Sandy Ray, a 61-year-old woman awaiting a lung transplant, left her oxygen tank at home in a desperate rush to reach her dying son in hospital. What she found there would haunt her forever.
A Mother's Agony and a System's Failure
Her son, 35-year-old Steven, lay on life support in 2019, brutally beaten by guards at the William E. Donaldson Correctional Facility in Alabama. Doctors confirmed nothing more could be done. As Sandy held his hand all night, hooked to his oxygen supply, she was told the machines would be switched off. Yet, she was denied the right to make that decision herself.
"They had to call the prison warden. Steven belonged to the state of Alabama," Sandy told Metro from her Texas home. "We had to wait around until they found her. She called back and said 'Do it'. It was shocking. Horrible."
A disturbing photo, taken by Steven's brother while guards slept, showed him bruised, intubated, and unrecognisable, with blood crusted around his mouth and severe swelling. "His whole body had footprints on. It was so bad, we had to have a closed casket," Sandy said.
The Cover-Up and the Promotion
The family was initially told Steven had attacked guards with plastic shivs, forcing them to use deadly force. Later, an anonymous prison staff member called to say he was murdered by an officer. Inmates who witnessed the attack corroborated this, alleging internal investigators encouraged them to claim ignorance in exchange for potential transfers.
Roderick Gadson, the officer alleged to have beaten Steven to death, was cleared following an internal investigation. He has since been promoted twice. The prison has not responded to requests for comment.
"A dog wouldn't be treated in that way," Sandy said. "To lose a son like that – I was just in disbelief. It was hurtful, and frustrating and there were so many lies."
Steven's Story and a Documentary's Exposé
Sandy remembers Steven as an energetic, happy child, a talented athlete who struggled with ADHD and oppositional defiant disorder. He was labelled a bad kid but was very smart. After dropping out of school, he moved to Alabama, where a terrible mistake cost him his life. In 2009, he was sentenced to 20 years for murder after being forced at gunpoint to drive a car following a drug-related shooting.
Her story features in the HBO documentary The Alabama Solution, directed by Andrew Jarecki and Charlotte Kaufman. The film, using contraband phone footage, exposes the brutality, corruption, and inhumanity within Alabama's prisons.
Alabama's 14 prisons have the highest murder and suicide rates in the US. Andrew Jarecki stated that around 1,400 people have died in state custody since filming began in 2019. He described conversations with guards and inmates that "made my hair stand on end," citing an officer who casually mentioned placing people in solitary confinement for up to five years—a practice the UN defines as torture.
"I was shocked by the level of brutality and the lack of justice we saw," Jarecki said, arguing for better ways to address crime rooted in poverty.
A Mother's Mission for Reform
Now in ill health, Sandy is fighting for prison reform. "People are killing our family members like they are nothing. They are not nothing. They are human too," she said. "People have done wrong and they deserve punishment, but let's try to steer them in the right direction. They are just dying left and right for no reason."
She receives calls from other bereaved mothers struggling to uncover the truth about their sons' deaths. "I'm on a mission. They can't knock me out. I'm going to get justice for Stevie, and then we're going to change things within the system," Sandy vowed. "That way other mothers don't go through what I went through."
