Sunday Mornings with Big Mitch: Ep. 11

On this episode of Our American Stories, every Sunday, Our American Stories host Lee Habeeb speaks with Mitchel "Big Mitch" Rutledge, who has spent more than forty years serving a life sentence in Alabama. Each call traces the shape of faith, regret, and forgiveness inside a place built for punishment.
When Mitch first entered prison, he couldn't read or write. He had dropped out of school early and tested just above the threshold that once marked intellectual disability. But that was only where the story just began. Over time, he learned to read, earned multiple degrees, and became a teacher to other prisoners. 

On this particular Easter Sunday, Mitch shared what he saw as his resurrection story—one shaped by faith, discipline, and the belief that change is always within reach.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib, and this is our American stories.
This next story is about a friend of mine. We're
close in age, but have little else in common. Mitchell
Rutledge aka Big Mitch, was born black and poor in Georgia.
I was born kind of brown and middle class in
New Jersey. He never met his father. I still talk

(00:33):
to my ninety four year old father every week. He
dropped out of high school in his early teens and
was illiterate into his early twenties. I was surrounded by
books growing up and finished graduate school in my early thirties.
Big Mitch spent the last forty four years of his
life in Alabama prisons for killing a man. But this

(00:55):
is not a story about an innocent man sentenced to
prison for a crime he didn't commit. Big Mitch never
denied the crime or made excuses for it. This is
the story of my friend's spiritual transformation while serving his
life sentence. It's also about a friendship. Only God could

(01:15):
have engineered a friendship that began with a single Sunday
morning call. Through these weekly conversations, I hope you come
to know and love him as much as I do.
Here's episode eleven. Our conversation on Easter Sunday, March thirty first,
twenty twenty four, where Mitch shares the story of how
even he, an inmate who scored just below what is

(01:39):
considered to be mental retardation on an IQ test, can
still achieve educational success. Let's take a listen.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
This is a free call from an.

Speaker 1 (01:53):
Incarcerated individual at Alabama Department of Corrections.

Speaker 2 (01:57):
To accept this free call press one to used this
pre called press to thank you, forducing Securius. You may
start the conversation now. Joe Sequel, he was. He was
a bank robber. And when I get off there road
and they moved in the dormitory with him. You know,
he was the older guy. He and Joe Cie was

(02:20):
every now Joe Cecert would be who see, he might
be about ninety something, but he didn't look his age,
so he was still real fit. So I met him
and we lived in the same dormitory together. He did
he worked in the leather shoping, he made leave goods.
You know, he was real good or he was a
level crash. He was like a no nonsense guy. So anyway, uh,

(02:43):
I know him and I knew that he was real.
He was extremely intelligent, you know, So I had tuck
me g he the first time and uh and when
I didn't pass it, the only two things that I
missed was I in math and English, but I passed

(03:03):
and social studies, science and English literature. I ate those.
So the only thing I really had to do next
I had to take the whole test over. But the
points that you scold they were staying, so really I
really didn't have to worry about the other three because

(03:24):
the points that I made and that when changed. So
the only thing I had to do is pack my
grade up in English and math. Anyway, when the test
first came back, I got in the back of the
line because you know, I was intimidated and uh so
I saw the teacher shaking guys hand and so on,

(03:45):
so I got in the back of the line. He said,
well a miss, I said, yeah. He said, I'm sorry, Uh,
you know other words, been a long time, but you know,
you didn't make it this time, but you did good.
So I looked at him, and I made a forty
two point six but the past to test you had
to you had to make it forty forty five points

(04:06):
and more so I looked at it I said, shoot,
I said, man, it ain't nothing about that had three
points to get me there. That's where I looked at it.
So I was encourageration. I was okay. So he said, well,
you're gonna take it three months later? Good with me.
I ain't feel bad. I felt good because I was
a bride. I was. I didn't think I score that high.

(04:31):
So he said, you gotta find somebody to help you
with the English and your math. So I said, man,
I gotta find somebody. You have one minute left. So
I'm walking through the dormitory and so I'm looking around
and I see Joe secret and uh, I tell Joe Cia.
I said, hey, you man, I said, you can pretty

(04:51):
good with that math, and ain't He said, yeah? Me,
I said, I need you. He said, yeah, I helped
your man. You know. And you know, in the environment
like this, you knew a lot of guys. You know, hey,
you know they won't spend the time which is to
try to help them. Put Joe see what did do?
And man he worked with for three months and I

(05:12):
was learning, you know, he knew all type of assibus
and everything the English language, sending them annanam pro now
had verb you know, he knew everything. Yeah, we had
worked for three months and uh, the test was coming up,
so round there and uh, but Joe told me said,

(05:33):
miss man, you're gonna pass the test. I said, yeah, man,
I believe I'm gonna pass that test. Work harder we worked,
you know. And so he layd you know. We went
all by the business and went out there and took
the test. So I came back in. He said, man,
how you think you did. I said, I think I
did good. Joe, you know, he said all right. So
about two three weeks later, the tests for us came back.

(05:56):
I was still in ged class then, you know, school
and everything. So I went out there. He said, well,
the testis us and came back for me and a
few more guys. You know. I get in the back
of the line again, and uh, and I'm looking at
them seeing all they do. Just saw them dropping their heads,
some of them smiling when they come out of the room,

(06:17):
the little office where the teacher at. So, h, come on,
he said, mention, come on in. I said yeah. He
said congratulations. I said what and uh he showed me
the tension. I made a forty nine point something. He said,
you did good. He said, you you you you score

(06:38):
higher than uh some of the other guys that I
thought us go higher than you. And I said, thank
you teasing. So I go in and I tell Shoe
see and I said, hey man, for this, you know,
for this celebration, you know, come on because of you know,
a grand meal, and a grand meals at that time

(06:59):
was you know, uh something that we called uh a burrito. Uh.
And what we did, uh we took soups, somersatages ships
and you know, and and seison and stuff and and
put it together and uh crunch the soups up, crumched

(07:20):
the cheese, curled up the cone chips, onions, cut up
some onions in and uh and stuff like that. And
well we had to bar the water because we didn't
have a microwave, so uh we had to make a
makeshift stove and uh oh yeah, we had sodas and
I ain't got all that sodas hundred bonds and we

(07:43):
can have a feast, you know, so uh anyway, uh
mad Joe, we cooked everything uh over this stove and
we we we had tarlet paper and we we we
we'll we'll make the target tarlet paper stole if you
rolled it up the right way and picture the right
way to burn a long time burned long enough for

(08:04):
you to really do what you want to do. So
we had cans that we had made and we put
the hammers on it where we can have what we
want in there and cook it, you know over there,
and to cut the summerste yourself and everything. And it
made a great meal. And we sat there and we
hate then and uh, I was deserved, was hunted barb

(08:26):
and uh eate the honey bar and uh and we
had Coca cola and we sat there, you know where
we celebrated, you know, the victory that I finally got
my cheese. And once I got my cheese, he I
went and signed up for Jefferson Davis Junior College. I

(08:50):
just thank God, JESU. Christ on this Easter Sunday, I
just thank him for allowed me to be able to
still be in after all your three three months going
also by that, thank you Christ.

Speaker 1 (09:05):
Today had a terrific job on the production, editing and
storytelling by our own Reagan Habib and our own Greg Hangler.
And what a story you've heard from Big Mitch. A
story of just pure generosity from a fellow inmate to
pour into him like that for three months, Joe C.
And what did Joe C get out of it? Well,

(09:26):
what we all get out of things when we help
people for no other reason than to help them. And
my goodness, that big party in the prison, the big
feast Mitch called it, replete with a prison burrito and
Coca cola, and of course honeybuns to top it all off.
And what did Big Mitch get The ability to read
the Bible, to write poems, and so much more? The

(09:48):
story of Big Mitch Rutledge Sunday Mornings with Big Mitch
here on our American Stories