It happened on the morning of my birthday, February 16th. “Code Blue! Code Blue!” Boots squeaked on concrete before the thump-thump-thump of a guard running down the stairs. During the 6am live count when guards check on every inmate to make sure he is alive and in the cell, they stopped at IU-134. Bangbangbangbang. The noise of a metal baton striking the metal commode left no doubt something happened to Hector between 6am and 5am, the last time the guards walked through the block.
                “Mr. Juarez!” A pause. “Mr. Juarez, why are you on the floor?” No response. “Mr. Juarez! Mr. Juarez!” Several minutes later four guards jogged through the open pod door and up the stairs to Hector’s cell. They carried no backboard or medical bag. Louis, the guard who found Hector on the floor, asked, “Where is medical?” His African accent was unmistakable. “Code Blue! Pod 3! Code Blue! Pod 3!” A radio squawked with garbled sound and static.
                I stood at my cell door and watched through the window, unable to see what happened on the tier above me. While brushing my teeth four more guards streamed through the open door and walked up the stairs. Ten minutes had passed since Louis found Hector unresponsive on the floor. Another minute and a group of nurses arrived carrying a red Emergency Response duffle bag. Six more guards rushed in behind them, out of breath after running from the other end of Central Prison.  After fifteen minutes a doctor strolled in at a brisk walk with two more nurses in street clothes. Two guards pushed a gurney behind them.
                Somehow twenty-one staff were crowded along the narrow tier above me. I tried to imagine what it looked like with so many people clustered near Hector’s cell. Only two or three could squeeze into the cell with him. What were all of the guards for?
                It took a bit over twenty minutes from the time Louis radioed in the Code Blue to the point where Hector was strapped to a backboard, carried down the stairs, and checked by a doctor. Finally, upon making some decision I couldn’t see a guard and two nurses wheeled Hector out of the block. The rest of the guards milled around for a few minutes before they too left.
                Weeks later we learned Hector had a stroke and was paralyzed on the right side of his body. It would be another month before he gained enough strength to walk with a cane and return to the block.
                While Hector was gone I stood in the canteen line one day, waiting for my turn at the window when two guards’ radios squawked “Code Blue! Code Blue! Unit Three!” Again a parade of guards ran, jogged and fast-walked down the hallway and out of a unit door to a plot of ground used for Native American service. A prisoner was having a seizure. Those of us standing in the canteen line, our unit sergeant and a guard stood dumbfounded, counting. Twenty-one, two, three – a doctor and two plain clothes nurses brought up the rear. Twenty-six staff responding to a medical emergency that, at most, might have required two nurses, a few staff from the unit and a doctor.
                Why so many staff in one area after the incidents at Bertie and Pasquotank Correctional Facilities, where similar ploys were used to draw staff away from other parts of the prison? This couldn’t be the new Security Response Team, not when there are still staffing vacancies that need to be filled. This must be the training element where response time of new hires were measured against the notoriously slow nursing staff. It makes me wonder if next, as a way of rating their response time, prisoners who are hospitalized, and still alive, will be given surveys. How did we do? Check one of these boxes:
 

•  I feel safe and secure
  
•  I feel okay about staff’s response
  
•  Needs Improvement
•  God help us!

Short Journey is a nondenominational Christian retreat for prisoners, a three day blitz of song, food and the Word of God. A group of older men called “Kairos” conduct the Short Journey on death row and other area prisons. In doing so they are effective stewards of The Way, The Truth and The Light.

April 10-12 was my third Short Journey in the last four years and the anticipation among those of us selected to attend was not any less than the previous times. Admittedly, our excitement had a lot to do with the food, catered by Central Prison’s “Test Kitchen”, the place where prison staff go to eat. Compared to food served in our chow hall, meals from the Test Kitchen (also known as the Officers’ Dining Hall) is restaurant quality. You might not think three days of good food does much for your capacity to listen and absorb an important message; you would be wrong.

The simple pleasure of palatable, seasoned food and a full stomach is a powerful draw in prison. On death row it’s akin to Christmas. Not only are you spared the drama of standing in line for 20 minutes to get a tray of something that is often tasteless or disgusting, the atmosphere of Short Journey is buoyant and friendly. The Kairos have done this ministry for many years and know the secret to getting a stubborn man to listen lies in meeting his most basic need. They call this “the hook”. Dee, one of the oldest Kairos said:

“We know many of you guys come here for the food; we want you to. Eat your fill and tell others. And when you’re sated we’ll feed you with an entirely different kind of food, the sort that will feed you for a lifetime and beyond.”

Over the course of three eight-hour days we dissected the Lord’s Prayer line-by-line, discussed prayer in our confinement, and read a number of different passages from the Bible, reflecting on how they applied in our lives. A lot of our table discussions--twenty death row prisoners were divided into four tables entitled, “Luke”, “John”, “Mark”, and “Matthew”--tended to be lively. Not every prisoner who participated professed Christianity as their faith and some who did had very strange views. Needless to say there existed an opportunity for everyone to learn from his neighbor.

Our table discussions were facilitated by the Kairos’ “talks”. These speeches, often harrowing accounts out of their own personal hells, inspired and provoked thought. One particular talk caught my interest the most because it touched on the topic of forgiveness from Jesus as he hung from the cross, in Luke 13:34

“ Father, forgive them, they know not what they do,”

Ken the Kairo interpreting the passage said:
“I often think of what Jesus said that day he was crucified, imagining there to be so much more in between the lines. ‘Father, heal them of their wounded pride and their soul sickness that leads to the death of their own souls; the death of sane, rational thinking; the death of their trusting relationship to you, Father; the death of relationships with others who suffer the same soul sickness they themselves have.’”

As I listened to Ken it struck me how much truth can cut through the debris of our lives to fulfill a need that had yet to exist until that moment. Soul sickness described an ache I can never quite soothe on my own, a place my spirit weeps, just as Jesus cried out “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?”

I go to the Short Journey to get fed in what is quite literally a mountaintop experience of fun, fellowship, and fulfillment. It is a respite from the daily grind of life in prison. The challenge is carrying the light of God down into the shadow of the valley so others who stumble along in their soul sickness might be shown The Way. The challenge is in making certain the light is not extinguished.

​

A February 2018 News & Observer editorial described an alarming increase in jail deaths as “supervision failures”, then recommended these solutions:

1. Improve staff training
2. Hire more guards
3. Investigate the cause of these inmate deaths

 
“Supervision failures” imply lapses in judgement on the job, poor management of underlings, or a department’s collective incompetence led to dysfunction and inefficiency. Not a sixteen year old girl hanging herself with a bed sheet in a jail cell. Not an ill man dying of pneumonia in a jail cell because he was denied medical attention. At best, the solutions suggested by the editorial oversimplify the problems inherent in mass incarceration; at worst it obfuscates a culture of abuse and neglect, then suggests funding the problem instead of addressing the cause.
                Yes, train and properly staff every jail and prison; investigate every lapse in supervision, and not just the incidents resulting in death but each medical emergency and attempted suicide; call on the general assembly to appropriate and invest more funds in the safety and security of the state prison system. These are necessary responses to the increased number of suicides and “supervision failures” in North Carolina jails and prisons.
                The NC Republican legislature can also vote to give judges greater discretion in sentencing and eliminate mandatory minimum sentences allowing courts the ability to divert more offenders to mental health facilities and drug treatment centers. Legislators could also hold prosecutors accountable for over-incarcerating addicts for simple things like paraphernalia and public intoxication charges. The general assembly could even release the remaining 3 of 12 million dollars allocated for the NCDPS mental health department in 2014. These changes would directly impact jail and prison populations across the state, and remove some of the burden put on overworked, underpaid staff.
                Does being charged with a crime mean one deserves less adequate medical care and consideration as a human being? Focusing on a jail’s bureaucracy and staffing policies underscores a fundamental flaw in how incarcerated citizens are perceived. Rather than be recognized as complex beings with more needs than the average person, prisoners are devalued beneath the shade of incarceral policies. Instead of acknowledging how deinstitutionalizing the mental health system has wrought catastrophic damage on the penal system – there are calls for more guards. The N&O editorial, in its reasoning, fails to mention how the courts criminalize mental illness because draconian drug laws show no mercy to addicts, and city ordinances and the VA further alienate homeless veterans. Not even a token word about drug courts, involuntary commitments from the jail to mental health facilities, intake screening, or other viable alternatives to jail.
                Overrelying on incarceration as a panacea to crime exposes every weakness in the criminal justice system. More suicides occur in jail because more addicts and mentally ill people are incarcerated, not treated. Jailors are not orderlies or mental health professionals and expecting them to fill such roles is disastrous policy. Jails are not asylums. Before lasting changes can be made to the safety and security of NC’s jails and prisons their occupants must be treated humanely, and with the recognition by staff they are not things in a warehouse. Maybe then the general assembly and NC Prison Reform Commission can address every failure in the criminal justice system, not just those that support their tough-on-crime rhetoric.

We were hurt when chaplain Chestnut left the prison to pursue other opportunities in the free world; but, also, to save his marriage. Months before Chestnut left, he let slip that his wife was angry he spent more time on death row than he did at home. We were grateful. Chaplain Chestnut provided counsel before and after the executions of our friends. He grieved with us and some guards hated him for it. Chestnut treated us fairly, maybe even favorably, going out of his way to lessen the harshness of our confinement by valuing our humanity as much as any of his parishioners in the free world. He treated us like equals.
    The chaplains who replaced Chestnut were policy wonks, sticklers for following the rules and making the guards feel more comfortable than the “inmates”. Their use of the word “inmate” was like that of the N-word on a plantation--intended to segregate, isolate and belittle.
    Chestnut left in 2004 and none of us thought to connect his departure to any unwritten rule regarding death row. Prison is full of unwritten and unspoken rules that guide interaction between prisoners, but the idea of an unspoken or unwritten rule controlling interaction between staff and prisoners was the stuff of conspiracy theorists. Or so I thought.
    The written policy of no fraternizing between guard and prisoner poisons the purpose of a chaplain, but with regular guards it is easy to understand. The problem is that human beings are social creatures and no matter how much you indoctrinate or denigrate a person, humanity wins out. Guards are not emotionless robots any more than death row prisoners are solely the crimes for which we are convicted and sentenced.
    Over the years some guards have gone out of their way to be kind, patient, and compassionate toward us. They show leniency without violating any policies and are not blinded by the idea of their job; humanity guides how they respond to us. In prison, where humanity is intentionally devalued as a form of punishment, where empathy is withheld lest it be construed as sympathy for enemies of the State, being treated as a guard’s equal is as rare as potable water in the Sahara.
    When we are devalued it negatively impacts our sense of self-worth and influences how we respond to orders. It is hard to see our keepers as anything more than a uniform enforcing a set of rules; it’s actually easier for us to devalue them in return. Humanity does not depart if an external force fails to recognize or validate it; it’s intrinsic to personhood. Except, the unwritten rule works to deny this claim, forging an identity defined as “condemned”, and pushing out any who cannot abide it.
    Before my friend Earl was executed in ‘05 a guard who befriended him quit: she couldn’t stand the thought that her continued employment on death row signaled participation in his execution. Months later another guard quite because his live-and-let-live attitude was unacceptable to a unit manager who would rather see us pick up rocks than go unpunished for the slightest transgression. Many have asked for transfers to other units because accepting the unwritten rule means squelching your natural inclination to show compassion. Other guards have been put on notice by management for taking sides against the abuses of their co-workers. Two unit managers and assistant unit managers were transferred because they were too willing to challenge nonsensical or poorly made administrative decisions regarding death row.
    The unwritten rule on death row requires disinterest, allegiance to policy, and a frequent changing of the guards to reduce the development of familiarity. The rule holds that working for the State does not mean you leave your humanity at the door, it means you must forget about ours. Flouting the idea that we are “less than” is unacceptable.
    From 2013 to the end of 2017 Dr. Kuhns directed psychological programs for the mental health department at Central Prison. A man of conviction and compassion, Kuhns established a number of therapeutic programs on death row. Creative writing, yoga, drama group, chess therapy, Toastmasters and more -- these groups changed the way we prisoners saw our value as human beings and promoted emotional maturity. Dr. Kuhns enlisted the aid of like-minded volunteers from the free world, people who recognized our potential for growth. The problem, and ultimately end of Dr. Kuhn’s employment at CP, is that he ignored the unwritten rule on death row. We are not meant to be rehabilitated or treated as if there is worth in our potential. Since Dr. Kuhns was forced out of the prison the programs he established on death row have been eliminated along with the volunteers. There is no psychologist in the prison who even looks in the direction of death row despite a legislative mandate requiring their presence on the unit.
    Early January of 2018 a sergeant retired after twenty-five years of dedicated service to the prison. I remember meeting him for the first time in 1997, when I came to CP as a 19 year old safekeeper facing a capital murder trial. Because of his proximity to us, many knew this man better than their own families. We all knew he participated on death watch squads--groups of guards assigned to watch condemned prisoners in the final 72 hours before execution.
    I asked him about this before he left. He said, “Some guys ask for me to be there. At least then they can die with somebody close by who knew them, despite everything.”
    After his retirement this sergeant returned to death row in street clothes, his wife and son at his side as he pointed out death row prisoners he knew for decades. Then he left with a wave; it was the goodbye for someone who was as much a part of our lives as we are of his, regardless of the rules.

​

At Central Prison most prisoners cycle through a position working in the kitchen. Washing pots and pans, cleaning surfaces, preparing food, serving food on the line, and cooking, but only if you know how. Since there is no longer a cooking program at CP only those with prior experience get to cook, though this hardly makes the food better. Every once in a while somebody will be put in the baker position and do a great job; biscuits are fluffy, cakes soft and coated with icing, and cornbread not too sweet. Good bakers are rare and do not last long; they get their choice of whatever prison in the state they want to live in because good bakers are a high commodity.
                Bakers, like cooks, are paid $1 a day. Every other position earns 40-60 cents a day. Before the NC Sentencing Commission changed the law in 1994, incentive wage jobs came with gain time – time off of a prisoner’s sentence. Anyone charged with a crime after 1994 does not have access to good time (good behavior), gain time (work and school), and parole. Life without parole was implemented, and de facto life sentences became common. Federal and state funding for higher education ended, so did many other programs like the cooking school at Central Prison.
                The food at CP did not begin to get bad until several years later, when the then NC Division of Prisons decided too much money was spent on food, the old school kitchen stewards retired, and an influx of new prisoners with life sentences filled all of the kitchen positions. The wages are the only thing that remained the same: bakers and cooks are paid the most, everyone else 40-60 cents a day.
                Regular guards without cooking experience took the place of kitchen stewards, monitoring the making and doling out of food. There were too few of them to stop the black market of sugar, bacon and contraband passed out of the window where trays are received in the dish room. The guards could occasionally be bribed or were lazy enough only to pretend they cared. They knew the prisoners worked because they wanted to avoid solitary confinement. There are no other incentives. No gain time or better wages.
                There are other jobs at Central Prison – hallway and cell block janitors, clothes house workers, maintenance assistants, canteen operators, and hospital janitors. The more technical or hazardous positions – canteen operators, maintenance assistants, hospital janitors and clothes house workers earn $1 a day; every other job at CP pays 40-60 cents a day.
                It’s bad enough the NC Sentencing Commission eliminated parole and the ability for prisoners to earn time off of their sentences; but, when you try to live off a dollar a day or less in prison it makes for a miserable existence. Stamps costs more than the lowest wage. A local phone call costs nearly twice as much as the highest wage. Toiletry items and writing materials cost money too. Imagine being given life without parole, you don’t have friends or family after twenty years, no way to appeal your sentence, and nothing left to lose. What if it wasn’t LWOP? Maybe just 20-25 year and no reason to believe life will get better?
                It is no secret the food prepared in the kitchen sucks because the guys who prepare it don’t care. They have no reason to care when it’s easy to fix their own food and mix slop for everybody else. It’s not as if they are being rehabilitated anymore; in fact, with guards standing over them like plantation straw bosses it’s easy to see how a bad day often becomes much, much worse.
                Kenneth Lassiter, Director of NC prisons, made an appearance on WRAL’s Sunday morning news program “On the Record” (3-18-18). Along with the director of SEANC (State Employees Association of North Carolina), Lassiter spoke of the problems facing NC prisons as he answered questions from news anchor David Crabtree and Laura Leslie. The discussion focused on what changes will be made in NC prisons to address staffing shortages, undertraining, and general safety and security of every facility. There was a cursory question about the cause of 2017’s violence in NC prisons, to which Lassiter, made an equally cursory response about “idle minds in prison and no programs lead to violent problems . . “ (not an exact quote, but pretty close; feel free to google the broadcast for more information).
                Lassiter’s comment about “idle minds” glossed over some extremely pertinent information that directly impacts public safety.

1. Not every prisoner spends the rest of his or her life in prison. A majority will return to the free world after so many years of forced labor, and will have little to show for their time.
2. The lack of higher education and rehabilitative programs breed “idle minds”. The work done in prison is not a marketable skill to employers on the outside, unless you’re talking about absolute obedience to authority. Idle minds released from prison recidivate.
3. There are no incentives in North Carolina’s penal system, only coercive measures. There are no rewards for good behavior or doing the right thing. There is no give or leniency in the system, only a crumbling idea of what rehabilitation and human decency used to look like in prison. Now there is only despair and hatred for people who give you plenty of the stick without the benefit of a carrot.

 
I will give Mr. Lassiter credit in one thing. At least he deigned to mention “idle minds” in prison. He is aware there is more to the problem of prison safety than calling for the National Guard (Rep. Bob Steinburg) and executing people who have been sentenced to death (Rep. Bob Steinburg) so other prisoners will get the message North Carolina is tough on crime.  I have to wonder though, do any of the prison officials and legislators on the North Carolina Prisons Commission know what it’s like to work for 40 cents a day? To be told at the end of an eight hour shift you’ve got to work overtime for free; to be forced to work or get punished?
My guess is they don’t, and neither does the general public when they call for harsher laws and more punishment. By now it should be obvious to the public, as it is to Kenneth Lassiter, that violence in prison primarily comes from a lack of incentive.
 
3-18-18  On the Record
http://www.wral.com/news/local/video/17423783/

Five of us and the priest sat around the table making small talk when the chaplain stepped over and held up his hands, signaling a desire to interrupt before Mass began.
                “Gentlemen, the North Carolina Department of Public Safety has established a new Religious Practices Policy, as of February 1, 2018. The main one that applies to your Catholic service is that no offender will be allowed to consume the wine. Only the priest may do so.” He looked away, as if he had created a list of potential responses to our reaction.
                Angel’s thin mustache turned down with the corners of his mouth. “You gotta be kidding me. We litigated this before. New policy? Right. We’ll see about this crap. I’ll write to the Vatican again. We’ll just have to sue you guys again since you’ve forgotten.”
                Disgusted, Jeff dropped the front legs of his chair to the floor and unfolded his arms. “We’ll just have to write some grievances.”
                “You cannot grieve policy,” said the chaplain.
                “Really?” Jeff sat up. “What is this, a friggin’ tyranny? We can’t write grievances about policy? That’s what they’re for!”
We have to write a grievance just to get stays of execution. Writing an Administrative Remedy Procedure, or grievance, is the necessary first step before any litigation can move forward. Even if you want to sue the prison because the guards are beating you in full restraints – you have to write a grievance first. Of course doing so is a ridiculous waste of time; the patent response by the administration is to quote the very policy you are claiming has been violated or is unconstitutional; and they claim their officers are doing the job they’ve been paid to do. Grievances on the inside mean nothing, but courts on the outside require us to fill them out anyway.
Keith, Andrew and me sat and watched, knowing the chaplain didn’t really care what we thought or did, so long as it did not involve him. With a few exceptions, the chaplaincy has never really been there for us. They’re seldom more than another type of guard enforcing a specific set of rules.
Sensing it was time to move on, the priest cleared his throat and began Mass, reciting the familiar greeting and making the sign of the cross. “Saints of God. We gather in celebration . . .”
For the entirety of my nineteen years on death row I have attended Catholic Mass and celebrated the Eucharist – both the host and wine – on Thursday afternoons. There has never been a problem with, or abuse of, the Holy Sacrament by anyone on death row or anyone in the general population. The amount we consume is mixed with water – as is required by the rite—and never more than a sip, if that much. Getting a bureaucracy like the prison system to understand this requires a court.
Before the early 90s there was no Catholic Mass on death row until Angel, a devout Catholic from New York, wrote the Vatican and explained how the chaplaincy at the prison refused to acknowledge Catholicism as a Christian faith, or allow a priest to deliver Mass at the prison. It took a few months, but Angel received a letter from the Vatican representative who asked for a detailed account of the anti-Catholic sentiment at the prison. Angel responded and, about six months later, the first Catholic priest delivered Mass on NC’s death row; and one has done so – hearing confessions, delivering Mass and conveying the Holy Eucharist – every week since then.
                Of the original members in our small church only Angel, Jeff and me remain. Keith, Ryan and Andrew are our newest brethren, though Andrew is Greek Orthodox. The others I was confirmed with in 2000 have since been executed or succumbed to cancer. We are a small group because the chaplaincy refuses to allow our services to be open for just any prisoner to attend.
                Over the years we have experienced a number of petty slights and restrictions on the Catholic faith that are not experienced by Protestant denominations. While most Christian religious programs in prison are intended to be inclusive and serve all prisoners, it’s because they are sponsored almost exclusively by Baptists. Catholic prison ministry is rare, and typically rebuffed or undermined by the Religious Affairs Committee within the NCDPS.
We have received mixed reactions from the Church on this latest affront and ban on our receipt of the Blood of Christ. The previous bishop, Monsignor Burbridge, before transferring to another diocese, told us “The grace of Christ is present in both the host and the wine.” Some of the priests agreed. Some of the deacons disagreed.
The problem is less about whether we are receiving the full grace of God conferred in our celebration of the Last Supper, it has little to do with the ingrained disapproval of Catholicism’s spread into southern W.A.S.P states; our conflict is a continuing erosion of fundamental rights justified under the guise of “security”, or as Jeff pointed out: tyranny in the shape of public safety. Of course a sip of watered wine has nothing to do with safe prisons, but the programs themselves do. Maybe, rather than doing everything in our power to weaken and curtail rehabilitative programs the chaplaincy and prison administration could improve volunteer-based programs and facilitate Catholic prison ministry. Anything has to be better than ignoring the very problems that led to violence in NC prisons in 2017, then covering it up with the concern for better staffing and security. Try some better policies.

​Prison food varies in palatability. Some meals are tasteless, bland, and barely register in the day’s events, which is how most time passes. By night the stomach growls as if it too cannot remember the meals churned within. Other meals are flat out disgusting: slightly rancid, ground meat patties mixed with water and flour to make S.O.S (help indeed!) on biscuits without the benefit of yeast or baking soda; a Cajun turkey patty full of gristle and some odd flavoring suspiciously reminiscent of vomit, served with undercooked rice and gravy, collard greens straight from the can, stale bread . . .
                I get it. Prison food isn’t supposed to be comparable to food of the free world. We are in a place of punishment, to be held responsible for the crimes for which we were convicted and sentenced. The food should at least be edible though. It’s simply that the guys forced to prepare and serve it don’t care. They have no incentive beyond 40 cents per work day. No more good time or gain time. Just a life sentence and an overworked, underpaid kitchen steward browbeating them. Hundreds of mouths to feed three times a day is a lot of work and no reward or anything to hope for, so of course the food sucks. Even the tyrant Gordon Ramsay pays his subjects in the kitchen.
                The reality of food at Central Prison’s dining halls is that it becomes the worst part of a day in the life of every prisoner. The long line in which we stand waiting for a tray often takes thirty minutes to move through 40 prisoners. With four dining halls and roughly 800 prisoners at CP (about 200 are locked down so only about 600 filter through the food lines) “feeding time”, as the guards like referring to it, is an all day affair.
                Food aside, the lines are the worst part. If you’re smart and stand in line next to people you know and like, the time won’t be as bad. If you are unlucky and caught next to a guy who doesn’t know what a bar of soap is used for, or that a toothbrush is meant to include toothpaste, then the next 15-30 minutes is going to feel much longer. Worse than the stench of poor hygiene habits are some of the inane or frustrating conversations from personalities better to avoid than engage in eye contact. No radio to block that rant. Nowhere to go except the end of the line where you are subject to find some truly mentally deficient people. Unless, that is, you cut to the front of the line and risk a fight or enmity from multiple hungry people.
                Assuming you make it through the line, get a tray with edible food, and eat it within the 15 minutes—which ends up being 10 minutes more often than not—you still have to make it out of the dining hall and back to the cell block. Avoiding difficult conversations and drama sounds easy, but sometimes it comes from unexpected places.
                The other day as I stood in line, waiting with my chow group to go to the diet line (that’s for another post), we watched a prisoner attempt to walk out of the dining hall with a Styrofoam cup. A guard saw this, grabbed the guy’s elbow and pulled his arm. The prisoner snatched his arms out of the guard’s grasp. The guard immediately tackled the prisoner to the floor and was joined by a much larger guard who dogpiled both of them. The sergeant in the tunnel started screaming “Get those inmates back in the chow hall!” as two more guards joined the ruckus, though it was over before it began. The prisoner was cuffed behind his back and jacked to his feet, bleeding from his lip. After a moment the four guards hustled him down the tunnel to Unit One, CP’s solitary confinement unit. About five minutes later we were waiting in line for a tray.
                Turning the incident over in my mind I realized the guards’ overreaction is a direct result of two things: 1) some of these guards were previously named in a lawsuit filed against a number of CP staff responsible for egregious abuses of power on Unit One; 2) this kind of guard has been let off the leash after the murders of five of their brethren in 2017, fomenting a more retaliatory environment.
                I stood in line, wondering if this was the new normal, but knowing it was just the beginning. With Rep. Bob Steinburg and Rep. Marcia Marcy calling for Governor Cooper to deploy the National Guard at NC Prisons, bad food and endless lines are small potatoes compared to what’s coming.
*NOTE: this post references an article from the News and Observer
“Lawmakers urge Gov. Cooper to consider deploying National Guard at NC Prisons,” Alexander, Ames; Off Gavin; News and Observer, 20 Feb 2018. A1.

Mid-conversation I began to cough and wheeze as if there was dust in the back of my throat. Instantly my thoughts went to the several different strains of the cold floating around the unit, and to the recent flu pandemic gripping the country. In prison, especially NC’s death row, avoiding viruses is a near impossible feat. We have no bleach to clean with, only some generic glass cleaner and disinfectant that smells suspiciously like water. Close quarters and poor hygiene habits make the spread of the common cold inevitable. Some guys intentionally try to catch it by hanging around those already infected; better than avoiding it for three weeks only to catch it anyway.
                The itching persisted and my nose ran. Oh crap. One of the strains came with a horrible, mucousy cough that settles in the chest for a solid two weeks. When Todd, Les, Jerry and Squirrel had it at the same time their coughing fits in the middle of the night echoed through the cell block, awakening everyone. It’s not like we have access to cold remedies or can go to the doctor. The canteen sells hay fever tablets that slow down a runny nose long enough for it to stop up, cough drops that make your nose run and Ibuprofen. Anything more than that requires filling out a sick call, waiting several days to a week before a nurse sees you, and then you might get some cough syrup and more Ibuprofen. That’s it. Oh, and the five dollar co-pay fee for the sick call is immediately charged to your trust fund account, whether you have the money or not.
                Declaring a medical emergency is useless unless you’re deathly ill and even then the nurse and shift sergeant on the unit will resist. Bleeding, broken and unconscious or dead are usually the only emergencies they recognize. Plus, the co-pay fee for declared medical emergencies “Help! I’m coughing, sneezing and nauseous!” is seven dollars. When you rarely get money, or have none at all seven dollars is enough to deter most people. I declared an emergency only once for a really bad cold. A sinus infection had caused mucus to leak from my eyes – pretty scary, very gross. When the nurse saw my symptoms she gave me some salve eye drops, Ibuprofen, hay fever tablets, and told me not to declare an emergency.
                Things have changed a bit with this year’s flu, the one that has killed normally health people of all ages.
                On the bottom floor of Unit 3, there are four death row cell blocks, but one of them, Pod 4, is empty. About a month ago, it was designated a quarantine block for flu patients. This happened once before when the hospital overflowed with flu cases. At the time, we were not really surprised because of the mindset we believed lurked behind such an idea: put the contagious on a death row cell block because if it spreads on death row . . . well, who cares? The irony of Pod 4 being the quarantine block for flu sufferers is that no one on death row would be quarantined there. No. No. Catch the flu on death row and they put you on Unit One, the long term solitary confinement unit.
                No TLC here folks. No chicken noodle soup or an extra blanket. Just punishment.
                I get it, quarantine is meant to be isolating to prevent the spread of the disease, but on Unit One you cannot be moved outside of a cell without being handcuffed. Unless, that is, policy has changed, which it seems to do as frequently as the seasons. Normally policy dictates restraints must be used for any prisoner being removed from a cell in isolation. No exceptions. Three showers a week. No property. Canteen once a week. God help you if the flu symptoms linger. When guards transport you down the hallway one stands three yards behind you and another stands three yards in front of you. You are required to wear a mask.
                After hanging up the phone I went to my cell hoping it wasn’t the flu. They took Big Ray to Unit One on Thursday. Ten minutes after I drank some water with a couple of hay fever tablets a friend stopped by and laughed. “You’re coughing and sneezing and wheezing cause Young Money knocked out a sergeant at the chow hall. They maced the hell out of him and left the doors to the unit open. When everyone came back from the chow hall the draft brought the mace with them.”
                “Jesus, how much did they use?”
                “It looked like a small fire extinguisher.”
                Well maybe not the flu after all. I washed my hands for good measure and wondered if Big Ray and Young Money would be on the same block. I’m sure Young Money would have the worst of it.

In previous posts I have published essays and poems, updates on projects I’ve worked on, and commented on current affairs. Because I am simultaneously working on college correspondence courses and writing for various publications and purposes, maintaining a current blog has been difficult. This is largely due to the fact my posts are not very blog-like. I aim to change that, writing more frequently about the things I do and see in prison;  a closer look at my daily grind, as well as that of others. My goal has always been quality over quantity because some writers give prolificacy a bad name. I will do better than merely increase the number of posts by pretending I am writing a letter to you, dear readers. Let us hope it works.
                For the past month I’ve been deeply involved in completing the Davis-Putter Scholarship application. It has been a fun, yet involved, experience I never imagined possible on death row. Who does that? Apply for competitive grants when most people expect less than nothing from you? The same could be said of completing an AA degree while on death row. Or trying to change hearts and minds.
                What I discovered in earning my degree and pursuing a Bachelor of Specialized Studies degree program is that the “where” of one’s life does not matter nearly as much as “how” or “why”. The Davis-Putter scholarship is an opportunity to prove my social activism, both in advocacy for higher education in prison and penal reform in general. This grant would fund as many as six correspondence courses through my alma mater, Ohio University, but it would also be a validation of higher education in prison. Always a good idea. There is no guarantee I’ll win, of course, but I remain hopeful. The results will be determined by the end of July.
                The most involved element in the application is my personal statement, which is kind of like a resume, only with more narrative about the groups and activities I’ve written about on this blog. Putting my experiences on the row over the last five years into a coherent story was interesting. I seldom stop to think about the work I’ve completed because it distracts from the work that has yet to be done. The personal statement for the scholarship forced me to reflect on my work product and what I saw gave me courage. I’m doing the right things in the best way I can, bringing attention to the humanity on death row and challenging the narrative told about people in prison. Rather than allowing my cell and sentence to be a coffin, it is the “why” of my advocacy, and “how” it gets done is something for which I thank God.

​The recent Our View op-ed “Prison staff crisis deepens,” posits a false dichotomy: either improve staffing at prisons by investing in salaries and security, or another catastrophe is coming. While it is true better staffing could have helped prevent the deaths of five NC prison guards in 2017, it is a logical fallacy to disregard a substantial body of sociological evidence that proves rehabilitative programs work to reduce prison violence. Although investing millions in staffing may increase prison security, it is a temporary fix that does not address the causes of violence in prison.
                An appropriate number of prison staff is essential to the safety and security of every facility and the communities in which they are built. To ensure this happens, increasing the pay and training to current national standards should be a priority for lawmakers. However, the way officers are paid to do a better job with higher wages is how prisoners should be incentivized with higher education, job training and other rehabilitative programs designed to improve their behavior.
                1994 marked a turning point in North Carolina’s prisons. Tough on crime rhetoric created a sentencing commission that abolished parole, good time, gain time, parole-eligible life sentences and initiated a point system for felonies committed after October of that year. Sentences beyond this point became static and no amount of judicial discretion, hard work or good behavior by the prisoner could reduce the time handed down by the court. As a result, the prison population increased and the primary incentive for positive behavioral change was eliminated.
                To make matters worse, in 1996 the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act ended Pell grants for prisoners. Without federal funding, access to post-secondary degree bearing programs ceased overnight. The rehabilitative mindset of the DOC shifted. No longer would it promote correctional programs intended to improve behavior. Incarceration served to incapacitate and punish convicted criminals.
                As the prison population rose, so too did recidivism, gang activity, violence and corruption. Prison labor earns no more than a dollar a day and with no gain time awarded for work it became yet another form of punishment. Without positive reinforcement for good behavior the NC prison system fostered an environment of hopelessness. The biggest problem is how a majority of those warehoused under these conditions will return to the community. Angry. Bitter. Undereducated and potentially desperate because they were not taught how to thrive in a world unwilling to give them a second chance.
                Before a decision is made about how much money should be spent to increase prison security strong consideration must be given to rehabilitative programming. Higher education and vocational training with placement are fundamental to ending prison violence and impacting recidivism. A marketable skill set teaches autonomy, competence, relatedness and prepares people for re-entry in such a way they can create opportunities for themselves. They can thrive. Punishment does not do these things. California, Texas, and New York dealt with the problem now facing NC prison officials. They are focused on rehabilitation and are moving their notoriously violent punitive prison systems toward more effective corrections.
                Hiring and training more personnel is an external, cosmetic effect, that like building more prisons, does nothing to alter the internal culture of prison management. The murders of five NC prison guards in six months may be a result of staffing vacancies, but it is also an indictment of the whole penal system. Prisoners who have no incentives to change their behavior, and are hopeless do stupid, vicious things. Damned if they do. Damned if they don’t. When more punishment and security is the only response the state fails in its duty to the public and those it incarcerates.
 
*This was a response to a News and Observer Op-Ed article by the editorial staff, published Nov 13, 2017. As of this post they had not yet published my article.