Chapter 29: Violated! Part 2
Brown County Jail, Exodus Bldg., Dorm D
This is part of a series. For more please go to the Table of Contents.
The Celebrity Inmate
I finally figured out we had a “celebrity inmate” in Pod F the day after the book cart came around. Before that I’d been a bit confused because it sounded like my neighbor, who liked to get on the door all the time, was saying, “Captain, Captain,” pretty often. A couple of times I looked out my cell door to see what officer’s attention he was trying to get, but saw nothing.
Then one morning when the nurse came to deliver my medications (metformin & amlodipine) she also brought me briefly out of my cell to take my blood pressure. While I was standing there I noticed there was another cell door open not far away, and the dorm office called out, “Mr. Capt, get ready — you have a court hearing today.”
Then I looked up at the TV which was blaring the local morning news. There he was! They were showing file footage of one of Harry Capt’s many court appearances along with the headline “CAPT SENTENCING HEARING TODAY.” The reporter was blabbing an overview of Capt’s case, which was as follows:
Harry Capt was a local millionaire who lost his shirt and went bankrupt in the Great Recession of 2008–09. But that’s not how he earned his 15 minutes of fame. After all, every city has its share of millionaires and a bunch of them lost their shirts in the Housing Bust. However, in Capt’s case his financial disaster led to a domestic catastrophe in which he got in some big-ass fight with his wife and, without us here passing judgment on his guilt or innocence, let’s just say said wife ended up dead.
Since then he’d been tried twice for this crime and found guilty both times. The thing had been splashed across the local news headlines for years. Now he was sitting in Pod F awaiting sentencing in protective custody, undoubtedly because his case was so high profile that he was an obvious target for any jit or gangster wanting to make a name for himself.
Today was his sentencing hearing. He was looking at 13–30 years. Because he looked perhaps a bit younger than me, anything close to the max would essentially be a life sentence. However he would undoubtedly appeal, post bond and live to fight another day — primarily because even though his charges were definitely violent, the crime took place before our illustrious state legislature passed their law preventing murderers (and sex offenders) from getting bond, and he wasn’t in on a probation violation.
Once Capt came back from his court appearance I saw him toss several books into the book return box. When I had my hour out in the day room the next day I looked them over. They were his personal books with his name CAPT written across the binding. I suppose he was purging his library of books he’d already read. They were all crime or espionage thrillers and I took a few to read, starting with Midnight Line, part of the Jack Reacher series by Lee Child. Not great, in my opinion.
The following Monday was canteen order day, so I submitted my pre-filled-out form hoping this time there’d be pens at the warehouse. I also ordered ketchup, mustard, cheese squeezes etc. to season my food with, but as usual no chips, honey buns, soups, snacks or other junk food (see Essay “Prison Food Really Sucks!”). Supposedly the order would arrive on Wednesday.
Exodus
In the middle of the night that Wednesday morning I was awakened by the sound of my cell door sliding open. The dorm officer peeked in. “Inmate Z, pack your shit. You’re moving.”
“What time is it?” I asked groggily.
“2:30.”
This move, while unwelcome, didn’t come as a complete surprise. A “housing officer” had visited me about a week before and warned me he was reviewing my eligibility for protective custody. “I think you’d fit well in the Exodus program,” he’d said.
“What’s that?”
“Open dorm, direct supervision. All the inmates are screened, so it’s a good fit for you. No problems.”
“I’d really rather stay here,” I said weakly, trying to describe my previous experiences being threatened, extorted and put down on.
“It’s not my decision, but PC here is supposed to be strictly temporary.” Temporary had turned out to be one more week.
I’d never been housed anywhere in Brown County Jail before other than the Pods, but of course I knew that there were other types of custody and programs available. Hearing the name “Exodus” you might think it was a religious program, but mercifully (in my case) it was not. The christian program was called Sunrise. There was another program for repeat offenders who, in the jail administration’s judgment, seemed serious about making a fresh start in life. Each of these programs had their own dorm building.
Then there was the Main Building, “general population,” where they put all the irredeemable scumbags who didn’t qualify for any kind of program. I soon discovered that the rest of the inmates called that place “The Zoo.” You do not need much of an imagination to understand how it got a name like that!
The Exodus building consisted of four quadrants, each of which was an open bay dorm. You had to be a low security inmate to qualify for Exodus, and no gangsters were allowed. It was called “direct supervision” because unlike the dorms at state prison there was no separate officers station (a.k.a. “bubble”) overlooking all four of the quadrants. Instead there was a desk inside of each quadrant near the entrance (see diagram) which served as the officer’s station and we were, as the name implies, directly supervised. No inmate could get away with bad behavior without getting caught.
If you acted up they cuffed you and sent you to the Box, after which you’d probably be headed to The Zoo and nobody wanted that. This served as sufficient motivation for most inmates to keep their cool most of the time. The entire time I was there I never smelled a whiff of toochie either.
On the other hand the officers usually demanded a pretty high standard of behavior, especially keeping voices down, having beds made at all times and keeping belongings in property bags. This often proved too much to ask of some of the young street jits in my dorm, so we were frequently “locked down” on our bunks for hours and even “shook down” periodically.
Another difference from the state’s open bay dorms was that the bunks were on two levels (see diagram). The rest of the first level was a fairly large day room. Under one of the stairwells was a set of folding tables and stackable chairs. Everything that happened each day happened in that day room and the housemen periodically took the tables and chairs out, moved them around or put them away to accommodate meals, “day room time,” discipline, etc.
I never left the room for anything except when called to medical for a check-up. Food trays were brought to us — there was no chow hall. Same for morning & evening medications. In short, 70 guys were all locked in one (albeit large) room.
There were four phones, two upstairs & two down, and they were open whenever the day room was open. However with 70 guys, some of whom made multiple calls per day, there were usually lines, especially in the evenings. After trying that a few times I switched over to calling my ex-wife and others in the mornings when there were sometimes no lines at all.
There were two TV’s in the day room but as usual my fellow inmates’ program selections were awful. I seldom watched any of it. Instead I read, first finishing off two of Harry Capt’s books that I’d brought with me from Pod F. They were End Game, a Will Robie Series book by David Baldacci (spy/crime/action thriller, lots of violence, one-dimensional characters — not great) and The Rooster Bar by John Grisham (as always for Grisham, a courtroom drama and well-written with engaging characters and story line).
Then I moved on to books from the book cart that sat permanently in the Exodus day room. The selection wasn’t great but I found a few books to occupy my time including The Hotel on Place Vendome by Thar J. Mazzeo and Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow which turned out to be Part 1 of the series that included Innocent which I’d read in Pod F. Also, The Confession by John Grisham in which he makes clear his opposition to the death penalty, especially as practiced in Texas, and to the aggressive police interrogation practices that lead to false confessions.
Story time
For me, one thing that was always a challenge about being in an open bay dorm with 70 other guys was making sure nobody found out I was a sex offender. In this regard, at the Exodus dorm I was aided by the fact that there was no law library with computer access where jits [LINK to Glossary] and gangsters could go look up my charges.
Also, because only qualified inmates could be assigned to this dorm and the gangsters were screened out, nobody was in the extortion put down business. Because this was a county jail instead of a state prison the inmates were either awaiting trail, awaiting transfer to state custody or serving short sentences. They all had their own problems and didn’t seem to be in anybody else’s business.
This time around if anybody asked why I was there I could always start with, “I’m here on a probation violation.” Sometimes that ended the conversation … but usually it just begged the question, “So what did you do in the first place?”
That’s when I dusted off my old cover story about accepting a bribe as a government employee. And guess what? That story worked perfectly with this unsophisticated audience. In fact, one of the most frequently asked follow-up questions was, “Ya mean it’s illegal to take the money? Weren’t ya able to keep it?”
To which my response was, “Of course it’s illegal! It’s just as illegal to accept a bribe as it is to bribe somebody.” Duh! My story worked like a charm every time.
Jail food
As I pointed out way back in Chapter 2, the food at my county jail wasn’t even as good as in the state prison system and that’s saying something. Still, as always I was resolved to eat what was put in front of me rather than “live off the canteen” (Essay “Prison food really sucks!”) even though as I noted in the previous chapter, subheading “Intake” I had arrived at the jail this time with enough money to do so and they’d put that money in my canteen account.
I also noticed, even while I was in The Pods, that the jail administration had put me on some kind of “special diet.” My tray was always labeled “Inmate Z — 2200 calories/day ADA/snack.” As long as I’d been in solitary confinement in The Pods I had no way of comparing my tray to other inmates to see what was so “special” about it, but once I was in the Exodus dorm I quickly figured out this was the “diabetes diet tray.” They must’ve put me on this diet when they saw I take metformin, the most commonly-prescribed diabetes medication.
Actually, I take metformin even though I do not have diabetes. I got on it because I was “borderline” when I weighed 70 pounds more. I stayed on it even after I lost that weight and any time a doctor said, “Mr. Z, you’re not diabetic. Do you want to stop metformin?” I always said, “No doc, one reason I’m not diabetic is that I take metformin.”
Being on the diabetes special diet meant, for example, that instead of a couple of cookies for desert I usually got an orange, and instead of some kind of mystery meat casserole as the main dish I got chopped up smoked turkey & rice. I decided there was nothing to complain about, so instead of pissing away my canteen account money on junk food I’d stock up on ketchup & mustard packets and cheese squeezes to perk up my otherwise completely unseasoned food trays.
I soon learned that the jail inmates had come up with clever names for some of the main dishes on the menu. One was minced ham with minced bits of celery & onions, all mixed in mayonnaise. The inmates called that one “Cat Food.” This wasn’t necessarily a derogatory name however. Some guys liked it despite how it looked and would happily trade away their cookies for it! There was also a mystery meat patty that the guys called the “Rat Patty.”
As for snacks, I often put something aside from my tray but also bought crackers and peanut butter squeezes, much like I’d done at state prison. As ever, this was the cheapest possible snack and none of the mooches were interested in it. They found it hard to believe I wasn’t stocking up on chips &cookies & cheese doodles, but then later on they tried to mooch my condiments. “Man, look like Z the only smart one,” one said, “I gotta get me some ketchups & mustards.”
Just like at state prison, Ramen Noodle soups were both a staple for making those bad-for-you goulashes (see Essay, “Prison food really sucks!”) and the coin of the realm, so I kept a few on hand to get haircuts, shaves and personal clothes washed.
Get me out of here!!
It had been about a week & a half since I’d met with my attorney. He’d warned me that if there was a delay the problem would be with the prosecutor, not because he was a dickhead but because he was notoriously hard to get on the phone.
Still, after this much time I figured it couldn’t hurt to give my lawyer a nudge, so during one of my daily phone calls with my ex-wife I asked her to send him an email and ask how things were coming along. The next day (which was a Tuesday) she reported back that he’d spoken with both the probation officer & the prosecutor and everything was positive, but the prosecutor wanted to speak to the P.O. before finalizing the deal. Be patient, he said, we’re making progress.
Then that Friday my ex told me she’d heard good news! The deal was done, everyone was in agreement to re-instate my probation. All that remained was to set the court date, after which I’d be going home. Yey! The bad news was that this was the Friday before Memorial Day which meant nothing at all would happen until the following Tuesday. So I waited …
I heard nothing that Tuesday but then on Wednesday my ex-wife reported, “Your hearing is 1:30 pm tomorrow!” Double yey!! I wanted to look my best in court, so that night I paid one soup & one peanut butter squeeze for a good shave & haircut. Then I took what I hoped would be my last shower in jail, and tried to get some sleep — not easy when I was filled with so much anticipation.
Although my hearing was in the afternoon, I and the other pm inmates got called out at 7:30 am and brought to the “transport center,” there to wait for over two hours in a freezing cold holding cell. Finally my group of seven guys were cuffed up, shackled and chained around the waist, then locked into an armored police van with no windows that took us downtown to the courthouse basement. Then of course the whole process was repeated in reverse, so that by 11:00 am I found myself in another holding cell with about ten guys all waiting to go upstairs to their respective hearings.
Since my hearing was at 1:30 pm I waited there in the holding cell for about 2 1/2 hours, all the while with hopeful or disappointed inmates coming and going. An officer passed by handing out paper bag lunches (two baloney & cheese sandwiches, two cookies & a juice). Then right at 1:30 I heard my name called and an officer escorted me upstairs — in handcuffs of course.
In the courtroom I was escorted to a seat in the (unused) jury box along with a few other guys, all of us in handcuffs & jail jumpsuits. Several prosecutors and attorneys (including mine) were seated in the audience section and the judge was calling cases and issuing orders. The courtroom was buzzing with efficiency.
Soon my case was called and my attorney jumped to his feet. He and the prosecutor swiftly outlined the agreement to re-instate my probation. Then the judge turned to me.
“Mr. Z,” he said, “I am not in the habit of granting re-instatement of probation in circumstances such as this. Mr. Bloodhound [my attorney] and I have known each other for a long time and he knows this about me, don’t you Chris?”
Holy shit! My attorney nodded solemnly.
“However, in this case the prosecutor and the probation officer are in agreement and I am not the judge of record. I am just sitting in because Judge Black is on vacation this week. So I am inclined to go along with their recommendation despite my misgivings.”
Whew!
“However, Mr. Z, I hope you understand the seriousness of this matter. Your probation order sets forth the rules you must follow, like a box you must stay inside while serving your probation.” Here the judge drew a box in the air for emphasis. “You have gone outside the box, Mr. Z, and you should know that if this ever happens again and it comes before me I will not hesitate to order you remanded to the state to serve the remainder of your probation in prison.”
“I understand, your honor,” I croaked meekly.
“So ordered,” he said. BAM!
My attorney stopped briefly to shake my cuffed hands on his way out of court. “You’ll be home tonight,” he whispered.
And that was that. Back down to the basement holding cell, loaded back onto another windowless van, back to the Brown County Jail and escorted to Exodus Dorm D.
It was the custom at the Brown County Jail to let out each day’s releases, of which there were always a couple of dozen, all in one big group in the evening. My name was called at about 7:30 pm and I joined four guys from other dorms in the Exodus building waiting in the hall to be escorted to the Booking & Release Center (BRC) to get in a long line of the night’s releases.
Men and women were in separate lines (yes there were about a half dozen hookers being released that evening) to go to separate property and changing rooms. Once I had my property back I was able to change back into the now thoroughly wrinkled clothes I’d been wearing when I got picked up almost a month before. Then downstairs to the Release Room to wait again for my name to be called for check out.
By this time it was 9:45 pm. My ex-wife was out of town visiting our daughter and grandchildren and Reevestown’s pitiful bus service had stopped running for the night. However there was a taxi stand right outside the jail. Since my house was way across town from the jail the trip (including tip) cost $40 but so what. I was home!
It was 10:30 pm on May 31st. I’d spent 2 1/2 hours shy of the whole month of May in jail but not one day more. You probably don’t understand the importance of that, so let me tell you that you can be incarcerated up to exactly one month without having your Social Security payments cut off. One month + one day = WHACK! There you are, broke and back standing in that long line at the Social Security office trying to get it straightened out again.
Whew!
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