My first experience photographing prison inmates was at Chino State Prison in Southern California. When I was hired for the project shown here, was originally asked to photograph a Catholic priest who administered last rites to death row inmates. But during the assignment, I struck up friendships with several of the prisoners. With Christmas approaching, I thought it would be a wonderful gesture to take their portraits so they could send photographs home to their families. I wasn’t permitted to shoot individual inmates, or be alone with them, so we had to shoot these portraits quickly and deceptively, around the corner from the Correctional Officers. We only to capture a few in this clandestine operation before we were discovered. But I love the way they turned out.