ESCAPE ARTIST
MEMOIR OF A VISIONARY
ARTIST ON DEATH ROW
WILLIAM A. NOGUERA
SEVEN STORIES PRESS
New York • Oakland • London
Copyright © 2018 by William A. Noguera
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Seven Stories Press
140 Watts Street
New York, NY 10013
sevenstories.com
FEATURED ART: courtesy of artist William A. Noguera/The William A. Noguera Trust/Artists Rights Society (ARS), NewYork.
GALLERY EXHIBITION IMAGES: courtesy of Alan Bamberger and artbusiness.com.
COVER AND CHAPTER ART IMAGE PHOTOS: courtesy of Melissa Ysais.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Noguera, William, author.
Title: Escape artist : transformation through tragedy / William Noguera.
Description: First edition. | New York : Seven Stories Press, 2018.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017004932 (print) | LCCN 2017012083 (ebook) | ISBN 9781609807986 (E-book) | ISBN 9781609807979 (hardcover)
Subjects: LCSH: Noguera, William. | Noguera, William--Childhood and youth. | Noguera, William--Philosophy. | Death row inmates--California--Biography. | Criminals--California--Biography. | Artists--California--Biography. | Colombian Americans--California--Biography. | Redemption--Philosophy. | Art--Psychology. | Self-actualization (Psychology)
Classification: LCC HV6248.N63 (ebook) | LCC HV6248.N63 A3 2018 (print) | DDC 364.66092 [B] --dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017004932
DEDICATED TO
Guillermo Emilio Noguera.
I’ve loved you, sometimes hated you, worshipped your
strength, and feared it. But no matter what, you will always
be remembered and forever my dad. . .
Contents
DISCLAIMER
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
FOREWORD by Walter Pavlo, Jr.
PREFACE
THE SENTENCE
CHAPTER 1: Orange County Jail to San Quentin Death Row, 1988
CHAPTER 2: San Quentin Death Row, 1988
CHAPTER 3: San Quentin Death Row, 1988
CHAPTER 4: Orange County Jail, 1984
CHAPTER 5: San Quentin Death Row, 1988
CHAPTER 6: Childhood, 1970–1975
CHAPTER 7: San Quentin Death Row, 1988
CHAPTER 8: Orange County Jail, 1984
CHAPTER 9: Childhood, 1975–1976
CHAPTER 10: San Quentin Death Row, 1988
CHAPTER 11: Orange County Jail, 1985
CHAPTER 12: Childhood, 1975–1976
CHAPTER 13: San Quentin Death Row, 1988
CHAPTER 14: Orange County Jail, 1985
CHAPTER 15: Childhood, 1976
CHAPTER 16: San Quentin Death Row, 1988
CHAPTER 17: Orange County Jail, 1985–1986
CHAPTER 18: Adolescence, 1977–1978
CHAPTER 19: San Quentin Death Row, 1988
CHAPTER 20: Orange County Jail, 1986
CHAPTER 21: Adolescence, 1978–1979
CHAPTER 22: San Quentin Death Row, 1989
CHAPTER 23: Orange County Jail, 1986
CHAPTER 24: Adolescence, 1979–1980
CHAPTER 25: San Quentin Death Row, 1992–1993
CHAPTER 26: Orange County Jail, 1986
CHAPTER 27: Adolescence, 1980–1981
CHAPTER 28: San Quentin Death Row, 1993–1994
CHAPTER 29: Orange County Jail, 1986–1987
CHAPTER 30: Adolescence, 1981
CHAPTER 31: San Quentin Death Row, 1994
CHAPTER 32: Orange County Jail, 1987
CHAPTER 33: Adolescence, 1981
CHAPTER 34: San Quentin Death Row, 1997–2000
CHAPTER 35: Orange County Jail, 1987
CHAPTER 36: Adolescence, 1981–1982
CHAPTER 37: San Quentin Death Row, 2000–2004
CHAPTER 38: Orange County Jail, 1987
CHAPTER 39: Adolescence, 1982
CHAPTER 40: San Quentin Death Row, 2004–2007
CHAPTER 41: Adolescence, 1982
CHAPTER 42: San Quentin Death Row, 2008–2010
CHAPTER 43: Adolescence, 1982–1983
CHAPTER 44: Adolescence, 1983
EPILOGUE
ADDENDUM
GLOSSARY
PHOTO SECTION
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
DISCLAIMER
This memoir reflects the author’s memories from his lifetime as truthfully as recollection permits. Events have been compressed, and some names or places have been changed to respect the privacy of those mentioned. The author does not intend to hurt anyone living or deceased, and regrets any unintentional harm resulting from the book’s publication.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My gratitude to the following people for their help, confidence, and belief in me:
Margaret Bail, my agent, who saw the potential and took a chance on me where no one else would.
Walt Pavlo, Jr., who has walked a mile in my shoes, stumbled, and continued on.
Paul Reinhertz, my brother, my friend; words cannot reach the depth of my gratitude for what you’ve brought to my life—true friendship.
Melissa, none of this would be possible without your help. Thank you for not only believing in me, my work, and my words—but in the memory of that teenager you once knew, and recognizing he’s still here. And finally, for helping me to understand there are second chances in life, love, and happiness.
FOREWORD
I spent time in a federal prison camp for a white-collar crime from 2001–2003. There is no pride in this proclamation, but it is through that experience that I have talked and written on white-collar crime for the past twelve years.
In September of 2011 I became a Contributor to Forbes.com and have interviewed insider traders, embezzlers, defense attorneys, prosecutors, and family members of inmates. In my work I attempt to create a mosaic of the people involved in our criminal justice system so that the general public understands how these crimes are perpetrated, who perpetrates them, how they are discovered, and the resulting punishment.
On reflection, my reasoning for digging deeper into white-collar criminal law has been as much about a search for self as it has been about an interest in the many cases that I cover. So I have been dedicated to understanding everything I can about the topic, the people, and the law. Then I met William A. Noguera, a man living a quarter of a century on San Quentin State Prison’s death row.
On June 22, 2013, I walked through the gates of San Quentin State Prison just north of San Francisco. I was going to visit Noguera, a man sentenced to death in 1987 for a murder committed some years earlier. At the sentencing he was all of twenty-three years old and he had been in prison since he was nineteen. While I was interested in the case against him that resulted in the ultimate punishment, I was drawn to Noguera by his intellect, the disciplined life he leads in extreme conditions, and his beautiful art that he creates in the hell that surrounds him.
I was locked in a cage with Noguera for my visit, which is now the procedure for visitation at San Quentin’s death row since a violent incident between two rival inmates broke out during visitation in 2000. I was allowed to visit for five straight hours and was not allowed to bring in any prepared notes, pen, or paper. I had wondered if I had five hours’ worth of conversation in me with a man on death row, whom I had spoken with only a number of times via phone prior to that visit. It turned out that five hours was not enough tim
e.
I left San Quentin that day wondering if I would ever see Noguera again or how I might further pursue telling his story. It was a long flight back to Boston, and in the following months I thought of William, his art, and our visit together. He left a lasting impression on me.
As I read a draft of this book, I recognize the man and the artist that I visited with in San Quentin. His transparency, acceptance of responsibility, and his passion for art come through with every word. He takes us along a journey of his life that is reflected in his own words and, more importantly, through his art.
After getting to know Noguera, reading this book, and viewing his art, his life continues to make me ponder deeper questions I have about my own life. First, can a person be seen for the good that they do now, no matter the wrong they have done in the past? This question is not one of forgiveness, it is about our ability to accept the good in the world without judgment. Was Picasso a saint? No, nor is Noguera. Yet we are able to look upon works by Picasso without analyzing the faults in his life. Art should transcend our ability to judge a person beyond what is on the canvas.
Second, how does a person live an ethical life in the face of daily challenges to conform with the unethical, the savage? Each semester I teach an Ethics class to MBA students at Endicott College, just north of Boston. Noguera calls in to the class and shares the surroundings he lives in and how he overcomes the temptations against falling into the demonic life of fellow inmates. For our students, it provides a view of a man in the midst of ethical temptations that go on in perpetuity. However, Noguera offers hope to those students, insight and love from a place that is void of it. Our students have embraced the experience.
The third question that I have has to do with my own limitations in understanding art. Is Noguera a brilliant artist, or is he simply a good artist who is in prison? I have sat and looked at his paintings for hours and have been moved to tears. His ink-stippling pieces look like photographs and each tells a story. His abstracts are full of color, and I have enjoyed conversations with him as he described each piece in detail, though they had left his cell many years before. Is he an art master? I do not know, and Noguera himself wants to know. He wants to be judged by peers in the art world, critiqued, talked about, but he wants it to be based on his art, not the circumstances of his life.
“The limitations that I have on supplies and access to the outside world are the very things that make my work better, special,” Noguera told me. Rather than look at his situation as one of limitations, he sees it as his unique signature on the world of art.
William Noguera is my friend. He is also, in my opinion, someone that the world needs to know. It is my hope that this book and Noguera’s art will speak to you in a way that will leave a lasting impression on your life, just as he has left one on mine.
Walter A. Pavlo, Jr.
co-author of Stolen Without a Gun,
Forbes.com contributor
PREFACE
I live in a cage like the other 524 men in East Block, San Quentin’s main death row housing unit. Built in 1927, East Block is a massive concrete and steel structure that looks like a large castle from the outside and a massive human warehouse from the inside. The cell I live in is four feet wide, nine feet deep, and seven and a half feet high. I’ve lived in this steel and concrete cage for nearly thirty-two years.
I am here for an event that happened at a time when my impulses were less restrained and my maturity still in development. My life should have been much different. This is how it actually turned out.
In an attempt to tell my story with honesty and integrity, including the dangers I face each day, I expose some of my deepest fears, pain, and desires. I share these candidly by detailing events and personal thoughts over the course of my life up to the present time. Some of these experiences are violent and criminal in nature. I use descriptive words such as warrior, gladiator, and rage, as well as racially charged slang. I don’t include these words to glorify or sensationalize my actions. I feel great remorse for the pain I’ve caused. Rather, I include these words because they’re a real part of my life and necessary to an understanding of how I developed into the man I am today.
I’ve faced conflict much of my life, and in prison survival depends on the decisions you make and whether you can defend your position each time. As you read, I invite you to ask yourself, what would I have done?
The most important question, though, is this: Who holds the key that sets us free? If you’re honest with yourself, you’ll understand, or at least take with you a sense of what some of us have gone through to find the answer.
THE SENTENCE
Orange County Superior Court Department 39
Friday, January 29, 1988. In open court:
“William Adolf Noguera, it is the judgment and sentence of this court that for the offense of murder you shall suffer the death penalty. Said penalty to be inflicted within the walls of the State Prison at San Quentin, California in the manner prescribed by law and at a time to be fixed by this court in a warrant of execution; it is the order of this court that you shall be put to death by the administration of lethal gas. Said penalty to be inflicted within the walls of the state prison at San Quentin, California. You are remanded to the care, custody, and control of the sheriff of Orange County to be by him delivered to the warden of the state penitentiary at San Quentin, California within ten days from this date. In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand as judge of the said superior court and have caused the seal of the said court to be affixed hereto. Done in open court this 29th day of January 1988. Signed, Robert R. Fitzgerald, Judge of the Superior Court of the State of California, in and for the county of Orange. Good luck to you, Mr. Noguera.”
Chapter 1
Orange County Jail to San Quentin Death Row, 1988
I sat in silence as the judge read my sentence. None of it seemed real until that moment, when he said, “Good luck to you, Mr. Noguera.” My raw emotions surfaced at that exact second and I cried from the deepest part of my being.
When we exited the courtroom, armed sheriff’s deputies escorted me to a special holding cell separated from the prisoners I’d previously shared a cell with. Being sentenced to death changed everything. At some level I had known the death penalty was a real possibility, but I didn’t believe it would happen. My world changed as I realized my name was on the list for San Quentin’s execution chamber.
I sat in the holding cage for nearly two hours before I heard a deputy at the electronic door yell, “Open door.” The sound of the door opening brought me back to reality. I’d sat there without moving or thinking—blank and too numb to feel or think rationally the whole time. Now I had no choice but to function. It was the beginning of a completely new life. I didn’t know exactly what lay ahead, but I was committed to mastering and controlling my new circumstances. The alternative was to be killed, or something worse.
“Come on Noguera, time for a joy ride,” the deputy prodded.
I stood and moved to the door as the deputy prepared to escort me from the cell and down the hall to the courtroom exit. Each step wearing the leg irons hurt the bones in my ankles, and I had to concentrate to keep from tripping or falling. My hands were in steel cuffs attached to a waist chain, with a long chain running down to the leg irons.
As they locked all the hardware I remember thinking how completely unnecessary it all was. I’m not some dangerous animal—just a guy whose life should have turned out differently.
My focus changed as we headed past the holding pens where other prisoners awaited their court dates. The prisoners yelled things like, “Alright now, big homie,” “Take care of yourself,” and “Stay strong, big dog.”
We continued walking and came to another holding pen where a group of prisoners stood in silence. These men I knew. They were the elite—the convicts. Most were in for murder and wouldn’t see the streets again. They were the men I’d spent the past four and a half years with—men who were no strangers to prison a
nd the dangers that dwelled there. They were the proudest and most dangerous men I’d ever met. The prison system had honed them into fearless gladiators, and I was grateful for the respect they gave me in that moment.
I stopped as I came in line with the gate of their holding pen.
The deputy told his partner, “Give him a moment, he’s earned it.”
They backed away a few steps and left me alone facing these warriors. I nodded to the men I’d learned so much from about the thin line between sinking and swimming in the prison system. They were hardened convicts who lived by a code, not unlike a standard that promotes military cohesion and effectiveness among soldiers. Their code was all about the two most important elements in any prisoner’s existence: fear and respect.
Those words represent an aspect of prison life that permeates every conversation and action of each prisoner for the total length of his incarceration. Who you fear, or who fears you, and whether you show appropriate respect and receive it in return are continually monitored by each prisoner in every situation. Being capable of intense physical violence is the obvious path to being shown respect and having no fear in prison. I would later learn other, more subtle ways that sometimes work, but an underlying capacity for violence is always the most reliable element for a peaceful existence.
I stepped close to the bars of the holding pen and, without a word, each and every convict shook my hand through the bars. Their eyes searched mine as if looking for a crack, any sign of weakness. I’d just been sentenced to death, and convicts always test you for weakness.
I needed the respect and loyalty they showed at that moment, but I’d learned not to be fooled. I knew they only respected who they feared or considered their equal. If I’d ever showed weakness or fear over the past four and a half years, they would have killed me.
As we all shook hands, Chente, a Mexican I’d known the longest, as tall as me and built like a seasoned warrior, said, “Órale, carnal, you take care of yourself. You know how we do it. When you get to Quentin remember who you are.”
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