75 & 97

Numbers. We’re wired for numbers. We build our lives around them. They become a part of us. We have a social security number which identifies us – even though it was never supposed to be used for that. We have PINs and memorize birthdays, anniversaries, milestones all with numbers. Our lives are remembered in numbers. If we’re old enough, we know what 11-22-63 is, the day President Kennedy was gunned down. We’ve built 9-11 into our cultural conscience.

            Numbers. My life has been about numbers. I obsessed over my undergrad class rank; my monthly pay; my won-loss record with juries. With my arrest, I learned new numbers – the Virginia statue number for embezzlement. I saw on my sentencing order (again with social security number prominently displayed) a seven-figure restitution order. I reviewed records, massive piles of checks and numbers – all numbers – to account for my taking. And, I kept lists of numbers: of monies, assets conveyed to my employer and my wife, all in the desire to make things “right.”

            I came into DOC with an “offender ID” number – six digits – already issued. Two weeks later, DOC “upgraded” to a seven-digit number system. I put the six digit aside (though I still can recite it) and memorized the seven. Guys in here know how many years, months, days they will serve. It’s all numbers.

            I thought a lot about two numbers this week and what they mean. “75” and “97,” two obscure random numbers yet they carry meaning for me. And that, I realized, is what makes a number significant: What it means to us.

            “75.” Seventy-five years ago this July 4^th Yankee great Lou Gehrig gave one of the most poignant and heartfelt speeches in American history. Gehrig, “the Iron Horse,” had to give up baseball, his career, his artistic medium, when his body inexplicably began to deteriorate and weaken. We now know Gehrig had ALS, a form of muscular dystrophy that now bears his name.

            On the 4^th of July in 1939, the still young Gehrig stood at home plate as he was feted and recognized for his baseball accomplishments. And there were so many. Baseball – a game I hold in near reverence – is built on numbers and Gehrig’s dwarfed all but a few. The crowd knew, the man they had called “the Iron Horse” who set a record for consecutive games played (a record not eclipsed until Cal Ripken more than fifty-years later), was dying.

            Gehrig did not want to speak that day. He wanted, as was his custom, to stay quietly in the back. But, at the urging of his manager, he reluctantly stepped to the microphones. He spoke of his love for the Yankees and the men he played with and then he uttered these words:

            “Some people say I’ve been given a bad break. But today I consider myself the luckiest man alive …”

            In my prior life my wife and kids would laugh each time as I watched Gary Cooper in “Pride of the Yankees,” recite those words. No matter how many times I saw it, I choked up. They were, they are, te most powerful words of courage and hope in the face of death I had ever heard.

            There have been days these past six years when I conjured up those words to keep going, keep hoping. Gehrig knew he was dying, yet in his mind’s eye he was blessed. Two years after he said those words Gehrig passed away. Baseball, however, will never let Gehrig pass. His numbers still rank him among the greatest, but his words spoken from the heart 75 years ago will live on long after every record is erased.

            “97.” He lived to the ripe old age of 97 and when he passed the other day celebrities and politicians marveled at his life. And in here, at least a dozen of us who had read his life story knew we were better men because of him.

            Louie Zamperini lived an extraordinary life by any measure. A member of the 1936 U.S. Olympic track team he was in Berlin, Hitler’s showcase event where Nazi legions sat in stunned silence as black American runner Jesse Owens took gold. After the beginning of the war he became an Army Air Corp bombardier. What made his story amazing was little known until recounted in author Laura Hillenbrand’s best seller, Unbroken.

            Zamperini’s plane crashed in the Pacific. For 47 days – a tremendous number of days by any means – he floated in the Pacific. “Somehow,” he survived. Reaching an island, he was captured by the Japanese, taken to “Execution Island” and interned in a prisoner of war camp. He was starved and beaten by one particularly sadistic guard. “Somehow,” he survived.

            After the war, he returned to Southern California a hero. But, he couldn’t escape the anger and demons that welled up inside him from his time in captivity. He couldn’t escape the guilt of surviving when all the others on his plane didn’t. He drank and watched his life spin out of control.

            And then it happened. Louie was convinced by his wife, a woman pushed to the edge by his demons, to go to a church service. A young preacher named Billy Graham was having a tent revival in Los Angeles. Louie Zamperini went and discovered he didn’t have to live in guilt and hatred. Louie Zamperini was saved.

            He found the strength and courage to return to Japan and to forgive the guards who had treated his so cruelly. He found the courage to forgive himself.

            I read Ms. Hillenbrand’s book within weeks of its release. That copy of the book went from man to man in here. As I read it, I thought of a friend of mine who in my worst days at the jail visited almost daily. I was falling apart; I hated myself; I hated what I’d done. My friend told me to stop wearing sackcloth. “Stop being so hard on yourself. Every hair on your head is numbered.”

            Every hair is numbered. Even for a balding man those words made sense. I mattered. I was alright. As I read Louie Zamperini’s story, his was a story of numbers – every hair numbered.

            There are few books I consider life changing. Mr. Zamperini’s journey described in, Unbroken, is one such book. Throughout these years I’ve thought often of him and his amazing story. It is a story of numbers – of times in track races, days lost at sea, days in captivity, and finally days knowing his hairs were numbered. “97,” an extraordinary life for an extraordinary man.

            I found myself thinking of numbers this week: my friend DC turned 61 and has spent 42 years incarcerated. My father turned 81. In three weeks I’ll be 55. In 5 weeks I will have been locked up 6 years. Numbers all around me. And then I came across 75 and 97 and I remembered some numbers really do matter.

The Promised Land (2)

On June 11, 1963, a reluctant young President Kennedy addressed the nation. For the second time in his administration he was forced to federalize a state’s National Guard to ensure that black students were able to enroll in universities, which were deemed “off-limits” to people of color.

            Kennedy was not a champion of civil rights at the time. His ventures into the increasingly violent white reaction to a black minister’s call for an end to “Jim Crow,” a call for equality under the law regardless of the color of one’s skin, were often politically motivated. But now, with a Southern Governor standing on the threshold of his state’s flagship university and refusing admittance to two qualified black students in defiance of a Federal court order, with fire hoses and attack dogs let loose on peaceful children (some as young as six) marching and singing, Kennedy had seen enough.

            Race, he said, was a moral issue. America cannot be the land it professes to be as long as some of its citizens are denied the American dream, denied equal citizenship because of their color. He said, “Race has no place in American life or law.”

            That night, a young black wife and her children waited for a husband and father to arrive home in Jackson, Mississippi. This man – soft spoken and well versed – was the face of the civil rights movement in his state. As his wife and children walked out the front door of their home to tell him of President Kennedy’s words a shot rang out. Medgar Evers lay dead in his driveway. His crime? He believed in “the promised land.”

            Race in America. President Kennedy was right. Until we deal with it, lay it out there and move forward, America will never get to the Promised Land. I write this blog in a moment of deep distress over what I saw in here this week among young men who are – purportedly – seeking an education and a future. As I have written so often, prison is a reflection of the society at large. The views, the prejudices, uttered in here are the same as those out there. That thought distresses me.

            A Humanities class is being taught. The subject the African-American experience. It is taught through great American literature and it is taught by a petite white woman. The class is equally divided: eight whites, eight blacks. It wasn’t intended that way; that’s just how the college student pool in here breaks down.

            From the outset of the class I heard carping from white students. “Why do I need this bullshit?” My response: Have you ever read ‘A Raisin in the Sun”? Have you ever read Richard Wright? Do you know who Langston Hughes is? Maya Angelou? Have you ever dissected Dr. King’s letter smuggled from the Birmingham Jail?

            They reluctantly agree to give the class a shot, all the while muttering code words for the “N” word: “Yams,” “Canadians.” There are dozens of words tossed around in prison that white guys use to degrade blacks without uttering the “N” word.

            So now I’m pissed. I can’t believe I’m having to justify Dr. King to a bunch of idiots – worse, idiots who profess a belief in the teachings expressed by Jesus yet they fail to see that everything Dr. King wrote and preached began with this pure statement of faith:

            “We as a people will get to the Promised Land … Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!”

            Powerful, heartfelt words of faith and determination, and hope, uttered-ironically – less than 24 hours before he too was cut down by an assassin’s bullet.

            In frustration I run and wonder how professing Christians can ignore Paul’s words to the citizens of Athens (Acts 17) as he proclaimed “the God who made the world and everything in it … He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on the face of the earth.” We are so far from the Promised Land.

            I was frustrated and angry … and it got worse. For now there were the black students, members of offshoot black supremacist groups acting under color of religion: the IVOI, Moors Temple, 5%ers. They profess intellectual acumen yet they are forged and schooled in the same dearth of prejudice and ignorance I just confronted with the whites.

            “Why do you want to teach this material?” One guy asks in class. The question, at first blush, seems innocuous; but it isn’t. Moments before, I heard this same Einstein shake his head and say, “I got to listen to this European lady talk about black issues.” “European,” that’s black “supremacy” lingo for “cracker.”

            “Why do you want us to read Native Son? Why do you want us to read 12 Years a Slave?” Each question is a challenge to her. He might as well say, “What gives you the right to delve into the black experience? You aren’t black!” And I get more frustrated, pissed off, angry. “When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn?”

            “I don’t know what the future holds … but I know who holds the future.” On one of the darkest days of the civil rights struggle – bombings, murders, beatings, - a fearful group of parishioners gathered in an all-black church on a sweltering day. Dr. King, from the pulpit, uttered those words and from around that church came soft murmurs of “Yes, Lord.” “The Promised Land” is so because He deems it to be so. God – not man – will deliver His people to the Promised Land.

            A story I have never shared with anyone. I was a sophomore in college living in a wild party-filled dorm across campus. In the room next to mine was a young black guy from Dayton, Ohio – Johnny D. Johnny and I shared some common interests in music, food, girls. I thought I was cool – I had a black friend.

            One night we had a party on our floor. There was way too much alcohol and weed; there were girls everywhere and we were all getting way too sloppy and out of hand. I’d spent some time with “Charlotte” a tall, gorgeous girl from Valdosta, Georgia. We were making out, getting friendly, when she saw Johnny looking our way. In her sexiest Southern drawl she told me the “N” was making her uncomfortable. I turned toward Johnny and laughing said, “he’s a harmless n-----.” … As the word came out of my mouth I had a flash of sobriety. I saw his face and what my saying that word had done. In my rush to win over some beautiful, though obviously ignorant, girl I had done something harmful.

            “Look, Johnny, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. I was just trying to impress her.” He looked at me and said, “It’s ok. I’m used to it.” The truth is you never are used to that.

            I have never used that word since. I still feel guilt over saying it then. “The promised land.” Will we ever get there?

            “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.” Powerful words that describe the dream of America written by a slave owner from Virginia.

            “Jesus loves the little children

            All the children of the world

            Red and yellow

            Black and white

            They are precious in His sight

            Jesus loves the little children of the world.”

            Will we ever get to the Promised Land? We have to walk through the valley of fear and ignorance. In God’s eyes there is no black or white, no yellow or brown. In spite of this week’s race baiting and ignorance on both sides I still have hope. As Dr. King so eloquently put it in his Letter from Birmingham Jail, America will overcome the scourge of its racial past because,

            “The sacred heritage of our nation and the

            eternal will of God are embodied in our

            echoing demands.”

Personal Ad

Big S and I were talking the other day about relationships. He’s been giving a great deal of thought to his future. In particular, does he try and reestablish a relationship with his daughter’s mom and rebuild their family. As I’ve written before, Big S is a relatively young man (early 30’s) but I think he was born mature. Perhaps it’s the prison experience, but he is wise beyond his, beyond my, years.



Relationships and sexuality are weird subjects anytime. They are even more so in prison. Guys approach their sexuality, their “needs” in all sorts of ways. First, there are the openly effeminate, prancing, dancing gays. They sew their own clothes; call each other “girl” and hook up in the bathrooms in the middle of the night. Almost all of them are housed in two buildings. I’m in a “gump” free zone (gump is prison jargon for homosexual) so my only contact with “La Cage aux Folles” is on the rec yard or at work.


Flamboyance in the prison gay community is a must. At the same time, there is a vicious undercurrent of homophobia in here. The only thing worse than being labeled a snitch is a gump. Guys go out of their way to prove they’re “hetero” and their proof is weight lifting and describing in exact, graphic detail what they’d do to a continuing increasing list of celebrities, models, vice-presidential candidates (Sarah Palin is a big hit in prison). This weeks “girl guest” was the TV Azteca reporter who was sexually harassed in the Jets locker room.


The dirty little secret in here is every gay guy has one or two supposedly straight guys as “boy toys”. And the guys who secretly see the “girls” are the ones who react with such venom when jokes are made about their sexuality. They rationalize that they aren’t really gay, just doing what needs to be done. That may explain why a pimp did so well in 6 building.


My ex used to complain that I was homophobic. I had definite opinions on gays, but like many other things, my opinions have evolved since my arrest. When I was at the jail, a Captain wrote a major charge against a gay trustee (“Kiki”). He asked me for help and I soon realized the Captain had it in for him. I believed correctly (as it turned out), because he was gay. I defended Kiki, won his case and convinced the jail the Captain needed “sensitivity training”. Two days later I was mysteriously transferred to DOC custody and the hell that was Powhatan receiving.


In February, I was walking across the compound and heard a shriek. “That’s him! That’s the lawyer that kicked that F---in Captain’s ass!” Scampering toward me was Kiki and two other “Supremes”. I am the lawyer for gay and straight, black and white.


On the other side of the sexual revolution in prison are the serial gunners. “Gunning” is the prison term for self love. There are guys in here who will announce “headin’ to the shower for some me time”. We have a few “shower guys” in here. You just learn to give them their space.


There are always incidents at visitation involving “conjugal” visits from wives or girlfriends. At least once a weekend a guy gets sent to the hole for receiving a “helping hand” from his “girl”. No matter how discreet, the camera in the sky knows!


I always wondered, back in my free days, how Catholic priests did the celibacy thing. I’ve learned over these past two years it’s not that hard (“that’s what she said!” - sorry, too many episodes of The Office). I was with my wife for 28 years. In that time I never cheated, never strayed. We had our problems, no doubt, but I loved her and viewed our physical relationship as part of who we were as a couple. Frankly, sex, without that loving relationship, just doesn’t interest me very much.


Back to Big S. He’s been thinking a great deal about his daughter and trying to create a loving home for her when he’s released. “Do you love her (the mom)?” He does. Then I told him about my situation. How I still love my ex and the thought of growing old without her fills me with deep sadness. But, I also know things couldn’t just go back to the way they were. I’ve realized through this experience that our relationship wasn’t as good as it should have been. I realized I put in an incredible amount of energy out of fear – fear she didn’t love me – and it made me not be the kind of man I should have been.


Big S understood exactly what I meant. I was reminded of a letter I received from my ex shortly after she filed for divorce. In it, she told me the reasons for her action. She said:


“You’re a convicted felon with a huge debt to repay and probably a lousy credit rating. You’re not much of a catch!”


It got me thinking about a personal ad I should run to find a new “significant other” (my ex used to teasingly suggest we go on “eHarmony” to see if we were a match). After all, advertising is really about the message, not the reality (case in point, our current President). So here goes:


“Physically fit, mature hairline, 51 year old male seeks any communication from females ages 35+ to 55. Must enjoy writing, reading, outdoors, my cooking, and be willing to overlook a $1 million plus restitution order. Must wait – patiently – for years – for an actual date. Interested candidates must be pre-approved by Big S and DOC (I can’t associate with know felons).


I’ve discovered it’s easier for guys to get hard core porn smuggled in than sustain a loving relationship with the one you love. It’s sad really. You get jaded about love, then you see “DC” and his wife in visitation. 38 years she’s stood by him. 38 years she comes for visits and they hold hands. “She knows I’m not the murderer they defined me to be. She knows the man I am, the man I can and will be. We’re in this together.”


Now, that’s love.

At Least This Isn't California

About a week ago, a riot broke out at California’s Folsom Prison (think “the Man in Black”, Johnny Cash) on a handball court. When it was over about 250 inmates were injured or charged with fighting. California has 155,000 men and women incarcerated in a system only built to house half that many. They are currently operating under a Federal Court order to release 40,000 inmates in the next 18 months to reduce their inmate population to 137% of bed capacity [Note: the inmate lawsuit over this issue took the Federal Courts 10 years to finally order the mass release. For eight years California operated under a consent order to either release or build more prisons. Oh yeah, they have a $19 billion budget shortfall so they can’t afford to build any new prisons.]



Things are so bad with California prison medical care that “Governor Aahnold” agreed by consent order to spend $150 million immediately to improve medical care for inmates when faced with “an alarmingly high rate of deaths of inmates due to poor care and suicide”.


At least Virginia doesn’t have the problems California has. Really? Last Friday, August 27th, one inmate was stabbed to death and three others seriously injured at the level 4 Nottoway Correction Center.


At Greensville, a massive 3,000 inmate prison holding level 2 and 3 inmates, since January two inmates have been murdered and one committed suicide. And, at Red Onion prison – the Commonwealth’s Super Max facility – two inmates have been murdered – by the same inmate.


But forget that. After all, those guys are felons. They deserve what happens to them (I wonder how many people dare say that while they’re sitting in their church pews on Sunday morning). Instead, think about the cost.


According to Virginia’s State Government website, there are approximately 38,900 inmates serving time in Virginia’s prisons. That does not include another 5,000 with DOC numbers awaiting transfer to a DOC facility who are sitting in regional jails, overcrowding them. The DOC website announces “fortunately, we don’t yet have an overcrowding problem”.


I guess it depends on how you define “overcrowding”. Having bunks sitting in fire lanes must not meet DOC’s definition of overcrowding. Having 200 inmates being watched by two officers must not meet their definition either. And, I guess being so understaffed that COs at Nottoway couldn’t search for “shanks” isn’t overcrowding, at least according to DOC’s spokesman, Larry Traylor.


Still not convinced, consider the other costs. As former Lt. Governor (and now head of Prison Ministries) Mark Earley recently said: “Virginia spends more than $1.1 billion annually on its prisons”. That’s more than is spent on education or healthcare in the Commonwealth.


Then there are the legal costs. In between filing lawsuits challenging the new federal health care plan, or going after a University of Virginia Professor who conducts research on global warming for fraud, Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is responsible for defending DOC in a myriad of cases.


Each year, inmates file thousands of Habeas Corpus petitions in an attempt to get their sentences reviewed. Each case requires an Assistant Attorney General (and support staff) to defend the legitimacy of the incarceration.


Each year thousands of other suits are filed by inmates over violations of constitutional rights, such as religious freedom. Injured inmates or inmates denied adequate medical care sue.


Then, there are the major lawsuits brought by or on behalf of inmates. Currently, Troutman Sanders (a major Richmond law firm) is providing counsel to eleven inmates who have been denied parole (guys locked up pre-1994 are still parole eligible).


The National Lawyer’s Guild filed suit against DOC for refusing to allow inmates to order a legal self-help book. Prison Legal News filed a similar lawsuit over censorships of their paper, a monthly compilation of cases around the country involving inmates and prisons.


On September 2nd, U.S. District Court Judge James Turk, sitting in Roanoke, found “laughable” the Attorney General’s argument in an inmate censorship suit. In that case, the inmate sued because Augusta Correction Center refused him access, under Operating Procedure 803.2, to literary classics such as James Joyce’s Ulysses, DH Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover and Nabokov’s Lolita (all three books appear on various “100 Must Read Books”). The reason for denying access to these books according to the Attorney General? Inmates read these books for the sex scenes depicted in them, then “barter” the books for goods and services.


The Judge – not a bleeding heart, a no-nonsense conservative – found the policy unconstitutional censorship. DOC has dozens of rules that are selectively enforced and/or vague and nonsensical that lead to litigation. Imagine the dollars Virginia taxpayers spend just on legal costs alone. Add that to the $1.1 billion annual budget and you start talking about “real money”.


In this case, Virginia DOC is well on the road to copying its neighbor to the west. Soon Virginians will be able to paraphrase President Kennedy’s famous words. When it comes to prisons, Virginians can say: “Ich bin ein Californian”.