Tehachapi State Prison, 2012 — Prison is a hustler’s paradise where only the strong survive. It’s full of buyers and sellers and everyone is a con-artist. Hence the term con-artist. The weak are susceptible to the game early and are easy to spot. You can tell when it’s someone’s first rodeo, as they say around here. Their title here is “first-timer” and they might as well have it tattooed on their face. Their fear or lack thereof is easy to spot. They’re still wet behind the ears and a little green, if you know what I mean. Although their ages may vary their demeanor doesn’t. They either have wide eyes and are walking on eggshells, or they carry themselves like they don’t have a worry in the world because they still have no idea what’s in store for them.

Think of your first term as something like your freshman year in high school. Its going to be an experience. I don’t care if you are the biggest guy in class or the smallest. Your surroundings are new and so are the people. You will be tested. Crash course. Your little world just got much bigger and whatever you thought you were just became much smaller.

I think it’s pretty safe to say once you make it through your first term you’re a man. What kind of a man depends on the type of people you rolled with. You could parole with newfound skills that could exceed your criminal expectations, from extracting Excedrin in your microwave to being gone in 60 seconds. The choice is all yours. The professionals are all here only too eager to tutor some new pupils. I promise you we do breed killers, along with any other felonious titles you can think of. We do not discriminate and are accepting all applications. No matter what brought you here to this war zone known as the California Prison System — green you may enter, but only educated you may leave.

A criminal mind is a terrible thing to waste. I tell you from direct experience that all the world’s best artists, poets, rappers and even athletes are all locked up. I tell you Little Wayne would slap himself for saying he is the best rapper alive if he could hear some of these cats spit a few bars of what I’ve been privileged enough to hear while I’ve been down. The artists, the rappers, the ballers. They’re all here.

I swear to you the next Michael Jordan is locked up. Forget the NBA draft, check San Quentin. As for the artwork, it’s almost worth coming to prison to see — and I’m not just talking about prison tattoos either, although that’s so true that it should go without even saying. The portraits, collages and other artworks I’ve seen would blow your mind. Where else does someone find the time to perfect their craft? I’m talking about spending ten hours on an eyebrow, three weeks on a hook, and six years on an album! It kind of makes you forget about that kid’s jump shot in San Quentin, doesn’t it?

I happen to live next door to one of the most talented artists/songwriters the world has never seen. I kid you not. What I’m witnessing daily has to feel something like watching John Lennon and Paul McCartney discover themselves before they become legends. His style in general would have to be labeled as pop or R&B, but with a twist and flavor no one’s ever seen outside the prison walls. He’s got a California drawl and a swagger that is all his own. He could chew up any rapper alive and serenade your girl out of her panties at the same time. To say dollar signs are in his future would be an understatement and no one even knows he exists. He’s never even seen a studio, but vocally he’s on top of his game and lyrically he’s off the charts. Still, with all his talent, will you ever know his name? Will he ever be discovered? You will never see a convict on American Idol. If America’s Got Talent, then Prison’s Got Professionals — or at least it breeds masters of their professions.

How many Michael Vicks got busted before Virginia Tech? Before changing the quarterback position as we know it. What if he was mopping floors at Leavenworth for 12¢ an hour before we ever knew his name? What if the only NFL action he ever saw was in a prison dayroom on a Sunday afternoon?

Look at Mike Tyson. Once upon a time the baddest man on the planet. Heavyweight Champion of the World. Also a convicted felon who had a long fall from grace and went to prison at the peak of his career.

Imagine if that fall from grace wasn’t as far. What if they never reached the top of their profession? What if they were sentenced to prison before they became household names? Would that have made them any less remarkably talented athletically? In short, the answer is no. I tell you this for a fact. I’m surrounded by more talented individuals then all the outsider stars combined.

The sky is a deep purple and a warm night is falling over the mountains that surround this prison yard. My favorite song is being sung by an individual most people don’t even know exists. As he beats on his chest to a soundtrack you’ve never heard he has our full attention and, as a crowd, we react at all the right moments.

I sit on the edge of my seat so I can keep my forward attitude. I continuously soak in my surroundings. In prison the critical subtext of every situation is animal. Never let your guard down. Even in silence everything is territory and dominance. A battle for advantage.

There’s something in the air. I can sense it. A disturbing silence envelops the whole yard. The hushed conversations, the sounds of boots on the pavement, even the crickets are silent. As I scan my surroundings in search of all this tension, a buzzer sounds. That’s followed by a voice over the public address system screening, “Down on the yard!”

The song has been cut short but the soundtrack continues playing out around me. I prone out on my stomach with the other 300 inmates on the yard. We were just trying to enjoy a warm evening out of our cells and now some kid is bleeding all over the grass some 50 yards away from me. He’s trying to hold his face together having just been sliced with a razor. Soon cops and guards and medics are all over the situation. They cuff anyone within 10 feet of the bleeder in the grass. The medics are rushing the bleeder in a wheelchair across the yard to the clinic. All that remains is a black shadow in the grass, staining the area where the boy had bled. Another five minutes of deathly silence is finally broken by that familiar voice over the public address system: “Resume program!”

Slowly I rise to my feet along with the rest of the yard. Boots scrape the pavement, conversations continue and groups re-converge. Now from the top, California picks up the beat on his chest in tune with the soundtrack around us. As the song continues I realize with certainty that this is truly a song I’ll never forget by an artist the world may never know.

To be continued. Submitted and all that mumbo-jumbo as the saga continues. I just thought I’d shoot this to the AVA readers and see what they think. Cheddar Bob still continues to work on his story as the editors very well know. Sometimes it’s worth printing and still other times it’s worth forgetting.

Ronald Rhea

Tehachapi

On October 24, 2011, I was taken out on a medical transport to San Joaquin hospital and the following took place.

We were transported with a set of leg irons and a chain around the waist that goes in between your legs and then is hooked by what they call the block box which fits over the handcuffs and which is cinched tight against your body so you can’t move your hands at all nor can you twist your wrists whatsoever. Then we are put in what is well known as the dog kennel in the back of a van and then transported to wherever we have an appointment at a very high rate of speed.

I can attest that the trip is one fast rough ride that no one in their right mind cares to do if they can avoid it at any cost.

Just so you know, there were four inmates that day going to the same hospital in one van but for reasons that the state is NOT broke there were four transport vans that went on that trip that infamous day of my “Hell I have fallen and I can’t get up” trip. There were also eight officers, two in each van that went to the same place with us but not one of them had a single inmate in their vans. We got to the hospital and one officer held my arm because it is almost impossible to walk when one is bound and chained up this way. But I can attest that it is impossible to walk in this contraption.

They tossed all of us into a room at the hospital that is part of the Sheriff’s holding wing of the hospital which has three thin, short benches. This is where the big fall took place off of one of those benches. I was sitting there for some time and decided to lay down. Needless to say, as I dozed off I felt myself falling and tried to catch myself. With my hands chained tight to my groin area, I could not stop myself from falling less than 8 inches from the bench to the ground. Unfortunately the chain around my waist was at my hip and I felt it snapp and it hurt. It really hurt — just so we have that clear from here on out. Okay?

As I laid on the floor moaning and groaning like a sissy, the other inmates started hollering for the corrections officers saying that a man (me) had fallen and needed help. As they came in the door they thought the scene was a big joke and ordered me off the floor. I told them I knew that something had broken and that I was suffering. They could see that I was starting to go into shock so they got a gurney and were just going to toss me on it until I protested and a hospital nurse informed these correctional officers that they needed to get a backboard to remove me from the floor. They were bummed out that they could not just toss me on to the gurney. So they rolled me over onto the backboard and off to the x-ray unit we went. Lo and behold, my left hip was broken. Then they took me out to the inmate hospital room.

By now it was October 25 and they did surgery on my hip installing three screws. I spent one day in recovery at the hospital then the following day they brought me back to good old Mule Creek State Prison, again at a very high rate of speed on the back country roads.

Lots of things have happened and not happened since that day. Here are a few things that stick out in my mind that I’m sure will interest someone out there.

For pain medication they gave me Vicodin for a couple days and finally they provided me with morphine for seven days. They took me off of all my other pain medications stating that they don’t issue that stuff. I went nine days without a bandage being changed because they said they did not have an order to change it and they would not touch it without an order. After nine days I got up the courage to change it myself and I got very sick from the smell and looks of it. It was very bad. It was black and green and where they installed the staples it was the worst. But I cleaned it as best I could with some pads I had and then I used a 6” x 36” ripped up sheet for a bandage. It was really bad, believe me. But now the six staples are out and it is healing up nicely believe it or not. I have still not yet seen a doctor since I returned from the hospital.

For those of you who want to know: yes, it still hurts all the time and the nurse says I don’t need any medication.

Wish me luck with the rest of my endeavors here at the happiest place in the Department of Corrections.

Peace,

Mark Sprinkle

Ione

I don’t know what all the fuss is about. “Awesome” is the most phenomenally iconic word ever. Actually I buried and mourned it long ago, interred it with a host of other cheapened, diluted, inflated, and perverted superlatives, though not without some serious regret and resentment.

I’m a word guy and I will delve into the archaic, the arcane, or other languages to find the mot juste. If necessary I will create a new word to fit a definition lacking one. Hubris? Hell yes; I’m lousy with it.

So for years I actively resisted the cheapening of awesome. “Really? That cappuccino is ‘awesome’?” I’d say. “Because you’re not acting like it. You’re drinking it. Shouldn’t you be gaping or genuflecting or averting your eyes or something?”

To which the offender would reply: “Huh?”

My resistance, which would eventually be completely eroded, focused on awesome’s singularity — there really is no replacement for it. The conditions associated with awe — fear, amazement, reverence, wonder — you will find grouped in no other definition. Therefore, when one finds oneself in a truly awe-inspiring situation: the aurora borealis, a nuclear explosion, a supernova, what have you: you may as well just say “cool,” ‘cuz awesome don’t mean shit.

“Phenomenal” I’m puzzled by. It’s sort of like awesome in reverse. I don’t have a dictionary handy, but as near as I can recall a phenomenon is an observable occurrence; something that happens. No qualification or values inherent. So when dipshit #1 says to dipshit #2 on Dancing With the Stars: “That Paso Doble was absolutely phenomenal!,” what he’s saying is: that Paso Doble just happened. Which I guess is pretty awesome.

Iconic, another burr under my saddle, is almost not worth mentioning because the people who (improperly) use it sound so stupid that I feel sorry for them. An icon is a representation that stands for something else. A person achieves iconic status when they are so thoroughly associated with something that you cannot think of one without the other coming to mind. Michael Jordan is for sure a basketball icon. Madonna is definitely an 80s icon. Leighton Meester’s performance on “Gossip Girl” is in no way iconic.

Yours in awesomeness,

Lynn Washburne

San Quentin

In watching across the lobby of the local clinic I see two little girls and a boy playing at a table with Plato and all the accessories that go along with it. There are great big smiles on their faces. I know those smiles, although I don’t know the children in front of me, at least I don’t think so.

They have that look in their eyes. You know look — not a worry in the world, innocents you can only see in a six-year-old. I’m captivated and staring and can help it. Do I know them? As the boys features become clearer I realize that almost the same moment two things: that he’s approaching me and second that I don’t know him.

He’s got spiky black hair and glasses on which seemed to magnify his golden eyes. They could be the largest eyes in the world. Just as that thought crosses my mind I realize he has said something. He’s asked me a question undoubtedly because that’s the only way to explain that questioning look in the largest rise in the world standing in front of me.

“I’m sorry. What’s up little man?” I finally reply having absolutely no idea where this is going.

“Can he play?” Spike asked as he gestures to the chair next to me.

“I don’t know,” I respond as I looked to my right to see who he might be referring to. I smile as I realized I absolutely do know this blonde haired blue eyed Devil next week.

“Well, you see yours?” Spike asked me as if the boy sitting next to me is in some kind of bottle.

“Yes,” I respond as it dawned on me where I am and start questioning why I’m here.

“Is he in trouble?” Spike asks with a little self-doubt in his voice.

“No,” is all I can manage as I continue to be consumed with thoughts of how I got here and what’s going on.

“Well, uh, is he sick?” Spike whispers to me. This time all too aware of how close he is to us. He takes to tentative steps back in slow motion.

As my whole world begins to spin, I looked down at my boy next to me. I asked myself, is he sick? He doesn’t look sick as he looks up at me waiting for the answer. “No,” I stammer. “No, he’s not sick,” I manage.

“Well, does he want to play?” Spike asks me with a newfound excitement in his voice.

“I don’t know little man. Why don’t you ask him. His name is Ronnie,” I say looking at Little Ronnie has the brightest mile in the world comes across my son’s face. Somewhere inside me the darkest cloud in the world seems to take over my mind.

“I,” Spike says. “My name’s Damon. Why not come play with me?” Just as if I was never there to begin with.

“Okay,” Roddy says as he slips out of his chair next to me and they had across the room.

As their conversation fades I’m consumed with my own demons. Questions of why I’m here? If he’s not sick, why are we at the clinic? Not to mention, why does this feel so much like — well, like a dream.

As the dream ends and my nightmare begins by awaken on my bum covered in sweat and feeling sick to my stomach. I rushed to the restroom to throw up.

I’m still in prison, rotting away in feeling rather sick, I might add. My son turned seven yesterday and needless to say he’s been on my mind to the point of me waking up to another nightmare of something happening to my children. This is truly hell. You see, as such thoughts consume my every waking minute and then only to be haunted in my sleep, it just doesn’t seem fair.

For me there is nothing worse than being away from my children. Ever since I held them in my arms it’s like I have lived through them. All my hopes and dreams. Everything. My whole existence is all about them. I lived through them and without them on dead. I have no life. No meaning. No reason to take that next breath if you will. I tell you the sun doesn’t rise without my children’s faces in my heart and on my mind. It’s been two years since I’ve looked in their most precious blue eyes. Two years since my whole world has been snatched from me. Believe me when I tell you these have been the hardest years of my life. Compound this pain with the fact that my current girl/lover has given birth to my third child this past July.

Now I will remind you that to be in love in due time is the worst time one could do. You see every day that goes by she’s doing time to. It brings a new meaning to have time, don’t you think?

Kryptonite (my pet name for her because she’s my only weakness) has given birth to our first child together on her own. This being her only child as well makes it even that much more difficult on her end. I am so proud of her. The pictures and news of my new baby girl, Stasia, fills me with such pride and sorrow it’s hard to describe. When I first heard the news and saw the pictures I cried. This was last August and now in October if you leave me when I tell you they’re still tears in my eyes and although the tears may have come and go in the smile I’m wearing inside and out hesitated for a minute.

She still loves me! She can’t wait until I come home and our beautiful girl and meet her daddy. It’s all too perfect for me. With the exception of being locked up and not being able to hold them and hung them and love them, she’s still there for me. She hasn’t given up on me for us and that’s saying a lot. It’s more than I ever dreamed of six months ago and now here we are.

It’s the two-minute warning of the first half of my journey. I’m approaching a year down in November and although my life seems to stand still in reality so much has changed. No longer are only the two to worry about. Now I have three. It really makes me want to get out and be all I can be.

Ronnie Rhea

Tehachapi State Prison

PRO-MAGNON

Blessed event:

Don MacQueen has let slip news of my candidacy for president. I will run (or shamble) if called, but not if called “late for chow.” Negotiations to secure (sic) Supervisor Smith as Catamite General have broken down: perhaps Mr. MacQueen can facilitate.

The “pro-fusion” ticket will combine elements from salient Three Stooges films and the work ethic of Caltrans and the local Edu board with holidays whenever rocks fall from heaven.

We will be proactive, pro-stupid and pro-life.

In other words, business as usual.

Bonzai!

Ignatio Hephalumpe, Fuhrer Emeritus

Bellingham, Washington

MOVE OVER EATON

Editor,

I’m sick and tired of the AVA continually bashing the local public schools. I moved to Boonville over two years ago, and it took me about five minutes to decide that the schools here are true diamonds among schools today. I’ve spent a lot of my life in public schools in California as a student, employee, volunteer, and school board member*. I’ve never witnessed better education than is happening right here.

No one should utter an opinion unless they know what they are actually talking about. Until you spend time in the classroom trying to teach today’s students according to the current rules and regulations of our state you know very little about schools. And I don’t mean a single visit to a classroom. I mean regular assistance and involvement.

Schools cry for assistance because they need it. My youngest daughter is the teacher of second graders near Sacramento. One of her students has such severe hyperactivity issues that recently, for no reason, he leaped out and over his desk and punched another kid in the face. (During the first week of school he jumped into the bus driver’s seat as the driver walked a little girl across the street and nearly ran the two over.) Another of her students would have been labeled retarded back in the day. Sweet and innocent, three weeks ago she was sexually molested by a third grade boy at lunchtime. The parents’ responses? Pretty much nada.

As a frequent volunteer at both campuses here, I have met and worked with many students. Invariably they are polite, eager learners. The programs our students have available to them are exciting and fun. The recent weather balloon story about the rocketry club is case in point. What could be better learning? Teachers and administrators are bombarded by more and more regulations, testing time-wasters, and required curriculum. To be able to insert any creative activities at all is amazing. And it happens every day here in our schools.

My advice? Quit complaining and go volunteer! Help the teachers and administrators instead of beating them over the head with your paper. Go supervise a game or a dance yourself. Correct papers. Read to a group of children whose parents don’t speak English. Tutor a child who’s struggling with his math facts. Push a broom after lunchtime.

After you’ve spent actual, real time in the shoes of several of our educators, then have an opinion. I have a feeling I know exactly what it will be.

Alice Bonner

Boonville

PS. *Of the eight and a half years I spent on the school board of a medium sized district (4,000 students), two and a half years were productive and six were exasperating and frustrating. Why? Because during the latter period two members were there on account of their egos, professing to know more than professional educators and assuming administrative subterfuge at every turn. We still got good things done for students but progress was excruciatingly slow. Hundreds of hours of discussion and continuous split votes. 5-0 votes don’t necessarily mean unthinking board members. They often mean that the superintendent is following the direction of the board.

ms replies: “…continually bashing”? The occasional complaint about the local school system pails in comparison to the unvarnished high praise for everything school-related in School News that is prepared by a paid school staffer and runs as an uncommented-on free ad for the school system almost every week. (By the way, have you noticed that School News never has anything about academics in it?) Or does only the so-called “bashing” count? Anyway, what’s the difference between “bashing” and ordinary adult skepticism and criticism? If Boonville U. is an example of the best education around, then that explains a lot about the current state of this country. PS. We’d love to correct some papers! Bring us a batch of random (i.e., an entire class) advanced math and English assignments and we’ll immediately review, correct and grade them and provide you with a summary analysis. If they’re as good as you say, we’ll be the first to say so.

CONSPIRACIES AS THEATER

The Editor,

The discussion on conspiracies has been most informative. While there are other Merriam-Webster definitions somehow involving collusion for evil or unlawful purposes, the one I like is “a conspiracy is a striking concurrence of tendencies, circumstances, or phenomena as though in planned accord.” Cockburn and the far right appear to have concluded that those concerned with global warming and peak oil are so in striking concurrence, each somehow for personal gain. I assume this is true as well for those raising alarms about 9/11 — book sales have surely been profitable. Interestingly though that 9/11 made a fortune for Halliburton and Cheney and he destroyed all his VP papers. It seems judgments always come down to “my expert is right, yours is wrong, and you can’t convince me otherwise.”

A series of psychological experiments have demonstrated that if we believe something to be true, any contrary arguments no matter how valid will only increasingly firm our belief. Of course, these reports may also have been part of a conspiracy in order to publish academic papers, get grants, and get promotions as with global warming research, as Cockburn and friends assert. I’m more and more concluding that commentary columnists of whatever political or economic stripe are probably serving up tripe and I am mostly discounting anything they profess simply because they are certainly seeing only a tiny fraction of what is happening and surely have prefixed beliefs that aren’t in evidence.

Yes, I think Cheney was/is a crook and could have been guilty of almost anything, but that is only my opinion. Surely doubt applies to my commentaries as well. Still, it is all great theater.

Don Sanderson

Hopland

HOME SWEET HOME

Editor,

“Blutoville” 15 miles

A stinking Cloverdale gas station lavatory

Dented metal door, enameled walls

My favorite “color,” gloss white.

It’s raining and out in the car with all its windows rolled down

A hitchhiker with dice for eyes

A dog with green lips

And a woman dressed in kelp.

Fort Bragg is another two hours out.

Yet I feel somehow I have already arrived.

M.E. Johnson

Fort Bragg

THE 99% SOLUTION

Editor:

It is obviously true that until money is taken out of the political equation, corporate wealth and power will govern, if not own, the United States. Presently, representative democracy has become an ideological myth used to entice ordinary Americans to falsely believe in their “democratic ideals.”

This has to some extent always been the case, e.g., the “gilded age” of the late 19th century. Nevertheless, for the past three decades we have seen an enormous concentration of wealth and power, which has led to the hardship and suffering of the majority. One Republican/laissez-faire rebuttal to this is that the disadvantaged “reap what they sow,” i.e., it is their own fault. The ideology is that the disadvantaged are inferior and morally to blame for their predicament — they have chosen to be poor, which is absurd.

Another response is that the individual is the primary source of value, not society. This has led to a possessive individualism where empathy for others is blunted. But the contrary is true: Society is the primary source of value. It has taken time, effort and work by all those in the past and present to build together the society we presently have. Without a functional society there can be no individual value. Yet today, society, like our political system, is becoming increasingly dysfunctional due to the exploitation by the few of the many. And in so doing the wealthy few are actually and unwittingly destroying themselves — and the country.

The greatest danger to the United States is us — as reflected in our Congressional representatives and both political parties. Those who are indebted to and/or so ensnared by power, wealth, and greed that any notion of the common good is irrelevant. Over the past 30 years this has caused a precipitous decline. Our prison population has increased to the highest per capita in the world and “reeks of cruelty.” We condone torture and fail to bring those responsible for it to justice. We assassinate and kill American citizens without benefit of due process of law. We clandestinely use drones in foreign lands for targeted, extrajudicial assassinations without any legal justification, knowing full well the probabilities of killing innocent men, women and children. We support dictators who brutalized their own citizens. We employ the barbarism of capital punishment while the civilized world cannot believe what we do and 600,000 people around the world sign petitions to stop us. We have developed an enthusiasm and celebration for killing which is openly and mindlessly expressed by our citizens and congressional representatives — if not by our President. We employ corporate mercenaries which we euphemistically call “contractors” to maintain our “Empire.” We allow a mass media to infantalize us and accept an economic system that dehumanizes and alienates us from each other. We allow Wall Street bankers, financial institutions, corporate lobbyists and special interest groups to dictate to our congressional representatives and President what legislation and laws are to be passed to further their interests. And, at the same time, we have allowed the same institutions to forcibly remove millions of us from our homes due to a financial crisis they fraudulently initiated and which we have been unjustly forced to pay for.

During these same 30 years, corporate wealth and power has steadily increased. We have taken great steps to care for the “corporate person” — a thing. This is in keeping with our commodified society where there is a greater relationship between things than there is between people. In this process we have abandoned ourselves. It is this insidious ideology and ethical failure that is destroying the nation.

Sincerely,

Terence Bresnahan

Berkeley

TOO MANY CRACKPOTS

Mr. Anderson:

1. Todd Walton is a writer I respect. I read and enjoyed his columns in the AVA. However, as a retired science teacher, I must respond to the obscurantist nonsense of his response to Lee Simon that appeared in the AVA on October 26, 2011 (“Crackpots, an analysis”).

Mr. Walton writes that “crackpot beliefs are only crackpot to those who don’t agree with those beliefs.” Bullshit.

Massimo Pigliucci writes in ‘Nonsense On Stilts,’ on page 304:

“What makes astrology a pseudoscience is that its theoretical structure is hopelessly flawed (e.g., constellations do not exist) and when apparently tested, it repeatedly fails the confrontation with the data.”

We can substitute “crackpot beliefs” for “pseudoscience.” I would include creationism, Scientology, Mormonism — which some wit defined as Scientology plus 150 years, and Christianity in all its incarnations — Scientology plus 2000 years, among the crackpot beliefs that plague us today.

Pigliucci concedes that “even good science is no guarantor of the truth. Science is a complex social activity carried out by limited human beings who are affected by the time and place in which they happen to live, not to mention by having a brain that evolved to solve everyday life problems, not to rationally and impartially pursue cosmic questions about the nature of things. … It is easy enough to trot out a long litany of blunders that self-assured scientists have committed over the centuries, or even very recently.” (Page 305)

However, he adds, “what all scientific inquiry has in common… are the fundamental aspects of being an investigation of nature, based on the construction of empirically verifiable theories and hypotheses. These three elements, naturalism, theory and empiricism, are what make science different from any other human activity.”

Amen. Which comes from the Hebrew word for truth.

Massimo Pigliucci is one of the smartest people in the world and ‘Nonsense On Stilts’ is a must read.

2. Enclosed is a check for $150. Please use it to renew the subscription of my troubled brother, Joseph D’Avey, and two other brothers or sisters in prison. You choose the recipients. You usually do this at your own expense. I would like to share the cost of providing the AVA to people who, due to the fell clutch of circumstance and the bludgeoning of chance, cannot themselves pay for a subscription at this time. Stay strong. Thanks for all you do.

Siempre adelante,

Louis Bedrock

Roselle, New Jersey

MIDDLE-EASTERN HALLOWEEN

Editor:

The Palestinians and UNESCO—

The UN body for education, science and culture UNESCO, backed the Palestinian request for membership. In the going “107 member countries voted for the Palestinians, rejecting US and Israel pressure. Only 14 countries voted against membership, while 52 abstained. France voted in favor, Germany voted against while Britain decided to abstain, China, India, Russia, and Brazil also backed the Palestinians while Canada sided with the US and Israel.” [FT Nov 1.11:4]

The USA usually funds UNESCO with 80m a year but “will not send a 60 million payment “(WSJ Nov 1: A9) Presumably they sent 20 million already. But there is a 1990 law passed by the freedom loving US Congress “that automatically cuts funding for any agency that grants Palestinian authorities the same standing as member states.”

Now there is a US humanitarian AIPAC funded law that we didn’t know about. I know a number of anti Zionists but they never mentioned that one. No matter this is a great moment for Abbas and the Palestinians.

When interviewed by a reporter, the Marxist geographer David Harvey said: “the Republican Party will do more damage to capitalism than the working class:” A wonderful observation wherein the negative is just as good at puncturing the hubris of the capitalist state as the left faction. The UNESCO vote will be wonderful news in the Arab Countries and a warning to Arab Spring(ers) that the US can’t be trusted. It is one of the better events exposing the Empire.

Hamas gets 1000 prisoners for one captured (military term, kidnapping is wrong — it is captured soldier). Correctly stated 1000 Palestinian resistance fighters for one Israeli soldier. Plus the Abbas Fatah PLO faction that was put in place by Israel-US has bolted.

Why did they go the route of nonviolent diplomatic gaming? The F.T. reports this is nothing new, “The move to obtain recognition in UNESCO sets no new precedent. Other countries such as North and South Korea joined UN agencies when their applications for full membership were in dispute.”[Editorial Nov. 1/2011:8]

Wall St. Journal considered the maneuver an affront to US hegemony and Zionist Israeli — the process that has gotten the Palestinians less territory, fewer and fewer homes and more walled attackable territories. Susan Rice our feminist representative to the UN, said that without direct talks, [that have disguised aggressive apartheid for 40 or was it 35 years] there will be no Palestinian State. The jibe is obvious, the gig is up, the ridiculous argument by the US that negotiations with US as mediator will get anything for the Palestinians but dead bodies after missal and drone attacks is exposed. The US face is not bloodied the Empire will remain but the kids just kicked the shines of the Gargoyles.

Abbas and Hamas have gained the day in different ways — hail to them even if they dispute each other. From out here in Empire-Disney-land it’s a double kick in the shins.

An, additional doublespeak in US foreign policy: Reagan took the US out of UNESCO and Bush put the US back in and revised the educational component. UNESCO operates in Afghanistan and does the educational work for the US. Another US war where billions were spent to kill but now without funding no more education for women.

Bully, Bully, the Mask is off. Halloween is (almost) over!

R.G. Davis

San Francisco

MORE BILE

Editor,

Too little bile and the food doesn’t break down. Romans used artichokes. It’s in rock but not in stone or bone marrow, but not the bone. He never lifts a leg off the floor so I can get a leg up. I’m not a plane but I’ll lift you. I’m not a river but I’m full of water. I’m not a river but let’s float, nary gloat, nor bloat. I’m not a river but if I swallow you you won’t be able to stir. What do elephants have that no other animal has? Baby elephants. Three legger asks a man for money. He gives each leg a quarter. What time is it? Quarter to three. Why did the girl think the cook was mean? He beat the eggs. Why do birds fly south in the winter? It’s too far to walk. What animal can jump higher than the mountain? Mountains don’t jump. Nibble on dandelion greens for indigestion. Dogs eat grass. Grate the orange peel for a digestive kick in the pants. And serve a side dish of brown rice. Harvard says high fiber foods prevent ulceration. Banish the cough with bananas. Cinnamon contains volatile oils that break down fat. Chew fennel seeds to crush gas. Fennel contains terpenoid anetnole which relieves muscle spasms and encourages production of bile.

Mark Twain calls cauliflower “cabbage with a college education.”

Yours,

Diana Vance in the drizzle

Mendocino

CRANK IT UP!

AVA Editor,

While never trisecting a triangle or squaring the circle I probably qualify as a crank in the mind of the editor of the AVA because of my subscribing to the AVA, my advanced years, and my belief in Peak Oil. Along with Galileo, Jesus Christ, Copernicus and Karl Marx, we cranks have a role to play: Replacing zinnias in our planters positioned on the rail of our deck with radishes, I discovered that the radish plant has the ability to position its leaves in such a way as to gather the maximum amount of solar radiation much like the sunflower. I’ve attached a photo showing this phenomenon.

Harold Ericsson

Harbor City

THANKS FROM PETER’S FAMILY

To Our Community of Family & Friends:

A big ‘thank you’ to each and every one of you fine people who took the time to come by, call, bring hugs and food — to cry and remember with us.

All the touching condolences, flowers, cards, and thoughts will be forever remembered.

I will always remember Peter, and the love, joy, and pride he brought to me.

Your remembrances will bring smiles through the tears.

Thank you and love to you all,

Marianne Pardini

Donald & Families

Philo

KGB IN IONE

Editor,

Here we go again. Mule Creek State prison, SNY, the most unclassy California SNY prison. The scandal machine. But let me explain. And you will agree.

On September 16, 2011, on my way to store (canteen), I was stopped and put in handcuffs and marched to C-yard program office at 9am and I was put in a dummy cage until 11am. I was duly informed that I was being locked up for written threats on staff. The correctional officer told me I was running a Sacramento investigation from what he/she heard. A covert operation at that. Shit. Here we go, CIA-KGB!

I refused to sign the lockup order, CDC 114d, until I saw the “Lt.” He finally came to see me (Lt. G. Murphy) and told me I only wanted to talk to him for ID purposes. Okay. It’s got to be a CIA operation. I refused to sign for my copy of the CDC 114d and off to the ASU-hole I went (Area 51) C-12. No man’s land.

On October 17, 2011, I was fully cleared of any threats on staff by, guess who? Lt. Murphy. But now I can’t go back to the yard. As now all of a sudden I got an “enemy”? It was crazy. A total scam at that. I saw my CIA mole correctional officer who told me that he or she heard via reliable sources that three COs had a meeting on September 16 to see how to lock me up as the captain was not on duty and it was a Friday. So they had 72 hours to get the story straight as the captain would be back first thing Monday. But now I had a so-called “enemy,” courtesy of staff of the sitdown mafia meeting on September 16. Members only. (Ha ha.)

On October 20, 2011, I saw the warden (Warden Knipp) at ICC who told me, Do me a favor, step out while I get to the bottom of this bullshit. In so many words. After ten minutes I went back in and it was quiet as all staff, seven of them, including ISU, said nothing. The warden had the floor. After we talked, just me and Knipp, I could see he was pissed at staff for locking me up. I tried to sign a Barney Chrono, but my captain, Captain Kaplan, said no. We can’t disclose who put you down as an enemy? I told him it was Dino the scumbag, chomo child abuser. So much for any confidential paperwork. (Ha ha.) (My mole CIA told me who it was.)

So the warden told me, Don’t worry, I’ll put you up for a transfer to two places you pick. I made two choices and that was that. Knipp said, I’ll get you to a place you can program, get a job and visit your elderly parents who are in poor health. You got my word. I said, Okay Warden Knipp.

So here I sit, waiting to leave this soulless place! This place is a total shithole. They keep stuff from the warden and he only knows what is told to him. Trust me, I spoke my piece on October 20 and laid it out for the warden to hear! He agreed!

So as I said before in my prior AVA letter of October 19, this place is unclassy. Totally. Drama. Not to mention 90% sick chomos and rapos. So think twice prior to coming here. Also my family offered to hire a former FBI handwriting expert but this place said it was a CDCR rule that I was entitled to. Come on. My family wants to pay the cost and CDCR says no! Okay, whatever. Also, my mole CIA-CO, also told me that if I file a lawsuit he or she will sign a declaration and testify in court on my behalf. As he or she is transferring to another prison that is not shamelessly corrupt.

So now if this is not corrupt, then what is? Bottom line, if they don’t like you or somebody smuts you up with staff, you’re out of here. Also, an investigation on staff? I don’t think so. But now where will be an investigation? Trust me. Let alone a major civil suit at that.

Area 51 out.

Kenny ‘Irish’ Callahan

Ione

DIVEST THYSELF

Letter to the Editor

I hear a lot of verbal support for the Wall Street and other “Occupy” events.

A further demonstration of support would be to divest oneself of all holdings in corporate stock.

The class lines a being drawn.

Bruce Hering

Boonville

MID-SPECTRUM PARADOX

Hi Todd,

Your response to my comments about your ideas about spirituality was emotionally generous and well founded. I think it is possible for us to both be correct. There is not knowing and then there is not knowing. The kind of not knowing your ascribe to science is a positive not knowing, the kind that leads to further knowledge. The kind I was thinking of is the kind of not knowing that leads to a closed mind, one that does not want to know.

They are at opposite ends of a spectrum. Most people get stuck in the middle of the spectrum; they accept science as wanting to know and being alright with not knowing any final answers. At the same time they cling to a religion (any of them) that tells them that only the deity can know what’s really going on, so not knowing is o.k.. They have (each of them) a final answer, which means, to them, that they don’t need to know anymore, because they already have the final answer.

The real paradox here is that the middle is good when you speak of moderation in all things, the middle path, and so on. But the middle is not good when it is an excuse for making no further inquiry. There are those who seek the truth and there are those who reek of it.

I enjoy your columns. They always make me want to know more.

Lee Simon

Far ‘n Away Farm in Virginia

CRIME PAYS FOR THE 1%

Dear Editor,

Caption: Slave in arms. From North Star Shining, a pictorial history of the American slave industry.

* * *

Does this slave drawing look suspiciously like today’s court, jail, prison system? Makes you wonder if modern mass imprisonment isn’t a continuation of slavery.

Occupy, yes! Unfortunately if we occupy the courts we could be in irons to. Those unaccountable, the black robes, seem to own the jails and prisons. $180,000 per year plus perks judging the 99% while very dangerous criminals like Tony Hayward, former CEO of British Petroleum Co., the mortgage fraudsters, greedy bankers, federal reservists all run loose. In fact, the bailouts demonstrate that crime pays. The remedy I’d suggest: give all the prison inmates a bonus so government bailouts are fair and equitable. Remember the official position: crime pays.

Thinking about the ironic reminds me of you, Mr. Anderson, thanking the medical doctors because you didn’t perish from their treatment of your prostate problem. Allopathic medicine: intrusive, dangerous and expensive. Holistic or more natural medicine offers real alternatives that succeed and are even affordable since you have to pay for them yourself. Alternative medicine, including ozone and hyperbaric oxygen treatments, electromedicine — such as Refe machines, Bob Beck blood blood purifiers, vibe machines which harmonize our bodies like ecosystems in time with the earth’s own frequencies, nutritional medicine including dietary change, all can accomplish what allopathic medicine deems uncurable.

There are many alternative healers publishing newsletters and online solutions. Check out health science’s Dr. Robert Rowen’s (phi beta kappa) Second Opinion, Dr. Richard Chilton’s American Botanical Pharmacy, Dr. Julian Whitaker’s Health and Healing. Just a sampling of what’s available.

Glad to see you quote Thomas Szasz. His book, ‘toxic psychiatry,’ is a classic debunking of the mental illness game. An older classic is Orthomolecular Medicine with an introduction by the vitamin C Nobel Prize laureate, Dr. Linus Pauling.

Glad you survived your ordeal. Getting well need not be so risky, nor so expensive. Costs keep rising for our failed medical system. Up, up, up and away — out of reach for so many.

Single-payer, yes.

Occupy.

Dorotheya Dorman

Redwood Valley

Ed reply: When the tumor that grew until it killed Steve Jobs was first discovered, the doctors wanted to take it out before it became too big and lethal. Instead, Jobs went to the quacks, and by the time he returned to proven medical science he was a dead man walking. The cadaverous practitioners of “alternative” medicine, of whom there are of course many here in quackety-quack Mendocino County, and none of whom has ever seemed more fit to me than the many more meat-eating drunks loose in the land, are right about diet and exercise but, heck, me dear old mum smoked Pall Mall non-filters and knocked down many pints of Old Crow right to the end of her days, which numbered 86 years worth, while Jim Fixx, the famous running guru, went out at age 52 with a massive heart attack while he was jogging. The point would seem to be that life hangs by a very thin thread no matter what you’re throwing down your slop chute, and it’s probably healthier not to spend whole hours of it dissecting your bowel movements. As for me, I’ll go to my grave singing the praises of St. Mary’s Hospital, San Francisco. In fact, I’m thinking of faking it so I can get back in for a week or so.

Were I asked at any point in my life where I saw myself at the age of 51, the answer would invariably have been: Dead. Not from any romantic notion about leaving a good-looking corpse (that ship has sailed) or being just too good for this earth (ha!) or the awareness that the weight of my despair would ultimately crush me (I’m actually a fairly happy guy), but the realistic presumption of early mortality for a fella who actively, persistently and gleefully engages in the practice of willful self-destruction. It stands to reason that a life defined by drug abuse, alcoholism, violence, criminality, indiscriminate sexuality, across the broad profligacy, and just general wise- and jack-assery would get one struck down along about the first few decades, if not in one stupidly glorious stroke, then through attrition.

But no. Instead of occupying my rightful place in an urn, boneyard, or (more likely) as an unclaimed cadaver in a third-rate medical school being tsk-ed at by future abortionists and pill hustlers over the condition of my liver, I’m moldering in moldy old San Quentin after having suffered that most base of ignominies: being made sport of by a rural rabble-rounsing rag whose revolutionary rhetoric has doubtless galvanized several dozen parakeets into political or at least peristaltic action. Having thus been made a figure of fun by you, I don’t think I’m displaying undue cheek in requesting a free subscription at least temporarily. I’ll see about shooting some feria your way once my resources have fleshed out a bit. Thank you.

Signed, the scourge of banks, bookstores and trendy Little River spas,

Flynn Washburne, # V79663

SQSP, San Quentin, CA 94974

Ed note: Flynn old boy, you sure can write. If you’d come to me before you got into bank robbing I would have put you on as roving correspondent. Subscription coming right up.

Please sir help me by posting my cry for help in the AVA for a few weeks to come as my life is in the hands of this county’s judicial system and Linda Thompson. Thank you kindly.

I am writing in regards to what the Mendocino County Sheriffs office has told you (I imagine). It says Jason cried for help. Wrong, ladies and gentlemen. I screamed for help after my ribs were caved in with a blunt instrument. During that fight for my life many times I thought: This is it. My life is over! As Jason would not stop.

Linda Thompson is my attorney. I am fighting for my life still in a battle that I not only can’t afford but lack the knowledge to defend myself. Please people of my hometown, help me. I need funds for a lawyer — any and all donations would help. Fair is fair. I’m asking for “any and all”!

I am not a murderer as anyone who knows me knows and my family cannot afford the means for a private attorney.

It took me over three weeks to get medical attention and x-rays. As for proof of my side of this, as of this day six witnesses have still not been interviewed, 25 days after the incident. I have a history of petty crime from my childhood days and to show anyone I had retired from that mischief it’s been 11 years since my last felony. This past year I got myself off parole and had a job in the town of Mendocino. My biggest crime is “self-medication.” People see my ink from my past and condemn me.

I’m grasping at straws. I could use some friends. I could use the community here in Mendocino where I grew up.

Someone please put it on facebook or make it on a myspace-page. Donations have to be brought to 951 Low Gap Road in Ukiah. My birthday is 8-16-70. A# is 52817. Please folks, 5¢ or $5 for a good attorney who goes by our state laws and regulations. Even visits and letters are welcome. As moral support, love and understanding helps to. I am still that pleasant little redhead. This system has taken my adult life. But I know and believe in the people of this county where I was raised. I need your friendship and prayers. I believe all of you folks can throw me a life raft or you could hold my head under water. I hope and pray I am not as alone as I feel right now.

I have told authorities from the start exactly what happened during this nightmare. I have an extensive record for evading cops when I’m guilty. But I stayed right where it happened because I am not guilty of murder. I need sufficient support from you all to prove self-defense.

My public defender, Linda Thompson, has spent a total of less than 10 minutes speaking to me. My preliminary hearing is set for October 4 and my defense is what you all are reading so far. Please help me!

Sincerely,

James Kester A#52817

951 Low Gap Road

Ukiah, CA 95482

Greetings from San Quentin where I am serving four months for parole violation. I am humbly and respectfully asking for a free subscription to your newspaper which I have been a fan of and read for 20 years. Thank you kindly.

A brief comment on Michael Johnson’s encounter with the on-site manager at the Hospitality House in Fort Bragg concerning donated blankets and so forth. I resided at the Hospitality House for ten days in August. Upon entry I was forced to surrender my medication to the house manager, “Mitch,” for placement in his office where I was allowed access at 4pm each day. On the tenth day of my stay I requested my daily medication and was informed by Mitch that my meds were accidentally given to someone who had checked out of the shelter. I attempted to refill the prescriptions and was unable to do so due to my insurance not fully covering the cost. These medications are extremely important in managing severe depression and anxiety due to the death of my wife of 20 years.

Long story short, I am serving four months in hell for a parole violation stemming from a suicide attempt which I believe I would never have occurred if my medication had not been lost by the shelter’s on-site manager, Mitch. While I certainly accept responsibility for my actions, I also to a certain degree hold Mitch responsible for my attempted suicide and subsequent incarceration. Had he managed my medication in a responsible and competent manner perhaps the situation could have been avoided.

So I applaud Michael Johnson for conducting an investigation into the conduct of the manager at the Hospitality House.

In closing I would like to thank you for the subscription to your newspaper and encourage anyone with a kind heart to write to me. My situation is extremely depressing in that I will be here for the entire length of the upcoming holidays and I’m alone in this world! So I also ask that you please print my mailing address.

Thank you for the kindness.

All my love,

Alan Crow G-31111

San Quentin State Prison/5B-48-L

San Quentin, CA 94974

Tehachapi State Prison. Thanks so much for the subscription the last eight months. It’s really helped keep me in touch with the outside world and my mind off my daily struggles behind bars. If you can find it in your hearts to renew my subscription it would be greatly appreciated. You will never know how much it meant to me to see my past letters in print and for that I must thank you again.

I would like to wish my oldest daughter Veronica happy birthday. She turned nine on September 18. I hope she had a big party and got everything she wanted. She’s always been daddy’s angel and I believe in spoiling her rotten. As my first child she can pretty much do no wrong. And she’s had me wrapped around her little finger now for a minute and knows it.

As for myself and my current situation, my surroundings have again changed as well as my release date. While everyone else is talking about early kicks and county parole, I’m one of the few it just doesn’t apply to and my release date seems to keep getting farther and farther away. I’ve been written up twice now in the last six months. First for self-mutilation when I sliced my tongue like a snake with a string. Take it from me, don’t do this at home! Second, for a fresh tattoo of my San Francisco Giants on my right arm. Got to love the misfits. Better luck next year boys!

Anyway, as of now I’m on my third day of C-status which consists basically of nothing coming, for 90 days. I’ve lost all privileges and personal property. No store, no packages, no dayroom, TV, games, etc. Only one hour yard a day and I was moved to the gym. I’m so totally grounded it’s not even funny.

As I enter my new domain, a partner of mine shakes my hand and says, “Welcome to Hell.” I laugh it off and continue making my way to the back towards the office with a smile on my face because it’s all fun and games until — well, you get the treatment which I was about to receive for having a smile on my face of course.

Immediately this 6-foot, 300 pound black Correctional Officer, looking a lot like Shrek I might add, snatches me out of the crowd. “You over there with a smile on your face. Get over here! Are you laughing? Do you think this shit is funny?”

Now, two feet in front of him in the office, I reply, “No sir,” for which I earned stage two of the treatment which consists of stepping into the adjoining room as directed — a mop supply room in the corner with no windows full of gawking inmates like we had in the office.

He has me strip down to my boxers as his partner steps in and shuts the door. This officer is maybe 5-5, and a buck-fifty soaking wet. He’s got a Dr. Evil scowl and a mad-at-the-world complex. All kidding aside, this guy has some issues.

So now that we have some privacy and I’m in my boxers. Shrek breaks out the handcuffs and hooks them around behind my back. Now he proceeds to make his stand and solely with his breath, screaming 2 inches from my face that I’m not running shit and this is his house. I’m nothing. I’m not a man. I’m just some punk inmate. Etc. This goes on for about a minute as he goes into how they do things here at at CCI.

At this point stage three of the treatment is upon me when Dr. Evil uncuffs me from behind. I leave my hands behind my back and Shrek tells me to put my hands at my side. I don’t move. He repeats it. I comply. Now he tells me, “Do something. I will use my toys. Come on, be a man! Do it!”

I state, “I’m trying to go home.” To which he laughs at me and backs off stating, “That’s what I thought. I’ll whoop your ass right here in front of this camera,” looking up at the all-seeing bubble in the corner of the room.

For the final act, Dr. Evil and Shrek switch positions now with Shrek cracking his baton out repeatedly while Dr. Evil evaluates my face. All of two inches separate us as he looks at each side of my face like he’s checking my ears.

“Look at you with your green eyes and your slick hair. I bet the boys love you. What are you? Some Cho-Mo?” I crack a smile and shake my head. It’s all too funny. “I ain’t no Cho-Mo,” is all I say as I shake my head and looked down at my children’s faces blasted on my stomach.

“Well, then what are you here for?” he says. “What brings you to Cho-Mo-ville?” I flinch. What do I say? “Physical elder abuse to cause great bodily injury or death. I’m in here for beating up old men like you”? This is not going well.

I finally say, “Home invasion.”

“Oh, so you like to rob people, huh?” he asks.

“No sir,” I respond.

“Do you got parents? What do you think should happen to somebody if they robbed them at gunpoint, then duct taped them up and started taking things from their house?”

Now somewhere behind me Shrek turns off the lights. It’s dark, real dark, and Dr. Evil continues, “You’re going to pay for what you did. I might just crack your skull with my baton or I may end up taking you outside and have the gunner shoot you. Your ass is mine! Step out of line again and see what happens. And you’re gonna cut that hair too, because I don’t like it. Got it?”

“Yes sir,” I reply.

“Did you think you would just get away with it?” he asks.

“No sir,” I state. “It wasn’t like that.”

I’m waiting for my eyes to adjust. I’m wondering if I’m going to see the first shot coming or just feel it.

“It wasn’t like what?” he asks.

I say, “That whole scenario. It didn’t go down like that.”

This whole time from behind me I hear Shrek’s baton opening and closing like a toy light-saber sword from Star Wars I used to play with. I’m waiting for the first contact. Will it be to the back of the head or the ribs? Is it coming at all?

“Well, how did it go down?” Dr. Evil asks.

“It was just some old man,” I tell him. “I hit him once and took his wallet. He was a weirdo.”

Game over. Dr. Evil tells me to get on my knees and cross my legs. I try to comply and get on my knees. As I cross my legs I ask, “I don’t know if I’m doing it right.” From behind Shrek tells me to just sit down on my ass. “Are you really ready for your whoopping?” Shrek asked.

My heart is beating a million miles a minute. Are they bluffing? “It is what it is, if that’s what you want to do,” I say.

As the lights come back on, Dr. Evil tells me to stand up, keep my hands behind my back and head to my rack. He follows me all the way and states I’m on bunk status — if anyone talks to me or I talk to anyone then everyone’s locker is going to get hit!

I’m famous and I’ve only been in the gym for 15 minutes. Welcome To Hell is right and I’m just getting started. Needless to say, I’m on their radar now and every minute around this camp has been an adventure.

Cheddar Bob, signing out

Tehachapi

I’m writing to say thank you for all you’ve done for me and the others who benefit from your terrific newspaper. I’m also writing as a rebuttal of the piece you carried on Frances Seymour who is a very nice and caring person because I know her and I also fight the disease of addiction every day since I’ve left the military. It’s never easy to ask for help and even harder to come to terms with being with being an addict. The Veterans Administration and Delancey Street program dealt with me also, and the court sent me to prison in 2001 and now I’m getting ready to get out of prison to where and what I do not know. I’ve lost both my parents and also the one lady friend who stood by me all these years. She passed without knowing how much she truly meant to me and the strength she gave me to look over to my tomorrows.

Addicts don’t need to be chained, they need a structured environment and others with the same problem around them to get support. In a prison setting, most addicts become victims and are preyed upon over what little they have and for what they can be forced to do. It’s sad.

If there’s ever, ever a chance for a person, male or female, to enter into a program, face their disease and get the helped we need to return to and become a productive person in our society, not years of hardship, separation from families in times of need and children missing one or the other parent.

I’m not even sure how my children will act once I’m free and forced to go to the Salvation Army for a place to live. We get $200 — if we’re lucky not to have to buy state-issued sweats to dress out for $46. The lady I’ve been corresponding with is the best angel on earth ever. She is now having to come to terms with an ex-addict coming back to freedom, hopefully to a job and able to cope with a society that doesn’t believe in second chances. She is frightened and I can’t blame her. It’s just that I’ve been out of the loop, so to speak, for so long that I can’t settle her fears or what-ifs.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m a survivor and my courtin’ skills will come back I reckon. I hope so. If not, I’ll be free.

Hopefully you will print this in hopes that not only Francis and my girlfriend, but others who need and want help, will speak long and loud because chains are not the answer. Truly with all these budget cuts, the Department of Corrections is broke and making their cuts through us. So who is really being kicked? I’ll see you in soon my friend, and hopefully my world hasn’t changed that much and I will get that second go-round. I pray so. Again thank you for the smiles and sometimes tears. You’re one of the last straight shooters and I hope that Francis got the help she was asking for because not many of us try anymore. Why? Maybe I’ll end up at the Sea Shell motel in Point Arena again. They need a good handyman.

Sincerely,

Joseph D’Avy C-62414 Ad-Seg

PO Box 689, Soledad, CA 93960

PS. Ronnie Rhea is a wuss. He would do drugs and then ask his girl to get more anyway possible.

This is Tony B., still at San Quentin Hotel, Resort and Spa (SQHRS), live with the lifers, still having a great time. I am so glad I’m here. It’s Friday night and I still haven’t recieved a single copy of your great paper. So I’m a little bit depressed. I know it’s not your fault, but I just wonder how they can justify slowing the mail the way they do.

Anyway, the lifers don’t understand my missing your paper and they get a kick out of my sorrow. They have taught me so much in the few days I’ve been here. To them slow mail is normal. I guess they’re right. I’ll get to find out how you guys are doing eventually. I miss you guys.

I thought I’d let you in on my Enlightenment of the Day. First off, let me explain my environment. I’m in a big box with a smaller box inside. That box consists of five floors of two-man cells (designed for one man, of course). There are 100 cells per floor or a 1,000 person capacity. This is where we live. Small rooms, 5′ x 10′, one toilet, one sink, community showers downstairs. Pretty cozy by jail and prison standards. Community living, SQHRS — they aim to please.

Oh, my Enlightenment of the Day. Not surprisingly, SQHRS has its very own mill (the rumor mill) and today’s product is that the new warden is pushing for desegregation of inmate cells. I know what a lot of you are thinking: segregation is bad, racist. If you think that, grow up. This is America. We are a free country. We are allowed to be racist if we want to be. Most of us in here are not racist. Everybody gets along pretty well in my opinion. They just feel more comfortable sleeping with their own race. Nobody wants desegregation forced on them. But the California Department of Correction knows this would create problems so it’s possible they might pull something like that. The lifers’ fears are justified. Anyway, that’s Today’s Rumor.

People in Mendoland know that the state has the press in their pocket. I know how Department of Corrections thinks. They think that they can create a ruckus and the press will make them heroes for stifling said ruckus and showing the public how dangerous their jobs are. In reality, Department of Corrections jobs are as dangerous as the Department of Corrections makes them. I’m not saying we are all angels. But come on, these guys are professional correctional officers. All they have do all day and night is sit around and observe us. They get paid well and maybe they feel guilty. After all, the state is broke. But their jobs mainly involve observing us and keeping with peace. It’s an easy job. But it’s a job and they do it well — generally anyway. So that Today’s Fear. I thought I’d share it with you.

One other thing. Our congressman, Mike Thompson. I wrote to his office explaining how my rights have been violated and he has not even given me the courtesy of a return letter, let alone any type of help. If you catch the scent of that slippery little guy, let him know I’m really having a great time here so keep up the good work. How many trillion? I wrote him at his Fort Bragg office. I haven’t tried his Napa office or his Washington DC office. They only give me five free letters per week. I guess he’s busy with all those offices. Does he have any more? Maybe he needs help. I think I wrote the right person. Isn’t our congressmen supposed to represent us? It’s been so long since I studied civics. I sometimes forget what the words mean, let alone who is going to stand up for our rights. Maybe I should ask the next junior high schooler I see. That’s when I studied civics. Maybe they teach civics in elementary school now; the kids these days are much smarter.

Somehow I get the feeling our public schools forgot to teach the kids how the real world operates.

Somehow I still have the feeling I’m wasting my time complaining to my congressman. I’m probably better off taking a nap.

Well, boys and girls, cock-a-doodle-doo. It’s Sunday morning. I’m well rested and SQHRS is great. It’s 4:20 in the morning and all I have is peanut butter and Kool-aid. I guess that will teach me to never under any circumstances operate the copy machine under the influence of alcohol. At least not while on parole. I’ve learned my lesson. Christ — I don’t even have any jelly. This is torture. Oh well, at least I have the Kool-aid, the good kind too, black cherry. They usually give us lemon. SQHRS really looks out for me.

I had a beautiful Saturday. The weather was perfect, cool breezes off the Bay with lots of sunshine. We had some nice visitors on the yard playing basketball, baseball, a few church groups — and that’s just what I saw. That is really nice of them to spend time with the lifers here. Now I know why they love SQHRS. The other prisons are in the middle of no man’s land and I doubt the people have such easy access to help their fellow man in their times of sorrow. Yes, it is pleasant here. It makes a difference to these guys. Keep up the good work, San Francisco. Maybe if I get lucky I can stay on parole and come back next year. I think Hawaii is way overrated and flying these days really sucks. They don’t let you bring anything on the plane. Those damn terrorists. Yes, SQHRS has much better security than the airport. They also have free shuttle service anywhere in California. Hell, what am I thinking? I bet they’d pick me up anywhere in the world! Thanks Jerry and SQHRS. How many billion?

This concludes another fun-filled dispatch from the fabulous San Quinton Hotel Resort and Spa. It’s now Sunday afternoon and everybody is winding down. I spent the day playing chess, exercising and listening to the musicians play. SQHRS has many talented people, artists, musicians of every shape and color. This is a diversified community located conveniently close to San Rafael. So anytime you’re in the area stop by the information booth — it’s always open.

This has been another installment of Life with the Lifers. Stay tuned. Next we’ll have H-Unit with many special guests.

Signing off,

Anthony ‘Tony B’ Boyles

San Quentin

This is Tony B. live from San Quentin. I’ve been busy, in case you guys have been wondering. I finally made it out of West Block after three months. I was moved to North Block last week. Now I get to hang out with the lifers. Pretty good group of guys, actually. Everybody is entrenched pretty well. Most have TVs and radios. You can also receive packages for sundry items and such. The guards are way more respectful compared to West Block. I imagine that the lifers will not put up with as much compared with parolees. Staff knows we will put up with their crap because we want to go home and the lifers don’t have that luxury. So at least they get treated better.

Speaking of luxuries, I haven’t received an AVA yet. I don’t know if you are even receiving my letters. I wouldn’t put anything past the staff here. I am pretty sure that my letters are being read. We have no right to confidential correspondence with the media. That was taken away a few years back along with many other rights. I can’t let silly little things like rights get in the way of our punishment or rehabilitation or whatever we’re here for. Anyway, please send me the AVA at my new address. I love to know how Mendoland is doing.

I am finally not being held incommunicado anymore. I get to watch the propaganda that passes for TV news these days. It’s hard to find the truth and in a fog of deceit, but I try. It looks like the big empty vault called the US Treasury is giving Mr. Obama a bit of trouble. Did I say empty? I guess I should have phrased that better. Zeroes would be great. How many trillions? I was never good at math.

But I want you guys to know that us inmates are doing our share. We are taxed at a rate of a flat 55%. I wonder how much our professional state employees pay? I’m sure if they paid us inmates a little better we could at least bail out the state in no time. But 80¢ per hour only goes so far. Oh well. I just hope Mr. Brown knows he can count on us. He said no new taxes without voter approval. Well, if they can get it on the November ballot I bet that they could tax us at 65%. I can’t speak for the rest of these guys, but I’m willing to put out another 10%.

Now for Life with the Lifers. From what I hear, San Quentin is the place to be if you’ve got a long sentence. They have a lot of programs being so close to San Francisco and all. There’s still a little love in the world, I guess. I don’t think the general public realizes that 90% of the people in prison are pretty decent folk who just got into a bad situation and handled it the wrong way or whatever. It’s mainly the fault of the media showing the worst of the worst with shows like Lockdown, etc. That’s the way to go, general public. Let’s just believe what the TV tell us and vote away our rights. Let’s not forget to give all our money to our competent government officials either. They manage our money so well and keep us safe from all the evil in the world. For how many trillions?

I just got a good idea. Maybe we should give government financing to the lifers. After all they’re getting by with 80¢ an hour and at a 55% tax rate. And that’s our top wage. Most of them don’t get that. I’d love to see Sacramento try to get by with that system. How many billions? If somebody brought out our thrift, Sacramento would probably come up with some type of excuse like “Prisoners can’t get by on so little because they get free food and housing and medical care, etc.” Oh yes, San Quentin Resort, Hotel & Spa. I think I’ll come back next year. How many billions? At least the public is safe. Hell, now that I think of it, so am I. There is very little crime here. Maybe it’s the free medical care. No self-medicating people around here. Not much crime around here, no sirree. San Quentin Hotel Resort & Spa. Free meds, low crime rate, friendly staff, historic setting…  who would want to go anywhere else?

Well boys and girls, I guess that’s about it for this episode. Until next time, Fort Bragg’s one and only Tony B. signing off.

Oh yes, one more thing. If anyone in the audience has any questions, please post them to my address as shown below. Mail is always welcome. Stamps, pen and paper are always accepted here at San Quentin Resort Hotel & Spa.

Anthony Boyles

G11626/4N81L

San Quentin State Prison

San Quentin, CA 94974

The man in the cell next to mine hung himself yesterday. I knew him for almost four years. He had what I have: an unreasonable Three Strikes sentence. They dragged him out of his cell after cutting him down and attempted CPR on him unsuccessfully right in front of my cell. It was a terrible sight. I’m sorry I watched it. But I kept expecting him to breathe, already! He was someone’s son. Someone’s father. Someone’s brother. Someone.

Unfortunately for his family, he didn’t make it. Luckily for him he didn’t make it. I say luckily because that’s what he wanted and he is now mercifully free of any more state-sponsored pain and suffering. And how screwed up would it be to go through all that and wake up right where you started? I know the pain and loneliness and despair and hopelessness he felt. I’ve been to the edge of a dozen times or more. The only thing that’s kept me from looking into the abyss is my family. Especially my mom. She’s done every minute of this time with me. God bless her saintly soul! I could never hurt my Mom, Dad, sons like that. I may be too old to ride when it happens, but I want to live to walk out of this place. I don’t want my kids to see me die in prison. And I’d never give my enemies the satisfaction of a suicide!

A big problem I had with Peewee’s suicide was this morning some psych techs (LPTs) came by everyone’s cells with some stupid ass questions. Mainly, “Are you okay with what happened yesterday?”

What? Hell no, I’m not okay with what happened! Are you? (Says I.) I am not okay with any of it. Including the state’s “automatic” defibrillator which kept insisting “no shock recommended. Continue CPR.” I have personally watched this contraption which is designed to protect staff members from any liability, say the same thing, with three deaths. I watched all three unlucky souls involved die from this “order of inaction.” (It never did recommend to defibrillate.)

I have a huge problem with a system that drives people to commit suicide. I have a big problem with a state that torments people until they feel that suicide is an option, until people are in so much internal pain and despair that it overrides the fact that they will be causing their families pain and despair.

There’s a guy on this tier who’s been here 18 months. He says he’s watched six people get dragged away in that time. That’s just this tier! There are six tiers: three floors, two tiers per floor. Do the math and don’t round down!

Does anyone see or care what the state is doing to its own people? Yes. I blame the state. And the Three Strikes law. I’ve been emphasizing “people” because that’s something I feel is lost on most of society. The people who are in prison are people! Everyone in here, minus a small percentage of illegals, are American citizens. Their families. Their children. We are Americans. Some of us in here are surely the type of Americans “polite society” frowns on to say the least! But Americans just the same. Some of these incarcerated Americans probably shouldn’t ever be let loose upon society. But that number is truly small. And some, like myself and my recently “self paroled” neighbor PeeWee, are (were) way overdue for release. This state chews up its own and shits them out. This California Three Strikes law is the death sentence in slow motion. It is an attack on the American citizens. It’s the most irrational, draconian “blanket” law since Salem. People commit crimes. So punish them. But let the time fit the crime. My crime carried a four-year maximum. I’ve done 12 years and have to do 20 more before “they” will even consider release. And even then there’s no guarantee. Attention American citizens: the evil being done by this law is being done in your name.

California has more of its own citizens “incarcerated” (what a genteel, polite word!) than almost every country on this planet! That’s one state! Close to 200,000 slaves! And yes, that’s the correct word. My last check? $6.60 for the month of February, 2011. (Yes, I have the “paystub.”) Now tell me I’m not a slave. And I’m one of the “lucky” ones who even has a pay number. Most people don’t.

When I was sentenced the state did not just take my freedom from me. (I’m so proud of our soldiers who are fighting to “keep us safe,” by the way!) The state also took my kids, my fiance, my career. But what the wonderful state of California also took (in your name, citizens!) was my children’s father. The state, in all its wisdom, left my sons without a father. Forever. Hey, maybe I screwed up. Maybe I committed a crime. But let the time fit the crime!

“Let not the sins of the father be visited upon the sons.” I’m paraphrasing, of course. The Bible’s all Greek to me. At least the Greek Orthodox Bible!

It’s probably going to be the “almighty dollar” that finally frees the slaves. It’s terrible that the citizens of the state think it is time for these Paul Blart Mall-Cop, Police Academy III reject prison guards to make ridiculous amounts of money to hold a group of fellow citizens hostage and ruin the lives of those citizens’ families in the meantime! What kind of twinking is that? Is it just cowardice? By the way, how are those cuts to your children’s education feeling? How about the cuts to the disabled or the elderly? Man! If you could just step out of it and look at it from a different angle! But hey! Just as long as those prison guards can buy their boats and Harleys and snatch up those foreclosed on houses at cut rates! If you could just see these clowns sitting on their asses for six of their eight hours a day with their “Pennysavers” and “auto ads” and “Homes” magazines trying to spend all that money that they don’t earn. Oh well! As long as nobody breaks in your dang mailbox! Disgraceful!

Do I sound mad? Well at least I have a reason to be mad. My crime carried four years. The voice of the California citizen has already made me do triple that. And I have five times that to go! The way things currently stand I’ll be 67 years old when I parole. Too old to give a damn, nothing to lose. 32 long pissed off years behind me. I wonder how the offspring of all you wonderful citizens are going to feel about your “sins of the father” policy when I and the rest am finally free?

PS: For the record, I was convicted of assault with a deadly weapon, protecting my girlfriend from being “jumped.” One of the other people got a cut, half an inch, no stitches! (It’s in the transcript.) For that I got 32 to life? For that you abuse my children’s lives? Tell me — who has committed the real violence? Fair and balanced? Yeah, just like Fox News.

Signed,

Enemy of the State

San Luis Obispo

A Short-Term Death Sentence —

On February 19 while in Mendocino County Jail I was tested at 4am and had low blood sugar of 59. I was given 25 units of Lantus but I only took 15 units. I was also given one sugar tablet which I ate half of. I returned to my cell and approximately five minutes later I felt like my blood sugar was still dropping. So I ate the other half of the sugar tablet and I sat down on my bed. The next thing I remember was waking up in the ambulance on my way to the Ukiah Valley Medical Center’s emergency room. The emergency medical technicians informed me that I had suffered from a diabetic induced coma due to an overdose of insulin.

During my stay in the hospital I overheard a doctor telling the nurse about some recent studies on diabetics. He said that a diabetic’s blood sugar levels can run in the 200 range and be fine. Tight control, as previously thought, is not necessary as most doctors believe. However, low blood sugar levels have a major effect on brain function and can lead to irreversible brain damage. I was taking 45 units of Lantus a day, 20 units at 3:30pm and 25 units at 4am. This is three times the amount I take when I’m free. I am getting Humalog insulin to cover high blood sugar, not for meal coverage.

Approximately two and a half weeks prior to this I was rushed to the hospital for an extremely high potassium level, signs of my kidneys shutting down. This is known as DKA — diabetic keytone acidosis. Thankfully, the doctor was able to pull me out of this. Dr. Medvin and the medical staff at the jail were quick to blame me for this saying it was my commissary food that was causing the problem. This was completely untrue. First, my blood sugar barely improved after having my commissary taken away. Second, I ate the same things the night of the 18th and every night prior. My blood sugar has only made slight improvements because I wasn’t eating a lot of the food to jail served me.

Dr. Medvin is not up to date on diabetic issues. In mid-January I had another episode of extremely low blood sugar levels and woke up in the medical room. My blood sugars have been a roller coaster ride ever since I came to jail.

My attorney looked into this matter and was told numerous times by the medical staff that they had my diabetes under control. The medical staff lied again when they told the court that my first visit to the hospital was for a routine doctor appointment. The truth is that I was rushed to the hospital at 3am in the morning because they could not get my blood sugar under control. My kidneys were failing. I almost died.

When my commissary was taken away, my grandmother, being concerned, called the medical staff to find out why. She was told that they couldn’t afford another hospital room and that my commissary food was the problem. Again, this is simply not true. The diabetic meals in jail are a joke. The meals are exactly the same as the other inmates except for dinner where they replace the dessert with a can of sweetened heavy syrup fruit. This has a higher sugar content then the desserts. Almost every meal consists of noodles, rice or potatoes. All carbohydrates. This is all wrong — a diabetic’s diet is high protein, high vegetables, low-carb, low sugar.

I wrote a grievance to the medical staff in an attempt to get my commissary returned. This resulted in a smaller modified list of commissary items that I was allowed. I gave this list to Sergeant Spears so she could pull the items from the food they took. Sergeant Spears then took it upon herself to reduce and modify the list even further and brought me a small handful of items. When did Sergeant Spears become a medical expert in diabetes? What gives her the right to overrule a clear medical evaluation? I then wrote another grievance to Sergeant Spears and the medical staff due to their vindictive behavior. This resulted in medical staff approving that all my commissary be returned to me. What is it that all of a sudden changed? Up to this point they blamed my commentary food for all their mistakes. Now what is their excuse? When I asked for my commissary back, all the officers and medical staff told me they could not find it. Since Sergeant Spears was the last one to see it I asked her about it during her next nightly walk through. She responded by laughing in my face and continued walking out the door. This happened twice — about a week apart.

A couple of days later I left the jail on a ten-hour pass for my grandmother’s funeral. As I was walking out the door (half an hour late) Officer Mareno handed me a large plastic garbage bag with all my missing commissary. He told me I had to take it home, lieutenant’s orders. This is discrimination. I am being singled out, plain and simple.

Going back to the first week I was booked into jail. For some strange reason I was put into lockdown for being diabetic. My grandmother called Sheriff Tom Allman to find out why I was put in isolation. Sheriff Allman told her, “He must have had a disciplinary issue; they would not lock him down for no reason.” After a few phone calls placed by Sheriff Allman, he found out that no behavior problems had occurred. I was out of lockdown the next day. Why was I put on lockdown in the first place?

The first time I was in the hospital, the beginning of February, Officer Masterson refused remove my handcuffs so I could eat. When I told him this was ridiculous, he said, “You can always eat in the jail.” The whole time he was pacing the floor complaining and worried that he would not be able to get off work at 7am. When we finally returned to jail I heard him tell another deputy, “I don’t see why they don’t just lock him down.” 45 minutes later I was locked down in medical isolation for eight days. I was told this was “to keep an eye on me.” Needless to say, I was upset about this and slept a lot. Never once did anyone wake me up to check to make sure I was not dead.

And not one of these episodes is a deputy find me. In the February episode, inmates Billy Rickman and William Cohen saved my life. Other inmates found me the previous time I was not conscious.

Everyone wants to believe that Dr. Medvin is the almighty doctor. What he says is never wrong. He understands and can control all medical problems.

This is simply not true! He is old school. All mechanics need training merely to keep up with technology advancements. This is the same for doctors, only twofold. How long has it been since Dr. Medvin has updated his diabetic training?

Also, I never had problems with my feet and legs swelling. I have now since coming to jail. On top of all this I have developed a rash on my legs that Dr. Medvin looked at. He said he didn’t know what it was and would look into books and get back to me. What if it’s contagious?

Bottom line is Lantus insulin is not designed to cover meal carbs. Humalog is. Humalog takes between 15-30 minutes to work effectively and is out of your system within an hour. I usually receive my Humalog an hour before meals. This simply does not work. Dr. Medvin is trying to use Lantus insulin to control high blood sugar due to high carb meals. This is causing extreme fluctuations in my blood sugar at different points in the day.

Outside of jail my blood sugar is by no means perfect. However, it’s been over five years since I’ve been to the hospital due to my diabetes. It’s happened three times since December 2 while under strict doctor’s care. Even a blind person can see the problem!

Rodney Breen

Ukiah/Willits

Dateline San Quentin State prison, South block, Alpine section, entry 2: Play now, Pay later.

Picking up the pieces one day at a time. I find myself stranded somewhere between nowhere and goodbye.

My surroundings are familiar but comfort eludes me. I’m so alone yet my cell feels crowded.

I can’t escape this place in my thoughts and I always run to you. You are the smile on my face and the strength that gets me through.

When I dream at night we are together again. When I awake in the morning I wish that dream would never end.

But here I am awake in my own living hell. Locked down 23 hours a day sharing a 5.5′ x 7.5′ cell.

They only let us outside two days a week. Then society wonders why we act like animals when we finally get released to the streets.

So here I am now strolling the yards with my hand held to the sky. I wish that someone, I am that tear in your eye.

I work out daily with the mirror to see my physique. All I see are other convicts doing the same thing and I don’t want to look weak.

Still no letters, they tell me. The mail is slow. I say no big deal. I will write to the editor and the world will know.

I never expected anyone to hang on my every word. I just wanted to let you know what it’s like to be the opposite of a free bird.

So until next time I’ll continue to write. I hope my loved ones don’t forget me. Something like out of mind, out of sight.

You know what I’m saying. I’m just backwards because I’m in here. I start my days at night. Thanks again for reading and listening. I just wanted to drop another kite into the wind.

Sincerely,

Ronnie Rhea

San Quentin

This is Mr. Gutmann, “The One and Only!” You might remember me

Luke Gutmann

from an article you published a while back titled “Something Nice” by Bruce McEwen. I was the one who was “supposed” to get the life sentence for the premeditated attempted murder of William Troy Passmore, but thanks to the fine work of the Ukiah police department’s so-called hotshot detective Chris Long and prosecutor Killion who “concealed” evidence that ultimately blew the case, I will be coming home just in time. “Thank you all very much.”

As we speak I’m sitting here in San Quentin State prison’s lockdown unit (Carson Section) due to being (allegedly) a validated Northern Structure prison gang member. (Yes! It’s truly an honor!) With an indetermi­nate SHU term awaiting transfer to the Pelican Bay Security Housing Unit where I will drink coffee and watch color TV. However apparently California’s super­max-Pelican Bay Security Housing Unit (see “Cate v. Lira” for details) is quite the popular hangout for “alleged” prison gang members nowadays as it’s so over­crowded that it’s bursting at the seams and on average is taking inmates a two-year wait to get there.

In the meantime I’ll be maxing and relaxing, drinking coffee, reading books, laughing at the world and being my utterly remorseless self.

Of course, I do have one regret and that is as luck would have it sometimes modern medicine saves the wrong people! But we can’t always have our way now can we?

Anyways, believe it or not, there are more then a few “upstanding individuals” here with me from the “Ukiah area” (which would be the rest of Mendocino County), who for legal reasons I cannot list here as the California Department of Corrections will say it’s proof of gang activity that would sincerely appreciate a subuscription to the revered “Anderson Valley Advertiser” — the last real newspaper.

Send it to me and I will make sure the rest of the criminals, crooks, dealers and killers from California get to share in its delights.

Sleep easy, leave the door unlocked!
Ruthlessly yours,

Mr. Luke Gutmann # AC1022

4C2 San Quentin State Prison

San Quentin, CA 94974

Footnote: Shout out to “Bert” Schlosser! Shout out to my baby’s Mama mamas, your baby’s mamas and all the ladies at Low Gap Road with no morals or boundaries! See you soon.

And to all the haters, take a long walk off a short bridge, probably just mad because your kids look like me. That’s life. Oh and did I mention I’ll be getting out! That I got a release date! That this is temporary! That we will be rubbing elbows real soon? Please send me a free subscription to your newspaper. I get out in 2022.

* * *

AVA, Dec. 23, 2009 — There were so many stab wounds in William Troy Passmore’s upper back they all kind of ran together and were hard to count, but he had at least twenty holes in him, maybe more.

When DA Rayburn Killion asked Passmore to take off his shirt to show the jury his ventilated shoul­der blades the jury’s faces went white.

The stabber, the alleged stabber that is, and his lawyer considered their shoelaces.

Killion: “How sure are you that the defendant is the man who stabbed you?”

Passmore, having waited for the defendant to meet his eyes, “One hundred percent.” he said.

The defendant, Luke Gutmann, held Passmore’s gaze before checking his shoelaces again.

Gutmann and Passmore, at a residence on Cindy Street not far from Ukiah’s Pear Tree Shopping Cen­ter, had had a disagreement over a computer.

Mr. Gutmann exchanged some whispers with his law­yer, Mr. Bert Schlosser who, for the sixth time, dis­covered that the prosecution had not given the defense tapes of interviews “concealed” by the policeman who’d recorded them.

Every time Mr. Schlosser cross-examined a witness he found that the cops had taped interviews but not given these tapes to the defense.

Judge Richard Henderson was not happy. When he’d sent the jury home for the weekend, he came down with both feet on prosecutor Killion for withholding the evi­dence every defense is entitled to. Schlosser had moved again to dismiss the case because so much had been withheld, not that there was much dispute over the basic facts of the event.

The contested computer was torn in two, and Pass­more came very close to dying before the knife was finally wrested from his erstwhile friend’s furious hands.

According to the testimony of one witness, Brittany Finley, Gutmann then fled down the street to a waiting vehicle driven by, she said, one Richard Fambrini.

Gutmann, it was concluded by the court, will go away to state prison for four-and-a-half years.

I want to acknowledge and commend Mr. Bruce McEwen for the bold journalism displayed in his report in your Off The Record section on March 3, 2010. I respect anyone unafraid to call a spade a spade and not shy away from the facts and truth of matters of importance. It troubles me that other reporters and publications do not act with an aggressive voice to protect and make aware the citizens in this country of their constitutional rights and force the courts, government officials, law enforcement, etc., to abide by the Constitution and laws which they are bound to. The freedom of the press is a very powerful engine, one on which the citizens of this country rely heavily for action and information. The courts or anyone else should not be allowed to ignore any of the Supreme Court rulings, government and state laws, and Constitutional amendments without consequences when deciding on the interests, welfare or fate of any one person, group, or organization in this country.

In my case it is frightening to learn that the Mendocino County justice system is doing whatever it chooses to do with no regard for my rights and the specific duties and obligations of court-appointed defense counsel in a criminal proceeding. For a black man — myself — to be told in an all-white courtroom that it is fair and that I have not been wronged by a public defender who refuses her obligation to conduct necessary investigations, call and contact expert and alibi witnesses, file motions critical to the defense, etc., etc., is not only outrageous, but demoralizing.

I mean seriously, my public defender, Ms. Linda Thompson, has done absolutely *nothing* for me. I’ve been incarcerated for 19 months and I have *never* spoken to her over the phone and she has only met with me on *two* occasions for a total of 50 minutes. The depth of these errors is so critical that the National Bar Association has now gotten involved.

Yet it is the trial judge who has the power to enforce and protect my constitutional right to a fair trial and competent and effective assistance of counsel. However, so far he has failed to do so. I have since convinced the court to allow me to represent myself (in pro per) and relieved Ms. Thompson as counsel. Of course, this is not a move I am absolutely comfortable with, being that I am ignorant of the laws and processes and I am now officially solo.

But truthfully, I’ve *been* solo and without effective attorney assistance since I was arrested. So what’s the difference? Can I really do any worse than the nonexistent lawyer? Sadly, the answer is yes, which is the number one reason the court’s rulings should be scrutinized. A person should not have to take such extreme measures to receive justice and fairness. But that is why I say that journalists like Bruce McEwen and publications like the Anderson Valley Advertiser are extremely critical to the American people. They give a voice to the little people like myself who refuse to remain tightlipped by a court system such as the one in Mendocino County which is doing as it chooses and operating entirely in the dark without caution.

I hope there is someone out there who is willing to investigate my story and cast light on the situation. Otherwise, one day it will be your friends and family members tangled in a system where the people appointed by the court to defend you are merely district attorneys with public defender business cards.

Glenn Sunkett

Oakland/Ukiah

I was just about to write you to see if you knew whether the documentary “Rivers of a Lost Coast,” featured at the Anderson Valley Film Festival is available to the public or not. Then I found an article on the film in the January 2010 issue of Salmon and Trout Steelheader magazine. The article explained how the two young filmmakers and steelhead flyfishers, Justin Coupe and Palmer Taylor, created their very successful documentary. Their film is endorsed by several pro fishing conservation groups and has been made available for conservation fundraisers. The DVD comes with a 42-page booklet containing original articles, historical photographs, interviews, biographies, production photographs, and original drawings by Bill Schaat. Hopefully by the time I get out of prison I will be able to rent this video. Their DVD is available for $29.99 at www.riversofalostcoast.com

My associates and I here at South Soledad Prison have all really enjoyed your book “Mendocino Noir.” We’re hoping that you are working on book number two. My heart goes out to Jody Lesiur your (“Killed Without Dying”), Skye Nickel (“Tree Rustling, Fort Bragg Style”), the Orr Sisters and family (“The Great Fort Bragg Which Hunt”), James Denoyer’s poor starving horses (“Where Are They, Jimmy?”) And especially to Russell Rexrode (”The Hunter As Prey”). Russell Rexrode’s life got turned upside down for doing the right thing. Rexrode handed a month-old mountain lion cub to a Fish and Game warden and was rewarded with a search warrant being served on his home. The end result for Rexrode’s efforts to do the right thing was the cost of thousands of dollars in legal fees and his right to hunt being taken away for ever.

My mother has sent me several newspaper articles on “Lil’ Smokey,” the bear cub that was rescued from the Moon Fire in Trinity County by CDF Forester Adam Deem. Deem didn’t get in any trouble for turning “Lil’ Smokey” into the Fish and Game Department. In fact, Deem is known as a hero for “rescuing” the bear cub. Deem and his wife also made a children’s book called “Saving Lil’ Smokey,” a true story that tells the story of Lil’ Smokey.

After talking to friends and loved ones living in the real world outside prison about how hard it is surviving, raising children, finding employment in this bad economy out there, I keep telling myself, “It doesn’t get much better than this.” But I still want to get out, of course. Where else can one live rent and bill free? Where else can one get free medical and dental work done and not have to pay for medications? Where else can one be supplied with clothing and have their laundry done weekly for free? Where else can one sleep as much as one wants with no responsibilities? Where is the value of the dollar worth more?

When I say to myself, “It doesn’t get much better than this,” I am only trying to make myself feel better about being stuck in this prison.

Lance Scott

Soledad

I would just like to thank you for sending me your paper and continuing with the awesome work on your end. I only know that it is a pleasure to have your paper passed through my bars by some stupid correctional officer each week.

Conditions are [bleep]ed here in Quentin. It’s dirty, crowded and the staffing rating is mediocre at best. People go home after their release dates about 75% of the time, which makes me wonder: is there any hope for my release?

Thanks for your time and concern.

Yours always,
Cameron Hammond
San Quentin

I hope all is well there. I was not going to write this story because the last one had me ending up in the office and needless to say I came out on the short end of the stick. But I can’t just sit here and do nothing; that would be so wrong. I must do what I must do.

Let me fill in those of you who have no clue: this sad story comes from inside Mule Creek State Prison’s mental holding tank, in Ione, California. This is a prison setting. We have five buildings packed with men here, three of them with 240 men and the other two with 200 men. These buildings were built for 100 men each. There’s also the gym which is triple bunked with 160 more men in it. I call it “the homeless shelter.”

Truthfully, there is little room to even defecate. With a total of 1250 men on a yard built for 500 it is cramped to say the least. It certainly is not a place to treat anyone with mental health issues. The two buildings with 200 each are known as EOP, Extended Outpatient Program units. These are the worst off in the way of mental health issues. They are in very bad shape. Most of them need to be led to the showers and told when and what they can and cannot do. They need to be pampered like eight-year-old children since nobody knows when they might just go off. One of the worst things is when they do go off there is a “code.” The correctional officers wear little boxes on their sides and when one hits the button a loud alarm goes off and we all must sit down as the guards come running from all directions to get in on the action. Unfortunately, if you are one the one on the other end of the baton and can of gas, you lose. Remember, these are men who are mentally ill. There is not much anyone in here can do but show them a little compassion. But there is little to be found.

I have read quite a bit about the lack of mental health treatment in Mendoland or worse yet at the Low Gap Hilton. Please don’t turn your back on these men who are in real need. We lost a couple of good men not so long ago due to no one hearing their cries. Suicide was their only option.

I understand the values of the California Department of Corrections, but to physically and/or mentally abuse anyone is wrong and I have seen abuse that should get a person put in prison. The point is these are mentally ill people who might be your grandfather, father, son, grandson, uncle, or just a guy you once knew. But you probably don’t even know any of these men so does that mean you as a human being can just turn your back on this neglect and abuse?

Most of these men are on heavy medications like Thorazine and other psychotic medications. Some are court ordered to take shots to keep them stable and the medication comes very easily. All one must do is ask and anyone can get most anything he wants. The problem is they will give you about all you want. But knowing when enough is enough is the problem.

We have men here who have no clue whatsoever just why they are here or even where I Ione, California is. All it takes is a person to have a little compassion to see just how wrong it is to keep some of these lost men here. Some of you may be able to just turn your backs on the situation. But for me to just to reach just one person who may be helped is all I seek. But also to expose the lack of care for those who are mentally ill and locked up.

Please don’t get me wrong. There are some psychiatrists and psychologists here who go way beyond the call of duty to help these troubled men.

I have befriended a couple of these men in EOP for good karma in my life. It can be very trying as they can be “way out there.” I have a friend I will call Richard. He is a father and an all around good person. Just why he is here is beyond me and I could not care less. Over the last five years I’ve spent a lot of time with him talking about everything. Some of it was legal stuff because he has been to law school and was a bright man. I say “was” because he has been in the EOP program for couple of years now and things have deteriorated very badly for him. They said he had dementia. I never noticed that at all, not until they put them on a number of medications. Now he cannot even tell me the date or the year. This is so hard to see right before my eyes as he is a kind, big hearted man who has no clue about anything. How sad it is to know his family has no knowledge that their daddy is being so neglected. There are many, many more men right here at this fine nuthouse who are suffering and alone.

I am sure that some of you from good old Mendoland still remember the Talmage State Hospital. I don’t know the number of men and women they had there, but now a hell of a lot of them are in Department of Corrections custody. These corrections officers, no matter how they may look at them, are not trained to deal with those who are mentally ill. The system is a complete failure, not only to the ones who need help but to the taxpayers.

Now you know a little more of what goes on behind these walls and even as wrong as you and I know it is, it just keeps going on. It is wrong in every way. It is wrong for just one more judge to sentence another man or woman to the California Department of Corrections who has a mental issue. You must do what you must to live your life with karma, good or bad. This is just a warehouse for those who are truly sick at a cost to you of about $50 grand a year each, and that is just to babysit us. That does not include treatment of mental or medical issues for most of us.

I hope I have shined a little light on what is going on in this world here. This letter is a plea for a little compassion for those of you out there to try and understand just what it is like to be put in prison with a mental health condition. I plead and pray that you do not turn a blind eye to those who have been shut up inside for so long. Step out of your comfort zone and do something to help just one person who is struggling with the biggest challenge in their lives. You may have a family member who is locked up in a mental hospital or you may know someone who is. Please take it upon yourself and drop them a card or letter so they know there is someone who still cares about them out there. I hope just one of you makes some sort of contact with a person who is so lost in the system. This may be their last chance.

Peace be with you all.

Mark Sprinkle K-24619

PO Box 409040-B-gym-110-L

Ione, CA 95640

My name is Glenn Sunkett. I am an African American citizen and Oakland California resident who is being illegally detained, prejudiced, racially discriminated against, inhumanly traded, and a constant subject of cruel and unusual punishment inside the criminal court system and detention center here in Ukiah, California.

I have been convicted by a 12-person jury (comprised of 11 white bodies and one Middle Eastern body) on charges ranging from kidnap to burglary (of four white victims) in a marijuana related crime that lacked sufficient or substantial evidence against me to support a verdict of guilt. Although racism combined with highly questionable tactics and unlawful conduct by the investigating detectives, prosecutor and local media played a significant role in influencing the jury’s decision, it is my court-appointed attorney who is mainly responsible for dictating the outcome of this case and violating my constitutional rights.

From the start of Ms. Linda A. Thompson’s tenure as my public defender, she has actively worked against me without camouflage. And I have made certain to document in detail Ms. Thompson’s refusal to provide effective assistance of counsel as well as her incompetence, neglect and conspiratorial behavior. (Please refer to below for a list of some of Ms. Thompson’s failed responsibilities and questionable actions.)

I have petitioned vigorously to the court to relieve Ms. Thompson as my court-appointed counsel but my pleas are being denied by the court without my being given any explanation or case law whatsoever to support this decision. I am literally being forced into representation by a court-appointed public defender who is openly acting as an assistant prosecutor against her own client. I have presented overwhelming evidence, case law and sufficient reasoning that supports my claims against Ms. Thompson. Yet, the trial court continues in its unexplainable failure to relieve her as my defense attorney. And the adamancy of the court continues even after I hired a private attorney to petition the court for her substitution.

One must seriously consider the motive behind the judge who forces court-appointed representation on a defendant who prefers private counsel when there is an open conflict of interest between the chosen public defender and the defendant. This is a blatant denial and violation of my constitutional right to a fair and impartial jury trial. Gaining a conviction in this mock trial setting should be viewed as a farce or a sham and should also be considered invalid being that my fate and outcome of this case was obviously preconceived outside of the courtroom.

Sadly, the courtroom is not the only place Ms. Thompson failed to protect my rights and well-being. During the duration of my detention at the Mendocino County Jail, I have been constantly subjected to racial discrimination, racist remarks, cruel and unusual punishment, inhumane treatment, deplorable living conditions, physical torture, and mental abuse. My family and I repeatedly begged for Ms. Thompson to intervene and take action against jail staff for their illegal and inhumane conduct and tactics, but were vehemently ignored during this time. I felt as if I was in Guantanamo Bay.

For months I was being chained up like a dog in leg irons, belly chains, and handcuffs and *forced* to take showers in this manner. I have been forced to live in a cell specifically used for the mentally ill and deranged that, upon my arrival, was literally painted with another human being’s feces, blood, urine, semen, snot and spit. To this day I have never been given the proper cleaning supplies, sanitizers, disinfectants and protective body covering needed to safely occupy this cell.

Also, I was initially placed in a 24-hour a day lockdown unit strictly because of my race. Racial segregation is implemented at this facility in which minorities are the only affected parties. I was denied the right to participate in religious services and congregation of my choosing and excessively disciplined due my being “black” and detained on a marijuana related robbery in a pro-marijuana farming county.

But what I stated in this letter so far still cannot express the depth and magnitude of this horror story. I have over 500 pages of thoroughly detailed documentation supporting my claims and I am willing to provide them to any person or organization interested in helping me bring the needed attention to this matter.

I should add that starting February 10, 2010 and I will begin a hunger strike that I will not end until I’m granted my constitutional rights to fair and impartial court proceedings and court rulings in my conviction is overturned based solely by the laws the court is bound to.

Being that I am in a meet in immediate need of assistance, advice and support I ask that all concerned parties contact me at 951 Low Gap Road, Ukiah, California 95482. You may contact my private attorney, Geoffrey Fletcher, at US Bank Plaza, 980 Ninth Street, 16th floor, Sacramento, CA 95814. All responses and or other action will be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,
Mr. Glenn Sunkett
Ukiah

PS1. Attachment: Things my public defender did/did not do pursuant to her obligatory duty as outlined according to the California Defense Advocate:

1. Failed to move the Court to dismiss charges due to insufficient evidence of a supporting nature that resulted in my being tried and convicted of crimes that never occurred.

2. Failed to object to an unduly suggestive and highly illegal identification procedure which resulted in my being implicated in a crime in which I had no knowledge of or participation in.

3. Failed to conduct an investigation into the prosecution’s allegations and clients alibi which is necessary in presenting a meritorious defense.

4. Failed to call expert and alibi witnesses which were both critical to the defense at trial.

5. Made it *my* obligation to conduct and *pay* for the services of a cross race identification expert needed for their expertise at trial. Again this is a public defender charging a client to retain experts as well as other needed services.

6. Failed to file motions to suppress evidence that had no relation to the crime yet was used in a suggestive manner against her client at trial.

7. Refused to communicate with me in *any* manner whatsoever in the months leading up to trial and led to a withdrawal of a meritorious defense.

8. Allowed and assisted in investigative and prosecutorial misconduct.

These are only 8 of 31 issues and errors made my made by my public defender.

PS2. Declaration to commence hunger strike demonstration on February 10, 2010: This declaration is being made in protest to the fact that my constitutional rights are being violated in the Mendocino County Criminal Court system and detention centers so severely and unjustly that evidence supports that I am being illegally detained and discriminated against. In addition to the commencement of a hunger strike I am also refusing to leave my cell for all reasons excluding interviews from the press, attorneys and investigators. This demonstration will start on February 10, 2010, and end when my public defender Linda Thompson is removed from my case as defense counsel for reasons of ineffective assistance of counsel and or conflict of interest, new counsel is appointed or retained, fair and impartial court proceedings are conducted according to the Constitution and rulings made by Mendocino County judges are based on the laws in which they are bound to protect, enforce and adhere to. Not before then will this peaceful and justifiable protest end.

A blessing in disguise!

Do I have any friends? I’d like to know. / Because the friends that I have they hurt me so. They lie and steal, they stab me in the back. / If these are true friends, then where is the love at? My wife, she cheats, a slut you might say. / I haven’t touched her in months but she has sex every day. My kids have my eyes, but not my smile. / They curse like sailors and that’s not my style. My father disowned me because I had to be fed. / I think I’m adopted — well that’s what I read. I was sentenced to five years for something I didn’t do. / They showed me a mug shot of someone who looks like you. My life has been shattered and I’m falling apart. / It’s hard to be humble with malice in your heart. Well, my mother loves me at least that’s what she will say. / It was for my own good, that’s why she went away. I’m telling you folks that my life is a mess. / But the chaplain says, man you are blessed.

Larry Wilson
Soledad

I wrote this while I was in Mendocino County Jail wishing that I was out fishing on the beautiful Navarro River with my son Noah. I thought you would enjoy it.

Navarro — It’s 5am and my alarm wakes me up. I brew up some coffee and I pour me a cup. I wake up my boy and I pack up our gear. “Go to sleep in the truck, I’ll wake you when we’re near.” We drive down the coast as the sun starts to break. We talk about how many casts it will take. As we reach the Navarro and look for our first spot, we reminisce about all the big steelies we’ve caught. There’s cars at the best spot and the second spot too. So we know exactly what we need to do. We go to Hendy Woods Park to the big log of safety. We walk through the redwoods as it’s light enough to see. As we reach the great hole we walk with all care, knowing that if we are loud, the fish we will scare. Because it rained last night the water is a clear “snappin’ green.” But as we peer into the log hole there is no fish to be seen. I tell my son to cast right up there and let it drift through so he puts on some roe and knows just what to do. He casts where I suggest and to our surprise his rod doubles over and he looks back to my eyes. The fish races downstream as Noah edges over a hump. How many times will this silver beauty jump? The fish fights really hard but only for a while. As Noah feels the fish tiring he gives me a smile. Noah eases the great steelhead into his two hands at last, posing for a picture with my camera’s flash. He removes the barbless hook and resuscitates the fish slow. He is only too happy to let this fish go.

Lance Scott
Soledad