Untying the Knot: John Mark Byers and the West Memphis Three

by Greg Day

  There are actually two variations of the hoe squad at Brickeys. One is called a “field utility unit,” and the timetable it follows is simple: fifty minutes at the hoe, ten minutes for rest and water, and pack it in after four hours in the field. The second type of squad is for inmates who have been acclimated to the heat by previous time on a field utility squad and who can presumably work longer with fewer breaks. These men work for four hours straight and then take thirty minutes for lunch—the ubiquitous prison-issue baloney sandwich and an apple, or some variant. They are put back to work until 3:00 p.m. and are then marched back to their barracks.

  Mark was on a field utility squad. During the squad’s ten-minute water breaks, small cups hanging from a long chain were emptied one at a time by the first group of cons. After an inmate finished his cup of water, he would go to the back of the line till he came around for another cup. When the ten minutes were up, whatever water he had gotten was all he was going to get, and he was put back to work. Four hours of this, and the inmate was returned to his barracks, if he made it through the shift without “falling out.” On his first—and only—day out, Mark Byers didn’t make it.

  At 6:00 a.m., immediately following roll call, Mark’s number was called out, and he and the rest of the squad were lined up by twos and marched out to the field. They were guarded by horse-mounted bosses with shotguns, rifles, handguns, or some combination of the three. Each boss was responsible for a particular squad. These bosses were a special breed, with a cruel streak and twisted sense of humor. One day the kitchen workers reported to inmates on hoe squad duty (there aren’t very many secrets in prison) that the riding bosses ran a betting scheme within the group. The first riding boss who could drive his squad hard enough to make an inmate fall out would win the pool. This process could be accelerated by the practice of assigning the ablest inmate as the squad lead, forcing other, less fit inmates to keep pace with him. If the heat and the humidity were right, the boss would be able to drop an inmate within an hour or two.

  Hoe squad workers always walked the one—to five-mile distance to the work site, following ATVs (all-terrain vehicles) that pulled trailers filled with hoes, food, and water. As the sun rose that day, the temperature rose quickly, well on its way to the near ninety degrees it would hit that afternoon. With the relative humidity hovering at around 68 percent, it would feel more like ninety-five degrees. The hoe squads were huge, often numbering several hundred men, all being taunted, timed, harassed, and mentally abused by the riding bosses. The choking dust, blinding sun, and crippling heat and humidity were de rigueur for the southeast Arkansas summer in the fields. These conditions also tended to make the inmates a little testy. Despite the heavy security detail, inmates decided from time to time to hack at each other with their hoes instead of the Johnson grass. That, of course, earned them a month or two in the hole, along with the usual complement of sanctions imposed on inmates who misbehaved.

  After his third hour of work that day, Mark succumbed to the heat and humidity, falling out with what he described as a seizure—probably heat exhaustion—and didn’t wake up until he was in the infirmary. He had no idea how he’d gotten there, but he was painfully aware of the throbbing in his head, a combination of the headache that accompanies hypothermia and the lump forming around the gash in his head that had taken four stitches to close. Whether he’d hit his head on a rock or a hoe or something else, he wasn’t sure. He was covered with blood and cold towels, his blood pressure critically low at ninety over forty-five. Mark’s experience on the hoe squad was not unique. Inmates who fall out are unceremoniously dragged by the collar and dumped onto the beds of pickup trucks until they can be hauled off for medical care. There isn’t much consideration given to their comfort or safety. Other inmates had and have succumbed to the crippling conditions, some even dying after a stint in the field.136

  After his falling out on the hoe squad, it was discovered that Mark had been incorrectly classified at Pine Bluff as “M4” (okay for all labor, full-time), instead of “M2” (light inside work, part-time). No more hoe squad for Mark Byers.

  Was Brickeys a violent place? Because prison officials in general are publicity-averse and understate the true number of assaults at any given facility, it would be difficult to determine the extent of the violence. ADC spokesperson Dina Tyler said, “We’re not going to tell [the press] about every scuffle. We have fights every shift at every unit.”

  Moving On Up

  Another inescapable fact of prison life is that much like the military, prison populations are frequently on the move. Sometimes the reasons are logical—inmates make parole, are found with contraband, or are charged with a disciplinary infraction. More often, however, the reasons are elusive, at least to the inmate or inmates being moved. Within a couple weeks of his falling out on the hoe squad, Mark was moved to barracks 13, where there were more class I and II inmates. For Mark, this was a mostly agreeable move; the inmates Mark had fought with on his first night were still looming around the fifty-bed barracks from which he had been moved, as well as some class III and IV inmates with major attitude issues. Changing barracks, however, presented its own set of problems. “You have to size people up all over again. You must be very careful who you talk to. In here, the strong survive; the weak are consumed. See nothing, hear nothing, know nothing. Mind your own business.” Mark’s own classification would remain class II for a minimum of sixty days, at which time he would be eligible for reclassification. Barracks 13 turned out to be fine, which must have been why he was inexplicably moved to barracks 10. Shortly thereafter, barracks 10 was raided, and ten people, including Bad News, were moved out to points undisclosed. Mark was moved to barracks 3, one of the Little Saigon barracks, which put his class I status in serious jeopardy. Barracks 3 was a one-hundred-rack facility, and by Mark’s reckoning, eighty-seven of those racks held black cons, nearly all of whom were class III or class IV inmates.

  Before his trip to Little Saigon, Bad News had been learning chess from Mark. One of the prison activities Mark was involved in was woodworking. With a little money sent from home, he had been able to buy the materials needed to craft a nice chess set, which he immediately put to use. Mark had been playing for years, and Bad News was no match for him. “Every now and then I let him win,” Mark wrote. “It was good PR.” On July 16, Bad News delivered his last piece of envelope art to Mark, one depicting a wild turkey. The bird has its legs tucked under its rotund torso, and the whole image is set against a skyscape dotted with puffy clouds. Wild turkeys can fly at an impressive forty-five miles per hour and can maintain level flight for up to one mile, a feat usually accomplished while fleeing a predator. This was the image captured by the artist, the bird’s attacker not shown in the frame.

  Mark’s rather elite cadre of friends in Brickeys included a gentle but potentially dangerous giant named “Kool Aid.” Kool Aid was a “big ol’ dumb country boy” who was serving time for running supplies and paraphernalia for a methamphetamine lab. He was a match in strength for Bad News, and the two men would arm wrestle for cigarettes, often to a draw. Kool Aid had been in three fights that Mark could recall, each consisting of only one punch. When Mark first met Kool Aid and realized that he could neither read nor write much beyond a second-grade level, he asked Bad News whether he thought it would be okay to cautiously approach Kool Aid and offer to write letters for him and read his legal paperwork to him when needed. Bad News thought this was a good idea, and so did Kool Aid. “People would see me with Bad News and Kool Aid and they knew not to fuck with me.” He shared these thoughts in another letter home. “Life in here is very cheap,” he wrote to his brother. “You walk very carefully. Thank God I met a couple of men that have helped me.” In the dangerous world they lived in, a world in which men are easily slighted, and personal and corporate vendettas are commonplace, the trust they had between them was often the difference between life and death. Although Mark had seen jail before and had his share of “street smarts,” he was
not prepared for prison and needed the protection and tutelage of the few men he could trust.

  The raid on barracks 10 unfortunately sent Bad News to Little Saigon. Affirming his nickname shortly after he arrived there, Bad News sent two inmates to the infirmary with broken bones and was given a free ticket to the hole. Mark never saw him again.

  In many prisons, association between races is a good way for someone to get shanked. Although prisons are no longer officially segregated, in the ADC racial separation is rigidly enforced by the cons themselves. An inmate obviously cannot choose his “cellies,” or the other inmates housed in his barracks, but he is expected to show allegiance to his own race and choose the right side when the “shit jumps off” (a fight or riot breaks out). Eating or associating with other races while in the day room or other common areas can also be problematic. If there is any disrespect shown, no matter how slight, the inmates generally show solidarity with their race, at least in public. Mark was highly aware of this code when he “rolled it up”—moved his belongings—to barracks 3. It took only fifteen minutes for trouble to find him. As he settled into his rack on his first day in Little Saigon, two black inmates approached. Words were exchanged. The words themselves were less important than the way they were said; any nuance of delivery, even subtle, that hinted at disrespect could provoke a reaction. Fortunately, it didn’t go that far. The guards heard the commotion and cut the confrontation short. The peace wouldn’t last.

  Less than a week passed before Mark had another run-in with his barracks-mates. That particular day happened to be a commissary day. Mark had picked up his goodies and stashed them in his locker, a small steel enclosure welded to the rack. Later, he returned to find that his locker had been broken into. He went off, screaming epithets, curses, and accusations at anyone and everyone within earshot. The other inmates reacted, forming a circle around him. No one was going to call for a guard this time. Mark sized up the closest inmate, and before anyone knew what was happening, the larger of the two was leveled by a right hand to the face. He quickly dropped to the floor, and the other black inmates in the barracks jumped Mark.

  Abruptly, the crowd of inmates parted, and a colossal figure, some six feet eight inches tall and over four hundred pounds, came through the crowd. His name was Big Chuck (inmates are often known by their prison nicknames; Mark was “Little John”). As he surveyed the scene, a slightly amused look crossed his face. There was Mark in a sea of black inmates, holding his now-throbbing right hand, looking for all the world like a man who was about to die. “I know who you are,” he said to Mark. “I got kids too.” Big Chuck pulled out pictures of his two daughters and his son—“Little Chuck”—to show to Mark. Looking around at the others, he said, “Give him back his shit—all of it!” Everything was passed back to Mark, including a half-empty can of Coke. Not one inmate questioned the order. Big Chuck was the chief “shot-caller” in the barracks, and his power was absolute. “You’re one crazy white boy,” he told Mark, “and you have balls. You won’t have any more trouble in here.” And he didn’t. The two became friends, and it was a friendship based on the most important measure of power in prison: respect. As an example of the regard Big Chuck had for him, Mark was one of the few people Big Chuck let sit on his rack. Sitting on another inmate’s rack without permission could get you killed, especially in a place such as Little Saigon.

  When the guards finally arrived the day Big Chuck and Mark met, they saw the injured inmate lying on his bed with his eye swollen shut, “looking like someone had just kicked his ass,” and nobody said a word. Big Chuck had crossed the racial line because he’d taken a liking to Mark or possibly because he felt a kinship as a father that transcended race. Also, he said, Mark was “pretty cool for a white boy.” But mostly he did it because he could. Not only did Big Chuck save Mark from a trip to the infirmary—or worse—but by keeping the guards away, he helped preserve Mark’s upcoming class I status and current good time credits.137

  Passing Time

  The days tend to run together in prison. The significance that the free world assigns to days of the week and months of the year diminishes when all the days seem the same. The only practical significance that time has is in its relationship to an inmate’s sentence—time remaining till a parole hearing, good time credits, and so on—or when counting down time in the hole. All inmates develop their own mechanisms for passing time. It is all they have, and they have plenty of it. There are various ways to transcend the physical constraints of the days, weeks, and months in the joint. Sleeping up to eighteen hours a day (sleep time is easy time!), doing drugs, getting drunk (a substance known as “pruno” or “home brew” can be made with fruits and bread or bought from one of the prison’s enterprising merchants), attempting suicide (usually to gain a ticket to the infirmary), and maybe even attempting an escape or two are all ways to get from one day to the next. And of course, all depends on the sentence being served. An inmate doing twenty years will likely be more willing to experiment than a short-time class I or II inmate like Mark Byers.

  Mark mostly spent his days steering clear of trouble, writing letters home, working when that option was available, and finding diversions—any diversion—that would get him out of his barracks. Early on in Brickeys, Mark discovered the prison choir. They practiced three times a week for a couple of hours each session, and he got out of the barracks on Wednesdays and Sundays for chapel. He also took a course from the Institute of Biblical Studies during the summer of 1999, titled “The Biblical Approach to Alcohol and Drugs.” At one point he even took a course on anger management, which was required for inmates serving time for violent crimes but voluntary for other inmates. It not only improved your “jacket”—the complete record on an inmate kept on file by the prison—before the parole board but also was yet another way to “lay in” for the four weeks the course ran.

  Inmates could also spend time in the day room, watch television, or play chess and other approved games (cards were not permitted). During times when he could not leave the barracks, Mark would read, especially the novels of Sydney Sheldon and Clive Cussler, which he had shipped in to him by relatives.

  Racial tensions within the barracks were taking their toll on Mark. In a housing unit with almost ninety blacks and only a handful of whites, it was difficult to avoid racial harassment. Black inmates would taunt and attempt to provoke Mark and the other white inmates, knowing that in the event of a fight, their side of the story would be backed by the other black inmates in the barracks.

  Mark dealt with the racial issue pragmatically, as any inmate wanting to survive needed to do. “The blacks ran the prison. That was just a fact. They outnumbered the whites. You needed to have as many associates—not necessarily friends—as possible, not just for peacekeeping and basic survival, but to get the okay to run any game you wanted to run.” For example, a friend of Mark’s in the kitchen hooked him up with some yeast one day, and Mark wanted to make a few dollars selling hooch in his barracks. He did what had to be done: he approached the barracks shot-caller, a black inmate; told him what he wanted to do; and asked what it would cost. “Three cups for me, and half your profits.” It wasn’t a negotiation. Life in prison is much like life in the mob: keep your mouth shut, pay tribute where it is due, and don’t take shit from anybody, and you just might survive.

  Violence, racial or otherwise, could break out with amazing speed and a total lack of warning. A fight broke out in Mark’s barracks during the same month he was denied a reduction in his sentence.138 He wrote, “One white guy got his left eye poked out and face cut very bad. The black guy was thrown from the top level and busted his head open. It almost started an all-out war. There was so much blood. It was a very bad scene. Everyone was on edge for the rest of the night. It was a night where not too many people slept any. Brother, this place can scare the hell out of you.”

  A recurring theme for Mark during his confinement was a deeply felt remorse for his actions and for the shame he believed he’
d brought on his family. “I really let you down,” he wrote his brother from Brickeys. “I screwed up big time. I can’t ever tell you how much you truly mean to me. You have always been there for me . . . I’m very blessed to have you as my brother. The only way I can repay you is I’ll never come back [here], not in this life.”

  “What a dumbass, hard headed, fool I’ve been,” Mark wrote from the Delta Regional Unit in Dermott (Dermott), the prison he was transferred to from Brickeys eight months into his sentence. “I wish I could blame it all on someone else, but I can’t. The truth is, I must stand up and pay the price for my actions.” As depressed as he was at times, Mark also wrote about hope. “At least I know there’s a day coming when I will get out. Freedom . . . what a word! It’s truly something I won’t lose again.”

  More often, though, what he felt was fear, the kind of fear that could keep a man awake at night, a fear of getting killed, of never getting out of prison alive. Sixty-six men to a barracks, sometimes more, all trying to protect the tiny speck of real estate that marked the only territory they had. Things that are barely noticed in the free world become major events in prison. Take a power failure, for example. During the summer thunderstorm season, the power at Brickeys would frequently go out. The time between when the power went out and the generator kicked in was about eight seconds, sometimes a little longer. If it happened at night, God help the inmate who wasn’t prepared.