Top 25 Nick Yarris Quotes

They put me in solitary confinement, and although I went on to do 8,755 days of solitary in total, the first two were the hardest. I almost went mad, beating my head against the wall.

I used to dream about being able to sit at a table with another human being, have a normal conversation, and have a meal with normal cutlery, and have normal moments.

The world on the outside was tougher than I imagined. I felt allergic to fresh air, and my feet hurt from wearing shoes again. I didn’t know how long I was going to live, so I did everything as fast as I could.

I circumnavigated the globe while I was sitting in a prison. It was wonderful because I kept defeating those walls they put around me.

I taught myself German and psychology. Learning about psychology really helped me understand myself and the others around me and it helped keep me sane.

If you torture a man as I was tortured he will learn more about love than you could ever ­imagine, and that has left me ­vulnerable.

I used music and reading to erase my world, so basically I read for up to 16 hours a day for 23 years.

Death row saved my life. It taught me everything is a luxury to be treasured.

Here’s the crazy thing: if I was guilty I would be entitled to job training, housing, medical treatment. But I have nothing. I was released with five dollars and 37 cents of my own money.

The whole purpose of my education ultimately was so I could deliver a statement eloquently before my execution.

I have nothing negative to say because what happened to me has happened to many others and I need to always remember that it was not personal what happened to me.

There is a man out there who prosecuted me. He’s been constantly calling different lawyers, telling them how afraid of me his is. He’s afraid I’ll come after him now that I’m out, because of all the horrible things he did to me. The furthest thing from my mind I would ever do is waste a day being vindictive.

For more than 20 years my identity was bonded with those people on death row, I cared about them.

Everyone seems to be rushing through their lives, wishing they had just two minutes to do all the things they want to get gone.

I had an enormous responsibility not just to survive but to become a good man because I had all of my family’s hopes on my shoulders because they walked around outside without the shield that I carried knowing I hadn’t done anything.

It is a strange thing that true crime has now got entertainment value. I don’t know why people love shows about crime so much.

It is really difficult to read a movie script about yourself and to think that a major actor – perhaps even Chris Pine – is going to play this role is really daunting.

When everyone is spitting in your face and you can be nice back to society – that is the ultimate self empowerment and that’s what I was striving for.

I realised no one else was going to care about me so I started to be nice to myself.

I was 20 when I was sentenced to death. My life had been on a one-way path to self-destruction for years. I don’t remember too much about my early life, but I think I had a happy childhood, growing up in Philadelphia in a loving family with five siblings.

I lived around the man who was the model for Buffalo Bill in the movie ‘Silence of the Lambs.’

My worst memory is living through the 1989 riot in Huntingdon Prison.

In death row every rule in society is flipped.

So the chances of you being sentenced to Death Row in America is roughly the same as you winning the lottery.

The hardest thing to do when people are hurting you is to remain a decent person.