Swinn talked about the causes of Sam’s problems. He described
the horrors of living in a cell, near the gas chamber, twenty-three
hours a day; o f being denied companionship, good food, sex,
movement, exercise, fresh air. H e’d worked with many death row
inmates and knew their problems well. Sam, of course, was very
different because of his age. The average death row inmate was
thirty-one years old, but Sam was sixty when he first arrived at
Parchman. Physically and mentally, he was not suited for it.