imported_Echo_
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http://tinyurl.com/kftjy
well worth the time to read this
quite amazing
forgive me if some of the language is strong
mods if you feel it is in badtaste of head-fi ill try and edit it all out so it is worksafe
Quote:
well worth the time to read this
quite amazing
forgive me if some of the language is strong
mods if you feel it is in badtaste of head-fi ill try and edit it all out so it is worksafe
Quote:
| First let me point out the obvious. This is an alias account. I bought this account specifically to post this thread for reasons which will soon become clear. As background I'm a regular forums poster, and have been so for a while. So, hopefully it is clear why I am using this account. Once this thread dies down, I'll probably do an autoban or see if the admins will let me give it away to someone. Second, there are a few forums members who know me in person, and you'll know who I am once you read this. I ask on good faith that you please not reveal my identity. While I'm proud of who I am and the sum of my life, I'd really rather not have to suffer through "HEY PRISON DUDE, LOL BUTTSECKZ" in every subsequent post. Third, quite a few of you are very good Internet Detectives. All of the names, places, cities, states, and identifying bits of information are changed. There's always the chance that I'll make a mistake or give just enough information for someone to put some puzzle pieces together. I know that I can't and don't control anyone here, and I understand that I am posting this at my own peril, but again, I ask for restraint in revealing my identity. In the event that it should come out, it wont make much of a difference, I'm not ashamed of this, or my past, I just would rather it didn't. I hope you all understand, and will support me in my attempt to inform others about life behind the wire, answer some questions, and get it off my chest. I've seen some threads here about people who have done some short stretches, mostly in county jails, but never anyone who's done a long stretch in prison, especially at a MAX facility, much less escaped... So I figured I'd contribute. So lets see. Here's how I went to prison, escaped, got caught, got extradited back, had sex in jail (with a woman, no less!), got married in Jail, rescued a kitten, got out without being rectally violated and got my **** back together. Please bear with me - I'm not a very good writer. It's the early nineties, I'm about twenty-two years old and just moseying through life, not the brightest ever kid, I suppose. Little harmless "growing up" scrapes with the law here and there, nothing to write home about. The internet is just starting to get its legs, crossing over from the FIDOnet/BBS days, and its still more of a lawless digital frontier run by extreme geeks, hobbyhackers, phreaks, and universities. Long story short, I "come across" some interesting Government owned stuff, and like a dumbbo, I post it to a board, you know, "Hey guys look what I found, what do you think it could be?" type stuff. Well it turns out it was rather sensitive, and some pretty important people were fairly upset about some kid getting his hands on their private stash and posting it on the internet for all to see. So I'm discovered, stuck on "con air" (an interesting experience in itself), flown to the Federal Transit hub (A big giant jail at an airport, believe it or not), and from there, hauled off to the local county Jail. (I'm omitting lots of details here for my own piece of mind.) After selling my cars and everything else I own to pay for good lawyers, the Federal conspiracy charges are dropped (I was looking at 65 yrs, which under Federal sentencing guidelines, says I would have done a minimum of 50 on that.) But it turns out the local Judge and DA had taken something of a shine to me. So they slapped me with three counts of "obtaining money or merchandise by false pretenses." - Fair enough I suppose, having by now bounced a couple grand in checks due to this whole fiasco, as well as poor financial management on my own part. The local DA wants to play hardball because he figures I got off easy with the Federal charges being dropped, and he is trying to make a show for the Governor, who has taken an interest in my case, for some reason - probably because it happened in a pretty military oriented state and the Federal charges were rather serious. So, despite my attorney's best wrangling, the best we can do is a guilty plea in exchange for five years. Wherein I am assured that, if I take this deal, I will be sent to the main processing/intake facility, be evaluated and booked into the state corrections system, and within a month at most, released on an ankle monitor to serve out the remainder of my sentence from home, what with being a harmless non-violent white-collar criminal with no noteworthy similar convictions in my past. County jail is not a happy place to be. Especially if you know you're going to be doing a stretch of time. It is the slowest, most tedious time of the whole corrections experience. Also, because of the nature of a County Jail, it is the most violent. Because what you have is a combination of guys who are waiting to "pull chain", meaning they've been sentenced to time at a State prison, and are waiting for transit to come and pick them up and take them to the State Intake Facility, and they're eager to prove themselves before they get to a yard, you have the short-timers doing their DUI weekend time, or their 30 days for Domestic or breaking/entering, or battery, who have read one to many Steven King books and think that the first thing they need to do when they get into county is to win a fight with someone, again, to prove themselves, and you have the "local color" - Guys who are in and out of jail so often that they dont really give a **** if their stay at County gets stretched out a bit, because it's like a mini vacation from their fat slovenly wives and their truck that doesnt work, etc. And then you get your drunks who, if they put one in your cell, you never know what kind of drunk they're going to be. Oh and then the guys who think that if they cry, scream, kick their doors hard enough the Sheriff will come in and let them go, which only pisses the 'residents' off at them. And with the turnover rate at County Jails being so quick, there isnt much of a chance to build alliances, find out who to trust, etc. So County is where you're going to see most of the fighting, crying, etc. Also, in County, they (the system) doesnt know you very well, so you're all treated like hardcore high-risk offenders. So this means you shave twice a week, under direct supervision, your visits are "through the glass", like you see in movies, you have no real "outdoor" time to speak of, the food is horrible, and your canteen options are minimal, at best. Basic necessities only, maybe you can buy some candy if you're lucky. Most county Jails also dont allow smoking nowadays. But like anything else, tobacco finds its way into the facility. While I'm a smoker, I quickly learned I could forego paying between $2 and $10 in canteen items in trade for a cigarette. Your day looks like this (Depending on your facility, of course - each is different). Wake up for breakfast at about 7am, get counted eat, go back to bed until about 10am. Wake up. Shower if you're brave. Take care of any business (calls to attorneys, etc). Lunch at about noon, get counted, watch tv in the dayroom, provided nobody's ****ed up so far so you're not "locked down" in your cell all day, about 2pm get counted, go "outside" (meaning a fenced-in, razorwired area usually on the roof of the jail) for 30 minutes to an hour, come back, get counted. around 4pm is mail call, when you get to find out who found the time to write you back. Count again, then at 6 is dinner. After that, call your girl if you have one and she can afford the $7.50 collect call, where you get 15 minutes, timed calls, if you're lucky. To use the phone during this time usually requires an hour wait in line. If, after two attempts you cant get trhough to anyone, you go back to the end of the line to wait to try again. 9pm is lockdown for the night. This is when you write desperate letters to old friends, ex girlfriends, etc. Anyone you think might possibly write you back. Even if its to tell you what a ****off you were and how much they hate you and never, ever write them again, it's a letter you will read over and over again because its something somebody took the time to put pen to paper to with you in mind. Validation that your whole existance on this Earth hasn't somehow been deleted from everyone's memory. Each cell has a window. Usually its about one foot by three feet wide. Having no interest in television or cards when the dayroom was open, I would mostly stay in my cell and watch life happen outside the window. Its funny about county jails. because usually they're in the middle of an urban area. So you sit there in your orange jumpsuit, and look at the world through the glass covered in scratchings of gang names, FTW's, "Sherrif Osbourne is a ********", "James L was here" and horrible jailhouse poetry. Its interesting to just watch the world happen yet be totally excluded from it. People going to work, trains going by, cars at intersections. People on sidewalks. I never knew I'd miss just the sound of a shoe on a sidewalk. Anyway, Like I was saying, I took the plea-bargain. It took about thirty days for me to be picked up to be brought to the State Assessment center. This is where you get medical tests, in-depth health assessments, education testing, psych assessments and interviewed several times by various people. All of this combined with your past incarceration history, etc is used to assess your general fitness and risk, and determines what Prison you're sent to, and at what security level. And they shave your head. Only if this is your first trip through the system, though. This establishes a hirearchy right off the bat. Those with shaved heads (Skinners), those with not (Folks who have done time before and know how it works). In most states, you're given a level based on security points. The amount of security points (cumulative numbers based on all of your assessment scores and history) indicates what security level you're placed on, and that security level determines what security prison you go to. The levels are: Conditional Supervision (AKA Ankle Monitor) Community/Work Release Minumum Security: Unfenced facility, weekend passes on good behavior, no "cells" but large rooms with bunkbeds. Full contact visits (non-conjugal - thats Federal only.) High-minimum security: Fenced facility, usually no weekend passes, no cells, some off-compound work Full contact visits Medium security: Double fenced with razor wire, some off compound work, Full contact visits for most, others behind glass. Two-man Cells, usually has a counterpart minimum security facility. High Medium or Low-max securty: Same as above, only the guards have shoot-on-attempt orders. This is where I spent most of my time. Maximum: Yard time is point to point only. No loitering. Heavy supervision. Shoot-on-attempt. Two-man cells. Contact vistits but no visiting "yard", only a room. Ultra-Max: If you're here, you're either under long term administrative segregation, or you're on the Row and waiting for your turn to visit the sleepy-sleepy room. Assessment is also Ultra-max, becuase it deals with all incoming inmates. So I went to the Assessment center. It's a lot like jail, except you spend alot more time in your cell, because, again, you're now convicted and among other convicts, ranging from short timers like myself to killers waiting to go to Ultra-max, so you only get about two hours a day of dayroom time. The food is a little better here, though. Less beans. In my assessment, because I was a first-time felon, convicted of a white collar crime, with a "short" sentence, with a recommendation from the judge to go directly to Conditional Supervision, that's how I was classified. I was ready. I'd had enough and I'd learned my lesson. All I had to do was wait for my final W&W check (wants and warrants) and I was free to go begin home-incarceration a'la Martha Stewart, minus the ponies. The next couple days were spent tossing and turning in my cell, these six months of torture were about to be over. I could taste the outside air. Well of course the story would end here if everything went the way it was supposed to. But life being what it is, this is only the beginning. I get called into my case manager's office, and told that I will not, in fact be going home this week. When I heard that, my jaw dropped to the ground and my heart sank like it never had before. My case manager calmly and indifferently explains to me that I have a detainer (ie warrant) pending from some county outside of Dallas, Texas for forgery of a financial instrument. Now, here's where it gets interesting. I've never been to this county, and only driven through Texas and seen some shows in Deep Ellum. That's it. never wrote a check, certainly never forged one. But alas, there's a detainer on me, so I now have to be fully classified and assigned to a facility while this works itself out. He told me if, in fact, they dont wish to extradite me to Texas and they drop the detainer, I'll be released in mere weeks, but as long as there is anything pending over me, I cannot be released to Conditional Supervision. So off I go to the other side of the state where I am put in a high-minimum security facility (fenced, see descriptors above). Days turn into weeks turn into months, during which time I re-establish contact with a girl that I'd dated for a few years before all this **** began. We start speaking through mail, and I write letters daily. After some time, she decides to come visit me - wasn't too long after the first visit that she reaches her hand across the table at the visiting yard and is holding my hand. Gentlemen, let me tell you, when you are confined in a facility consisting of nothing but anger, resentment, stinky men, and all the women that work there are big, fat, round nasty bullish women, the slightest touch from a girl you care about brings all those feelings from your first physical contact with a girl that wasnt your mother leaping back to mind. Anyway, as beaurocracies go, even just seeing this warrant so I could get cranking on it was taking forever. By the time I lay eyes on the warrant, I had already been in for quite a few months. Finally my case manager calls me in and tells me that it had arrived, and showed me a copy of it. Very simply it stated that they had a detainer on me, and not to release me without notifying them beforehand so they could come pick me up. However as luck would have it, upon closer inspection of the warrant it was discovered that it did not, in fact, in any way describe me. It called for an individual who's description is 5'7", blue eyed, white FEMALE. Well you bet your sweet speckled pooper I threw myself into the books at the law library, taught myself how to read legalese, how the processes worked, and most importantly how to file a motion to dismiss. The key points of my Motion to Dismiss were simply "It will be made plain by an examination of the Defendant, or any records maintained by the state of XXX, That the Defendant could not be the the person described in the detainer. First and foremost, the defendant is Male, having brown eyes, and has never resided at any address in Texas. "With these facts being true it is asked that the honorable court see fit to dismiss the pending warrant for Forgery of a Financial Instrument, on case no XXX, on the grounds that the Defendant named in the warrant is not who is physically described, and therefore cannot be detained as such." So this was prompltly sent off to Texas and meanwhile I occupied myself with visits from my girl on a near weekly basis, got involved in the prison band program (They had a pretty decent little setup, for a prison yard. Everything was old and off-brand, but it worked!) and we would rock out 3 times a week. Also my dedication to my own cause and research caught the eye of the Administrator of the Law Library, and offered me a job as a Law Clerk, or Leagal Research Assistant. Up til now, my job had been "evening orderly" in my dorm, which as you can imagine sucked ASS. Cleaning toilets and showers, sweeping, mopping a dorm the size of a small airplane hangar, etc.,etc. So not only did I have my case in my own hands, I now had a ticket to eight hours a day locked in the law library to study law, the cases of others, help myself and help other people too. Everybody has to have a job, I was lucky to not have ended up in the kitchen, which is where 99% of inmates end up when they first roll in. Plus, being a law clerk is one of the most lucrative jobs on a prison yard. Not only do you have the second-highest inmate paygrade ($60.00/month), but also, since you're now helping other inmates out, you are often given "incentives" in the form of cartons of cigarettes, canteen items, etc., in order to go above and beyond your duties for them. Your basic responsibilities as a law clerk are to ensure that an inmates right to legal resources is protected, and to help them navigate the maze that is criminal law. For instance if a guy came in wanting to write a motion to dismiss, like mine above, all my job entailed was to show him how to research caselaw and where the book was that contained templates for brief writing, and provide tips and information as needed. Now if that inmate was too flustered or illiterate to do it for himself, this became a matter of incentive. He could easily have his case moved to the top of my file and his brief done the very next day for a carton of generic cigarretes and six cans of pop. If a guy wanted me to do his whole appeal to the circuit court, (research, writing, filing, etc), why then we're talking literally, hundereds of dollars. Habeas Corpus and Mandamus ran about three hundred bucks in canteen items, easily. And just like real lawyers, the better your reputation, the more you charged. So I was on the bottom rung, doing $20/$30 jobs here and there and helping the Big Time law clerks with their stuff for a cut, (And for the experience, too!) but loving the hell out of it. Morally there's no conflict, despite it being against facility policy to barter, but all of the law clerks would happily provide any service required by law, for free. It was when you wanted us to do things you are supposed to do for yourself that 'money' became involved. Time passes and The Girl and I are becoming closer and closer, rekindling our old relationship, and I work my ass of, absorbing as much information in the law library as possible to become Certified, waiting for Texas' response to my Motion to Dismiss, rocking out with my Prison Band, covering such ditties as Santa Monica by Everclear, Purple by Stone Temple Pilots, etc. At night I'd write letters to my Girl, and listen to the radio until the noise had settled to where I could fall asleep and dream about going home. Minimum security is pretty "easy time" as far as prison goes. Just be where you need to be, dont get into debt with other inmates, and do your time. It is also very frusturating. As months passed, I would see child molesters come in and be released on Conditional Supervision in less than three months, yet here I sat on a bounced check and a warrant, watching truly Awful people be released back into society. A note about the child molesters: Minimum security consists of a lot of people who are very close to going home - So even the child molesters are left pretty much, um, unmolested (for lack of a better term). Nobody wants to lose their good time or get more points with a writeup for battery when they're so close. Sickening, really, but understandable. Finally, FINALLY, the day comes where I find a note on my bunk. I open it and see that it is from the state of Texas. I am competeley terrified to read this. This one paper is the difference between my staying and my going home. "To the Warden of XXX facility, State of XXXX, and All Concerned Parties" My Name, Case Number, Detainer number, County, etc. Then a very short and curt: "Please release our detainer on the above inmate. A dismissal has been filed in XXX County, TX for the above referenced case. Thank you." I was home free! Instantly I run to my case managers office. :Video Montage of the next six months: * Sign papers for release on Conditional Supervision, sent to governor's office for signature * Home verification happens (where they verify I have a home to be released to) * Papers for release sent back, as they still mention the Texas Detainer and must be redrawn * Papers re-drawn and re-sent * Wait 2 months * Governor's office reports Paperwork lost * Resent, again * Sent to low-Minimum (Unfenced) Level Facility while awaiting signature * Wait two-months * No signature, paperwork is lost, Again * An violent-offense inmate slips through the cracks, is released to Conditional Supervision. Proceeds directly to ex girlfriend's house, shoots and kills Girlfriend, Mother, Self. * Press fiasco ensues. * Conditional Supervision program suspended indefinitely by Governor. Right about now we're about 1 year, three months into what should have been a six-month ordeal at most. Yeah, thats right - As soon as I was going to get out on Conditional Supervision, they suspended the program. The kicker was EVERY INMATE WHOS PAPERWORK WAS SIGNED BY THE GOVERNOR BEFORE SUSPENSION WAS STILL GOING TO GET TO GO HOME. And here I was, excluded because the stupid governors office "lost" my paperwork not once but TWICE. My Girl, by now very eager to get me home so I would stop dryhumping her on the visiting yard, deluged the Governors office to make an exception in my case, as it was their fault my paperwork hadn't been signed before the suspension. She made calls, wrote letters, made appointments, was on a first name basis with the Governor's assistant and the Deputy Director of the Corrections Department. They would not budge. Rules are rules. "As part of our core mission we would be remiss if we were to bend rules for an inmate. We are concerned about the message that would deliver." said one particulary smug response. So here I was, to serve out the remainder of my sentence because some ******** other than me went and killed some people. And because the Governor's office lost my paperwork not once, but TWICE. Didn't they realize this was a human being they were dealing with? Somebody with a future? Somebody who had never committed a violent act nor an act against a child or a minor, but had to sit here and watch these people come and go? This simply would not DO. Plans were made on the visiting yard over the next few weeks. I'd show them, oh yes I would. After paying several of my inmate friends large amounts of money to assist and maintain secrecy, one day a ball went behind a backboard, my papers and important items were shoved under some bushes, and so was I. I leapt into the trunk of my Girl's waiting car, closed it above me, and she drove. And drove, and drove. We couldn't go back to her place, really, so I got on a bus and high-tailed it to my brother's house in another state, where I stayed until she could tidy things up and move inconspicuously to a town out west. My brother describes it as the most surreal moment in his life. He's at home, minding his business when he gets a call. "Hey, its me." "HEY! you're out of prison? Where are you?" "Oh, downtown XXXXX, I need you to come pick me up", "When did they let you out?" "Oh, they didnt let me out." "Then how... OH MY GOD, I'LL BE RIGHT THERE". My brother was a saint taking care of me for the next few weeks while we awaited my girl's arrival. When she showed up she stayed for a couple days and we relaxed, put our minds together, and got on the next Greyhound out west. When we arrived at our desination we immediately set about getting **** together. We both got jobs - She at a camera store, and I used my previous retail management experience to land a full time job as a manager in training for a chain music store. I got a second job as well, at a resale shop, sort of an upscale salvation army - Rich people would donate their clothes, computers, toys, etc, and we'd resell them to generate funds for a battered womens' shelter. This resale place was right around the corner from that place's county jail. So we were dealing with lawyers, deputies, jail employees, judges coming in and browsing during their lunch breaks. I couldn't help but bask in the surrealness of looking people who would be my future captors in the eye knowing I was an escaped convict. I made pretty good friends with some, even went out to coffee on the corner with some deputies and shot the ****. This all went on for months, both of us working our lil' tails off, me doing 70+ hours a week. I didnt know how it would end but I knew it couldnt go on forever. My intent wasn't to evade capture forever. My intent was to PROVE to them what I was capable of. And yeah, life was pretty good - A decent roof over our heads, thanks to some caring souls, money in our pockets, regular sex, decent food, etc. One morning we were walking from our place to catch the bus for work, standing there just talking about mundane life-things, when out of all directions comes a ****-load of city cops, about five federal agents, and a god damned tv news crew, guns and cameras pointed, shouting different things all at the same time. Jesus christ they had GUNS pointed at my girl. The only thing I could think to do was drop all my stuff, show my hands and step in front of her, in case one was trigger happy. She didn't deserve to get shot for being a supportive, caring girlfriend. So they dropped me and cuffed me. One of the cops knew me from the resale store. "I would have never guessed in a million years", he said - he was good enough to fish my keys out of my pocket and give them to my girl. She, poor thing, in tears, went at my instruction to my store, called my manager, and, bless her heart, OPENED the store with my manager on the phone, until she could get there. This is the real weepy and like tragic part of the story beginning. O my brothers and only friends. Well sort of, anyway. So into the county jail of THAT state I went to. But I wasn't without allies! I was placed into the "pod" with high-profile offenders. If you'd been on the news or had a high-profile case in any way, you went into this pod. So here we had a seventeen year old parental muderer, a multimillion dollar embezzler, a couple other hackers, etc. Interesting to say the least. My cell had a great view of the corner, some many stories below, as well as the river. My girl would come and stand on the corner, and tie large flowers to the lamp post every day. and wave. She could see my cell by counting windows up and over. She could only see me backlit and we would do puppet shows for an hour or so at each other. Pantomiming drawing hearts in the air. She'd come visit me, through the glass again, sadly - but if I was REALLY good, I'd get a panty shot or two to keep my mind occupied during the week. Having lost more than half of our income, she had to move to a hostel, but her work was kind enough, after hearing our story to allow me two collect calls during the week, on them. Meanwhile, turns out my case manager was one of my regular customers and borderline friends from the resale shop! I fought extradition, she even wrote letters to the governor of BOTH states (the one I was in and the one I'd escaped from), asking them not to extradite me, as I was a fully rehabilitated upright citizen, and no further incarceration was necessary. All this support from my "host" state really lit a fire under the governor of my escaped state and they accellerated my extradition hearing - which I of course, lost. So I was extradited back to the state from who's loving arms I'd escaped from. Since my neither the original crime nor my new charge (Escape from a State Correctional Facility) were not Federal, I didn't get to go Con Air. They stuck me in a van which drove all around the country. But i didn't go directly to my Home state. it took TWELVE days of driving through states all over the place to get me back. TWELVE DAYS in a van with full shackles on. Handcuffs with the immobilizer, Leg irons, and a chain that connected the two. The county wherein the facility was located that I escaped from was a verrrrry small county. Wich meant they had a verrrry small jail. Pretty much a mom and pop operation. I had to stay in jail to face the new charges and couldn't go back to a yard until that matter had been settled. Funnily enough I earned myself the position of "trustee", having experience in legal matters, I was a needed resource - So eventually I got to be outside of my cell, helping other inmates with their things, and doing other chores, like laundry,etc. Again, like I said, this was a tiny little jail - so I knew everyone from the sheriff on down to the dispatchers in no time. Before long I had free reign of the place, and hardly ever had to go back to my cell, only to sleep. I was also still rather handy with computers, and through doing some big favors with their system, I slowly earned priveledges. Within a couple of months my cellmate and I had in our cell WITH PERMISSION from the jail staff: Carpet. Pictures. A laptop computer. A large color television. Real blankets. Tools. tapes and CD's, handheld video games. A microwave and our own food. Weekly trips to the local market to buy said food. You name it - And we could call anywhere we wanted provided we had a calling card, and we could wear street clothes, provided our shirts were stencled with "XXX County Jail Inmate" on the back, which we did ourselves. So my Girl and I decided to stick this out - and we also decided to get married and make it official. So we registered with the county clerk in the same building, got our blood tests, and got hitched, in the recieving area of the jail with the Jailer and a Deputy as our witnesses (She (The jailer) was in tears as we said our vows). Of course, what good is a wedding w/out consummation, right? Remember I had free movement until 2300. So one night when I was supposed to be cleaning out the courthouse side of the building I snuck my Wife in through a side-door, and we scurried up some stairs, into the court records office and into a closet. So, yeah. We honeymooned in a courthouse closet. This was to become a regular occourance while waiting for my trial to come up. it was funny making appearances for motions in court, standing near a closet I'd ****ed in the night before. Never ****ed on the judges bench though - I wanted to, but they lock that specific part with another key. By the time it came for my sentencing hearing on my escape - which carried typically five to seven years ADDITIONALLY, I had a two page letter from the Jailer on sherrif's department stationery, stating how they'd never seen an inmate so determined to get his life on track, etc etc, and to please go lightly, and it was signed by about fifteen members of the jail staff. The judge was amazed that I was working while escaped, and asked me why I did what I did, and I told him, to show that I could be a productive member of society. So he said "I've never said this before, but I wish I could get away with dropping this. But I can't, so I'm going to fine you court costs and give you two years' concurrent to your remaining three on your original sentence". What this meant is that it would run along with my remaining sentence. Essentially he sentenced me to NOTHING, except a fine. So back through the assesment part again, head shaved again. Poked, prodded again. This time I was assessed at Maximum Security. Not only that but I was going to a particularly notorious yard. Rumored to be the "hardest" yard in this entire section of the country. There were pretty regular killings, and a riot some ten years before burned down over a third of the prison. Hostages were taken. Inmates were killed. I almost peed myself when they told me what yard I was going to. I was going to get assraped and murdered. I was sure of it. I later learned that the Governors office had an indirect hand in this. So off I went to Maximum security. When you arrive at the facility you get off a bus, and go through the main reception office where your identity is confirmed, your property box is taken, you're unshackled and officially booked into the facility. Then you do "the walk". "The walk" is when your group, usually about 20 or thirty skinners are walked through the middle of the yard toward the orientation dorm. All the inmates line up on either side of the sidewalk on the way and stare you down, to put the fear of god into you. One inmate with a missing ****ing ear asked me, as we were walking "HEY! You play baseball?" "OH MY GOD NO, I DON'T PITCH OR CATCH OKAY **** YOU". Razorwire. Oh god was there ever fences, coils of shiny razorwire, on top, then a ****ing PILE of razorwire on the ground, then an outer fence with razorwire and barbed wire on top of all that. Gun towers. Yep. 40 foot high towers with men with guns pointed at you in them. Rapists. Killers. Murderers. people serving life sentences without parole. People who were seventy years old who had been in since they were fifteen. This was the Real ****ing Deal, Bubba. I took about a week to settle in in the orientation dorm. It was built in the early twentieth century, and looked like it. It used to house Germans during world war two while they were "relocated" during the war. (Up to that point I thought they'd only done that with the Japanese). There were places you could still see German words scratched into the walls back behind the Charlie's office. After a week in the kitchen I was assigned to the Law Library once I proved my worth to the Boss. From there I started working some cases. The trick to being a skinny whiteboy in the pokey and not being raped is this: Become a law clerk. Then, get the cases of someone in the Black faction and someone in the white faction. Therefore, nothing will happen to you during this time. This way they won't rape you because you're working on one of their cases and if you catch out, nobody will. This gives you time to prove yourself on the yard, but do it without rectal penetration. Use this "grace" period to buddy up with someone of your own race. (You have to - this isn't a racist statement - its the way things work behind the wire). Preferrably someone who weilds power on the yard. In this case, my saviour was Lefty. Remember that guy who asked if I played baseball? Turns out he was sincerely curious if I played baseball, the game. They were building teams since spring was upon us. His name was Lefty. "'cause I only have one ear left," said he. Well I didnt play baseball, but **** was lefty ever smart. And he saw pretty much instantly that I was no dumbass myself. We'd talk philosophy, music, etc. His story was simple, and later I'd confirm it was absolutely true. He was seventeen, and somebody sold his sister some bad ****. It killed her. He killed the person that sold her the ****. He was sentenced to death. In the '70s the death penalty was overturned for a brief while, so his sentence was commuted to life w/out parole. Later they reinstated the death penalty, but the law prevents anyone from being put back "on" a death sentence. So here he was, forty-something, I guess. And one of the kindest, smartest, wizest people I've ever met. If there's anyone that deserves to be out in the free world it is that man. He took me under his wing, and introduced me to the guys. A mix of Aryan brotherhood and lifers. These were the people that ran the yard. And they all liked/respected me. I was safe. Everywhere I went one of them always had an eye on me. If I was out walking the track, one of them on the hill playing dominoes was watching. As long as I was here, nothing bad would happen to me. Let it be said here, though. Prison is prison. You have to handle your ****. So when a black guy tried cutting in the lunchline, you have to speak up or be shamed. So we were set to fight. The way prison fights work is like this: everyone gathers out in the domino hut (a little covered place with benches, outside by the band room). Blacks behind their guy, whites behind theirs. What this is for is to ensure a fair fight. the rule is, when a man goes down, the fights over. No weapons, no ********. The "groups" of people are there to ensure that. If the fight gets dirty, your guys jump in. This is often how people get killed. You're not armed, but the men behind you sure as **** are. Well I lost. I was the man that went down. Busted a tooth and my lip. "You know what though," said lefty - "You fought, you took your hits, and you went down. This is over - thats all there is to it. Had you run away or hid or tried to get one of us to settle your **** for you, it'd have been a different story and you'd be on your own." This is one of the many lessons I took with me. You may lose, but standing your ground and stepping up for yourself is what matters. A year passes. In this time I get really situated in the Law Library, gaining my certification, litigating like a mother****er. I win cases, get inmates out of prison who had been fighting for years, I even have a few cases that are now caselaw in p2d, with regard to Double Jeopardy as it relates to administrative punishment. My wife visits every weekend, I join the band - actually join several, as there's a shortage of drummers on the yard. I'm in the rock band, the blues band and the OTHER Rock band. I eventually take over band room maintenance, too. Larry was the singer and guitar player for the blues band. He had been in for most of his life - he was almost 70. But that mother****er could sing like no other. I'd have been proud to take that band out and play "real" shows, we were that good, particularly him. Lefty was in the rock band. He was a great guitarist and had an outstanding work ethic. Nate was someones punk, but still a good bass player. I've got money coming in from law clerkin', my lockers are all chock full of goodies, I'm getting letters from inmates on other yards for help with their cases via my reputation. (the letters are removed and destroyed, as inter-facility communications are forbidden), and I've "settled" into accepting this is my fate for a couple years. My cellmates range from good to horrible. Jason was in for murder, he was stinky and messy. Ron was the leader of the AB, he was in a wheelchair from being stabbed to much. Chris was the Second in command of the AB, he ran dope, but he was my favorite cellmate, he had good ****, and was also pretty bright. Inevitably one of you will ask for some gross stuff I saw. Heres the story of a young kid named Jake. He came in from another yard, but really didnt have a clue. He fell in with the AB guys, and was really desperate to fit in. So he went and paid a TON of money to get AB tattoos on his arms and legs and back so he could be accepted with them. He was the kind of guy like on the forums "HAY GUYZ!" type. Nobody liked him, and he was too much of a ***** to **** with the big boys. Word gets around the yard about what he's done. One thing you DON'T do is get a set's tattoos without someones approval. So when it gets to Ron that he's gone and gotten AB ink, he is confronted in the cell (I'm on my bunk trying to read) and told that he has one week to get them covered up or its going to be done FOR him. Well unfortunately he'd spent all of his money on getting the tattoos in the first place. He was broke, and in debt. A week passes. Two. Three, and still he has his tattoos. One day I'm sleeping in my cell and hear a scuffle and the door slams shut. I open my eyes and see three AB's pushing the kid onto the bed. I really cant get off my bunk because the cell is very small and full of people and I do NOT feel that it would be a good idea to try to say "excuse me" through a pile of enraged racists. The next twenty minutes I spend under my covers, listening to the muffled shreiks of this kid, as he is, literally, skinned alive. Guitar strings are superheated, and dragged over his skin, burning off the tattoos, like some kind of heated cheesegrater. Finally they all leave, and the kid is discreetely dragged to his cell, and told to keep quiet. He ends up cellbound for a week with "the flu" while he peels and grows new skin. The people I saw killed or stabbed were killed for being dumb. Not much to say there. Then one day I saw a kitten. I was walking from work to my cell. I saw him in a little drainpipe. Scrawny. A runt. THe mother abandoned it because it wasn't going to live. I picked it up, put it in my jacket and it mewed, I couldn't just leave it. At this time Jason was my cellie. It is a violation to have pets in your cell, but what the **** were we going to do? I called my gangster racist murderer friends over and we made a plan. Cell inspections happen twice a week. Different days for each unit. Lefty would take the kitten on inspection days since he was in another unit and they didn't inspect on the same day. It was sickly. It was mostly blind. It had poor muscle control. It could barely hold its head up, and whenever it tried to jump up on something, it would miss, usually hitting a wall. But every day, someone who worked in the kitchen would come by with bits of stolen food. And guys would bring milk from their breakfast every day for the kitten. And every day, guys would pop in to see how he was doing. One day we had a random cell inspection, and we tossed the kitty in the locker when we saw the Unit Manager coming our way. But it was NOT sleepy time for kitten, because he was getting better! Healthy kittens love to play and talk! So while the unit manager was in our cell inspecting our beds, cleanliness, flushing our toilet,etc, the kitty wanted to come out and play. I never thought it would work and it probably didnt, the unit manager probably knew, but every time the kitty would go "merewlll" WE would cough or shuffle our feet or say "HAY WHATS UP UNIT MANAGER?" "DID YOU SEE THE NEWS ABOUT THE WEATHER!!!!?" Yeah. close call. Since I was a short-timer, I decided I didn't want the heat for the kitty. But I couldn't let him go either. He may be a little better but he was still half blind and dumb. I did the only thing I knew to do. I went to my boss at the Law Library. "Ron," I said... "I've got a problem..." "oh no 655321! Is someone threatening you?" "no" "Are you in trouble?" "not yet" "WHAT, FOR GODS SAKE IS THE PROBLEM, 655321?" "I have a kitten, boss." "You... have a.... kitten? As in a cat?" "yessir. It was sick. I found it by the admin building. I brought it to my cell and it wa...." "You know that if a Law Clerk gets even a MINOR misconduct they're fired, right?" "Yessir. And I had a close call, today, sir - That is why I need your help" "How the hell can I help you with a kitten 655321?" "Well if I could just somehow get it to my wife, sir.... She could take care of it" Thus began operation Smuggle a Kitten out of Maximum Security Prison. So Ron (not the cellmate, My boss), sent me with a box to my cell, under the pretense of getting some papers that I'd been working on. One of the new guards stopped me with my box, on my way to the unit. Because an inmate should NOT be carrying a box. If it were a guard that had been there for a while it wouldn't be a problem, most of them liked me and let me get away with ****. Like me and bezo's spider fights. Some would even bet with us. Anyway this new guard stopped me with my box and asked me where I was going, and I said "to my cell to get my papers - I'm a Law Clerk". "I dont care if youre the ******* pope you shouldn't have a box". I said "call Ron at the Law Library, he can verify". So he does, and ron confirms I should, indeed have a box. But he doesnt let me go until he is satisfied that I dont have contraband in my box, by looking inside. "****," i thought, this ****er better be gone when I'm on my way back up. So I make it to my cell, and put the ***** in the box. I get back up the hill without incident and surrender the ***** laden container to Ron. Ron then puts his career and everything on the line and meets with the wife of an inmate, off prison grounds, some days later, to deliver the kitty. It was really ****ing great, to hear that the kitten had made it home. A part of all of us, that we had nurtured and helped thrive and petted and played with was on the outside, a free "creature". It meant so much to all of us. Especially me. Every time I would call my wife, or see her, people would pass and ask "hey, hows the kitty doing?" Word on kitty's progress would spread like wildfire with every update. Every new eccentricity the kitty developed (It would hypnotize itself watching the ceiling fan and get so dizzy it would fall over), would come back to me from total strangers. "Hey I heard about dizzykitty!", or when he decveloped some kind of lump on his neck and had to have a shunt attatched and my wife had to drain the kitty daily... "How's ol' spigotkitty?". He got bigger, and dumber. More and more stories passed, even the guards were hip to it by now, so some of the "cooler" guards would ask about it, too... Guards and inmates.... You know, one said to me once "the only difference between you and me, is you got caught". They're like inmates. Some have been there long enough, that they just want to do their time, get their paychecks, go home and watch the game and **** the wife. So long as we're not up to anything TOO awful, they turn their back to little things - Tattooing, smoking in the cells, weed, even consentual buttsex between a man and his punk, so long as they didnt have to hear about it. Or see it. Some would bring us little things, like good tattoo ink, or bits and parts of stuff for us to use in our hobbycraft, etc. Some would sit and chat it up with us on a ****ing hot summer day out on the hill. Some would play bones with us, or say "hey, a little bird told you to get your tattoo **** out of the cell, you're up for a shakedown tonight". Others. Well others were straight ****S. They'd write you up as soon as look at you. When it was shakedown time, instead of taking your books off your shelf neatly to see if there's contraband in/behind them, they'd toss them onto the floor. They'd try to instigate fights. They'd lock you down for no ****ing reason, etc. We made the best of it. We just watched from the hill, observing, listening. Going home... My time finally came. All my good-time was revoked over the escape. But in the two years I was at MAX, I earned enough for the day to finally come, nearly four years after it had all begun. You mark down the days on your calendar and it all seems like it will never end. You calculate and re calculate, and you note six months left (it might as well be six years) - Three months left (it'll never get here), One month left (Something is going to happen... Something will go wrong)... Two weeks left (your fellow convicts begin to detatch a little from you - they're still your friends but you can tell somethings a little different), Seven days left (you're waiting for a note on your bunk telling them that your Pre-release W&W check came back with a detainer in some ****off county), Three days left (each hour is two hours long and you can't sleep for ****), TOMORROW YOU'RE GOING HOME. You can't believe it. They begin the process - Your outgoing physical, all the signing of forms and papers, packing up the things that have become your worldy posessions over the years, saying goodbye to those that will be at work when you do the "walk". The morning of. You pick up your box from the property office. You go to the main office where you're given your street clothes. You're shaking. Youre ****ing scared to death. What's changed in the world? How am I going to get a job? Holy **** I now have a WIFE to look after! You go through the first gate, with a guard. it closes behind you. "Excited?" says the guard. you hear some disembodied voice answer in the affirmative, but everything in you wants to drop that box and go running back to where everything is regimented, where you knwo exactly what each day will bring, like clockwork. The second gate opens. You step beyond it. twenty yards away there's a yellow line. On the other side of that yellow line are your wife and a guy who you got out of prison seven years early with your law clerking, here to show his appreciation. Off to your right is the razor wire. Through that you can see fifty people, who have all gotten permission from their bosses to wave you off. Many of them will never see this side of the wire again. Many of them will never go home. Many of them, to this day, six years later, are still in the band room, playing awful covers. Many of them are still sneaking a quick grope or a little through-the-jeans handjob on the visiting yard. They're having lunch at twelve-oh-five. Fridays they have fish. Sometimes, just sometimes, I want to go back. Here in the world it's all me. It's all under my control. Sometimes I'm lonely. I was somebody there. I was the smart guy on the yard. I was the one to talk to if you needed help, and could afford me. Then I remember how it felt when I got out. That I could just open my door any old time and step outside. Any time I wanted to. My first week or so home, my wife told me she would wake up and see me opening and closing our front door, just because I could. I don't remember this, though. Who am I now? I'm your neighbor. I'm the guy with a nice car, the good house, the good job. You'd never guess me for an ex-con, unless you saw my well-hidden tattoos. I won't get them removed, I need them. My wife and I are now divorced. It's hard to tell somebody who broke you out of prison that you dont know where your relationship is going.... But it was for the best. Sometimes, I'll dream that I'm back there, that some freak of the law brought me back there. That the governor is ****ing with me some more. that my life is on hold, again. That I'm just some guy in a box behind some wire. I wake up in a cold sweat, leap out of bed, dash down the hall... ...and open my door. |
