Abby Connolly
Randi then explains that these inmates were placed in an area away from the prison’s general population to keep them from getting hurt or killed by other inmates.
Before her shift, Randi was unsure what she was walking into or how the inmates would behave, but she remembers the experience as not at all what she expected.
“[It was] definitely not what I expected,” says Randi.
“I say that because they were all so nice and extremely respectful. Most inmates, they’re not the nicest, you know? But all of these guys were so incredibly nice [and] so respectful. They never gave me a hard time [and] they never harassed me.”
Randi recalls these inmates being polite and charming, always saying please and thank you and asking her to get them things ‘whenever she had the chance.’ They behaved the exact opposite way she expected, which she found to be terrifying.
“We think these monsters look like monsters; they don’t,” says Randi.
“They look nice, they have good manners, and they’re respectful. They gotta get you to trust them [and] they’re good at it, like, they’re scary good at it.”
Eventually, Randi was a little freaked out when she remembered that all of those super polite and friendly inmates were the ones who did something awful to children. Not a single one of them would be where they were if they hadn’t done something to harm a child.
She was deeply disturbed when she went home after that shift and researched what some of those men had done. To make matters worse, many were men who were supposed to protect and nurture children, like doctors, pastors, judges, and fathers.
In her video, Randi explains that this is one of the reasons she doesn’t want to send her children to sleepovers. You never know what an adult, even if they seem friendly and have great kids, is capable of.
“You don’t know what goes on in other people’s homes, and also, I don’t think we talk about it enough, but not just men hurt children,” says Randi.
