JANUARY-FEBRUARY 1996

Ab~ut

the

C~ver

A prisoner shoots up in his cell.
Photos and design by Chris Cozzone.

FEA1'1JRES
21 Drug VJar lGl
Just say " Know." What every fool should
kn ow before getti ng into the drug business.

34 High $n

the Range
Just your typical state joint-drenched in drugs,
bursting at the seams and no one listening to a

2 4 King Rat
Former DEA agent Michael Levine reveals
how rats rule the criminal justice system. Lazy
prosecutors and inept agents depend more
than ever on double-dealing crimina l info rmants to make cases.

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4

PRISON LIFE

warden who cares.

4 6 Junk in

the Jfiint
Get high. Do crime. Go to the joint.
Get high . Do crime. N othing changes.
The drug economy knows no barriers.

5 7 VJsmen

Casualties
ef the Drug VJar
How government drug war troops target the most
vulnerable prey- women, mothers, low-level
dealers and mules- then squeezes them.

---DEPAR1'MEN1'SVoice of the Convict

6

In-House Counsel

69

Contributors Column

8

Tattoo of the Month

72

Word
Mail Call

10

11

Mail-Order-Mall

78

Guest Editorial:

12

Classifieds

79

Ask Bubba

82

In-Cell Cooking

83

The R ight Verdiclfo·r the Wrong M an

Block Beat

15

Callouts

19

Cellmate of the Month

32

Resources

84

Family Matters

65

Pen Pals

86
PRISON LIFE

5

TRUCE: A JOINT PROPOSAL
by Richard Stratton & Kim Wozencraft
When the tymnt has disposed offoTeign enemies by conquest or treaty, and
there is nothing to f ear f rom them, then he is always stirring ujJ some war or
ollun; in order that the people may require a leader.
- Plato
f we care abo ut th e futu re o f this
coun uy, it is time for Ame ricans to
admit th e War on Drugs has bee n
a ro ut-n o t just a failure, but a catastrophe. We lost th e War. Drugs won.
We lost the War for good reason: we
c h ose th e wro ng e n e my. Yo u ca nnot
win a wa r waged aga inst p la n ts and
c he micals. It was bogu s to begin with ,
a wa r n o o n e- ce rtain ly n o t the gove rnme nt-wa nted to win . The real
e n e mies-igno rance, d rug ab use and
addic tive be h avior- survived th e war
unscathed and are as prevale nt as eve r.
As ve te rans o f the con nict, we believe
the time has come to call a tmce.
We com e to th e n egotia ting table
fro m o pposite sid es o f the Dru g War
battlefield . Kim is a fo rme r cop whose
fi rst assign me nt was unde rcove r na rco tics. She got strung o ut in th e lin e
o f duty, t h e n se rve d a fe d e r al se ntence in '82. Richa rd is a re tired marij ua na a nd hash ish smuggle r who d id
8 years o n 25 befo re win ni ng re lease
th rough th e cou rts in '90. O ur e xpe rie n ce in th e wo r ld o f illicit d rugs is
exte nsive, fro m th e h ighest ech e lon s
of in tern ation al traffic ke rs to the foot
soldi e rs m a kin g re ta il stree t sales,
fro m th e bac k roo ms o f po li ce stati o n s to t he walled fo rtresses of o ur
vast p e n al syste m , we have seen and
b ee n p a rt of th e wh o le corr up t and
dead ly wo rld of th e Drug Vh r.
O u r na ti o n is awash in d rugs, licit
a n d illi cit. G u n b a ttles r age in o ur
ci t ies as riva l ga ngs see k to ex pand
th e ir turf o r j ust ge t eve n fo r yesterd ay's kill ing. Acco rd ing to m a instr ea m m ed ia o u tl e ts, c ri m e is

I

6 PRISON LIFE

ra mpant. We a re to ld it's a ll because
o f drugs. The war on crime is esse nti a lly th e Wa r o n Drugs. But the viole n ce is no t abo u t drugs. It is a bo ut
mo n ey. As a n a rticle e n titled "T h e
Wages of Proh ibitio n " in The Economist
(Dec. 24, l 994) ma kes plain, once you
d ecla re so me thin g illegal its ma rke t
value increases so expone n tia lly that it
becomes impossible to stop despe rado
e n tr e pre n e u rs wh o wou ld b eco m e
rich trad ing in tha t product.
T h e numbe rs a re clear . Do p e is a
multi-billion do llar indusuy. The Drug
War is the biggest cash cow tl1e federal
gove rnment has h ad going for it sin ce
the fall of the Evil Empire. The sa me
people who gave us th e Cold War and
the war in Vie tn am, the same people
wh o h ave r un th is county h ead ove r
heels in to de bt, no w give u the Wa r
o n Drugs as j ustification for the ir invasio n u pon o ur private lives a n d th e ir
d isasu·ously overstuiTed budge t.
H e re is an issue o n which bo th the
Rig ht a nd t h e Le ft ca n a n d sh o u ld
ag ree: T h e go ve rnm e n t' s War on
Drugs has e ro ded our righ ts as Americans, both in nocent and gui lty; debilita ted th e eco n o my; a nd fo m e nted
a n a unosp here whe re the po lice run
a mok, invade o ur ho mes, beat us, ki ll
us a n d seize our pro pe rty, all in the
name of pro tec ting us from ourselves.
Conse rvatives and rad icals will have a
meeting o f the min ds whe n they realize tha t the real e nemy in th e ' "'ar on
Drugs is freedo m.
Po li tician s, cops, j udges, physicians
a nd t h e m illi o ns o f Am e ri can s wh o
use drugs d a il y kn ow th a t th e Drug

Wa r is a to tal bust, ye t th e gove rnme nt continues to raise the battle cry
because it is in th e ir inte rest to keep
t h e m yth o f th e War a live. Like all
wa rs, th e Dr ug War e n ric h es t h o se
who profit on our wea knesses.
Many wh o kno w th e Wa r has bee n
lost yet favor continua tio n o f crim inal
pe nalties fo r drug possessio n a nd use
a rg ue th a t to legalize drugs wo u ld
cause us to become a nati on of drugaddled zomb ies. Perha ps they unde rstand that addictio n is a fu nda mental
flaw, or trait maybe, of our species, living as we do in the late Twe ntieth Century. We a re a na tio n of addi cts,
whatever substa n ce o r act ivity the
addiction is directed towa rd . Food, sex,
work, ga mbling, sho pping, d ri n king,
watching TV: it doesn 't ma tte r what we
a re addicted to. Laws wo n ' t change it.
What matters is that we learn to conu·ol
o ur addictive be havior.
Drugs a re here, ava ila ble, a fact o f
li fe. In te rd ic tio n d oesn ' t wo rk. The
tO ta litar ian wo r ld o f priso n is a
h otb ed o f dru g activity. If we ca n ' t
kee p drugs o ff the cell bloc ks o f o ur
m ax imum sec ur ity priso n s, we wil l
never be a ble to successfu lly pro hibit
th e m in a free soc ie ty. It is fo ll y to
th ink o t h erwise. Po liticia ns wh o
claim to be working towa rd a "drug
free Ame ri ca" d efraud th eir vo te rs.
Ma king so me d rugs illegal me re ly
e n a b les drug add ic ti on by a llo wing
the addi ct to b la me t he d r ug fo r th e
add ictio n . We wage war on pla nts an d
in e rt substa n ces instead o f trying to
un d e rsta nd a nd lea rn to control
addi ct io n . We bla m e th e su bsta n ce,

the evil fore ig ner who produces it, o r
the despicable d eale r who provides it,
inste ad o f fo rcing t h e co nsum e r to
ta ke r esponsibi li ty fo r hi s o r h e r
b e h avior. Som e p eople become
a ddicte d to d rugs, o th e rs d o n o t.
Those who care a bout the mselves and
o ther p eo pl e a nd who want to lead
healthy, active lives usua ll y kn ow when
to say, "No, th a nk you ," to d rugs.
T h e do ctor wh o presc ribes Prozac
o r Va li u m o r so m e kind of slee pi ng
ta ble t is viewed as giving solace
through his legal remedy. Peo ple who
ta ke illega l drugs often say th ey do it
fo r th e sa m e re aso n as th e patie n t
wh o see ks re li ef fro m th e ph ysic ian:
because it works. Drugs, li cit o r illicit,
d o allevia te pa in . But drug addi ction
o n ly co mpo unds pa in. By te lli n g us
what d rugs we a re allowed to become
a dd ic ted to, a nd pun ishing us wh e n
we beco me addicte d to controlled substances, the government is u·eadi ng o n
o ur m ost bas ic ri g h t: th e rig ht to
d e termin e o ur own be havior, with th e
corresponding obligation
to take respo n sibili ty fo r
our actions.
Ne ithe r drug use n o r
drug addictio n is responsible fo r the burgeo ning
prison industry. The Drug
War is. T he War is responsible for the corruption of
o ur pol ice fo rces, o ur
prosec uto rs a nd j u dges,
and as it co rrupts th ose
peop le it empowe rs th e
most aggressive a nd
unscrupulous elemen ts of
o ur so ciety. The Wa r is
responsible for the prolife ra tio n o f fi rearms a nd
violence on the streets. By calling the ir
anti-drug effort "war," the governmen t
has legitimized the use of weapons-by
bo th sides.
The War has also meant a m ultilate ra l surre nde r of pe rsona l libe rties.
Am eri ca ns now submit to be in g surve illed , sto ppe d o n the highways a nd
searched , having the ir urine ana lyzed,
th e ir pho n e lin es ta ppe d , th eir childre n turn ed to info rmants a nd th e ir
la nds a nd h omes in vaded by marauding d rug cops, a ll in the name o f waging this shadow wa r. The a uth orities
may seize o ur cash , o ur ca rs a nd o ur
h o mes, eve n if th ey o nly su spect
wro ngd o in g . We have to p ay lawyers
to try to ge t o ur assets bac k, wh e the r
convicted of illegal activities or not.
What we propose is a tru ce, pe rh a p s p a rtia l at first to see h ow it
wo rks, but with th e ultim a te goa l of
pla ci n g respo n sibili ty fo r c h oices

nu mber of h eroin addi cts in th is
cou ntry. To say pot use leads to heroin add iction is another case of placing
b la m e on a substance; a subs tance
can have no malice o r ill will, it si mply
is, whe ther add ictive or no t. We invest
it with mystiq ue wh e n we say it is so
harmful th at it must be mad e illegal.
The o n ly real relation ma rUuana has
to hero in is that bo th mus t b e purchased on the b lack market.
Deregulation of marijuana does
n ot necessari ly lead to comp le te
d ereg ul ation of a ll drugs. T o offe r
cocaine a nd he roin in t he shop window of o ur pha rmacies would be too
tempting for m a n y, an d a n enticem e n t to so me wh o o the rwise wou ld
n eve r consider using either drug. But
marUua n a, by a ny a nd all standa rds,
is less h ar mfu l th a n two p rese n tly
lega l, th o ugh co n tro ll ed an d clearl y
very a d d ictive drugs: a lco h o l an d
to bacco . Alco h ol a buse is d irectly
respo n sib le fo r at leas t 150,000
deaths a year, tobacco abou t 400,000.
Ye t \Ve may choose to use
alcohol o r tobacco withou t 1·isking im p ri so nme n t. As we become
more ed ucated abou t the
d a nge rs of these su bstances, som e o f us may
thi n k twice be fo re lig h tin g u p or toss ing one
back. Bu t th e c h o ice
rema in s ou rs to make.
The governm ent is not in
ou r ho m es te ll i ng us
wh at to do. We a re
respo nsib le fo r o ur own
we ll-being. We are free to
m a ke c hoices.
T here h as neve r been
Ame rica would do we ll to investigate a d ocumented case of ma rijuan a
th e busin ess possib ilities. Afte r a ll , killing anybody, though its illegality
o ur Co n stitutio n was printe d o n fo rces users to ris k imp ri so nm e nt,
even d eath . Th e substance itself is
he mp pa per.
De regu latio n wo u ld e nta il do in g rela tively be nig n. It has a lo ng histoaway wi th crimina l pen a lties fo r pos- ry of u se as a m ed ic ina l h erb. But
session of marU uana, permi tting ind i- u nde r the aegis of Wa r, th e poli ce
vid u al s to gro w pla nts for p e rso n a l have arrested ove r e ig h t m i Ilio n
cons um ption, a nd lice n sing la rge Am e ri ca ns and th rown them into the
scale growe rs a nd sellers. Li ke tobac- j ustice system 's labyrinth. Eight m ilco a nd a lco ho l, ma rijuan a co u ld b e lio n . Thin k of the lives dam age d or
sold with app ropriate regulatio ns fo r d estroyed by crimin al prosecutions,
qu a li ty co ntro l in p lace . Instead of p riso n sente n ces a n d felony records.
wasting billions of dolla rs chasing pot Th ink of t h e tax dollars was te d to
h ead s a nd rippin g up c ann a bi s im p ri son marij u a n a o utlaws. T h in k
plants, we would crea te a badly need- of how much we could d o to info rm,
ed influx of capital into the legitima te ed u ca te and ass ist drug ad d icts if
th ose same d o lla rs \Vere spe nt in a n
economy.
The argu me nt th at ma rUuana func- effort to help ou r fe llow h u m a n s
ti o n s as a g ate way to th e u se o f r athe r th a n to wage a vic ious a nd
stronge r, d an gerous d ru gs falls a part un wi n nable war agai n st our ve ry
whe n you look at th e num ber of regu- selves.
III]
lar ma rijuana sm o ke rs ve rsus th e

abo ut dru gs wh e re it b e lo ngs : with
the individual in a free American society; in cases of min ors, with the ir pa re nts. We suggest the place to begin is
with th e c u rrently sc h edul ed dr ug
tha t see ms to b e the least harm ful o f
a ny of t he p rese ntl y illicit drugs, less
ha rmful eve n than many legal drugs,
a nd o ne tha t is used regu larly by 30 to
40 million Ameri cans.
Deregulate marUua na, lega lize c ultivation of h em p , incl ud ing cannabis
sativa a nd indica fo r the myria d uses
to wh ich it can be put, gran t a mn esty
to th e hundre<;Is of th ousands o f people curre ntly in prison, on pro ba tio n
or o n pa ro le lo r having grown o r possessed this p la nt, a nd see if, in a year
o r two, we h ave in fact beco me a
n a ti o n o r h eroin a ddi c ts. Ge rm a n y
recently legalized cultivatio n of he mp
fo r use in ma kin g pape r, clo th , rope,
oil a nd ma ny other p rod ucts; they' re
in o n th e groun d floor o f a po te ntia lly huge marke t. He mp farming is a lso
an eco logica lly sou nd pro posit io n.

PRISON LIFE

7

Our n e w con t ributin g e ditor Mansfield B. Frazier was
released from fe d e ral p rison to a halfway house in May
1995. His first book, FROM BEHIND THE WALL, Commentmy on C71'111e, Race and the Underclass, was rece ntly published by Paragon House. He lives in Cleveland whe re he
is workin g on his n ex t book o f essays a nd a collection of
sh ort stories.
George C. Gray co-wrote "High on the Range," and contributed to "Junk in the .Jo in t." He is a j ournalist in Albuque rque, New Mexico, where he curre ntly works o n films
a t IZNME-TV.
Marc Levin, AI Levin a nd Daphne Pinkerson of Blowback
Productio ns a re award-wining documentary fi lmmake rs
whose Prisoners of the Wm· on Drugs, produced in association with Prison Life magazine, a irs o n HBO J a nuary 8,
1996. The Blowback team is a t work on a six-part history
of the CIA for th e Discovery Chann el and a lso has a new
HBO / P1ison Life documentary in d evelopme nt.
Th rough his wri ting, public speaking a nd on-line particip atio n , former DEA Special Agent Michael Levine has
beco me o ne o f the m ost fo rmidable foes of the governme nt's wa r on drugs. His books, Deep Cover (De lacorte,
New Yo rk , 1990) a nd The Big White Lie (Th u nd e r' s
Mouth , New York, 1993), writte n with his wife and writing
p artn er, Laura Kavan a u-Levine, te ll th e inside story of
how th e illegal drug trade is contro lled at its hig hest lev-

e ls by the CIA. Levine's n ew book, TTiaugle of Death, is a
fac t-based novel abou t revenge and the deep cover hunt
fo r a deadly a nd addic tive sex d rug.
Michael Montalvo is one of tl1e natio n 's foremost jailhouse
lawyers. With his victory in U.S. v. 405,089.23, Monta lvo
ti1reate ned to slaughte r the government's sacred cash cow:
asset forfeiture. And h e did it a ll fro m the law library a t
USP Lompoc. Now in his third year o f law school, Montalvo in tends to become a licensed me mber of the Bar afte r
release from prison so that he can continue to resist the
drug war by c ha lle nging th e un co nstitutio nal means the
governme nt employs against U.S. a nd fore ign citizens. He
h as a bai l motion before th e Ninth Circ uit Co urt of
Appeals pending ti1e o utcome of his direct appeal, and he
rece ntly filed his brief in the Supreme Court o n the double
jeopardy issue he won in U.S. v. 405.
Susan Rosenb erg is a U.S. political prison e r serving 58
years for weapons possession. After over ten years in maximum security fe deral prisons (including two yea rs at the
Lexington, Ke ntu cky Hig h Secu rity U n it (H SU) fo r
women that was fina lly closed as in huma n e under pressure from human righ ts groups a nd the AC LU Natio n al
Prison Proj ect), she was recently tra nsferre d to DanbUJl'
FCI for wome n in Con necticut. She is an AIDS e ducator
a nd p eer advisor as well as a pri ze-winning poe t a nd
write r. He r sho rt story, L ee's Time, publishe d in th e October 1994 issue o f Prison L if e, is curre ntly be ing a dapted
fo r a fea wre film. Rosenbe rg is gu est
e ditin g a sp ecia l iss ue o f Prison Life
o n politi cal prisoners to be publish ed
in 1996.
J e ff Stewart served 52 months o f a
60-month se nte nce in federal prison
for g rowing m a riju a n a. Si n ce his
r e lease in Novem b e r , 1994, he h as
b ee n worki n g with his sister, Juli e
Stewart, at the na tional headquarte rs
ofFAMM (Families Against Mandatory Minimums) in Washin gton D.C .
J eff is in c ha rge o f program deve lopm ent for FAMM a nd he is pursuing a
bach elo r 's d egree progra m in business education.

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8 PRISON LIFE

APPEALS
KENNETH A. WEBB
Attorney at Law
30 Years' Experience in
Criminal Appeals
A complete list of published crimi nal
appeals in which Kenneth A. Webb represented the appe llant, together with the disposition made by the court in each appeal,
is available fo r your review by writing to
Kenneth A. Webb at the address below.

3155 W. BIG BEAVER ROAD, SUITE 206
TROY, MICHIGAN 48084

PRisoNLIFE
January-February 1996
EDITOR & PUBUSHER
Richard Stratton
EXECUTIVE EDITOR & ART DIRECTOR
Chris Cozzone
EDITOR-AT-LARGE
Kim Wozencraft
MANAGING EDITOR
Jennifer Wynn
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS
Edward Bunker, Mansfield B. Frazier,
Donnie Martin, Susan Rosenberg
EDITORIAL ASSISTANT
Pamela Widener
DESIGN & LAYOUT
Bobo Boggins
CONTRIBUTING ARTISTS: BEHIND BARS
Henry Herz
CONTRIBUTING ARTISTS: FREEWORLD
Steve Conway, Steve Gressok
CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS
Tony Hardman, Steve Krueger
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS:
BEHIND BARS
Alex Friedmann, Michael Montalvo
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS: FREEWORLD
George Gr'!y, Michael Levine,
Jeff Stewart

Pleas send me my AFRO-UN ITY Swimsuit Calendar
I have enclosed check or money order payable to "Hawks" for $12.95
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PRISON LIFE 9

by Chris Cozzone, Executive Editor

JY

e ore in touch with a
lot of people in federal
and state p risons.
Many of our connections ore "in-house
reporters" or editorial advisors; othe rs
ore just friends. Long before you see our
concepts and ideas in PLM, they are put
to the test by consulting w ith our homiez.
Most o f th e time , they agree with
what we' re doing or where we're headed. When we run pieces on shitty prison
cond itions or exp ose scams like UNICOR, they all soy "cool." Stories on successful ex-cons like Eddie Bunker and
Jimmy Santiago Boco, or respected convicts like Herby Sperling, always get us
thumbs-up, too.
O ther times, we ore warned not to run
something. A lot of prisoners suggest we
keep away from stories on riots ond
gongs because they'll get the mag censored (like they did in our October '94,
March '95 and May-June '95 issues). O r
they'll tell us not to run stories on snitches,
like the one on Dona ld Frankos in the
October '94 issue, because "those punkass rots don't deserve the space or attention ." The a rticle, "Challenging the
Convict Cod e," in our July-August '95
issue was warned against, too. "What's
wrong wit' youse guys?" one guy said.
"Y'con't change do code."
But we ron oil tha t shit anyway,
because our code tells us to run the truth
no matter what. When we begin bowing to censorship, we'll be just like any
other weak-ass mainstream publication.
N one of our sources hod a problem
with a n entire issue devoted to prisoners of the wa r on drugs. "Long overdue! " w rote one guy. "It's time people
heard the o ther half of the story," said
another.
Then we told them we were going to
run someth ing about the drug scene in
prison. Here's some early criticism:
"You' ll blow it for a lo t of people,"
wrote one woman.
"That's just what the public wonts to
see: how all these 'coddled' prisoners
ore hanging out doing drugs in these
country club prisons. Nice going ."
It was not our original intent to do a
feature on drugs in prison, even though
we knew it was a big port of prison life.
But when we got inside and sow how
the drug scene in pri son reflects th e
10 PRISON

LIFE

failed drug war on the streets, we felt
we hod to confront this contradiction.
As we were working with Blowback
Pro ductions on the HBO d ocumentary,
Prisoners of the War on Drugs, we visited dozens of prisons across the country.
During the course o f the filming , and as
we put together this issue, we got both
video and stills of prisoners doing drugs
behind bors.
"You can't put a picture of o prisoner
shooting up on your cover! "
"The poliricions will use it against us!
The d eportmen t of corruption will use it
as on excuse to crock down on us and
stop visits. n
"You can't do that!" one dude wrote.
"You're supposed to be the voice of the
convict! You're on our side!"
Well, we ore.
A lot of people out there need help.
The war on drugs is o mess. The focus of
the drug wor is not trafficking and distribution, it's possession arrests. While these
petty criminals have little or no impact on
the overall drug trade, many of them ore
more than just recreational
users.
Many ore addicts
who need help.
As you'll read in
this issue, the federal and stole departments of correction do little
more than scoop
these guys off the
street and throw
em
behind
bars. Because
there ore little or
no
treatmen t
programs, and
because the
prison environment is deluged
with

system con do is keep the prison environment clean. If there's any place in the
world that should be clean, shouldn't it
be prison?
The fact that drugs ore just as available in prison as they ore on the street
makes a mockery of the government's
wor on drugs. I mean, if you can't keep
a controlled environmen t like prison
clean, how ore you ever going to clean
up the streets?
"It's the visitors ," a lo t of guards and
wardens hove told us. "They bring in all
the drugs, smuggled in their buttholes
and other cavities."
That's what John Q. Public thinks. The
truth is, most of the drugs in prison get in
through the guards. They con bring it in
bulk and make big buc ks under the
table. The authorities know this. If visits
were really the problem, they would 've
been stopped a long time ago
Our mission is to show what's going on
behind bars. If we pull our punches or
slan t our stories to kiss the Man's ass or
hype some inmate's bullshit, we wouldn't
be the Voice of the Convict.

:::~----------~~--~-~----­

people gel
no help and
drugs,
these
remain addicts.
The some argument that says nonviolent people turn violent due to the prison
environment con also be applied to
drugs. A few years in the system and
what happens? Drug users become drug
addicts; drug addicts die.
Since we all know that rehabilitation
is 0 dead word, we figure the least the

This month's envelope art:
j ed Millrr is the rn1ist responsiblefor the
envelope above. A victim of the 3 Strikes
laws in California, j ed is loclwl njJ at
Sau Quenlin. Douglas Brrg of Eastern
Correctional Institution in Mruyland,
also one of last )'l'ar's Art Behind &n:s
winners, m•aterl tlu• ot/u>r two envelopes
on the next page.

SQUEAKY COMES CLEAN
Dear Richa rd Stratton:
I saw your Sept./Oct. '95 story on exconvict Eddie Bunker, and want to
write to both him a nd you. As Eddie
told you, he and I were swarmed by federal drug agents in the hallway of the
Hollywood Holiday Inn sometime in
the early '70s. We had no t gone there
to score or to discuss a drug deal but to
review my notes for a proposed book.
I had first me t Eddie a bout h alf an
hour be fore when, by th e arra ngement of m u tual friends, he picked me
up from the o ld county courthouse
and drove me to the h otel.
I found Eddie to be a cold and taciturn monk durin g the r id e to the
hotel; chit chat was d efinitely n o t in
order. Then, within seconds after we
stepped o ut of the h otel elevator ,
agen ts streamed o ut of rooms like
cockroaches. Th ey must h ave occupied the whole floor. I was shoved into
a room and intermi tte ntly ign o red
a nd ridiculed, as agents came in a nd
out, disrespectfully rifled and read my
notes, a nd after a n h o ur o r so, told
me to go. T h ey wanted Eddi e. I
learne d la ter th a t h e h ad bee n
booked for some ridiculo us d o llar
amount of drugs.

didn 't see Eddie again until o n e
brig ht day when h e a nd a mutual
friend stopped by th e Dodge van
where my fe male frie nds a nd I were
living to drop off an e normously co nspicuous rifle before they went to ro b
a Beverly Hills ba nk. I accepted this
piece of artillery open ly, as if it were a
set of drapery rods. It wou ld 've been
in poor taste to argu e.
Eddie h ad b ee n to ld that our va n
had bee n tailed while we lived beside
the courthouse. He himself h ad only
recently b ee n let out of j ai l under a
false agreement to h elp the feds catch
a bigger fi sh , and it could 've bee n
assumed by then that they suspected
th eir bait was b ad. As it turned out,
Eddie's ve hicle h ad a tracking device
on it, and h e was re-arrested that d ay
fo r bank r obb e ry afte r b eing c hased
by seve ral bran ches of local and federal police.
During the next mo nths I was living
between cities, getting into some troub le of my own, but not o f my own
doing. I sp ent six or eight weeks in a
central California jail c ha rged with a
sh ooti ng d eath th at had occurre d
when I was in a n othe r city. I was visited the re by a bow-tie guy who said he
was Eddie Bunker's Los Angeles public defender on the H oliday Inn case.

---~=====--------~I-_:_I was wi lling to testify for Edd ie, but

-

after th e interview, the lawyer
could no t say wh eth e r o r n o t he
would call me. I think now that I
d idn' t ask him eno ugh questions.
The murder ch arge against me

USA

was dropped because I could prove my
n o,vh e reabouts, but instead of being
released, I was given over to the custody of the Los Angeles she riffs, transported and charged with the robbery
of a 7-11. At a prelimin a r-y h earing, I
was positively ide ntified , with e motional emphasis, by two indig n a ntly sur e
witnesses, bound ove r for tri a l, a nd
spent maybe two mo re months in custo d y before th e true perpe tra to r ,
whose only resemblance to me was by
gender, confessed to the robbery.
It was during this bizarre stay in the
co un ty jail tha t I was ye lled awake,
bad gered into hun-y-up-a nd-wait lines,
and taken totally unpre pared into th e
much larger and mo re po lish ed federal co urtroo m o n behalf of Ed ward
Bunker. There he was, well-dressed, at
a wide counsel table far across th e
courtroom, and he re was I on exhibit
in a short-hemmed hand-me-down j ail
dress, my face dotted with a forgotten
d ry blob of toothpaste/ pimple cream.
On the witness sta nd I was asked
something that h ad n o t co me up in
the conversatio n with the man asking
it of me now: ·w hat was Eddie wearing
on the day he was arrested?
In the previous e ighteen mo nths, I
had been arrested in five counties seve ral times for auto theft, at least twice
for murder, three or fo ur times for
trespassing, once for dissuasio n of a
witness, and now for robbery. Most of
my friends were in jail; Charlie Manson
a nd several others recently sentenced

(continued on page 81)

Old G lor

For United States a d-'-Y
...""aea o.n1y

PRISON LIFE

II

THE RIGHT VERDICT FOR THE WRONG MAN
by Mansfield B. Frazier
h e swiftn ess o f th e n ot-g ui lty ve rd ict in th e O .J .
Simpso n trial shows how re pulsed the jury was by
racist, corrupt cops li ke Ma rk Fuh rm an. An ax io m
o f law is tha t whoever comes into court accusing a nother
must himself h ave clean h a n d s. Fu h rma n' s han d s we re
stained with black blood. T he verdict was a n indictmenL of
racism a nd co rruption in ow· criminal j ustice syste m.
T h e prosec uto rs added furth e r in su lt to Fuhrma n 's
c ri min ality fi rst by pro mo ting h im as t h eir key witn ess,
th e n t ryin g to save face by sta tin g to th e ju ry, "Yes,
Fuhrman is a racist. But h e is a n a no maly, a rogue co p."
Su re , li ke the co ps wh o beat Rodn e y King . Or like th e
co ps who ro utine ly h a rass, co e rce a n d bru ta li ze b lac ks
because they know they can ge t away with it.
Mos t b lac k Am e r ica ns a re a ll to o awa re th a t ma ny
cops are racists. A growing numbe r of wh ites a re now recogn izing tha t la rge numbe rs of our police ope ra te ou tsid e

T

12 PRISON

LIFE

th e la ws th ey a re sworn to up h o ld . These o u tlaws with
badges a nd g u n s a re co mm o n in b ig-city po lice fo rces.
The ir ve ry presence in a case ca n, a nd ofte n d oes, ta int
th e o utcome.
T hough most white po lice officers are no t as d e praved
as Mark Fuhrma n, virtually all of th e m will pro tect racist
o r co rru pt cops a nd become wi lling accomplices by t heir
complaisance. A hard core of bad cops co rrupts a n e ntire
police force.
If Fuhr man pla nted th e blood y g lo ve at Simpso n 's
esta te, he did it because he believed Simpso n had killed
white peop le. Like so man y othe r white p o lice officers,
Fuhrma n acted as if his first a nd o n ly duty was to pro tect
white ness a nd its privileges. Had 'icole Sim pson a nd Ron
Go ldm a n bee n b lack, Fuh rm a n m os t li ke ly wo ul d no t
have cared en oug h about the outcome of the case to conside r p lantin g evide n ce.

The impunity ~ith which Fuhrman perjured himself
indicts every police department in America. All cops are
capable of committing similar illegal acts because they
know that the system they operate under will allow them
to get away with it. So much wrong has been done in this
country under color of authority-and behind the blue
wall of silence-that Detective Fuhrman had no cause to
hesitate when faced with an opportunity to plant evidence
and bolster his case.
"Badly captured; well held," is the secret rule of
thumb of many police agencies. Why should OJ. Simpson.
be treated any differently? Cops don't make reputations
and get promotions by sending Joe Blow to prison. They
actively seek high-profile, career-enhancing cases. Some
will go to any length to nail a celebrity suspect. Where
shoddy, slipshod and outright dishonest police work had
been good enough to win conviction after conviction in
the past, Fuhrman and his accomplices had no reason to
believe it wouldn't work in the Simpson case.
Much of the fear that drives the white militia movement is founded on what these people have seen the government, in the jack-booted form of its police agents, do
to blacks and other minorities. They fear that the noknock warrant, the stop-and-search with no more probable cause than a hunch (usually based on race), and the
flagrant disregard for the
rights of non-whites will spill
out of the ghettos and imperil
their lives. They understand
that once the mad dogs within
police agencies get a taste for
the blood of citizens, they will
not be sated. For when a bad
cop is caught, police brass circle the wagons. They never
clean their houses of those
unfit to serve. Racist and
overzealous cops are allowed
to undermine all our liberties
and make a mockery of the
principles our forefathers
fought and died for.
The most frightening aspect of the corruption of our
criminal justice system by cops like Mark Fuhrman is that
the judges who are in a position (and indeed have a sworn
duty) to expose and punish such blatant abuse of the law
tum a blind eye to the Constitution and allow fundamental concepts of justice and fair play to be trampled under
the guise of fighting crime. Testifying by police and other
authorities is routinely winked at by those who are in a
position to halt such egregious injury to our court system.
Crime has replaced communism as the scare tactic to use
on the willingly misled majority. With statements such as,
"You're either with us or against us," and "We'll do whatever it takes to get the bastards," the fascist mentality is
dividing the land. We have reached the point where it
takes..a beloved athlete (albeit a black man) and a multimillion dollar defense team to ensure that justice is served
and our rights are protected.
OJ.'s guilt or innocence became a secondary issue to
the tactics of the police, and rightly so. A solid house
won't stand on a rotten foundation, and a criminal cannot
be brought to justice by illegal means. Our system of law
holds that it is better for a guilty man to go free than for
an innocent man to be convicted. And again, rightly so.
The police, in their zeal to convict, denied the families of
Nicole Brown and Ron Goldman a fair prosecution of the

man accused of (and, despite many blacks protestations to
the contrary, probably guilty of) murdering their loved
ones. The police will now compound this failing by refusing to investigate any further. No one will ever be tried
and convicted for these crimes. The case is over. American
justice is no better served because into all of this the "race
card" has been played.
,
I wish my race didn't have the luxury of interjecting
the race card into this or any other case or situation. It is
crippling to blacks and protective of a corrupt system. It
provides blacks with a strategy even when racism is not
operating. It gives us an all too convenient way to duck
responsibility for the nefarious acts we, like every other
group, commit. To have full and true equality in America,
we must be held as accountable for our misdeeds as anyone else. But the very real specter of racism prevents this
and robs us of the right to be held responsible for our
good and bad deeds as individuals. Unless and until justice is meted out fairly and in a color-blind manner in
America, we will always have to question any and all police
action because too often racism and the corruption that
goes along with it distort the proceedings.
Of equal or larger concern to the black community
should be the reaction of some of our members to the OJ.
case. Here we have a black man who completely disavowed
and relinquished his blackness
when it suited his purposes. We
championed his cause when
the white world he abandoned
us for turned on him. We surrounded him with our support,
our care and our love without
mentioning his former desertion. We as a race have been
far too quick to forgive those
who betray us in this manner.
Michaeljackson similarly
quit the race and we just as
quickly embraced him and his
cause because we were afraid
that his and OJ.'s blackness
wouldn't allow them to receive fair treatment at the hands
of a white judicial system. Thus, we are forced into supporting men who, by their actions, have proven that they
have no love for their own black race, men whose lifestyles
border on the pathological, the shameful and the downright disgusting.
Shame on us for not qualifying and attaching strings
to our support. If we _allow these black men to so use us,
and to turn their backs on us when fame and fortune lure
them away, but who then rush back when trouble arises,
what message does this send to the rest of the world? It
says that we are at best children who will allow ourselves to
be treated in any shabby manner while we remain as loyal
as lap dogs.
Shame on us for not setting higher standards of racial
fealty for.those we shower with admiration. In Simpson
and Jackson, we find the closest approximation to royalty
blacks are allowed in America: athletes and entertainers.
We worship and idolize them for escaping the stigma of
what white America attempts to portray its black citizens
as, yet we make no demands on them for our love. These
men managed to transcend the color line by negating
rather than celebrating their blackness-but at what price
to us as a race and ultimately to themselves?
Today, for example, when a black youth is discovered
to have talent with some kind of ball, he is given an athlet-

O.J.'s guilt or innocence
became a secondary issue
to the tactics of the
police, and rightly so.

PRISON LIFB

13

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ic scho larship, usually to a white university. If his prowess con tinues to develo p, h e is g iven a sports ca r, a n exp ensive watch, a nd all too often a white
cheerl eade r lO marry-at which point he loses all connection to his race.
Li ke every othe r race, we need o ur heroes. They offer us hope that th e
wretch ed third o f our race still mired in poverty, d egradatio n and ig n ora nce will o ne day rise above the ir squalid conditio n. But just as we accord
o ur h eroes admiration , so we must require that they do their duty to the
rest of us.
W.E.B. Dubois stated in The Soul of Blac/c.Follts that races advance by the
excep tional member reaching a high e r vantage-ground a nd the n reaching
back and li ftin g his dulle r brothe r up. Sadly, this isn ' t happening e nough
within the b lack race.
We have been too busy ido lizing the wealth y and famous of our race to
notice how qui ckly they have disavowed the down trodden a nd the disenfranc hised. Did the H o llywood branch of the NAACP, which staged a rally fo r
Mich ae l .Jackso n, raise its vo ice above a peep to protest th e Rodn ey King
beating? Neve r mi nd tha t King is a ne'er-do-well who will constantly be in
some son of trouble with th e law. The fac t re mains tha t if we don' t move to
pro tect the rig htS o r th e least a mong us, th e r igh ts of all o ur race a re a t risk
o f being violated by those in authority.
And so it is with OJ. and Michael. Yes, their rightS deserve protection,
too. But we, ord inary black me n and women, have rightS also. \Ne have the
rig ht tO demand that those in th e position to d o somethin g do just th at:
Something.
When we tru ly mawre as a race we will demand tha t ou r he roes live up
to their rol e as mod els for th e rest of us a nd that they d o not be tray us by
becoming pse udo-whi tes. T he O J. verdi ct has done mo re to call much needed a tte ntion to the ende mic co rruption and racism in ou r crimina l j ustice
system than the couml ess Rod ney King-like vio la tio ns that ta ke place o n our
city streets every day. In this case, it may be tha t it is be tte r for a guil ty man to
go free in orde r to d e mo nstrate to the rest of us how g uiily we a re o f allowing innoce nt men a nd wome n to be treated unfairly by o ur criminal j ustice
system beca use o f' race. It's just too bad that th e ma n himself is such a d isg race lO his people.

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14

PRISON LIFE

FROM DEEP W ITHIN
THE PURGATORY
OF AN AMERICAN PRISON
"Humorous, always
compassionate, and
painfully real.
Bravo! A well-crafted sojourn
into prison life."
-Piri Thomas, author of
Down These Mean Streets

"A remarkable writer....
The evidence is not just of talent
but of tenacity and courage that
most of us can hardly imagine. •
- The New York Times

By the author of
The Boys In Cell Block "C"

Sllf)l

1

V INTAGE

0

BOOKS

Now In Paperback, $11.00

"All the News
You Can't
Confine"

BLOCK BEAT

America's National Prison Newspaper

Januan;-Februan; 1996

-----

RIOTS ERUPT IN U.S. PRISON SYSTEM
It was the most widespread and cost- direct response to Congress's refusal crack laws are a race thing and how
ly uprising the American penal system to amend the unfair sentences for th ey shou ld be changed. Finally, we
has ever experienced. When it was crack cocaine offenses. C4 was sen- thought, somebody understood what
over, 70 federal prisons across th e tenced to over nine years for posses- is happening. "
country were locked down. Various sion of 4.9 grams of crack. If he had
According to a study by th e U.S.
sources said anywhere from 20 to 40 been caught with powde r cocaine, he Sentencing Commission, about 14,000
prisons had gone off. The unprece- would've received a slap on the wrist of the 90,000 federal prisoners are
dented rash of rioting r esulted in and two months probation.
incarcerated for crack offenses. The
dozens of injuries to prisoners and staff
On October 18. the House of Rep- study also shows that 88% of these
and caused tens of millions of dollars resen tatives voted 332 to 83 to reject a offenders are black, 7% are Hispanic
in damage, overtime pay and lost rev- proposal by the Federal Sentencing and 4% are wh ite. In contrast, 32% of
enue from closed Federal Prison Indus- Commission to modify the 100 to 1 offenders convicted for powder
tries factories.
sem e ncing disparity between crack cocaine crim es are white, 27% are
As yet, the full extent of the casual- and powder cocaine. Under current black a nd 39% are Hispanic. The Senties and damages is not known as federal law, possession or distribution tencing Commission's report to ConBureau of Prisons officials continue to of five grams of crack cocaine means a gress r ecommended removing the
shroud the disturbances in secrecy. At mandatoqr five-year sentence without dispari ty in se ntences for crack and
press date, at least one federa l peni- parole. To receive the equivalent se n- powder cocaine.
tentiary (USP Atlanta)
"Whenever the opposiwas still locked down, and
tion spoke out during the
USP Leavenworth seems
d ebate," re ports C4, "their
to be under a communiargum ent h ad n o merit.
cation blackout-we have
When they came out with
heard nothing from our
'We just need to lock
usual sources at Leaventhese people up,' there
worth, and other prisoner
were experts who opposed
advocacy groups report
this as unjust. At the time
that they, too, are co nthey took a voice vote,
cerned that prisoners in
everyone in the TV room
Leavenworth are being
jumped up, happy. It realkept incommunicado as a
ly looked as if something
result of trouble at the
was going to be done. But
maximum security pen.
then they took the count.
Although major media
We couldn't even look at
outlets reported some of
each other. We were in a
the incidents early in the
state of disbelief.
"There was no question
course of more than three
weeks of rioting and lock- Prisoners and experts agree crack laws target minmities. A guard at 0/da- there wou ld be tro u b le.
down, they relied on fed- homa State Reformatory monitors two drug prisoners: Lionel Fortenberry People were saying, 'The
eral prison officials for (middle), who received 100 years for fJossession of crack with intent to dis- more they lock us down ,
information and quickly tribute, andAldofus Wade (right), wlw got60 )'eal-sfor conspiracy to disttib- the more we're gonna
dropped the story as BOP ute crack. Photo IJy Ch1is Cozzone.
tear this shit up."'
spokesmen refused to
According to a prisoner
admit there was a crisis. ' - - - - - - - -- - - - - - - - - - - - - -- - - - - - ' at FCI Talladega, a riot
Reports from prisoner witnesses tell a tence for powder cocaine, you would there also broke out soon after the
different story.
have to be caught with 500 grams.
debate. There was a chain reaction
"The feds are saying it's racial," says
The day the proposal was defeated, from prison-to-prison.
C4, a prisoner at the Federal Correc- riots broke out at five U.S. prisons.
"It was spontaneous," reports one
tiona! Institution in Memphis, TN . Upri sings at oth er institutions soon prisoner. "The frustration felt by all of
"But it's not. During the riot, you had followed .
us in the federa l institutions has
Crips and Bloods from LA, you had
"Everyone was in th e TV room reached the boiling point. We got no
gangs from Chicago, you had white watching the debate on CSpan," says more parole, no more good time, no
guys, all in this together. There 's C4. "We were following th is bill from more educational programs, and
nothing racial going on."
day one. During the debate, congress- more time than rapists and killers, all
The uprisings, explains C4, were in me n and judges explained how the for a few rocks."
PRISON LIFE

15

BOP Crisis
( co~nued from previous page)
During the lockdown, prison guards
harassed prisoners who are members
ofFAMM (Families Agai nst Mandatory
Mimimums) and singled them ou t as
ringleaders due to the group's advocacy effo rts, which include eliminating
the disparity between crack and powd e r cocaine sen te nces. FAMM 's
newsletter, the FAMMgram, and Prison
Life have bee n accused of facilitating
communication between prisoners.
"The only communication we had,"
says C4, "was through our fami lies,
altho ugh this is the first d ay I've been
able to make a call-a full two-and-ahalf weeks after the uprising. Because
this co untry has a way of lockin g up
fa milies, word gets spread through the
home. 'Yo ur brother at so-and-so
pdson called today.. .'"
Federal Di tri ct Judge Ri chard
Cona boy. who, as Chairman of th e
Sente ncin g Commissio n , ove rsaw
pre paratio n o f th e Commissio n 's
report, said tha t he had bee n .. forewarned th at if something isn' t don e
soo n th e re may be undesirable
results." And in fact the BOP predicted tro uble bac k in 1993 after d istu rbances in three prisons related to the
crack laws.
Ye t, once the troubl e began , th e
BOP typically overreacted a nd,
according to inside witnesses, the
g uards provoked disturbances at several institutions.
"You would no t be lieve what is
going on in this place," reports a pris-

o ner at FCI Marianna, Flo rida. "In the
ea rly ho urs of O ctober 25 (Wedn esday), there was work call. The people
left th e units but quietly congr egated
in the ya rd for a peace ful no wo rk
d emo nstratio n. But the peo pl e wh o
run this place are just itching for a
fight. They had the ir SORT team
r eady. They came in numbe rs, all
dressed in black with black helme ts,
black sh ields an d with arm ame n ts.
They ca me in with AR-15 assau lt
machine guns that each ca rried a 30
round ammo clip. Also, th ey came in
with sho tguns, tea r gas guns and tear
gas foggers. They bombarded the yard
with tear gas. We've all bee n locked
down since.
"Now the SORT team, who look just
like Nazi SS troopers, bring u s o ur
box lunch and try to intimidate us day
and night. Tod ay the SORT team
came into o ur cell, made a shambles
of it, and took away my ce llma te on
some bum excuse.
"All weigh ts, pool tables, ping pong
tables and other recreational stuff have
been taken away. I feel that the govemment, as well as d1c warden here, wants
us to go off so that they can keep us on
lockdown. All o ur windows have been
bolted shut, there are bars going up all
over the place. This place really looks
li ke he ll now. They eve n have thre e
peo ple to a cell-o ne slee ps on the
floor. H e re come 15 SS troopers to
take o ne more prisoner tO the hole."
At the minimum-secu rity fede ra l
priso n camp in Atlanta, pri so ners
report th at a SORT (Specia l Operations Response Team) sq uad invaded

the camp while priso ners slep t. The
SORT team then began beating priso ners indiscriminately with clubs.
..We've never seen an ything like
this," said Monica Pratt of FAMM, after
prisoners and fam ily members called
to report the beatings. "Som etimes
th e re is a good explanation. But the
stories are coming together to paint a
very disturbing picture ." In o ne
instance, a blind prisoner at the camp
was clubbed by SORT team members.
A re po rt fro m USP Lo mpoc also
atu·ibu tecl much of the u·ouble to overzealous g uard s. "Du ring lun ch, two
cops pushed a black kid fo r taking an
extn dessert. H e put it clown, but the
co ps kept pushing him. The kid
pushed back and shit flew: Peo ple
were jumping, co ps were running to
pile on, several fights broke o ut. The
cops almost lost control. It took iliem
about 3 to 4 minutes to regain orde r.
Several guards were injured.
'They were e mbarrassed ; n ow
they're pissed. To get even , th ey've
condu cted hosti le shaked owns and
destroyed personal property. Firearms
we re broug h t in for th e first time
since Alca traz. A SORT tea m has
arrived: he lme ted, jackbooted , clubcarrying troops are in comple te contro l now. They want to hurt th e
co n victs to get even . I think this wi ll
probably last a while."
At FCI Memp his, whe re there was
ta lk of an upri sing eve n before the
debate. the actual rio t b roke two days
after me vote.
"A work strike had been one of the
altern atives," a prisoner said, "but the

PRISON RADIO SHOW
WINS AWARD
H ouston 's Pris011 Program (KPIT, 90. 1 FM) won th e Best Radi o Talk
Sh ow titl e in a co ntest sponsor ed by th e Houston Press. Airing Fridays
between 9 and 11 p.m. , the progt·am was laun ched in 1980 by Ray Hill, a
former Texas prisoner and gay rights activist. As a manager o f KPIT, Hill
started the radio call-in show for Texas Depanment o f Corrections prisoners and their fam ilies. Hill wanted "to cast some lig ht down the clark channels of the criminal justice system,., he says, and the hour-lo ng show quickly
doubled in le ngth . The Prison Program ran on Sundays a t fi rst, but Hill
found that the time slot was causing prisoners to miss th eir suppers. Its new
slot on Friday nights is a time when, Hill says, "convicts do n 't generally
have a hell of a lot to do."
Hill learned that first hand when he was convicted of burglary and sentenced to 160 years in 1970. Luckily fo r the prisoners who use his show·as a
lin k to th e o utside wo rld , H ill wo n an appeal o n hi s se ntence and was
released after four years behind bars.

16 PRISON

LIFE

I
I

l,

outrage was so great, we wanted something full-strength."
· "It broke out at chow time while
everyone was eating," reported C4.
"All of a sudden, units were on fire.
There was chaos from noon until tenthat night. I was locked in my room
and the whole unit was smoking. We
thought everything was burning up.
But my celly next door kicked my·
door off its hinges and got me out.
"There were people everywhere. My
homeboys were at another unit so I _
went to see if they were okay. There
were police everywhere, not shooting
guns but cameras, trying to capture
everyone on film. We saw the warden.
He turned around and rani The goon
squad came in but turned back when
the prisoners ran to the rec yard. It
was a mess. The Beale Unit was on
fire, the Memphis Unit was totally
destroyed. We even tore up the UNICOR factory some. There had to be
millions in damage.
"A lot of guys were hurt from fire and
smoke," C4 continued. "At least one
person is in critical condition. Thirty or
40 suffered from smoke inhalation after
the goon squad smoked out a building.
Then we were given masks and told to
get our homeboys from the buildings
that were smoking. Then we were all
locked down."
Prisoners at FCI Memphis were
locked··down for two-'and-a-half weeks.
"They kept us in busses," says C4,
"10 busses outside the complex. Some
slept outside in the cold. We didn't
even have shoes for three days. We
were fed bologna sandwiches."
During the lockdown~ prison~rs say,
the institution did everything it could
· to cover up or downplay the riot.
"The goon squad came in ~nd tore
up everything," says C4. "They took
everything that was written. I had a
diary I was writing in. It's gone.
They're trying to hide the fact that
this was not a racial thing but in opp(}sition to the unfair crack sentencing.
"They shipped out all. the leaders by
now. They were put on busses, destination unknown. They shipped off
the Muslims and anyone connected to
. the Nation of Islam, too, I think,
because of the Million Man March.
Gangl~aders and those who were
heavily jacketed are also gone. I'm
sure they're recording this phone conversation-then I'll be gone, too."
Although several prisoners voice
regret in having to resort to violence,
C4 sums it up: "We know it's wrong,"
he says. "But we've been denied so
cold, so bluntly, tha~ we just don't care

PRISONER DEATH. PURSUED IN HIGHER COURT
Kingston, Ontario-October 24 marked the second anniversary of the
death of Robert Gentles, a prisoner at the maximum-security Kingston Penitentiary. Gentles· was 23 at the time of his death, said to be·causec:I by asphyxia.
During a lockdown, guards stormed and maced Gentles' cellwhen he
refused to lower the volume of his radio. Gentles was taken to a segregation
cell, hands cuffed behind his head, and placed face down on a bunk. He
never got up. According to Tidy Francis of the Black Action Defense Committee in Toronto, "Robert Gentles didn'tjust die. He was executed."
Robert Gentles was a 240-pound, prisoner rights activist serving a 31-month
sentence. He was handled by at least six guards trained to deal with violent
incidents. Mtera brief inquiry, the government closed the case. Ontario's
chief pathologist cited the cause of death as "positional asphyxia."
Gentles' family and anti-racism groups throughout Canada were outraged.
Exercising a rarely used. Canadian law, the Gentles family filed charges of
manslaughter and criminal negligence causing death against the six guards
in September 1994.
By March 1995, charges against folir of the guards were dropped, leaving
only Brian Aitchison and Sean Wylie to stand trial. During th~s time, Wylie
was transferred to a minimum-security institution, where prisoners filed complaints of abusive behavior.
On June 22, all charges were dropped due to lack of evidence. Of grave
importance to the family are the three conflicting autopsy findings between
prosecution and independent pathologists.
Dr. David Dexter, a Kingst~n pathologist, performed the initial autopsy on
Gen ties and refused to offer a specific cause of the asphyxia du_ri~g the
inquiry. In an earlier hearing, however, Dexter told a Justice of the Peace that
"Swelling at the back of 9entles' neck could be the result of pressure being
applied." Despite this testimony, he failed to mention any swelling in his original post-mortem report.
Dr. Frederick Jaffe, a retired forensic pathologist retained by the defense,
said that after reviewing Dr. Dexter's file and performing a second autopsy,
"All findings point toward a death due to smothering, probably by a pillow."
The government reported the guards used reasonable force and that the
swelling behind Gentles' neck and a cut over his lip were irrelevant.
Ontario's chief forensiC pathologist, Dr. David Chiasson, argued that "It is
highly unlikely Gentles was suffocated, since it would have taken considerable
force to hold down a 240-pound man." The defense points to the siX guards
present and the fact that Gentles was handcuffed.
·On the second anniversary of her son's death, Carmetta Gentles led a vigil
and march through Kingston, ending outside the prison. Attorney Julian Falconer, hired by the family, will pursue the charges in a higher court.
In the initial court appearance, Correction Officer Wylie was.represented by a
successful, outspoken Toronto attorney, Alan Gold. Paid by the Corrections Service of Canada Union, Gold is known for representing high-profile clients for
high fees. The Gendes family has filed a separate civil suit for $10 million against
the warden; the Correctional Service of Canada Union, and the six guards.

-Tom Mann

anymor~."

PIISOI LIFB

17

HELP WANTED
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who have written and requested catalogues. A catalogue of over two million
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each institution and continually update them as we receive our updates.
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1nagazines currently in circulation.
Please send us the name of the director of education and/ or the individual
who oversees the library and we will contact them on behalf of the prisoners
at your institution.
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wishing to learn the correct use of a law library. Also, please feel free to
write to us and explain the special needs of your particular institution. Help
us to help you gain better access to free world books, magazines and other
literary services.
Here is a list of a few of our special services:
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Thank you for your valued patience and patronage.
Books Beyond Bars is a subsidiary of Captive Marketing, Inc.
We do not mail hate or racist literature. • Libras En Espanol.

TAKE ACTION! REPEAL THE DRUG LAWS!

SURVEY

Prisoners and Families of Prisone rs-Telephone your sena tors
and congressmen once a month with the following message:
Repeal the mandatory minimum sente ncing laws that pertain
to drugs. Decriminalize drugs and stop wasting my taxes incarcerating drug offenders. Dial 202/ 224-3121 to speak to your
representatives. If you don 't know their names, call your nearest post office for the information.
- Thomas R. Geers, USP LewisbU1-g.

"GETTING HIGH IN JAIL"
Legal vs. Illegal Drugs

PRISON EDUCATION.

Boston University is interested
in forming a national assoc iation of colleges that co ntinue to
offer educational programs for prisoners. Any readers who
might know of college programs offe red at federal, state or
county joints that have su rvived the '94 Crime Bill, or former
inmate students whose college programs have been cut due to
the loss of Pell Grants (include n ame and address of eliminated program), please contact: Walter J. Silva, Director of th e
Prison Education Program at Boston University, Metropolitan
College, 808 Commonwealth Ave nue, Boston, MA 02215. For
the past 25 years, Boston Un iversity h as offered college programs at the following prisons: MCI Norfolk, Bay State Correctional Center a nd the women's prison, MCI Framingham.

PELICAN BAY LIFERS have recently formed a support
group but would like to see how other cons are running their
own groups. If you h ave any suggestions, ideas o r any helpful
literature, please send to: Dr. George
Leavitt, Pe lican Bay State Prison,
P.O . Box 7000, Crescent City, CA
95531-7000.

Can you answer yes to any of the following questions?
1. Did you swallow, or were you injected with any kind
of drug (medication) after you were taken into custody
by the police, through the time you were sentenced for
your current commitment?
2. Was this a " mind-altering" drug? Did it make you
feel different from the way you normally feel?
3. Was this drug given to you before or without your
signing a written " informed consent" form?
4. Was this drug(s) given to you by a medical doctor or
psychiatrist?
5. Before being arrested, were you taking these same
medications or just after you were arrested?
If you answered yes to any of the above questions,
please write to the two addresses below and state who
you are, what state and county you' re from , and what
drug(s) were administered to you in jail.
It is illegal to take a defendant to court under
the effects of mind-altering drugs w ithout
due process of U.S. and state laws.
Write to: B. Buechler, 825 Battery St., 1st Floor,
San Francisco, CA 94111 or B. Yaley, 1606
Milvia Ave. , Berkley, CA 94709
Thank you for your help and participation in this survey.

INCARCERATED NATIVE
AMERICANS: The Native American Church, Inc. is a legally incorporated and recognized entity which
fights to protect and establish Native
American Freedom of Religious
Rights in all ironhouses across Turtle
Island (U.S.A.) The NAC is not a
prison gang or a disruptive group but
merely see ks to practice ancestral religions. NAC h eadquarters is in Houston, TX; chapters have been
established in WA and CA, and more
are p lanned for OR and OH. The
NAC supplies limited religious ite ms
to incarcerated Native Americans if
you have been approved by the DOC
to receive these items. Native American brothers an d siste rs in other
states inte rested in starting a chapter
should write to: David Thunderhawk,
#399488, Rt. 1, Box 150, Coffield
Unit, Ten n essee Colony, TX 75884.
Lib ~ ration to all prisoners! A-ho
Mitakuye Oyasin!

PRISON LIFE

19

VOICE OF THE CONVICT

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DRUG
efBple
LfBcked up

lGl

Y.fBU -Get
Decades

A3 peli tician3 in the l 98G 3tried te 3 he~
that they were "doing some thing" in the wa r on drugs, mandatory min im um se nte nces
for drug offe nses beca me co mm o n . T he ex pectatio n was that m a nda tory minimum
would reduce the availa bility of drugs by re du cing th e numbe r of suppl iers, b ut 1he
expecta ti on has not come tru e. Wh at has co m e tru e is a living nightma re of barbaric
punishme nt for small-time oiTcn ders.
The governme nt's war on drugs has succeed e d wildly in packi ng priso ns, but that's
about a ll.
• The numb e r of adu lts in sta te an d federa l priso ns o n drug charges more than
tripled between l 986 and 199 1.
• Ne arly l in eve ry 3 new state prison ers is a drug offende r, up fro m I in 25 in 1960.
Much o f the priso n p op u latio n explosio n is due to ma ndatot-y m ini mum sentences
imposed by Co ngress in 1987 fo r eve n th e sma llest fe de ral drug vio la tions; many states
have adop ted mandatot-y m inimums as we ll.
THE ORIGINAL CULPRIT:SENTENCING RE FORM ACT
Alth ough mandatot-y minimums arc some times co nfused with the federal sentencing
guide lines, it is important to u nde rstand the distin cti on. Through 1983, federal judges
e njoyed broad se nte n cing discretio n. T hat latitude allowed judges to tailo r the sente nce
to the facts of the individ ual case; it a lso resulted in large se ntenci ng disparity.
In 1984, Congress e n acte d the Sentenci ng Reform Act, perhaps the most signi ficant
c han ge in se n te n c in g policy in American histOry. T o begin with , th e ac t a bo lish ed
parole in the federal prison system. In additio n, th e Sentenc ing Re fo rm Act de legated
to th e U.S. Sente n cing Commission broad discretiona ry powers to create a body of sente ncing g uide lines that the fede ra l couns would be req uired to fo llow. T he g uide li nes
have been fuJl y operative in th e federal courts for severa l year .
The g uidelines begin by assigning a base-level sente n ce to each type o f crime. That
se nte n cin g level is the n e n h an ced by aggrava ting fac to rs (such as perpetrating t h e
crime in a n unusually brutal ma nner) and reduced by mitiga ting factors (such as accepta nce of' responsibility fo r th e c rim e) . The co mpu tatio n th e n provides the sente nc ing
judge wi th a particular range within wh ic h he may sente nce the d efendant.
Sentencing guide lines have bee n criticized for th eir rigidity and severity. T he defendant's perso na l c haracteristi cs a rc "not ord ina rily re levant. " Tha t a pe rso n has bee n
em ployed fo r th e Jast 30 years, raised three c hildre n, and contribu ted th ousa nds o f voluntee r ho u rs to charity d ocs no t en title he r to any se nte nce re duc tio n co mpa red to a
pe rson wh o has nc\·er held an honest j ob or clon e anything for th e community.
T he 700 pages o f fede ra l se ntencing gu idelines are, in the words o f Federal District
judge j ose Cabranes, "nearly un inte lligible to victims, d e fendants, an d observers, n ot to
me ntion the lawye rs and judges in volved . Disparity is rife, though much o f it is now hid-

---~ PRISON LIFE 21

den within th e guideli nes the mselves
a nd in th e silent exercise o f discre ti on
by police office rs a nd fede ral agents,
prosec utors, pro bation o ffi ce rs a nd
fede ral judges."

SEALI NG THE DEAL:
MAND ATORY MINIMUMS
Whil e m a ny fed e ral priso ne rs a re
semen ced according to the guide lines
c rea ted by th e U.S. Sente ncing Commission , th e re are also statuto ry
mandato ry minimums for ce rtain
c rimes. Whe n statuto•·y ma ndato ry
minimums e nacted by Cong ress co nflict with the sentencing guidelines, the
mandatory minimums prevail. Thus, if
the senten cing guidelines specify a senten ce in the 5- to 6-year ra nge, but the
sta tuto ry ma ndato ry minimum requires a 10-year minimum se nte n ce,
the 10-year se nte nce is imposed .
Today th e re a re ove r 100 fed eral
laws specifyin g ma ndato ry minimum
se nte nces. Alth o ugh a few mandatory
minimums h ave existed since 1790 (for
piracy and murd e r), suc h se nte n ces
did not become widespread in th e federal system unti l 1956, when they we re
e n ac ted as part o f fed e ral effo rts to
contro l narcotics. T he fed eral mandatOI)' minimums we re re pealed in 1970,
as Re publican a nd De mocra tic me mbe rs of Congress recogni zed the fl aws
in the mandatOI)' minimum approach.
But in 1984, Congress e mbarked on
a process th at continues today, adding
vast new numbe rs of mandatory minimums, particu la rly fo r c rimes involving drug or firearm o ffe nses. In fact,
94 pe rcent o f fede ral manda tory minimum cases invo lve four laws cove ring
dr1,1gs or wea po ns.
Th e m an d a tory minimum s a re
ex tre m e ly tough on drug offe n ses
and make drug weight almost th e sole
facto r in setting a drug c rim e sen te n ce. Fo r exa m p le, me re ly possessing m o re th a n fi ve grams of c rac k
cocaine requires five years in fed e ral
prison. (An individ ual packe t of sugar
in a restaurant weighs a bo ut o n e
gram.) The on ly fac tors o th e r than
drug weig ht th at may be co nside red
in the se n tenc ing are

(1) if the de fe nda nt has prior convictio ns (in whi c h case th e ma nd a tory
minimum is r aise d ) and (2 ) if th e
U.S. Atto rney makes a motion sta ting
that the defendant has provided "substa nti a l assistance" in obta ining th e
convi c ti o n of a noth er drug criminal
(in whi c h case th e co ur t h as disc retion to sentence the defendant to less
tha n the mandatOI)' minimum ).
In 1988, Congress added conspiracy
to commit a drug offense to th e list of
c rim es with m a nda to ry minimum s.
Co nspiracy c harges e n ab le prosec utors to cas t a wide n e t in a ppre he nding suspected drug o ffe nd e rs. For
exa mple, if a woma n te lls a n und e rcover fede ral agent whe re to buy some
LSD, a nd th e age nt th e n buys som e
LSD from a pe rson who possessed five
g rams of LSD, th e woman , as a "conspirato r," is subj ec t to th e same
m andatOI)' minimum as is the pe rson
wh o ac tually possessed tJ1 e LSD.
Beginning with New York 's Rockefe lle r Law in 1973, almost every state
has e n acted its own manda tory minimums. T he tre me ndous e mphasis o n
imprisoning drug offenders h as resulted in a correctio ns boom:

• In Washing to n State the numbe r o f drug priso n e rs has r ise n
966 pe rcen t since 1980.
• In New York State 45 p e rce nt
of all n ew priso n co mmitme nts
are fo r drug convictions.
• Illi no is prisons n ow hold fi ve
Limes as ma ny drug priso ne rs as
th ey did five years ago.
• T h e dire c tor of Fl o rid a' s
Departme nt of Co rrec ti o ns
describe d th e drug war as "th e
primary e ngine fueling th e e normous g rowth ex pe ri e n ced by
Flo rida's correctio nal syste m. "
• In T exas, the number o f drug
offe nders in prison rose 350 pe rcent fro m 1989 to 1992.
• A wh opping 70 p erce nt of federal prisoners are drug offende rs.

Th e co mbin a ti o n of mand a tory
minimums a nd the sente ncing guidelin es res ults in seve re se nte n ces for
fi rst-tim e drug offe nde rs. In 1990,
88.9 pe rce nt o r all drug o ffe nd e rs in
federal co un wh o had no prior co nviction for a ny o ffe nse were se nte nced
to priso n . In co n trast, 79.4 percem of
fi rst-time vio le nt c rimin als we re se nt
to priso n. Drug offe nd e rs with no
pri o r r ecord were se nte n ced to a n
average priso n te rm o f 68.4 months,
compared to 56.2 months fo r vi o le nt
criminals with no prior record.

"REAL OFFENSE"
SEN'I'ENCI NG &
DUAL PROSECUTION:
FURTHER MISCARRIAGES
OF JUS'I'ICE
Most peo pl e b e lieve th a t in th e
Ame ri can c rimin a l justice sys te m a
pe rson may be se m enced fo r a c rime
o nly if he p lead s gu ilty to th e crime or
is convic ted of the crim e after a trial.
Alth ough conviction-based sente ncing
was th e practice in Am e rica for most
o f its histot)', it is now be ing replaced
with "real-offense" se nte ncing. Under
real-o ffe nse se nte ncing, a pe rson who
is convicted of a ny crime may have his
sente nce in creased o n the basis of any
oth e r o ffe n se th at th e prosec u tor
a ll eges was com mitted-eve n though
the supposed real offe n se was neve r
proven in a court of law.
Incorpo rated in the fed eral sente ncing gu idelines, real-offense sente ncing
is also used in NevJ York a nd othe r
states. Al lega tions about th e supposed
real o ffe nse may be based o n hearsay,
re putati o nal evide nce an d o the r "evide nce" Lhat would not be admissible at
tria l. An actual example of real-offense
se n tencing involved a defe nda nt who
was acqu itted of possessing a ce rtain
quamity of drugs and convicted of possessing
a
sma lle r
quantity.

The court sente nced him o n th e basis
of the highe r a moun t, even though he
was acquitted .
Fede ral prosec u tio n a nd impriso nment o f a defenda n t who has already
bee n prosec u ted in state cou rt is
refe rred to as "dual prosecution." Durin g the Reagan and Bush years,
administrative guide lines o n dual prosecutions we re g reat ly re laxe d . The
double j eopardy cla use of the Bill of
Rights mig ht be thoug h t of as a protection aga inst dua l prosec ution , but
that cla u se, like th e Fourth Ame ndment, is n o t n ea rly as p owerful as it
used to b e, as inte rpreted by co urts
who co nf u se bei n g tough on crime
with being tough on th e Constitu tio n .
Thus, t h ere are more a nd more
cases like th ose of Rufin a Ca n edo.
Canedo pled guil ty to possession of 50
kilograms of cocaine and was serving a
six-year state sente nce. Federal prosec utors cam e a nd demand ed th a t she
testify against h er h usband, whi ch she
refused to do . H e r g uilty plea in state
co urt was usable evide nc e in fed e ral
co urt. And so she was se n te n ced to a
federal 20-year mandatory mi nim um .
H er sta te prison tim e is not cred ited
against he r federal sente nce.

JUDGES:
NO FRIE NDS OF
MANDATORY MINIMUMS
As long as there have been mandatory minimums, there h ave bee n
judges who fo und the resulting
sentences repugna nt to
prin ciples of
justice.

In New Mexico in 1981, o n e judge
resigned after being fo rced to send to
priso n a man with a clean record who
had brandished a gun during a u·affi c
dispu te.
By May 1993, 50 se ni or fede ra l
j udges, such as J ack B. We instein and
Whi tman Kn app o f e w York, h ad
exercised th eir p re rogative to re fuse
to hea r drug cases. (Senior judges a re
allowed much more control over thei r
doc kets th an a re o rdi nary d istri c t
j udges.) Many co nservative, Reaga na ppoi nted federa l judges have
denounced the 5- a nd 20-year mandatory mini mums as draco nia n misca rriages ofjustice. Fede ral Disu·ictj udge
Stanly H a r ris remarked, "I've always
bee n co n sid e red a fa irl y hars h se ntencer, but it' s killing me t h at I'm
send ing so man y low-level offe nders
away for a ll th is time."
A Gall up survey of 350 state a nd 49
federa l judges wh o be lo ng to the
Amer ica n Bar Associatio n fou n d 90
perce nt op posed to th e fede ra l
manda tory min imu ms for drug offe nses. The sen tenc in g gu ide li n es did
so mewh at bette r: 27 p e rcent o f the
judges th ough t they had worked well,
wh ile 59 pe rcent th ought th ey had
worked poorly or not a t al l. Fifty-nine
pe rce n t of the j udges thought th e federal se ntencing guidelines should be
scrap ped , whil e 30 percent
did not.

T he judges o f' every federa l circuit
in the Uni ted Sta tes have e nacted reso lutio ns calli ng for re peal o f the fede ra l m a nd ato ry mi nimums, as h ave
the American Bar Association and the
Federal Co urt Study Commi uee (crea ted by Congress).
The na ti o nal incarceration budget
is about $25 billion a nnually. This figu re is about as hi g h as th a t of the
muc h-malig n ed Aid to Fa mi lies with
De pe n d e nt Children program . Taxpaye rs h ave justifiably b egun to ask
wh e th er th e $22 .5 bi llion spe n t o n
AFDC h e lps c ure pove rty or, in fac t,
ca u ses p ove rty throug h its p e rverse
in centives. It is tim e to begin askin g
whe th e r the $25 billio n spe n t on priso ns is a n in te ll igent res po n se to a
nati on al d rug e pide m ic.

Exce11Jled from the Calo lnslilule Policy Analysis, Priso n Blues: H ow
Ame ri ca's Foolish Sente n cing
Policies Endanger Public Safety,
by David B. KofJe!, May 1994.

by Michael Levine
''Gentlemen, in this business,
you're only as good as your rats.''
-Lecture on the Handling of Crimina/Informants from
U.S. Treasury Law Enforcement Academy, August, 1965

"I'm looking for Mike Levin~, ex-DEA," said a man's voice.
"How' d you get this number?" I said. It was close to midnight
and my wife and I were in a San Francisco hotel on business.
"Man, you don't know what I went through to find you."
The voice belonged to a well-known California defense attorney who saiP, he'd tracked me through my publisher.
"I'm in the middle of trying a case," he said. "I need you totestify as an expert witness. The judge gave me the weekend to find
you and bring you here."
''Whoa! Back up," I said. "I'm not a legal consultant."
"But you're a court-qualified expert. I checked you out. I read
your books. I read some interview you did. Didn't you call the
drug war a fraud?"
"A huge fraud. But because I talk about thieves, crooks and
dopers inside the government doesn't mean I'm gonna work for
them on the outside."
24 PRISON LIFB

Days before this phone call I had turned down a six figure offer to work as a co nsu ltant for a Bolivian drug kingpin I'd spent h alf my life trying to put in jail. I was a firm
be liever in if you can ' t d o jail, don ' t do the sale.
"Look, I'm defending the guy for expe nses," snapped the
attorney. "He's bee n working sixty ho urs a week fo r the last
three years parking cars-does th at sound li ke a Class O ne
fucking cocaine deale r to you?"
Class O n e was DEA's top rating for drug d eale rs. You
had to be the h ead of a criminal organization a nd dealing
with tens of millio ns of do lla rs in drugs eac h month to
qualify as a Class One. Pablo Escobar and the fabled Roberto Suarez were Class Ones.
He had my curiosity.
"You can prove your g uy's a parking lot a tte n dan t?" I
asked.
''I'll Fedex you his time sh eets. Bette r yet, I' ll se nd you
everythi ng-unde rcover video-tapes a nd DEA's ow n
re ports. You tell me if the guy's a Class One."
"Why me?"
"DEA couldn't ge t a ny dope from Mig ue l (not his true
name)-not eve n a sample. So th ey charge the poor bas-

tard with a n o-dope co nspiracy. Did you ever hea r of a nything like th at? A parking lot attcndanL o n a no-dope conspiracy? The n they bt·ing in a DEA expe rt from Wash ington
to testit)' that a true Class O ne doper doesn ' t give sam ples.
You and I both know that's bullshi t."
His words flashed me back lOan incident I d escribed in
The Big While Lie. It was .July 4, 1980, and I was in a suitc at
the Bue n os Aires She raton, sitting across a table from on e
of th e biggest do pe deale rs alive, Hugo Hurtado Candia, as
h e ha nded me a one-oun ce sampl e o f his me rchan d isenin ety-nine p erce nt pure cocain e-as a prelude lOa huge
coca ine d eal. The man was part o f a ca rtel th at was two
wee ks away from ta king ove r hi whole country.
Th e lawyer was right: it was pure bullshit. But it was the
kind of bullshit I had always been aware of. The re's enorm ous ca reer pressure on stree t agen t to make as ma ny
Class One cases as th ey can, fo r a simple reaso n: fede ral
agencies justify their budge ts with sta tistical reports to Congress a nd Co ngress loves to sec C lass Ones. The age nts
with the h ighest percenLage of Class Ones are the guys who
get mon etatl' rewards a nd promotions. And over the yea rs
the professional rats, who origina te more than 95 perce nt

Art by Stephen Conway
PRISON LIFE

25

of a ll drug cases, had lea rn ed that selling a C lass O ne to
th e governme nt was wo rth a muc h bigge r re ward payment.
Many o f th e m kn ew the DEA's criteria for a Class O ne be tte r than a lot of the agen ts.
Unfortunate ly, in DEA and other fe deral agenc ies-where
agents a re trained to be dupli citous to begin with and the n
exposed to deceitful, lying, scum bag politicians and bureaucrats who want results that make th em look good and don ' t
give a da mn how you ge t them as long as yo u don' t e mba rrass the m by getting caugh t-the re were agen ts who wou ld
bend the facts in their own favor. They'd write up a mid-level
elope deale r o r a street peddler as a C lass One, based o n
"evidence supplied by a previously reliable info rmant," withou t corroborating th e nn's info rmation.
To me, that kind of bull hit was no d iffe re nt than a ll the
fed e ra l prosecutor with an eye o n public office who exaggerate d th e im porta nce of the ir case to a media that would
swallow j ust about a nything as long as it sold papers and got
ratings-and it was downrigh t harmless compared to some
drug cza r facing 20 mi ll ion Am e ri cans o n Lany King Live
a nd saying , "We've turn ed th e co rn er on the drug war," 10
furth e r his po li ti cal career. If you put a ll th e d o pe rs th e
26 PRISON

LIFE

press had re pon ed as "linked to the Med e lli n o r Cali cartels" hand-i n-hand, they'd circle the fucking Eanh .
Bu t DEA n yin g a n ex p e rt witness ac ro ss country to
ma ke a pa rking lo t a tte ndant look like a Class O ne coke
deale r in a fede ral trial was some thing I'd never heard or.
"You d idn ' t a nswe r m e," I said. "What do yo u th ink I
can do for yo u?"
"Whe n l cross-examin ed the DEA ex pe n he named your
book, Deep Cover, as o n e of th e boo ks he read to qual ify as
an ex pert. Now I wam you to testifY that he's fu ll of sh it."
"The re ' goua be some th ing you 're not te lling me. "
"IJ I'm te lling you t.he tru th , wi ll you be here on Monday?"
Just the thought of me go ing h ead-to-h ead aga inst the
small elite agency I'd bee n part o f for a lmost a quarter of a
ce mury put kno ts in my stomach. Outside rs hear about the
blue of wa ll sile nce, but n o d escriptio n I've eve r heard really does it justice. To m ost g uys in narco ti c enfo rcement,
th e scummy bottom o f life's barrel is the CI- the crim ina l
informant-the rat. Th e re's only o ne thing lowe r: a cop
who turns rat on his own. And to me, going to work for a
dope r was exactly tha t.
"H ow did the thi ng get started ?" I aske d.

"A C I approaches DEA with a deal. He 's wanted in
Argentina and Bolivia. He says, 'If I get you a Class One
arrest here, will you get the ch arges dropped agai nst me
over there?"'
"How much did they pay him?"
"Over thirty thousand fucking dollars. And they admitted
he's gonna get more when the trial is over."
Thirty thousand was n o t all th at much for a C lass One,
but I wasn't going to say anything.
"And Mr. Car-parker , wh at kind of rap sheet does he
have?"
"Nothing!" I held the phone away from my ear. "This is
his first arrest."
"What kind of rap sheet does the ra t h ave?"
H e laug h ed. "This g uy's been busted a ll ove r South
America for eve ry kin d of co n job in th e book. He eve n
tried to sell his wife's vital organs whi le sh e was in a coma."
"Come on, counselor," I said.
"If I'm telling the truth, will you be here Monday?"
"I listened th is far," I said. "If you wan t to send me your
stuff, I'll look at it."
The telephone woke me early the next morning. It was a
retired DEA agent I'd worked the street with for two different federal agen cies.
"People called me, Mike" he said. "And I said, 'No way,
not Mike Levine. ' You ain't gonna testify for some fucking
dirtbag."
"I' m not do ing anyth ing ye t, " I said, marve li ng at th e
speed of the federal gra pevine. "I agreed to look at th e
case file."
"The guy's a scum bag, piece-of-shit dope lawyer. H e's
like all these guys- every time his mouth moves he's lying.
The case was righteous,
Mike. Don't fall for itnot you. "
When I hung up, my
sweet wife and partner,
La u ra, was studyi ng
me. "You're as pale as a
g host."
"He's someon e I really respected . Did I
sound
as
mealymouthed as I think?"
"No,just really shaken ."
The Fedex package was d elivered to my room on Saturday mo rning. I opened it to find a stack of reports including Miguel's work records, the transcripts of aud io-tapes,
the rat's fi le (much of it blacked out, as I expected) and a
video cassette. It was the DEA's whole case.
The work records were straightforward. Miguel worked
for a large parking lot ch ain, punching a time clock for an
average of sixty hours a week for th e past three years, at
minimum wage. He also had a little side business of delivering lu nches to workers in the area. And, as the attorney
had claimed, he had no prior criminal record.
The CI (I' ll call hi m "Snakeface"), on the other h a nd,
was wanted in both Bolivia and Argentina for bad checks,
petty theft a nd every kind of scam known to man. He h ad a
tota l of seventeen c ha rges outstanding against him. His
favorite scam was selling cars he didn't own. His o ther parttime source of income during the last four years was selling
drug cases to DEA.
Snakeface first comes to Washington, D.C. from Bolivia
with a wife a nd two kids wh om he pro mptly abando ns,
returning alone to South America. T hi ngs don't go too
well and in a sho rt time he 's back in the U.S., on the la m

from police and scam victims in two countries. Miguel, a
fami ly friend and fellow Bolivian, tries to help out by giving
Snakeface part of his lunch delivery business.
In the meantime, Snakeface's wife suffe rs a cerebral
h emorrhage a nd falls into a coma. While she lies d ying,
her grieving husband tries to sell her vital organs. Whe n
the sale of h is dyi ng wife's heart, lungs and kidneys doesn 't
work out, Snakeface decides to sell Miguel, organs and all,
to the DEA as a Class One cocaine dealer.
Snakeface's first move showed me th at he was no novice
in p laying the federal rat system. Instead of calli ng t he
local Washington, D.C. office of DEA, o r th e FBI, he called
DEA in California. He described Mig uel as "Chama," the
"East Coast distributor fo r a huge Sou th American ca rtel
dealing in shipmen ts of thousands of kilos of cocaine into
the U.S." a nd "th e h ead of hi s own c riminal organization "- a description th at just happened to fit th e c rite ria
for a DEA Class One violator.
T he reason Snakeface approached a DEA office in
Southern Californ ia, as far away from Washington, D.C. as
he could get, was a move of shee r co n man beauty. His
experience as profession a l federa l rat had taught h im
about the insane competition for h ead lines, budget and
glory between the myriad American federal enforcement,
spy and military agencies- 53 at last co un t-involved in
some form of narcotic enforcement or anoth e r. He knew
that the California agents, afraid that the East Coast agents
or some oth er agency would steal th eir case, wou ld keep
Cha ma King of Cocaine a secreL.
California DEA reacted exactly as Snakeface had predicted. Instead of calling the Washington, D.C. office and asking
the m to c heck out the information, they sent Sna keface airline tickets a nd money
to go to Californ ia so
they co uld get their
first evidence- a recorded telephone conversation-and lock
tl1e case in as a California case.
Next Snakeface told
Miguel, "Look, I've
got this American
Mafiosi in California
who is dumber than a guava. The guy's so dumb he's even
se nt me a ir plane tickets to fl y o u t the re an d set up a
cocaine deal. I'll tell hi m you 're the capo de tutti frutti o f
all Bolivian drug dealers. You tell this boludo th at you can
de live r a ll t h e cocaine h e wan ts. H e' ll give you a co uple
hundred t h o usand d o llars out fron t. Th e n yo u a nd me
take off back to Bolivia ri ch me n and open up a chain of
drive-in theaters."
So Migue l-me-Car-Parker went along with the deal. He
had failed the U.S. government-financed test of his honesty; a test th at, accord ing to my training, was called
Entrapment.
Now we c ut to Snakeface in Soumern California making
his first DEA-tapped phone call to Chama King of Cocaine.
H e calls th e parking lot where Miguel is supposed to be
waiting, prepared to p lay the role of Ch ama King of
Cocaine for some capo di tutti dummo he knows wi ll be liste ning in. Only Miguel isn't mere.
"He's home sick," says tl1e woman who answers the parking lot phone.
Do the DEA age nts stop here and ask, "What the hell is
the East Coast distributor of hundreds of millions of dollars wort h of cocain e a nd th e head of his ow n crimi n al
PRISON LIFE

27

o rgani zatio n d o in g p arkin g cars al l day lo ng?" 1\o. They
call his house a nd tape-record the call.
Mi g u e l answe rs. He's in a bad way. He a p o logizes to
Snakeface, explain ing tha t he's home with a terrible hangover. Then he te lls th is lo ng, co nfused story about some
friend of his ge tting drunk in his room, stealing his pa nts
a nd wrecking his car.
"Shit," says Ch a ma King o f Cocaine, "in th e mo rn ing I
co m e o ut a n d I d on' t see m y ca r. Ma n ! 'Tha t so n-of-abitch,' I said. 'Shit! Wh e re's my car? Shi t! ' I was sad ...
Shit! It's li ke the o nly o ne I have to go to work."
Sn a keface, with som e effort a nd d o ing a ll th e ta lking,
fina lly stee rs the conversa tion into some garbled code-talk
that sou nd s mo re like Robe rto Duran ll)1ing to explai n the
Mo nroe Doctrine to Mario Cuo mo than a drug deal.
Snakeface: "Yea h , wh a t I'm trying to do is-since it's a
matter whi c h is quite serio us-big-a nd fro m th e o th e r
thin gs th a t I've seen like t h is, when we can't be p laying
wi th, with unclear words and ... that's why wha t I, what you
did , a nd I asked you if you 'd spoken with him, because I
know that he has th e fin a n cial capacity and afte r all he's,
he·s a partner of, of, of [major d rug cartel leade r] and, and
in the e nd anything will yield a profit if we' re h anging on
to a b ig sti ck that's o n a big branch and , and we won't have
any proble ms. Right?"
Chama King o f Cocaine: "Of course."
That was about as clear as it ever got. If it was a d ope conve rsati on, the fact tha t he was ta lking across three th ousand
miles o r te lephone wire fro m his ho me pho ne-some thing
a hi g h-sch ool crack deale r wo uldn ' t do-didn ' t see m to
bother Chama or the agents in the least.
At th e e nd o f th is co nve rsa tion , did th ese ex pe ri e n ced,
hig h ly tra ined age n ts say, "This guy doesn ' t so un d sm art
e no ugh to be a Washington He ig h ts steere r," or, "Let's pull
th e a utopsy re port on the rat's wife." Nope. T hey opened a
C lass O n e invest igati o n targe ting Mig ue l
the pa rkin g lo t a tte ndant, and paid the ra t
his first thousand d o llars. An d th e re was
plenty more to follow.
T h e pac ke t of repons in d icated th a t
the investigation lasted
e ig h t months, during
wh ic h tim e Snakeface
su ccessfully pimped
th e DEA agents a bout Chama King of Cocaine whi le simulta neously pimping Migue l abou t "Tony" (a DEA unde rcover a~e~; t), describing him as "tl1e Dumb-a nd-Dumber of the
Maim.
During t hat time, Califo rni a DEA conducted no in vestigatio n o f Mig ue l whatsoever. The record showed n o te lep h o n e investiga ti o n to asce rta in whe th er Mi g u e l was
making telepho n e calls to any real d rug dealers; no fina ncial inves tigation to see what he was do ing with his drug
mi lli o n s; n o surve illance th at would have revea led th a t
Chama King of Coke was a working stiff who lived in a oneroom a partmen t. They d id nothing but write down as faCL
whatever th eir rat told the m.
For eight mon th s Snakeface sta lled the Californ ia agen ts
by re p o rting th a t Chama was in th e process of puttin g
togethe r a m ~j o r shi pme nt o f cocaine; and the agents continued to pay him . In all , he received a noth e r 29,000 in
informant fees, p lus ex pe nses, whic h included perio di c
trips back to Califo rn ia fro m Washin gto n to be debri efed
28 PRISON LIFE

o n his progress. Fo r e ig h t m o nths th e age nts nagged
Sna keface into trying to get Migu el to de live r a sample of
cocaine, any amo unt, j ust someth ing to prove he was really
in the business.
The sa mple n eve r came. Mig ue l d id n' t eve n know a nyo ne who could sell him a small amoun t. And if h e did, he
d idn' t have th e money. Snake face was afraid that if he paid
for t h e a mple himself, th e Ca liforni a agents might ge t
wise to him . So he came up with a cleve r solu tio n: he told
the agen ts th at Class One d eale rs don't give samples, on ly
small dealers give samples. Wh en, to his asto nishm e nt, they
be lieved him, h e took it o ne step furth e r: he to ld them
Migu el would not make the deal un less th e age n ts put part
o f th e m o n ey- $300 ,000-o ut front, a nd said this was
another sign th at Miguel was a true Class One dealer .
Snakeface had enoug h expe rie n ce selling cases to th e
Feels to know they wou ld n eve r front th at kind of mo ney.
He also knew tha t the Feel's indecisio n a nd the slow-moving burea u cracy co uld give him quite a few m on th s o n
salat)'-wh ic h is exactly wha t ha ppe ned .
After eight months, the Californ ia agen ts fina lly decided
tha t if Chama wou ld n ' t deliver dr-ugs to the m witl10ut front
mo n ey, they' d get him on video-tape prom ising the m
cocai n e a nd acce pting th e mon ey- all they'd n eed to
prove him guil ty of conspiracy to possess and distributeand th e n bust his ass. Migue l would face e nough cha rges
to make him a guest of th e Ame rican tax payers for mo re
years than he had left o n this earth. T he n<H.lope conspiracy arrest would also give the age nts th e ir Class One stat and
maybe a headline from th e ever gullible press.
By this time Snakeface had not o n ly received $30,000 in
ra t Cees, but a ll charges against him in South Ame rica had
disappea red .
What a country!
Now Sn a keface had two final duti es to pe rform for his
maste rs: bring Migue l
to Califo rni a fo r his
arrest a nd the n testify
in co urt. More m o n ey
was pro mised to come
a fte r Mig u el 's convictio n . How muc h , we ' ll
never know.
Th e stage was n ow
se t fo r the fina l ac t th e video ta ping of th e
crim e. Only th e re was
o n e re m ai ning sn ag.
Migu e l didn 't have the money to come to CaliCornia fo r his
own a rrest. In a final irony, DEA had to pay fo r his trip.
At last, d ressed in h is best Sears casuals and pre pa red to
play th e ro le o f a Class One cocaine d eale r fo r what h e
th oug ht was a live audi e n ce o f Malia retards, Miguel was
o n his way to Califo rnia, like a big Bolivian turkey on his
way to e njoy Thanksgiving d inne r.
It was close to midnight when I keyed the videotape of the
cl imactic unde rcover mee ting betwee n C ha ma King of
Cocai ne and Tony Capo ofThe Three Stooges Mafia Family.
The scree n flickered to life.
Center scree n, Cha ma a nd T ony (the DEA unde rcover)
faced each oth er across a table. Be tween the m was a piece
of ha nd luggage containing tl1ree h undred g rand in hundreds and lifties.
Several proble ms were imm edi ately appare nt. First, they
hardl y share d a co mm o n la ng uage. T o ny's Sp a n ish was
rudime n tary a t best and Miguel spoke on ly a few words of
En g lish . Ton y, for examp le, ke pt refe rring to the "p e r-

cento," unti l Miguel finally figure d out h e was trying to say
"purity"-a wo rd a nyone who did drug dea ls in Spanish
would have known in his sleep.
Second, ne ith e r man kn ew his role. It was like Peewee
H erman and Newt Gingri ch playing dress-up and pre te nding to d o a drug d eal. Chama was dressed like th e ho te l
ma intena nce ma n , a nd T ony li ke an Elvis impersonator.
eithe r knew the mechanics of a real Class One drug deal,
or any real drug d eal for that ma tter. The'f was no discussion
of specific amounts, prices, weights, mee1.1ng places, d e livery
dates, provisions for testing the merchan~ise before deliveJ]',
methods of delive1l' or prearranged trouiJ)e sign als. lothing
h appened th at resembled a real drug dea l, which is typ icall)•
a paranoid event all about specifics. What the agents had on
video wasn ' t authentic enough for a Stallon e movie.
The only thing clea r was that Tony was aski ng Mig ue l to
promise that if Miguel was a llowed to leave the room with
th e $300,000 h e would delive r a n unspecified amo unt of
cocaine within 20 to 30 d ays to an unspe c ified loca tion .

Pretty good for a pa rking lot atte nda n t.
Miguel e agerly assured his new bene factor that he would
ma ke th e d e li ve ry. He was th e n a llowed to exam ine th e
mon ey, al'le r which th e undercover DEA age nt asked him
if h e was happy wi th what h e saw. Migu e l, who must h ave
been thinking that America truly was a land of gold-paved
streets gua rded by idiots and that h is friend Snakeface was
a ge nius o n a par with Einste in, or a t least H oward Ste rn ,
assured Tony tha t he was very happy.
With all the e le me nts of the crime of conspiracy recorde d o n vi d eo tape, Ton y co nclud ed by sayin g "Wh ew!
Thank you ve ry much and I'll wait for your call."
"O.K.," said Miguel, h is eyes bugged ou t with disbe lie f as
he got to h is feet holding the money.
"Hey, dude," said Tony, "I' ll be here a little whi le. I have
to make a few calls. Bye."
Migue l's loo k as he starte d to le ave with the money said:
Fee t, d o n ' t fai l m e now. But the y didn ' t have fa r to goa bout a half dozen steps be fo re he was arrested.
PRISON LIFE

29

COLLECTOR's ITEMS-PRISON LIFE BACK
JUNE '94

ISSUES ARE SELLIItG O..,.,AS,.!

OCTOBER'94
Former DEA Agent Michael Levine
Debunks the "Phony" War on Drugs ;
Snitch ' n' Bitch: Confessions of a Government Rat; 3 Strikes, You 're In-For Life! ;
Prison Fiction : Lee's Time by Susan
Rosenberg.

JANUARY '95
PLM's First Cover Woman , Karen
White-One woman's triumph over 18
years in hell; Ground-breaking journalism
exposes the scam on UNICOR: The Economics of Imprisonment; Julie Stewart,
founder of FAMM.

MARCH '95- 1fi ~~
Art Behind Bars-Winners of PLM's 1st
annual Art and Writing contest; Exclusive
Interview with Controversial Filmmaker
Oliver Stone; First Amendment Rights of
Prisoners by William Kunstler & Ron Kuby;
From the 'Hoods to the Pen: Gangbangers
Speak Out.
MAY-JUNE '95
Gangland USA: Part II of PL M's Inside
Look at Prison Gangs. Learn the shady history of Texas prison gangs from an O.G.;
John Gatti 's Lawyer Bruce Cutler Tells
Why the Feds Want Him In Jail; Contract
On America by Richard Stratton; Liberating Prison ers With Kindness: Jennifer
Wynn on Bo Lozoff.

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Novelist Kim Wozencraft on the Controversial Case Of Mumia Abu-Jamai-Convicted of killing a cop, this outspoken journalist
may have been framed ; Revising the Convict Code; Prison Life Reveals the Truth
About So-Called " Resort" Prisons; PrizeWinning Ex-Con Poet Jimmy Santiago
Baca.

SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER '95
America' s Greatest Living Convict
Writer Eddie Bunker, by Richard Stratton ;
Real People on Death Row; The first look
into the Alcatraz of the Rockies; Inside
the Capital's Cage; plus fiction by Dannie
Martin.

NOVEMBER-DECEMBER '95
An inside look at Alabama Chain Gangs;
A CURE for Crime; Gettin' Out & Goin' for
the Green ... Legally! 3 ideas for starting
your own business; plus Animal Factoryfiction by Eddie Bunker.
Zip _ __
Prison Life, 1436 Gray, Suite 531, Houston, TX 770 19.
call 1-800-207-2659.

I clicked off the video. If DEA stood for Dumb Enforcement Admin istration, Miguel undoubtedly was a Class One vio lator. But a drug dealer
he d efinitely was not.
Had the agents responsible for this case bee n working for me at any
time during the seven teen years I was a supervisory agent, I would h ave
j erked the m into my office for a private conference. "There are a million
real drug dealers in th is country," I wou ld have told them. "Th ere's probably a couple of hundred working within a square mile of th e office. If
you've gotta go 3,000 mi les and spend a qua rter of a mi llion in taxpayer
bucks to turn a fucking parking lot a tte ndant in to a Class One doper, you
oughta be working fo r the CIA, or Congress, o r whereve r else you ca n
convert bullshit to money."
I would have put them on probation and moved to fire th e m if th ey
couldn't do the job. I had done it before.
But was this any of my business now that I was retired? And if Miguel
wasn ' t a dope dealer he was certainly a thief, wasn't he?
"What are you going to do?" asked Laura.
"I wish I knev1," I said. "It's pure entrapment, but th e idiot did his best
to sound like a doper. If I'm gonna go against DEA, I do n ' t want to lose."
There were things happening to me and things in the n ews that had
been on my mind during the days leading up to this phone call , and that
would keep me up for the rest of the night.
The first 'vas the shooting of the wife and son of Randy Weaver by FBI
agents during a raid at Ruby Ridge. T he guy was supposed to be a white
supre macist and I'm a j ew, but we had some thing powerful in common:
the unbeli evable pain of having our childre n murde red.
What had my h ead spin ning in disbe lief was that the case aga in st
Weaver that had provoked the raid in the first p lace-possession of a
sawed-off shotgun-had been set up by a professional rat like Snakeface,
and Weave r had been found innocent by reason of entrapment.
I kept flash ing back to an incident from th e beginning of my career ,
whe n I was serving with BATF, enforcing the federal gun laws.
The rat's n ame was Ray. He h ad a g lass eye, no front teeth and a rap
sh eet as long as a cheap ro ll of toi le t pa pe r. He was my first CI and would
be the prototype for many hundred s to follow.
"I met this guy wh o wantsa sell a sawed-off shotgun for sixty bucks," said
Ray. "His n ame is Angel. He's a blac k Puerto-Rican. " He flashed me his
goal post smile. "One a the m Young Lords," he added, naming the Maospouting Latino organization that was high on the BATF list of favorites.
"How do you know it's a violation?" I asked. A sho tgun h ad to have a
ba rre l length of less than 18 inc hes to be a vio lation o f the Natio n al
Firearms Act, wh ich was the law we e nforced.
Ray winked his good eye at me . He kn ew the Jaw as well as a ny age nt.
He made his living selli ng drug and gun cases to the governm ent.
"Whe n the dude left th e room to go to the j ohn , I measured it. How
much is it worth if I duke you in to the guy?"
I explained th at if Angel delivered the gun in a car, we would seize it
and the informant fee would be raised accordi ng to the value of the car;
or if Angel was somebody newsworthy it would be worth a couple of hund red. But Angel-Nob ody-with-one-gun was only worth a hundred bucks
(the n twice the average weekly income in the U.S.).
Ray already knew all this. Like all professional stools he just wanted th e
arrangement spelled out beforehand. If I didn ' t take the case or he d idn ' t like the d eal, h e knew h e mig ht still be a ble to sell it to th e FBI or
anothe r ATF agent.
"But the dude is a Young Lord, that's got to be worth some thing extra."
"People can say they' re a nything . We' ll see who he is afte r I bust him. "
Following my insu·u ctions, Ray set up a buy/ bust mee t. Later that night,
covered by a team of about a half dozen unde rcover agen ts, I me t Angel,
a ne rvous eigh teen-year-old, on Bruckne r Boulevard in the South Bronx.
The kid had the gun in a paper bag just th e way Ray said h e wou ld. I
ha nded him th e sixty bucks, took the gun and busted him.
On the way back to h eadquarte rs in lower Manhattan, someth ing happe ned that Ray didn ' t count on. vVhe n I told Angel tha t possession and
sale of a sawed-off sh otgun ca r ri ed a se nte n ce of 25 years in federa l
prison, he blinked a few times and turn ed rat himself.
(continued on page 74)

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STEINBORN
&
ASSOCIATES
(U.S. v. McCllslin: U.S. v. $405.098.23)

• Cri minal Defense
• Forfeiture Double Jeopardy
• Recovery of Seized Assets
Representing the Accused since 1968

Steinborn & Associates
30th Floor, Smith Tower
506 Second Ave.
Seattle, Washington 98 104
206-622-5 1 I 7
fax: 622-3848
Internet: SURLAW@AOL.com
AvaiIable for representation,
or consultation with your attomey.

PRISON LIFE

31

FAR FROM HOME?
NEED YOUR LOVED ONES?
If you are far from home, the Law
Offices of Benning hoff & Ramirez can
ass ist you in m ovi ng you closer to
your loved ones. We have been able
to accomplish this both in the fede ral
system and in various states.
We have fo und tha t the chance for
rehabi litatio n is g rea tly improved
w hen there is proximity to famil y and
loved o nes.
If you find yourself far from your
family and loved o nes, please w rite to
us. We w ill employ all of o ur years of
experience to he lp you. Our ra tes are
reason able and we w ill provid e a
very prompt response.

INTERNATIONAL PRISONERS
Oo HOME!
Not only do we have years of experi ence moving priso ners closer to
the ir fa milies, bu t we' re a lso a ble to
assist prisone rs in re turning to the ir
h o m e la nds to compl ete their sen tences. Tra nsfers can be arranged to
the following countries: Austria, Belgi um, Ca nada, Cyprus, Denmark,
France, Germany, Greece, Icela nd ,
Ire la nd, Ita ly, Luxembo urg, Ma lta,
Ne the rl a nds, Nor way, Po rtuga l,
Spain, Swed e n, Switzerla nd a nd the
United Kingd om.

LIBERTAD TEMPRANA PARA
PRESOS HISPANOS
Los prisoneros Hispanos, especialmente en el sistema federal, pueden
ser transferidos hacia Mexico,
Espana, Bolivia, Peru y Panama para
recibir libertad temprana, y vivir
cerca de sus seres queridos atraves
de los servicios del Bufete de Benninghoff & Ramirez. Atraves de
nuestras oficinas hemos proveido Ia
transferencia a muchisimos prisoneros Hispanos.
Los
prisoneros transferidos
podran recibir libertad immediata
bajo fian za, libertad temprana para
trabajar, y tiempo libre por buena
conducta. Tambie n, hemos tenido
mucho exito con prisoneros a los
cuales se les ha negado Ia transferencia anteriormente.
Favor de escribir a Ia siguiente
direccion para que reciba un folleto
descriptivo prparado especialmente
para prisoneros Hispanos.

Write to (Escriba a):
BENNINGHOFF & RAMIREZ

P.O. Box 1355
SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO, CA

32 PRISON

LIFE

92675

Rap Sheet
Name:

Yusuf Abdush-Shaheed

Age:

37

Birthplace:

Newark, New Jersey

Conviction:

Murder in a drug-related
armed robbery

Sentence:

30 years-IS-year
mandatory minimum

Time Served:

Almost 15 years

Ambitions:

To help young convicts re-enter
society on a straight, sincere
path

by Pam Widener
Those of yo u who ch ec k o u t the Prison Life/ HBO docume m aqr o n J an uary 8, Prisoners of /he War on Dntgs, will see ou r
Celly of the Month, Yusuf Abdush-Shaheed, standin g in the
yard a t East j e rsey State Prison, explai ni ng in cold, hard terms
how easy it is to make drug deals in the j o int, a nd why 75 perce n t of Ra hway prisoners fee l drugs are a necessary part o f
making life be h ind bars more bearable.
The sce ne is brief but the message is clear: "If it wasn't for
drugs in prison, you' d have a lot more viole nce. Ain't110//ting
in h e re," says Shah eed. "Whe n yo u got a nger, frustration,
p rison and lime... tha t's gon na b reed viole nce. They should
feel lucky there are g uys li ke me inside the pe nitemiary with
some thing to sedate th e viole nce."
But this perspec tive, and the role of d r ug deal er, is actually
a reenac tme nt of Sha heed's former self, the three-time lose r
wh o cam e into t h e syste m a t the age of 2 1 - a h eavy d r ug
user with a heavy attitude. And it is no t a past he likes to d we ll
o n. "I' m more concerned with who I am now, a nd where I'm
go ing," says Shah eed , now drug-free fo r te n years. Tha t his
role in th e docu mel1lary is so powerful and compelling only
em phasizes the d e pth of h is personal conversions.
Shaheed spel1l the first fo ur year of his incarceration ll]ing to escape the real ity of a 30-year sentence with 15 years to
do before possibil ity of parole . "If I had this time to do, " he
th o ught, "I was going to do it with what I though t at the tim e
was my freed om- freedom to do the things that I did before
in th e street. An d what I did o n the street was I go t high and
robbe d people.
"I wasn ' t surprise t hat you cou ld actua ll y do dru gs, get
hig h , buy and sell do pe in prison. Because you hear sto ries
whe n you ' re in the g h e tto, a nd you hea r stories in t he co unty jai l, th e n it a ll ju st co m es to rea lity wh en you get to
priso n. "

The cha n ces of brea kin g such a cycle are slim . Fo r
years, Shah eed wo re a mask in priso n - a tough-guy
mask, a "swpidjai lho use pride th ing," h e now calls it.
He saw his options as: prey or be p reyed upon. And getting hig h ke pt him fro m h aving to face what was under
th e mask.
But Shah eed says the re was always a voice d eep inside
te ll ing him he wou ld so me day have to sto p. "You run
a nd you run a nd you run, and then you realize tha t you
have to confront yo urself. Fo r m e it was a p rocess from wantin g to c h ange to ac t ua ll y taki ng steps to
cha nge."
Sh a h eed's ex pe rie n ce h as been re lig ious thro ugh
a nd thro ugh. When he re lates the story of his earliest
motivation to ch ange - and to stop ge tLing high - he
describes an epipha ny: "I was sitting and looki ng out the
window, looking over the wall, and I thought about my
tim e and j ust how my life was going, and I said, ' We ll,
it's time to stop. It's time for me to really stop.' Earlier
in th e day, which happe ned to be the designated Rahway "Fa mi ly Day," Sha heed had go tten h igh on ba rbitura tes, reefer and coke - his usual combinatio n - to try
to wash those kind s o f thoughts away. An d for th e first
Lime in his four years of inca rce ration, the drugs d idn ' t
work. His inner voices were still getting thro ugh to him.
"For once in m)' life, I wanted to give it an hon est
hot. I wa nted to try to live my li fe with in cerity.
Because I h ad bullsh iued myself for so lo ng, I just wanted to u-y be ing real with myself. "
Expressing h is d ecisio n to his crew wasn ' t easy. Shaheed was a leader a nd they didn ' t want to break off the
relaLionship with him, but they also didn 't want to stop
getLing high. Eve nwally, tho ugh, wh e n it became clear
to them th at Shaheed 's d ecisio n to live drug-free was
fi nal, they joined h im. In an ironic twist, Shaheed's na tural qualities as a gang leade r were what he lped get h is
prison crew off d rugs. An d now his pas t life as a drug
d eale r an d use r is part o f what ma kes h im so accessible
to the young me n h e h elps to ge t straight.
T o bo lster his ch ance fo r recove ry, Shah eed sought
o ut a prisone r-run drug program called ew DirecLion
an d got in vo lved with e nco unte r g ro ups. But after six
m o nths, h e knew th ese grou ps we re n ' t go ing to be
e no ugh . "I needed more to he lp reinforce me, because I
kn ew th a t at a ny time, if I got into a ce rta in m ood, I
could get high again ."
It was slow in coming, but th e re inforceme nt Shah eed
need ed fin ally cam e wh e n he was a ble to e mbrace th e
te nets of Islam. "I never in my wildest drea ms thought I
would be a prayi ng p e rson. I looked a t p eo ple wh o
prayed as people who were soft - wea k - not able to
d eal with reality." But afte r focusing more o n re ligion,
a nd reading m ore, Shaheed eve ntua lly came to feel the
power of praye1· and to become a prac ti cin g Muslim .
"Prayer is just one thing," he insists. "After you pray, you
got to get up and work. You've got to work towards what
yo u're praying for. "
'A'hen Shaheed was transferred to a j e rsey pre-re lease
ce nte r te n m onths ago, the supe rviso r fo r the ch ape l,
Abdu l Ka rim Muhammad requested to the warden tha t
Shah ced be th e Isla mi c represe ntative. Fo r a lmost a
yea r , he h as bee n g uiding congr ega tio n , praye r a nd
cia scs teach ing th e basics of Isla m. To Shaheed this is
'j u t a noth e r way of g iving back, wh ich is somethi ng I
pla n to do fo r th e res t of my li fe. I ' m n o t j ust do ing it

..I
>

1
I , ,

y

now beca use I' m inca rcera ted . I t's somethi ng I owe
myse lf, a nd I owe it back to the society I co me from. I
don ' t intend on going to a no ther pan of the community. I want to go rig ht back to th e sa me co mmunity where
I d id the ro bbing a nd th e hurting, and u-y to help with
some healing."
Despite th e work credits Shaheed is earning (enough
to max ou t in 11 months), h e is sure that when his
m andatory minimum is u p in two months and he goes
before the p a rol e board , h e will b e denied. "Wh ic h
m ean s that when I walk out, I wa lk o u t. No parole, I d o
th e who le se nte n ce."
The Musli m te n ets arc now t he strong inn e r voices
for Sh a h eed: "My faith is in Allah, n o t in th e parole
board . othing is going to happen without Alla h ' pe rmission ." And if he can 't get back to his comm unity, to
his wife a nd fi ve childre n , h i · role on the in sid e is
clear: to set a n e xamp le for yo u nger people who a rc
on th e ir way out of the system. "Th is is a pre-r e lease
ce nte r, wh e re you have kids between I8 an d 25 who are
d o ing a year a nd then going back o ut into society. I try
to ma ke th e m loo k at their o ptions. I say, 'Loo k at what
you did , but nov; look at some o f your o ptions go ing
out. What you can d o.' In ou r classes we look at re-entry
fro m an Isla mi c perspective. How important it is for
them to be since re. The biggest thing is sincerity. Relig io n is sincerity. That's what re ligio n is. Re ligion is sincerity. That's it."
[ll]

PRISON LIFE 33

'
'
Drug~ar in

·

tbe ~i\d ~est

here's not much to see in Granite, Oklahoma: a
convenience store, a gas station, a restaurant that
never seems to be open and people who give you
weird looks because they can see you're from out of
town. There's not even a McDonald's in Granite. What
you will find there, besides a lot of sky and farmland, is
the Oklahoma State Reformatory, a high-medium security prison vvith a population bigger than its neighboring town.
The prison lies hidden behind Granite Mountain,
which rises several hundred feet at the edge of town.
On one side of the 1nountain, you'll see fields where
farmers tend the crops according to the season. On the
other side, b e hind the steep walls of the prison, the
convicts watch the seasons pass.
At the turn of the century, the mountain was an actual granite quarry manned by prison chain gangs. You
can still see strings of numbers where the old-time cons
have taken a stab at immortality by chiseling in their
prison i.d. numbers. Now the quarry is the prison
dumping ground: Rolls of rusting concertina wire and
junked building material lay strewn beneath an old
watchtower. Built of the mountain's rocks, the tower
stands vacant and gaping. Today, the only rocks quarried at Granite Mountain go to supply a dying tombstone business in town.

T

Th e p ri son was bui lt in 1909 for
Okla h oma 's juve nile de lin quents.
After a few years, th e state turned it
in to a medium-security pri so n for
adu lts, though the te rm "reformatory" stayed . But as priso ners a t OSR
will tell yo u , t h e re's n o t mu c h
reformin g g o ing o n behind those
gra nite walls.
In ma ny ways, OSR is yo ur typical
state pe n. It could be Sa n Que ntin, it
could be Rahway-its lo cation, d eep
in Ame rica 's h eartla nd, in the middle of now h e r e, maue rs n ot. The
escalating conseque nces of the country's war o n drugs have b loa ted this
priso n with co nv ic ts, wh o not on ly
have li ttle h o pe of a future b ut wh o
a re a ngry a t havin g to live in a bo minable, overcrowd ed conditions. T he
prison , p lagued with escapes, has had
three warde ns in the past six months.
T here 's a 60 pe rce nt prisone r une mployme nt ra te, no treatment fo r the
hundreds of convicted drug add icts,
and drugs are as easy to score as gu m
in a candy store. Half of OSR's overcrowd ed p o pulatio n li ves in a condemned cellho use.
Orig in ally, OSR had two tripletiered cellh ouses. But in 1987, u n de r
fed e ra l co urt o rde r, th e cell ho uses
we re conde mned and th e prison had
to build pod u ni ts in t h e yard. Last
year , in defiance o f the fede ral co urt
order, OSR reope ned o ne of the conde mned cellho uses a nd the tri-tie red
bloc k is n ow doub le-bunked. Eve n
with th e un lawful reo pe ni ng , th e
prison is runn ing at 135 pe rcent
capacity.
"They got people sleeping on floors
in so me ce lls," says Eas t Cellho use
prisone r Ho m e r H a rd igr ee, one o f
OSR's drug cases who has spent time
in Alcatraz and Mario n. "The re's no t
one empty bunk anywhe re."
The overcrowding is a direct result
of the wa r on drugs. Six ty pe rce nt o f
all OSR prison e rs are in for drug use,
possession or distributio n . Tha t p e rcentage climbs to 9 0 p e r ce nt wh e n
yo u add those se n te n ced fo r drugrelated crimes.
Okla h oma has h ad a h ard-o n f01·

crazy d rug laws ever since the war o n
drugs b ega n. In 1994, it led th e
n ation in loc kin g up mo re male
o ffe n ders pe r ca pita th a n a ny o th e r
sta te, a nd for the last te n years it has
been n um ber one fo r loc king up
more wo me n pe r cap ita no t only in
the U.S. but in th e world .
In Okla ho ma, possessio n o f a co up le j o ints ca n get a su cke r 20 ye ars
straight time. And it has. Victo r Warr ing ton was sla mme d with 20 years
fo r po ssess io n o f ma r ijuana with
inte nt to distribute. Distribution does
n ot mea n actually selli ng weed. If you
happen to b e a gen e ro us pa rty host,
yo u ca n get ha mme red fo r it. Wa rrington had 12j oin ts o n him when he
was a rrested .
"I've bee n in sin ce '92,"
says Warringto n. "Ame ri ca's
dru g laws? T h ey' re a bsurd.
They're passing ou t too
much time fo r drugs, u·eatin '
us like we went o ut a nd killed
some bo dy."
Sam Shoals got nailed , too .
H e e nded u p with 25 years.
"I h ad a c rack pipe," he
says. In Okla h o ma, p ossession of a c rack pipe is a Class
A misde mea no r . "But th ey
too k it, ra n a substan ce tes t
th roug h the pi pe a nd fo und
residue o f crac k cocaine.
T h ey gave me 25 yea rs fo r
th at bullsh it. 25 years .. ."
Ho mer Ha rd igree

workin g as a truck drive r , ta king
speed to kee p awa ke as h e drove
from Oregon to Flo rida whe n he was
pulled ove r by a city co p in O klah o ma C ity. Beca use Ha rd ig r ee's
prior offe nse was 19 yea rs o ld , h e was
considered a first-time o!Tend e r. Still,
he was sla ppe d wi th a n e ig ht-year
sente n ce for possession of o ne gra m
of m eth (s ho r t fo r m e t h a mph e tamine) .
"I a ttribute my low sente nce to th e
fact that I had e n o ug h mo n ey fo r a
lawye r," h e says. "If I h ad to re ly o n
the state, I wo uld 've gotte n 50 years."
Most o f the prison ers locked up for
drugs have had to rely o n the state for
their d efe nse. Mo re o fte n th a n n o t,

O
th ey e nd up with a se nte nce that wi ll
kee p th em be hind bars for several
d ecades. As in New York a nd L.A.,
most a rc yo un g Afr ican-Americans
from urba n ghcnos.
At OSR, th ere is a n abundance of
African-Ameri cans doing tim e for
crack cocaine. Anthony Ed wards, a
first-Lime offender, was busted with a
straight shooter that h ad residue in it
and was given 30 years. Ten )' Stevens
got ca ug ht traffick ing a n d was
slapped wi th 15 yea rs for his first
o ffense. Rodney Vi cks go t 20 yea rs
for possession; Aa ro n Butler got 25
years fo r trafficking, distribution and
possession; Terrence J efferson got 15
for unlawfu l d e li ve ry of narco ti cs;
a nd Ton y Mil es got 15 for distribution. But those senten ces are considered light by Okla homa standards.
Lione l Fortenberry go t p in c h ed
for possession of cocaine with in tent
to distribute and end ed up with 100
years for his crime. The cops d idn't
even find drugs on Aldofus Wade,
but h e was g iven 60 yea rs for conspiracy to di stribute. Wade's fa ll
partn e r , wh o sold the drugs to
und e rcove r cops, had enoug h
m o n ey to hire a la wyer. He got off
with half th e time Wade got.
"Too Sh ort" was give n a life se nte nce for distributi on and u·afficking
in cocain e wh en h e was 18 years
o ld-that was 22 years ago. H e h as
n ow lived longer in priso n t h a n h e
has as a free man. Mark Sanders has
on ly been in o ne year but the judge
gave him life, too.
"They gave me a li fe se nte nce for
an 8-ball o f cocai n e," says Sanders.
"You d ig? On e 8-ball. This isn ' t th e
answer. I deserve to be in prison buLl
don't deserve a li fe sente nce."
If c rack cocaine is th e ba n e o f
Africa n-Ame rica n s, th e n "crank" is
th e sco urge of Ok la h oma's low-

income whites. In th e Midwest, crank
is re fe rred to as "poor m a n's
cocaine." It is easy to ma ke and sell.
Thirty-seve n-year-old Do nald M cCalev wa busted fo r possessio n of
meth and received 120 yea rs; Ke ith
Brooks got 43 cale nda rs fo r conspiracy to manufa c tu re. De nl ea Morrow
receive d I 05 )'Ca rs for his in volvement in man ufacturing crank.
'This is no t what I had planned fo r
my fulllre," says Morrow, known
through ou t th e Midwest as th e
"Grand Master of Meth." "Bu t what do
you expect? The citizens of this counll)' a rc obvio usly pretty damn stupid.
If you g ive a man a life senten ce for
drugs, what's to preven t him from
killi ng to keep him fro m getting that
sentence? By puLLing peo ple away for
life for th e same thin g yo u do with
so meone taking a g un an d killing
so meone, yo u 're sending the wrong
message to socie ty. You're equating
murder wi th taking drugs. v.re've been
o n this drug kick, but it ain 't got noth ing stopped. It's a futile elforL"
Morrow's a nswer to th e war o n
drugs is simple: legalize evC J)'thing.
"If yo u just d etac h th e drugs and
make th e m legal," he says, " you just
le t 'em run their course. T his is fucking Ame ri ca wh ere you ca n have the
pursuit of happiness. If the pursuit of
happ iness is two good-loo kin g
blondes, a motherfu cking p ack of
syringes a nd a pound o f K c ream, I
say fuckit. ··

SR's for m e r warde n , Ja c k
Cowley, do csn ' t advocate
legalizing d rugs. But h e does
ad mit to big problems in correctio ns
as a resu lt of th e war o n d rugs. Cowley was th e warde n of OSR for two and-a-ha lf yea rs b efo re he was
tra nsferred last September. An o utspoke n critic o f co rrections, he has
bee n called a lo t of thin gs in h is 25yea r ca ree r, "mave ri ck" being the
most common.
'Tm a li ttle proud of th at," he says,
"becau ·e I don ' t typically agree with
bureaucrats when it co m es to th e
treatment of offend e rs. I believe the
sys tem ca n work, but I thi nk it h as
gotten off h e rding them a ro und
m o re tha n trying to he lp them he lp
themselves."
Com ing from someone wo rk in g
fo r th e Okla h oma DOC, Cowley's
p e rspec tive on th e war o n drugs is
even mo re radi cal.
'The wa•· o n drugs is a failure a nd
a success. It's a mi se rab le fa il u re
because it h as not stopped drug use
in thi s cou ntry. But it's a g rea t success because it's the best econ o mic
boom we' ve eve r see n . Prisons are
big business. It's th e gr01vth indusll)'
of the '90s a nd the profits are overr idin g th e expe nses. Th e public is
not wi ll ing to c h a nge beca use the
upper class h asn ' t fe lt th e pain yet.
The
poor
fo lks are the .--- - c li e nts o f the
system. That's
wh y we have
poor p eo p le
in t h is cou nU) '- tO be the
cl ie nts. Un til
th e
ri c her

"The war on drugs is a failure and a
success. It's a failure because it has
not stopped drug use in this country.
It's a great success because it's the best
economic boom we've ever seen."
-Jack Cowley, former warden at OSR.

38 PRISON

LIFE

...
;,t'•
'·

people fee l th e effec t, noth ing's
going to change."
To O klahoma prisoncrats, Cowley
was a da nge ro us man to be re prese ntin g th e department of co rrections. It was no su1·prise, then , whe n
they transferred him o u t of Gran ite
in Se pte m ber afte r two priso n e rs
esca p ed. Two wee ks b efo re th e
escape, Cowley rece ived word that
there was som e digging going o n in
th e conde mn ed ce llh ouse. He se nt
his officers to investigate, he said, but
they told him there were n o signs of
tunne lling. So wh e n two co ns
escap ed through a good-sized h o le
and took a local woman a nd he r baby
hostage, Cowley was taken off guard.
After a high-speed chase, the men
were ap preh e nded . T hey h ad ra ped
and killed th e woman. Another we llknown escape occu rred last year
when a priso n er too k o ff with the
associate warde n 's wife who wen t with
him e ither wil ling ly o r as a h ostage,
de pending upon whom you talk to.
Cowley says th e esca pes gave people the excuse they needed to get rid
o f him. "Primarily," he says, "I got a
n ew boss a nd h e wanted so m e bod y
e lse h e re. He a nd I a re fairl y diffe re nt philosophically whe n it comes to
manageme nt."
Tha t ma n was Ga ry Mayna rd, now
th e Southwest regional direc to r fo r
the Oklahoma DOC
"He was the warden a tJ oe H arp
Correctio n al Facility before I was,"
says Cowley, "and h e h ad it when
t h e re were o nl y 400 priso n e rs . H e
had a rio t th e re, too. In fac t, they've
had a riot a t both of his prisons."
Cowley took ove r th e prison several yea rs la te r whe n the pop ul atio n
h ad doubl ed . "It was b eco min g a

model facility," h e says. "We still had
so me wo rk to d o, but he [Mayna rd )
didn ' t want to sec anothe r soft insti tutio n. O ve r h e re, they didn ' t like th e
way th e institution was h eaded. They
still li ke th at pla ntation me n tali ty. So
I got nailed . On the last escape, I told
so m e staff to look for tun n els
because I h ad gotten word tha t some
tunn e lling was go ing on. An d th ey
did n 't go look."
The priso n ers wil l te ll you th a t
Cowley was framed. T hey also report
that staff was antagonistic toward him
because he would ofte n give the prisone rs re ponsibili ty.
"They fe lt threa te n ed by
tha t," on e prisoner said.

owley's te mpora11' successo r was Ass ista nt
,...... ....-Regio n a l
Directo r
Justin J o n es. For a month
and a h alf b e fore th e n e w
ward e n was c h ose n , J ones
ran things a t OSR.
Despite th e adm in istrati o n 's attack on Cowley,
J ones' perspective on correctio ns and the war on drugs is
surprisingly similar.
"I thi nk it's time for evei)'thin g to be re th o ug ht," h e
says. "We' re fi ll ing th e priso ns, not winning the war o n

C

dru gs. If we co n tin u e o n the sa m e
path , we' ll bankrup t o urselves. Right
n ow, evei)'th ing's a Ban d-Aid effect:
build more prisons, add more beds. I
d on' t kn ow if this is really a war, but
the victim is the publi c. You're creating a wh o le ge n e ration of peop le
who'll be unemployed when they get
o u t, wh o will h ave the stig ma of
b e ing a co nvi cted fe lon. You're
doi ng noth in g on the preven ti o n
end. You house th e m , they co m e
b ack, you house them some more,
they come back."
Both Cowley a nd J o nes agree that
as many as 90 pe rcent of OSR prisone rs a re incarce rated fo r drug-related
c rimes.
"Whether it's b urglary, a property
c ri me or a vio lent o ffe nse," says
J o n es, "th ey we re e ith er under th e
influe nce o r th ey were doing a crime
to suppo rt a habit. "
Tim Waldrup got five years fo r
escapi ng from a county jai l while he
was in fo r possession of meth, a case
h e late r beat; Shaun Miller is doin g
15 years fo r assault and battery that
had to do with drugs; Ma..xwell Kagen
go t 40 yea rs for attemp ted burglary
to support h is habit.
Dann y Clark was a lso a n ad di ct
when he was popped [o r a variety o f
charges: kidnapping, a rmed robbe ry,
burglai)', forgei)', larceny, assaul t a nd
battery on a p olice o f'ficer , abscond-

PRISON LIFE

39

ing and escape. He was sente nced to
25 years.
"Everyth ing I d id ," h e says, "I did
for drug ."
J e rry Pe lley was a drugstore cowboy
when th ey busted him in Lough ton,
OK. H e now has 175 years to se rve,
five d iffere nt c ha rges that spa n three
sta tes.
"All th e mo n ey I got," h e says, "I
used it a ll for drugs. T hat's alii basi-

cally d id. Whe n I'd rob a drugstore,
I'd go check into a Holiday Inn o r a
Howard j o hnso n 's a nd I 'd do it. I
mean, I wasn 't out the re elling to a
h undred umpteen peop le."
The re is o nly one progra m in th e
state of Okla homa for p risoners who
ne ed he lp for d ru g ad d iction: th e
Life line progra m at j oe Harp Correctional Facility. The waiti ng list is so
lo ng th at yea rs can p ass be fo re an

addict is a pproved and admitted.
Robert Todd Clark has a lready
b ee n approved to enter the drug
trea tm ent program, but h e has n o
idea how lo ng it wi ll take him to get
tl1ere.
"I believe I' m being denied ad mitta nce because o f overcrowding," he
says. "It's a mess."
Accordi ng to Warden j ustin j o nes,
mo re programs like Li fe lin e are critical. "lf t h e state al located more
m o n ey to tr ea t ment programs, it
wou ld do more to p reve n t c ri me in
the long run. What we need is more
prevention. I f th e ave rage drug
o ffe nder serves three to seven yea rs,
eve n at t he lowest security level, it's
gonna run yo u 24,000 a year to
house him. 'ow mu ltiply tha t by the
number o f years he 's incarcerated. If
you look at the eco nomy of scale, if
you wa n t someone puni sh ed fo r
doing drugs or committing crimes to
suppo rt a habit, at so m e point you
h ave to loo k at the law of d iminishing returns.
"I do n 't th ink prison d e ters people
from any c h em ical ad di ction th ey
h ave. Most p a ro le o ffi ce rs wi ll tell
you th a t their worst cases a re d ru g
offende rs because tlle recidivism rate
is so high with this group."
"Every day it's a struggle," says
Da n ny Clark. ''I'm always on edge. I
tried to te ll th e m when I was getting
sentenced that I needed drug treatme nt, but I've rece ived no n e in t h e
two years I've been he re. They kee p
lllrning me down. Do you know how
hard it is to be drug-free in the pen?"

V

ncent Pa ul Candelaria has the
perspective of an o ld-Li me convict. H e was at t h e Santa Fe
prison du ring the riot in 1980, which
claimed the lives of 34 convicts. Cande laria was o ne of the prison negotiators who put a n early end to the rio t
a nd saved the lives of guards the prisone rs too k hostage. He was g ra nted
clemency for his ro le d uring the riot,
but two yea rs la te r was convicted for
th e d eath of a po lice o fficer, for
whi ch h e received 4 14 years. H e is
cu rre ntly a ppealing tl1e co nviction .
At Gran ite, Candelaria kicked the
heroin habit tha t had been the motiva ti ng force beh ind hi s criminal
ac tivity. H e h as been clean for twoand-a-half years.
.
"I didn ' t go th ro ug h a drug treatme n t fac ility," he says. "I did it
myself. 1 did it because of tlle oppor-

In
Memory

of Yogi
A pt!rson I cared abou t and understood mo re than
anyone is dead now.
Randy "Yogi" Gwinn was a man of honor and dig ni ty;
a man who c-ould not be hem by force or circumstance.
I It: can!d li1r others and had a heart as big as the problem whkh c·nckd his life.
Yogi died from a drug overdose. It is ha rd to accept
how he died, and that h e is gone . It's even ha rder to
lose one of the fe\\ friends l have le ft to a da mn drug
problem. If someone would have don e this to him , h e
would h an · ta,tt·d hi, own blood.
My Iiiend had a problem. Eighteen years of incarceration and the problem was still there, even inside this
"co ntrolled" environment. His biggest problem was not
drugs. but r.\lher the indill'crcnce from a vindi ctive system and tlw malicious way that the present govern or
took all his hopt' away.
Mam tinws we talk(·d about his freedom , and how he
Wlt.'i going to IIHUT) his girlfriend and h ave children.
His fare would light up. and for just a second he ' d be
cominccd that all of his dreams would be reality. But a
few months before he died , he found he was going to
ha'e to spt•nd a lot more time in pl'ison.
Yogi didn't talk much anrmore. He fe ll into a pit of
dt'prcssion and d espair.
My friend i'> dt•ad uow. Drugs will kill a perso n. That
is a bitter lt'sson to lt·a•·n. In a m atte r o f seconds you
willlca\'c this world and meet vour Creator to account
for vour dct:ds.
Bitt how abo ut tho~c.: who kill o ur hopes and bury us
ali\'e in this hell-hole called prison? Which death is worse
and who is responsible for tho~c souls who cannot afford
to gn·c a damn anymore? The adminisu·ators of d1is state

have a lot to leam. Befo re th ey can raise a finger to point
out the deeds of a convict, the)' should all look at the mirror and see wh o the real criminals are.
Some peo ple m a)' accu se h im fo1· his weakness and
think h e g o t wh a t h e d eserved . I h ave a fe w wo rd s
inside m y ch est fo r those who fa lsely po int fin gers a t
the troub le, and maliciously pro lo ng the pain of those
wh o are e nslaved by this for ce. Sta nd ing ta ll in th eir
o wn ch a p e l of g lass, th ey t h row r oc ks a t o th ers n o t
re a lizin g that so m e d ay they will mi ss a nd h it th e ir
own walls.
Live lo ng, my brot.h er.
Vin ce nt P. Cande la•-ia

Oklahoma State Reformatory
To th e left of th e entran ce is th e Eas t
Ce llhouse , whi ch alth o ug h co n d e mn e d , has bee n reo pen ed to ho use
prison e rs. The la rger West Ce llhouse,
to th e rig ht of th e e n tra n ce, re ma ins
close d . Th e pod units sca tte re d
throughout th e ya rd h o ld mos t of
OSR's prisoners. Photo by j ohn Thomas.

PRISON LIFE

41

"and think they're do ing some th ing,
they're n ot. Drugs are eve rywh e re.
Out th e re. In h e re. And th ey' re n ot
go n n a ch a nge th aL. Not by lock in g
people up anyways."
Acco rding to o ne of the g ua rds a t
OSR, ma rijua n a is th e most wide ly
used drug, followed by crank, heroin
and crack. "\Ne try to kee p it down ,"
h e says, "but it gets in h e re. Usua ll y
visitors b ring it in , som e times it ge ts
thrown over th e wall. "
"Visi tors?" says one prisoner. 'T hey
may bring in small amou n ts, bu t shit,
we go t hypod ermi c n eed les in he re,
m an. You te llin ' me peo ple p ut that
shit up their ass?"
For five bucks, you can get a cap of
weed: e n o ugh for a slim j oinL. Fifty
b uc ks will get you a sh o t of h e ro in ,
abo ut te n c.c.s. T ypically, pri so n
va lue is two to three tim es stree t
va lue . Beca u se o f th e hig h un c mployme m rate a t OSR, ma ny prisoners withou t money reson to hustli ng
o r viole nce.
he pri .one rs at O ~R won) ' th at
th e vto le n ce wtll on ly get
wo rse. T h ey kn ow the DOC
will not give the m anothe r Cowley o r
j o n es-someo ne who's going to g ive
the m a chance or do anyth ing about
treatme nL. They kn ow th ey' re going
to get a hard-ass.
"This isn ' t go nn a be a bo ut th e m
taking away our HBO," says one priso n e r . "T h ey've alread y do n e th at.
1o, we' re in for some dee p shi t whe n
this n ew wa rd e n-wh oeve r h e iscomes in ."
Vincen t Pau l Ca nde laria will be
go n e by th e t ime the n ew wa rde n
arrives. He is being transferred back
to the pen in Santa Fe. 'This prison is
Disneyland compared to some of the
joims I've bee n in ," says Ca nde laria.
"But I'm getting ou t becau se I kn ow
wh at's co ming. It's the best time for
m e to leave. Th e overc ro wdin g
h c t·e-thc y got a big problem. It
won ' t take mu c h to ki c k it o ff. T h e
prisoners a re frustra ted and pissed
o ff. Th ey go t rid o f Cowley beca use
of p o li tics. When th e n ew h ard-ass
wa rden comes in , the priso ne rs arc
gon n a have a lot of shi t take n away
from th e m.
"I don't wa n t to see a n o the r riot.
Sa nta Fe is still vivid in mr mind ,
so methi ng I'll always re me mbe r.
"Whe n the riot hits here, th ere will
be a lo t o f killing. The o ffice rs who
a re wo rking the yard wi ll suffe r . The

T

tunities. Becau se t he wa rd e n who
was h ere-Cowley- gave me a
c hance. And since I've bee n he re , I
haven ' t hun anybodr or do ne drugs.
But a frie n d o f m in e d ied h e r e six
month s ago. H e ro in , yo u kn ow. If
yo u ' re o n it, yo u ' re go nn a get it no
ma tLe r whaL. "

42 PRISON

LIFE

Acco rd ing to th e prisoners, drugs
are ea }' to score.
"It's a nythi ng you want," says Roderick 1\anedy, serving time for a drugre lated robbery, "any time you wam.
If you got the mo ney, it's here. "
"As muc h as they'd like to cover up
drug usc in prison," st~ ys j c rry Pe lley,

o n es up th e re in th e g uard towe rs,
Lhey'll just stan firing at people. A lo t
of these office rs ask me if it's time to
quit. I tell the m th e}' should consider
findin g a new j o b beca use a ri o t is a
real po ·sibility."

0

n O cto be r 9, 1995, O SR was
g ive n a n ew wa rde n , th e
ph il oso phical o pposite o f a
Cowley o r j on es. Afte r 12 years with
the Oklah o ma DOC, Ke n Kli nger has
his own opinio n of the war on drugs.
"1 work fo r th e Oklahoma De partme nt o f Co rrectio ns," says Klinge r,
"and I suppo rt wha t the laws a re . If
th e drug se nte n cing is 10 0 years,
th e n I suppo rt th a t. I d o n 't think
they're fa ir o r unfair. I Lhink we have
a process in Lhe syste m and wha teve r
th e co n victi o ns a re in th e state of
Oklahoma, I support."
Kl inger has plans fo r OSR:
"This institution will not be run the
same . This institutio n will become a
sec ure fac ili ty. The missio n o f this
agency wi ll be put first-that mean s,
to pro tect th e public, th e n e mpl oyees, the n the offe nde r, always in that
orde r. H ow you pro tect the public is
you ma ke sure no bo dy escap es. You
protect th e staff in ma king sure it's a

safe a nd sec u re e n viro nm e nt. Yo u
protect the offe nde r by making sure
th ey d on' t wa lk aro und killing eac h
o th er. How you do th at is you have a
lot o f co ntro l m ech a nisms p u t in
place. I'm not gonna destroy any prog ra ms th a t h ave bee n tar ted, b u t
they' re gonna be modified , and contro l mechanisms a re go nn a be pu t in
p lace tO ma ke sure th at staff conu·ols
the facil ity. T ha t's wh a t's sujJ/JOsed to
h a ppe n . Yo u ' ll see K-9 uni ts used
m o re, yo u ' II see m o re ra ndom
searching, you ' ll see more things like
that.
"Warden Cowley was the righ t man
a t th e rig h t tim e for this facility but
rig ht now, I'm the righ t man."
t didn ' tta ke lo ng fo r Lhe viole nce
e rup t at th e Okla h o ma Sta te
Reformatory.
On ovember l , 1995, a rio t bro ke
out a t OSR. It sta rted as a confrontaLio n a mo ng several black and NativeAme ri ca n priso n e rs, but soo n 200
prisone rs we re invo lved a nd g ua rds
in th e co rner towers we re firing shots
d own into th e yard. o bo d y was
kill ed, al though six or seven p ri so ne rs required medi cal treatme nt.
Whe n it was ove r, the entire facili ty

I

to

was locked d own for e igh t days.
The re was ta lk of a permanent loc kd own an d c h ang ing th e prison's
h igh-m edium securi ty status to maximum . But a t press time, th e faci lity
was return ing to no rmal, with limited
yard move me n t.
The o fficials labeled it a me re "d isturba n ce," bu t p riso n ers who too k
pa rt in it said it was mo re than that.
T hey also said th e inciden t was o nly
th e beginni ng.

h e gua rd tower ove rl ooking
th e junkyard q ua rry stan d s
d esolate a nd stark against th e
big Okl a h oma sky. Decades ago,
g u a rd s statio n ed in th e tower
observed convicts toiling away at the
mou n ta in, m ak ing big rocks into
smalle r rocks a nd hauling their cargo
to the site whe re Lhe walls of G1·ani te
would be built.
Soon, th e o ld tower and qua rry
may have to re-ope n. As OSR
becomes mo re b loated with prisone rs o f th e war on d rugs, a n oth e r
pr iso n may n eed to be built.
They may eve n h ave to reb u ild
OSR, o nce its wa lls are broke n down
[II]
from within.

T

)[

joint. Think he'll ever come out clean and so
If the American government were really serious about winning
the war on drugs, wouldn't prisons be the most drug-free places of
all? Think about it: What other environment offers more opportunity for control? With cops and cameras galore, solitary confinement, lockdown, stun guns, searches and high security, prisons
should be squeaky clean.
Yet the drug scene rages in prison. The drug business in the joint
is as profitable and as structured as it is on the streets. Dealers get

rich, prisoners die of overdoses, guards are on the take and
junkies walk out after years of confinement, ready to do whatever
it takes for another fix.
48

PRISON LIFE

"Nobody can convince me that
there's a county jail, a prison or any

other place where people are locked up that
there aren't drugs," says the former warden of East
Jersey State Prison, Patrick Arvonio, 20 years on
the job.
"I think there's a drug problem in every prison,"
says Justin Jones, assistant regional director of the
Oklahoma Department of Corrections. '1ust recently, one of our prisoners on death row took an overdose of drugs the night before he was going to be
executed. They had to revive him so they could kill
him. The point is, somebody got the drugs in, even
in maximum security, on death row. Nobody in
their right mind would say their prison is drugfree."
Between 1986 and 1991, the number of adults in
state and federal prisons on drug-related charges
has more than tripled.
"Prison is a microcosm of the streets," says Jack
Cowley, formerly the warden of Oklahoma State
Reformatory in Granite. "Whatever's out there is
gonna be in here ... the drugs, the violence, generally all the bad characteristics of what's on the
streets."

Visit just about any state institution
and you'll find a tliriving drug trade.

Neither prisoners nor authorities hesitate to talk
about drugs openly. When we visited the state
prison in Granite, we spoke with Jerry Pelley, sentenced to 175 years for five drug-related robberies.
Are you drug-free?
"No. No. No."
You're not afraid for us to print thaP.
"No."
What's your drug of choice?
"Cocaine, speed, heroin. Whatever comes in.
There's no way they can keep drugs out. They've
been trying for as long as they've had prisons, but
they haven't done it. And now, with the drug war
raging in here and out there, I don't see any difference."
Ralph Sowell, a crack dealer doing 21 years at
East jersey State Prison, boasts about dealing. "I've
been selling drugs ever since I came to prison, and
I've never been caught," he says. "You can make
approximately $3,500 to $4,000 a week here selling
drugs. Anything they sell on the street is triple in
here. A $10 bag of dope on the streets goes for as
much as $40 in here. And everybody wants a piece
of the pie."
East jersey's Lieutenant Connell is well apprised
of Ralph's drug dealing: ''The rumor we get is that
he'll do 5 to 10 bundles a visit. You're talking about
50 to 100 bags per visit, three times a week. On the
street a bundle goes for about $70. In here, you can
sell it for about $300. So ·he can make about a $230
profit per bundle, and if he's doing 10 bundles like
is rumored from some of the information we get,
you're talking $2,300 a visit two or three times a

week. That's a lot of money."
It's more than a C.O. makes.
Authorities seem resigned to the fact that shutting down operations like Ralph Sowell's wouldn't
make much of a difference in the prison drug business.
'We'd be very naive to think that if we put Ralph
Sowell out of business that would change the drug
trade in this institution," says Lt. Connell. "When
he falls, five different dealers will come to the forefront to take his place. So it doesn't matter if we
frisk Ralph's cell·or Joe Jones's cell. You have so
many inmates incarcerated for drug-related crimes,
who are involved in narcotics on· the street and
want to perpetuate that addiction wh~le they're in
jail, and if the demand is here, someone will find
the supply."

Naturally, corrections officials

blame visifors for bringing in the drugs.

"Women carry drugs in their vagina," says Lt.
Frank Pascucci, a 20-year veteran of East Jersey
State Prison, "and then pass them on to inmates
who bring it back in their mouth or in their anus.
And there's no frisk known to man that's gonna
f'md it there," he laughs.
Sometimes a snitch tips officials to the name of a
dealer expecting a package through a visit. Officials
get the names of the people on the dealer's visiting
list and try to apprehend them before they get to
the joint. But clever cons can thwart even wellplanned efforts.
''The dealer has an unrelated inmate's girlfriend
bring it in and give it to her boyfriend, who in turn
will pass it to someone, who in turn will pass it to
Ralph Sowell or somebody like Ralphy," reports
another EastJer~ey official. "His girlfriend's clean,
he's clean. We can squat on him as often as we
want, frisk him as often as we want, try to bust his
visitor coming in and.she won't have it. But the
stu~ will still be coming in and it will be his."
East Jersey official Tim Dill believes there's no
end in sight to the drug trade in prison. "There are
just too many ways to get drugs in," he concedes.
'We've had some ingenious attempts."
Like the time someone sent green olives in a
food package. The pimentos had been removed
and replaced with small red balloons filled with
heroin.
'We once found drugs in ajar of peanut butter,"
says Lt. Connell. "Dug down deep and found narcotics." The jar had been heated in a microwave to
smooth out the peanut butter, and then resealed to
give the appearance of being unopened.
"Once someone dropped off a pizza for a relative
and underneath the cheese were decks of heroine,"
continues Lt. Connell. "It's limited only by the
imagination."

PRISON LIFE

49

that
locke up .

that
.....,_.,.... on or any
· are
,
ere aren,t drug~.
warden ofEast]ersey State pnson.

-Patrick Arvonw, former
The guards may complain about
visits,out many say it is guards who do
m ost of the drug smuggling. " Less than 10% of
drugs com e in through visits," says an experien ced
dealer who served a d ecad e in federal institutions.
"Just as on the streets, where you have drug cartels
supported by corrup t governm e nt officials, the
major drug operations in prison rely on collusio n
with authorities; on corrupt guards who abuse their
p ower for profit. The maj or drug op eration in one
federal joint wh ere I did time involved two guards
who p icked up drugs at a P .O . Box, brought them
in a week later, and got paid on the street from the
d ealers' freeworld associates," he says.
"The drug business h ere is very lu c rative," adds
"Ringo," a Sing Sing co nvict with a decad e down. "A
lot of gua rds use d ealing as a way to su ppleme nt
th e ir income, a nd th ey' re a lways getting bus ted. I
kne w a prisone r who was awarded work re lease for
getting a cop to bring in cocaine. He wou ldn ' t have
made it ho m e t hat easy because he was in o n h is
second murde r charge.
"Just recently," he continues, "a recreation civi lia n
got ca ught up in a sti ng. A rat bastard in mate set
him up. The depa rtment of corrections gave h im a
m icro p ho n e a nd marke d mo n ey. T h e civilian go t
busted o n th e o utside with the mo ney h e was su pposed to buy drugs with ."
On October 27, 1995, four corrections office rs at
a fe deral prison in Atla nta were indicwd on charges
of trying to smuggle marijuana, cocai ne and heroi n
into the prison.
Since 1989, 13 staff m e mbe rs a t the crowded,
max imum-security state prison in Graterford, Pe nnsylvani a have been arrested o n c harges of trying to
so PRISON LIFE

smuggle drugs. Eleven prison e rs have di ed of drug
ove rd oses at Graterfo rd a nd about 20 p erce nt of
the u ri ne tesL~ done on prisone rs each month sh ow
sign s of drug use. In Marc h 1995, three priso ners
were fou nd in a cell, a ll with hypod e rmi c need les
and a ll un conscious fro m drug overdoses.
Wh e n 650 state troope rs recently desce nded o n
Graterford in a surprise nightti me raid in tended to
curb the d rug trade th e re, ove r 60 caches of drugs
we re seized. As a result, n in e ran ki ng officers a t the
prison re tired or were transferred, and 21 prisone rs
suspected of drug tra ffic ki ng were moved to o th e r
prisons, acco rd ing to Martin F. Ho rn , Pen nsylvania's Corrections Commissioner.

Heroin is the most popular prison

drug because it puts you in a " fuck-it-

all" type of m ood. " You nod o ut and chill," says
one con. Pot is a dangerous drug to use because it
stays in your system too long, although users can
sometimes s ucceed in " flushing" the drug from
their system by drinking a lot of water.
"Cocaine doesn't see m to be as prevale nt in
prison because it's so expensive and, from what I've
been told," says an East j ersey prison o fficia l, "it's a
great high , but it's a short o ne. Whe reas with he roin , you ca n buy one $30 bag a nd be hig h for nin e
or te n ho urs. T hirty d o lla rs of cocaine m ight only
last you 45 minutes."
As o n th e streets, drugs are cu t with othe r substances to in crease profits. In the joint, aspirin a nd
flour a re most co mmonly used. "I once heard of a
guy wh o used his AZT medicine," says Ringo.

et you two caps
"Ten bucks will g h for two slith
of reefer-enoug
joints."

"But a lot of
guys sell beat
shit when they
get bad packages from th e
street, n he add s.
"Instead of not selling it, they do, causing big proble ms. It
happens all th e tim e. In fact, most of the stabbings
and figh ts here are drug-re lated."
Anthon y Goom bi was in the disciplina ry unit at
Granite when we spo ke with him. ''I'm in he re for
battery. They' re saying it was ove r drugs. They say
we robbed this guy for his dope. This oth er guy confronted us about stealing drugs from a g uy. H e says
we robbed him fo r some marijuana a nd vali ums."

With plenty of cash to buy goods
from the commissary, privileges from
guards and sex from other prisoners, dealers in
the joint live well. "A drug dealer is looked upon
highly here," says Ringo. " He's a big man. Usually
he'll have bodyguards-flunky kids who like to get
high-who will do everything for him."
Michael J o nes, a.k.a. "Snowball," is do ing life at
East J ersey State Prison for first d egree murde r .

Openly
homosexual, he
has been d own fo r 20 years
and knows the syste m inside a nd o ut. Although h e
doesn't do drugs, h e has made himself into a kind
of drug pimp, negotiating deals on behalf ofjunkies
who only have th eir bodies to sell.
"Most o f the time, if a guy's got a drug habit," h e
says, "h e will h ave sex with a n other inmate for
drugs. No malte r what type of hig h he's o n he will
have sex with a nother g uy in p rison so h e can get
his drugs.
"A new guy who wants drugs wi ll go to a homosexual first, because th ey kn ow th at fags kn ow
mostly eve rybod y," h e says: "No w-if a guy just
co me in and h e go t a h abit, and I kno w h e got a
ha bit, I'm going to make som e mo ney off of him .
lt's easy. I wou ld take him to a no ther prisoner and
say 'Hey, you see th is fine thin g right h e re? Yo u
wa n t a blow j ob? He's yo urs. You can get him a nd
do him anyway you want to do him , just give him a
li ttle b it of that dope and give me a box of cigarettes for myself. "'
(Continued on fJage 54)

an't get in here
thin'
you
c
ain't no
d and go lay
. I'll just
th~t
TV. Fuckit,

smoke
7:e
in my cell, loo ad "

't gonna hurt nobo Y· State Reformatory.
''""-'"'·"' Hill, a prisoner at Oklahoma

PmSON LIFE

51

RIKERS HIGHLAND
By Anthony Wareham
Ri lum Island, six miles from Manhat-

tan, is the world's largest penal colony.
With 12 j ails a nd more being bui lt, the
complex holds nearly 20, 000 jJrison ers
seroing a yem· o-r less of cily time or awaiting transf er to an ttpstate f acility. Once
u sed as a du mping groun d f or the city's
garbage and subway e.'l:covalion nifuse, the
island was converted into a prison complex
in 1957. Planned as a model penitentiary,
the jails today are di1·ty, antiquated and
overcrowded.
Anthon)' Wareham, an ex-con, ex-heroin
addict, questions the logic of methadone
main tenance as the primmy f orm of drug
tn!atment at Rilters.
52

PRISON LIFE

Rikers lsland, a t least in t h e
wojails (C95 a nd C76) I 've
p e nt tim e, if yo u 've g ot th e
commissary, th e cas h o r th e cigare ttes, you ca n always find some
drugs to help pass the time. For me,
this was a mixed blessing, because it
was my drug addictio n that kept cata pulting me back to the isla nd.
H e ro in was my dru g o f c ho ice .
Before my most recent bo ut, I h ad
been su<tight fo r several years, which
had reward ed me with a good j ob, a
long-ter m re latio nsh ip a nd a Ma nha tta n apartm e nt with all the trimmin gs. My d ownfall bega n whe n I
visited a buddy in Londo n. The pla n
was to indulge for a couple of d ays
and the n resume my sobe r life whe n
I re turn ed to New Yo rk.
Pro b le m was, after I go t bac k, I
conned myself in to thinking I could
continue sh oo tin g h eroin recre-

a ti o n a lly. T o make a lo ng story
sh o rt, wi thin six mo nths I'd lost my
job, m y a p a rtm e nt, m y g irlfrie nd
a nd most everything I owned. T h e n
I started ge tting a rrested . My habit
had me so stru ng out I could n ' t do
a n yth in g in t h e morn ing b efore
feed ing th e mo nkey. This included
a tte n di ng co m m un ity se rvice a nd
making it to court. So one by one my
a rrests turn ed into wa rra nts, un til
even tu ally j ai l tim e was th e o n ly
alte rnative the judge could con sid e r.
I blew eve ry ch a n ce th e co urt gave
me, and I had gou en so used to kicking do pe on the Ooor of Manhattan
Central Boo ki ng th a t th e nurses
knew me on a first na me basis. I got
used to a rriving at Rike rs like the
wa lking d ead with one goal in
mind- METHADONEl
Do p e fi e n d s like myse lf we re
always amazed to find that the city's
liberal a ttitudes toward cr iminology

extend to the detoxification of heroin addicts via methadone, a synthetic
form of heroin. Most amazing,
methadone maintenance is offered
for entire sentences (at Rikers, that
means up to a year). Any misdemeanor
offender admitted to the New York
City Department of Corrections with
a habit can receive 40 milligrams of
methadone. each day of his or her
incarceration. Methadone is so powerful it keeps addicts "straight" for
over 24 hours, whereas heroin lasts
only 4 to 6 hours. To describe the
program as popular with prisoners
would be an understatement at best.
There are, however, some serious
problems with methadone treatment. One is that an addict can leave
jail with a worse habit than he came
in with. For me, I could have used
jail time to kick the habit and get a
sober perspective on life, but I never
got to the point where I was able to
say no to dope. It's far more difficult
to make the decision to be drug-free
if you haven't had a drug-free day in
years. Historically, jail provided that
period of sobriety from which countless alcoholics and addicts have been
able to see there is another way to
live, and then choose that way.
But while methadone is neither a
substitute for sobriety nor true treatment for drug addiction, it may still
be preferable to no intervention at
all. It is virtually free when compared with the cost of true drug
treatment, which makes methadone
particularly seductive to bureaucrats
under pressure to do something
about the drug problem. We can
teach our youth that drug use is for
losers, but we must acknowledge
that until an addict is ready to quit,
he will continue to suffer, and suffer
even more while addiction to illegal
drugs demands criminality. Methadone
addicts are free from the need to
commit crimes and from the health
dangers of injecting street drugs. In
this way, methadone can be part of a
rational response to addiction. But it
is no panacea.
Prisoners, like all of society, cannot afford to be confused about the
ultimate effects of methadone. At
best, those on methadone settle
down to a life of quiet addiction. But
many do not. They inject cocaine
instead of heroin and continue their
criminal activity. So sub~tantial is the
problem of heroin and methadone
addicts getting arrested that New
York City has an entire jail with some

3,000 beds for detainees needing three times a week if I had the cash.
methadone.
One jail bag (about half a street
For new detainees like myself bag), goes for $20, or a carton of ciggoing through withdrawals on the arettes. If I wanted reefer, the most
bullpen floor, methadone was the prevalent drug at Rikers, I'd trade a
light at the end of the tunnel. If I can pack or two of cigarettes for one jail
just hold on until I see the doctor, every- joint.
thing will be all right. And sure
Eventually, however, I decided to
enough, my time would come: The stop. I came to the conclusion that
doctor would take one look at me something had to change if someand within a few hours the pain thing was to change. The Rikers
would be gone. Once you're on the Island thing was getting old fast. I
monkey juice, Rikers isn't such a bad realized that if I kept coming to Rikplace. You can sleep 16 hours a day, ers, signing up for methadone and
you can· eat (or not eat) the prison getting high every chance I got, I
food. Even if the days drag on a bit, would keep walking out the door an
addict and starting the whole cycle
you're half in the bag anyway.
If you're not in the methadone again. If you are ready to quit, jail
program and want to catch a buzz, can be as good a place as any· to
you can always find someone looking begin to make changes.
Narcotics Anonymous was where I
to sell his supply for a few packs of
cigarettes. Although a guard watches began to put things into proper pereveryone drink his dose, the clever spective on my last visit to Rikers. It
consumer will hold the liquid in his helped me find the strength to get
mouth then "spitback" into a bag or myself off the methadone, and to
cup and sell it later. Doesn't sound become totally drug-free for the last
too savory, but a little methadone four months of my incarceration.
Of course, in-patient drug treatgoes a long way in beating the jailment is what a great many prisoners
house blues.
Predictably, the trade of prescrip- want, and even more desperately
tion drugs at Rikers extends to other need. Prison is not where someone
medications: Klonipin, Elavil, Dal- with a drug problem belongs, but it
mane, Zantac and even Dimetapp is where a justice system strapped for
are all popular and available nightly cash and compassion has dropped
if you have the cash. Of course, you them. But even if your facility doesn't
can get them for free if you can con- offer drug counseling, you can work
on your problem anyway. Just admitvince the doctor you need them.
Street drugs, too, are widely avail- ting you have a problem is a big part
·
able at Rikers. I discovered this my of the solution.
A counselor once told me that the
first day there. It was 2:30 p.m. when I
awoke, having slept like a log thanks most important thing long-term
to my first dose of methadone. I was treatment provides is not the lecstill high when I staggered into the tures, the meetings or the 12 steps.
bathroom to take a shower. Before I It's clean time away from the drug.
Time away from drugs is worth
reached the stalls, an officer peered
in to adviSe me that the showers were fighting for. If you can say no. in jail,
closed until after the count. As the where there is nothing to do and
C.O. approached, I noticed a prison- you've got plenty of excuses to get
er who had shielded himself from the high, then you have a good chance at
officer's view. When he saw us, he staying clean once you're out. You'll
probably find some others like yourstood abruptly and walked out.
As I spoke with the C.O., I noticed self to talk to, maybe start your own
the guy had left a fully loaded syringe meetings. Groups like AA and NA
on the bench behind him-in plain will send you free literature.
So while jail will never be the Betty
view. He'd been hiding in there, trying to find a vein when I blew up his Ford Clinic, it can be used as a theraspot. If the shit had hit the fan, his peutic community. It's the best place
to start getting sober, if that's what
plan was that I would take the rap.
You can imagine that for an addict you want to do. As an ex-con with 18
spending his first day in jail, the sight years off dope told me, "If you want
of a loaded syringe did a number on to change your ways on the outside,
my head. I even entertained the idea you better start while you're on the
of taking his dope myself after the inside. It's not going to happen in
OJ]
C.O. left. Once I knew my way the receiving room."
around, I found I could score two or

PRISON LIFE ss

I want here?
Can I get an~t ~ng nds on when
"Sure. But It epe
?"
Prices?
you looking f or·
"What are
Heroin.
will get you a shot
"Fifty bucks
.
.th
About ten c.c. ' s."-InterVIeW
WI

h.

at Oklahoma S
.
in the Hole
a pnsoner
conunenting on

Because drugs have become so avail(Continued from j)([ge 5 1)
At Sing Sing, says one convict, some strung-out g uys who
won't sell sexual se rvices will sell things th e ir fami ly gives
th e m, like neakers, shirts and sha mpoo, for d rugs. T hese
are the "cold dope fiends, the guys who fuc k up sooner or
late r wh en they run up a bill. They e nd up checki ng in to
protective custody."
Take Duane Hammery, for example. He's in protective
c ustody at East.J e rsey Sta te Pr iso n because of an un paid
d rug bill. "I did some he roin and I couldn ' t pay, so I came
he re . I was in fea r for my life. I owed $ 100, and you ca n
ge t hun fo r that amount of mon ey. In h e re, heroin is like
gold."
But eve n in ad seg, an add ict can still get a fix. "Wh en
you h ave an addic ti on to so methi ng," says a no th er East
.Jersey State prisone r in ad seg, "it's a sic kness. It's n ot
something yo u can j ust stop, especially whe n you sec o Lher
guys getting h igh. T here's drugs in ad seg. T he re's drugs
a ll over. The re's more d rugs in the re than a nywhe re."
54

PRISON LIFE

able in prison, and sentences for drug crimes

span two or three d ecad es, m a ny p eople wh o don 't
come in as dope fiends pick up habits o nce they're in.
''The re are so ma ny guys who catch habits in here it's not
fun ny," says Ringo. "Being locked up in a cage fo r 20 years
sucks. It takes your hean away. You become an a nimal. You
want to escape the reality, forget you've become pan of the
system, so you turn to drugs. You get high to forge t a ll that
you've lost."
Clear ly, m ost people who buy ju nk in the jo int a re
addicts, no t recreational users. Those who wan t to qu it say
th ey don ' t have the support they need.
"Anybody who has don e drugs a ll his life doesn't li ke
th e m ," says .J e rry Pe lley at Granite. "I was talking to a
friend of min e last n ighL, and I said, 'Dan, don't you wish
we co uld qu it?' And h e said, 'Yeah , man. But it's j ust not
that easy.'
"And it's not that easy. Especially when you don 't have any
su ppon a nd you 're doing so much Lime. They have o n e
drug unit in this whole p rison and it Lakes an act of Con-

gress to get in ... If you're doing a long time, like I am, you
can't get in because th ey don ' t give a shit about you."
Prisoners and a u tho ri ties a like say that drug progra ms
fo r priso ne rs are e ithe r nonexistent or are so poo rly run
as to be virtua ll y ineffective. "The drug programs h ere
a re a joke," says a Sin g Sing priso ner. "Guys who participate just do it to loo k good a t th e board. It's mandato ry
to get drug treatment if yo u have a drug crime. But th e
place where they give drug trea tme nt is full of drug u se rs
a nd pushe rs."
Several studies sponsore d by the 'ationa l Institute o n
Drug Abuse ha\'e shown that professionally run drug u·eatme m programs, on the whole, a re successful in reducing
dmg abuse and crime among partic ipants and in increasing their abi lity to ho ld a j o b. Treating drug addi ct io n
medically rc~ther tJ1an criminally is also more cost-effective.
Case in poim: In New York State, a one-year reside ntia l
drug treaun e nt program costs less than S20,000 per parti c ipant, wh e reas incarce ration cos ts the state n ea rl y
S30,000 per prisoner , according to the Correctiona l Associa tion or eiV York.

Research and ratio nale aside, allocating m oney for the
rehabil itation of convict drug addicts isn' t h igh on the publi c's priority list. Former Warden Arvo nio pai n ts a grim picture of th e co mb in ed1·esu lts o r America's fa iled wa r on
drugs, ma ndatory minimums a nd th e lack of fund ing for
drug u·eaunem:
"Th e mandatory minimum se ntence in New J e rsey
sta rte d with a new penal code in 1979. Since t hen, many
m o re people have bee n loc ke d up , so obvio usly th e
mandatory m inimum is n o t a d e terrent. All it did was
make us more crowded.
"Meanwhile, I am not getting any mo re resou rces to run
th e kind of u·eatme nt programs th ese drug add icts need.
Even th oug h a g uy may co mmit a n assault or a rme d ro bbery, the fact remain s th at when he goes bac k out o n th e
street h e's going to continue to use drugs, he's goi ng to conLinue to be invo lved in that culture. There's a feeling in the
general public tJ1at once you've bee n in prison , some miracle's going to h appe n so th at when you go back o ut there,
you aren't going to commit crimes anymore. Well, tJ1 ere is
IIIJ
no miracle. We' re basically ware housing people."
PRISON LIFE 55

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Call f o r s pecial pric ing o n ord ers of 2 5 or mo re.
lllflflllllllllll lll l lfl llfll lfllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllfllfllllllltlttll~llllllllllllllllllll llllllllllllllllllllllllltlltlllllllllllllllllllllllllltltltttlttltlltlltllllllllllllllllfllllltlllllllll

by Susan Rosenberg
he wa r o n drugs has beco me a
wa r o n wom e n in the dru g
trad e: th e wives a nd girlfrie nds
o f drug d ea le rs, tl1c runn e rs, mu les
a nd drug use rs. ln th e IOl tg-te rm e r s
unit a t Danbuq• FCl fo r wome n, many
p riso ne rs a re se rving le n g th y senten ces with n o ho pe of parole. For the
mos t pa rt, th ese life rs a re first-time,
n o n-vio le nt o ffe nd e rs wh ose com·ictio ns a re rela ted to drug conspiracies.
T h e majori ty are Blac k o r Lati n o .
T hey leave th eir children a nd families
on the outside in ru in.
Though some women are fo rtuna te
e nough to have fa mily m e mbe rs wh o
re ma in un sca thed by the c rimina l
prosecution-a loved o n e who can
h o ld so me sembla n ce o f fa mily I ife
toge the r- many have no o ne to care
fo r th eir chi ldre n. Without fa mily at
h o me, t h ese women lose the ir c hildre n to the state. Gone. In a mauer o f
m inutes, everything th e woman h as
kn o wn in t h e making of h e r life is
over a nd do n e with. Only p riso n time
lies a h ead , ofte n mor e p r ison time
th an there a re years left to live.

T

T h e le n g th y se nte n ces, a nd th e
o ften great d ista nces fa mily me mbe rs
o r frie nds must travel to visit p riso ne rs, ma ke it n ear ly impossib le for a
woma n to m aintain tics with the o utside wor ld . Whe n t he re is little ho pe
of release, wo me n prisone rs quickly
lose to u ch with those they leave
be hin d . If yo u a re 35 years o ld a nd
you ge t a 45-year sente nce unde r the
n ew sen tc n cing laws, yo u must do at
least 40 yea rs, whi ch mea ns you ca n
walk o ut free a nd clea t· a t age 75. If
you have a n a tural life sen te nce, yo u
n ever walk o ut; yo u d ie in the wome n 's prison hospi tal cente r a t Carswell
AFB, Texas.
Many wome n d o th e tim e . They
struggle th rough every d ay a nd find a
way to cop e. Some don't know how to
survive in prison; th ey e n d up on psyc h o u·opic medi ca tio n. Increasing ly,
wo men who have information to u·ade
will use it to get a tim e cut; o the rs, wid1
no information to trade, e nd up do ing
len gthy sente n ces. T he severi ty of th e
pu nish me n t, th e very le ng th of th e
sentence, is inte nded to be coe rcive.

A~

a result, more and more women are
targeted by drug agents a nd pressured
in to becoming snitch es.
The co nvict cod e o f sil e n ce h as
been d isma ntJed piece by piece by the
sta te. \'\'h en a wo ma n is a walki n g
"co nte nts und e r pressu re" a bout to
explode, a nd she fin all y does, it
means sh e has been bro ke n. She has
been bo ug ht by the governm e nt a nd
can a nd will be used again and again.
Once a defe nda nt gives in fo r mation
in exc h a n ge fo r se n te n ce le ni e ncy,
the governmen t owns h e r.
To j ustify this to th e mselves, th ese
women e nd up seeing d1eir captors as
all-p owerfu l. It is the governme n t d1at
ho lds their fate in its h a nds; it is th e
gove rnm e nt t h at must b e obeyed.
Othe r pr iso ners are seen as a threat.
Build ing unity a mo n g wo me n prisoners becomes close to imp ossible. Eventually, a mo re pe tty fo rm of sni tch ing
ta kes ove r. T he u·ade of inform atio n
in prison may n ot rise to the level of
informan t trial testimo ny or "coop eratio n," as p rosecu tors e u p he mistically
call it, but i t can an d d oes preve n t
PRISON LIFE 57

Ramona DiFazio
• Arrested with 8 1/2 grams of
cocaine and a gun
• Sentenced to 145 years in
prison
Don' t ask Ramona DiFazio to explain her
charges . Li ke most , she can't make heads nor
tai ls of the legal morass of mandatory minimums and federal sentencing guidelines. All
she knows is that she was arrested in 1992 for
8 1/2 grams of cocaine powder, and a gun . For
t hat s he received a sentence of 145 years,
with 75 to do. Her only prior convictions were
a D. U.I . and possession of hal f - a-gram of
cocaine, for which she received probabation .
"I can't for the life of me figure out where
all these years came from," says DiFazio from
the Federal Correctional Institution for
Women in Danbury, cr . "There was no violence .
I smoked cocai ne for two y ears, b ough t and
s old s mall amounts to pay fo r my habit, and
now I'm here for the rest of my life . " Sentenced at age 32 , DiFazio will have to l ive
t o 107 to complete her time .
Ramona DiFazio grew up i n Newport News , VA .
She f i nished high school and worked as a bartender at a local tavern, "Ellie ' s," a job she
held for 14 years before her arrest. She volunteered a t a home for the e l derly and on weekends could be found cleaning the garages of
senior citizens. A pot smoker since her teens,
DiFazio started smoking cocaine in her early
30s . "Some friends from school and I would pool
our money, then I'd get the coke and sometimes
cook it up. I'd get my share for free, sometimes make a little Ironey," she says. "But this
was no Noriega drug ring . I wasn't the mastermind cocaine queen they painted me to be . "
When DiFazio got to court, her public defense
attorney, who had met her only an hour before
the trial , mispronounced her name . After it was
over, she was cha rged with con spiracy to possess and distribu te 3,000 pounds of cocaine .
"They used hearsay evidence from a local dealer
who turned out t o be an inf ormant . They said I
cooked and smoked half an ounce a day, and then
they added to that charge information from
somebody that my boyfriend made trips to get 2
kilos at a time, once a week, which is a
ridiculous lie, and they multiplied that by
weeks and months over a certain amount of time
and came up with the 3, 000-pound figure."
Like many small-time drug users and dealers
the government wants to put away for life,
DiFazio was turned over to the Feds and given a
new dose of charges . "They said we (DiFazio's
boyfriend, his brother and his girlfriend-also
first-time offenders now doing life sentences)
were too big for the local police . So they
switched us over to the DEA and call ed i n the
Feds . Under the con s p iracy charges, I got
58

PRISON LIFE

everything they were charged with . .. 20 y ears
for each conspiracy : conspiracy to possess ,
conspiracy t o sell and conspiracy wi th i ntent
to possess and sel l . And another 20 years on
each of the substantive counts (actual sal es). "
Possession of an unlicensed gun , wh ich
DiFazio said she and her boyfriend used fo r
sport at a local shooting range, got her
another five years . The gun was in DiFa zio' s
car when she was arrested .
"I was i n a dark p arking lot , and all of a
sudden a group of men came rushi ng a t me . I was
scared and pulled out the gun . Then I saw their
badges and said, 'Oh shit.' I put the gun in my
pocket . I tol d them I had a gun on me , and they
pul led me out of the car and beat my face i nt o
the trunk, over and over . I never resisted . I
just spread ' em and laid over the car . They had
me by the hair and kept beating me , saying I' d
better coop erate because my boyfriend t old
them I did all these things, which was just a
ploy to get me to spit something out."
With the recent denial of her fed eral
habaeus corpus appeal, DiFazio plans to bring
her case before the Supreme Court . In the
meantime, she's taking paralegal courses t o
help her understand the technicalities of her
case. "I'm doi ng t he best I can. I'm going to
college and trying to b e t ter myself. I j ust
hope I don't leave here i n a wheel chair."

women prisoners from exercising collective power over the actual and difficult conditio ns of their lives.
The Burea u of Prisons plays an
active role in this coercion. Although
the Bureau claims it is only involved in
custody, not in th e te rms of punishment, and th a t it is n eutral and only
carries out the directives of the courts,
this is not so. No longer is prison itself
sufficient punishment. No longer is the
loss of freedom e nough. Now the purpose of imprisonment is also to ensure
total "cooperation," total subservience
to the all-powerful government. While
the re may b e diffe re nt government
agencies-FBI, DEA, IRS, BOP and so
on- the re is only one system.
Most peo p le who get busted don't
think they will wind up giving information to the government. But threats of
lengthy sentences begin before the
indictment and continue into the first
several yea rs after conviction. Before
the imp lementation of manda t011' sentences, prisone rs had a right to request
a sentence reduction. The motion was
called a Rule 35. The re were various
grounds on which one could bring this
motion, including fam ily h ardship. If a
prisone r could demonstrate to a judge
th at h er imprisonme nt was causing
her family undue suffering, the judge
could reduce th e sen tence. Though
no t common , se nte n ce r eductions
under Rule 35 gave priso ners hope, a
chance for a break in th e unrelenting
prison time.
Now a Rule 35 mo tion ca n o nly be
brought by the prosecution. Rule 35
h as been transform ed into a government too l whereby compliance, or
snitching, is th e only grounds fo r sente n ce r eduction. The motion h as
been reduced to a single-page list of
categories with a box for a check mark
nex t to each. Under the first category,
"Debriefing," a re four sub-categories:
d ebriefing on own role; d ebriefing o n
o the r principals; debriefing o n gene ral activities of the conspi racy; debriefing on crimin al ac ts. The se nte n ce
reducti o n d e p e nds o n h ow man y
boxes contain c heck marks.
In the years I was locked up at the
ma ximum-sec urity women's unit in
Maria nna, Florida, I witnessed man y
tim es the process of women prisone rs being broken. The unit, call ed
Sha wn ee, is uniqu e in the feder al
priso n sys te m. It is th e on ly super
maximum-sec urity unit for women.
Many prisoners a re se nt the re d irectly
fro m senten cing proceedings. This is
not because they a re a securi ty threat
and n eed mo re supervisio n; few
wome n require max imum-secur ity

Angela Farris
• Charge : Conspiracy to Distribute LSD
• Sentenced to 6 1/2 years
"I was a Dead Head," says Angela Farris, 27. "A casual drug
user, more of a pot smoker and a beer drinker. " Far ris was
travelling with some Grateful Dead fans through Tennessee
when the group was pulled over.
"I had nothing in my possession," she recalls. "But because
my codefendant had half a gram of LSD on him, and ended up
being charged with over an ounce, and I was physically present, I was charged with conspiracy to distribute. The whole
thing just kept getting bigger and bigger. It snowballed . I
still don't understand how I wound up with federal charges."
Farris, now at FCI Danbury, is nearing the end of a six-anda-half-year sentence. What has been most painful is being
away from her son, whom her parents have been taking care of
since she was sentenced .
Farris says she knows many women at Danbury whose husbands,
boyfriends or lovers got caught up in something and because
the women l ived with them, they got charged with conspiracy.
"The conspiracy laws are so broadsweeping . They're almost
impossible to disprove . It's something out of an Orwellian
nightmare," she says . "It's pretty frightening."

conditi ons. Rathe r , the purpose of
Shawnee unit is to subject the wome n
wh o are se nt there to th e worst of
conditions-maximum iso latio n-to
g ive them a taste of the way the rest of
th eir lives wi ll be unless they give in to
th e government. For ma n y, it is
unbearable.
The coercive threat is explicit. I saw
wome n with life sentences, 100-year
se nte nces, 40-year senten ces, pass
through Shawnee's five electronically
contro lled doors. Whi le they lay in

their cells, the impact of their new lives
hit the m. They walked out, transferred
to easie r priso ns, with ten , seven or
four years left to go . They h ad called
the special agents or prosecutors, or
responded when law enforce ment officials contacted them; Rule 35 motions
1ve re offered, p rosecutoria l powe rs
exercised , accompanied by promises of
protection and even money.
Belle is a 40-year-old African American woman who h as a life se ntence for
h er involvement in a drug conspiracy.
PRISON LIFE 59

She is th e mother of tee nagers a nd
yo un gste rs. Before h e r arrest, Be lle
was the backbon e of h e r fa mily. She is
a large, smilin g, expa nsive woman
whose eyes c rink le a t th e co rners
when sh e tells a story. T he full life sh e
once kn ew as a m o th er is go n e;
though she tries to stay involved in the
lives o f her children, t h e fami ly t ies
u n ravel with each passing month.
Along with 12 co-conspirators, Belle
so ld a bou t a kil o of cocaine a week .
The Colo m bia n cartel th ey we re not.
They didn't make millions of dollars,
th ere were no murders in the case nor
a n y bribes or threats to public officials. They we re local people involved
in a small-time o pe ratio n labe led "big
time" by self-serving DEA age n ts. Seve ral of the people who we re convicted
a nd se ntenced to decades in prison
had no knowledge of the overall conspiracy. T hey were selling co ke on the
side to make e nds m eet.
When DEA busted Belle, th ey to ld
h e r th ey were go ing to put h er away
forever. They to ld her th a t h er best
friend had already rolled over on her.
T hey said several o thers were ready to
ro ll. They bro ught Bell e's teenage
d a ug hter in and told h e r th at if h e r
m o th e r fail ed to rat o n o th e rs, sh e
wou ld be wheeling he r mo the r's body
out in a cheap p ine box after she died
in prison. "Debriefl" they all screamed
a t Be ll e ove r a nd ove r for months.
He r o ptions, they explained, were life
in priso n or coopera tion-whi c h
meant a t most five yea rs in prison ,
three yea rs with good co nduct.
Belle is the first to admit that selling
co ke was wrong. Like m a ny o th e r
m others who ge t caug ht up in th e
drug trade, Belle told herself she was
selling cocaine to give her childre n a
better life. Because of the diffi culti es
she faced in providing for h e r famil y,
she o pted fo r existence in the unde rg ro und economy. "It was an easy way
o ut of a bad situa ti on ," she says. IL was
later that h e r addi ction too k h o ld. "I
know th a t crack addi c tion destroys
peo ple, an d I ' m g lad it's over." She
says this no t to justify her ac tions, but
to place the m in context.
As of the present, Belle refuses to
ge t past that first ch ec k ma rk o n the
Ru le 35 motio n. H e r positio n is that
sh e did th e c rim e, so sh e must ta ke
th e weight for her actions. She refuses
to d e brief o n a nyon e other than he rself. Sh e is fo ur years in to a life se ntence. Sh e did go back to th e
a uthorities and d e brief o n her own
role in the conspiracy, but that wasn 't
e n o ugh for the U.S. Atto rn ey to recom me nd a sente nce red uctio n. Again,
so PRISON LIFE

Patricia Young
• First-time Offender
• Charged with Conspiracy to Distribute
Marijuana
• Sentenced to 24 years

"I'm a woman and a mother. When I got in the system I was
stripped of all pride . You are stripped of every piece of
clothing. You squat, you cough, you spread; you are told when
to get up, when to eat, what to wear. You quit thinking for
yourself, and unles s you can build a friendship, find some
warmth and a sense of family, you just keep dying every day. A
little more of you keeps going inside yourself .. . "
Patricia Young and her husband of 30 years, Cl yde, were living on a farm in Alabama when the DEA raided their property and
arrested them. "We had about 500 hogs at the time," Young says.
"We also owned a dairy with about 250 milking cows, which the
government has now. They just came and took them all . "
Patricia and Clyde believe they were set up by a neighbor who
wanted their land. When the Young's refused to s e ll it, they
say he used government contacts to fabricate a case against
them.

•
Sandra Ospina
• Arrested for Transporting Cocai ne
• Sentenced to Eight years t o Life
Sandra Ospina is your typical mule: foreign born, female,
first offender. Before she was sent to Bedford Hills Correctional Institution in New York, she lived in New York City,
working in a factory.
"I'm here because I was transporting drugs from Columbia .
I was very young, 20 years old. I got married to my
boyfriend and we were living a very difficult life. I never
learned English until I came to jail. He didn • t know English
either . n
When Ospina was pregnant with her second child, she stopped
working. "We started owing money to our families. Then we
couldn't afford to buy food so we decided to buy only formula for the kids.
"Things started going very bad for us and in that time I
was visiting a friend and she introduced me to a guy and we
started talking and became friends . He came to our house and
saw we were living a hard life. He asked me if I wanted to go
to Columbia . He never told me exactly for what, but in the
back of my mind I knew for what.
"So I went to Columbia, to his family's house. His brother
set everything up . He got the cocaine, three kilos, and then
put me on a plane. I was arrested at the airport when I got
here."
Instead of the $5,000 Ospina was desperately counting on,
she received an eight-year-to-life prison sentence. Her
children are living in Columbia with her family.
"Being away from my children breaks my heart apart," she
says, crying . "One day I spoke with my son . It was his
birthday, and he had a party . He said he invited this person
and that person. 'Who else?' I asked, and he said, 'My mother. • And I said, 'Oh yeah? Who is your mother?' And he said,
'Nobody. • N

they told her, "Give us what we want
and you can walk out in 18 months."
It is diffi c ult to imagine how one
might face such a choice: 18 m o nths
versus life in priso n. Be lle didn't go
for it; and she struggles with this decision every day. I can see it in h e r face
when sh e thinks n o one is looking.
When she went back to be debriefed
on her own role, a nd she saw he r children in th e visiting room, they had
grown beyo nd recognition. At th at
m o ment, h e r beliefs were more
d ee ply challe nged than at any previous point in her life. It is the foulest of
bribes- your beliefs or your life- a n
un conscio nable action by an all-powerful state.
Soon, Belle will n o longer be of any
use to law e nforce me nt. If sh e ho lds
out and resists the pressure to inform
on others, h er options wi ll close. H e r
punishment, the forfe iture of he r life,
so exceeds the crime that it is difficu lt

to compre hend un less you consider
the government's agenda to target the
most vulnerab le defe ndants and
coerce the m into snitching. What they
are sayi ng is that the crime itself is not
so bad; they seek to punish excessively
only those who refuse to te ll on others.
Belle, like most wome n casualties of
the drug war, was a low-leve l playe r.
The white m e n who run the inte rnational drug cartels have the p ower and
mo ney to buy and bargain th e ir way
out of priso n , often by snitching.
American society is dom inate d by
wh ite supremacy in its institutio n s,
particularly in the criminal justice system. The gove rnm e nt h as targeted
the African American community with
its so-called war on drugs and crime.
With the h e lp of a complaisa nt mass
me dia, we are barraged with images
and pro nounceme nts tha t demonize
and criminalize the African American.
T h is disregard for th e value of life,

and particularly non-white life, is part
of the fa bric of American social relation s. T h e natio n was founded upon
the d estru ction of Native American
life a nd th e importation o f Afr ica n
slave labor. Now the means of dealing
with people of color has been relegated to the prison syste m wher e it has
become a rule th at one must e ither
snitch or rot behind bars.
When the most callo us a nd cynical
manipulations of sentence length are
the main devi ce the government
e mploys in its war on drugs, a total
corruption of the sys tem prevai ls.
That the government, through its law
e n forceme nt agents, can say to a
woman, a mother, a pe rson with a past
and a present and hopes for a future,
"Your life means shit to us, and your
freedom nothi ng at all," is a betrayal
by the state of all basic human rights,
and a degradation to the humanity of
us all.
lli1
PRISON LIFE

61

Listen in on SASSY SORORITY GIRLS
- See how bad two sorority sisters
can be when they answer your
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CHEERLEADER
CONFESSIONS
"Eavesdrop" on this very
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three wild cheerleaders
tell you what turns
them on the most.
BACHELORETTE
PARTY
Find out what
happens to the
only male stripper
at an all-girls'
bachelorette
party.

~4

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Rich Girls 1 Sassy Sorority Girls
Private Yacht Party1Horny Hitchhikers
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Female Bonding I Pearl Necklace

2

Alabama Alice 1 Drugstore Cowgirl
Jenny & Suzi I Too Big for Brenda
Kneepad Nancy1 Knob Gobblers

4

Bachelorette Party I Secretarial Interview
Tammy & Tina I Cheerleader Confessions
Backstage Visitors I Stewardess on Flight 69

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62

PRISON LIFE

IJAD,LJADQJI71? lt\E :JU.DG;E

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PRISON LIFE

63

Don't
serve the
time,
let the
time serve
you
THE
PRISON LIFE
FOUNDATION
D on't incar cer a te ;
educat e .

e

Personal Transformation
through Education
e Fully-accredited GED, College
and Vocational Degrees
e Scholarships and Funding for
Prison Educational Projects
e Courses and Study Materials
Deli vered Directly to the
Prisoner/Student

Please tell us your educational interests.
GEDIH.S. Degree D
Liberal Arts B.A.
Science B.S .
Business
VocaLional
Other (Specify)
Name
Address

D History
D Biology
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D
D

D English
D Computer Sciences D Chemis try
D Pre-Law
D Marketing
D An

D Philosophy
D Engineering
O M.B.A.

T he Prison Life Foundation,
Inc. is a not-for-profit organization
devoted to helping prisoners break
free from the cycle of c rime and
incarcerati on through education.
The Foundation , togeth er wi th
Prison Life Educational Services,
Inc., sponsor full y-accredi ted GED,
co ll ege a nd voca tion al co urses
through corresponde nce learning.
If you are inte rested in learnin g
more about educational opportuniti es o ffered by the Prison Life
Foundation , pl ease fi ll out a nd
return the attached questionnaire to
The Prison Life Foundation, 350
Fifth Avenue , Suite l 905, New
York, NY 1011 8.

FIRST DEGREE
HORTICUlTURE WITH

AQQR~II-TED

s·or11NY

By Jeff Stewart

O

n Fe bruary 25, 1990 I was sitting alone in my Afra me cabi n 30 miles north of Spo kane, Washington, whe n the re was a knock at th e doo r, My
ca b in was off t h e bea te n track so I fig ured it must be
h unters whose car h ad broken down or maybe someone in
need of d irec tions. Instead , it was three agen ts fro m th e
Drug Enforceme nt Agency. "Fede ral agen ts!" they sh om ed.
"We have a warran t for your a rrest."
T hey threate n ed th at ifl d idn 't le t th e m in, th ey would
be bac k with a sea rch warrant a nd tear my ho use a part. I
fig u red that th e q uarLer o unce o f pot o n the co ffee table
wasn ' t wo rth having the h ouse wrecked, so I co nse n ted to
the search.
"An y weapo ns inside?" th ey asked. "Any guns?"
"We'll have to walk through th e kitch e n ," I said, "wh ic h
has a few kn ives in it."
O n ce inside, t hey h a n dcu ffed m e a n d sta rte d fir ing
questio ns. "All right, whe re is it?" th ey ke pt asking. Th e n
th ey sat me down in the living room a nd mad e me wa tch
wh ile t h ey sn oo ped a ro u nd. "This p lace is pre tty tidy,"
Agent Eric Levy rema rked. I guess he fig ured a nyon e who
smoked pot must also have fil thy personal habi ts.
Afte r satisfying the mselves that the ir search wou ld produce no thing, two agen ts put me in the rear seat of a Ford
Bro nco. T hey made a poin t of me ntion ing tha t the Bronco
had been seized fro m some othe r u nl ucky ci tize n . A th ird
agen t fo llowed in my car, t.he la test additi on to th e ir fleet
of confiscated vehicles.
Two ho urs earlie r, I h ad been read ing th e Sunday pa pe r
with my ca t curled in my lap and watching NCAA baske tball on TV. ow I was on my way to the Fede ral Building to
be finge rpr inted and h ass led by pu b lic se rva n ts. O n ce
insid e, th ey wouldn ' t let me take a leak until I sig ned a d ocume nt stati ng that I had co nsented to th e search and bee n
read my Mira nda rig hts. I in sisted I n eeded a lawyer b u t
th ey wou ldn ' t le t me call one.
Fo ur d ays late r I was arra ign ed in Fed e ral Co u rt o n
charges o f manufacturing mo re th an 100 marijuana plants.
Wh e n th ey told m e I was facing five to 40 years in p rison
with a possib le fi ne of$2 millio n, the room began to spin.
Had I no t h ad t.h e lectern to stead y me, I pro ba bly wou ld
have hit the floor.

~I

It a ll began in late 1989 whe n three guys and I d ecided
to g row some po t. I had knmvn two o f th e th ree, Terry a nd
Ken , since hig h sch ool. T h e t hi rd g u y, Chu ck , ca me in
late r o n Ke n 's recommenda tio n . Chuc k was ou r "te nde r, "
H is job was to stay on the pro pe rty, wate r the p la nts a nd
ma ke sure n o on e came po kin g around .
Chuck h ad d o n e seve n years a t Soledad priso n in Califo rn ia a nd to ld us he was d ying of lung can ce r. H e h ad
been o ut fo r five years and was living o n Social Security in
a p rimi tive cabin 30 miles fro m the growing o pe ra tio n. I
fe lt bad ly for th e g uy a n d offe red h im a warm , spacio us
mo bile ho m e, ple nty of fire wood , weed to sm o ke a n d a
fridge full o f ve n iso n in exch a n ge for ta king care o f th e

PRISON LIFE 65

pla nts. Ke n , wh o knew him best,
o ffe red him a portion o f his sh a re of
a ny even tual harvest.
A few weeks after Chuck sta rted
tending the plams, he invited a ne ighbo r, Fred, over to smok e a j o int. A
week later, Fred returned and they
smoked again. At some p oin t, Chuck
showed Fred the pol we were growing.
Freel, who was o n some kind of paro le
or probatio n from th e stale of Idaho,
wen t straight to the Washingto n Sta te
Pa trol in Spokane.
Thro ug h th e di scove ry motion my
atto rn ey fil ed , I learned that b o th
Chu ck a nd Ke n had tolcl the prosecuto r everythin g th ey co uld t hi nk of

dom u rinalyses. I was ex pected to be
home by te n o'clock each night a nd
to stay there until six the next morning, a hig h schooler's hours at th e age
of 35. But I' m g ra teful to h ave spe n t
th e summer with Dad. Shortly afte r I
was sent to p rison, he d ied o f cancer.
Dad a nd his wife j an d id a lo t fo r
me that summer. Spokane is a bo ut 90
miles north of my ho me town in Pullm a n , Washi n gto n. We h ad to make
ma ny trips to Spo ka ne fo r m eet ings
with my lawyer a nd to ta ke ca re of my
prope rty. My belo ng ings had to be
packed a nd sto red. All the whil e, my
fathe r was patie nt an d understanding.
I o n ly wi sh h e' d lived to see me wa lk
out of prison.
\1\That
was
ha rdest fo r m y
fa mily to acce pt
was why I hadn ' t
been will ing to
·'help myself," as
th e prosec uto r
phrased it. It
was clear t hat if
I were not wi lling to provide
th e gove rnme nt with "substa ntial assistan ce" I wo uld r ece ive the fu ll fi veyea r se nte n ce wit h o u t possibility of
pa role.
Years later, a t th e in st illltio n in
Spoka n e, a g u y to ld me, "You don ' t
c h oose to h o ld you r mud because
o th er people are wo nh protectin g
(even t h oug h th ey mig ht be) . Yo u
choose to do the tim e because of who
yo u a re." I could h ave ratted my way
ou t, bu t I would have had to live with
myself the rest of m}' life.

I COULD HAVE RATTED
MY WAY OUT BUT I
WOULD'VE HAD TO
LIVE WITH MYSELF
THE REST OF MY LIFE.
a bo ut me-i ncluding things that were
completely f~tl se. We also learned that
C hu c k was n o t suffe r ing fro m lung
ca nce r but fro m AIDS, which h e had
contracted in prison . He died about a
year la ter.
Ken a lso h ad a record . He had
clone a yea r at California Stale Prison
ten years ea rl ie r on a ma r ijua na
offen se. In exchange for the ir willingness to testify aga inst me, Chuc k a nd
Ken received two years' probati on.
The pro ecu to r call ed me the
"leade r ," the "organi ze r ," beca u e I
had supplied th e seed s fo r th e o pe rati o n. Ke n a nd C hu c k also agreed to
tes ti fy aga inst Terry, our e lectrician.
Terry's lawyer was clever e n o ug h to
ask me to testify for t h e defense. He
wanted me LO ex plain tha t afte r wiring
t h e sh o p , T e rry h ad bee n excl uded
from th e operati on , making it impossible fo r him LO know th e number o f
pla nts we we re g row ing. Th is argument co nvinced th e prosec u to r to
dro p the five-}'ear mandatory se men ce
aga inst Terry a nd to settle for "minor
pa n icipam·· conspiracy c ha rges. Like
m yse lf, Te rT}' plead ed g ui lty. He
received 2 1 mo n ths.
~ l y fathe r was pre em at my arraignme nL and to ld th e judge he had a job
for me o n his wheat farm. The j udge
felL I posed no th reat to th e comm unity and I was re leased o n my own recogniza n ce. T h e te rm s o f m y re lease
req uired attenda n ce at a substan ce
a buse treatmen t p r ogr a m a nd ra n66

PRISON LIFE

W

en I was forma ll y se nn eed in Septe mber of
990 to th e ma nd a tory
fi ve years without possib ili ty of parole,
my judge, fede ral Distri ct Court judge
Ro be n Me ic h o ls sta ted tha t "it was
n ot wh at [h e] wo u ld d o." H e criticized th e fac t tha t h e was fo rced to
g ive m e more ti me tha n h e felt was
a ppropriate. H e pe rson all y wro te to
m y siste r , julie, and my mo th er a n d
me in the weeks that followed. Shortly
after my case, he refused to hear drug
cases, as se nior judges are pe rmitted
to d o. judge Me ichol also d ied of
cancer while I was in prison.
judge MC1 ic ho ls asked me in open
court whe n wou ld be co nve ni e nt for
me to self-surre nde r . I couldn ' t
believe my ea rs. A ste n ogra ph e r
flipped thro ug h a des k calendar a nd
whisp e red to thejudge that ove m-

ber 1st was a Mo nday. The j udge
asked me if that wou ld be a good day.
ovember 1st was seven weeks away.
Se lf-sur-rendering is no ca kewa lk.
On the a ppoimed day, my mother and
I drove to the Federal Prison Cam p in
She ridan, Oregon. It was hard on me
but doub ly tough on my m om . Like
most parents, she b lamed herself for
my troubles. And a t tha t point, none
of us knew whe n , o r if, I'd be a ble to
see my famil y aga in. Add to this t h e
fac t t ha t l h ad a valid pass po rt and
e no ugh mo ney for a plane ticket to a
faraway desti nation . l began to wonder
why anyone wou ld se lf ~s u rrender.
Sherida n Fede ral P riso n Ca mp is
about an h our southwest of Po rtlan d .
Wh e n l a r r ived in late 1990, it was
abou t a year o ld. Much to my amazement, the doors never locked and the
windows ope n ed . Th e re is no fence
aro un d th e faci lity, and whi le I was
th ere four o r fi ve g uys wa lked away.
Afte r the usual new-guy questions a nd
mistakes, my overridin g emotion was
ela ti on. After mo nths o f a nti cipating
shanks, stabbings and brutal homosexual rape, l was tre mendously relieved
to find that She rid a n was differen t
an d I woul d live to te ll about it.
Th e in it ial e latio n borne of th e
re lease of momhs of mouming anx iety wore o ff q u ickly.
I was assigned the j ob o f unit o rderly, cleani ng tl1e dorm a nd the adj acem
bath room , for wh ic h I was paid
aro un d fi ve do llars a month. At th at
tim e, Sherida n o ffered a few j un io r
college courses through a nearby college. It was while in prison that I began
my secondary educatio n in earnest. It
was something of a revelation to sudde nly like school afte r h ating it years
earlier when I was in college.
In time, I learn ed a bout anoth e r
priso n cl ose r to my home called
Geiger. Geige r is a contract facility run
by Spo kane Co un ty th at leases bun k
space to the Feels. It is also co-ed:
about 150 wome n and tl1 c sa me number of me n. Still more surprising to me
was tha t tl1e BOP actually a llowed priso n e rs to re qu es t tra n sfe rs fro m one
in titu tio n to another. I put in a
request to be moved and sure e nough,
six months late r, I '~as approved.
At Geiger, I fo und my sta nd-u p cod efe ndant Terry. He expla in ed the
ropes to me, but oon afte r my arrival I
learn ed that Geige r is co nsidered a
sni tch camp. It was tough to be civil to
people who had give n up tl1eir grandmo the rs for a few momhs o fT tl1eir sentences. Geiger is q uick to u·ansfer out
anyone who rocks tl1eir little boat. You
ca n do your time with wo m en a nd

wear your street clothes, but you can ' t
call a rat a rat. Som e of th e inma tes
made a fu ll-time job of running to the
staff with every li ttle tidbit. Even tua lly,
tl1oug h, I found tha t, as in most p laces,
a few good peo p le co ul d b e fo u nd,
a nd that makes all the d ifferen ce.
I e n ded u p being assigned to work
a t nearby Fai rchil d Air Force Base as
a n orde rly for th e m ili ta ry police statio n . H ard ly my fi rst c h oice of jobs.
Still, it paid a bo ut $40 a m onth, th e
Ai r Force peo ple treated me we ll a nd
th ey we re defin ite ly m ore fr ie nd ly
tha n the guards at Geige r.
I took a few college courses and contacted tl1e College Board in Princeton,
NJ. They agreed to let me take College
Level Equ ivale ncy Program (CLEP)
exams and tl1e Scholastic Aptitude Test
(SAT). CLEP tests a re a great way to
ob tain co lle ge credits qu ickly a nd
cheap ly. I took tile SATs a nd scored a
1400, th rowing cold water o n the "use
d rugs, d estroy your mind " theory. I also
contacted O hio U niversity in Atlle ns,
O hio, wh ich offers over 100 courses lor
prisoners. It is by far the best correspondence program I've e ncounte red. Basically, I discovered that if you 're really
d e te rmined to lea rn , th e re a re ways.
You just have to work at fi nding tile m.
I j o ined th e Toast masters Club to
bone u p o n p u b li c sp ea kin g a n d
played on a co-ed softball team. I realize tl1at my time at Geige r was notl1ing
li ke most people's prison time. My sis-

ter, J uli e, sta rted Fa milies Against
Mandatory Minimums in tl1e spring of
1991. H aving a direct li ne to FAMM 's
excell e n t inform a ti o n a nd .J ul ie's
u·emendous moral support made my
time much easie r. Still, having my Dad
d ie of can cer o nly an hour's d rive away
was no t easy. Be ing inform ed of h is
d eath with a guard sitting besid e me is
a me mOI)' that will never leave me.
Since my re lease, I've learned no t to
d own p lay re-e ntry. Adj u stme nt to the
free wo rld doesn ' t happe n with a snap
o f th e fin ge rs. Even after a re la tively
short im priso n m e n t, it ca n be
dam n ed trying at times. I was fortuna te, h owever , that FAMM n eed ed a
boo kkee pe r. And I' m still in school,
maintaining a 4.0 grade point average.
Every n ow and m e n , someo n e asks
Jul ie and m e to speak about cri m inal
j ustice issu es. But when I talk a bo ut
tile prison syste m, I know that in many
ways I' m hard ly qualified to comme nt.
Yeah , I was in th e war, but I neve r saw
the fox h o les o r the r ice paddies. My
expe rience was more like being o n a
hosp ita l shi p moored in a safe harbor.
My sister, J u lie, h as taken the fig h t
to our na tio n 's Capital, and to the lawma ke rs wh o ma ke the d ecisions th a t
se nd o ur yo ung me n a n d wom e n to
priso n for le ngth y mandatory terms
for growing or using a plant. Knowing
my case was tl1e catalyst for j ulie.'s work
with FAMM ma kes th e wa r years I
spem seem wortlnvhile.
lii1

POST CONVICTION

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THE WINNINC DOUBLE JEOPARDYFORFEITURE DEFENSE STRATEGIES OF "$405"
Learn th e method used to win the landmark case, u.s. v. $405,089.23, 33 F.3d
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Palm Springs, CA 92264
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which defeated the government and affirmed the landmark decision. use
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(305)569-3099
• FORFEJTIJRES
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PRISON LIFE

67

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68 PRISON LIFE

u.s. v. $405,089:
THE NEW DOUBlE JEOPARDY RUliNG
How it Can Set You Free or Get Your Assets Back
by Michael Montalvo

Jailhouse Lawyer

O

n December 5, 1994, the front page headline of a
San Francisco legal newspaper proclaimed: "Who
Needs Lawye rs?" and "With a case no d efense
a ttorney would touch, federal inmates have dealt a h uge
setback to the war on drugs." The four-page story went on
to tell h ow I won a lan dmark victory for my fellow convicts
Chuck Arlt and Jim Wren , in U.S. v. $405,089.23, 33 F.3rd
1210 (9th Cir. 1994). The rul ing h eld that a civil forfeiture
of pro pe rty is prohibted by th e Do uble J eopardy C la use
when the forfe iture is based on the same offense already
p rosecuted in an earlier proceeding.
I have to adm it that it felt pretty good to read that this
ruling was like tossing "a grenade into every U.S. Attorney's
office from Arizona to Alaska," and that "[t] he decision
was so alarming to the government that West Coast U.S.
Attorneys and their forfeiture experts hastily arranged an
October summit in Seattle hoping to find a way to neutralize t he opi nion ." It was es pecially satisfying since t h ese
same U.S. Attorneys h ad ridiculed my doub le j eopardy
claims every year since 1989, when I sought injun ctions to
prevent the government from forfeiting my properties
afte r I was illegally convicted. My 1989 j ury trial was based
on false testimony of rewarded snitches concerni ng activity
fro m 1982 to 1986. My case was an old-law "Pre-Sente ncing
Guidelines" case.

turn ed my old-law life sentence in prose on direct appeal,
got remanded, and then received a new-law life sentence
without the possibility of parole for the old-law indictment.
Now I a m back o n direct appeal again, hoping to win on
doub le jeopardy grounds. My post-conviction civi l forfeitures became th e fi rst place punishment for the same
offen se as the criminal co nviction. I got the first criminal
se n tence vacated on appeal, b ut the civil forfei ture for the
same offense and conviction was affirmed.
Whi le a\va itin g a thi rd tri al in 1989, my outside legal
runn e r gathered history a nd legal research on "splitting
the cause of action, " which is pro hibited in litigation. My
researc h led me through lengthy legal treatises and case
authorities from the 1800s on related legal concepts of
claim preclusion, issue preclusion, the doctrines of merger
and bar, mu ltiple prosecutions and multiple punishments.
Each of th ese legal concepts was related to the Double
J eopardy Clause in some way an d each concept was routinely violated in my case- and in many o th er defandants'
cases.
The appellate court vacated my sentence on August 4,
1992, and reman ded my case for a discovery vio lation and
de novo sen tencing. Thus I sat in Lompoc pen itentiary o n
August 4, 1992 as an unsentenced prisoner.
In October 1992, I enrolled in a four-year law school,
hoping to earn a J uris Doctor Degree in order to take the
State Bar. In November 1992, the inth Circui t Court of
Appeals affirmed the civil forfeiture judgmem in a separate
appeal and denied my double jeopardy claims. 1 was still
I had written the double jeopardy issue in the $405 open- unsentenced, but now the civil forfeiture became the fi rst
ing briefs in 1993 wh ile locked up in tl1e U.S. Penitentiary val id , fina l an d fully satisfied judgment of punishment
at Lompoc, California, without the assistance of an attor- (even though the court had denied that forfeiture of assets
ney. In fact, no attorney I knew would touch tl1e issue until was "punishment" at that time.)
In December 1992, two fellow convicts, Chuck Arlt and
months after I had won the appeal decision on September
6, 1994. After they saw the sign ificance of the ruling, many J im Wre n, app roached me and asked me to save the ir
attorneys offered to help, but I didn 't entirely trust lawyers p roperties from forfeiture. They had federal, State of Nevaafter my experiences at trial.
da a nd State of Californ ia civil fo rfe iture actions on stay
I have been a prisoner of the unconstitutional drug war and pending sin ce th eir criminal trials. I looked at the govsince 1987. That's more than eight years of being h eld as a e rnm en t's complaints, thought about it for a wh ile, a n d
political prisoner. From th e day I was a rrested, I started then decided to do it because I saw a double j eopardy issue
learni ng th e law, but I couldn 't learn it fast enough to beat ide n tical to my case. The proble m was th at every court
three successive prosecutions of one scheme- split up to d ecision in every Circuit, including my own, had denied
disadvantage me- by an overzealous ATF agent who, li ke doub le j eopardy defenses to fo rfeiture actions based o n
the rest of t h e ATF, was a psyc ho with a badge. I over- prior criminal proceedings for the same o ffense. But afte r

How I Found the Kev to
the Double Jeopardv Door

PRISON LIFE

69

swdying doub le j eopardy an d forfeiture in te nsely sin ce
1989, I knew I could win the issue if the judges would fo llow the Constitutio n.
On j a nuary 7 , 1993, Arlt, Wren a nd I made an agreement. I sta rted d efending th eir property interests in all
three forfeitures while I continued my law school curric ulum and prepared my own motions for the remand s in my
case.

Opportunitv Knocked
On june 29, 1993, th e U.S. Supreme Court issued Austin
v. U.S. , and h eld tha t civil fo rfeitures unde r drug sta tutes
were "punishm e nt." This was perfect timing. I was alread y
well-versed in fo rfeiture and double j eopardy. I decided to
make a fo ur-part attack. In july of 1993, I. prepared a
moti on to d ismi ss my resen te ncing as moot based on the
Double j eo pardy Clause since I h ad suffe red a separa te
civil forfeiture as "punishm e nt" for the sa m e indicted
o ffense. In Septe mber, I prepa red th e appea l briefs for
$405 o n th e double j eo pard y issue for my clients Arlt and
Wren. In O ctobe r I fil ed a p e titi on for a writ of H abeas
Corpus re lief fo r myself in the local federal district court
sin ce I was now un se nte n ced (vacated ) and h ad alread y
received full "punishm ent" by forfeiture. Also , I had the
same double j eopardy issue as my lo ng-time friend and fellow prisone r , Pe rry McCullogh , to insert in his dire ct
appeal brief, (U.S. v. One 1978 PijJer Cherollee Aircraft). I figured the fo ur double jeopardy a ttacks on asset forfeitures
and convictio ns wo uld be the best way to get before a good
judge. Th e rese nte ncing motio n I filed in m y case went
before a hostile judge, whom I was smck with.
Sure e n ou gh , in j a nuary I994, I went for resente n cing
and told th e judge in clear la nguage tha t h e had n o power
to resente nce me for the crimin al case since I had suffe red
and satisfied a n inte rvening civil forfeiu1re of my property
for the same offense in a sepa rate pro ceeding. He to ld me
I was wro ng b ecause he'd bee n a judge for twe nty yea rs.
ine mon ths later, I won the $405 case o n the same issue.
I was very appre h ensive when newspaper reporte rs and
a n ABC n ews crew came to USP Lompoc to interview the
convict who wounded the Fed 's cash cow-asset forfeiwre.
I kn ew firstha nd that convicts always get screwed in interviews with th e press. The public d oesn ' t want to h ear th at
the government's snitches are pe1jurers. The public wants
to believe law e nforce me nt is no t corrupt.
This time the re porters seemed to have a d ifferent a ttitude. The ABC reporter asked me why this simple con ce pt,
that forfeiture o f prope rty for a drug crime is a punishment implicating Double jeopardy, had not been exposed
sooner. Why hadn 't any lawyers figured it out earlie r? Why
did it take a convict to win this major legal issue? I told her
th e obvious a nswe r, that g enerally very few lawye rs care
abo ut us, a nd that most c riminal defe n se lawye rs, until
now, didn 't know anything about th e arcane a reas this law
involved.
For a mo nth a fter $405 was publish ed, th e d efe nse
lawyers were still asleep. I knew the prosecutors would ge t
c razy o n $405. So I wro te d oze ns of le tte rs to promine nt
c riminal de fe n se attorneys to inform the m that my case
co uld revitalize th eir business (a sure-fire way to inte rest
a ttorneys) a nd could ei ther get their drug case clients out
ofjail or recover their forfeited assets wh e n there were two
sepa ra te proceedings based on the same o ffense. Well, that
mailing lit the $405 fire. Many attorneys wrote back, saying
they wanted to "take over" the case now that I had already
won it. Th ere was no way I wou ld trust a street lawyer with
70

PRISON LIFE

so huge a victory for convicts. Besides, I knew that no
lawyer could possibly duplicate the many years of research
and pleading experience I h ad with double jeopardy and
forfeiu1re laws since 1989. This was a convict victory against
the government, and no lawyers were n eeded after the fact
to screw it up. I e nvisioned the government pressing up on
any lawyer who could get control of $405, and threatening
him with an IRS audit unless he worded his further pleadings to loo k good but lose. Maybe I was paranoid, but I
remembered all the lawyers rolling their clients into pretrial guilty pleas when I was in the county jail awaiting my
trial. I've seen lawyers sabotage their clients in trial and on
appeal to help prosecutors win.
After $405 was published, the prosecutors a ttempted to
control the damage by launching a media campaign to
manipulate the press to create fear and hyste ria. I read predictions that "courts will be flooded with attempts by defend a nts to r eve rse convictions or dismiss pending
indictme nts" (which is actually true), and "other inmates
would likely try to recover untold millions in dirty money,
as well as cars and houses paid for with drug profits"
(whi c h is hostile and irrelevan t). The prosecutors who
we r e quoted in the press never once admitted that they
had been intentionally violating d efendants' constimtional
rights and stealing billions in property or incarcerating citizens in complete disregard of the Double Jeopardy Clause
fo r years. One prosecutor claimed that "all kinds of bad
guys are on the verge of being let out of jail. The public is
going to love it when half these guys ge t out ofjail and the
other half gets a check cut for them from the government."
T h e prosecutors cried, whined and bellowed that they
weren't given the opportunity to make oral arguments on
so important a case. A San Francisco prosecutor said that
"the result in this case is offensive. We're not dealing with
innocent p eople or sympathetic people ... " Another said,
"They did not n eed a lawyer. They had an advocate in [the
judge who wrote the opinion]." I saw the handwriting on
th e wal l. The power-drunk prosecutors got their dirty
hands caught in the constitutional cookie jar and didn't
have the honesty or the courage to admit it. Amazingly,
instead of admitting the error, they blamed the convicts for
being d ouble punished: it was their own fault; the judge
was soft on crime and h ampering the noble crusaders of
law and orde r.
In sho rt, prosecutors were going to fight $405 and deny
accountabili ty for the billions of dollars seized, which have
disappeared into agency use. The government was going to
protect its perks program for law enforcement officials who
like those Me rcedes, new trucks, Rolexes, homes for pennies a nd anything else they wanted from a defendant.
On September 30, 1994, my friend and fe llow political
prisoner, Perry McCullough, won the same double j eopardy issue in U.S. v. One 1978 Piper Cherokee Aircraft, 37 F.3rd
489 (9 th Cir . 1994) based on the $405 argument wording
th a t I h ad provided to Perry when h e was preparing his
app eal here a t Lompoc. Now convicts had two major double j eopardy victories.
On October 14, 1994, nine prosecutors filed a joint petition for reh eat·ing, and suggested re hearing en bane in the
Ninth Circuit. They p etulantly de manded the wi thdrawal
of $405 from publication, claiming it would cause immense
damage to their asset forfeiture program. The prosecutors
asked the Court of Appeals to appoint counsel for my
clie nts. I read the government's pe tition for rehearing and
thought it was a terrible waste of ink and wood pulp fibers,
an unjustified, hysterical overreaction. Nonetheless, I
d ecided to imple ment a back-up strategy since the govern-

ment was obviously trying to make the en bane court think
that the opinion panel had lost their minds and were soft
on convicts. I knew my legal analysis of the facts and law in
$405 were solidly based on constitutional law and Supreme
Court decisions. I wasn't worried about the poor legal
analysis of the government's petition.
Just in case the panel requested it, I wrote a response
expressing my intention to represent my clients Arlt and
Wren as a law student, pursuant to the Circuit Rule. I didn'twant the court to take up the prosecutor's amazing suggestion to appoint counsel for my clients-a sure way for
the government to undermine this ~onvict victory in the
drug war. I wrote an opposition for Arlt and Wren to
decline the government's unusual concern to have counsel
appointed. It sure was swell of the government to want to
help my clients, but we just didn't trust them.
Meanwhile, many outside attorneys were expressing
great interest in being involved in $405. A representative
from the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers
Asset Forfeiture Task Force came to visit my clients and me
and offered support in the way of a Brief of Amicus Curiae.
On January 23, 1995, the Appeals Court ordered the
claimants to respond to the government's petition. I decided that a show of support from the legal community was
necessary window dressing to counter the prosecutorial
attacks on the panel. I sought amicus curiae briefs from
organizations and carefully selected some attorneys to participate in one of my client's response briefs Qim Wren)
with me, while I retained responsibility for claimant Chuck
Arlt's response brief. I then circulated my $405 response
brief to the NACDL Task Force attorneys for their amicus
brief preparation, and sent copies to defense attorney Jeff
Steinborn, who won a district court double jeopardy issue

in U.S. v. McCaslin, and his associate, jeff Finer, who won
the issue U.S. v. Oakes, for them to prepare Wren's
response brief. The defense was now a team, and we submitted three response briefs to the government's petition,
supported by respectable members of the legal community.
Qn May 31, 1995, the Ninth Circuit panel denied the
prosecutor's petition for rehearing and rejected the suggestion for rehearing en bane. Since then, hundreds, maybe
thousands of motions have been filed, but few, maybe half
a dozen, have been granted.
20/20 recently contacted me to discuss what they called
the "$405 Fallout" and how my legal work has caused "convicts and drug dealers to be released because they were
tried twice." Unfortunately, and despite all the hysteria, no
one I know has been released from prison or has received
his property ·back. However, the prosecutors, while screaming that the $405 ruling destroyed asset forfeiture, have
quietly and quickly changed their policies from "multiple
proceedings" for assets and criminal prosecutions to a "single" proceeding by indictment for jury trial, and they lost
nothing but an unconstitutional practice to enrich themselves without accountability.
In September 1995, California Lawyer magazine wrote an
article about my legal work as a convict. Entitled "Take iny
Porsche-please," it shows how prosecutors are now going
after the crime and the assets in one proceeding.
"Do You Have a $405 Claim?," the article asks. "If so, is it
a claim sufficient to get out of prison, or get your property
back? Don't make the wrong motion."
This important question will be the subject of Part Two,
to be published in the March/April issue of Prison Life.

U1l

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PBISOI LIPB

71

KING RAT
(continued f rom page 31)
Angel claimed he had a partner in
the deal, a guy named Ray h e'd me t
o n an unemployment line a few days
earlier.
"The guy tol ' me he knew a sucker
who'd pay sixty bucks for an o ld shotgun he could get for ten in the pawn
sho p. Ails we got to do is cut the barre l. He say if I cut it and make the
de live ry, h e puts u p the te n for the
gun and we split the profit. H e was
rig ht there when I cut it. H e even
marked it."
What Angel had described, without
realizing it, was that his crime never
would have happened if it hadn't
been provoked by a paid government
rat- en trapment. In those yea rs th e
ru le was that sim p le: if th e cr im e
wou ldn 't have happened without a CJ
or an undercover agent planting the
idea, there was no crime. The justice
Department wouldn' t prosecute it. In
fact, an agen t co uld ge t himself into
serio us trouble by
bringing an e ntra pment case to th e U.S.
Atto rney's office.
How things have
changed.
It too k me two days
to corroborate Angel's
vers io n o f eve nts a nd
get all charges dropped
agai nst hi m. The federal pr osecutor thanked
me and told me I had
just learned the most important lesson
I wou ld ever learn as a Fed: " ever
trust a crimi na l informant, Mike. "
Over th e next twenty-five yea rs I
wo uld hear th ose words repea ted
th o usand s of times by agen ts, co ps,
training instructors and prosecutors,
ye t I neve r heard a prosecutor say
th em to a jury.
Everyone who has eve r carried a
federal badge knows how easy it is to
convict someo ne who 's been
e ntrapped on little more than a n
informant's testimo n y, as lo ng as the
informant was clever enough to h ide
his tracks, the victim gullible enough
to fall for the trap, and the agents and
prosecutors amb itious an d immoral
enough to go for headlines, statistics
and winning at all cost.
Until a few years ago, I had
believed that most of us in federal law
enforcemen t were people whose pride
and consciences would not allow that
to happen.

I was no longer so sure.
After the Ray-An gel case, I continued on with BATF for three more
years before transferring into narcotic
en forceme nt. During those years I
never saw another sawed-off shotgun
case involving a CI accepted for prosecution by the two federal courts in
New York City. There was just too
much possibility of informant entrapment.
Yet in the Randy Weaver case, the
question of how the hell a CI entrapment/ sawed-off shotgun case was ever
allowed to become a military invasion
of a n American citizen's home was
not even being asked-either by our
political leaders or by the media. The
question in my mind was, What happened to the people of conscience in
th e Weaver case? Yo u can't just
blame it o n the ra t-a professional
rat can't entrap anyone unless a governm e nt age nt with more a mbi tion
than conscience is wi lling to look the
other way.
The other thing going o n in my life
that would aiTect my decision was that
as a result of my books, I'd bee n

A

74

PRISON LIFE

rece1vmg letters from federal prisoners who claimed th ey had been set up
by lyi ng criminal informants working
for the va rious competing federal
agencies e nfo rcing th e drug and
mo ney laundering statutes. Guys like
Lon Lundy, a o n ce suc cessfu l businessman, husba nd and fath e r from
Mobile, Alabama, a man with no criminal record who was set up by a CI in a
no-dope conspiracy case and received
a life-with-no-paro le sentence; or
Harry Kauffman from Cleveland, a
o nce successful used car dealer, husband and father, who was conned by a
CI into accepting cash, alleged to be
drug money, for some cars and
charged with money laundering. And
many, many others.
They we re men of every race, religion and national origin in the federal priso n syste m . Most had no
previo us criminal records, most had
had the ir homes, businesses and
financial assets seized by the federal

gove rnm e nt, leaving their families
destitute. Each had received a priso n
sen tence of more than twenty years.
These were men whose lives and families had been destroyed. Their letters
to me were desperate cries that affected me deeply. In many cases the rats
ended up with a perce ntage of the
asse ts seized as a reward for their
work.
My 25 years in th e justice syste m
had taught me that there were plenty
of bureaucrats and politicians who, if
th ey didn ' t like the way you exercised
yo ur rights as a citize n , or if they
thought th ey could make headlin es,
po litical hay or a pro motio n by your
a rres t a nd pr osecution, would not
think twice about using the gove rnme nt's legions of paid belly-crawlers
to target yo u . Few peo ple have th e
m o ney of a j o hn De Lorean to adequately defend th emselves against a
slick rat.
The o nly thing, in my experience,
that sto pped these rats with badges
and rats in public office, were people
of conscience in positio ns of authority and a kn owledgeable an d watchfu l
m ed ia.
For
seve ra l years I had
bee n see ing no evidence of e ither. And
as pub licly outspoken as I ha d bee n
abo ut th e pho n y
drug war bureaucrats
and politicians, I
fo und this all personally threatening.
Finally, the most
pain ful iss ue of all
was th e murder of my so n Keith by a
man who had two prior murde r convictions in New York State; a man who
was o n th e street-according to o ur
political leaders-because there isjust
not enough money to put everyone in
jail wh o belongs there. Yet I had in
front of me a file that spoke of federal
law enforcement spending many hundreds of tho usands of dollars to arrest
and convict a parking lot attendant as
a Class One drug dealer.
''I'll do it," I heard myself say the
next morning. "I wen t over a ll yo ur
stuff. You've got a better entrapment
defense here than j ohn De Lorean
had."
There was a long sile nce on th e
phone. "I didn't claim entrapment as
my defense theory," said the attorney.
I started to ask him why and
stopped myself. It no longer mattered.
The atto rn ey's o pening state me nt
claimed Miguel was innocent of a ll
charges-not that he had been

entrapped into committing the crime
by a governme n t rat working on commission. Miguel, o n camera, h ad done
h is best to p lay th e ro le of Chama
King of Cocaine; he had accepted
money and promised to deliver drugs,
wh ich was all the government needed
to prove conspiracy. If a judge didn't
explain to a jury what e n trapment was,
not even Johnnie Coch ran cou ld get
h im off. And once t h e tri al h ad
begun, no j udge wou ld allow a change
in the defense th eory-it was a simple
matte r of law.
But Miguel's gui lt or innoce nce no
longer ma tte red to me . I h ad so meh ow committed myself me ntally a n d
emotionally to go to war. I wan ted to
u-y and make the issu e of the growing
power of rats- those with and wi thout
badges-as publ ic as I cou ld. T h ey
weren't only hurting peop le who had
fai led a n ho n esty test, th ey were
spen d ing billions in taxpayer d o llars
for nothing but phony show trials, and
they were fi lling the jails with peo ple
who were, at worst, no n-violent dupes,
while our nation 's streets ra n with th e
b lood of in nocents.
My testimony for the defense lasted
all day Mo n day a n d in to Tu esd ay
morn ing . A co u p le of g uys I used to
work with sa t wi t h th e prosec u tion,
watch ing me in disb elief. During a
break one of them ca me up to me ,
stared at me for a lo ng mome nt and
said: "It's a shame you h ad to go tha t
way."
I said nothing. T he re was n othing I
could say. I h ad known th e guy fo r
more th an 25 yea rs. We had se rved
toge the r in two fede ral age ncies. I was
sure h e was not capable o f bri nging a
mess like Miguel Car-parker into federal court, but he would never viola te
the b lue wa ll of sil ence ; he fel t the
need to protect people I th ough t d idn't deserve it. Whe n yo u become a
Fed you take two oaths, one to protect
th e bureaucracy and th e peo p le wh o
pay yo ur sala ry, a n d th e o th e r to protect th e Co nstitution. No fed e r al
agent can live up to both.
We would never speak aga in.
During my testimony I pointed out
dozens of p laces in th e ta pes wh e re
Tony and Mig uel's actions indicated
that neither of th em knew what a real
drug deal was li ke, and stated that in
my opi nion th e crime n eve r wou ld
h ave h appened h ad it n ot bee n for
the CI's actions a nd the agents' failure
to con tro l him and prope rly investigate his allegations. I managed to get
in th at "if th e Federal government is
going to use su itcases full of taxpaye r
dollars to test th e honesty of Ame ri-

ca n citizens, in ste ad ofworking the
parking lots of America, they ough t to
be running th eir tests in the halls of
Congress wh e re it might do us some
good."
As soon as I got off th e witness
stand I headed back to New York. The
wh o le t hi n g h ad been a trau matic,
shitty experience for me. The attorney
said h e'd call to let me know the verd ict. T he judge had refused to instruct
th e jury that they could find the
defendant inno ce n t by reaso n of
e n u·apme n t, but the attorn ey was still
hopefu l.
In New York a message was waiting
fo r me from anothe r Californ ia attorney th at would qu ickly take my mind
off wh at I h ad begun calling "The
Beavis an d Butth ead case."
T h e attorn ey rep resented Donald
Carlson, a forty-five year old executive
for a Fortune 500 computer company.
A federal task force comprised of Customs, DEA, BATF a n d Border Patrol
agents who had j ust graduated from a
param il itary assaul t school the wee k
before, wea r ing b lack ninj a outfits,
he lmets a n d flack vests, using flashbang g renades a n d au tomatic
wea pons, h ad invad ed Mr . Carl so n' s
upscale, suburban San Diego home.
O n e o f th e invadi n g Fed s did a
Rambo-ro ll, fi ring fifteen rounds fro m
his submac h in e gun, h itting everythin g in Mr . Carlso n 's foyer but Mr.
Carlson. Oth e r agents h it their mark:
Car lso n was sh ot three times and
arrived at the hospital in c ri tical cond itio n . Th e tea m had exec uted a
sea rc h warran t based o n the u ncorroborated, uninvestigated word of a
professio nal rat.
Mirac ul ously, desp ite the b es t
efforts of th e this newly formed suburban assau lt squad, Mr . Carlson h ad
survived. H e wan ted to sue th e gove rn me nt.
"We'd li ke to retain you as our consul tan t," said the attorney, a soft-spoke n, thoughtfu l man with a n
impeccable re putation for in tegrity.
"How d id this happen ?" I said .
''That's wha t we'd like you to tell us.
It seems th at this task force h ad a
search warrant seeking 5,000 pounds
of cocain e and four armed-and-dangerous Colombians in Mr. Carlson's
garage. T h e warran t was apparently
based on the word of a criminal informan t. "
I immed iately started poring over
th e reports and statements. Dawn had
begun to light th e sky before I realized I h ad read t h e who le ni ght
th rough . It was o ne of the most frigh te ning exa m p les of out-of-co n tro l,

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PRISON LIR

75

almost comically inept federal Jaw
enforcemen t I had ever seen or heard
of in my career.
In short, a low-level professional
rat/ petty thief/druggi e who'd been
selling stree t-leve l dope cases to a
local south Florida police department
convi nced a team of agents representing four federal agencies that he had
become a trusted member of a major
South American drug cartel.
They overlooked the fact that the
rat spoke no Spanish and see med to
have a hard time putting together an
intelligible sentence in English; that
most of the people he was implicating
as members of t hi s Colombian drug
ring weren ' t even Spanish speakers;
that the rat's credit was so bad that the
phone company refused to furnish
him with a telephone (the age nts had
to give him a cell u lar
phone, which they took
back when he started
making unauthorized
phone calls); that a local
cop had called the rat a
liar. The rat's storythat he had been doing
pushups in a California
park when he was first
approached
by
a
stranger and asked to
join one o f th e notoriousl y paranoid
Colombian cartels-would have been
d issed at a UFO abd uction co nve ntio n.
None of this bothered the Feds.
They put the CI on payro ll for
three months, accepted everything he
said as fact, implicated dozens of innocent people in government files and
com puters as drug u·a£fickers belonging to a trafficking organization that
didn't eve n exist, and obtained four
search warrants-including the Carlson warrant- based on nothing more
than the rat's uncorroborated words.
And then, ignoring the words of a San
Diego cop who call ed the rat a liar,
they Ramboed the suburban home of
a computer company executive in the
manner of Desert Storm and almost
killed an innocent citizen .
"Holy shi t!" I th ought. "What is
going on here?"
The fede ra l grapevine must have
been buzzing. I was contacted by cops
and agents who wanted to see some of
these guys go to jail. A San Diego cop
who had taken part in the investigation- but not the raid-was quoted as
saying that the agents involved shouldn't be carrying guns and badges. A lot
of Feds fe lt the same way, but they
weren 't going to break the blue wall
of silence. One did, however, send me
76

PRISON LIFE

a copy of a Congressional Report he
thought might be helpful, of hearings
chaired by Congressman J o hn Conyers J r.
The title of the report tells its story:
Serious Mismanagement and Misconduct
in the T1·easury Department, Customs Service and Other Federal Agencies and the
Adequacy of Efforts to Hold Agency Officials Accountable.

The hearings not only found evidence of al l of t he above, they also
fo und there was "a perception of
cover-up" in these federal agencies for
a ll their misdeeds . In spite of this
report being issued within months of
the Carlson shooting, the killings at
Ruby Ridge a nd the massacre at
Waco, Texas, it went virtually ignored
by the media.
I had served part of my career as an

Ope ra ti ons Inspector and began
doing what I used to do for the government-documenting violations of
rules, regulations and Federal Jaw on
the pan of agents. I began what would
become two reports noting hundreds
of instances where the Feds violated
their own rules, dozens of ind ications
of federal fe lo nies-false statemen ts,
perjury, tampering lvith evidence and
coercion of witnesses-and violations
of the U.S. Constitution. I also found
and noted in my reports-just as Congressman Conyer's r eport notedpowerful indications of cover-up
going righ t to top level manage ment
of DEA, Customs a nd the Justice
Department. Powerful people wanted
the Carlson incident to disappear. I
was not going to let that happen.
Or so I thought.
A couple of days into my work o n
the Carlson case I got a call from
Miguel's attorney. The jury had found
him guilty of attempted possession of
cocaine. The charge ca1-ried a mandatory minimum sentence of twenty
years in prison.
"The jury said they weren't very
impressed with ei ther your testimony
or the government's," he said. "They
voted on what they thought was the
Jaw. Miguel promised he 'd deliver the
coke for the money, so he's guilty."

The attorney said he was appealing
the conviction. The CI , in the meantime, was paid wh atever h e'd been
promised and was probably off selling
more cases. Even I had to admit, it was
a good livi ng. I hung up fee ling like
shit.
Weeks later, after I had su b mitted
the Carlson shooting report, recommending that the agents and prosecutors involved in the case be fired and
prosecuted, I was full of hop e. A rat
cannot be king unless the people who
are supposed to con trol him become
as immoral and corrupt as he is, and I
was going for their th roats. The Carlson case would be the example that all
Ameri ca ns sho ul d see of what was
going wrong all across this country.
I looked forward to the civil trial
and testifying publicly to my reports.
It wouldn 't be a congressional hearing,
where th e facts testified to are usually
only the ones th e
politicians want to
hear so that they can
comfortably r each
th e conclusion they
agr eed upon long
before th e hearings
began. I was eve n
going to call Court TV.
I was at war.
Miguel's attorney called me again.
"The judge reve rsed h imself. H e 's
granted a new trial on the basis that
Miguel should have h ad an entrapment d efense. Will you be available to
testifY?"
"Sure," I said. "I'd love to."
It would be months before
learned that the attorney and the Federal prosecutor had worked out a plea
bargaining deal. I 'm not sure what
Miguel pled guilty to, but he ended up
with a ten-year prison sen tence. I suppose it could have been a lot worse.
It would be more th an a year
before I would learn that the U.S. government in the person of San Diego
U.S. Attorney Allan Bersin, had
decided to settle with Mr. Carlson,
avoiding a trial and the p ublic revelations o f my reports. Mr. Carlson's
attorney made a public statement that
because they were settling without a
trial, the misdeeds of the government
were being covered up. The government paid Mr. Carlson 2.75 million .
Part of th e final agreement was that
the government's reports of its own
actions be classified.
The U.S. Attorney of San Di ego
made a public statement exonerating
the agents and prosecuto rs of a ll

wrongdoing. He said that "the system"
failed Mr. Carlson, but that the agents
and prosecutors were to be commended for having done their jobs.
Within weeks the government
would also settle with Randy Weaver,
paying him $3.1 million. Once again
the legality and morality of the government's actions in entrapping
Weaver in the first place were never
even questioned.
This was also the year that Quibillah
Shabazz, Malcolm X's daughter, would
be charged with conspiracy to murder
Louis Farrakhan. The young woman,
according to the press, had been set
up by her fiance, who also happened
. to be a long-time professional rat for
the FBI and who was reportedly paid
$25,000 for his services.
It seems, though, that once the
prosecutor and the FBI got their
headlines, they lost all stomach for
their case against Ms. Shabazz and
agreed to a plea bargain that freed
her. I didn't think the prosecutors
were freeing her out of pity. They had
spent an enormous number of taxpayer dollars to charge her with conspiracy to murder. They were protecting
their own butts and covering up perhaps one of the ugliest cases of rat
entrapment on record.
I flashed on another professional

rat I knew in the DEA who had turned
every friend and relative he'd ever
had into government cash as if they
were deposit bottles. One day he came
crying to me, actually bawling big wet
tears, that he'd met a woman and for
the first time in his life was in love.
She lived in California and he was
broke. He needed enough money to
get there. "I'm a piece of shit," he
said. "Please don't deny me a chance
to turn my life around, Levine." I
bought him a one-way ticket. He was
there a week when I got a call from a
Los Angeles DEA agent checking on
the guy's record. The rat was trying to
broker a deal on his fiancee.
I watched the Senate hearings into
the federal government's a.ctions in
both Waco and Ruby Ridge and heard,
for the first time in my life, liberal
Democrats and the liberal press, who
for decades had criticized the tactics
used in federal law enforcement suddenly refer to them as "our federal
agents" and defend their actions. It
was clear that their real interest was to
protect the President and Attorney
General for their actions in two of the
worst screw-ups in law enforcement
history. At the same time, the conservatives and Republicans, who for
decades had defended federal law
enforcement no matter what they did,

were now attacking the Feds as racists
and jack-booted storm troopers."
And somewhere in the middle of
this political shit-storm the truth was
lost and, as usual, all the rats-those
with badges, those in appointed and
political office-came out smelling like
roses, while the walking-around, taxpaying, hard-working Americans and
their Constitution took it up the ass.
The other day I read an interview
with Sammy "the Bull" Gravano, who,
in payment for turning rat against his
lifelong partners in crime, was forgiven for the murders of nineteen
liuman beings (that we know about)
and an uncountable number of
felonies. He was allowed to keep the
millions he had earned as a murdering thug, plus a pile of taxpayer dollars for expenses, and received a
taxpayer-paid ride in the Federal Witness Protection program for life. Gravano, speaking from what he
described as a "nice little apartment
complex," said he was enjoying his
new life as a bachelor millionaire.
"There's a pool, ~cquetball courts,
gym, tennis courts and a lot of single
women who don't have the slightest
idea who I am," he said. "It's nice. I sit
down and relax under some trees."
God bless America, I thought. The
land where the rat is king.
[[0

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PRISON LIFE

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lVIailCall
(continued from p age 11)

to d ea th afte r a nd e ig ht-an d-a-h a lfmo nth tri a l. I had neve r in my li fe
seen Eddie Bun ke r fo r more than a
few minutes, a nd we had n eve r had a
co nve rsa tio n , b ut I fe lt I was fa ili ng
him a t a very im portan t momen t.
On ce it was es ta bli sh e d I didn ' t
know what Eddi e was we arin g and
didn ' t recall a nything abou t th e d ay
o ther tha n tha t it ha d bee n gray and
probabl y colde r th a n norma l, th ere
was no a ppa re n t purpose fo r my
prese nce . The few succeeding qu estio ns and some inform a tio n after th e
fac t le d m e to u nde rsta nd wh at th e
publi c d efe nd e r had n ot to ld m e,
and I we nt a way be lievin g th a t
Eddie's lawye r \vas no t giving him an
h o nest de fe nse. T h e FBI agen ts were
alleg in g th a t th e Ho lid ay Inn bust
was initi a te d b y a n o b se rva tio n of
fresh n eedle tracks o n Eddie's a rms,
but it was n ot. Ed die h ad been wearing a lo ng sleeved shi rt.
I d o n ' t kn ow why th e FBI lie d o r
wha t t h e ex p osu r e of th at lie
might've meant to his d efe nse, but a t
th e time I wa nte d to a pologize to
Eddie fo r my not be ing of a ny he lp. I
d on ' t feel that way now, so I tho ugh t
I'd just te ll him the story.
O n an o the r no te, I'd li ke to continue th e discussio n yo u sta rte d abo ut
th e business of d o u b le-dea ling
known as sni tchi ng. No t lo ng ago, a
wo m a n wait in g o ut th e last week of
h e r se nte n ce to ld m e a snitc h h ad
just re p o rted to th e o ffi cer that sh e
h a d b rou g ht foo d fro m th e di ning
room . I said yes, tha t 's th e level tha t
snitc hing h as gon e to. Sh e said most
of the wome n in o ur unit are nothing
but sn itches. I learned later th at her
time h ad bee n cut afte i- she' d tes tified against he r own siste r.
Yo u ta lk a bo ut t h e o ld convic t
cod e. Yo u kn ow it is bu t a me m o ry
a nd laug hed at by most of tod ay's little two-h ead e d sn akes, a mo r a l
rode n ts a nd pred aLOrs. Rats rul e, of
cou rse, beca use n o on e checks th e m.
It \Vould be a very big a nd continuous
j o b. Since th ey play b o th sides, th ey
n o t o n ly vio late o u tside laws unde r
po lice pro tec tio n bu t fi nger oth ers
in side a n d o u t as bo th law brea ke rs
a nd snitc h es. I h e a r d 25 yea rs ago
th at th e re we re hi ts made o n t h e
word of a ra t trying to cover his own
shit. I ' m sure th ose d ays we re ba d ,
but a t least the re were guideli nes fo r

b e h av io r b e twee n office rs a nd
inma tes, a t leas t th e re we re g u id elines for be havio r b e twee n officer s
and inma tes, a t least the re was some
o rd e r a nd some h o nor. Guys like
Ma x De m bo didn ' t snitc h o r hurt
kids because tha t was the law in penite ntia ry socie ty. As it turns out, it was
fea r th at ke pt that law in p lace, a li ttle
bi t of pride, so me le ftover pr inciple,
bu t ma in ly fear. In the last te n years,
I' ve heard a bou t o ld , fo rme rly solid
g uys wh o, in th e absence of fear and
down a t the dregs of respect fo r the ir
peers, apparen tly fe lt no reaso n not
to snitch.
I realize th a t men 's prison s are differe nt th a n wo m e n' s. Tha t 's o n e o f
ma n y reason s I so respect Ma nso n:
H e h as ke pt his wo rd a nd th e o ld
co nvict law for a li fe tim e und e r th e
most treach e rous conditio ns.
Wh e n I ca m e to pri son in 1975, I
tho ugh t that people still he ld to order
and hono r, and that guards respected
it as we ll. In t he wo m e n 's priso n in
West Virginia, the staff was made up
a lmost e ntire ly of locals wh o h a d
farms, families and no interest in moving up or out. In general they disliked
invasions of privacy and had a natural
ave rsio n to r a ts. Late r, t h e Bureau
began transferring new officers in and
o ut to kee p from h aving such a sa tisfied, m ora lly confide nt bunch.
Afte r m oving to a n o th e r prison , I
saw wha t had always bee n present but
not appa rent to me. In California, th e
office r on h is way to pro m o ti o n s
actively soug ht ou t informa tion with
hi ts of rewards for anyone who mig ht
have heard what someone might have
said o r do ne. The ten sio n this caused
was chao tic. I e nded up hi tting someo n e ove r t h e h ead with a h a mme r,
geuin g ship ped a nd spendin g twoand-a-half years in d ete ntion for it.
Nowad ays in th e wo m e n 's fe d e ra l
prisons, the re is a lways so me bod y to
te ll evei)'thing-the minor, tl1e infinitesima l, tl1e imaginary- some bold ly,
with p rovoca tive a rrogan ce. T h e ir
sycoph ancy a nd manipulation crea tes
REALITY a nd pu ts th e rest o f us at a
d isad va ntage beca use th ere are so
m any un p rin c ip led co ps wi lli n g to
reward , to even feel rewarded by, this
des pi ca bl e du p li city. T h e de clin atio ns be tween us and th e m are set in
co ncre te. Any offi ce rs wh o let th ose
lines blur a re e ither offi c ia lly scamming o r in for a fall.
The socie ty o n th e in side re fl ec ts
th e o ne ou tside, a nd a n a lmost to ta l
lac k of ch a rac te r va lues is evide n t.

But it is o ne thing to know in te llectually th at people's strongest bond is in
ma te rial tl1ings, and a nother to experience the sta rk e m ptiness o f having
parents, sibli ngs, spo uses o r frie n ds
who wou ld sell you and the mselves so
c heaply.
Lynette Fmrnme

DAMN FINE
Dear Priso n Life:
Cong ratu lations o n last m o nth's
damn fi n e issue! Stratto n 's e ditoria l,
"Amer ican Owned, " to ld th e tr u t h
abou t the growing prison-as-busin ess
ind ustry. T he a rticles by convicts Karl
j oh n so n and Mic h ae l Chavaux we re
stra ig h t-up, too. We d o n ' t n eed to
scream or curse or pri nt pro fan ity to
let society know th at we're m en .
Pt·ison Life contin ues to show th e
world that many p rison e rs are a rticulate an d intelligent people with vo ices tha t need to be h eard.
Alex Friedmann

PRISON LIFE

81

BUBBA ON DRUGS
Dear Bubba:
I'm an ex-cou, ex-junlli1', ex-alcoholic,
ex-armed robbm~ ex-jmrolee holding down
a legit job into my 15th straight year in
the free world without a bPif J'm mar-ried,
gotlhTPe rug rats and r1 dog. I live neaT a
major r.ity and I read Priso n Life magazine. l jus/ltajJjmu•d to see a copy on the
magazine rack at a booltstore, picked it up,
and couldn 'ljmt it down . Now I'm a subscriber. I aLm bought ropiPs of all the bad1
issues. \'l'hnuver I grt a new issue, the
first thing I do is opm to )'Our rolwnn.
Reading JOU remind mr !tow furked ufJ
jn'ison is and how fuelled ujJ most of the
dudes lochrd up in those joints are. What a
sony bunch of brokrn down suitcases )'Otl
got for rraders. How do you heejJ you?" sanity and sensr of humor and deal with all
the rrafJ you have to fJulujl with not on!)•
from the Man but from other convicts? I
feel for )'Otl, Bub. >'ou 've got a pretty good
head on your shoulders evm if you haven 'l
figured out yet thatjJiison is for losers.
1felt bad for )'Ott wltm I read the kite you
sent from the ltolr. What upset me was a
commrnt that chick Sylvia made. She said
sltr ltojJed llwy kerjJ Bubba locked ttfJ "for
his own good. " That tells me a lot about
you, road doggie. I wony about you, uwn.
l hopr )'On can find the strength to tum
your life amund.
Doug Reston
Dear Dougie Do Good:
How do I do it? D111gs! Good weed,
that's how I cope. vVhere there's dope,
the re's hope. And if there's one thing l
hate it's so me self-righteous reformed
wino or j un ki e te lling me it's time I
cleaned up my act. Do your own time,
pal. l'm real happy fo r you and the family, but I et~oy prison as an alternative
lifestyle. I just burned a bone of some
kick.'\SS ganja and I'm so high right now
I don'L know if I'll ever come down.
I was at this federal j oim in Califo rn ia one Lime when a hippie guy I knew
got in a load of blotter acid. I a te 750
m ics, my cellie ate 1000 mi cs. About
h alf an hour later, both ripped to th e
tiL~, we wem out to the yard to play tennis. (This was back in the good old days
when you could play tennis in prison.)
Yo u sho uld have see n me playing
te nnis o n acid. T looked like Nu ryev

82

PRISON LIFE

dancing Swan Lahe except I was wearing steel-tipped work boots. Guys were
in awe. 1o o ne had ever seen anything
li ke it: a 260 lb. muscle-bound Bubba
hitting backhands with all the grace of
Chti ssy Everet. My friend was a wiseguy
wh o h ad never clone acid befo re. He
me t Cod on th e te nnis court and h as
been a practi cing Buddhist ever since.
T h e trip lasted clays. They locked us
up , pissed us a nd ran a ll sorts of tests,
but none that d etected LSD.
It's always imcnse ly weird trying to
navigate the prison experience fro m
in side a n acid head. It's all in t h e
mi nd. You can 'tlock up a loony. Sure
you can limit his physical freed om but
if you ca n ' t make h im suffer the psych o logical pain o f prison , th e n h e's
no t getting th e full punishmen t. I figure eveqr fu ckecl up hour I spend in
h e re is one m o re h o u r I' m ge uing
over on th e Ma n .
Here I a m still in th e ho le. Day 45
in seg on th is bullshit c ha rge. I smell
so me righ teo us smo ke wafting alo ng

the tier. Guy calls, "Hey Bub, wanna
bu r n so me herb?" H e's th is wh ite
rasta Coptic dude fro m Miam i.
Locked up 15 yea rs now for importing weed from j amaica. I've run into
him a nd his brother Cop tics in join ts
all around th e country. Their defense
was th a t th e boatloads of po t t h ey
were bring ing in we re for relig ious
use so the First Ame ndm e nt pro tected th e m from prosec ution. You can
imagine how th at we n t over.
As a bro I know who's doing life for
po t once said, "I n ever pass u p the
d ivi ne opportun ity to smoke a join t. "
My rasta pal, Broth e r Luv, is all the way
at the o ppo ite e nd of the range. We're
all locked down. I can 't figure how he's
going to ge t the sh it to me. "Don' t
worry about it," he says. "'' llmule it."
I h ear hi m saying, "Here, boy.
Tha t's a good boy," like he's talking
to a dog. I figure he 's lost it, done too
much time in t h e ho le-he's been
locked up 17 m onths stra ig h t this
tim e for dirty urin e . Every 60 days

they come in and piss him; he's still co ming
up dirty. Nobody can figure o ut h ow he gets
the h e rb. G uy h asn ' t h ad a visit in fo ur
years. If yo u ask him he says, "Ma nn a fro m
heave n.Ja h provides."
"Hum," he te lls me. "Do you know Yankee
Doodle?"
"Sure I know Ya nkee Doodle."
"Hum it, bro, so th ey' ll kn ow whi ch cell
you ' re in."
So I hum. You 've got to humo r these stir
crazy old fuckers o r they'll twist off a nd stick a
fork in your kidn ey whe n you ' re not looking.
"Fo rwa rd , marc h !" I h ear Bro th e r Lu v
command. "Left, rig h t. Left, righ t."
J esus, I'm thinking, this poor mo th e rfucker has smo ked too much o f tha t shi t. I'm sitt ing o n th e edge of my bunk humming,
feeling foolish , but the n I've bee n locked up
lo ng enough to know tha t things n ever a re
as they seem. I hear this scratching sounda so und a nyo n e who's ever lived in a New
York a pa rtme nt knows o nly too we ll.
"Kee p humming," Bro th e r Lu v calls .
"Don 'tlose the tune."
I' m abo ut halfway through the third rend ition of Yankee Doodle when I look down and
see three cockroac hes ma rc hing single fi le
into my cell. The first o n e was th e scout o r
so me thing. H e comes righ t up a nd h alts a t
my feet with th e o thers close behind. The second roach looks like a mini packhorse with a
j oint strapped to his back. And the one bringing up th e rear loo ks li ke a flatbed u·u ck 1vith
a book of ma tches riding o n his carapace. It
was a cockroach mule train. Brother Luv had
trained the vermin to run drugs.
'They get th e re yet?" Broth e r Luv asked
when I stopped humming.
"Yeah , man . They' re h e re."
"You got to ta ke care of 'em. They don ' t
do this shit for nothing."
''What do they get fo r a j ob like this?"
"Crumbs!" Bro th e r Luv h oo ts. "Th ey
work for fucking crumbs!"
It's a mazing wha t you ca n get ove r whe n
the situation de ma nds. No one wan ts to be
here, no t eve n the goddamn roach es. But we
d o wh a t we gotta d o . Sylvia might be rig h t.
The re are those of us-too bold , too idealistic to live within th e confin es of a mee k an d
conformist socie ty-who n eed to be locked
up. The way I see it, you guys are the suckers.
Here I a m, high as a n astro na ut o rbiting the
p la n et fro m a j ail cell, and d o ing business
with a cr ew o f croo ked cockroac h es. Yo u ,
m ea nwhile, ca n ' t get beyo n d yo u r p e tty
pro ble ms a nd a pp recia te life fo r th e
moment-to-mo ment j oy of not knowing what
the fuck is going to ha ppe n next. Instead of
fee li n g so rry fo r me, as k yo urself, H ave I
ma n aged to escape my p altry point of vie w
and see life through the cosmic third eye? If
the answer to that questio n is n o, bro, you 're
(]]]
in a lot more u·ouble tha n I am.

Chef's Special of the Month:
Penitentiary Pizza
1 can spaghetti sauce
1 block Yelveeta cheese, sliced
1 can mushrooms, drained
1 pack flour tortillas
1 pepperoni stick, sliced
1 pie tin, with holes
Spread spagh etti sauce over to rti llas. To p with mush rooms,
pe ppe ro ni a nd cheese . Put tortillas on pie tin, cove r wi th a
bowl, p lace ove r bo iling 1vater a nd cook un ti l cheese is melted .
Serve.
Ma kes eight pizzas.
William j oe Casey
Sheridan, IL

Fruit-Chocolate Crunchies
bag rice cakes (or any crunchy bread product)
1 CaClbury plain milk chocolate bar
1 jar of jam (raspberry is best)
1 hair dryer
Break o ff two to fo ur squa res of c hocola te fo r each rice cake.
Me lt chocola te using h air dJ)'er until it's the consiste ncy of peanut
butte r (abou t 45 seconds o n high). Spread with a knife. Squirt a
do llup of j am on the chocola te and spread. Eat it ho t and gooey.
This r ecip e is good e n o ug h to pay fo r a nd is go od fo r peop le
1vith no access to microwaves o r ho tplates.
J essica du Mas
WA Cmrections Cenlerfor Women

PRISON LIFE 83

by Alex Friedmann, Resource Editor,
SCCC, TN
The nonpmfit and volunteer-nm agen- • Inside Journal, c/o Prison Fellowship, P.O. Box
16429, Washington, DC 20041 -6429 (703/ 478cies in this list are all worhing to heljJ us, 01 00): A publication of Prison Fellowship.
but they can't help us without you1· heljJ. If • Outlook on Justice, AFSC, 2161 Massachusetts
you want to contact one or more of these Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02140 (617/661-6130): A
of the American Friends Service CommiHee.
organizations for information, self-help newsleHer
• Prison Life Magaz ine, 200 Yorick Street, Suite
materials or for lheh· newsletters, then do 901 New York, NY 10014 (800/207-2659): A
the 1ight thing-enclose some loose stamps noti~nol magazine by and lor prisoners
or an SASE. Better yet, send them some ($19. 95/year).
BOOK AND READING PROJECTS
mone)' (that's right, some of your haulearned, hard-time prison money.) Even one • Books lor Prisoners, c/o Left Bonk Bookstore, 92
Pike St., Box A, Seattle, WA 98101: This volunteer
dolla1· can help. There are over a million program provides up to three books at o time.
p1isoners in the U.S. , and if eve1y one oftLS • Prison Book Program, Redbook Store, 92 Green
sent just a buck each month to a worthy Street, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130: No books con be
sent to prisoners in KS, NE, lA, Ml, OR or CA.
cause like CURE, FAMJ\11 or the AFSC, • Prison Library Project, 976 W. Foothill Blvd #128,
then those 01ganizations would be collect- Claremont, CA 9171 1.
ing over $ 12 million a year. That 's some- • Prisoner literature Project, c/o Bound Together
Books, 1369 Haight Street, Son Francisco, CA
thing to think about. lf we expect free-world 94117:
Free books lor prisoners.
01ganizations to heljJ us, then we have to • Prison Reading Project, Paz Press, P.O. Box 3146,
help them. The bottom line: What goes FoyeHeville, AR 72702: Free books lor women prisoners.
PAROLE & PRE-RELEASE INFORMATION
around comes around.
SOCIAl SUPPORT AGENCIES
• American Friends Service CommiHee, 1501 Cherry Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102 (215/ 241-71301:
A Quaker organization that works lor peace and
equality. Their criminal justice branch con provide literature on a variety of prison issues. There ore six
regional AFSC offices in the U.S.: CA, Ml, NJ, MA,
OH and NY.
• John Howard Association, 67 E. Madison # 1416,
Chicago, IL 60603 (312/263-19011: This organization is mos~y involved with prison reform and criminal
justice issues in Illinois, but they con provide materials
of interest to all prisoners. There is a separate JHA
branch in Canada.
• Notional Association lor the Advancement of Colored People (NAACPI. Criminal Justice Prison Program, 4805 Mount Hope Drive, Baltimore, MD
21215-3297 {410/358-89001: Offers referrals and
advisory services lor prisoners who wont to break the
cycle of recidivism-especially among minorities.
These projects operate through regional offices and
ore not available in every area. Write lor local contact addresses.
• Offender Aid and Restoration (OARI. 301 Pork
Drive, Severna Pork, MD 21146 {410/647-38061:
Provides post-release assistance lor prisoners in lA,
MD, NJ, PA and VA, through 12 locol offices.
• Woodbourne Long Termers CommiHee, Pouch # 1,
Woodbourne, NY 12788: A prisoner support ond
advocacy group. Send lor free brochure and newsletter.
ADVOCACY ORGANIZATIONS
• CURE, P.O. Box 2310, Notional Capitol Station,
Washington, DC 20013-2310 (202/789-21261:
Organization lor prison reform, with stole chapters
and special groups lor veterans, lifers, sex offenders
and federal prisons.
• Campaign lor on Effective Crime Policy, 918 F St.
NW #505, Wa shington, DC 20004 (202/62819031: This agency works lor effective criminal justice
reform. Ask your worden to join.
• Families Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMMI,
1001 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, #200, Washington,
DC 20004 (202/ 457-57901: Works lor the repeal of
federal mandatory minimum sentencing lows.
• Justice Watch, 932 Dayton Street, Cincinnati, OH
45214 (513/241·04901: Works to eliminate clossism
and racism from prisons.
PUBUCATIONS & MAGAZINES
• Fortune News, ATIN: Inmate Subscriptions, 39
West 19th Street, New York, NY I 0011 (212/20670701: A publication of Fortune Society.

84

PRISON LIFE

• American Correctional Association, Publications
Dept, 8025 Laurel Lakes Court, Laurel, MD 207075075 (301/206-5059 or 800/825-26651: Publishes
o parole planning guide, •As Free as on Eagle; and
sells other sell-help books.
• Interstate Publishers, 510 North Vermillion Street,
P.O.Box 50, Danville, IL 61 834-0050 (217/ 4460500 or 800/843-4774): Sells o parole planning
manual, "From the Inside Out."
• OPEN, Inc. (Offender Preparation and Education
Networkl. P.O. Box 566025, Dollm, TX 75356·6025
(214/271-1971 ): Sells "99 Days & o Get-up; "Man,
I need o Jobl" and other great pre-release guideslor $4.95 each.
• Manatee Publishing, 4835 North O'Conner St.
#134435, Irving, TX 75062: Sells "Getting Out and
Staying Out; o porole-j)lonning manual, for $22.45.
• CEGA Services, Offender Referrals, P.O. Box
8 1826, Lincoln, NE 68501-1826 {402/464-0602):
CEGA offers pre-release referrals for prisoners for the
area they will be paroled to {such as housing, employment ond substance abuse treatment programs. I $15
lee for each city. CEGA a lso sells the "Surviva l
Sourcebook" and "The Job Hunter's Workbook."
PRISON AIDS RESOURCES
• American Civil Liberties Union, 1616 P Street NW,
Washington, DC 20036 (202/234-4830): Operates
on • AIDS in Prison• information project.
• Correctional Association AIDS in Prison Project,
135 E. 15th Street, New York, NY 10003 (212/6740800): OHers resource information concerning AIDS
in prison, especially lor inmates in New York.
• HIV Prison Project, NYC Commission on Human
Rights, 40 Rector St., New York, NY 10006
(212/233-5560).
• Notional Prison Hospice Association, P.O. Box 58,
Boulder, CO 80306-0058: Helps develop hospice
programs lor terminally ill prisoners.
• Notional ACLU Prison Project, AIDS Education Project, 1875 Connecticut Avenue NW 410, Washington, DC 20009 (202/234-4830).
• "One Day at o Time: c/o Richard H. Rhodes
#05353-0 18, U.S.P. Leavenworth, P.O. Box 1000,
leavenworth, KS 66048 : An AIDS newsletter lor
prisoners.
• Prison AIDS Project, Goy Community News, 62
Berkeley Street, Boston, MA 0211 6 (Notional AIDS
Goy Task Force: 800/221-7044).
• Prison AIDS Resource Center, P.O. Box 2155,
Vacaville, CA 95696-2155; or 926 J. Street, #801 ,
Sacramento, CA 95814.
• Prisoners with AIDS/Rights Advocacy Group, P.O.
Box 2161, Jonesboro, GA 30237 {404/946-9346):
Offers support, educational materials, referrals and
political lobbying lor prisoners with AIDS/HIV.

MISCELlANEOUS RESOURCES
• A Society of Concern (ASOCI. Delaware Correctional Center, Smyrna, DE 19977: Provides legal
research, educational programs and workshops lor
prisoners at the Delaware Correctional Center..
• Infinity Lifers Group, c/ o Julie Travers, Choorperson, P.O. Box 772, Station B, OHowo, Ontario K2P
5P9: A volunteers priosners rights and political advocacy group.
• League lor Lesbian a nd Goy Prisoners, 1202 East
Pike St., #1044 , Seattle, WA 98122: A project of
Goy Community Social Services.
• James Markunas Society, 245 Harriet Street, Son
Francisco, CA 94103 (415/ 775-5445 ). A resource
lor lesbian, goy and bisexual prisoners.
• Mothers Opposed to Maltreatment of Service
Members (MOMS I, 8285 Block How Court, Frederick, MD 21701 : Advocates lor prisoners in military
prisons and disciplinary borrrocks. Con provide a
pre· release booklet enti~ed "New Beginnings."
• The Prison Chess Program, P.O. Box 44419,
Washington, DC 20026 (301 /530-4841.)
• Native American Indian Inmate Support Project, 8
Dallas Dr., Grantville, PA 17028: A Native American
group that supports the introduction of Indian religious ceremonies and programs in prisons.
• Native American Prisoners' Rehabilitation Research
Project, 2848 Paddock Lone, Villa Hills, KY 41017:
Offers many services lor Native American prisoners,
including legal and spiritual support, tribal and cultural
programs and direct contoct with prison administrators.
• Packages from Home, P.O. Box 905, Forestville,
CA 95436: Sells moil-order food packages lor prisoners, at around $20/pkge.
• PEN, Writing Program lor Prisoners, 568 Broodway, New York, NY 10012 (212/334-1660): Offers
a great resource booklet lor prison writers.
• Prisoners of Conscience Project, 2120 Lincoln St.,
Evanston, IL 60201 (708/328-15431: A religiousbased agency that works lor the release of prisoners
of conscience/ political prisoners in the United Stoles.
• Prisoner Visitation and Support, 1501 Cherry
Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102 (215/241-7117):
Provides institutional visits to prisoners in federal and
military prisons nationwide.
• Project lor Older Prisoners (POPS). c/o Jonathon
Turley, Director, The Notional Low Center, 2000 H
Street NW, Washington, DC 20052.
• The Soler Society, Shoreham Depot Rood, RR 1,
Box 24-B, Orwell, VT 05760-9756 (802/897-7541):
Sell·help materials lor sex offenders.
• Stop Prisoner Rope, Inc., PO Box 2713, Monhottonville Station, New York, NY 10027 (212/ 6635562); e-mail: sprdon@ix.netcom.com; Web:
hHp:// www.igc.opc.org/ spr/. Information and advocacy on sexual abuse and exploitation of prisoners;
support and advice lor victims and targets of both
sexes including info on psychological and health consequences, legal action ond survivors' options.
• The Poetry Wall, Cathedra l of St. John, 1047
Amsterdam Avenue, New York, NY 10025: Displays
poetry wriHen by prisoners.
CHILD & FAMILY RESOURCES
Thtrt flrt many organizations that htljJ prisOfii'YS wholwlH! childrtn. Thtst agmdes providt litn-aturt, infomwtion, 11dvirt and sujJport 011 how to cojJt with family
problems whilt in fJrison. Direr/ assistancr is usually
availablr only intht loc11l 11reas thatth-se f>rogmms .m w.

• Aid to Imprisoned Mothers (AIM). 599 Mitchell St.,
SW, Atlanta, GA 30314 (404/221-0092): An advocacy group lor incarcerated mothers. Although social
services ore only provided in the Atlanta area, AIM
con provide helpful information lor all women in
prison who hove children.
• Center for the Children of Incarcerated Parents,
Pacific Oaks College, 714 W. Californ ia Blvd,
Pasadena, CA 91105 (818/397-1300) : Provides
fre e educational materia l lor incarcerated parents
and their children.

• Family and Corrections Network, Jane Adams Center M/ C 309, 1040 West Harrison St. #4010, Chicago,
ll 60607-7134 (312/996-32 19): Provides information
about programs serving fomilies of prisoners.
• Fathers Behind Bars, P.O. Box 86, Niles, Ml 49120
(616/684-5715): A by-prisoners, for-prisoners
agency that helps Ia set up institutional parent groups
lor incarcerated fathers. Only the serious need apply!
• legal Services lor Prisoners with Children, 4 7 4
Valencia St. , #230, Son Francisco, CA 94103
(4 15/ 255-7036): legal services ore provided in California only, but some general information is available.
• Notional Institute of Corrections, Information Center, 1860 Industrial Circle, Suite A, longmont, CA
80501 (303/682-0213): Provides the "Directory of
Programs Serving Families of Adult Offenders."
• Notional Resource Center for Family Support Programs, Family Resource Coalition, 200 S. Michigan
Ave., #1520, Chicago, ll60604 (312/34 1-0900):
Provides informa tion about family programs, including prison projects.
• Parent Resource Association , 213 Fernbrook
Avenue, Wyncote, PA 19095 (215/ 576-7961): Support lor child/ parenting programs in prison; oilers
referrals and information to incarcerated parents.
• Prison Family Foundation , P.O . Box 1150,
Auburn, Al 3683 1 (205/821-1150): Works to support family education programs in prison. Sells preand post-release books and other publications; works
with prison administrations to form institutional family
support groups.
LEGAL RESOURCEs-fEDERAl/ NATIONAL

n,,.,, arr

lllflfl)'

ngmrifS that providf legal .<mJices for

jl7iJollm; most of tllfJt orgnni:atimu disjxuM iufomwtion

or off" rtjfTmrt mntmnl. Note thnttl"s' agt~~ri's do not
usually lu11ulle pusonnl legal service; such ns filing
npJxn/s, post-ronuirtions or lawsuits-with tile I'XrffJtion of
for-pmfit comJmnies (notlistrd hPre) that rhmge ltugefees.

Federal
• U.S. Deportment of Justice, Civil Rights Division, Special litigation Section, Washington, DC 20 530
(202/51 4-6255): Enforces the "Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act" through lawsuits against stole or
local prison officials who deprive prisoners of their constitutional rights or who practice racial discrimination.
• U.S. Supreme Court, Public Information Office,
Washington, DC 20543-0001 (202/ 479-3211 ): Con
provide up to live Supreme Court decisions per term.
Supreme Court slip opinions ore available through the
Government Printing Office. Contact: The Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Printing Office, Washington,
DC 20402 (202/783-3238).
National
• ACLU Notional Prison Project, 1875 Connecticut
Ave., NW #4 I 0, Washington, DC 20009 (202/2344830): A branch of the notional ACLU that works on
prison legal issues. Sells resource directories, criminal
justice statistic books and legal aid manuals; also
offers a prison newsleHer lor $2 per year and sells the
"Rights of Prisoners• handbook lor $5. Doesn' t handle individual cases; they only litigate large-scale state
or notional prison reform legal actions.
• Americans lor Effective low Enforcement, 55 19 N.
Cumberland Ave # 1008, Chicago, ll60656-1498
(312/763-2800): Sells monthly legal update publications, including the "Jail and Prisoner low Bulletin."
Although this bulletin is meant lor corrections officials,
it includes excellent resource materia l on the latest
prison-rela ted court cases nationwide. Annual costs
ore $168; perhaps your low library con subscribe.
Other bulletins include the "liability Reporter" and
"Security Legal Update."
• Columbia Human Rights low Review, 435 West
I 16th Street, Box B-25, New York, NY 10027
(212/ 663-870 I ): Sells the • Jailhouse lawyer Manual" (JLM) lor $30 a copy ($13 for prisoners).
• Georgetown University low Center, Criminal Procedure PRoject, 600 New Jersey Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20001. (202/662-9468): Publishes the
Georgetown low Journal, the annual "Criminal Procedure" issue costs $30.
• Freedom Press, P.O . Box 4458, leesburg, VA
22075 (703/391-8604) or: (800/370-7052): A
prison project run by volunteer paralegals. They offer
legal services at reduced rates, sometimes on monthly
payment plans; they also offer ministry and counseling services.

• Inside/Out Press, P.O. Box 188131 , Sacramento,
CA 958 18: Publishes self-help legal guides.
Inside/Out is the moil-order business for the Prisoners' Rights Union, which focuses on California prison
issues.

• lewisburg Prison Project, P.O. Box 128, lewisburg, PA 17837-0128 (717/523-11 04): Sells lowcost literature regarding constitutional rights, due
process and other legal issues of interest to prisoners.
• Notional lawyers Guild, Prison low Project, 558
Cop Street, Son Francisco, CA 94 II 0: A notional
legal agency with on interest in helping jailhouse
lawyers.
• Oceana Press, 75 Main Street, Dobbs Ferry, NY
10522 (91 4/693-81 00): Sells prison-related legal
books, including "The Prisoner's Self- Help litigation
Manual" ($20) and "Post-Conviction Remedies"
($20).
• Prisoner Legal News, P.O. Box 1684, lake Worth,
Fl 33460: A magazine published by prisoners in
Washi ngton that covers nationwide prison legal
issues. Subscription rates ore around $ 12 per
year/ 12 issues.
• Southern Illinois University Press, P.O. Box 3697,
Carbondale, ll 62902-3697: Con provide "The
Rights of Prisoners" brochure ol no cost.
• Storlite, P.O. Box 20004, St. Petersburg, Fl 33742
(813/392-2929 or 800/577-2929): Sells the CITEBOOK, which is a collection of positive federal and
stole case low, both criminal and civil. The CITEBOOK
is updated quarterly and costs $28 (S 112 annually).
Although this is fairly expensive, perhaps your low
library con subscribe; this company also sells other
books regarding business, consumer and legal issues.
• West Publishing Company, 610 Opperman Drive,
Saint Paul, MN 55123-1340 (800/328-9352): Publishes "Corrections and Prisoners Rights in a Nutshell"
a nd "Criminal Procedures in a Nutshell, • a t $ 17
each.
PARALEGAL PROGRAMS
• Blackstone School al low, P.O. Box 701 449, Dollos, TX 75370 (800/826-9228): Offers a well-known
correspondence program.
• Southern Career Institute, 164 West Royal Palm
Rd, Boca Rolon, Fl 33432 (800/ 669-2555 or
407/368-2522): Offers o complete paralegal course
that costs $ 1595to $1977; monthly payment plans
available. This school is accredited by the D.E.T.C.
• The Paralegal Institute, 3602 West Thomas Road
#9 , Drawer II 408, Phoenix, AZ 85061-1408
(602/272-1855): Offers paralegal courses for fees
ra nging between S1290 and $2750. Monthly payment plans and on Associate degree program available. Accredited by the D.E.T.C.
MINISTRIES & BIBLE STUDIES
• Emma us Bible Correspondence School, 2570
Asbury Rd, Dubuque, lA 5200 I (319/ 588-8000):
Offers free Bible courses for prisoners.
• The Notional Convocation of Jail and Prison Ministry, 1357 East Capi tol St. SE, Washi ngton, DC
20003: A notional agency for prison chaplains.
• Good News Mission, I 036 Highland Street,
Arlington, VA 22204 (703/979-2200): A Christian
organization tha t provides support, witnessing and
spiritual counseling to inmates in 11 0 prisons across
14 stoles.
• Guideposts, 39 Seminary Hill Road, Carmel, NY
I 0512 (914/225-3681 ): A Christian organization
that publishes Guidepost magazine. Also sponsors the
FIND information network, which provides information referrals: FIND Network, P.O. Box 855, Carmel,
NY 105 12.
• Hope Aglow Prison Ministries, P.O. Box 3057,
lynchburg, VA 24503: A nationwide religious organization that offers Bible study courses.
• International Prison Ministry, P.O. Box 63, Dallas,
TX 75221.
• Liberty Prison Ministries, P.O. Box 8998 ,
Waukegan, ll 60079: This Christian ministry publishes the Liberator newsletter.
• liberty Prison Outreach, 70 I Thomas Rood, lynchburg, VA 24514 (804/239-9281): Provides religious
assistance to prisoners, mostly in centra l Virginia;
Bible correspondence courses available.
• Prison Fellowship, P.O. Box 17500, Washington,
DC 20041 (703/ 478-0 I 00): A nationwide ministry
that sponsors spiritual activities in prison.

• Prison Ministry of Yokefellows International, The
Yokefellow Center, P.O . Box 482, Rising Sun, MD
21911 (410/658-266 1): a religious organization
that offers information and literature to prisoners.
• Set Free Prison Ministries, P.O. Box 5440, Riverside, CA 92517-9961 (909/ 787-9907): Provides on
extensive Bible study course.
• Southern Prison Ministry, 910 Ponce de lean Ave.
NE, Atlanta, GA 30306.
• U.S. Mennonite Central Committee, Office of Criminal Justice, P.O. Box 500, Akron, PA 17501-0500
(717/859-3889): Offers many publications concerning crime and religion-most ore free to prisoners.
ISLAMIC ORGANIZATIONS
• Islamic Prison Foundation , 12 12 New York
Avenue NW #400, Washington, DC 20005: Mostly
works with Muslims in federal prisons.
• The Notional Incarcerated Muslim Network, c/o
Maurice Taylor, #476837, Route 3, Box 59,
Rosharon, TX 77583: A prison-based organization
that networks with incarcerated Muslims for support
and educational purposes.
JUDAISM ORGANIZATIONS
• Aleph Institute, P.O . Box 546564 , Surfside, Fl
33154 (305/864-5553): A lull-service Jewish advocacy agency with regional offices.
• International Coalition for Jewish Prisoners Services, 1640 Rhode Island Avenue NW, Washington,
DC 20036-3278 (202/857-6582): Offers support,
referra ls, guidance, educational and religious programs, and pen pols.
BUDDHIST/MEDITATION GROUPS
• Human Kindness Foundation, Prison Ashram Project, Route I , Box 20 1-N, Durham, NC 27705: Provides reeding material for spiritual living.
• lskcon Prison Ministries, 2936 Esplanade Ave.,
New Orleans, LA 70119.
• Prison Dharma Network, P.O. Box 9 12, Astor Station, Boston, MA 02123-0912: Offers Buddhist meditation literature.
DEATH PENALTY RESOURCES
• American Civil Liberties Union, Capitol Punishment
Project, 122 Maryland Avenue NE, Washington, DC
20002 (202/675-2319): A branch of the ACLU that
deals with death penalty issues.
• American Friends Service CommiHee, 150 I Cherry Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102 (215/241 -7130):
o Quaker peace organization that works to bon the
deeth penalty a s one of their Criminal Justice projects.
• Amnesty International, Project to Abolish the Deeth
Penalty, 322 8th Ave., New York, NY 10001 -4808
(212/ 807-8400): Works to abolish the deeth penalty
through public letter-writing campaigns.
• Capitol Punishment Research Project, P.O. Box
277, Headland, Al 36345 (205/693-5225).
• Catholics Against Capitol Punishment, P.O . Box
3125, Arlington, VA 22203 (703/522-501 4): A religious organization against the death penalty.
• Death Penalty Information Center, 1606 20th
Street NW, Washington , DC 2000 9 (202/3472531).
• Death Row Support Project, P.O. Box 600, Liberty
Mills, IN 46946 (219/982-7480): Offers pen-pol
services to death row inmates.
• Endeavor Project, P.O. Box 23511, Houston, TX
77228-35 11: A magazine produced by and for prisoners on death row.
• Friends Committee to Abolish the DeothPenolty,
c/o Charles Obler, 802 West 3rd Street, Farmville,
VA 2390 I : Publishes the Quaker Abolitionist; subscriptions S6/ yr for prisoners.
• NAACP Legal Defense Fund, 99 Hudson Street,
16th Floor, New York, NY 10013 (212/ 219-1900):
A legal branch of the NAACP tha t supports minority
rights; also has on anti-death penalty project.
• Notional Coolition to Abolish the Deeth Penalty, 918
F St. NW #601, Washington, DC 20004 (202/347241 I): Works to abolish the death penalty. Also provides a booklet listing anti-death penalty resources in
each stole ("The Abolitionisrs Directory; $2).

Changes, additions and new information
should be sent to: Prison Life Magazine,
Resources Department, 200 Varick St,
Suite 901 , New York, NY 10014.
PRISON LIFE 85

\11lite/ :.lcxican, j ' II ", 1()5#. 37-) r-old California
bo)' downe d in Oklahoma. Seeking correspondence with frl·cworld people (fl·mak) hut will
an>wcr all. Looks, age or race docs not maner.
Some of nl\' i111Crc't~ are: low rider• (cars).
oldies music. rock 'n · rnll. outdoor acti\'ities.
writing and quiet tinll'S. Pic for pic. :-.lo Polaroids
allowed. ;-.;o conrict to con\'iCt allowed either.
jan1cs ll:unilt on. # (():J64!l. OK ~tate Pen. P.O.
Box 97. ~ l cAbter. OK 7~[>02-0097.
I xI = I( llanchome x Romantic= ~ l c). 1-1 = O(~lC
- Ft·ccdom = Lonclitwss). I + I = 2 (You + ~lc =
Frie nd ship ). ECJu:uion: It mar >CCIII elconcnt:n)•O, but it's 1nathem:11icall)' impossible for genuine friendship and tnt<: happiness 10 prc\'ail
unless ro u: a) Wl'ite Ill<: b) Befriend me c)
Share rour feelings d)AII of the abn\'e.
ANSWER: d)AII of the abo,·c. \\'rite Steve Tetro
1107983 1, Florida State Prison. PO. Box 747.
Starke. FL 3209 1-07,17.
S\1'~1 . :iO. 6'1", 185#, hrn hair, htl eyes. Allracti,·c.
"'ell-built on an. Et~j<>)' hodv building. hikes, reading. c hl·,~. UHlonlight. tra\'cl and learning for
othe rs. ln tCrl''' in international bsne>. Value &
n"pcct. hone'''' & intiman. ceking assistance
from anyone \\'ith background in Engli'h or hl\\'.
In need of sonteont· willing to correct Ill)' mistakes in wn1ax 10 impron- Ill)' writing ,kills. It's
,·cry important that I be able 10 communicate
well when writing. In struggle. ,\nthonr Lucero.
#7()324. P.O. 1\ox 10000. Limon. CO 80826.
Green-t:)'t'd Al:t~kan Fi•hennan and writer down
in Oregon seeks soulmate. I'm 3:1, educated, and
a.s strong as an ox. Into politics. adventure, rock

.utrl folk musk. weight lifting and reading. Going
overse:ts :tnd leaving Amerika for good in '98.
Need a !;OOd, ho ne" , s trong woman lO come
with. Write to:.Jantt'> D t\nder>on, #6952487.
~1405 Del·r Park Dr SE. Salem, O R 97:10 I.
S\1'~ 1 . !1!!. I'm caged here in T exas. I am sta"·ed
for :tmllscml'lll. I want mail. Whatever rou send
will be appn:riated. Send me poignant cnnuncntarics on our cn1Ten1 stall' nf political quagmire.
Send llll' interesting pol·ms. If nothing else.
send me llC\\'\(Mpl'l' clipping>. puLLk•. chess by
mail or anrt hing tha t strikes your fancy. I will
answer all lellers. Blistering tales of romantic
nature "•ill he c'peciallr appreciated from
female readl·r,. Stt·,·e Kadis (ili9720. P.O. Box
1170-2E I0 . Lockh:"t. TX 7 6~~30 \'Car old, talloocd. A""" "'nTior. 5' 10";" 155#,
bn;wn hair. blne C)l''· Dt>ing a 15 )'Car 'lenience.
Expect 10 be rclea'>t'd by the )<'•'r 2000. Looking
fnr Aryan (white ) fl· ntalt·s to correspond with.
\\'ho kno"·,? ~l:tybt· t·ven a lasting relationship "ill
do:vclop. Frank E. ll:unntons. TDC}ID 1160,154212002. F.~ l. 350 So. Living,ton. TX 773.51.
ll ombre, Thinysomcthillg, Latino & blanco,
collcge-educ:llcd. Pu blished writer. Finishing
prisonjoumcy. Seeks female com rades of all
nationalities. Unclt·rstand' women prisoners' situations and cares about "sisters of the su·ugglc."
A1nor con todo mi cor:tzon, por vida. George
dcjesL" Fields N- 52~18~. l'.o. Box 711. ~Ienard.
I L o r Georgia cll:jl'l>U>. 1337 \\'. \\'innimac.
C hicago. ll. (i0G40.
25 yr old. \I'~ I. ACJuarill'>. 3'7", 170#. Dishwater
blonde hair. lliiiStadle 8.- GoT. Native of I lollywood. C.\. Tcrnporaril)' illcarccrated cntrepn:lle ur ill search of all imclligent, highl)·moti\"tcd.
caring. lnvinH"· mature. 'l'I1Sitin· woman with a
high >clf-estccon lnd for good COITc>pondence.
possible serious rdatiollship. 011l)' females
bctwecll 18-55. who are real abo111 there own
idcntit)'. \\'eight or race irrclc,•mt. Good per>onality and sc n-,c of humor is mandatory! Photo

gets mille. will allwer all. Jeffrey ~I. Carlor
#3%85. P.O. Box 3 11 . El Doo•1clo. KS 67042-0311.
Tit·ed of geui ng h11rt' I ant. "Prison Life" i, full
of heartbreak> and headaches. l .eL• change that.
23 rear old black male looking l(n· a relationship
with female. No incarccr:ucd ,,·oman, no gay~ or

me n please. II. I Io hn es 118911 1S 12, Box 2000.
Pine city NY 14871.

86 PRISON LIFE

Lont·l). oftl·n mi,unclerswod cartoonist seeks
intdkctually sti1n11lat ing correspondence with
mature fem:tle. Any or all exotic photos gladly
expected. Send kuer' ( & photm) to llenrr
I Icrt. P.O. Box liOOO. Nesa- A/ 39 1:~5- 1 98, FlorcnCl'. CO 8 1226.
SB~I. ~ceking open minded person to co n·c•pond with who '"" a good \ensc of humor.
Relieves in giring >econd c hance>. Appearance
not imponam. will respond 10 all. l'n1 6'1", 245#.
So pi ck up the pen and paper and get busy.
Robe rt L. llcll jr II -20-B 7G4:18. Parch1nan, MS
:~87:is.

I'm 24 Yrs old, •1'6", half-French , Indian and
black. I ha\'c loll !; hair 10 my sh ou lders. very
prell)' with light brown C)'C>. Looking for honest)'. trus t. caring and sup port. I like any race.
I'm in priMm doing a 30 yr >entencc. I h:"·e one
son whom I lo\'c :mel I have nl'vcr IH;cn married.
So I'm \'ery >ingk. Writl': Gidget Lewis 652467.
1401 State >ehool Rd. GatesvilleTX 76599.
Act! Staring ont of tiH· window. wondering wi ll
the\' do rill' like ~lalccun; African-American man
of 22 yr•. l'allll:>tl)' striving to transgress all odds
in thi' nngodh· '"tcon. Sct•king the prerequisite
of my completion, s incere woman who's down
lor the c:u"e. 'The struggle continues. together
we will win!" Artis wafford #57225, P.O. Box
1568. l··hnchin>OII. KS 6750'1.
Blk male. !10 )'~''· (i'·l". 220#. blk hair. brn ercs.
just here f(>r a minute. Seeking lt·11ers from all
yon lovcl)' ladic' (inside and out). Send photos.
\\'ill probably ha\'c to write to a third part)', but
that's 110 probktn ; I'll hook you up. Write: Shan
Gan~u:rer # O'l:i32-0:IO, 1'.0. 13ox 3007, San
Pedro, CA !!0731-0207.
Fi·Cl· Spirit. 6'0". 17!>11. Inn!( brown hai r, g reencred ani>t. Would like 10 lwar from an intelligent w0111an with good sense or h11mor. Tom
Connoll\' #11386 1!!. 13ox 99, Pontiac, IL Gl764.
Down l)ut 1101 out in ~li c hi ga n . Long bro\\'11
hair. bright blue ere,, 6'2". 85#, lots of tauoos.
Looking for \\'hite or Spani,h females who arc
real and also have a !;OOcl heart and are verr
open-minded. For correspondence and maybe
onore. I would love It> trade photos and will
answer all. ~like Cybuhki~ 202229. Saginaw Correctional Facility, 9625 Piern· Rd. Freeland, ;\II
486~:1.
S\\'~1. 27. (i'l". 205#, muscular. brn hair. gr ercs.
Seeking hone>~ and >incerl· pc1·son for serious
relationship. I enjoy \\'eight lifting, reading, travel ing. outdoor> and 'POrt>. Gelling 0 111 soon!
Ke\'in Porth 406!'>Ci. P.O. 13ox 1989, Eh• NV 8930L
S\\':\1. 25. 5'7'', 152#, blond hair:hlne eyes.
Wanted: One good-hearted woman looking to
corl't:spond with :til)' An·an ladies, either locked
down or in the free world. Will answer all. Pic
for Pic. Tion Plat e, ll(i!i3·17:1, Rt 2, 13ox 4400.
Gate>ville. Tx 7(i597.
WM. 34, (i'O", 18!ill. big brown bedroo m eyes,
muscular build. looking to fill lonely nights writing 10 yon. citht•r erotic advemures or honest to
com munication. I do it all! Glen n Reyes
#657f>53. Rt 4. 13ox 1500. Bcaumo11t, TX 77705.
Down and out. doing time l(lr hcing a tad bit 100
cntcrpri,ing. I'm a :~0 rear old \I'~ I with a heart
as big a> Texa>. Looking 10 co rrespond wi th
females or am·onc willing to be a friend. I'm
5 'II·. 190#. bn,·n hair. han· I eye• that change
colors with my 11100d •. l'\'e hcen told that I h;l\'e
good look' and a million dollar "nile, although
I >n· my>clf a> jn>t a\'t'l'agl' (not ego ti'iical). I

encouragl' only opl'n minded to write. ~o

game;! J ame' I f. \\'all,trc, Connally Unit
#663496. II.C. (i7.13ox ll!i. Kcnnedv. TX 781 19.
This thorn is still set• king his wild 'rose. ~0 yrs.
yo11ng, maturt• half-hrccd Cherokee ,,•Ito's still
alin: and well. Seeking frel·-,piriwd counterpart.
Age/ race not i1npon:u1l. ~ l anifcstation of the
he:tn / sonl is. Presently hindered by ilnprisonmenl: though Ill) ' >pirit ~o;u·, free. Patien t!)' a\\1titing you. Ill)' wild llow<."r. P. Si lvcnhorne, # 13739'1,
P.O. 13ox 1000, Craigwille, VA 2-14!30-1000.

Single ll ispanic :\laic, 24 years young but cxu·eme1)' wise and experienced . Seeking an easy going
woman who e njoys the many wonders and pleasures that life has to offer. Age, r.tce, unimpormm.
Gire us the opportunity to combine our souls and
become one. Ya nc\'cr know. Send info to: Ramon
Aviles. #93A8835, P.O. Box 2001 ~lain, LH 2-24,
Clinton C. F.. Dann emor<~. 'Y 12929-2001.
S\1';\l, 27 r rs old, long brown hair, hazel eyes.
Ta11ooed and muscular. Looking for a fr ie nd.
Dirk Harris, # 172053, Waupun C .l. , Box 35 1,
Wa~tut , WI f>3963 .
Sl3~ 1 . light skin, 5'7''. 32 )'I'S o ld. looking for a
serio us open-mi nded, open-h earted down w
earth woman of any age or race. Herbert
Burgess, #93A3237. Au ica C.F .. Box 1-19, Auica,
NY 140 11-0149.
Aryan Clmstian looking for a fric t1dto write. I'm
30, 6' 1", 190#, browu hair, blue eyes. Been in 10
years, getting om soon. In need of a good Christian female. Not int o ga ngs or drugs o r crime.
Into bcllering myself. Want to onect a special
woman. Prince lli1nmlcr. #225480, 1153 East
Street South, Suflie ld, CT 06078.
Down but not out4~-,·ear-<>ld W;\1. I'm an outlaw
in chains search ing for a lo\'ing angel to set me
free through her leiters and photos. Lenny Kurz,
#03809-424, P~ I B 4000, Rochester, ~ I t 55903.
sw~r 31, 5'1 1"-;-175#. Into an. rock 'n · roll. tattoos, the outdoors aud cool people. Would like to
correspond with open-minded, understanding
people. Thomas Weathers, #688192, Coflicld Unit.,
R'.:..!.,_Box 150, Tennessee C'.olony. TX 75884.
SWM, deaf, 38 yrs old, 5 '10", 20011, in good
health and rery open-minded. Seeks wh ite
female o nly, age 22-40. Will be free in '97. All
interest ing people welcome to write. Steven
Christman. 11946709, Indiana tate Farm, 1500
West U.S. 40, Greencastle, IN 116 135-9275.
S\1'~1. 26 yrs old. hr. hair, blue eres, 6'1", 200#,
college-educated weight lift er. Looking fo r pen
pal to share thoughts and feel ings with. Females
onlr. Age not important. Joseph Ri chards,
P .O .I~ox A. Thom:tston, Maine 0486 1.
S\\':\1, 28, 6'3", brown hair & eyes. Loo king for
some people to pass Lhc rest of this ti me with. If
you're real, regardless of age. looks and weight ,
just write to: J. cou ~lesechcr, #61453, P.O.
Box 777. C.S.P.. Canon City, COJ!.1..2 15-0777._
S\\'~1, 28. 5'10". 190#, long dark hair & beard,
brown eyes. Looking for a lady 10 write to . Will
answer all who respond. Jason K. ~I all h ews,
#8 1226. P.O. Box 777, C.S. P.. Canon City, CO
8 1215-0777.
S\\":\1. +1, 6' 1", 185#, green eyes, hr0\\11 hair, Danish.Cennan college grad. cxtrc1nclycomputcr literate. serious :.nist. Seeking lencrs & long-term
relationship witlt sincere. serio us, intellige nt and
fun-loving lady. Will answer all. R:t)'lllOIId S. Larsen,
#C,I0475, Pontiac C.C., Box 99, Pontiac, IL 61764.
S\NM. 40--;--5' 11", 200~1> 1'11 ha ir, h az eyes. ta ttooed and 1nuscular. 3 )~·s left. Seeking Lat in or
white lady to share rest of life with. Into bikes.
music. healt h. Age u ni mport ant. Ke n Fenton ,
#02658- 112. FCI Florence, Unit N/ A. P.O. Box
6000. Florence. CO 8 1226.
IIi. this is Ron and I'd like some pen-pals, M or
F, but F would be nice, howC\'cr. I'll write back
10 anyone who respond,. I'm a Christian bi-sexual who's in rcco\'cry & enjoys Bible study, music
&just plain kickin' it. Write 10: Ron Ryan, #2899 16. P.O. Box 209, Orient. 0 11 4 3 1 ~6.
Struck out in Clli. ~ I . 39. 5'9", ISO#, brn hair, brn
eyes. honest, respectful 8.- understanding. Looking
for tl1m woman out there who'd like 10 correspond.
Will answer :tlllellers. Lorenzo Antonio, #J-694 10,
-IBIR-15, P.O. Box 3481, Corcor;m, Cr\ 93212.
Is toda)' a good clay for you 10 wri te a SBII-1? I'm
posit ire-minded. 38 yrs young man. Would like
to hear from strong-minded black woman. Lend
me your ear and I'll receive what )'Oil have 10 say
for friendsh ip or amore. No inmates please. AI
York, E-70970, P.O . 13ox 5000, A4- 140, North
Ke rn Stale Prison. Delano, CA 932lfr5000.

$ 14.95
$14.95

- - - - - - - STAT E

ZI P

Send check o r money order plus $3.00 P&H to:
PLM Shirts, P.O. Box 537, Stone Ridge, NY 12484.
NY residents o nly add 8.25% sales ta.x.