by Leo Sullivan
ty and the fact that whites use more drugs but Blacks are the ones
targeted for arrest. Most important, federal judges, prosecutors
and some politicians have investments in stocks on prisons. Some
of the jurors started taking notes. I didn’t know if that was good
or bad. I knew the next day
USA Today
ran an in-depth article
with Nandi’s picture in it.
“The Life Thugstin Defense takes a gamble by using a one-of-a-
kind defense never heard of before–the socioeconomical crime theory
and how the environment can play a factor in crime.”
The paper went on to give a detailed synopsis of the trial and
just how prudent the theory is. The young Hope Evans was how-
ever hailed as an young up and coming legal prodigy. The news-
paper compared Hope to Johnny Cochran in his early years.
*****
With each day I found it getting harder and harder for me to
concentrate on the trial. Hope looked like she was starting to dete-
riorate right before my eyes, and the media took notice, too. They
claimed in one of the tabloid magazines that she was about to have
a nervous breakdown due to the lengthy trial.
*****
295
Chapter T
wenty T
wo
Chapter T
wenty T
wo
“Change”
– Life –
Like so many young Black men that find themselves trapped in
America’s penal system, I was determined to find a way out, so I
rever ted to my old ways. They say one of the most dangerous
things you can do is to lock a man up and for him to have noth-
ing to do all day but think. And that’s what I did in my cell each
day after trial. I found God in my cell and started praising Jesus,
too. I knew what I had to do.
*****
Holding cells are like New York train stations, only worse. You
get in where you fit in. You got dudes sprawled out on the pissy
floor, sitting on steel toilet stools and hard benches as well as sleep-
ing under them. The clamor of loud voices is maddening like lis-
tening to every scream at the same time. Cigarette smoke bellowed
to the top of the ceiling, thick enough to obscure the crude graf-
fiti written on the walls as well as satires about the judge’s moth-
er.
Finally, the door leading to the holding cells opened, with it
came a punctuated pause as deep as a bottomless pit, a protracted
silence, the practiced unison of prisoners listening, waiting to hear
their name called, as if God Himself were standing at the door
choosing who will make it into the gates of heaven. In prison,
lawyers are like Gods that work for the devil, only worse, consid-
296
L i f e
ering a prisoner is dependent on them as the intermediate. That’s
where the problem starts. Like being in a foreign country without
speaking the language. Many a man has signed his name on the
dotted lines, after paying a king’s ransom for what he thought
would secure his freedom, only to find he has paid a price to do a
lifetime. Lawyers are the biggest crooks God ever created.
We all listened for our names to be called by our attorneys. In
the distance the metallic sound of chains, shackles dragging across
the cold concrete floor, signal the arrival of another prisoner,
another destitute agony to mount in the chaos of madness.
Everyone in the cell listens. I strained my ears. Two cells down, I
thought I heard my name in hushed tones. I bolted to the cell
door accidentally stepping on two people.
“Shh,” I hissed gesturing with my finger over my lips. Of
course they all complied. Over half the federal system is full of
informants, snitches eager for a free ticket out of prison.
I had the most famous case that the State of Florida had ever
known. So of course cats in the cell were quiet, acting like it’s
respecting me, but I know that they were really ear-hustling for
information on my case to get a time cut. In the feds they have an
old saying, “You got two kinds of people, those that told, and
those that wished they had told.” Those that told will never stop
telling even for the sake of their moral integrity. Those that don’t
staunchly refuse to compromise their code of ethics, for it is
intrinsically embedded in their virility. Real men do not tell on
their best friends, family members, wives and kids. They die for
what they believe in.
I peered between the cell bars down the hall. I saw Scandels in
a heated conversation, all agitated and animated, talking with his
hands raised in the air tr ying to argue a point. Then I heard
another voice that sent chills down my spine. It was a voice that I
had not heard in years. It belonged to my nigga Lil Cal. He came
back from the penitentiary to do me, to take the stand and testify
against me. His testimony would be the coup de grace sending me
to prison for the rest of my life. I remembered Hope showing me
297
L i f e
Lil Cal’s name on the discovery sheet, but I just never thought he
would actually rat on me. Shit! I made the crucial mistake of
telling him too much, doing too much. I bought his moms a big
house, took care of his baby mama and put thousands of dollars
in his inmate account. In the process, I left a paper trail that even
a blind man could follow.
Scandels stormed by the cell door without even seeing me. I’m
sure he didn’t know I was in the very next cell close to his star wit-
ness. This would not be the first time the feds had blundered like
this. They have been known to place the rat and the accused in the
same cell with the rat ending up getting killed as planned. I stared
at the naked light bulb hanging from the ceiling outside the cell,
lost for words, my feelings and emotions stuck in the back of my
throat. There was an ancient-looking fingerprinting station in
front of the cell.
“Yo ... Cal ...?” I heard my voice carry down the hall as I felt
my hands gripping the bars tightly. At the other end of the hall,
shackles rattled, feet shuffled. “L? L? That you man?”
“Yeah, nigga it’s me aiight. Wuz up?” I said acidly.
“Man pah-lees! You gotta help me. Pah-lees!” Cal shrieked. I
stepped back from the bars full of rage. I turned around and
looked at some of the faces in the cell, read the deceit in their eyes
like the graffiti on the wall. By the time our conversation would
be over there would be a mad stampede to the prosecutor’s office.
Everybody trying to get a time cut.
“L … L ... You gotta help me!” Cal continued. His voice was
panic stricken, like he was on the verge of delirium. Just the way
the feds will make you when they break you, when you sell your
soul for another man’s life. I listened to Lil Cal, careful not to get
caught up in another indictment. “Both my grandma and her hus-
band are missing.” I could hear Cal crying as he spoke,
“Somebody ran
up in my moms’ crib, snatched up my mama and
my oldest brother Rob. Then yesterday, somebody mailed my
brother’s head to the institution with a note, ‘
lf you’re lookin’ for
your brother, Ax Blazack, oh, and don’t worry about your Grandma
298
L i f e
and Pops. They were old anyway.’
L man, I never would do you!”
Cal pleaded. His voice had taken on a feminine whine, that of a
broken man. Of course he was also lying. All I could do was shake
my head. Damn Blazack put in major work, the real menace to
society. I hurried away from the bars, away from a conspiracy to
murder and the kidnapping of Cal’s family. I talked solely for the
audience of snitches and microphones that I was sure were in the
cells.
“Yo! My nigga, I’m telling you what God love, the truth. I ain’t
got nuttin’ do wit dat. I’ma just pray to God and let Jesus, my
Lord and Savior help me through this.”
“Nigga, who you think you talkin’ to? I know you and Blazack
are behind this.”
I walked to the corner of the cell, lit up a smuggled cigarette
rolled in toilet paper wrappings and tried not to listen to Lil Cal’s
plaintive cries about murder and kidnapping.
Don’t worry about
your Grandma and pops. They was old anyway.
*****
As I entered the courtroom it dawned on me, that even after
almost two months I was still not at ease with the media and all
the attention. As usual, my stepmother called out my name along
with her declaration of love. Strangely, no matter how bad my day
was, she seemed to always get a smile out of me. In the back of my
mind I worried about the conversation I just had with Lil Cal back
in the holding cell. The feds are notorious for entrapment. I won-
dered if they were using him to set me up with a new indictment.
I pondered, maybe Scandels did know I was back there next to Lil
Cal in the holding cell all the time, and it was just an act. About
the only thing for certain was that Scandels saved his best for last.
Lil Cal was the last to testify against me of the 78 informants. So
what the hell was going on if Cal said he wasn’t going to testify?
After I greeted each of my all-female legal team and was seat-
ed next to Hope, she crinkled her nose up at me playfully, said I
smelled like smoke. Her beauty, along with her body, was serious-
ly starting to deteriorate. I could see her cheekbones, the shallow
299
L i f e
husk of flesh that covered her face. Her eyes looked to be too far
back in the sockets. She was tired and wary. Uncannily, I could
still see the impeccable courage in her eyes. She would not accept
defeat. Never. Despite being the youngest amongst the entire
group of lawyers, there was no doubt in anyone’s mind, she was
the brainchild and our leader. Just about ever y petition, every
motion, and every strategy, she had prepared it.
I looked over at the rest of my attorneys. Today they looked
stone faced, staring straight ahead at the judge. The entire scene
was bizarre, like I was living in a dream. My defense counsels,
Adrienne and Taya, continued to stare straight at the judge, as if
they were somehow beckoning him, willing him, in some kind of
way. Maybe that was their plea, as only Black women knew how
to plead, a desperate attempt to save a Black human life. They
failed.
*****
The proceedings were underway and Lil Cal was seated at the
witness stand. For some reason, Scandels looked very uncomfort-
able. The prosecutor fumbled with his suit coat buttons as he
asked, “Mr. Johnson, do you see Life Thugstin in the courtroom?”
Cal looked over at me with piercing eyes, brows knotted in con-
tempt. I tried to match his stare, as I held my breath, and felt my
heart beating in my chest in a way that makes it hard for a man to
breathe. That very moment felt like a showdown. Time was infin-
ity that lasted ... lingered on forever.
“Naw, I don’t see him in the courtroom,” Lil Cal answered and
turned his chin back to the prosecutor with his head held high.
Scandels flinched uncontrollably. It looked like his feet came two
inches off the floor like a man that just had the biggest surprise of
his life. It showed on his face.
“Are you sure you don’t see the defendant, Life Thugstin, in
the courtroom?” Scandels asked, raising his voice, making his
question sound like a command.
“No!” Cal answered without even looking at me.
Scandels turned beet red. Through clinched teeth and angular
300
L i f e
jawbone protruding in an irate temperament, Scandels looked like
he wanted to yank Lil Cal off the witness stand and beat him to a
pulp. Again, I was reminded of the old saying,
a rat don’t care who
he bites when trapped in a corner
. All Cal wanted was to free his
mama and not receive another Ax Blazack letter. Scandels fumbled
with some paper. “Are you aware of the statements you made, in
the form of over a one hundred page deposition, where you
alleged you and the defendant, Life Thugstin, sold drugs?”
“Objection!” Adrienne Greene was on her feet, her large
breasts heaved forward pronouncing her point for added empha-
sis. “Your Honor, the witness has already stated he does not know
the defendant. The prosecutor’s only purpose is to badger the wit-
ness with hopes to illicit anything incriminating.”
“Objection sustained,” the judge said like he was not all too
impressed with having to take orders from the defense.
Scandels tried another line of approach. He looked over and
smiled at the jury, wiped at a tuft of unruly hair on his forehead
nervously and walked up closer to the witness stand.
Genuinely he asked, “Do you remember talking to me for
hours in my office?”
“I would like to plead the fifth,” Cal said smugly with his
thick lips bunched together as if to say,
I will not be answering any
further questions
. There was a buzz in the courtroom. I have never
been good at reading people’s hearts, but growing up in the ghet-
to you had to know how to read people’s minds. So I looked at all
twelve of the white jurors’ faces, faces that our society says are my
peers. But I knew then what the verdict was going to be. Just like
I knew what I was going to have to do to cheat life and win my
own trial. I can’t lie. The broad, Tomica, and a few of the other
witnesses that testified against me hurt me bad! Now the trial was
almost over, nearly two months of verbal gymnastics of what is
termed law. I would’ve rather gone out in a hail of gunfire. At least
that way it would’ve felt like I was fighting back. For any Black
man being on trial and having to be forced to be judged by an all
white jur y is truly a humiliating experience. Then as I thought
301
L i f e
> about the dope game, and all its street fame, I can bare witness, it’s
two sides of the game. The other side ain’t nothing nice and it
comes with a hell of a price. Right there in the courtroom, I
opened my Bible. Secretly I enjoyed the way the media always
took note of every little thing I did. If I dozed off or laughed, it
would be in the next day’s newspaper. Reading the Bible made no
difference. They quickly took notice of that too, just like I want-
ed them to. I remember my stepmother always telling me when I
was a small child and been bad, to pray to Jesus. So that’s what I
did, I read my Bible and prayed to Jesus.
*****
302
Chapter T
wenty Thr
ee
Chapter T
wenty Thr
ee
“The Verdict”
– Life –
At the end of all trials, the defense and the prosecutors are allowed
to present their closing argument. This, in legal terms, is known
as summations.
Hope went first. War y and fatigued she spoke passionately,
exposing all the key points where the prosecution had blundered.
Dramatically she exhorted the jur y to see the logic in her argu-
ment and the flaw in the prosecutor’s case. As I looked on, she
really touched my heart, because to me with all her big words and
drawn out statements, she looked like a Black woman pleading for
a Black man’s life. I wondered,
how many times in history has that
happened?
I felt bad and ashamed of myself. The dope game was
not worth this. For two hours, Hope’s voice carried like the wind.
The church played their part with reverent hymns to Jesus with
enough fervor to get God’s attention. I’m sure to this day the
imperial heavens must have peeked down in wonder at what was
going on in that old courtroom.
Hope ended her summation with a standing ovation. All
Black folks clapping their hands with the commotion, I looked
around the courtroom as the judge pounded his gavel. Most of the
white faces in the courtroom looked uncomfortable. I watched as
Hope held on to the rail next to the jur y box for support. She was
coughing violently in spasms; she looked so weak, faint. Taya and
