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Wilbert Rideau Peculiar Case

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The Peculiar Case of Wilbert Rideau The Farm has destroyed many that have entered its camps. First, it was slaves from Africa, then Union army troops during the Civil War, and finally hundreds of thousand of men of every race and background. For those inmates on death row, Angola can be particularly cruel and inhumane. Prisoners in the row spend most of their time, and in many cases, their life, deprived of human interaction. However, through all the hardships of life in Angola, a select few are able to overcome. One of these men is Wilbert Rideau. Unsurprisingly, Rideau describes his experience at the Farm as "deprivation. It 's all about pain, misery and suffering"(NPR). But to fully understand Wilbert Rideau 's story of redemption it …show more content…

He was a 19-year-old high school dropout looking for cash in Lake Charles, Louisiana. Wilbert got his money but received a multitude of negativity in the process. When it was all said and done, one woman was deceased, two people were injured, and Rideau had incurred the wrath of a "white mob that had gathered at the site of his arrest and again at the jail"(A Brief History). Half-heartedly, Mr. Rideau was assigned two attorneys with a real estate background, and in 1961 he was sentenced to death by an all-white jury. Under normal circumstances, this would wrap up the court case, yet Rideau 's situation turns bizarre. After being sent to Angola in 1962, Rideau 's trial is reviewed by the U.S. Supreme Court, which labeled the presiding court in the case a kangaroo court. The Supreme Court insisted that Rideau 's "jurors were biased, and there should have been a change of venue"(NPR). Wilbert 's conviction was ultimately overturned by the higher court notwithstanding two Louisiana courts re-tried him and Wilbert without adequate defense lawyers was again sentenced to die. In limbo between life and death, he spent the next decade in The Farm waiting on his

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