Explore every episode of the podcast Prison Breakdown

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss the documentary Untouchable (2016)

Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit discuss Bi-weekly, a record payout for wrongful death in New York, the ongoing Christa Pike situation, Beckommendations and Brit’s Picks!

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss Timothy Leary, from his days as a Harvard Psychologist to a drug reformation advocate to a prisoner, also, Producer Brit discusses The Snowman (2017)

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss the upcoming parole hearing of the Manendez brothers and Republican candidates using prison labor in Oklahoma to politically campaign.

Professors Beck Strah, Eric Bronson, and their former student Madi Stevens discuss 9/11, prison pen pals, prison hobbycrafts, predatory prison e-mail services, untoward pen pal behavior, and Hands on a Hardbody: The Documentary (1997)

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss the death of an inmate in the hands of the Clackamas County Jail, and unbearable heat conditions in Alabama Prisons, and Joe Arpio

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss the history of psychedelic studies behind bars, Whitey Bulger, the CIA’s use of psychedelics on prisoners for their MKUltra studies, and The Client (1994)

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss prison abuses in Ohio, Buc-ee’s litigious culture and the pushback, sexual abuse in California prisons, and private prison companies pulling in record profits.

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss Dr. Timothy Leary, his history and beliefs as a clinical psychologist, MCI Concord partnering with Harvard, Dr. Leary’s experiments with psilopcybin, his accounts of his experiments, subject accounts, and long-term observances. Producer Brit reviews Primal Fear (1996).

Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit discuss Murder 2 convicts in Pennsylvania getting a new lease on life, felony murder, the prison-industrial link to diarrhea lettuce, some Brit’s Picks, and Beckommendations. 

Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit discuss a 7-Layer Dessert Dip, family podcasts, Flora, Illinois’s bid to get a prison in their town, Brown County’s bid for a prison and prison experience night, an early viral rap song, and The Last Seduction (1994)

Chief Ed Guyott and the Long Arm of the Law Band - All We Want'sa Prison - 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZVrckq-D-c

Barbed Wire Choir - Is We Is -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q5-d2WOgpfQ

Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit discuss the best cereals, protests over prison conditions in Wisconsin, felon disenfranchisement, an innocent man serving a record-setting prison tenure, and Israel using crocodiles as prison guards

Professor Beck Strah interviews criminology professor and author Dr. Jacqueline Helfgott about art in prison, restorative justice programs, working with incarcerated populations, psychopathy, and Escape Plan 2: Hades (2018)

Professor Beck Strah, Producer Brit, and Media Consultant Spenser discuss several federal prison closures, an update on the Prairieland case, plus Brit's Picks, Beckommendations, and Spenser's Gifts.

Professor Beck Strah, Producer Brit, and Media Consultant Spenser discuss Wesley Snipes' crimes, idiosyncrasies, trial, and imprisonment.

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss prison mail digitization services and new laws in Florida allowing the death penalty for child abuse. 

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson talk to Vik Chopra from the Concrete Mama Podcast and Unincarcerated Productions, with topics ranging from Vik's incarceration, building a media platform, peer support in prison, prison subcultures, restorative justice, and Vik's abs.

follow Vik's work on Instagram @unincarceratedproductions

or listen to Concrete Mama wherever you get podcasts

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss a stay of execution in Alabama, and an epidemic of suicide within solitary confinement at Mississippi state prisons. 

The boys take a trip to The Fife & Drum restaurant, a one-of-a-kind culinary program at Northeastern Correctional Center in Concord, MA. Also, Producer Brit reviews Mercy (2026).

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss lenient sentences for inmate sexual assault in New Mexico, a promising new college program in California, and toilet flush limiters in prisons. 

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss Brawl in Cell Block 99 (2017).

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss the Louisiana Prison System and Gov. Jeff Landry “tough on crime” policies, as well as a call to remove Michigan’s Prison Director due to some deaths at a women’s facility. 

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss Steve Buscemi's Animal Factory (2000)

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss a Louisiana Sheriff accused of malfeasance, Bronson’s recent student trip to the Angola Prison rodeo, Angola’s unfortunate conversion to migrant detention, and a mother’s attempt to break her son from prison. 

Professor Beck Strah, Producer Brit, and Media Consultant Spenser Hodge discuss former Subway mascot Jared Fogel, his rise, his media coverage, his cultural impact, his crimes, and of course: his imprisonment. Producer Brit also reviews Crime 101 (2026). 

Follow Spenser on IG: @numetalkvlt

Professor Beck Strah, Producer Brit, and Media Consultant Spenser Hodge weigh in on a pizza smuggling ring, two deaths at the Dayton Correctional Facility, a Texas court of appeals overturning a death row sentence, Brit’s Picks, Beccomendations, and Spenser’s Gifts.

Follow Spenser on IG: @numetalkvlt

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss The Real Housewives of Rhode Island, the conditions, amenities, training/vocational programs, Ghislaine Maxwell’s incarceration, special privileges, universal prisoner amelioration, and The Last Days of American Crime (2020). 

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss an expansion of education in Michigan Prisons, an update on the theoretical reopening of Alcatraz as a prison, and a Chilean Prison Rugby Team.

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss first albums, and Club Fed, including conditions, amenities, the population, prison camps, stratified prison placement, prison consultants, religious accommodations, food, and Carlito’s Way (1993).

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss a drone smuggling operation in New York, Marcy Playground, a Gun McGuyver in Washington State, poachers, Afroman’s victory in court, a Kansan man arrested for throwing meth over a prison wall, and a correction officer with an itchy pepper spray trigger finger.

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss a fantasy bookball league, Jim Breuer and airport food, New York City prison ships, the politics of prison ships, stinky carceral tactics, celebrity decommissioned ferries, prison ship medical issues, and Song Sung Blue (2025).

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss poor prison healthcare in Arizona, chronic overcrowding in a Washington child prison school, and a January 6th rioter going back to prison.

Professors Beck Strah and Producer Brit discuss prison ships, the carceral state of the United Federation of Planets, the brig, prison hulks, the history of maritime incarceration in Britain, the early history of prison boats in the US, cruise ship act 2 Cool, and Predators (2025).

Brought to you by Roger Williams University School of Justice Studies

Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit discuss an end to gender affirming care in federal prisons, and a Missouri bill to standardize minimum prison terms.

Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit discuss the critically-acclaimed HBO Documentary The Alabama Solution (2025)

Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit discuss a maternity program in South Dakota, poor conditions in Mississippi prisons, a bill targeting the mental health of corrections officers, the sentencing of Trump’s would-be assassin, and some Brit’s Picks and Beckommendations.

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss The Super Bowl, manipulation awareness, inmate manipulation strategies, the us vs. them mentality, the rumor mill, manipulator blackmail, gaslighting, and Night of the Comet (1984).

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss a handmade musical prison performance, Thomas Silverstein, an update on Elizabeth Holmes, and issues in programming at New York State Prison. 

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss being tall, how inmates select their victims of manipulation, secrets between COs and inmates, A Christmas Karen (2022), and stunt spectaculars. 

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss a brawl in a Georgia prison, a North Carolina man buying a prison for the forces of good, a Nevada warden getting fired for a party gone awry, and a mail carrier getting busted for mail theft.

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss the ethics of manipulation, advertising, population control, inmate manipulation, downing a duck, blackmail, totalitarian communities, and Get Santa (2014)

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss smuggling tobacco into a prison, detestable co-workers, and the buried 60 Minutes CECOT report. 

Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit discuss the made-for-TV movie "The Christmas Star", and, more importantly, who controls the pipes.

Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit discuss this week’s news, including Sam Bankman-Fried acting as a jailhouse lawyer, a loosening of regulations for UK corrections officer retention, and an update on CECOT. Also, Beck’s Reccs and Brit’s Picks!

Today Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss short time, good time, a father and daughter prison dance, God behind bars, and another Louisiana prison escape. 

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss orgies at P Diddy’s prison, methods of execution including stoning, beheading, burning, hanging, the electric “old sparky” chair, the gas chamber, lethal injection, firing squad, the 8th amendment, and Wild Things Foursome (2010).

Today Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit are joined by Dr. Andrew Baranauskas to discuss erroneous prison releases in the UK, ventriloquism in prison including the history of ventriloquism in prisons, Winston Pearson Jr., modern puppet shows, death row ventriloquism shows, Willie Brown, Walter “The Puppetmaster” Taylor, ventriloquism in WWII, a jail owned by a dummy, and Extreme Prejudice (1987) 

Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson talk about an update on Burl Cain and the Mississippi DOC, and Mike Tyson, including his early years, his rise in the world of boxing, his crimes, convictions, and prison time. We also discuss Prisoner’s Daughter (2022).

Today Producer Brit is taking the lead! With Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson, they discuss a final update on the NOLA prison escapees, and Oscar Pistorius, including his childhood, rise in running, murder of his girlfriend and subsequent trials, sentences, and current life. Also, Southern Comfort (1981).

Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss updates on the P Diddy sentencing, and the first week of Jocktober! This week we’re following jock/felon Aaron Hernandez, including his background, his multiple crimes, his arrests, his imprisonment, his gang activity, his sexuality, and his eventual death, and also Materialists (2025).