Doobie

“Doobie” is a guy I know here in the college dorm.  Ironically, Doobie is his last name, just spelled slightly different.  Doobie is also the slang name for marijuana back in my days growing up (the 70’s and 80’s).  I’d listen to “The Doobie Brothers” (“Black Water”, “China Grove”, “Long Train Runnin”) and knew exactly why the band chose the name they did.  You could just look at the band members and know these guys got high.  And so it is with Doobie.  I just knew this dude was in here on a drug charge.  And, I was right.  “Pulled me over on I-95 in Prince George County on my way to Jersey,” he told me.  A pound of home grown weed in the trunk and hydroponic growing materials sealed his fate:  three years in the Virginia Corrections system.  So why write about Doobie?  Because, he’s different, not like most of the men in here.  And watching him do his bid reminds me what a waste of money prison is for most convicted felons.

Doobie is a very intelligent twenty-eight year old white guy from the Florida West Coast.  He’d already earned an associate’s degree “on the street” (in information technology) and was enrolled in night classes working toward his BA.   He was employed in the computer industry, working for a well known internet company.  He also had a green thumb.

Doobie loved growing things.  He maintained his parents’ landscaping.  Photos I’ve seen show lush gardens bursting with color.  He just “had a feel” for the proper combination of water, nutrients and care.  And it was that horticulture talent that led him to creating new and improved weed.  He studied hydroponic growing (raising plants in water) and grew (at least according to drug testing conducted on his stash after his arrest) highly potent marijuana.

He drove north from his home heading to the Jersey shore to visit friends.  He never made it.  A local sheriff’s deputy pulled him over; “Observed driver weaving erratically,” the officer noted.  Somehow, I think it was the vanity license plate “DoBe” issued by Florida and the “Grateful Dead” sticker in the window that led to his arrest.

I know marijuana is illegal. No doubt about it, Doobie broke the law.  But, three years?

The other night, we received “food packages”.  Twice a year, November and May, families are able to purchase special foods for inmates.  There are dozens of cookies, nuts, specialty meats and cheeses to choose from.  Guys look forward to something “different”, something that changes your time up.  And what does Doobie get?  $100 of bacon.  At $2.50 a package, that’s forty packs of microwavable bacon.  Twenty slices to a pack.  “That and Dr. Pepper (ordered on commissary) will get me through another six months.”

Doobie’s a great artist; he’s a bright – very bright – guy.  In less than a year he’ll head back to Florida.  Nothing in Virginia’s arrest and sentencing of him has changed his outlook about marijuana.  What has changed is his view of prison and how society handles nonviolent felons.

Doobie, you see, is smart enough to see the hypocrisy built in the system.   He sees the officers showing up hung over; he sees the favoritism promoted for snitching; he sees how black officers favor black inmates, white officers favor white inmates and racial tension and ignorance fester; he sees how Virginia is spending $25,000 a year to keep him locked up for carrying about $3,000 of marijuana; and, he tries not to lose his mind as he’s confronted daily by mentally ill inmates who aren’t getting treatment or the constant and inane ignorance of the rest.

Doobie and I talk a lot.  I understand his frustration.  Every time a judge sentences a person to prison and doesn’t have the guts to say the truth “this is nothing but a way to punish and beat you down” the hypocrisy continues.

Doobie’s content right now.  He’s got his bacon and his Dr. Pepper.  In another year he’ll be heading to Florida.  And Virginia will have nothing to show for convicting another guy of a drug charge.  Just another example of no correction and no justice in our criminal justice/correction system.