Undercounted: Why suicide is a leading cause of death in U.S. jails

Here & Now Anytime

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4.1 • 953 Ratings

🗓️ 2 October 2025

⏱️ 27 minutes

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Summary

Mario Mason died by suicide in the Oklahoma County jail soon after he was convicted of murder in a dispute over a stolen car. His death wasn’t an outlier — data from the Marshall Project found that suicide is a leading cause of death in U.S. jails. Here & Now’s Peter O’Dowd reports from Oklahoma City.

And, some U.S. jails are taking measures to reduce suicide risk factors. O’Dowd talks with Jason Knutti, a formerly incarcerated man who experienced thoughts of suicide in jail, and Brown University's Lauren Weinstock, who studies suicide risk for people who have been incarcerated.

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0:00.0	Support for NPR and the following message comes from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
0:05.4	RWJF is a national philanthropy working toward a future where health is no longer a privilege but a right.
0:12.1	Learn more at RWJF.org.
0:16.6	WBUR Podcasts, Boston.
0:21.4	It's okay to say, hey, I need some help, man.
0:24.3	I can't do this by myself.
0:26.7	If you entertain the thought of end in your life, please don't do that.
0:29.6	You're worse more than that.
0:33.5	Suicide is a leading cause of death in American jails.
0:38.3	Families shattered by loss, blame a broken system.
0:51.4	This is here and now anytime from NPR and WBUR Boston.
0:55.8	I'm Chris Bentley.
1:01.7	We're continuing our series, Undercounted, the Hidden Deaths in America's Jails.
1:08.0	This is the second of three episodes looking at why so many people die behind bars and what
1:13.6	might be done to save their lives. You do not need to have heard the first episode to understand
1:18.3	today's, but you really should check out the whole series by following this podcast. I'm here with
1:24.1	Peter O'Dowd, who has been traveling the country to better understand the hidden
1:28.4	deaths in America's jails. And Peter, so today, you dig into one of the leading causes of
1:34.8	death in American jails, suicide. And I think it can't really be overstated that many of the
1:41.4	people that we're talking about in this series are awaiting trial or they haven't been convicted of anything. And yet they're locked up for a long
1:49.3	time, months in some cases before they might have their day in court. And when you spend that
1:54.3	long in custody, I think the conditions of jails matter a lot. This isn't just a matter of a few
	...

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