The Gatekeeper
Mississippi’s corrections commissioner, Burl Cain, is reportedly not a fan of inmate interviews. When I asked about visiting Joseph Spring at the Central Mississippi Correctional Facility, Cain aide Leo Honeycutt said his boss’s position is that such interviews can cause internal controversy – that inmates sometimes get upset when one of them receives special attention. As a result, my request would likely be denied, Honeycutt said.
I had years ago interviewed another inmate without any problem, and Spring, for his part, laughed when I told him about the commissioner’s concern. Most of the guys in his unit are in for the long haul, in close custody, off in their own little world, and the last thing they would care about was some guy talking with me, he said.
All of which is to say that Honeycutt’s explanation did not fully satisfy. I wondered if Cain was perhaps generally averse to media coverage, or concerned about what a voluble inmate might reveal. (For new readers who may not be up to speed on the series of stories about Spring that brought us here, it might be useful to read the episode “The need to know” for background.)
In hopes of getting a better grasp of Cain’s rationale, I began looking into his professional history and came across a book, God of the Rodeo, in which author Daniel Bergner claims that Cain, who was then warden of Louisiana’s Angola prison in the late 1990s, denied him access to inmate interviews because Bergner refused to pony up part of his book advance and grant editorial control of his manuscript. Bergner provided no proof of his allegation, and Cain denied it happened. Nothing remotely like it happened when I applied to visit Spring. It was just an interesting aside.
Bergner’s book is about Angola’s famed inmate rodeo, but in many ways it is also about Burl Cain. Bergner writes that Cain had previously granted him free access to inmates, but that after he refused the warden’s new stipulations he was barred from doing further interviews. In response, he began researching Cain’s backstory and found published reports that raised questions about his prior business dealings with the Louisiana corrections system. Bergner then successfully sued to regain access to the inmates.
Cain’s business deals, it turns out, raised questions throughout his two decades as Angola’s warden. They were the subject of an exposé by the Baton Rouge Advocate newspaper as well as probes by multiple state agencies. Though none of the official investigations resulted in charges of wrongdoing, Cain subsequently resigned.
Four years later, in 2020, Gov. Tate Reeves hired him to run Mississippi’s prison system.
During his Mississippi Senate confirmation process, Cain denied the allegations about his tenure in Louisiana and noted that he had been exonerated. The lawmakers listened with interest, no doubt because Mississippi’s last corrections commissioner, Chris Epps, had gone to federal prison for bribery and other charges.
The news outlet Mississippi Today was among the few in the state that reported closely on Cain’s past controversies in the context of the Mississippi job, but I had read little of its coverage and did not know much about him when I set out to arrange an in-person interview with Spring.
After I identified myself as a member of the news media, the MDOC staffer who responded to my initial query referred me to communications liaison Grace Fisher, who referred me to Honeycutt, an advisor to Cain who also fielded media queries. Honeycutt said he would ask the commissioner about my request to visit but that it would likely be denied for the reasons described. I then filed an official visitor’s application through routine MDOC channels, as a freelance writer and a friend of Spring’s nascent memoir about his experiences within Mississippi’s criminal justice system, which I had offered to help him get prepared for possible publication. My application was subsequently approved, then cancelled less than an hour later, the day before the interview was to take place.
When I texted Honeycutt to ask why my visit had been cancelled, he said he was unaware that I had applied and was surprised my application had been approved, but that he would speak with Cain about it. After two weeks passed without further word, I again texted him and he responded on Oct. 19, 2023: “I’m traveling on assignment and exiting MDOC at the same time. I’ll ask commissioner Cain again about this but I’ve already told you he’s not for such interviews because of the concerns I outlined. Now, nobody can stop the inmate from calling you. That would be the quickest.” Such phone calls are typically recorded, and Spring had said he could talk more freely in person, which is why I had applied to visit. By this point, he and I had done numerous phone interviews, but after my visit was canceled, his phone calls ceased.
I later texted Honeycutt to ask about his departure from MDOC and for the appropriate contact for further queries, but got no response. More than a month later, Honeycutt’s LinkedIn page and the MDOC website still list him as the agency’s director of communications.
I had expected Honeycutt to endorse my in-person interview because he is the author of a biography of former Louisiana Gov. Edwin Edwards, a convicted felon who has since died, which required extensive prison interviews. But after the October text, Honeycutt ghosted me.
Bergner’s conflict with Cain over inmate interviews was a departure from their early relationship, he writes in his book. Initially, Bergner was impressed by the warden’s unconventional methods but writes that his feelings changed after his publisher’s book advance came up in conversation. In his lawsuit, Bergner claimed that in barring him from Angola, Cain had violated his constitutional free speech and free press rights. A U.S. district court judge ordered that he be reinstated to conduct inmate interviews; he also issued a temporary order prohibiting the warden and other corrections employees from using threats, intimidation or other means to discourage Angola inmates from cooperating with Bergner’s research, according to the news site Nola.com.
At the time, Angola was under federal oversight and, according to the Boston Globe, the judge “had clashed earlier with Cain over questionable business enterprises involving prison labor.”
After Bergner wrote about his allegations in Harper’s magazine, the Louisiana Senate held a hearing into the matter, at which, according to the Globe, Cain told lawmakers, “It would be totally illogical of me to hit on him. I banned him from the prison when he refused to give me editorial control.” The committee took no further action.
Bergner’s lawsuit claimed that Cain had initially given him “carte blanche” access to areas of the maximum-security prison and authority to conduct unmonitored interviews with inmates during several visits in 1996 and 1997. Bergner claimed the arrangement soured after Cain learned that he had asked inmates about drugs and homosexuality in prison. Bergner also claimed Cain told him prison officials would monitor future inmate interviews “to make sure they don’t say anything bad about us,” but that Bergner would be allowed to have more private conversations if he gave Cain editorial review rights. During the same discussions, Bergner claimed, Cain asked how much his publisher had advanced him for his book and suggested he share $50,000 of the total. According to Bergner’s account, he later proposed an agreement that would have allowed Cain to review the accuracy of book passages about him or his family, but Cain considered that insufficient.
The events that Bergner cites from his own research into Cain’s history had begun in 1991, when Cain helped launch an organization called the Louisiana Association of Wardens and Superintendents for the purpose of lobbying the governor – the aforementioned Edwin Edwards -- on an appointment to oversee the state’s department of corrections, Nola.com reported. According to the article, Cain “took Gov. Edwin Edwards -- newly sworn in for his fourth term -- to Ruth’s Chris [Steakhouse] for the sole purpose of installing Richard Stalder, then warden of Wade Correctional Center, as corrections secretary. Stalder had been one of Cain’s deputies.” Edwards later appointed Stalder to the post and Stalder, in turn, named Cain warden of Angola in 1995, the article reported.
After taking charge at Angola, Cain reportedly secured a deal with a private company “to have inmates scrape rust and old labels off of expired canned goods and replace them with new ones, allowing the products to be sold in places such as Russia and Latin America with more lax food regulations,” Nola.com reported. The arrangement came under scrutiny after an inmate raised questions about the propriety of the plant, which was later shut down; two years after that, one co-owner reportedly pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor federal charge of mislabeling a food product, according to the article.
Afterward, according to The Advocate, it came to light that as warden of Louisiana’s Dixon prison in 1992, Cain had assisted a private firm that sought to build a recycling plant which would make use of inmate labor, and would have paid him a five percent commission for every new plant that he lined up. The contract, the article reported, appeared to violate ethics rules barring state employees from making personal deals with companies they hire, though Cain argued that it was ethical and above board. Cain’s relationship with the company surfaced only after the plan fell apart and he and a business partner sued the company in federal court, claiming they had been hoodwinked into investing, the article reported.
During Cain’s long tenure in corrections, several of his family members were also involved in the Louisiana prison system. His son Nathan Burl “Nate” Cain II became warden of Avoyelles Correctional Center and another son, Marshall Cain, became manager of Prison Enterprises, which bought products for the correctional system and sold products that the inmates produced, Nola.com reported. His son-in-law Seth Henry Smith, according to the article, was appointed “confidential assistant” for the corrections department. None of this involved nepotism because Cain was not in charge of the prison system – he was a warden. Nor was he implicated in a 2019 case in which Nate Cain pleaded guilty and went to prison for misappropriating state funds for his own use, as did his ex-wife, who had worked in the Avoyelles business office.
I found no apparent connections between Cain family members and the Mississippi Department of Corrections. “N. Burl Cain” is listed on the Mississippi Secretary of State website as a member of the board of directors of the Lansdowne, Virginia-based nonprofit Prison Fellowship Ministries, a position he also lists on his MDOC bio.
According to Nola.com, “another side deal” eventually “undid” Cain, which involved a more than $2 million investment in a real-estate venture in West Feliciana Parish with relatives and friends of inmates as partners, an apparent violation of corrections rules.
Louisiana’s WAFB-TV broke the news of Cain’s unexpected retirement, saying persistent questions about his business relationships had convinced him that it was time to leave. In 2015, according to WAFB, the Louisiana Department of Corrections held a news conference related to Cain’s alleged policy violations. Corrections head James LeBlanc said the state Department of Public Safety and Corrections was working with other agencies, including the State Police and the Inspector General’s office, to investigate the matter. “All the allegations that have been made are serious allegations and we’re going to treat them that way,” LeBlanc reportedly said. Cain had announced the previous week that he was resigning after more than 20 years at Angola, WAFB reported.
The Advocate reported that the West Feliciana project was a subdivision near Cain’s home in Jackson, Louisiana, about 30 miles from Angola, for which he had entered into a partnership with a friend and a family member of two inmates. The newspaper reported that when asked about his real-estate transactions, Cain said the matter “has been looked at and talked about” already. Though Cain initially agreed to an interview, the newspaper reported, he then asked that questions be delivered by mail. “We’d rather not put it on a state-owned computer, if you don’t mind,” the article quoted Cain’s lawyer saying. In the end, Cain declined to answer the questions. “As much as he would like to respond, it would take hours for him to set you straight,” the lawyer reportedly wrote in a letter to The Advocate. “Consequently, Warden Cain declines to lower himself into the world of gossip, rumor and fantasy.”
A year after Cain resigned, The Advocate, citing an investigative report by the Louisiana Legislative Auditor’s Office, reported that at least 10 correctional employees had helped renovate his private home. The audit, the article noted, “underscored his reputation for landing himself in ethically compromised positions.”
Mississippi Today quoted Cain saying of the controversies during his confirmation hearing: “I was investigated – three investigations and it was all totally unfounded. That’s why I stand before you today. I’ve been totally investigated and I’ve come out clean. I was exonerated.” Reeves said his search committee had looked into the matters and that he had “zero reservations” about appointing Cain.
After taking the helm in Mississippi, Cain vowed to get the state’s troubled prison system back on track, including by driving inmate criminal gangs from power. He also introduced state-sanctioned religious programs, as he had done at Angola. Though he has had some success in stabilizing the system, violence and inmate escapes remain persistent problems. Citing records from the State Medical Examiner’s Office, Mississippi Today reported that more than 300 inmate deaths have occurred in state prisons since Cain became commissioner, with at least 50 of those attributed to homicide, suicide or drug overdose. Another article cited a 2021 report by the U.S. Justice Department that concluded lack of adequate supervision threatened the safety of Parchman penitentiary inmates and staff.
In early November 2023, Mississippi Today reported that MDOC’s second in command, Karei McDonald Jr., had unexpectedly left his position, effective immediately, and that his bio had been scrubbed from the agency’s webpage. Among his other responsibilities, McDonald oversaw department budgeting and procurement, according to the bio, the outlet reported. Another outlet reported that he was escorted from his office by MDOC’s Criminal Investigations Division. None of the reports referenced any wrongdoing.
Though Honeycutt attributed Cain’s rejection of my visit to the potential for controversy among the prison population, it would not be surprising if Cain were wary of media attention, given past coverage. In another previous episode, from 2011, a reporter for Mother Jones wrote in an article about Angola that Cain had been unhappy about his previous reporting about the prison and that it had taken “close to two years and the threat of an ACLU lawsuit to get permission to visit the place.”
Notes
God of the Rodeo, by Daniel Bergner
Nola.com:
The fall of Burl Cain: How one last side deal led to longtime Angola warden’s undoing
The Boston Globe:
Book reins in a warden’s image; writer sees ego, not benevolence
The Advocate:
Audit: Former Angola warden Burl Cain benefited from free labor, nearly $20K in other freebies
Ex-Louisiana prison warden Nate Cane and his ex-wife get prison time for ripoff
Hearing up today over inmate jobs
WAFB/CBS:
State leaders launch investigation into Angola Prison Warden Burl Cain
Investigators: Longtime Angola prison warden Burl Cain says he is resigning
Burl Cain holds news conference after being cleared of wrongdoing, doesn’t talk about investigation
Mississippi Today:
How Mississippi’s troubled prison system has fared under Tate Reeves and Burl Cain
MDOC’s second in command out, replaced with new commissioner
Darkhorse Press:
MDOC Deputy Commissioner Karei McDonald Leaves Under Abrupt And Sketchy Circumstances
Mother Jones:
Image: Burl Cain, Mississippi Today