Of all the true scary stories about life inside America’s jails, the Tucker Telephone is surely the most awful. And for inmates doing time at the Tucker State Prison Farm in Arkansas in the early 1960s, there was nothing more terrifying than the Tucker Telephone.

The Tucker Telephone was a sadistic method of punishment frequently used on prisoners at the state prison which is now the Tucker Unit of the Arkansas Department of Correction. The torture device was the brainchild of prison physician Dr. A.E. Rollins and prison superintendent Jim Bruton.

Hooked up to a source of immense electric power, the Tucker Telephone functioned as an electric shock device attached to the private parts of victims. Inmates sent to the “hospital room” were strapped down to a table with two wires applied to their skin. The ground wire was wrapped around their big toe while the hot wire — which the electricity ran through — was strapped to the inmate’s genitals.

Once the doctors turned the crank on the Tucker Telephone, their victims were brutally shocked by torrents of electricity. Sometimes these torture sessions dragged on for long periods, known as “long-distance calls.”

This is the true story of the Tucker Telephone Torture Device. 

Thanks for listening!