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Directed by Paul Sutton & Lori Sutton
Twenty-four prisoners–mostly lifers–sat across from a dozen college students on a maximum security prison yard in southern California as part of an innovative and inspiring creative writing program. For 14 weeks, prisoners learned to express themselves openly and honestly, many for the first time in their lives, to a group of strangers, in a setting where survival often demands alienation, disaffection, even violence.
And the students–at first apprehensive, even hateful–discovered that the men across from them were far from the callous and unfeeling monsters they had expected to meet.
Though their often intimate collaboration, both groups found hope and humanity in a place where they had expected neither.
Professor Emeritus, Criminal Justice, San Diego State University
Post-doc., Stanford U., Ctr for Adv. Study in Beh. Sciences (1977)
Ph.D., Criminal Justice, SUNY-Albany (1975)
M.A., Criminal Justice, SUNY-Albany (1971)
B.A., Political Science & History, University of Kansas (1970)
* “SINNERS.” Producer, Director, Writer, Editor (4 min.; 2023) video poem dedicated to the millions of men and women behind bars, set against gripping images from Sutton’s prison documentaries.
* “FROM PEN TO PAPER.” Producer, Director, Writer, Editor (28 min. 18 sec.; 2023) short documentary featuring creative writing class in a maximum security prison yard.
* “POOCH.” Producer, Director, Editor. (5 min. 45 sec.; 2023) short documentary about prisoners training service animals for autistic children and disabled veterans.
* “GROWING UP GOODLAND.” Producer, Director, Editor (93 min.; 2022) a nostalgic look at life in small-town America, created half a century after the producer’s graduation from the town’s only high school and told by citizens aged 19 to 91.
* “STRAIGHT FROM THE PEN.” Producer, Director, Editor (51 min. 34 sec.; 2017) feature documentary about a group of college students inspiring maximum security prisoners to write truthfully and insightfully about their lives.
* “PRISON THROUGH TOMORROW’S EYES.” Producer, Director, Writer, Editor (56 min.; 2013) feature documentary chronicling life-changing experiences of 24 university students who come face-to-face with California’s prison system in an intensive, weeklong immersion into the world behind bars.
* “DOING TIME: TEN YEARS LATER.” Co-producer (58 min.; 1991) Emmy-winning feature documentary reprising life and conditions at the Penitentiary of New Mexico, site of the bloodiest riot in American prison history, ten years after the making of Doing Time.
* “DOING TIME.” Executive Producer (59 min.; 1980) Emmy-winning feature documentary about life behind bars; one of the first of the prison documentary genre. shot at the ill-fated Penitentiary of New Mexico, site of the bloodiest riot in American prison history.
Sutton has produced multiple award-winning prison documentaries; published numerous books, articles, and and research monographs; and appeared frequently in print and broadcast media as an expert on a variety of criminal justice policies and practices.
After creating a series of feature-length prison documentaries, he has more recently ventured into the creation of more novel products–a video poem, a “short” about prison-trained service animals, and an expanded, nostalgic treatment of the small town where he grew up.
Plays in
The Human Experience: Documentary Block 2
The Human Experience: Documentary Block 2 Where real stories highlight the depth and diversity of human life. These…
