American Scandal

The Attica Correctional Facility is a notoriously brutal prison, where beatings are commonplace, and prisoners work for pennies. Tensions have begun to boil over, and after a guard and inmate get into a fight, the maximum-security prison is pushed to the brink.

Negotiators enter the prison, and attempt to bring an end to the uprising. But the prisoners make a demand that proves to be a major obstacle.

An unexpected death upends the negotiations. As both sides dig in their heels, the hope for a peaceful resolution begins to fade.

The inmates receive a final threat, as the state demands their surrender. Governor Rockefeller makes a fateful decision.

Lindsay sits down with Heather Ann Thompson, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Blood in the Water, which tells the history of Attica. Thompson discusses the troubling aftermath of the uprising, when New York’s government took back control of the prison. And she reveals how, for decades, the state has worked to suppress the truth about its siege.