had to get an account through a certain phone service.

JM: What types of charges applied for calling people? How much money would you guess the average inmate spends per week on phone calls?
Jack: Very high rates another way to get rich at the Jail.
Jerry: $2.75 per call
Sarah: oh some god awful price like 50$ for 2 30 min calls
Jesse: Don't know
Kristie: It was really fucking ridiculous (sorry for the language but the adverb is apt). $10 for a 15 minute LOCAL call. Most inmates only called once or twice a week. I saw some that called every single free period. I would say it cost anywhere from $10-$210 a week depending on how much of a burden the inmate wanted to be on their friends and family.
Tim: I have no idea. I never made a single one. I had no one to call and no reason to want to.
Judith: I believe that whoever you were calling had to prepay and you only had 10 minutes per call. Some inmates spent about 20.00 a day easily.

JM: Did you need to buy phone cards to call out?
Jack: NO
Jerry: No, not unless you wanted to call someone on their cell phone or someone who was unable to accept collect calls on their home phone.
Sarah: yes or collect
Kristie: You could either buy a phone card from the commissary or you could call collect (very difficult to do when calling a cellphone)
Tim: how would I know. read the above answers about phones.
Judith: No.It was a prepay thing the people you called had to pay up front.

JM: Did the jail screen your calls?
Jack: Yes
Jerry: yes
Sarah: yes. every single one.
Kristie: Yes they recorded and actively listen. My mother and I were talking about the Discovery Channel that was there filming "Women in Lockup" which became "Cellblock 6" and the call was ended by the jail because it was considered "inflammatory".
Tim: how would I know. read the above answers about phones.
Judith: I do believe they were recorded.

Read about how inmates pass the time in the Gwinnett County Jail

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