CDCR
San Quentin State Prison
Last week, we ran an interview with Scott Kernan, who was until recently, second in command at the California Department of Correcitons and Rehabilitation. Kernan has been at the center of some of the biggest developments in the prison system over the past few years: he was central to the controversy over obtaining lethal injection drugs from Arizona; he was the prison official who negotiated an end to the recent hunger strikes originating in Pelican Bay State Prison; and he has a singularly unique perspective on the system in which he’s spent almost his entire life. Kernan recently sat down with reporter Nancy Mullane to talk about these issues, as well as his childhood, which he spent on the grounds of San Quentin State Prison, where his mother worked. In an unusual upbringing, Kernan recalls the time a prison warden showed him the gas chamber where inmates used to be executed–and reflects on the culture that shapes the prison, its inmates, and employees. This is the full audio from that interview.
