“Gay for the Stay” & “Trains Run on Her”: Inside Mackenzie’s Prison Dating Life

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
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**Stephanie Soo** (0:27)
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Badda bing, badda boo. Some of the best advice you'll hear in life is sometimes the most simple advice. Don't go to prison. But apparently, not all advice is worth taking. And sometimes, or like all the time, it's completely unavoidable at that point. But if you are to end up in a prison, the Ohio Reformatory for Women in Marysville, Ohio is probably one of the better options.
One reporter who's been inside, she says it's more like a college campus. And instead of housing students, there's dorm rooms with women that are classified by their charges. You've got units, they call them cottages. They don't even call it units. Cottages for the four lifers. They're in there for life. You've got cottages for the people that are coming in and out. They've got a lot of programs in the reformatory that I have honestly not seen being offered at other prisons or even at like your local community college. You can get your GED, yes. But you can also take lessons on how to properly raise your child. You can help train service dogs.
One former resident, Cat, she says, You actually have a lot of freedom in there. There's a track, you've got a volleyball court, a basketball court, a softball field. You've got a gym, you've got school, a place where you can go to use computers for job readiness. You've got cosmetology school, you've got college, GEDs. There's a lot of buildings and you kind of have free reign to kind of go and come as you please. If you're not doing that, you walk the track or you sit in the yard.
There's like tables also where you can watch TV in your bunk. You're on the phone doing video visits.

**SPEAKER_1** (2:30)
That's crazy. Wow.

**Stephanie Soo** (2:31)
It sounds like a summer camp. Yeah. And the Reformatory, they offer three different yard time slots in a singular day. So you've got the first, second and third yard. And this is a lot. Like most people, they'll maybe get yard time once a day. And that's if they're really lucky.
They have three yard time slots. One's really early in the morning. The second is in the middle of the day. And then there's one at the very end of the day. Interestingly, it's not even as bad as PE class in high school because you can't opt out of that. You can technically opt out of yard time in the reformatory. If it's too hot, if it's too cold, or for whatever reason, you just don't want to be outside, you can opt to stay in your room. A lot of people will stay in their rooms because they don't like the weather outside. There's no point in going out because when you come back in, there's no AC in the building. So everybody's sweating. They say it does get really bad in the summers. Like you'll stick to your bed in the summertime, but you can buy fans in the commissary. But it's that hot. Now for some people though, it doesn't matter the weather. They're going out for yard time because yard time is game time. Residents remember there will always be a few girls out at yard time who've got full face of makeup on. They've got gems in their hair. Each gem is like $15.
You have to buy it. They have curled hair. You can get a curling iron. They look like they're going to the club, just walking around yard time. It's like walking around Rodeo Drive, just walk and walk in.
Yard time is also, however, one of the few times throughout the day that inmates can be in the sun. So I get it, right? I mean, get fresh air. It's also hugely psychologically beneficial. Plus, yard time serves as the main flow of information between cottages. This is very likely the place where people start whispering about people they've met inside, who just came into their cottage, or sometimes they're whispering about the show that they just saw. Because there's TVs in the common areas. And there was this show that was playing on there. It's like one of those investigation discovery shows about a true crime case. And they said one episode was detailing how 17-year-old Mackenzie Shirilla drove a car into a building at nearly 100 miles per hour, killing her boyfriend Dom and their friend Davion. You know, that case, who also happens to be their fellow inmate, the one that's walking around looking like she's going bar hopping with a full face of makeup at yard time every single day? That one killed two people. And now, one former inmate says, you know she's actually in the bathroom getting trains run on her?