About Heide Brandes

Prison Bar

She’s never been an inmate, but prison has always been in the cards for Roberta Fields: She was raised near one, met her husband at another, and worked for years in corrections as both a case manager and correctional officer.  “I grew up in Shadyside, Ohio, right across the river from the West Virginia State Penitentiary,” she says. “When we were little kids and an inmate escaped, they would sound the whistle. We would hear it across the river; we were super fascinated.” Fascinated …