Episode notes
IN THIS EPISODE John was hardly the first person to point out corruption in America's penal system. Paul Wright was serving a 17 year sentence for murdering a drug dealer when, in May 1990, he started The Prison Legal News. Prison changes people; it changed Paul profoundly. He transformed from a rudderless young man into a veritable crusader for prison amd legal reform. SHOW NOTES Learn more about Paul Wright and The Prison Legal News here. If you're enjoying this podcast, please sample our other podcasts at Costard & Touchstone Productions. Your next podcast obsession is just a click away!…
John Kiriakou's Dead Drop
by John Kiriakou & Alan Katz · English · History
Join ex-CIA officer John Kiriakou on a very personal deep dive into what makes a spy tick. One of the most famous spies in the whole world, John - a spy with a conscience - blew the whistle on the CIA's torture program after the war on terror and spent 23 months in federal prison for it. As John exp
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S2 · E16 · 31 Aug 2026 · 53 min
S2E16 Free At Last
IN THIS EPISODE John's time at Loretto finally comes to an end - but not without a near hiccup. Though he's free of Loretto, he's not free from the federal Bureau of Prisons; John must report every day to "Hope Village", a halfway house - a situation loaded with ways to trip up and land back at Loretto. John begins the process of shaking off the prison persona he had to adopt in order to survive and relocating his true self. SHOW NOTES If you are enjoying this project, please check out the rest of our podcast offerings at Costard & Touchstone Productions . Your next podcast obsession is just…
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S2 · E15 · 24 Aug 2026 · 53 min
S2E15 The Home Stretch
IN THIS EPISODE When John first entered the gates of Loretto Federal Prison, his goal was to use all his training as a spy to survive prison. But, just as with spying, prison can be very unpredictable. In fact, John found that he'd been fooled by one of his roommates - who'd been betraying him from the jump. As he enters the home stretch of his sentence, John doubles down on his mission to use everything he learned as a spy to survive prison to the bitter end. SHOW NOTES If you enjoy this podcast, please check out our whole exciting range of podcasts at Costard & Touchstone Productions .…
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S2 · E14 · 17 Aug 2026 · 35 min
S2E14 The Torture Report
IN THIS EPISODE At Loretto Federal Prison, John can almost see the light of his release date in the not-too-distant future. Returning to the Outside World will mean having to shed the prison persona John worked so hard to create - if only for survival purposes. Meanwhile in the outside world, the suibject of John's whistleblowing - the CIA's torture program - is finally getting its day in the court of public opinion as the Senate finally gets up the nerve to release its damning report on torture. Things are coming to a head. SHOW NOTES If you're enjoying this podcast, please check out the…
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S2 · E12 · 3 Aug 2026 · 36 min
S2E12 Dangerous
IN THIS EPISODE When he first arrived at Loretto Federal Prison to start serving his 30 month term, John expected to serve that term where the judge and prosecutor both advocated that John be in the minimum security camp. But someone at the Federal Bureau of Prisons decided that John was too dangerous - and assigned him to the actual prison instead. John was not even remotely dangerous. Not nearly as dangerous as the FBP is to every inmate in its charge. But, the FBP wasn't entirely wrong. John was indeed dangerous - but only to the FBP. SHOW NOTES If you enjoy this podcast, please check out…
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S2 · E11 · 27 Jul 2026 · 35 min
S2E11 Unfinished Business
IN THIS EPISODE With his out date - the end of his prison sentence - now starting to come into view (albeit still in the distance), John would have been best served by keeping his head down. But there remained unfinished business - with sevveral fellow prisoners and especially with the Soretto Prison authorities. And then there was all the unfinished business - all related to torture - happening outside Loretto. SHOW NOTES If you're enjoying this show, please check out all our other podcasts at Costard & Touchstone . Your next great podcast obsession is just a click away! Hosted on Acast.…
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S2 · E10 · 20 Jul 2026 · 51 min
S2E10 Food, Glorious Food!
IN THIS EPISODE, meet Joey Casolo. These days, Joey owns a great pizzaria in South Carolina. But, back in the day, Joey was one of the greatest prison chefs ever at Loretto. If you remember from the movie Goodfellas, the Italians weren't interested in the prison chow. Instead they cooked their own food - gourmet Italian meals - all prepared using a rudimentary (and incredibly dangerous) cooking system: a bucket of water and a live electrical wire that makes the water boil immediately. SHOW NOTES If you're enjoying Dead Drop, please check out our other podcasts at Costard & Touchstone . Your…
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S3 · E3 · 5 Oct 2026 · 47 min
S3E3 Liars (And Lying) 101
IN THIS EPISODE Welcome to John Kiriakou's Spy Academy! Whether chatting with someone informally or conducting a full-on interrogation, every spy needs to know whether or not the person they're talking to is being truthful with them. To get to the bottom of that, we'll start with defining our terms: what do we even mean by "lies" and "liars"? Whether we call them white lies, fibs, fabrications or whoppers, lies cover a lot of psychological territory. Before we can interrogate our liar, we need to understand just how many kinds of liars - and lies - we could encounter. SHOW NOTES If you're…
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S3 · E2 · 28 Sep 2026 · 53 min
S3E2 The Whistleblower's Tiger Mom
IN THIS EPISODE Every whistleblower should know one thing before they step forward with their secrets that demand exposing - at some point, the legal system will engage with you. When that happens, each and every whistleblowerl will need a lawyer. John was fortunate enough to meet Jesselyn Radack early in his whistleblower journey. A whistleblower herself, Jesselyn has spent her career working for whistleblowers (all of them pro bono), making sure that government over-reach and corruption do not trample a whistleblower's legal rights or the important truth they're trying to convey. Having…
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S3 · E1 · 21 Sep 2026 · 45 min
S3E1 Whistleblowers & Spies
IN THIS EPISODE Welcome to Season 3! As the title of this episode suggests, season 3 will refocus the podcast on spying and, this season, on whistleblowing, too. We may be in a Golden Age of Corruption, but that's a future Golden Age of Whistleblowing. Whistleblowing is the cure for corruption and one of our goals this season is to make the podcast a safe space for whistleblowers - especially if they need to unburden themselves. While whistleblowing will eventually lead to John's re-emergence, when fresh out of prison, all anyone saw when John walked in the room was an ex convict. Rebuilding…
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S2 · E18 · 14 Sep 2026 · 1 hr 32 min
S2E18 Whistleblower's Roundtable with Tom Drake
IN THIS EPISODE We draw the curtain on season 2 with a preview of season 3 wherein we'll ask "What Makes A Whistleblower Tick?" To get us kicked off, John roundtables with whistleblower Tom Drake. A longtime member of America's intelligence community, Tom had just become an official at NSA when 9-11 happened - literally on Tom's first day. But, as America's "War On Terror" ramped up, Tom noticed NSA was gathering intelligence that it shouldn't - information pertaining to American citizens. NSA doing that was both outside its charter and flat out illegal. Tom chose to go through authorized…
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