Inmate Andrew Shelton, left, one of Chaplain Keith Knauf's Pastoral Care Workers, reads the Bible to a dying William Merritt in the hospice at the California Medical Facility, a high-security prison in Vacaville. When a hospice inmate is thought to have less than 72 hours to live, they go "on vigil" and are never left to die alone.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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George Taylor, a 59-year-old convicted killer who is suffering from cancer, sits silently in a chair in the inmate hospice at the California Medical Facility in Vacaville.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Ronald Bramlett is wrapped in a sheet as Pastoral Care Workers attempt to move him to another room in the hospice wing at the California Medical Facility. The hospice is the oldest inside a California penitentiary and one of the nation's first.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Hospice inmate Joe Turney grips his head in pain as he tries to sleep.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Pastoral Care Worker Juan Moreno strokes inmate William Merritt's forehead as he lays dying in the hospice. Opened in 1991 in response to the AIDS epidemic, it was cramped and spartan: 17 beds in seven patient rooms surrounding a narrow nursing station.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Hospice Chaplain Keith Knauf holds hands as he prays with terminally ill inmate Phillip Gary Granger. Knauf believes that working to ease death can teach compassion.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Kenneth Kolen gets a shave from a Pastoral Care Worker. When the hospice opened, ill inmates from around the state could petition to be transferred there if prison doctors gave them a prognosis of six months to live.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Pastoral Care Worker John Paul Madrona, serving a prison term for a 1993 murder, keeps an eye on Steven Thomas as he bathes in the hospice wing.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Pastoral Care Workers Sean Reece, right, and John Paul Madrona, left, lift inmate Richard Curry from a day bed onto the hospice patio.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Pastorl Care Worker John Paul Madrona, right, rests his head on his arms during eulogies for recently deceased hospice patients. He decided to turn his life around after being convicted of fatally shooting an environmental chemist in 1993.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Pastoral Care Worker John Paul Madrano, right, tends to fellow inmate Gary Smith. “There’s not a guy among our dying prisoners who does not find John Paul to be a favorite,” said Chaplain Keith Knauf, who’d come to lean on Madrona.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Pastoral Care Worker John Paul Madrona fist-bumps hospice patient Troy "Pinapple" Kamakona, since deceased. Kamakona had been serving a life sentence for the murder of his wife.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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With his cancer progressing and making him constantly tired, Freddy Garcia spends more and more time sleeping in his bed at the hospice.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Freddy Garcia, suffering from terminal colon cancer, prepares to change his colostomy bag in the hospice's common shared bathroom.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Cancer-stricken Freddy Garcia shaves his head as he gets ready for his May 6, 2011, wedding at the California Medical Facility.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Freddy Garcia knots a homemade tie as he prepares for his wedding. He’d already been in state prison once, for burglarizing a house when he was 18. His cancer was discovered in 2009, shortly after he began a second term, nine years for stealing an Oakland Raiders flask from a JC Penney while carrying a loaded gun.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Chaplain Keith Knauf, center, officiates at the wedding of inmate Freddy Garcia, right, and his longtime girlfriend, Marina Luevano. The ceremony was simple and quick.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Freddy Garcia, right, glances up as Chaplain Keith Knauf, left, officiates at his marriage to Marina Luevano. When it ended, the newlyweds returned to the hospice. They held hands and gently kissed.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Freddy Garcia, left, kisses his new wife, Marina Luevano, as the pair pose for pictures in front of a painted garden scene on a wall inside a visiting room. Garcia had put up a brave front, but bolts of pain were searing his abdomen.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Freddy Garcia wipes yogurt off his 3-year-old daughter Breanna's face during a family visit after his wedding at the California Medical Facility.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Freddy Garcia speaks on the phone with his wife, Marina Luevano, from inside the California Medical Facility. Their relationship had become strained, and he was contemplating a divorce less than two months after his prison wedding.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Freddy Garcia, right, winces in pain as his mother Rosalilia reaches out to comfort him in his grandparents' Carson home on Aug. 9, 2011. Freddy's family and friends are all pitching in to care for him in his last days.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Brother Salvadore Garcia, right, and friend Jessica Figueroa, left, help Freddy Garcia into bed Sept. 23, 2011, less than two days before his death at his grandparents' Carson home.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Salvadore Garcia, right, gently touches his brother Freddy's head less than 12 hours before his death at his grandparents' Carson home.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Brothers Jonathan, left, and Salvadore Garcia, right, hold Freddy Garcia's daughter Breanna up to view her father's body at the memorial service Oct. 7, 2011.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Freddy Garcia cleans his abdomen while changing his colostomy bag in the hospice bathroom.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Chaplain Keith Knauf, left, prays with dying prisoner Ronald Bramlett outside Bramlett's room in the X-Corridor, the inmate hospice inside the California Medical Center in Vacaville.

PHOTOGRAPH BY: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times

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Freddy Garcia rests his head on his hand after smoking marijuana to ease his nausea.

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