Fulton Research and Diagnostic Center, FRDC, was a sprawling yard full of massive concrete structures. The van pulled up to a fence and a guard came outside and walked around the van with a metal rod that had a mirror attached to the end of it, slim wondered if they had a big problem of people sneaking into the prison, shrugs. After the guard finished checking under and inside of the van for stowaways he radioed the control center and the gate started sliding open. “Home sweet home”.

    The inmates were escorted into the Intake Building, a huge building with about 300 men from county jails all over the state, every one of them beginning one sentence or another right here. There were about fifteen guys lined up on the wall to the left, all with visible bruises and cuts on their faces, must have been a tough jail, slim couldn’t help but wonder if it was the guards or inmates they had to be worried about.

    The chains were removed and they were stripped naked, a guard took out their shoes from their personal effects and smacked the souls together then threw them into a big pile of shoes at the end of the hallway. After all of the shoes were in one place the stark naked inmates were sent to find their shoes in the pile. Next they were sent to a window where they were given the rest of the personal property they were allowed to have, Slim noticed a pack of Newport’s in his property, eight months old, probably stale as could be, but all that time without a cigarette, he couldn’t wait to be able to fire one up. They were instructed to set their property down on a bench on the right hand wall and line up on the left wall. They waited in line for a couple of guards, holding what looked like bug sprayers, to spray there naked bodies with the foul, greasy concoction they called “delousing spray”. That done they were sent to line up with about 100 other inmates, all still as naked as the day they were born and all covered with the nasty fluid, and wait for a shower to rinse the stuff off. Slims turn finally came up and he stepped into the shower and pushed the button, the water came on and almost as fast as it did it was off again and he was given a towel and told to dry off and exit back out of the shower. Outside the shower room he was handed a pair of gray pants, a gray shirt and a pair of socks from a “perm” inmate at Fulton.

    Dressed again, finally, but still having to wait on the other new arrivals to finish up, slim and a few other inmates snuck off where the guards couldn’t see and smoked the best cancer stick that slim had ever tasted. They waited around in this building for around two hours or so for everyone to get done with the routine, then they were separated by where they were going to be housed and guards from their new homes came to get them, slim was going to one house.

    Entering the wing he noticed four inmates sitting at a table playing cards, the wing itself was fairly small, there were three tables in the middle of the floor, a TV set atop a metal rack built about six feet up the right side wall, to his left was a shower right below the metal stair case, downstairs on the left wall were twelve cells and upstairs were  twelve more, in between every two cells there were a set of bunk beds on the walk up against the wall. While slim was looking around the wing one of the inmates playing cards, a white guy in his early to mid twenties wearing a pair of glasses, asked him which cell he was going to.

       “Twelve” replied slim

       “Names J-Roc, I’m your cellie” said the guy

       Shaking his hand “aiight, I’m slim”

Slim went up to the cell, inside the cell was much bigger then the one in the county, to the left as soon as he walked through the door he could see a porcelain sink built into the concrete wall and around the corner from it there was a porcelain toilet on another wall, “ahh porcelain, beats the cold steal toilets” slim uttered to himself. In the middle of the floor there was a big steel desk and beside that there was a set of steal bunk beds bolted together. Slim grabbed his shower shoes and went down to wash the delousing spray off of his body.

    Feeling better slim returned to his cell and set down at the desk to smoke a cigarette; his cellie entered and plopped down on his bunk.

      “Where you from” he asked

      “Originally Memphis, but I fell from St.louis, you?”

      “Bonne-Terre, what you in for?”

      “Robbery” slim said

      “Oh, I’m here for my third DUI, got a year”

      “How long you been here” slim asked

      “Bout six months, I’m waitin to get moved to the tents” he paused “You know you’re not supposed to be in this house, right?”

      “Naw, why not?” slim asked a little perplexed

      “This house is for non violent offences, two house is for violent crimes, you’ll probably be moved soon”

    Slim and his new cellie got along pretty well but his cellie was right and about a week after he arrived at Fulton he was moved to two house. 

    Two house was like a whole different world from one house, everything looked the same but the similarities stopped at appearance, where one house was quiet and friendly, this place was loud and decidedly unfriendly, as soon as slim walked in he heard a white and black inmate arguing over what they were going to watch on the TV. The black guy was standing up and yelling at the white guy that they were watching videos on BET, the white guy just sat there quietly with a smirk on his face and every time the black guy, a big guy called bear, changed the channel to BET, the white guy, A small guy with curly hair and tattoos all over called squirrel, would calmly get up and change the TV back to the race. Bear outweighed squirrel by at least a hundred pounds but somehow slim got the impression that if this went to blows, bear was greatly outmanned. It never went to blows though, it did however go on for quite a while and it ended with bear ripping the power cord from the TV, now the whole wing wasn’t going to watch BET or the race, or anything else for that matter.

    Slim wasn’t placed in a cell here; his new home was a bunk on the top walk, with nothing more than a metal footlocker to keep his belongings in. There was an empty cell at the end of the walk for all the inmates on bunks to use the bathroom. He went to a small, square, metal table in the wing with a bunch of books piled on it and selected a book by Robert Ludlum, settled into his new home and tried to block out all of the noise in the wing and get lost in Bourne’s search for his identity.

    Some time early in the morning he woke to the sounds of doors opening and shutting and hurried up and got dressed to follow the crowd. He was the last one to leave the house and the last one in line at chow; he got his breakfast tray, pancakes, grits and a honey bun. He sat his tray down on a table and went up to get a cup of milk, milk in hand he went back to his table, took a couple of bites of his pancakes and heard the guard say time up. Slim hadn’t been eating more than two minutes and seeing as how he got up at 5 am for this he was determined to finish his meal. The other inmates shoved their food in their mouths as fast as possible and slid their trays through a metal window. Slim sat there and casually ate his meal, a little irritated by the whole thing, the guard came over and said “did you hear, times up”

     “I’m not finished”

     “You’re given ten minutes from the time the house is called for mainline, if you didn’t have enough time to eat then try not to be so far back in line”

 Guessing that sounded fair enough and pretty much finished anyway slim got up from his seat and took his tray to the window. A little while later slim was read a violation for disobeying a direct order in the chow hall that morning, his first write up in prison, and he had barely been here a week.

    After a couple of weeks in two house the institution had decided to remove the bunks from the walk so slim was again moved, this time to five house. In five house he was again placed on a bunk on the walk, makes no sense right? “Why didn’t they just take this bunk out and leave him where he was?” he thought. It wasn’t so bad here though, definitely quieter and his cousin was in four house so he would at least be able to see him on the way to chow, even though a fence separated 4 and 5 houses, they could still shout across on the way to mainline.

    He also seen another familiar face, from the county, Y-G, but for some reason Y-G didn’t seem very friendly towards slim anymore, Y-G slept on a bunk on the bottom walk “ bay” and slim was on the top walk, one night everyone was sitting up talking and a couple of the guys seemed to be intent on instigating something between slim and Y-G. Around 3 am they succeeded and Y-G called slim to the bathroom/cell at the end of the top walk.  Slim not seeing much good coming out of backing down put on his shoes and in nothing but his boxers and tennis followed him into the cell. Inside the cell slim, having a reach advantage of around four inches on Y-G, threw a couple of punches that landed home into his adversaries nose. Y-G quickly realizing that toe to toe wasn’t the best way to go, and outweighing slim by at least 50 pounds, decided to rush. His shoulder hit slim square in the chest and they both went to the ground, HARD, slim having smacked the back of his head on the concrete floor was a little dazed but quickly cleared his head enough to realize that Y-G had hit his forehead and was unconscious. He quickly pushed his slowly awakening assailant off of him and got to his feet, grapping Y-G by the shirt collar he hit his fallen ex-comrade in the face a half dozen times and left him on the floor bleeding and bruised, exited the bathroom and locked Y-G in, he went back to his bunk realizing he had just made an enemy and he better sleep with one eye open, at the risk of sounding cliché, “oh well” tired he went to sleep.

    After about two weeks here, without another problem from Y-G or any other inmate for that matter, slim was issued his second violation because the guard said that he had passed his “stinger”, a little metal coil that plugged into the wall so the inmates could heat up water for coffee or soups and anything else they needed hot water for, to an inmate in the cell at the bottom end of slims bunk. He had passed his stinger to the inmate but he would never admit that to the guard. His second violation, he had been here about a month, he was starting to see a pattern. Since he was still on contract for the first violation he was given 15 days in the hole when he saw the AD-SEG committee about two weeks after he was issued the “write-up”.

    On his fourteenth day they brought around cleaning supplies and bored out of his mind, slim decided to clean the cell to pass a little time even though he was getting out of the hole the next day. While he was sweeping a guard came around and told him not to worry about finishing to pack his stuff, slim got his stuff together and a guard placed hand cuffs on him through the “chuck hole”, a small slot built into the door used to pass food trays and anything else through to the inmates without actually having to open the cells. Slim was then taken to the main building, he had thought he was just getting released back to Gen-pop a day early, but now he realized he was getting transferred to a “camp”, good-bye R&O.

Chapter 8: Bowling green

    NECC better known as Bowling green, for the town it resided in, was located about 45 minutes from St.louis. It was a fairly big “camp” with a long main building separating the two sides, A and B, of the yard. On each side there were five houses, A side held one thru five and B-side, six thru ten. There was a gym, softball field, four handball courts, horseshoe pits and an outside weight pavilion on each side of the prison. A & B sides had their own separate chow halls and yards, besides a hand full of inmates whose jobs dictated that they were able to move from side to side, there was no interaction between the two yards. The houses themselves were built with four, secured wings built around a center control center, or the “bubble” as it was commonly referred too. Inmates were also not allowed to be inside of wings they didn’t live in, unless again their job description said otherwise, but who said inmates always followed the rules, there was a lot of sneaking, or “skatin”, from wing to wing, house to house, and even from A side to B side for the boldest of inmates. Getting caught skatin’ could result in everything from a simple “ disobeying an order” violation to a much more serious “escape”, just all really depended on the guard that wrote it up, but it usually netted a slightly serious but not too serious, “out of bounds”. Violations were labeled by numbers, the lower the number, #1 murder, the more serious and the higher,#37 violation of institutional rules, the least serious, everything was covered from gambling to rape and everything had a number between 1 and 37.

    Slim was housed in 10-C, go figure another R&O, inmates housed here pretty much had the same privileges as Gen-pop, except they weren’t allowed night yard, after evening mainline and they weren’t allowed to buy a TV off of canteen, other than that there wasn’t any difference between them and the regular yard inmates. They weren’t going to be given there “state grays”, the prison issue clothing, until the next day, so for the time being they had to walk around in orange jump-suits. Slim headed out to the yard, he seen a few familiar faces, mostly from the county but a few from the streets, but not really anyone he figured he would go out of his way to talk to, and besides they were calling over the intercom to return to the housing units for count. An institutional count was conducted before every meal, after evening lockdown and there were three over-night counts that were up to the guards to pick the times. This was the afternoon count, they would have yard for about 4 hours after chow and then they would lock down for evening count, after which the Gen-pop would again have yard, or gym in the winter but it was summer now, for a couple of hours and then about another hour of gym after it started getting dark, R&O’s yard ended right before the evening meal.

    After mainline slim went out to the yard again, it was packed with inmates, playing handball, working out, jogging, playing cards, there were around a thousand inmates on either side of the yard, it had the feel of tension and animosity, the hate was so absolute that it was almost a physical presence. Slim walked up to the gym and went in to see what was here, through the doors was a short hallway, towards the end of this walk was a room on the right with a ping-pong table and a foosball table. He kept walking into the main part of the gym, he could hear the sounds of basket-ball and chatter, in here there was a section of tables with a couple of TV’s on elevated metal racks. In front of him there were steps leading down to the gym floor, surrounded completely by bleachers, in one corner of the gym was a guy he recognized.

    John Hunt Brinker, a familiar face from the county, him and John along with someone else he would soon learn was also here, used to gamble at spades a lot in 5-D. He walked over, John a fairly big guy but not too bright, had been arrested for scamming an elderly woman he cleaned gutters for, out of around thirty thousand dollars, his partner, “the brains”, had never been caught, John had been given about three hundred dollars worth of crack cocaine and an eight year sentence for his part in the crime. Slim walked over to the punching bag where john was throwing hay-makers, even though policy was that you were always supposed to wear boxing gloves when hitting the heavy bag, John wore none and his knuckles showed the evidence of this, they were scraped and bleeding. It took a minute for John to realize slim was there, they talked for a few minutes and John told him that Russ, another guy they had played spades with, was also at the camp. They went out to the yard and found Russ sitting on the bleachers by the handball courts in front of ten house, Russ was a funny built guy, kind of reminded slim of a penguin in the way he walked and looked, he had a beer belly but the rest of his body was almost to the bone, his front tooth was almost a blue color, from crack or ice or something slim imagined. They walked over to Russ and talked for a few minutes, after a little while a short black guy with his hair parted back into two spikes came over to the bleachers and sat down. Slim was still new here but he figured this type of thing just didn’t happen. It seemed that more so than in the county the races kind of stayed segregated, the only whites that were to be seen around the blacks were in “hot pants” and home made make-up, kool-aid.

    Slim felt himself tense up and go on guard, but after a second John looked at the black inmate and said “sup’ Calvin” Calvin responded some kind of greeting back towards John and Slim let felt his body relax a little. He turned towards Russ and asked if he wanted to play a game of spades for canteen like in the county, and was surprised to hear Calvin’s voice come back with the reply instead of Russ’. Without looking away from Russ slim said “what does he do your talkin’ for ya?”

      Again Calvin answered “what’s it to you homie?”

      “It’s whatever cuz, who tha fuck are you neway?” said Slim

      Looking at John he said “you betta get ya boi, homie”

      Slim kind of getting irritated “hold up dogg him or no one else does my talkin, or  my muthafuckin thinking, you don’t know me nigga” Calvin didn’t seem to like hearing this word come out of a “white boys” mouth and started to stand up, slim squared his feet for a fight. Russ grabbed Calvin’s arm and told him “no baby please”. Slim looked at Russ and asked him “what you a punk homeboy?” but he already knew the answer just like he knew there wasn’t going to be a fight today so he turned and walked away from the bleachers. Slim had never really been a very violent guy but he had learned in the county and he knew the same rules applied here, you don’t take shit from anybody and you mind your own business. There were some exceptions to the rule, for instance the situation with Calvin, slim had almost started a fight with Calvin because he was butting his nose into slim and Russ’ business, but the exception is, that since Russ is Calvin’s “boy” then he is his property and he had every right to speak for Russ, actually some “punks” weren’t even allowed to talk to anyone except their man and other punks. Slim was starting to realize that he had fallen into the rabbit hole and was surrounded by homosexual mad hatters; he wasn’t chasing the white rabbit any farther into that world.

     November passed into December, on the 15th of November Slim received a plea arrangement for twelve years with 85% pending a P.S.I, Pre-Sentencing Investigation, and seeing no better outcome decided to take it. Now the 17th of December was here and slim was scheduled for sentencing by the judge. At 7 a.m. a guard entered the wing to get all of the inmates whom were to appear in court that day, slims door popped and he was ordered to sit at one of the tables in the wing. Two guards methodically moved from inmate to inmate placing each in cuffs and shackles, after which they were escorted out of the wing and to the elevators. Again told to face the rear wall, slim waited feeling the butterflies in his stomach but knowing there shouldn’t be much surprise, he would be incarcerated for around the next ten years.

    They were escorted through a tunnel built under the street that connected the jail to the court house, that way inmates could be transferred securely without ever having to be taken outside into the open. Slim was taken to a holding cell to wait for his time in court, it was deathly quiet, everyone thinking about their future, this was really the only time it was ever very quiet in this place. After about a three hour wait it was time, a guard called slim and three other inmates to the bars one at a time to put their “jewelry” back on. Secured once again the four inmates were taken to the court room, they stood to one side and the judge went through one by one and decided their fates.

      Judge “Mr. Sanchez?” the first victim was a small Mexican who barely looked more than twelve.

     “Yes sir” he said shakily

     “How do you wish to plead to the charges of possession with intent to sell of a narcotic?”

     “Not guilty, sir”                                                                                                                  

    The judge scrambled through some papers lying on his desk and after a few minutes he seemed to find what he was looking for, reading he said “your next court date will be January 27th”

    The other two inmates pretty much went the same way and now it was slims turn.

      “Mr. Tomas” he said in his booming baritone.

      “Yes sir”

      Rustling through his papers again “I see that you and the prosecutors have come to a plea agreement”

      “Yes sir” said slim, not really thinking it was meant as a question.

The judge picked up a piece of paper and adjusted his reading glasses. He held the piece of paper in front of his face reading it for what seemed like an eternity to slim but must have only been a few seconds. After which he set the piece of paper face down on his desk and looked at slim over the top of his glasses.

      “Mr. Tomas, I’m going to be asking you some questions and I need you to answer honestly, do you understand?”

      “Yes sir”

      “Are you of sound mind?”

      “Yes sir”

      “Under the influence of any drugs or alcohol presently?”

      “No sir” wow a different answer finally

      “Are you mentally handicapped?”

      “No sir”

      “Do you feel that your lawyer properly represented you to the best of his abilities in your case?”

    Now this was a bit trickier because slim didn’t believe that his lawyer had done much more than take his 2500 bucks and push him to plead out, nevertheless he answered “yes sir”

      “Mr. Tomas you have made an agreement with the prosecutor to plead guilty with a cap of twelve years in the Missouri department of corrections for the crime of armed robbery in the first degree and a secondary sentence of three years to be run concurrent for the crime of armed criminal action, these offences falling under the Missouri dangerous felonies laws which hold a minimum mandatory of ten years with 85%, knowing all of this do you still wish to plead guilty today?”

      “Yes sir”

      Slims lawyer, Alex Morgan, interjects here “your honor I would like to request that my client be given a suspended sentence of 25 years with five years probation”

     This is the first that slim had heard anything like this and wasn’t to sure he liked the idea of a 25 year back-up with five years probation.

       Judge “Mr. Morgan there has already been a plea made, why didn’t you bring this to the prosecutors before the day of sentencing?”

       “Your honor I just thought…”

       “That’s the problem sir, both councils in my quarters now”

    The prosecutor and my lawyer followed the judge out of the courtroom, we could hear the faint sounds of the judges’ deep voice, sounded angry, and after a few minutes they all entered the courtroom again. My lawyer walked over holding his head down a little bit; it was obvious that the judges’ anger had been directed at him. The judge looked towards me, “Mr. Tomas do you still wish to plead guilty as per the agreement?”

      “Yes sir”

      “after reviewing the case and reading over the P.S.I, I sentence you to a term of not less than ten years in the Missouri Department of Corrections, You are hereby remanded to their custody until the completion of your sentence, good luck Mr. Tomas” and that was it, ten years with 85% not eligible for parole until after he had served eight and a half years. At least now he knew his fate though, but he would still remain at the Clayton county jail until transfer to MoDOC.” Oh well, “it is what it is”

Chapter 6: Hurry up and wait

    A numb feeling had seemed to settle over slim since his sentencing, he knew he should probably feel something but he didn’t, that is until he called his mom. His mom and dad had visited once since his incarceration, but seeing as how they were in North Carolina he understood that they couldn’t get all the way up here very often. He talked to his mom at least once a week though, but with the news he had to tell her, it was hard to bring himself to make the phone call. Finally three days after his sentencing slim picked up the phone and dialed the number. His mom answered and he gave her the news, he could hear the sounds of silent sobbing from the other end of the line, the numb feeling was gone, god he missed the numbness. Slim hid his head with his hand, to avoid the other inmates seeing his “weakness”, and felt the wetness of tears rolling down his cheeks, “damn where is the numbness when you need it?”

    Christmas and new years passed, The clock struck midnight on December 31st and as 1999 became 2000 the wing sounded like a war zone, the inmates were kicking and beating on the doors to make as much noise as they possibly could, after about five minutes of this the guards entered the wing and told everyone to knock it off, after a couple times of saying it and threatening lockdowns the next day, there was peace in the wing again and Y2K was here.

    Sunday January 30th 2000, all eyes were on the television as super bowl XXXIV was getting ready to kick off, their very own rams against Tennessee. The Titans’ kicked off to the rams, Horne returned for 25 yards and the battle had begun. The guard let them stay out of their cells to watch, even though they were supposed to lock down for count. The rams first possession ends in a turnover on downs, and now it’s the titans turn, they have a pretty good drive ending in a missed field goal, still no score. At half time St.louis leads TN 9-0 and the wing is going crazy. The inmates are locked down while the guard takes his belated break. When they are released from their cells the third quarter is already in session and there’s a mad dash, everyone trying to get the best seats, or any seat for that matter. St.louis goes up by 16-0 and then allows TN to score 16 unanswered points, it’s a tie game. With 2 minutes left in the game Kurt Warner completes a pass to Isaac Bruce and 71 yards later the rams have the lead again, mayhem in the wing. Titans down by seven have one last drive to tie the game, they drive down the field and with five second left they have first and ten on the ten yard line, McNair completes a pass to Dyson he gets nine yards and times up, that’s the game, one yard shy, “ouch that’s gotta sting” slim laughs to himself, good game though. Funs over, now back to the everyday routine of life “on the inside”.

    February came and went and March was here, it had been three months since slims sentencing, he knew that he should be leaving any day now. When that day came slim heard his door pop some time in the very early morning and the guard came over the intercom “bunk and junk Mr. Tomas”, that meant exactly what it said, get your bunk and all your junk together, your transferring. Slim did as told and went out into the wing, looking at the clock he saw that it was 4:14 a.m., “too damn early” he thought to himself. He was instructed to throw his mattress down beside the guard’s desk and go sit at the tables. there were three other inmates sitting at the tables already, the guard got the pieces of paper in the plastic sleeves with their personal info and they were escorted out of the wing, to the elevators and down to the basement. Here they were placed in restraint and put onto a white van with caged windows, destination incarceration.

    This cell was similar to the one that slim had previously occupied, except there was no desk and there was only one bunk coming out of the wall. He laid on this bunk now and stared up at the ceiling, he hated being here but in a place where respect was everything, the fight was unavoidable, thinking about this, he dozed off to sleep.

    Time has no meaning when thrown into a place with no windows or clocks; he could have been asleep for an hour or ten. He was awoken by a loud banging on the door, outside stood a short, balding, white man.

     Not really wanting to get out of bed slim hollered “yeah”

     The man replied “Ad-seg hearing”

Slim reluctantly got up from bed; a little irritated for having been woke up, and walked over to the door. Through the small window in the door he noticed that this man wasn’t dressed like the guards, he was wearing a white button up shirt tucked into a pair of blue jeans.

      “Mr. Tomas you have charged with a fight in the day room yesterday at 4:30 pm, how do you plead?”

     Figuring that there wasn’t much to gain out of trying to deny what everyone had saw, and really just wanting to get it over with and lay back down slim said “guilty”.

    Since slim was the aggressor he was sentenced to thirty days in the hole, the other guy received three. After a few days the hole became pretty repetitive, sleep, eat, sleep some more, eat, maybe read for a while or talk to other inmates through the vent above the toilet, and sleep some more. AD-SEG, one of three classifications for inmates in the hole, which stands for Administration Segregation, the other two are displinary segregation or DIS-SEG and PC, protective custody. There wasn’t much difference between the three; the only real difference slim could see was what you were allowed to buy on canteen. DIS-SEG inmates were only allowed writing supplies, paper, little plastic “flex” pens, stamps, etc… and hygiene items. AD-SEG inmates were allowed this stuff and, as a bonus for being good, a deck of playing cards. Slim was sentenced to ten days DIS-SEG and the rest of the time was AD-SEG. On canteen day after his ten days were up he bought a little red deck of bicycle playing cards, which took away from the repetitiousness of the every day routine.

    These thirty days seemed like an eternity to slim; his first experience of solitude hadn’t been a very good one. Now coming towards the end of his time here he couldn’t wait for the last little bit to be over. That day had come and a guard arrived at his door, “finally out of one level of hell, now back to another”.

Chapter 4: higher aspirations

     Back in gen-pop slim found out fast that word of his assault had spread and the other inmates seemed to show him a slightly higher level of respect. He had been in Clayton County for around three months now and still didn’t seem much closer to finding out the outcome of his case. Actually the only times that he had even been to court was for his arraignment and preliminary hearings, the rest of the time he had just “rode the docket”. Since he was here and didn’t seem to have very much to do but count the days, and he was pretty sure that the other inmates wouldn’t bother him too much for a while, he figured he might as well do something productive. Slim, a smart kid but always kind of unmotivated in life, had dropped out of school when he was 16 and by the time he arrived here he hadn’t done very much good in life, pretty much had always been a bit of a screw up, since the jail offered GED classes he figured he might as well sign up.

    The first evening of class he found out that most of the inmates only signed up so that they could see their friends from other wings, it was loud and unruly in the class, but he was determined that he was going to do what he had set out to do. After a couple of classes slim was given a pre-test, he aced everything except for math, which had never been his strong point anyway, and the teacher told him to focus on math and then in a couple of weeks he would be given another pre-test to see where he stood. He studied day and night and when the day of the pre- test came, well he still barely passed, but he passed and the teacher put him on the list for the test.

    It took a couple of months for the actual test and by this time slim had received two plea offers from the prosecutor, the first was 52 years with 85%, which he of course denied, and secondly was 15 years on a robbery and 3 on an ACA ran consecutive and also holding a minimum mandatory of 85%, he denied this as well. Five months in the county and still not much closer to the end, but no time to think about that, there’s a test to take. The actual test took around four hours and he was told he would receive his results by mail in a couple of weeks.

    When he returned back to the wing him and another inmate, who had also taken his test that day, were called up to the C.O’s desk. The guard a young black man, probably in his early twenties, asked “you guys take your GED today?”

     Both of us “yeah”

     “How do you think you did?”

      Slim “pretty good, I hope” laughs slightly

      Inmate “I don’t know we’ll see” also laughs

The guard hands each of them a piece of paper, 15 minutes on the “free phone” and says “well good job, and good luck.”

Both “thanks” as they turn and start heading toward the area where the four free phones are located, the guard let them stay on the phones until the wing closed, around two hours later.

    Slim received his results in the mail around the middle of November a little over a week after his birthday. A smile on his face as he silently read, 270 he had passed with a pretty good score, “Happy birthday to me” he thought.

    During the midsummer of 1999 nineteen year old Jimmy was escorted into the St.louis county jail by two guards. Beaten and bruised, the punishment for running from the police in the darkened ghetto streets of St.louis, the only thing going through his head was “how did I wind up here”. A small time criminal now charged with four first degree armed robberies and four armed criminal actions, he didn’t see that things would get any better any time soon. ‘Shrugs’ oh well as mammaw used to say “no since in crying over spilled milk”.

    He was escorted into a small room; a few other guards entered leading four inmates dressed in orange jumpsuits. Deputy Estes, a fat, sloppy Mexican guard with stains on his uniform shirt and terrible BO, looks at Jimmy, points toward the other inmates and grunts “over there”. Jimmy does as told and lines up against the wall next to the other four inmates, another guard snaps a picture and the four inmates were once again escorted out of the room. Soon after Jimmy was taken to a set of elevators, each guard enters a key into a slot on either side of the elevator doors, and pretty quickly the doors opened. Inside the elevator, Deputy Estes again points, this time towards the rear of the elevator, and utters “face the wall”; Jimmy catches a whiff of his breath this time and realizes it’s not too much better than the stench that emanates from his body.

    After a few seconds the elevator arrives at its destination, the eighth floor, research and orientation or R&O, Jimmy is led to a concrete wall around three feet in height, with a desk sitting behind it, at this desk sits a guard wearing a white uniform  as opposed to the blue uniform that his hosts are wearing. The ‘white shirt’ is identified as an LT; he is a light skinned black man with a very long goatee, mostly black but with strands of gray hair. The guards talk for a few minutes, after which jimmy is led to a set of doors known as the ‘sally port’. Inside is a small room with another set of doors directly ahead, there’s a small wait while the electronic doors that jimmy and his escorts had just entered are closed with a loud “clacking” noise, after which the doors in front of the trio slide open on an electronic rail to reveal a big room.

     Looking around as he enters the “wing” packed with inmates, all of whom seem to be looking at him, must be the excitement of their day a “new fish” but unlike the movies there’s no hootin’ and hollerin’, just staring. He holds his head high and tries to keep the unsettled feeling he’s having  from showing on his face, jaw locked, he continues to scan the room’ he notices some heavy steel purple painted doors with slender windows on the right side of them. Through these windows he can see a phone and a piece of plate glass, the visiting rooms. In front of him there is a section of tiled floor with tables, currently packed with inmates’ playing cards and dominoes, and whatever else to pass the time, a black inmate is getting his hair braided while he plays a hand of spades. Either wall is lined with phones, all currently occupied. There are also cells lining these walls, downstairs there are 18 cells and there’s a purple rail to steps leading upstairs where there’s around 12 more cells. He’s escorted through the tabled area onto a section with a dark gray carpet; here there are a bunch of gray plastic chairs on the left hand side facing a small black TV. and another set of chairs facing an identical TV. on the right.

    He’s led through the chairs to a concrete slab similar to the one he was taken to outside of the sally port, here sits a “blue shirt”. One of the guards escorting Jimmy hands this “blue shirt” a piece of paper inside a plastic sleeve, Jimmy notices that it has his picture on it with some writing to one side of it, he cant read the writing but assumes its his personal information. His escorts turn and start walking back to the sally port doors and the guard behind the desk instructs him to stick his left arm out, she then places a plastic wristband around his wrist and secures it with a piece of white plastic. While she is doing this an inmate walks over and sits down a folded green mattress beside Jimmy, he is then instructed not to ever remove the wristband and to pick up the mattress and go to cell 12.

    As he approaches the door, mattress slung over shoulder, he hears a loud clacking noise again, and the door pops open. Entering the cell, the beds are two metal slabs, one on top of the other built directly into the concrete wall. There’s a metal desk in the far left, back corner, also built into the wall, and a metal toilet with a sink built onto the back of it, at the foot of the beds. Not much to see, plain concrete walls, probably not even quite an, 8×10 but “its home for now” he whispers to himself while he slings his mattress onto the top bunk, and heads back out into the wing to see what he’s gotten himself into.

Chapter 2: Jail politics

    The first few months of Jimmy’s incarceration were pretty uneventful; after a short stay in the R&O wing he was moved to the 5th floor C wing, he made some friends among the inmates here. The 5th floor was mainly reserved for people with dangerous felonies; robbery, murder that sort of thing, non-violent offenses were held on six, 4th floor was a 120 day county jail drug program called “choices” and seven was shut down for repairs, eighth floor was R&O, the hole and PC (protective custody). 5C was identical to the wing slim was in on the 8th floor except the paint was green instead of purple. He realized that almost everyone inside goes by a nickname, and being around 6’4” and 150 lbs soaking wet, the other inmates had begun to call him one variation of slim or another, slim shady, slim thug, slim greasy, etc…,he was ok with this, could be worse right? Slim, a white boy having grown up in the ghetto, hung out with a lot of the black inmates; he was soon to learn that politics weren’t just for politicians.

    In the right corner of the wing there was a door that led to a gym which C wing shared with D wing, and today C wing was having their turn to use the gym. Him and a, chubby black guy with a gold tooth on his top incisor, who went by Y-G, was playing a game of handball when some of the white inmates uttered “coal hauler” towards slim. Slim never having heard the word didn’t pay much attention to it, didn’t even really realize that it was an insult directed towards him. He noticed off and on towards the game that the two white inmates were glaring at him whenever they walked by, and it also seemed like YG kept giving him a puzzled look. Slim was at a loss, he wasn’t sure what he was missing here but he knew that something had transpired. Right then some other inmates started beating up on a light skinned black guy that had been all over the news for throwing boiling hot water on his girlfriends two year old. They had him kneeling up against the wall when one of the inmates kneed him in the side of the head causing him to drop the rest of the way to the floor where they proceeded to stomp on his head until there was blood everywhere and their legs were tired, after which all of the inmates left him lying and exited the gym so as to not get thrown in the hole under investigation. Slim forgot all about the situation with the inmates in the gym, for now, but he would soon find out what he was “missing”.

    The guard called for everyone to lock down for count, and all of the inmates finished up what they were doing and headed towards their cells. The guy who had been beatin’ up in the gym was taken out by medical staff and moved to the infirmary on the third floor. The guard completed count and left the wing for his break, slim laid on his bunk and read a book it would be an hour or so before they got out of their cells again. His cellie was an older white guy who didn’t care much for slim because he considered him a “wigger” but slim was okay with his cellie not liking him, didn’t really care if anyone liked him, and besides it meant that he could read in peace without being bothered by random conversation.

    About an hour and a half passed and the guard came back into the wing and did another count to make sure everyone was still where they were supposed to be, like they could go anywhere held in the middle of the air surrounded by thousands of dollars worth of steel, but policy was policy, right? After count “cleared” he popped the cell doors of four inmate workers. They pulled in the big metal cart that their meals were delivered by, after which they brought in a plastic container which held the juice. Once everything was set up the guards called mainline and the inmates were released from their concrete cages once again.

    As slim lined up for chow he noticed that people were looking at him and everyone seemed to be sharing some kind of inside joke at his expense. He shrugged and just waited his turn for whatever cuisine they were being fed this evening. As he reached the front of the line he was given a heavy plastic tray with a flimsy insert, to make it easier for the kitchen staff to clean the trays. Slim went to the same table he sat at everyday, with the same three guys as always. YG sat directly across from him, to his left was bonez, from McCree, slim had lived one street over on Blaine, all part of the dark side, and to his right was a 17 year old white guy named lil J. This was slims “click”.

    He was still getting the feeling that all eyes were on him though so after a few minutes he asked his homeboys what it was about. YG answered “that whiteboy in tha gym tha otha day disrespected you cuz”

          Slim looked at him blankly, he didn’t remember anyone dissing him “what ya talkin bout dog? What whiteboy?”

        “The dude in the gym called you a ‘coal hauler’”

        Slim: “I don’t even know what the hell that means”

Bonez gives him a little smirk and says “shit nigga he sayin you fuck wit niggas”

        “Aiight so I kick it wit black dudes, so what?”

YG again “naw cuz, he sayin you FUCK wit black dudes, he callin you a punk nigga and that shit all over tha wing nigga”

         “Oh” slim didn’t say anything else he just sat there and quietly finished eating his meal. After finishing he removed the plastic insert from his hard tray, laid it on the table, and without a word got up from his seat, tray in hand. He walked over behind the guy that had dissed him in the gym, the inmate didn’t seem to notice so slim said “hey cuz”. The racist looked up at him and he hit him square in the nose with the hard tray, causing the inmate to fall from his seat blood pouring through his busted beak. Slim threw the hard tray to the floor and let the dude regain his feet, a short fight ensued, broken up by the C.O’s, after which slim and his victim were both escorted to the hole on the eighth floor.

ex-con

Chapter 1: first day jitters

    During the midsummer of 1999 19 year old Jimmy was escorted into the St.louis county jail by two guards. Beaten and bruised, the punishment for running from the police in the darkened ghetto streets of St.louis, the only thing going through his head was “how did I wind up here”. A small time criminal now charged with four first degree armed robberies and four armed criminal actions, he didn’t see that things would get any better any time soon. ‘Shrugs’ oh well as mammaw used to say “no since in crying over spilled milk”.

    He was escorted into a small room; a few other guards entered leading four inmates dressed in orange jumpsuits. Deputy Estes looks at Jimmy, points toward the other inmates and says “over there”. Jimmy does as told and lines up against the wall next to the other four inmates, another guard snaps a picture and the four inmates were once again escorted out of the room. Soon after Jimmy was taken to a set of elevators, each guard enters a key into a slot on either side of the elevator doors, and pretty quickly the doors opened. Inside the elevator, Deputy Estes again points, this time towards the rear of the elevator, and utters “face the wall”.

    After a few seconds the elevator arrives at its destination, the eighth floor, Jimmy is led to a concrete wall around three feet in height, with a desk sitting behind it, at this desk sits a guard wearing a white uniform  as opposed to the blue uniform that his hosts are wearing. The ‘white shirt’ is identified as an LT; he is a light skinned black man with a very long goatee, mostly black but with strands of gray hair. The guards talk for a few minutes, after which jimmy is led to a set of doors known as the ‘sally port’. Inside the set of doors is a small room with another set of doors directly ahead, there’s a small wait while the electronic doors that jimmy and his escorts just entered are closed with a loud “clacking” noise, after which the doors in front open to reveal a big open room.

     Looking around as he enters the “wing” packed with inmates, all of whom seem to be looking at him, must be the excitement of their day a “new fish” but unlike the movies there’s no hootin’ and hollerin’, just staring. He holds his head high and tries to keep the unsettled feeling he’s having  from showing on his face, jaw locked, he continues to scan the room’ he notices some heavy steel purple painted doors with slender windows on the right side of them. Through these windows he can see a phone and a piece of plate glass, the visiting rooms. In front of him there is a section of tiled floor with tables, currently packed with inmates’ playing cards and dominoes, and whatever else to pass the time, a black inmate is getting his hair braided while he plays a hand of spades. Either wall is lined with phones, all currently occupied. There are also cells lining these walls, downstairs there are 18 cells and there’s a purple rail to steps leading upstairs where there’s around 12 more cells. He’s escorted through the tabled area onto a section with a dark gray carpet; here there are a bunch of gray plastic chairs on the left hand side facing a small black TV. and another set of chairs facing an identical TV. on the right.

    He’s led through the chairs to a concrete slab similar to the one he was taken to outside of the sally port, here sits a “blue shirt”. One of the guards escorting Jimmy hands this “blue shirt” a piece of paper inside a plastic sleeve, Jimmy notices that it has his picture on it with some writing to one side of it, he cant read the writing but assumes its his personal information. His escorts turn and start walking back to the sally port doors and the guard behind the desk instructs him to stick his left arm out, she then places a plastic wristband around his wrist and secures it with a piece of white plastic. While she is doing this an inmate walks over and sits down a folded green mattress beside Jimmy, he is then instructed not to ever remove the wrist band and to pick up the mattress and go to cell 12.

    As he approaches the door, mattress slung over shoulder, he hears a loud clacking noise again, and the door pops open. Entering the cell, the beds are two metal slabs, one on top of the other built directly into the concrete wall. There’s a metal desk in the far left, back corner, also built into the wall, and a metal toilet with a sink built onto the back of it, at the foot of the beds. Not much to see, plain concrete walls, probably not even quite an, 8×10 but “its home for now” he whispers to himself while he slings his mattress onto the top bunk, and heads back out into the wing to see what he’s gotten himself into.

Chapter 2: Jail politics

    The first few months of Jimmy’s incarceration were pretty uneventful; after a short stay in the R and O wing he was moved to the 5th floor C wing, he made some friends among the inmates here. This wing was identical to the one on the 8th floor except the paint was green instead of purple. He realized that almost everyone inside goes by a nickname, and being around 6’4” and 150 lbs soaking wet, the other inmates had begun to call him one variation of slim or another, slim shady, slim thug, slim greasy, etc…,he was ok with this, could be worse right? Slim, a white boy having grown up in the ghetto, hung out with a lot of the black inmates; he was soon to learn that politics weren’t just for politicians.

    In the right corner of the wing there was a door that led to a gym which C wing shared with D wing, and today C wing was having their turn to use the gym. Him and a, chubby black guy with a gold tooth on his top incisor, who went by Y-G, was playing a game of handball when some of the white inmates uttered “coal hauler” towards slim. Slim never having heard the word didn’t pay much attention to it, didn’t even really realize that it was an insult directed towards him. He noticed off and on towards the game that they were glaring at him whenever they walked by, and it also seemed like YG kept giving him a puzzled look. Slim was at a loss, he wasn’t sure what he was missing here but he knew that something had transpired. Right then some other inmates started beating up on a light skinned black guy that had been all over the news for throwing boiling water on his girlfriends two year old. They had him kneeling up against the wall when one of the inmates kneed him in the side of the head causing him to drop the rest of the way to the floor where they proceeded to stomp on his head until there was blood everywhere and their legs were tired, after which all of the inmates left him laying and exited the gym so as to not get thrown in the hole under investigation. Slim forgot all about the situation with the inmates in the gym, for now, but he would soon find out what he was “missing”.

    The guard called for everyone to lock down for count, and all of the inmates finished up what they were doing and headed towards their cells. The guy who had been beatin’ up in the gym was taken out by medical staff and moved to the infirmary on the third floor. The guard completed count and left the wing for his break, slim laid on his bunk and read a book it would be an hour or so before they got out of their cells again. His cellie was an older white guy who didn’t care much for slim because he considered him a “wigger” but slim was okay with his cellie not liking him, didn’t really care if anyone liked him.

    The guard came back into the wing and did another count to make sure everyone was still where they were supposed to be. After count “cleared” he popped the cell doors of four inmates, workers. They pulled the big metal cart in that our meals were delivered by, after which they brought in a plastic container which held our juice. Once everything was set up the guards called mainline and we were released from our concrete cages once again.

    As slim lined up for chow he noticed that people were looking at him and everyone seemed to be sharing some kind of inside joke at his expense. He shrugged and just waited his turn for whatever cuisine they were being fed this evening. As he reached the front of the line he was given a heavy plastic tray with a thin plastic insert, to make it easier for the kitchen staff to clean the trays. Slim went to the same table he set at everyday, to sit with the same three guys as always. YG sat directly across from him, to his left was a guy from the same neighborhood as slim, bonez, and to his right was a 17 year old white guy named lil J. This was slims “click”.

    He was still getting the feeling that all eyes were on him though so after a few minutes he asked his homeboys what it was about. YG answered “that whiteboy in tha gym tha otha day disrespected you cuz”

          Slim looked at him blankly, he didn’t remember anyone dissing him “what you talking bout dog? Which whiteboy?”

        “The dude in the gym called you a ‘coal hauler’”

        Slim “I don’t even know what the hell that means”

Bonez gives him a little smirk and says “shit nigga he sayin you fuck wit niggas”

        “Aiight so I kick it wit black dudes, so what?”

YG again “naw cuz he sayin you FUCK wit black dudes, he callin you a punk nigga and that shit all over tha wing nigga”

         “oh” slim didn’t say anything else he just sat there and quietly finished eating his meal.Ater finishing he removed the plastic insert from his hard tray, laid it on the table, and without a word got up from his seat, tray in hand. He walked over behind the guy that had dissed him in the gym, the inmate didn’t seem to notice so slim said “hey cuz”. The racist look up at him and he hit him square in the nose with the hard tray, causing the inmate to fall from his seat blood pouring through his busted beak. Slim threw the hard tray to the floor and let the dude regain his feet, a short fight ensued, broken up by the C.O’s, after which slim and his victim were both escorted to the hole on the eighth floor.

(Aung San Suu Kyi – above)

As we know, the News is full of bad News. Sometimes, I purposely don’t listen to the News in the morning. However, some of the news this weekend made me smile, although tinged with sadness.

1) The Release of Aung San Suu Kyi.

She is a Political Figure and was put under house arrest for more than 7 years and according to the news had no contact with her hubby or kids. No letter, no phone but yesterday 13 November – she was released. She finally saw the light at the end of her tunnel. FREE.

Paul and Rachel Chandler Above

2) The Release of the Chandlers.

Today, The Chandlers – Husband and Wife (they are a British Couple, I even wrote about them last year). They were kidnapped in Somalia while on holiday on their Yacht and held for about a year under terrible conditions. They were released by the Somali Pirates today, 14 November.

For me, The Chandlers issue hurts more because, Somalians who come to the UK are sometimes even given priority housing over the core British Citizens. They receive a lot of help from the Government in Benefits in UK.

Challenges

So, it made me think, no matter what the Challenge, it will end one day and if anyone of you reading are facing challenges, I hope it ends soon. Have in mind that with every day that passes, you are getting closer and closer to your day of Victory.

The Article I wrote last year: Somalian Piracy

In prison, he had worked his way up to clerk of the chemical dependency unit, spent several hours a week on the outside working with juvenile offenders, and coordinated the prison’s father education program. His wife and three sons visited him every week, and he was working at being a good dad.

I got to know Bobby’s story when I interviewed him in prison for research I do on crime. Bobby is not his real name.

Bobby has a strong work ethic. “Hustling for drug money is hard work,” he said. “There’s no two ways about it. You hustle hard. It’s a job. You get up in the morning. You’re sick. You get that shot of dope. You go out.

“It’s just like anybody else in offices downtown. Matter of fact it’s over eight hours a day, and you work hard. It’s stressful. You got to go in a store to boost. You got to finagle. You got to manipulate. You got to con. You got to. Some of it feels good. Some of the cons are pretty good, and some other ones just fall apart. You’re scared. Then you do get caught. You get arrested. You got to be in jail. You get sick. Full-time job, man.”

After a pause of several seconds, he continued, “It’s a full time job. It really is.” Bobby chuckled and shook his head. The skin around his eyes crinkled. His face lit up. He has charm. Maybe that is why his wife and children kept in such close touch. Maybe they don’t know what he does when he’s committing crimes.

As part of my work as a professor at a Big Ten University, I interviewed Bobby while he was in prison for the third time. Bobby and the other prison inmates I’ve interviewed are far different from what I had expected.

I thought I could tell if someone were a criminal. Media depictions swing between glamorous action figures or diabolic monsters, but I slowly realized that when you see them on the street, they look little different from you or me, or the next-door neighbor. They have a sense of morality, too, often twisted, but it’s there.

We are kidding ourselves if we think we know what criminals are like. Do we know anything about burglary from the points of view of burglars? What about the views of rapists? Incest perpetrators? Murderers? They may look like you or me, but what is normal and everyday, for them is often galaxies away from our own lives.

Yet, within in each of the men I interviewed I saw glints of humanity that helped me understand how their families and friends could love them and neighbors respect and trust them. Their lives are a thicket of contradictions.

Professing and sometimes even showing love for their families, they can do harm to them, sometimes in the name of love. For many, their crimes are not personal. They wanted something, and they took it. They believe they deserve it. Typically, they construct images of who their victims are and then act on these images.

Some have second thoughts, but they keep committing their crimes. As much as they harm others, they also harm themselves. Sometimes they know this, though they can’t guarantee they wouldn’t do the same acts in the future. Unexpectedly, a number of the men I interviewed had a sense of humor and even a sense of the sadness and tragedy of their behaviors.

The stories that I want to put out are stories that changed my ideas of who criminals are. Criminal behaviors are not what I thought they were. Criminals are not who I thought they were, and the stories they tell show just how complex criminal behaviors are.

Bobby had been hooked on drugs and alcohol for most of his life, sniffing glue by the time he was eleven and moving on to smoking pot, snorting coke, shooting heroin, and popping uppers and downers.

Beer, wine, liqueurs, and hard liquor were all right, too. He spent most of his time on the outside committing crimes to support his addiction and would do anything for his next hit of dope. He exuded confidence that he knew what was going on.

“They got so many different kinds of hustles out there,” he said. “They got everything. Then it changes. Something will come in, and it’s hot. It’s new. Boom. The hustlers will find a new store that just opened up. Oh, God, new stores are easy to steal from.”

Bobby laughed. “You got every junkie in town in that store because the word gets around. It’s weird. When you’re out working you just, bing, bing, you pick the hustlers out. You might not know them but you see them at the dope man’s house. They’re all doing the same thing.”

Bobby thinks he can get a job spotting boosters in stores. “I can pick people out,” he said, “if you follow them and watch them, you can. I don’t think I can say by looking, ‘That person’s a thief,’ but I can tell by what he’s doing and how he’s going about things. That’s how you tell he’s going to thieve. That’s how you can tell he’s a thief.”

Boosting and robbing pharmacies weren’t the only ways Bobby copped money for drugs. Burglary was his main job. The sound he dreaded the most was the “scritch scritch” of the home owner unlocking the door. That happened a lot.

“One time he was reaching for the handle of the back door to leave with a bagful of stolen goods. He heard the sound too late. “I fell right into this guy’s chest. He was a great, big, huge man. I scared the shit out of him, and I scared the shit out of me. It kind of shocked him. I looked at him. He looked at me. He said, ‘You bastard.’ I took off running.”

Another time he and his buddy Jeb were in an apartment when they heard the sound. They both hid. A woman walked in. “Where I was hiding I could look around. She didn’t see me. I was seeing the back of her going up to my buddy.

She thought he was her husband or somebody hiding from her. She goes like this.” Bobby mimicked someone walking on tip toes. “She’s sneaking up on my partner. ‘Boo!’ she goes. Jeb jumps up. He’s got gloves on.

The woman goes, ‘Who are you?’ Once she saw it was not her husband or friend or whoever, she must have got good and scared. My buddy was so afraid because she crept up on him and scared the shit out of him because he wasn’t ready for the ‘Boo’ part.

“I’m watching this whole thing. My buddy’s like this with his mouth wide open and his eyes really big. Jeb’s really not a wild type of guy. I mean, we could’ve gone and hit her and held her down and stuff like that. It was just not our style. We usually got out.

‘He stood there. He didn’t know what to say. Then he goes, ‘Hi.’ She goes, ‘What are you doing here?’ He started walking back. ‘Hi.’ He didn’t know what to do. I was by the kitchen door. I whistled. She turned around and saw me. I kind of waved. Then I ran out the door.

She went nuts, started screaming, ‘Help. They’re robbing me.’ We got away. Got the stuff. My buddy dropped the other bag. That’s what had all the silver and stuff.”

While Jeb was jamming his bag full of silver and jewelry, Bobby had been in the kitchen. “I went in the icebox. I saw in the back of the peas there was money. So I looked. Fifties. It was fifties, hundreds. It was a big wad, like that.”

Bobby held his thumb and index finger about five inches apart. “She had it in her freezer.” Bobby had the money when they ran out of the apartment, but he didn’t tell Jeb. “I used to do that to him because I always thought I was a worse addict. I needed money more than he did.”

Bobby said when he breaks into homes, it feels like Christmas. ”I get so excited I can’t make it to the toilet. I go right on the floor.” 

Oh, that explains why homeowners find these piles in their burglarized homes.  It’s not personal at all. Bobby is just doing his job.

Located in Virginia Beach, Virginia, this beautiful hotel is home to many strange happenings. Guests have reported toilets flushing on their own, and towels changing color. The Cavalier House resembles the infamous Stanley Hotel that was featured in “The Shining”, giving its guests a spooky feeling upon entering.

It is said that you feel as though you are being watched, but is this just paranoia brought on by the mere look of the hotel? Or is it something more supernatural? Perhaps the next time you visit Virginia stop by the Cavalier House and find out for yourself.

The Bell Witch Legend

In 1817, John Bell a citizen of Robertson County Tennessee, found a monstrous creature in his cornfield, he described it as having the body of a dog and the head of a rabbit. Although he tried to shoot the animal, it disappeared before he could get a shot. Shortly after this encounter Bell and his family began hearing and experiencing very strange things. The sound of something beating the outside of his house was the first of a series of events. Then his children began hearing gnawing sounds and something puling the covers from them.

The legend eventually ends with John Bell being poisoned by the spirit who is able to communicate with them. The spirit reappears several more times throughout the years, and is still said to haunt descendants of the Bell family. The most recent was in 1990 when one of Bells descendants decided to go rabbit hunting. After shooting the rabbit and chasing it into a bush, there was nothing there but a piece of Joel Egbert Bell’s tomb stone.

The Stanley Hotel

Located in Colorado, this 138-room hotel has held many celebrities as well as many non-living residents. It is famous for many reasons, Stephen Kind wrote “The Shining” while staying there along with his wife. The hotel was later used in filming for the mini series based on the book.

The paranormal activity at this hotel has also made it famous, TAPS from the popular series Ghost Hunters has visited this hotel many times, doing live shows on Halloween. People claim to see F.O. Stanley in the lobby as well as a variety of other ghostly habitants.

Noises are often reported in room 418, as well as room 217. In one extreme case, a woman was even pushed down the stairs after jokingly writing “RED RUM” on a mirror. So if you decide to visit the wonderful Stanley Hotel, you just might see something strange, so be sure to bring your camera.

However, sometimes our drive to protect ourselves actually hurts us in the end. Just like the toughened calluses you may develop on your feet if you wear shoes that cause a lot of friction between the material and your skin, our hearts are very much prone to subconscious toughening and hardening. Although we do need to be careful about who we trust and we do need to guard our hearts, the barriers and walls that we erect all around us are just as dangerous.

Now there are some qualities that I do not come by naturally – for example, patience is a virtue in which I’ve made great strides, but one in which I could still improve considerably. One thing I have always had, though, is a compassionate heart and gentle spirit. At times, the sarcasm or timidity makes it hard to see it, but it always lies there, just beneath the surface.

Words cannot express what a burden it is to have a soul like mine. Everyone is dealing with something, and to channel all their pain simultaneously would leave the person with even the strongest faith weary by the end of the day. There have been times in my life where the grief has been nearly unfathomable. There have also been times where I’ve found myself screaming at God and questioning why He gave me the kind of spirit He did. Tenderheartedness is by no means easy.

Just like everyone else at sometime or another, I have been known to unintentionally build a shell around myself to keep from getting too depressed by the broken heartedness of those that may surround me.

And every time, God sends a wrecking ball to tear down the walls and break the shell. You’re about to hear about one of those wrecking balls.

I was in my late teens and had gone on an errand to a well-known retail supercenter. While I was there, I felt that familiar urging from around my bladder area, informing me that a pit stop was in order. I made my way back to the ladies room.

Kneeling on the floor in the ladies room was a female employee; facing her was a small child that couldn’t have been any older than five. Attending to the task at hand, I paid them little mind at first. When I went to wash my hands, however, I couldn’t help but overhear bits and pieces of what was going on.

“Now, I told you to behave while Mommy’s at work!” the woman bellowed. Her voice was fierce, and it echoed throughout the restroom.

“But, Mommy…” her son whined, stretching out the last syllable as long as possible.

“Stop your b—-ing, you little m—–f—-r. Or I’ll give you something to b—h about!”

I pushed the tab on the soap dispenser and watched the clear liquid ooze onto my hand. I bit my lip as I heard the child whimper and start to cry. I’m not all that into kids, but I would still never talk to one like that.

“Don’t you start crying, you little b—–d. Stop that. Shut up.”

“Mommy,” the boy repeated, this time refraining from drawing the phrase out. The tone of his small voice was now more pleading than whining.

“D–n it, I told you to stop your f—ing crying. Now, you know what’s going to happen next if you don’t stop the crying, you little b—h.”

“No, Mommy, no…”

The child’s voice became a mere squeak as he began to sob. I washed the foamy soap off of my hands and looked in the mirror. I didn’t really look, though. I just stared at my own face, blankly, and watched it turn pale.

“Stop it!” the boy’s mother screamed. My heart began to pound and I felt very, very cold, even though I could see tiny beads of sweat forming on my forehead as I reached for a paper towel.

“You know what I’m going to do. You know what I’m going to do if you don’t stop the crying!”

“Please, Mommy, no…”

I swallowed a lump in my throat. Frozen where I stood, I watched the pupils in my eyes diminish in size. There was a part of me that very much wanted to leave before the mother’s abuse escalated. My brain sent an impulse to walk out of the restroom, but my legs didn’t get the memo. Still staring at myself in the mirror (but not really looking), I might as well have been super glued to the floor tiles.

Involuntarily, my peripheral vision picked up the sight of the store employee raising her hand at the child as he continued to sob. The next sound I heard was the smack of her hand hitting him across the face at full force.

I didn’t just hear it once, though. The sound reverberated, bouncing off the tile walls of that ladies room so that the sound waves invaded my ears multiple times, and upon each return it was a grim reminder that I was standing in the same vicinity as the terrifying monster known as child abuse.

She struck him and cussed at him many more times before word reached my legs that I couldn’t possibly just stand there complacently any longer. I shook myself out of the daze, took my eyes off of the mirror and made my way to the door. I looked straight ahead, in an attempt to keep totally removed from the situation.

It was a little too late for that, though. Although I had merely stood at the sink with a glazed look on my face, I was a witness. Just like the mother’s hand striking her son, God sent a wrecking ball, at full force, straight at the walls I’d built around my soft heart and they were crumbling around me.

As I made my way to the exit – a journey of perhaps ten feet that seemed a lot more like ten miles – I had to pass the victim and his black-hearted parent. For a split second, I made eye contact with the young boy. That split second saw the total and complete destruction of the walls I’d built; it saw the shell around me annihilated and decimated.

In the course of that incredibly brief moment where I met the child’s eyes, I heard him screaming – pleading – for help, though not a word passed his mouth. The boy’s crying had slowed somewhat; he now sat on the cold floor with a spirit long since broken and a nose beginning to shed innocent blood.

Long after I walked out of that ladies room, long after I abandoned the items I’d been sent to get and simply ran for the door, long after I raced through the parking lot and fumbled with my car keys until I finally found the one that opened the door, I sat in my truck and shook.

During that time of sitting in my car and recovering from the disturbing situation I’d just witnessed, the child’s eyes appeared to me again – the first of many times that they would. A question rose from deep inside me: Why didn’t you do anything?

I had no answer. I still don’t. The excuse I gave myself is that I was too shocked at the time, but it somehow falls short of satisfying the question.

I have struggled a lot with the memory of that day. I cannot see myself forgiving the mother with the poisoned soul. There is no excuse she could possibly give me that would make things okay. While time has helped me come to a reasonably healthy psychological view of the event, it is something I will never forget. Nor is it something I believe I should completely forget.

When the walls start to go up around my heart again and apathy begins to take hold, a memory of the day is sure to lodge itself somewhere in my mind and remind me of what I did wrong.

Why didn’t you do anything? I’d ask myself again.

This time, I will.

But Grandmother believed in the democratic process too, and often canceled out his liberal vote by her conservative vote. This was the only sore spot in their relationship but when it came to politics, they both drew a distinct line in the sand and never wavered. Beatrice was very proud of a woman’s right to vote and she exercised this God given right religiously, sometimes at the expense of her husband’s peace of mind.

For instance, during the presidential election between democratic nominee, Adalai Stevenson and the republican nominee, Ike Eisenhower, you would have thought the north and the south had gotten into it all over again. Grandmother was a conservative northerner from Detroit, but oddly enough supported a southerner, Republican candidate General Ike Eisenhower! This was her conviction and she stood by her candidate.

Granddad, on the other hand, was a southern Democrat, in favor of a definite Yankee, named Adalai Stephenson. It went against their personal “grain” to be so divided over an issue because they were so appropriately matched in their personal relationship and life-long marriage of forty-two years. Some evenings their kiss goodnight was postponed until the wee hours of the morning because they would have long, passionate debates about their “man.” History shows that Grandmother put her man in office that year, for General Ike Eisenhower won the presidential election for four years. But Granddad never did stop volunteering at the voting booth, and he never, ever stopped voting his conscience. Back in those days, people saw that voting was a privilege not to be taken lightly, even at the expense of marital bliss! But their marriage was remarkably resilient and they forgave each other before they turned out the light.