I go back to the dayroom feeling sorry for Bryant, because it’s bullshit like this that makes a person hate this job. I mean, for me, the job is mad easy. Shoot, coming from where I come from, it’s just like hanging on the block. But now, I’m looking at what they’re trying to do to Bryant and the job just doesn’t seem so prestigious. I’m hustling, Rains is selling ass, and Bryant is getting framed. There’s a lot going on, to say the least.
I observe a young inmate as he stands up, goes over to the corner of the room with his drinking cup, and then seems to take a piss in it. I jump up and yell, “What the fuck are you doing?” My shouting brings the female A officer running onto the floor. Then the inmate does the unthinkable. Right there while we are all watching, he drinks his piss. My face cringes at the act, imagining what that must taste like. The A officer just sucks her teeth and says, “Again, Davis?” Then she storms off to the officers’ station and gets on the phone. I’m stunned, standing there like a chick looking at a horror flick alone late at night. The inmate looks at me and finishes his drink like it’s the last call for alcohol at the bar. The A officer comes back inside and tells the inmate to lock in. He obeys and goes to his cell.
The A officer turns to look at me and laughs when she sees the look on my face. She explains to me that these inmates pull stunts like that all the time. She says that a lot of them, like inmate Davis, who’s facing a lot of time, do these things to try to convince a judge that they’re crazy and can’t be tried like sane people.
“Hey, sometimes it works and sometimes it don’t,” she explains.
She goes down to the inmate’s cell and yells, “They’re not coming!” On her way back to the officers’ station she tells me that he did that in front of me so that I would have to write a report that I witnessed him doing that to himself. She said that he could use that report to help his insanity case, but that the doctors were not coming to get him to evaluate him because they have already deemed him fit to stand trial for two murders he committed on the Lower East Side.
“Now this fool is banging his head against the cell door to get attention,” she says.
I shake my head and go sit down. Some of the less sedated inmates are still trying to figure out which of the well-dressed men are really women and which ones they would fuck. That’s when the killer that looks like “Pop from the corner store” comes back with his paperwork. I sigh and take a look at it, because I know that he won’t leave me alone if I don’t. The papers are stapled together neatly and in order, and as I go through them I see drawings of the bodies he shot as they lay out all through the apartment.
He’s sitting next to me narrating each and every picture, telling me who died and how he caught this one or that one off guard. A chill is running through me, thinking about how calm he is when he talks about it. The stench rises in my nose like one of these derelicts just farted but I don’t look up because one of them is always letting loose. Hey, that’s jail for you. I try to continue to read, but the smell is just too strong, so I finally look up to see if I can identify where the smell is coming from and Bam! The sight right there next to me turns my stomach, and my lunch begins to come up out of my mouth and nose. The inmate that was telling me about his paperwork was sitting there with shit smeared all over his face and clothes. I jump up and continue to let my guts spill out all over the floor. He gets up and grabs his papers so that I won’t mess them up and sits back down and continues to narrate his story without a care in the world, and I can see that he has chunks of shit still in his mouth.
The A officer again comes inside and sees this, then runs back to the station and gets on the phone. I run into the officers’ bathroom. While I wash up, I vow to never work this area again. Fuck the overtime! This is blood money! I come out of the bathroom just in time to see him being escorted out in a straitjacket. The officer asks me if I am alright and I nod yes, but I’m really not.
I go back to sit down and pray that this tour ends soon. After a while when all the excitement dies down I decide to make a tour of the area and check inside each cell to make sure that the inmates that are locked in are okay. I routinely flash my light in each cell to see inside and right now most of the inmates that are in their cells are curled up sleeping off their medication.
As I come to one particular cell, I notice the light is out and the inmate is sitting on the floor with his back against the wall right under his window. I don’t pay it any mind at first because I’m used to just walking by and peeking in the cells. Then I remember that this is the inmate that earlier was banging his head against the door of his cell to get attention. I think I’d better go double-check. So I double back to his cell and flash my light inside. He is still on the floor, sitting there with his head hanging down. Then I notice the thin string that comes up behind his head and connects to the window knob. I yell for the A officer to crack his cell open and hit the lights. When she does, I rush in and see that his face is turning purple. He was trying to hang himself by sitting down and leaning his head forward so that the string would draw tight around his neck. I cut the string from around his neck while yelling out what happened to the A officer.
The inmate has lost color in his face and he appears not to be breathing when I pick him up and lay him on his bed. I am panicking, because if he is dead, we are going to be in a world of shit because we are supposed to be giving these fools an option to go into their cells every hour and this allows us to check on them to prevent shit like this. Then I hear her walking, not running, down the walkway toward the cell. I hear her yelling to me before she gets there, saying, “Heyward, you’re stressing these fools too much. This is probably another one of their stunts to get attention because they can’t get their way.” When she gets to the cell I look at her like, “Bitch, does this look like a stunt to you?” Her eyes light up and she runs off to go call the clinic. I stand over him, panicking, saying to myself, “Let me think! Let me think!”
Then I think to myself that I have to try that rescue breathing shit that I was taught, not in the Academy but as a marine. So I proceed to follow the steps. I kneel down and put my finger to his nose to see if he is breathing. He isn’t. No, that’s wrong. You’re supposed to look and see if his chest rises and falls. So I step back so I can look at his chest. Shit, I really can’t tell. So I just assume that he isn’t breathing and start CPR.
I don’t really remember any of this shit! Is it five breaths and fifteen pumps on the chest or is the count one one thousand, two one thousand? Shit, how am I supposed to hold my hands? Where am I supposed to put them, and am I doing this shit right? I start to pump right below his chest but not on top of his stomach. I get no response.
This shit seems like an eternity but all this is happening in seconds. I brace myself, because I know that I have to do some nasty shit right now that I know that I don’t want to do and that instrument in the officers’ station that I could use has not been changed in years and it looks dirtier than this inmate’s mouth. I have to give him some air. I get up and, with my hands on my hips, look off into space and try to psych myself up to do this. I look at his chest again, praying that I see it rise and fall. I say out loud as I am looking, “God, please give me something.” Then I peek outside the cell. Where is the clinic staff?
Come on, stupid ass, you can do this! I kneel down to him, clamp his nose, tilt his head back, and give him a breath, look away, then give him another. I feel like I’m not doing the shit right. I step back to see if he’s breathing now. No bueno!
I’m about to do it again when he takes a deep breath and coughs. I’m stunned and don’t know what to do, so I stand there with my fist clinched and wait. He begins to cough some more. His eyes open and close and then he starts to breathe normally. I jump up and down and pump my fist. He opens his eyes and looks around like, “Where am I?” and without hesitation kicks off his shoes, pulls his covers over himself, and gets comfortable to go to sleep.
The medical staff fin
ally comes to get him. He’s looking at them crazy as they put him on a gurney and roll him out. Mind you, he has the mark around his neck from the string. I go sit in the officers’ station and tell the A officer what I had just done and guess what, she doesn’t believe that I put my lips on this dirty inmate’s mouth. At this point I don’t give a shit, because I’d rather fill out paperwork for an attempted suicide than an actual one.
Shortly after, our area captain arrives and we fill her in on what just happened. She, too, breathes a sigh of relief and tells me to walk with her while she makes a tour of the area. We get to the dayroom and she starts barking at the inmates, giving them orders to do this and do that, and to clean this up and clean that up, and she scolds me for not having them do so myself. When she’s about to leave, an elderly inmate, known for not talking to anyone, calls out my name. We both turn around, stunned, to see what he has to say. Pointing to the captain, he stutters, “Tha, that thatbitchisaman!”
CHAPTER 33
BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY
Two months later . . .
It’s a Wednesday, so I know the visiting floor will be popping. I’m on my way to my post from roll call and as usual I’m dirty with pouches stuffed in my vest.
“Put ya hands on that fuckin’ wall,” an officer yells at an inmate.
Whatever is happening with the officer and that inmate is the last thing I want to deal with right now. Technically, an officer in this situation should stop and stand there as a show of force to the inmate, because if he acts up he can and will catch a beatdown. But I got a big load on me and I really need to get to my post to set up shop.
I stand there and watch the officer go off on the inmate. He calls him a lowlife because he’s in jail. He tells him how much better he is than him because he’s an officer, how much money he’s making, and so on. I typically wouldn’t have a problem with what the officer is saying about the money he’s making, but I know this officer. He gets his drink on like me. He’s married and living with his wife’s family until they can get their own apartment. At his wedding reception they served us ketchup and syrup sandwiches. So, he wasn’t exactly ballin’.
I really don’t have time for this shit, so I ask him what we are doing. In other words, are we taking him down or what? The officer turns to me and says, “Nah, I just wanted to show him that he can get it at any . . .”
Before he can finish his sentence, I’m on my way to my post—and I’m not looking back. I get to my post, take my count, and relieve the midnight officer so that I can take care of business. Things had changed. Gone was the scared-for-his-job officer that would never do anything to violate his sacred job. Gone was the officer that was nervous every time he walked through those gates carrying contraband. And gone was the man that stood idly by and did nothing as child support sucked him dry and ruined his life. In his place was a man that was no longer on defense but on offense; a man that now ran an organization composed of trustworthy inmates and one female officer; a man that was no longer fueled by need but by greed.
I had gotten so used to making money every day that even when the child support leveled out and I could’ve probably survived off just what I was making from the pouches, I couldn’t stop. My lifestyle had changed, too. I had my own apartment now. I had bought a late-model used car that didn’t look half bad and I had the shakes (gambling problem) like never before, so stopping wasn’t an option. Plus, now I enjoyed it. I lived to come to work and collect and run my day-to-day enterprise.
I let Flocko and Moe out. I make the drop along with two bacon, egg, and cheese sandwiches. I learned from the streets that you have to take care of your workers and they will take care of you. As Flocko walks away with the pouches, I hear a door swing open and somebody scream out, “Search!”
Shit!
It was one of those surprise searches. They came through the fire door and not the front gate entrance to my housing area. Damn, they already had all the inmates coming out of their cells, lined up with their hands on the wall. Now I’m standing inside the officers’ station watching them go one by one searching the inmates and their cells. I can see Flocko from where I’m standing, peeking down the hall at me. He has a lot of pouches on him and I know that if he gets caught right now I will be questioned or looked at suspiciously.
I have to do something.
I’m pacing back and forth. I see that they are getting close to searching Flocko when I get an idea and spring into action. It’s risky but I have to try something. I go onto the floor where they’re searching and walk toward him and when I get there I start to curse him out, saying, “I got this one, because he likes to run his mouth.” I aggressively pat him down. I yell at him and say, “If you open your mouth I’m a bust yo ass!” As always I play it right, because I could see the other officers that were from other jails looking at me and praying that I wouldn’t start shit with this inmate. I know that they know better than to get into a use of force in a jail other than their own.
Officers were always told not to start shit outside their jail, because when it comes down to writing reports and coming up with lies to cover your ass, you’d rather they come from officers from your jail that you have a bond with, that you trust.
I order Flocko to stand across the hall as he witnesses me searching his cell. The captain and the other officers just assume that Flocko is an asshole and that I am taking advantage of the situation to get back at an unruly inmate while I had major backup. After I half-ass mess up his cell, I order him to go sit on his bed and I lock his cell behind him just as the other officers were doing with the other inmates.
Mission accomplished.
The facial expression on the other inmates who were a part of my team was a look of I-can’t-believe-this-nigga-just-took-that-risk-and-saved-Flocko’s-ass. It was also a look of loyalty, that Big Hey was real about his business. I breathe easier once the search is over and the visiting officers leave. I’m glad everything is over and we didn’t get busted, because I need my money. After the inmates clean up the housing postsearch, I go to Flocko’s cell to see why the money has been coming up short as of late.
As I’m walking, I peek into some other cells. I notice Aak on his knees praying and in the next cell is Murder putting up his towel preparing for a massive beatdown upon his penis. I continue to walk and I see two relatively young inmates standing in the corridor with no shirts on listening to the radio. They’re sharing a clear plastic radio that is sold at commissary and both are deep into reciting the words to the song, yelling out, “I ain’t no killa but don’t push me/revenge is like the sweetest joy next to getting pussy.” I give them the hand gesture like, “Keep it down” and they nod in the affirmative.
I approach Flocko’s cell. I hear voices coming out of it indicating that there is more than one inmate in his cell. I’m thinking they are probably having a smoke session.
As I get closer to his door, though, I hear a scuffle inside and then I hear Flocko say, “Give it up!” I peek in to see what’s going on. I am shocked at what I see. Flocko and two other inmates have an inmate bent over the bed with the inmate’s pants pulled down. Two of them pin the inmate down while Flocko is on his knees. Flocko is fully clothed and is off to the side of the pinned inmate. By now I’d been working here for a while and I’d caught inmates before in several disgusting sex acts, so that was no surprise. But I never figured Flocko to be that type. I’d look farther in and it appears that Flocko has his fingers going inside this inmate’s ass. I bang on the door and they all jump. The two inmates who are holding the inmate down release him, but Flocko does not let go until he pulls something out of the inmate’s butt. I open the door and they stand there, unsure of what is going to happen next. I’m heated. The only person I want to talk to is Flocko.
I yell, “Everybody out!”
One by one, they all file out. When the assaulted inmate walks past I can see the shame and embarrassment on his f
ace. I ask him if he needs medical attention. He shakes his head, indicating no, as Flocko says, “Hey, he knows what it is; that it wasn’t personal, but all business.”
“Business?” I ask.
“Yeah, Hey, this is jail, and if you want to survive you got to always know what’s poppin’ and be able to do what you got to do to survive,” Flocko said.
I look at him like he’s crazy and say, “Flock, I understand all that and I know that you have been in here awhile. It’s just that I never thought . . .” He sees where I’m going with this and cuts me off by bursting out laughing. He says, “Gee, this is me, Gee! You think I am in here fuckin’ niggas!?” Again he laughs and says, “No, Gee, seriously though, my man saw him boofing this on the visit.” He raises his hand, showing me a ball of something wrapped in plastic with a little shit on it. His facial expression has no shame or remorse about the fact that he has another man’s shit on his fingers.
Mental note: From now on, Flocko will definitely get the closed-fist bump when we greet, no more soul brother number five and shakes at all.
“Don’t nothing come through 8 upper without me knowing about it or getting my cut,” he says.
Then he points to the inmate that just had his colon checked and says, “That fool knows that! He’s just a fucking mule. His asshole is the size of Kansas. That’s what he does. That’s his job.”
Since he is acting like the boss of all bosses, I take this time to ask him why was the money, which I am supposed to be getting, coming up short all of a sudden.
“I was going to talk to you about that,” he says. “This is what that’s about.”
Then he holds up the bundle and opens the shitty package so I can see what is on the inside. Cocaine. With his hands in the air as if I was sticking him up, he says to me, “First, I just want you to know that somebody on the dorm side is cutting your throat.”
“What do you mean, another inmate?” I ask, with one of my eyebrows raised, letting him know that I am getting pissed.
Corruption Officer Page 13
