Russia's Toughest Prisons (2011) - full transcript

Once hidden behind the Iron Curtain,

Russia is opening one of its most

guarded institutions to the world.

For the first time ever,

three prisons across Russia

unlock their steel doors

to an international film crew.

ALARM

THEY SHOUT IN RUSSIAN

And in one of Russia's

highest security prisons,

a cannibal divulges

the details of his crime.

TRANSLATION:

I cut off his head, arms, legs.

All of a sudden,

something kind of struck me

and I thought I would try him.

This is a look inside

Russia's toughest prisons.

Near the border with Kazakhstan,

a prison known as Black Dolphin

houses Russia's

most brutal criminals.

DOG BARKS

Black Dolphin holds roughly 700

of Russia's most dangerous killers.

DOG BARKS

Combined, they have

killed over 3,500 people.

It's an average of

five murders per inmate.

Overseeing the lockdown of

Chechnyan terrorists, cannibals

and serial killers is

Lieutenant Guard Denis Avsyuk.

TRANSLATION: The main crime

committed by the convicts

here is murder.

But we also have maniacs,

paedophiles and terrorists.

To call them people,

it makes your tongue bend backwards,

just to say it.

I have never felt

any sympathy for them.

Nikolai Astankov is serving

a life sentence for killing

an entire family and burning

their bodies in the forest.

TRANSLATION: If you constantly think

about how you are here,

what is waiting for you,

that you won't ever get free,

that you are left here alone...

..you simply won't make it.

It's six in the morning

and for the next 16 hours,

Astankov and his cell-mate will

not be allowed to sit on their beds.

TRANSLATION: You're constantly

being filmed in your cell.

So you're being

watched around the clock.

Also, there are

light and motion detectors.

Plus, every 15 minutes,

a guard goes through the cells,

so you must

constantly be attentive.

Astankov shares his four

and a half square metre cell

with Sergei Vinogradov - a Russian

gangster charged with the murder

of six people.

TRANSLATION: I have a tendency

towards being hostile.

I can kill a man,

but a woman, a child,

I couldn't harm.

For me, it is wrong.

And for everyone who was below me,

there was a strict rule.

A woman or child, you can't harm

because they can't fight back.

Like all inmates,

Astankov and Vinogradov

live in a cell within a cell,

and behind three sets

of steel doors.

The extreme isolation

makes life inside Black Dolphin

nearly unbearable.

TRANSLATION: My life,

what I was preparing for,

it all came to nothing.

Of course, psychologically,

it's difficult to deal with.

Astankov and Vinogradov

have very limited contact

with the other prisoners.

All prison operations maintain

the highest level of isolation.

TRANSLATION: There is no dining hall

for life-sentence prisoners.

Their food is taken

directly to their cells.

After breakfast,

it's time for their daily exercise.

TRANSLATION: When you are being led

out, there is a dog and a handler

that follow you.

DOG BARKS

In front of them

is a senior officer.

You are always watched

by three employees.

You are never left alone.

DOG BARKS

Believed to be unique

to Black Dolphin, inmates move

about in a stress position to render

them powerless, bent at the waist,

head down and cuffed.

When moving between buildings,

they are blindfolded.

TRANSLATION: Why the blindfolds?

Well, so the inmate does not

have an opportunity to learn

our movements, our location

in the building or on the territory.

So that if something suddenly

happens, he will have no time

to think about a movement

in a certain direction.

That is why we use the blindfolds.

The position allows maximum control

over dangerous inmates

and keeps them from gaining an

understanding of the prison layout.

There is no prison yard

at Black Dolphin.

For 90 minutes, Astankov and

Vinogradov pace like caged lions...

..without even

a glimpse of the sky.

Meanwhile, guards search their cells

for anything out of the ordinary.

The guards look for contraband

and any signs of attempted

escape, like loose bars.

Once guards conclude their search,

they lead the cell-mates back

to their impenetrable cell.

TRANSLATION:

Escaping is impossible.

With these bars, all of the constant

alarms, always being watched,

it's simply not possible.

No-one has ever

escaped Black Dolphin...

..and only one inmate in the

prison's history has won an appeal.

TRANSLATION: Black Dolphin

is a final destination.

You can't go any further.

Yes, technically, there

is a way to leave this place.

But only one way.

The cemetery.

Even in the company

of Russia's most brutal killers,

some prisoners top the list

for the most dangerous and demented.

Vladimir Nikolayev is a cannibal.

DOG BARKS

Vladimir Nikolayev

is one of Black Dolphin's

most notorious criminals -

a killer with the blood of

two men on his hands...

..and their taste in his mouth.

TRANSLATION: I was coming home

from a party a little drunk...

..and next to the door to my

building, another guy, also drunk,

asked me for a light.

We started arguing

and got into a fight.

He hit me and I hit him,

and it turned out he died.

What was I to do?

I dragged him to the bathroom,

undressed him,

and started cutting him apart.

I cut off his head, arms, legs.

All of a sudden, something

kind of struck me and I thought

I would try him.

I cut off a piece of meat

from his thigh

and boiled it.

I tried it, didn't like it.

So I chopped it up

and fried it in a frying pan.

I gave some meat

to one of my friends.

He took it home,

gave it to his wife.

She made dumplings with it.

She had some herself

and fed it to her children.

Nikolayev's friends unknowingly

ate the body of evidence.

Well, I said it was kangaroo.

We don't have kangaroos around here.

They didn't know what it was.

Russian prison tattoos

have a historical place

in prison culture.

For over 50 years,

inmates have scrawled

their criminal histories and

beliefs across their bodies.

Well, the pirate here with a knife

is a symbol of

the constant life in prison.

Here on this shoulder

is my most-loved lady.

Well, those are from my first term.

My first term,

I was in for three years.

They are bell towers -

each one represents

a year in prison.

Inside Black Dolphin,

tattooing is strictly prohibited.

DOG BARKS

Russia's real-life Hannibal Lecter

will live out the rest of his days

caged in Black Dolphin

on a diet of mainly soup and bread.

A fellow murderer his only company.

Over 1,000 kilometres away,

outside of Moscow,

sits Russia's oldest and

one of the most feared prisons -

the infamous Vladimir Central.

DOGS BARK AND GROWL FURIOUSLY

Known for housing

Stalin's son and political prisoners

during the Cold War,

today it's the first stop

for brutal murderers.

A stroll down the dark hallways

of Vladimir Central

should deter any criminal impulse,

yet over the last 228 years,

Vladimir Central has imprisoned

an estimated one million inmates.

DOGS BARK AND GROWL FURIOUSLY

Vicious dogs, the size of bears,

and guards armed with AK-47s

uphold a regime more rigid

than anything in the Western world.

This is the first time ever

international crews are permitted

inside the prison.

TRANSLATION: In an American prison,

everything is more open,

and I don't think

this is the best solution.

Inmates cross paths,

they eat together,

and they openly go

into their cells.

I think that, after all,

in a Russian prison,

this is an advantage

because of more isolation

of the convicts.

They should not

influence each other.

This is one of a few prisons

in Russia that accepts inmates

who have committed

particularly heinous crimes.

Before entering

the general population,

guards search inmates

for contraband.

They check every shred

of clothing by hand.

TRANSLATION: The seams are checked

because mainly things are hidden

in the seams.

SIM cards, telephones...

Well, telephones are not

usually hidden in clothes,

but they are mostly hidden in,

how do you say, body cavities?

Today, the guard

finds forbidden contraband.

TRANSLATION: This metal coil

is forbidden because if they try

to hook it up themselves,

they are not electricians

and they could get electrocuted

which may give unfavourable results.

So this is not allowed.

Now, several guards

execute a more thorough search

of the inmate's belongings.

Guards search both the cell

and the inmate's belongings.

Luckily,

they find nothing suspicious.

DOG BARKS

Vladimir Central guard dogs

are among the world's scariest.

DOGS BARK AND GROWL FURIOUSLY

Weighing up to 90 kilograms

and standing almost two metres tall,

they are said to have the stopping

power of a 45-calibre gun.

This is an especially

aggressive breed,

known as the Caucasian

Mountain Shepherd.

Once used by

the Russian military,

now they scare inmates

into submission.

Arthur Gauchin is serving

a 21-year sentence

for killing his wife

and his brother-in-law.

TRANSLATION: The had a neighbouring

room and they would drink there

without any limits.

My daughter couldn't get any sleep.

She said, "Papa, Uncle Sasha

isn't giving me any peace."

I warned them once,

warned them twice, then...

Well, what?

I stabbed him.

Arthur is not alone.

Russia has a murder rate five times

higher than the United States.

TRANSLATION: My name is Igor,

my sentence is 18 years.

I am in for the murder

of two people.

I have been here

for only two months.

TRANSLATION: My name is Yevgeny.

My sentence

is 22 years and six months.

I am in for

a particularly brutal murder.

This is hard, believe me,

maybe in ten years I will comprehend

just how hard it is, but for now,

I don't think about it.

TRANSLATION: And if you

constantly think about the fact

that you have 22 years,

you can go crazy.

Arthur has been in and out

of prison most of his life.

Russian prison tattoos

cover his entire body.

TRANSLATION:

My tattoos are from the '80s,

when convicts started to move away

from the traditional prison

subculture and hierarchy

and started to get into

something different.

After that, tattoos

stopped representing your sentence

or your status, but rather

your understanding of the light side

and the dark side.

Among old-timers, classic Russian

prison tattoos express identity.

Stars on shoulders signify

the inmate will bow to no-one.

Church domes can represent

the number of years or terms served

and religious tattoos

can have misleading meanings.

For example, a Madonna and child

can mean the inmate

has been a thief since childhood.

TRANSLATION:

This says "cor ne edito".

It's Latin.

It means, don't rip your heart.

I just don't have one any more.

Both Vladimir Central

and Black Dolphin

are among the prisons in Russia

with alleged reports

of unfair treatment

and inmate abuse.

None of the inmates interviewed

in the show had a single complaint

of any unfair treatment or abuse.

Over 3,000 kilometres

to the far east,

the frigid Siberian tundra

hosts 149 prison camps.

Among them is Prison Camp 17.

This prison camp lies on the

outskirts of the city of Krasnoyarsk

along the Trans-Siberian Railway.

DOGS BARK

Prison Camp 17 holds 1,200 inmates.

All are first-time offenders.

Like 24-year-old Dmitri Komarov,

a Moscow native who was caught

transporting ecstasy pills.

TRANSLATION: In a Russian village,

someone can steal

a sack of potatoes.

He could get half a year in prison.

I don't think that's fair.

The sentence I got was four years

in a high-security prison.

But Dmitri's days inside the camp

may be numbered.

In just a few days he will plead

his case for early release.

After almost three years, this young

inmate may finally be going home.

Unlike the maximum security of

Black Dolphin and Vladimir Central,

in Prison Camp 17 there is more

opportunity for human contact

among inmates.

But even though day-to-day life

in the prison camp lacks the extreme

isolation of max security...

..the remote location isolates these

inmates from their families.

Prison Camp 17

sits in the heart of Siberia.

Dmitri has been here

since he was 21 years old.

TRANSLATION:

When I got here, it was wild.

When they took us through the prison

yard, everyone was looking at us.

This is my mum, this is at

our summer home right here.

We have a little piece

of heaven there.

Because it's a three-day journey

to Siberia,

Dmitri's family doesn't visit.

He has not seen them

in over three years.

TRANSLATION: My dog, he's a beagle.

His name is Boss.

It's hard to live.

I think about them all the time.

Constantly, actually.

Perhaps in place of

the relationships disrupted

by his sentence, Dmitri has

formed a new one on the inside.

TRANSLATION: My best friend

is my roommate, George.

We live together, work together,

we're always together.

George is serving

a five-year sentence for drugs

and has three more years to go.

TRANSLATION:

Fear means showing weakness

and people with weakness

in this system break down.

There are many examples.

Some commit suicide,

some lose their mind.

You must decide for yourself,

what are you afraid of?

Pain?

No.

I think you should be afraid

of being alone.

The only thing I am afraid of

is to be alone.

The two friends have dreams

of vacations and ventures

upon their release.

But for now, they are prisoners.

Dmitri, George and all inmates

in this camp

are first-time offenders,

but crimes

range across the board,

from drug charges to rape.

TRANSLATION: I don't like rapists.

I just can't stand them.

I don't put them down,

I just don't socialise with them.

I will never do anything nice

or pleasant for them.

I just ignore them.

And some are even here for murder.

TRANSLATION:

There was an inmate here.

Because his mum didn't give him

money for a bottle of vodka...

..he beat her to death with a stool.

It's 6.00 am.

George and Dmitri are up

for mandatory morning exercise.

Temperatures linger

at 45 degrees below zero.

Anton Yefarkin, a senior prison

official, is overseeing the inmates.

TRANSLATION: The entire correctional

facility comes out and according

to the schedule,

does physical exercise.

The exercises are specially

selected to be light

so the convicts can simply wake up

and feel normal throughout the day.

But today is unlike every other day.

Two years into

his five-year sentence,

George prepares for

a visit from his father.

George is among the lucky

inmates whose family visits him

a few times a year.

Most are not as fortunate.

After a short hour, it's time to say

goodbye for another several months.

TRANSLATION: Well, of course

I would like to see him more often.

Excuse me...

What can I feel?

As a father, when I want to see

my son and under these conditions,

I can't.

It hurts.

In three years, George and his

father will reunite on the outside.

It will be a fresh start

for their family,

but it's a future

that is still uncertain.

TRANSLATION:

God forbid if I end up here again.

I wouldn't be able to even

look my parents in the face.

Later in the day, a potential

security breach unravels.

ALARM BLARES

ALARM CONTINUES

HIGH-PITCHED ALARM

DOG BARKS

Something triggers a motion

detector in a secure area.

DOG BARKS

Fortunately, today's alarm

is not a serious breach.

TRANSLATION: In this case,

we had a false alarm.

Upon investigation, it turned out

that the alarm responded

to a gust of wind.

The reserve team inspected the area

and didn't see any signs

of an attempt to escape.

One of the guards reported

to the guard in charge

and the emergency was called off.

Siberia battles

a lack of cheap labour.

The region's abundant prison camps

have eased the problem.

Prisoners see work as an opportunity

to escape the monotony

of incarceration.

Inmates in Camp 17 sew uniforms

and make industrial fencing

for $5 a day.

Siberia makes up more than

three-quarters of Russia...

..but only 15% of Russians

live here.

Most have settled along

the Trans-Siberian Railway.

TRAIN HORN BLARES

These trains have

brought convicts to prison camps

for over 100 years.

DOGS BARK

They are far from family...

..and unaccustomed to some of

the harshest winters in the world.

Today, a shipment

of new inmates arrives.

Among them, a convicted murderer.

For new inmates, the first weeks

of incarceration are intense.

Most commonly, inmates experience

fear, depression and aggression.

He will spend the next

two weeks quarantined,

away from the general population.

TRANSLATION: I can't describe it.

Everything happened in a haze.

I will try to survive.

People can survive everywhere.

Dmitri Komarov

has a brighter outlook.

Today is his parole hearing.

TRANSLATION: I'm very nervous.

I waited for this moment

for two years and eight months.

My feelings are indescribable.

I don't know yet.

When I go there, that's when

I will have more definite feelings.

Dmitri has one year and four months

remaining on his sentence...

..but he is hoping

for an early release.

The questions

focus on Dmitri's plans.

Where will he stay?

What will he do?

And whether he will

get back into crime.

TRANSLATION: If they happen to say

no to releasing me early on parole,

then of course I'll be upset,

but I will accept it.

No-one will know the decision

for sure right away,

whether you get out early

or must serve the full term.

It's what the court decides.

In another cell block,

inmates who don't follow the rules

face harsher treatment.

TRANSLATION:

This is a regimented place

where converts who have violated

the regime are held.

Here, inmates stay in cells all day.

Unless it's night-time,

the beds are locked up.

Anton, a senior guard, checks in.

TRANSLATION:

We are in the punishment cell area.

Convicts are here for

breaking the rules of the regime.

All the inmates in this area

are monitored 24/7.

Some are reading books, someone

is just walking around the cell

so nobody is sleeping,

nobody is breaking the rules.

Behind this door is a convict

who's spent time in

a correctional facility in America.

This bank robber

served time in a Seattle jail,

but he speaks only a little English.

A few days after

Dmitri's parole hearing,

the administration has a response.

Without the administration's

support,

he will spend the next year

and a half in Prison Camp 17.

TRANSLATION: I really

want to meet with my father

in the kitchen somewhere.

Talk to him and just

have a heart to heart.

I really want to see my mother.

She always really supported me.

I miss their jokes, their love.

I really miss this.

I miss it every day.

TRANSLATION: I'm extremely happy.

My thoughts are already

of being home.

All my thoughts are of home.

TRANSLATION: I am also

extremely happy for Dmitri.

I think that he deserved it.

We are all here temporarily.

Soon my turn will come.

I think that, in freedom,

we will definitely meet

and keep our friendship

when we are both free people.