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Published: June 4, 2020, 7 p.m.

Chapter Twelve: 2005-2007

Months 209-231

 

“What’s this scumbag here for?”

The guard on duty barks as we enter the closed corridor inside the Special Housing Unit. Since he doesn’t know me I surmise that his obvious contempt extends to all prisoners.

I stand silently, both hands still locked behind my back.

“One for SHU. Captain’s orders.” The transporting guard uncuffs me and walks away.

“Strip!” The SHU guard commands.

I unbutton and remove my green shirt, then I pull my t-shirt over my head and drop it on the floor. The guard stands close, too close, staring as I take off my sneakers, my pants, my underwear, and my socks.

“Take everything off.”

I stand in front of him, naked, and I unfasten the rubber wristband of my Timex wristwatch, dropping the watch into his outstretched hand.

“Give me the ring.”

“I don’t have to give you my ring.”

“What did you say, Inmate?” He takes a step closer and his breath hits my face.

I hold up my left hand. “This is a silver wedding band, without stones. BOP policy says I can wear it at all times.”


The guard takes off his glasses, closes them and slides them into his shirt pocket. He inches closer to me. “You tellin’ me how to run my institution, scumbag?”

“I’m not resisting you. Call the lieutenant. He’ll know the policy.”

“I’m in charge here.” The guard balls his fists, wanting to fight. “Either take the ring off, or I’m gonna take it off. It’s not coming into my unit.”

Standing naked, I’m not in a position to argue for my rights. This guard thirsts for a violent confrontation, and if it comes to that, I lose. With the length of time I’ve served, I’m conditioned to accept that guards routinely cite their mantra about preserving security of the institution while they violate both human rights and civil rights. Despite the promise I made to Carole about never taking it off, I slide the band off my finger and I hand it to the guard. He steps back, puts his glasses back on, and then he continues the search.

The guard issues me a green jumpsuit and a bedroll.  We walk down the cellblock. When he unlocks the metal door I see three prisoners inside. Rollo, a young prisoner, is on the top rack. He caused a stir at the camp several months ago when he decided that he’d had enough of confinement and walked away. Pueblo is on the lower rack, locked in SHU two months ago for fighting. Jerome sits on the floor in SHU because the guard in food services caught him going through the food line twice on hamburger day. I drop my bedroll on the floor for a cushion, and I lean my back against the wall, bending my knees to prop my feet against the steel toilet.

“What’d they get you for?” Rollo asks from his rack.

“Embezzlement. They say I transferred a million dollars from the prison’s bank account to my wife’s account.”

“No way! Really?” Rollo would believe me if I’d told him I was locked in the SHU for not putting my napkin in my lap. He’s totally gullible.

“I don’t know why I’m here. They just locked me up,” I admit and shrug.

“Ay Rollo you so stupid, you believe anything.” Pueblo whacks him with his pillow from the lower rack.

“It could happen!” Rollo defends himself. “Ain’t you never seen The Shawshank Redemption, Homie?”

“Dat shit was a bad-ass flick,” Jerome says.

“Rollo,” I ask. “Why did you walk away from the camp?”

“I missed my ol’ lady.”

“When he done showed up at her door, da bitch done called da FBI on his stupid ass,” Jerome says, finishing Rollo’s explanation.

“Is that what happened?” I ask Rollo.

He nods his head and laughs. “I’m facing five more years for escape.”

“What were you serving before?” I ask him.

“Twenty-two months for credit card fraud.”

“You’ll probably get another year. You can use the time for school,” I say.

“That fool ain’t goin’ to no school.” Pueblo says. “He can’t even play no cards.”

I spend the entire day on the floor of the crowded cell, which won’t allow for Pueblo or Rollo to step off their bunks. When someone has to use the toilet or sink, I stand in the corner. Exercise isn’t an option here, and with the back and forth chatter, reading or writing will have to wait.

In the evening, a guard unlocks the door and tosses me a sleeping mat. I slide it under the steel rack, then carefully crawl under the bed, head first, and I lie still. Pueblo’s steel rack is only inches above me, too close for me to turn on my side. I sleep lying on my stomach, using my crossed arms as a pillow.

“Santos! Roll up!” I haven’t been asleep for long when I hear the guard kicking the metal door. He unlocks the door and opens it.

I crawl out from under the bed, careful not to step on Jerome. The guard cuffs my hands behind my back and leads me out. I don’t ask questions and he doesn’t offer explanations. I strip, toss my jumpsuit into a bin and I stand for the search, eager to move out.

“What size?” The guard asks.

“Two-X,” I say.

He tosses a roll of traveling khakis. After I’m cuffed and chained, I join a group of other prisoners and we climb into an idling bus. The sky is still dark. We drive through the gates and join a convoy of three other buses, two carrying prisoners from the Florence penitentiary and one from the ADX.

As the buses turn right, leaving the Florence Correctional Complex behind, I look through the tinted windows and wonder where Carole lives. The house she rents is only two miles from the prison, she told me, but I don’t know where. The bus moves past the dark cross streets too fast for me to see her car parked in a driveway. No matter. It’s before dawn and she’s asleep, oblivious to a new uprooting of our lives.

*******

I have a window seat as the plane takes off. I expect to sleep in the Oklahoma Transit Center again tonight and wonder whether I’ll see the Native American guard. I count how many times I’ve been on prison transport planes, and come up with 12, explaining why some of the U.S. marshals look familiar. I notice graying hair and new wrinkles in weathered faces; over the past 18 years I’ve flown with them throughout their careers.

We’ve been in the air a few hours when my ears pop and my stomach lurches. While we’re descending, I glance out from the tiny window.  As our plane approaches the landing strip, I see evergreen trees that surround a lake I recognize. We’re approaching Seattle, the city where Carole and I grew up, where Julie and her family still live. Carole and I may have grown up here, but it’s no longer home. We’re nomads, a prison family.

The plane lands at Boeing Field, right beside Interstate 5. I look outside and spot guards and marshals surrounding the plane for the prisoner exchange. I wish they would call my name, as I’d like to walk on Seattle ground again. I may be in chains, but I’m breathing the same air my sister breathes, though she doesn’t know I’m here. Even my wife doesn’t know where I am.

After an hour we’re airborne again and I take a last look out the window. It’s 2005, probably eight more years before I’ll see the Seattle skyline again. The Emerald City fades away as the plane banks and climbs higher. In eight years I don’t know where Carole and I will make our home. We may want to make a start in a new city, or even a new country.

I see Oklahoma City again as the plane taxis. It’s my fifth time here and I know the routine. Hobbling in my chains, I’m eager to fill out the forms and turn them in. The sooner processing begins, the sooner I’ll find out where I’m going.

“Do you know where you’re going?” the woman in uniform asks.

I shake my head “no,” and pass her my intake forms.

“Santos, Michael,” she says and moves her forefinger down the list of names on her computer printout. “Big Spring, Texas,” she says, and my heart sinks. “No, wait, you’ve been re-designated. You’re going to Lompoc Camp.”

*******

Among prisoners, Lompoc Camp on the Central Coast of California has a reputation of being the crown jewel of the federal prison system. For years I’ve heard that administrators reserved Lompoc Camp for politicians who’ve run afoul of the law and for powerful white-collar offenders.

Traveling by bus up the Pacific Coast Highway, with the salty smell of the ocean filling my lungs, invokes pleasurable childhood memories of visiting my grandparents in Los Angeles while on summer vacations. I remember swimming with my sisters at different California beaches, jumping into the waves that roll endlessly onto the shoreline. As I look at the ocean, I try to remember the sensation of floating in water. I contemplate what it might feel like to submerge my body. For 18 years the only water I’ve felt has sprayed from a spigot. I can’t remember the sensation of buoyancy. In eight years Carole and I will bathe together and we’ll swim in that ocean.

Klein Boulevard, the long thoroughfare leading into the Lompoc Federal Correctional Complex, is a crumbling asphalt road riddled with potholes. On my right is the fenced boundary of the medium-security prison, and on my left is the low-security prison. As the bus lurches along the dilapidated road toward the camp, prisoners in green uniforms walk freely on scenic trails winding between tall eucalyptus trees that fragrantly scent the air. I appreciate the natural beauty.

After six hours of processing, guards hand us our ID cards and bedrolls. I join four other prisoners walking outside the gates from the Receiving and Discharge building in the higher-security prison. Walking ahead of the crowd, I pass the field where a group of prisoners play soccer. Further down the road several men pump iron at the camp’s weight pile. Pinecones that fall from the trees litter the path I’m on.

The housing unit resembles a steel, prefabricated warehouse, and the laid back guard inside looks more like a member of ZZ Top, with his long beard, black sunglasses, heavy silver rings with Gothic designs.  Tattoos of double lightning bolts, flames, skulls, and cross bones cover his forearms. He’s in a messy office, holding a Maxim magazine with a young woman in panties, sucking a lollipop, on the cover.  He's leaning back in his chair, with crossed legs and heavy black leather boots resting casually on a gray metal desk.

I stand in front of him with my bedroll and the other new prisoners begin to crowd into the office, lining up behind me. The guard ignores us while flipping the pages of his magazine. Green canvas duffle bags are scattered on the scuffed and dingy tile floors. A desk fan blows and a radio broadcasts hardcore rap music by Tupac.

“Wazzup?” The guard finally lowers his magazine.

I give him my ID card and the other prisoners follow my lead.

“You guys the fresh meat?” he asks, turning down the volume of the radio.

We stand still, waiting as the guard sorts through index cards.  He then pulls his feet from the desk and stands.

“Follow me,” he says.

We follow him out of the office and down the narrow hall to the right. It empties into an open space as large as a private airplane hangar. For the crown jewel of the BOP, it’s mighty tarnished. Six columns of gray metal bunks, 30 rows deep, fill the immense room. The noisy, crowded accommodations have a putrid stench. I follow the guard as he leads us down the center aisle and taps the fourth bed in column four.

“Santos. This is you.”

He keeps walking with the others. I put down my belongings and prepare to settle in.

*******

“Santos!” I hear the loudspeaker. “Inmate Michael Santos. Number 16377-004. Report to the administration building. Immediately!”

Not again, I groan inwardly. I’ve only been at Lompoc Camp for a day and I’m already being paged. I walk the short distance for yet another confrontation with BOP administrators. As I pass by a sparkling white Dodge Intrepid sedan with darkly tinted windows and three small antennae sticking out of the car’s rear end, I assume it’s from the fleet of the Federal Correctional Complex security force. A closer look at the elaborate communication system inside the car confirms my suspicions. Someone is here to interrogate me.

Through the smoked glass of the building’s front door sits a receptionist. I knock, waiting for her to acknowledge me before opening the door. I’ve heard other prisoners refer to her as “the dragon lady,” so I don’t open the door until she indicates it’s okay. It’s a standoff, but I’m prepared to wait all day.  I prefer the wait to being scolded and bullied.

After several minutes, she grasps that I’m not going to open the door, and I’m not going to knock again. She looks up, annoyed, and motions me in.

“I’m Michael Santos.” I present my ID card. “I heard a page to the administration building.”

Before she can answer, a stocky man with a chiseled face and a military-style crew cut steps into the doorway of the conference room. He’s wearing a heavily starched BOP uniform.

“I paged you, come in.” He directs me to a chair at the side of the table.

“Sit down. Do you know who I am?”

“No.” I shake my head.

“I’m Lieutenant Merkle. Special Investigative Services.” He opens a burgundy leather portfolio on the table. “It’s generally not a good sign when I call an inmate for a meeting.”

“I’m familiar with the role of the SIS.”  These guards can’t intimidate me.

“I’m sure you are.”

The room is quiet as he flips through his papers.

“So you’re the writer. Do you know why you’re here?”

“Yes, I do.” I nod my head.

“And what’s your interpretation?”

“When I was in my early 20s, I sold cocaine. I’ve been a prisoner since then, and as a prisoner I’m susceptible to these kinds of summons.”

The lieutenant glances up at me. “So you’re a wise guy?”

“Not at all. That’s why I’m here. If I hadn’t sold cocaine, we wouldn’t be talking right now.”

He stares at me. “But you did sell cocaine.  Now you’re an inmate in my institution.”

He pulls out a page from his portfolio. “I received a letter from Lieutenant Knowles, SIS at Florence.”

“Okay.”

“You were transferred here administratively because your writing presented a threat to the security of that institution.”

“How so?”

“It doesn’t matter. Point is, you’re in my institution now and I’m here to give you notice. If you write anything that threatens the security of my institution, I’m not going to transfer you. Instead, I’ll bury you so deep in the SHU that no one will ever find you. Do you understand that?”

“What do you consider a threat to the security of the institution?”

“You’re a wise guy, you figure it out. But if I lock you up for an investigation, you won’t have access to telephone, mail, or visits. Do you understand?”

“For what, though?” I gesture with open hands. “I’ve never written a sentence that threatened security. All my work urges people to act responsibly and to lead law-abiding lives. I live by that rule. Why would you consider my writing a threat?”

“I ask the questions. I don’t answer them,” the lieutenant snaps, closing his file.

“Can I ask if you’re placing me on mail-monitoring status?”

“Inmate Santos, you’re starting here with a clean slate, no mail monitoring, no restrictions. Don’t threaten security in my institution and you won’t have any problems. If you see me again, it won’t be good for you.”

“One more thing, Lieutenant. While I was in Florence I wrote a book about what I’ve observed in prison. St. Martin’s Press has the manuscript and intends to publish it in 2006. Is that book going to be a problem?”

He rubs his chin. “We’ll visit that issue when the book comes out.”