Jimmy Iakovos

Meth Was the Routine in Our Biker Club. Psychedelics Were the Escapes.

I was a fan of psychedelics long before I got ahold of any. Such exotic drugs as LSD were not…

October 23, 2023

GA May Put CBD in Pharmacies. Could It Help People on Parole?

In a June 14 public hearing, the Georgia State Board of Pharmacy is considering proposals to make authorized medical cannabis…

June 14, 2023

Making Phone Calls From Our Prison Costs Us More Than Just the Money

Thirty years ago, Georgia Department of Corrections (GDC) prisoners were only allowed one 15-minute phone call per month. You made…

June 12, 2023

Georgia Poised to Criminalize Vaping in Public Spaces

The state of Georgia has long criminalized harm reduction whatever way it can, and tobacco harm reduction has not escaped…

April 3, 2023

How I Quit Cigarettes in Prison, After Smoking for 40 Years

I’m coming up on the three-year anniversary of the day I stopped smoking cigarettes. It’s strange to think that I…

February 23, 2023

How Drugs Grew in Our Prison Flower Beds for Over a Decade

[Read Part 1 of this story here.] Charlie was someone you’d expect to be an easy target in prison, and…

December 19, 2022

The Gardener Who Grew Our Health Care in Prison

For most of his time in Georgia Department of Corrections custody, Charlie was assigned to the horticulture crew. Over those…

December 15, 2022

Prison “K2”: The Hidden Center of a Chaotic New Drug War

Back when I was running with biker gangs, we used to play a game called Crash or Fly. Someone would…

November 28, 2022

How Prison and Parole Can Pull You Into a Debt Trap

In her late 20s, Laura* sold an eighth of Vitablend to a person who turned out to be an undercover…

July 20, 2022

Lifers, Lab Rats and the Mandatory Minimums Experiment

In the 1950s, John's Hopkins University Professor Curt Richter ran a series of experiments on rats that involved placing them…

June 6, 2022