Dan Bright is a thirty-seven-year-old New Orleans native, born and raised in the Ninth Ward. After spending ten years in prison—five on death row—he was exonerated and released in 2004. On the eve of Hurricane Katrina, he was arrested on allegations of disorderly conduct and sent to the city’s central lockup. During the storm, the guards left Bright and his fellow detainees to fend for themselves.

VOW: So when did you start hearing the storm?

DB: Late, late, maybe early Monday morning, maybe like 4 or 5.

VOW: What’d it sound like?

DB: Hard wind, very hard wind. And lights went out. I’m trying to remember what time the water started rising.

VOW: So the lights went out Monday morning.

DB: Yeah, early Monday morning

VOW: Did you hear the rain?

DB: We can look out the window. They had these little portholes that you can look out, and see the rain, the wind blowing and the water started rising.

VOW: You were on the top floor?

DB: I was on the top floor.

VOW: So how do you see the water?

DB: I can easily look out. It’s like this, this like the top level, and the bottom level would be under there, but the lobby would be the street, so you can look down and see the water rising.

VOW: At what time did it start rising?

DB: It was early.

VOW: How can you see the water?

DB: You can see the water. And the water constantly rising. You guys remember, we stuck in these cells. And the guys on the first level, man, they hollering and screaming, no ones comes. So, the water constantly rising...

VOW: This started at what time?

DB: ’Bout what time... It had to be early. It was early.

VOW: If it’s all dark in there, how could you see the water rising?

DB: You can see the water... And the water is constantly rising. You gotta remember, we stuck in these cells. Guys on the first level, on the bottom level, man they hollerin’ and screamin’. No one comes. See the water constantly rising.

VOW: So what are they screaming?

DB: Screaming out the cell, they trying to get somebody’s attention.

VOW: Are they trying to get your attention?

DB: They trying to get the guard’s attention, but no one still come. So now, only thing we had to do now is to break out. We wasn’t trying to break out just to be breakin’ out of jail, we breakin’ out to save our lives. So we kickin’ on the cell doors, and one guy showed us how to kick the bottom of it, and it would come off the hinges. But you still had to kick on this door maybe like two hours and whoever in your cell—your cell partner—he got to help you kick. You take turns. You kick, if your ankles don’t break you be alright. But you got to remember you kicking on a steel door. I kick a little while, then he’ll kick. Then after awhile, you don’t want it to come off, you just want it to give away a little bit, so you can push it off its hinge and ease up out it. And some guys that got out, then they got a mop ringer...

VOW: So how many hours are you kicking?

DB: Maybe like two, three hours of kicking. You got to kick off. And they have this mop ringer, that the guy got and busted a hole in his cell wall. And that’s the way we were doing it, you bust a hole in that wall, the guy would come out.

VOW: So you had one opening? And everyone would get through that one opening?

DB: No, the cell next to you. Now, you got to go in that cell and get the other guy out. All the cells is next to each other, so you got to knock holes in those cells to get those guys out, and some guy was breaking out through the door, kicking on the door like we was kicking. Now if you would go in that jail, if they haven’t patched those holes up, you would see what I’m talking about. They got holes all through the wall.

VOW: I would like to see that. What’s the address there again?

DB: Templeman, Templeman III, Gravier St.

VOW: Right, right. And I’m telling everyone to get a subpoena, and I will give you a grand tour of that. I would love to go in there with you and show you.

DB: Yeah, and you would see if you pass on [inaudible], you could see all the windows bust out the jail. The windows is like very long. You could see, you had guys breaking the windows out, and burning whatever they could burn, waving them, to try to get somebody’s attention.

VOW: You broke your cell open? And then the cell next to you broke the wall to get into your cell?

DB: Right.

VOW: And the cell next to that one broke your wall? How many people ended up being able to...

DB: It was a lot of them. And once you got more than one, you can pry ’em open with everybody pullin’ on ‘em. You gotta remember all you want do is knock them off the hinge.

VOW: You were on the second floor, did you go down, or did the first tier get out on their own?

DB: We had to go down to help most of ’em. When you go down, the water is maybe up to here.

VOW: Up to your chest?

DB: Yeah, up to my chest, right. And you got to remember that these guys are on that first level. They’re scared to death. They think this water gon’ continue to rise, but the water stopped maybe to your chest but they had no knowledge of that water gonna stop. So they hollerin’ and screamin’. I think a guy, if I’m not mistaken, a old guy was down there, had a heart attack, and he was in the top bunk of the bed, and he wasn’t moving. So I don’t know if he made it out or not. And I heard a story about a guy really died in that jail. They’ll cover it up and say it didn’t happen, but it only get worse.

VOW: So you went downstairs, tell me what you did? You get out... You got out of your cell?

DB: When we got out, a lot of guys got out of the cell. You gotta remember once you get out of the cell, you still in this dormitory, like, cage. So when you get out, we went down on the lower level trying to help those guys get out. Some guys had to go down, there was a mop ringer. The mop ringer is made out of pipe, so we use that pipe to pry the door open. But you got guy had to go down in the water and find out where the door hinge at, to pry it open. So your guy gotta keep comin’ up getting’ air. So that’s how we were getting’ the guys from on the lower level.

VOW: They actually dive down?

DB: Yeah, and it’s filthy water. And everyone... you couldn’t save everyone in the lower cell, ’cause you tryin’ to get out also. When we finally got out, you came to a hallway. Come to central lockup and that’s where they at, outside. There were boats and all that. They know we were gettin’ out.

VOW: They knew that.

DB: Yeah they knew, but they wasn’t gon’ come in and help us. They didn’t even come in the prison, they was outside the prison. Maybe like twenty of ’em with boats.

VOW: These were guards?

DB: Yeah, and when we gets out, they put us on a boat.

VOW: So how’d you get out? You were in the dormitory...

DB: We broke the window, the window made of something, like a thick plastic.

VOW: So you just broke through them? And there’s water on the outside?

DB: Yeah, water everywhere.

VOW: How high was the water on the outside?

DB: It was like chest-high.

VOW: So they’re just sitting there in boats, the guards. They’re just watching?