September 28, 2017
At present I choose to be – let me explain. For the first 9 years of my incarceration I was locked up and locked down several times. Dirty urine tests, attempted escape, drugs, cigarettes and every assault on staff a few times. I did not adjust well to prison life. At that time I was at Cummins Unit. In May 2010 I allowed one of the officers to push me to my limit and I cut him with a shank. I was not trying to kill but just get the dude to stop his BS. Well, this happened about 3:30 in the afternoon and around 5:00 I was beaten by 5 ADC staff members. They beat me so bad I thought I was gonna die. At this time I was forty-nine, almost fifty, years old and it had hurt me really bad. By six that evening without receiving medication attention, still bleeding and dazed, even in and out of consciousness they put me and my property on a van and transferred me to Tucker Max Unit. I spent eighty days in the hole so I could heal and I lost several days along the way including teeth. (They had broken my teeth.) I healed and decided that I was too old to suffer any more beatings like that and I would try desperately not to put myself in such a situation again. I was kept locked down by ADC due to behavior but over time I became complacent. In 2015 after mom died I decided to turn over a new leaf. We can call it many things but I chose to put all the smoking, dope selling, rule breaking, and just old self behind me and try to be a better person. I had been locked up since 2001 and in prison since August 2002 and never been class one. Now I have these implants in my eyes and such poor vision I choose to remain here in a single cell environment for several reasons.
First off I have complete control of everything that occurs in my 10×8 area, no one but me. I have only me to deal with and no other entity to have problems with. As long as I behave I have no worries of police brutality. Let me go a little further into the police brutality. This past Thursday, the twenty-eighth, several police went into one of the barracks and literally began tearing up inmates property under the guise of a shake down. The inmates began bucking the authority. The major and a lieutenant went into the barracks. The inmates became so agitated that 3 or 5 decided they were gonna take over the barracks. The inmates took shanks and stabbed the major and lieutenant, seriously wounding them. Now, the barracks was locked down, no one in or out and all available staff were gathered. The barracks windows was busted out by the warden and all staff began shooting inmates with shotguns loaded with beanbags. Even if the inmate was not involved in the stabbing, the inmate was either shot, beaten, or stabbed by ADC staff. Being in the single cell I don’t have that to worry about and since I have these implants in both eyes I was told to avoid blows to the eyes because the eye could rupture and I’d have not eyes. I guess for medical and personal reasons I choose to stay where I am, plus I am now thinking of 4 years I stay class one and might be allowed parole if I keep my nose clean.
Here I have balance in myself, my environment and my mind. That probably sounds crazy but truthfully I have peace, serenity and total harmony.