Five to Twenty Archive
Explore the raw and transformative journey of life before, during, and after incarceration. Delve into personal stories of reentry, redemption, and the challenges of rebuilding life beyond prison bars.
Beyond the Bars (2021–)
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The Visitor: A Probation Officer's Home Inspection
She stood beside my bed in a dark jacket despite the heat. I sat on the sofa holding a cup of coffee, intent on looking comfortable.
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The Freedom List: Returning to Prison
The walls sneered: 'We knew you'd be back, so we kept everything as you left it.' That terrible déjà vu began before I'd even reached the prison's chain link fences.
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Pink Socks: On Probation and Polygraphs
The test isn't really about separating fact from fiction—which it can't do—but rather about frightening and intimidating the test-taker.
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The Problem List: On Treatment, Polygraphs, and the Struggles of Reentry
By failing the first test and subsequently passing the second, hadn't he only proved that the test is flawed, that it doesn't measure what it claims to measure?
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Edgar: Seeking Connection and Redemption After Prison
I was in love. And on our second date, lunch at a taqueria, he brought me a dozen red roses and we made love back at my apartment, in the middle of the day, with the blinds open.
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Homecoming: The Challenges of Rebuilding A Life After Prison
I felt a sense of having come to rest after a long and arduous run, which was almost the literal truth of it. I would have liked to have laid there forever, savoring the tingle in my muscles...
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Andy: The Complexities of Relationships After Prison
It's encouraging to find such unexpected warmth in a world that seems to conspire to convince us it contains none.
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The Apartment: An Offender's Search for Home
Finding an apartment is almost improbable when you're a sex offender. Not only do most leasing offices want nothing to do with you, but many sex offenders are restricted from living near parks or schools.
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The Noodle House: An Offender's Search for Work
The food service industry is fairly friendly to ex-felons... the manager stopped me and revealed that he'd once been the biggest crack dealer in Dallas. 'We all deserve a second chance.'
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Releasing: The First Day of Freedom
I fought a giddy urge to turn to him and disclose everything. I just got out of prison. I have been locked up for ten years. You are the first free person I've spoken to.
Incarceration (2011–2021)
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Limbo: Freedom Posponed Due to COVID
What if freedom isn't everything I hope it will be? I'd been building it up in my mind for so long imagining it to be the answer to all my problems. But what if it isn't?
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Mr. Winky: Porn Addiction and the Fear of Re-offense
A decade in prison doesn't break a habit; a life sentence doesn't fix what's broken. My biggest fear is that I may get out of prison in a month but never be free.
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Send-Off: Farewell Rituals and Impending Release
They say time slows the closer you get to the door. Since then I've often felt as though I'm standing over a stove, waiting for a pot to boil while consumed with the most desperate hunger.
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First Death: COVID Outbreak at Big Spring Federal Prison Reveals Pattern of Medical Neglect
Robert spent the weekend lying on a cot, gasping for breath. He was provided no oxygen or respirator. Come Monday when finally seen by a doctor, Rob was rushed to a hospital.
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Compassionate Release: COVID and the Pursuit of Freedom
We were dominoes, all poised to fall. Locked down and left to ourselves, watching infections ripple through the prison system from Leavenworth to Carswell.
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Game Night: Pizza and Pandemic Pastimes
I've often marveled at the creative talent locked away in the nation's prisons, unwitnessed and wasted. The twins handmade the Monopoly game from cardboard, construction paper, and clear tape.
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Pandemic: Life Inside Prison During COVID
It's impossible for inmates to keep six feet apart when we're forced to eat, sleep, and shit within four feet of each other. The prison system itself has put us at highest risk.
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Cell to Society: Two Brothers Face the Complex Reality of Post-Incarceration Life
I've been told that leaving prison is more frightening than coming into prison. I wouldn't have believed that nine years ago.
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COVID: Pandemic Protocols in a Federal Prison
As the virus winds its way across the globe, people everywhere find their worlds shrinking. Prisoners' worlds, which had already seemed impossibly small, are shrinking too.
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Strip Searched: On Prison Sexual Abuse and Retaliation
Presumably my narratives on prison life—accounts of medical neglect, sexual assault, unsanitary living conditions—had embarrassed the staff. Was dropping me into a dangerous environment oversight?
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The Hole: A Month in Solitary Confinement
I realized why they call it the hole. Sitting perfectly alone, I watched the diffused light turn from silver to gray to soot, with the sense that I really had fallen into a deep hole.
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Estate Sale: Saying Goodbye
I felt like a marauder rifling through a dead man's estate sale. He kept throwing things in my lap. He was sweating, getting manic. Men say leaving prison is scarier than coming to prison.
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The Visitor: Reconnecting Behind Bars
At six foot four Jamie easily stands out in the crowded visiting room. From afar he appears both foreign and familiar, like an old beloved painting rehung in another room.
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The Strike: Seven Days of Hunger and Protest
Solidarity is critical in a strike. Each inmate regardless of his race or affiliation must fall in line, or else fall. In this respect we are captives as much to each other as we are to our captors.
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The Short-Timer: On Medical Negligence, Sexual Assault, and Cover Ups
The staff had caught a whiff of legal liability. So strong had the stench of illegality become that Dr. Tubb flatly asked the short-timer if he'd be willing to drop his assault claim.
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The Weight Pile: Prison Life Through the Lens of Weight Training and Personal Transformation
G maintains his usual calm, standing on his head, legs scissoring serenely in the air with nary a hitch in his voice. 'Breathe, gentlemen. I want you relaxed from nose to toes.'
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Tripping: On Addiction and Substance Abuse in Prison
When I came to prison I was surprised that one could procure from behind these fences any vice he wishes—drugs, sex, pornography, tobacco, alcohol.
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Eclipse: A Solar Event Witnessed from Behind Fences
Even through four darkened lenses the sun's glare still kicks between the eyes, and I have to look away before long, vision swimming.
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Love, Paul: A Brother's Letter from Behind Bars
'I'm sorry for any shortcomings of being a good big brother. Landing myself in here doesn't help you in any way. But maybe in the end it's for the better.'
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Fog: Meditations on Family and Isolation
After weeks of unseasonably warm weather, a cold front blows in overnight bringing with it a fog so tenacious not even the West Texas wind can drive it away. The world outside has vanished.
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The Officers' Mess: Feeding the Captors
It's a strange job feeding one's captors. Stranger still is seeing one's captors eat, watching them in this most intimate act of chewing and swallowing.
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The Hygienist: An Inmate's Illicit Affair with Prison Staff
Strangely, she refused to ever take off her key belt. It was the one rule that as an officer she would not break, as if unclipping it might have made her transgressions more real.
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Mascots: On Roadrunners, Skunks, and Captivity
I thought of Russian nesting dolls: a cage within a cage within a cage. Our skunk was penned inside a cage on the library lawn, his tail extruding through the wire mesh like cheese through a grater.
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The Pageant: When Inmates Perform Christmas
The song continued with each day of Christmas revealing some fresh iniquity of prison life: the pettiness of inmates, the incompetence of staff, the tedium of bureaucracy.
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Remediation: An Inside Look at Suicide Prevention in Prison
Suicide, Dr. Blatt tells us, accounts for about 40,000 deaths per year in the U.S., a figure roughly double that of homicide. More women attempt suicide than men.
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Comrades: Finding Brotherhood in an Unlikely Exercise Class
Routine is the bedrock of every inmate's bid, the pendulum that drives the clock, and lately mine had seemed to have grown stale. A flier in the rec center advertised a fitness class.
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Seasonal Doldrums: An Inmate's Perspective on Seasonal Changes
They say despite longer days the fall and winter months go by quickest, our attentions sated by football and gambling and long bouts of hibernatory sleep.
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Artifacts: Unearthing Memories in a Prison Food Service Class
We could have filled a hundred boxes, entire calendars, with the dishes we miss most. Fried chicken and biscuits. Shrimp jambalaya. Carne asada.
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Commutations: When Some Go Free
Joe wallowed on Willy's bed, waving the letter like a winning lottery ticket. 'One hundred fifty-one months, down from 216!' His commutation had been granted.
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The Meeting: On Inmate Law and Order
The speakers called a meeting in the dorm. All inmates of every race and affiliation was encouraged to attend. Over a hundred men crowded into the living quarters.
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Pressure Cooker: Heat and Housing Changes Ignite Prison Tensions
The affiliated whites don't want to be near the sex offenders, the Mexicans don't want to be near the blacks, and the blacks don't want to be near each other.
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Prison Reform: Hope vs Skepticism
No congressperson would support a bill that gets pedophiles out of prison quicker. Ironically these men have the lowest recidivism rates.
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Routines: Finding Humanity Through Daily Rituals
I thought it odd that Jack should have suggested we breakfast together. He confided that I am the only person here he can stand, quite a compliment from Jack, who unabashedly despises everyone.
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Brothers in Crime: Two Siblings, Two Sentences
My brother sent me a Get Out of Jail Free card in the mail. The copy read, 'Just in case your birthday celebration gets out of hand!' Paul himself just got out on bond.
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On the Lookout: Observations from a Prison Suicide Watch Unit
For fifteen minutes she and the companion watched Espinosa jerk and shudder on the cage floor, his head knocking against the coving, until another officer arrived.
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Candy Man: On Inmate Ingenuity and Ostracism
He makes his taffies not with rose petals but with Hawaiian Punch, combining the drink mix with powdered creamer to form a dough which he rolls into ropes.
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A Place At the Table: A Prison Cooking Class Reveals Social Hierarchy
Nobody told Baxter to wash the dishes. But nobody invited him to join in the cooking, either. If you shake a jar of sand, the larger grains know to rise; the smaller grains know to fall.
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Always Prepared: On Survival and Safekeeping
When the next riot breaks out I know where I'll hide. If I'm in the dormitory, I will crawl beneath my bunk. The corner walls should box me in nicely.
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Patricide: How Two Incarcerated Brothers Break Their Father
Our seventy-one-year-old father has said that his only wish is to live long enough to see his youngest son get out of prison. And now his oldest son has been arrested.
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Going Straight: The Employment Crisis for Ex-Offenders
Joe guffawed. 'I'm forty years old and have no skills. I've been selling drugs since I was ten. It's the only thing I know.' We are, Joe and I, in similar situations.
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Sunrise: A Night on Prison Suicide Watch
He's an older man, mid-fifties. His face is pleasantly bland. The smock he wears reveals a broad chest of graying hairs, fat shapeless arms. His exposed knees look small and vulnerable.
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Turbine Cowboy: On Prison Vocational Programs
Mr. Jones demonstrated how to wear a safety harness. 'You want to make sure all these straps are tight. You don't want to take a fall with these hanging loose. You'll tear your shit clean off.'
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The Ball Drops: New Year's Eve in a Federal Prison
Later I was awakened at midnight by the thunder of a hundred men beating on their cell doors. The ball had dropped. Their furor resonated with my fear.
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Christmas Bags: Measuring Time in Christmas Care Packages
Ask Joe how much time he has left and he might tell you 192 burgers—that's a burger for every Wednesday left in his bid. I myself have six Christmas bags left to serve.
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Newcomer: Navigating The Social Hierarchy As A New Inmate
I made three mistakes within my first twenty-four hours of arriving in Big Spring. My first offense was pissing in the toilet. We do not do this. We do not piss in the toilet.
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Econo Lodge: Arriving at Big Spring FCI
I'd heard the place was overcapacity—most prisons in the U.S. are—but surely these conditions posed a safety hazard. God forbid a fire break out. We'd die trying to get down those stairs.
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The Chain Gang: A Night Journey from Mississippi to West Texas in Chains
Freedom is underwhelming when observed from the highway. From four feet looking down I spied civilians driving to work, pumping gas, and hauling kids to school.
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Transfer: On Prison Relocations and Goodbyes
It's funny how kind people are when they hear you're leaving. It's the one thing we all share in common, regardless of our race or where we're from: we all want to get closer to home.
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Mail Call: Letters from Prison and the Pain of Separation
I put the envelopes to my nose and imagine I can smell the San Francisco Bay, the French countryside. But all I smell are the leaky magazine cologne samples of other people's mail.
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One Team, One Mission: Corporate Culture in America's Prison System
I stare out the coin-slot window of my cell and watch the cars pull in and out of the parking lot, the officers clocking out for lunch, changing shifts. Time sheets. Paid vacations.
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Static: Prison Tensions Rise as Rival Groups Face Off in Near-Riot
An inmate once compared the tension preceding a prison brawl to static, an invisible stirring in the air. That afternoon we felt its pull; we saw its effects in the sidelong stares, vigilant postures.
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Weakness vs Meekness: Prison Extortion and the Cost of Survival
If you refuse to pay him, he and his posse run you off the yard. If you fight him, the gang retaliates. If you report it, you're a snitch, and snitches end up in stitches.
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Faith vs Flu: A Prison Prayer Circle Confronts Illness
None of the brothers will admit he is sick. To admit illness is to claim illness, and so we come together stubbornly singing hymns in off-tune wheezes, trying to fool ourselves into remission.
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The Exchange: On Contraband and Kindness
We emptied our mattresses of all contraband—tattoo guns, cell phones, weaponry, porn, dope—and stashed them away in those units already searched.
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Disconnected: An Inmate Father's Attempts to Reach His Children
'Do you know how many letters I've gotten from my son since I've been locked up?' He flashes at me what I first perceive to be an okay sign. 'Zero. Nothing. Not a one.'
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Elijah: A Gay, Black, Jewish Inmate's Search for Belonging
I noticed him at the Christian table, a young black man with a linebacker's body and the face of a cherub. He wore a kippah atop his smooth head.
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Grits: Breakfast Debates and Social Dynamics
At breakfast there is the usual debate over grits. The Northerners at the Christian table prefer sugar while those brought up south of the Mason Dixon Line favor salt.
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Prayer Circle: Seeking Safety and Acceptance in a Prison Faith Group
Do they know that my Christian persona is a fraud intended to secure asylum within their community? I sometimes wonder if they can sense my disbelief as a break in their circle.
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Miss Dominique: An Open Letter in a Prison Bathroom
'Looking at me, you'll never guess that I'm a bitch. So if you're tired of using your hands to get off then get at me. Don't let the way I carry myself stop you.'
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Smashed: An Assault on a Sex Offender
I was in the library reviewing job applications when Old Man Landry got smashed. Inmates pressed against the windows two and three bodies thick, anxious to see whose race was involved.
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The Forbidden Garden: Hope Growing Behind Prison Razor Wire
It was miraculous to see such beauty, to think it could have sprung from prison ground where no trees are allowed to grow.
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Macaroni Salad: A Mess Hall Conversation on Death and Salvation
'They killed him,' Oscar says beside me. He wipes salad dressing from his lip. 'My girlfriend went to the funeral. He had only one year left.'
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Blue Shoes: On Adaptation and Prison Economies
You can tell the new guys by their feet; they wear the same shoes they arrived in—blue canvas slip-ons, flimsy and laceless so as not to pose a threat during transport.
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Teaching Behind Bars: Hope and Disappointment in Prison Education
A few months after his release, I ran into Ellis in the chapel after Sunday service. We shook hands. I thought I was hallucinating. 'What are you doing here?' 'Violation,' he said.
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Cotton Swabs: Prison Life and the Psychology of Control
There's a deliberate and finely honed economy to everything Rod does—every gesture, every tic, every glance, every remark, every intense habit.
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Anecdote: Becoming Someone's Prison Story
I'd like to be reassured that I am not simply an anecdote to be trotted out at dinner parties, that I did something good in our relationship worth pointing to.
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Piss Test: How to Cheat a Drug Urinary Analysis
Steve taught me how to cheat a piss test by filling a latex glove with warm salt water and adding just a pinch of instant coffee for color.
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MLK: Notes On Food, Race, and Education
Had we lived in the North, the meal might have been construed as a racist gag, but in Mississippi, serving fried chicken on Martin Luther King Day is simply an appeal.
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The Law of Seriality: Coincidences and Patterns in the Chow Hall
Coincidences aren't coincidences at all but the result of an invisible force in nature that favors unity, symmetry, and coherence.
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Watching: Inside the Inmate Suicide Watch Program
Dr. Hart says that for many people, the emotions that lead them to consider suicide are brief and temporary. You can save a life simply by being there.
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Christmas Letter: Finding Joy Amid Confinement
I try to wring out what pleasure I can from romance novels and cookies and eggnog, and it works for the most part, but sometimes the patheticness becomes so overwhelmingly apparent that I have to bite back the urge to cry.
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Christmas Cards: A Bittersweet Holiday Ritual
Rod sent out his Christmas cards this week. He slipped the cards into three white envelopes and stamped them upside down, a symbol of love.
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Locks: Violence and Racial Tensions at Thanksgiving
The more serious of the brawls happened yesterday, serious because it involved two races and therefore held the potential for a race riot. The Sureños ganged up on a black and stabbed him in the throat.
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El Burro: Laughter in Unexpected Places
He was given the name because of a medical affliction that resulted in his having a member roughly the size of a deli salami. It literally, from what Bo said, hung down to his knees.
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Another November: Reflections on Time and Aging
November brings a temporary peace to the compound. The waning light of early dusk casts us beneath a collective shadow. The cold winds unite us against a common enemy.
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The Bottom Rung: Reflections on Fear and the Struggle to Maintain Connection
My father couldn't understand why anyone would care about my charge or why anyone would want to hurt me. He couldn't understand the caste system in which snitches and sex offenders bear the weight of the bottom rung.
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Essays: Inmate Student Stories on Loss
'He was 6 months old when I left. When his first tooth came in, I wasn't there. When he first crawled, I wasn't there. And when he took his first step, I also missed that.'
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Visitation: Conversations and Vending Machine Meals with My Father
My father is among the morning's first visitors and sits alone beside the water fountains looking sad and regal like an ousted king with his crown of corn-silk hair combed back.
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No Sleep: A Night of Dreams, Memories, and Indignities
The mattresses are made of stiff foam, four inches thick, encased in heavy plastic. They're designed to be translucent when light shines through to detect contraband.
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Bitch: Sexual Politics and Survival Behind Bars
If I were caught with a black man, the whites would kill me, the blacks would prize me, and the Mexicans would surely come looking for their piece of the pie.
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Game Nights: Football, Food, and Racial Territories
On game nights, just before kickoff, the whites drag their chairs to the black side to watch the game in a small, safe cluster. The unit takes on the aura of a seedy sports bar.
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Pulled and Bagged: How Incarceration Kills Relationships
My former cellmate Bo once told me that prison relationships never last more than three years. Old couples are the one exception; couples beyond their fifties usually stick together.
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Lockdown: On Cellmates, Riots, and Unexpected Peace
I've only been in a few lockdowns and none have lasted for more than two days. I don't mind them really. They're like snow days; you stay inside, read, listen to the radio, do a crossword puzzle, nap.
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Love Letter: Passion and Confinement
'Damn u look so good to me Monday I had to really catch myself before I kiss u in front of everybody. My most wanted question tonite is when I'm going get some more.'
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South: A Grammar Lesson Leads to Intimacy
We sit with our elbows on the metal desk in his cell reciting parts of speech. The desks are inscribed with the histories of each cell's past and current occupants.
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Magic Shave: Inside the Prison Commissary
In reality, the commissary is nothing more than a waiting room with benches and flies. There are no shopping baskets, postcard racks, or reusable totes.
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Circling: A Walk Around the Prison Track
I round the track for the second lap and catch a whiff of booze. Two Mexicans came and sat beside me. One pretended to tie his shoe while the other unearthed a cereal bag from the ground.
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Essays: Inmate Student Stories on the First Day of Release
'I can't wait to take a bath. I been taking showers for fourteen years and counting, I just might take shower shoes to the bathtub with me. Soaking my limbs in some hot water will be nice.'
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Fugitive: From Teenage Thrills to Adulthood Incarceration
He was inside me when we heard the sirens. We took off sprinting across the schoolyard like two boys playing flag football, each with an empty pant leg flapping behind us.
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Shakedown Shorty: Inside a Prison Cell Search
Named for her favorite pastime and diminutive size, Shakedown Shorty sniffs for contraband like a hog sniffs for truffles. I heard she once got stuck in the ceiling looking for wine.
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Harper's Index: One Year in Prison by the Numbers
A statistical snapshot of prison life, from daily routines to personal connections, told through numbers that paint a picture of incarceration.
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Love the Sinner: Confronting Homophobia in Prison Ministry
I sat very still with my head planted firmly in my Bible. Embarrassment. Rage. I felt as though the whole congregation was watching me, studying me, waiting for me to flinch.
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Math Problems: Frustrations in Prison Education
The problem is that all inmates without a GED are required to participate in classes. The result is a classroom where ninety-five percent of the students have no interest in learning.
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Bug: Adjusting to an Institutionalized Cellmate
My neighbor Steve warned me about Rod before he moved in. 'You know Rad's a bug, dontcha?' A bug is a person who's been incarcerated for so long that they become loopy.
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Dirty Business: How to Make Tattoo Ink From Hemorrhoid Cream
The candle sits five inches from the top, and directly above the flame hangs an inch-long stalactite of black soot which Steve scrapes into a pill bottle.
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Silent Killer: The Hidden Dangers of Pornography Addiction
Pornography is the carbon monoxide of addictions, the silent killer. You're dead before you suspect anything's wrong.
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Bring the Hot Sauce: How Condiments Create Community
As the pill bottle exchanged hands, a miraculous thing happened: people started to like me. They began saying hello, wishing me a blessed day, and calling me 'brother.'
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Men Left to Themselves: Sexual Fluidity in an All-Male Prison Environment
He's disgusting. He belches, he farts, he scratches; he's loud, reckless, and immature. But when the lights go out, he's like a pile of warm laundry on a cold day, and I can't say no.
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Waiting: A Punishment and Meditation
What prison is really about, what it all boils down to, is waiting: waiting for the next move, waiting for count, waiting for a shower stall, waiting for your cellmate to finish taking a shit.
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Desire: The Desperation for Intimacy Behind Bars
The prospect and hunger for intimacy had completely crippled my ability to think straight. I brushed my teeth twice, baby-powdered my crotch. I had officially become his bitch.
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Pillow Talk: Late Night Confessions Between Cellmates
'I'm trisexual, I'll try anything. My home-bro on the streets, Shane, we sucked dick and shit...and by-the-way, man, this shit don't leave the room. You hear?'
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Bubba: Sexual Tensions Between Cellmates
My body is having a fit, and that damned dog is clawing and scratching and practically choking itself to death on its leash. It's been nine months since the old hound's been thrown a bone.
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Chicken and Waffles: On Race and Introversion
Today is the sixteenth of January—Martin Luther King Day—and someone within the BOP must have a sense of humor because the evening meal was fried chicken and waffles.
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Essays: Inmate Student Stories on Decisions
'I thank my God for putting me in prison. It saved my life because it took out of Drugs and I believe prison have saved my life it give a chance to think who I don't want to be anymore.'
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A Merry Little Christmas: On Search Warrants, Shakedowns, and Goodie Bags
To offset this year's Seasonal Effective Disorder, I've kept my mind occupied with books, crosswords, Sudoku—anything to keep my mind off Christmas.
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Dreaming: Psychological Escapes and Waking Disappointments
A friend who'd recently graduated from med school has always insisted that dreams have no meaning; they're just a 'random firing of neurons in the brain.' But how can that be?
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Opposites: On Mismatched Cellmates
I'm passive; he's aggressive. I'm tolerant; he's racist. I respect police; he shoots at them. I keep a list of books I'd like to read; he keeps a list of people he'd like to kill.
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Toilet Paper Wars: Power Struggles and Rebellion
He doesn't know it, but Bo and I are in the midst of a battle. For the past two weeks, the empty cardboard toilet paper rolls have been piling up on top of my locker.
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Rain: On Freedom and Normalcy
It started to rain after an hour, but I decided to stay out even after most of the field had cleared. Just me, three joggers, and the Mexicans who were playing a game of soccer.
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Gratitude: Thanksgiving Behind Bars
Conversation at the Christian table was quiet and nostalgic. One guy reminisced about his mother's deep-fried turkey. Another man was excited to see his family in January, their first visit in four years.
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Essays: Inmate Student Stories on Hands
After five minutes into writing, I noticed that many of the students were no longer looking at their hands; instead, their heads were down, their pencils scribbling away. And that's when the stories came out.
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Fractions and Friction: Tensions in a Prison Classroom
Outside in the hall, teachers and officers scrambled to contain the riot that threatened to unfold. The Mexicans rallied in the library while the blacks congregated in the halls.
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Bo: Another Confrontation Between Cellmates
'You know it took all of my strength to stop myself from smashing that fucking tub of cheese right in your face. Don't think for a minute that I'm weak. Don't misjudge me.'
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The Typewriter's Secret: A Love Letter Discovered
'I had it all worked out—the farm in Montana, the huge log home by the river, sharing the warm, snowy nights cuddled before the fireplace.' Must be a white guy, I thought.
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Essays: Inmate Student Stories on Childhood Homes
So I told the class to forget about introductions, bodies, conclusions, and grammar and spelling and paragraphs—just write, I told them. Describe your childhood home. Make me see, smell, hear, taste, and feel that space.
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Down on All Fours: How to Clean a Prison Cell
Sunday is my cleaning day. It's a ritual I've come to enjoy because it allows me to take ownership, to control something in a place where there is little control to be had.
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Duke: A White Supremacist Goes Gay
Duke told me that he used to be straight, but after 19 years of incarceration, he now prefers males, especially younger males—something about their innocence he finds appealing.
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Seeds Behind Bars: Fighting Cynicism in Prison Education
Teaching in prison is wrought with challenges. There are days when I feel as though I've made a difference, and then there are days when my efforts seem futile, like plugging holes in a ship destined to sink.
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Getting to Know You: Confession and Proposition
Every day we agreed to share one interesting thing about ourselves to get to know each other. Round one: cats. Round two: family photos. Round three: Bo tells me he's gay.
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Praying Mantis: Unlikely Pets Behind Bars
For some, bug collecting is a sport much like fishing—bragging rights go to those who can snag the biggest moths. For others, bugs make for friendly cell companions.
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Voodoo: The Aryan Cellmate
Five days after Roger left, I was assigned a new cellmate, a white, Aryan skinhead with the word 'VOODOO' tattooed across his belly, one of many tattoos including several swastikas.
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Human Zoo: The Dehumanizing Experience of Prison Tours
These people, these intruders, had the audacity to trample through my cage, the place where I eat, sleep, shit, and breathe, as if they were strolling through a zoo.
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The Suicide: An Inmate's Choice in His Final Year of Incarceration
What I don't understand, what is bothering me most about Red's suicide, is the question: Why now? Why did he kill himself in the final year of a 12-year sentence?
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The Weasel and the Rooster: Navigating Predatory Advances Behind Bars
Rooster still knocks but doesn't bother waiting for acknowledgement anymore; he just blows on in and takes a seat. His shaved head reveals a new tattoo: a mournful, half-nude female.
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Brawl: Hollywood vs Reality
"Get down! Get down! the guard yelled as he hurtled across the compound. We knelt to the ground as if tying our shoes—just life as usual. Maybe I'm getting the hang of this prison thing.
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The Act: Hiding Sexual Identity in Prison
I swagger and shift my weight from side to side; I keep my voice low; I sit with my legs spread wide and never crossed. I even feign sexual interest in the female officers.
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Hooch in the Ceiling: On Prison Ingenuity
If they can make booze from fruit juice, tattoo guns out of hair clippers, and free weights out of laundry and books, imagine what could be accomplished if that energy were focused.
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Cold Ramen: A Confrontation Between Cellmates
It started with petty criticisms. He'd criticize how I do laundry, how I hang a towel to dry, how I walk, how I stand, and even criticize me for being too quiet if I were trying to read a book.
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The Divide: Race Relations and the Prison Racial Hierarchy
On my second day here, an older white man took me aside and presented me with this advice: Mexicans are alright, but stay away from blacks. No further explanation was offered.
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Clerk: Inside Prison Education
My first paycheck came to $12.25—that's 25 cents an hour. Inmates who work in education are paid among the lowest salaries, underscoring how little value is placed on education.
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Escape: Finding Sanctuary in Books
I just finished my tenth book, and I figured if I keep this pace, I will have read over 1,200 books by the time I'm released 10 years from now.
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Law Library: How Prison Inmates Investigate Each Other's Crimes
I performed a search for my own name and found several hits. Luckily, my charge is never divulged. So why would Duke warn me that my case is in the computer?
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Macaroons: My First Birthday in Federal Prison
This birthday, my 25th, there was no seven-layer dip or pitcher of margaritas. Instead, my Jewish cellmate gave me chocolate macaroons he had saved from Passover.
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Stamps: Prison's Underground Economy
Since cash is not allowed in prison, postage stamps are the unofficial currency which inmates use for everything from gambling to purchasing goods and services.
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Rash: On Prison Psychological and Medical Care
The psychologist wanted to see me immediately. Before even stepping foot inside his office, I knew precisely why I had been called there. 'It's because you think I'm suicidal.'
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Fifteen Minutes: The First Call Home
The recording ended mid-sentence, and I smiled knowing my father had not hesitated for one second before accepting the call from federal prison.
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The Conversion: How I Became a 'Straight Christian' in Federal Prison
Sitting in the makeshift pews listening to Spanish translations of biblical passages was strangely assuring. It was the first time since arriving here that I didn't fear I'd be shanked.
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The Solicitor: A White Supremacist's Advances
After knocking, he let himself in, closed the door, and took a seat beside me. The PA system announced that the 10-minute move had ended. Duke had me all to himself for the next hour.
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Self-Surrender: My First Day in Federal Prison
As I stood in the middle of the cell, my new home for the next 10 years, it dawned on me that my sentence, which before had been nothing more than a number, now seemed like a life sentence.
Pre-sentencing (2009–2011)
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Pack It Up: The Last Days of Freedom
I've been dividing my belongings into four piles: stuff to giveaway, sell, donate, and keep. It's amazing and sad to see my entire life condensed down to two storage containers.
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Confessions of An Addict: How Pornography Led to a 12-Year Prison Sentence
When you're in the safety of your own home surrounded by four bedroom walls, it's easy to be fooled into thinking that you're not hurting anyone and that your actions have no consequences.
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The Judgment: A Sentencing Summary
The length of the term of supervised release shall not be less than the statutory minimum term of years specified and may be up to Life. I was sentenced to a lifetime of supervised release.
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The Sentence: Inside A Federal Child Pornography Sentencing Hearing
In an impassioned speech, the prosecutor accused me of being a deprived and violent predator. At the climax, she pleaded that the judge take this 'opportunity to send a message.'
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The Response: Prosecutors Push for Maximum Sentencing
My lawyer said the prosecutor 'attacked me from all angles' and asserted that my psychotherapist didn't know me well enough to conclude that I wasn't a threat to children.
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The Memorandum: A Defense Attorney's Strategy
My lawyer provided me a copy of the Sentencing Memorandum, the purpose of which is to persuade my judge to impose a sentence lower than the range calculated by the Federal Guidelines.
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The Last Month: Waiting for Federal Prison
Sentencing is Wednesday of next week, and it feels as though I've reached the end of the road. Nothing more to see or do or experience.
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Sentencing Disparity: Why CP Crimes Get Harsher Punishment Than Contact Offenses
My calculated sentence is 567% higher for trading pornography than the sentence given to a man who coerces a 13-year-old girl into sex.
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The Polygraph: A Pre-Sentencing Character Test
Two coiled wires went around my chest, strapping me to my seat. My left arm was fitted with a blood pressure cuff, and in the seat was a pressure pad that detected movement.
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The Results: What Psychological Research Says About CP Offenders
Studies suggest that the probability of escalation to a contact offense for a man without prior felonies, guilty of possession only, is low—roughly 0.5% per year.
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Normal Homosexual Male: The Pre-Sentencing Evaluation That Changed Nothing
My lawyer called to tell me he received my evaluation from the psychotherapist. After three sessions of questions and tests, the therapist concluded that I'm a 'normal homosexual male.'
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The Guilty Plea: The Court Process and Booking Experience
Each defendant stood behind a podium and answered a series of questions: What is your full name? Do you understand the charges? Are you entering the plea of guilty freely and voluntarily?
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Preparing: Advice from a Probation Officer
My PO says that prison is no more dangerous than society. If you go in looking for trouble, you'll find it. If you mind your own business, you'll do fine and time will go by quicker.
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The Evaluation: Psychological Testing for Sex Offenses
The goal of all these tests is to prove to a judge that I am not a sexual menace. There is, however, no guarantee the judge will consider the therapist's report or what that report might say.
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The Resignation: Termination and the End of a Career
The reality was that every day following the FBI's visit was hell, and work had been the only thing keeping my mind off my troubles.
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The Time Does You: A Former Inmate's Survival Guide
'When you first get there, they'll put you in the SHU. They'll verbally assault you, strip you naked, harass and humiliate you. They'll scare you bad enough to make you think they can.'
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Coming Clean: A Son's Confession to His Father
My dad, who'd been half asleep a minute earlier, was beside me on the couch with his arm around my shoulder, his voice soft and delicate, a voice he seldom used when we were kids.
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Misquote: Misrepresentation in Legal Proceedings
My lawyer corrected the report at my request, though he seemed to think that addressing the misquote during sentencing would prove useless, maybe even detrimental.
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The Therapist: Psychological Screening Before Sentencing
The therapist is in his mid-fifties with a tweedy academic air, the kind of look that judges find persuasive. We talked for over an hour about my family, childhood, and criminal case.
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Family Dinner: Last Meals Before Incarceration
When my father hugs me, it's because he doesn't know how much time he has left with his son. And when my mother laughs, it is in the hope that she might forget.
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PSI: The Math Behind Federal CP Sentencing
According to the PSI, my offense level comes to thirty seven—meaning seventeen and a half to twenty years imprisonment, more time than some who committed hands-on offenses.
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The Target Letter: When Criminal Charges Become Real
I had tried to forget everything about that day the investigators came. I shredded the search warrant papers and the FBI agent's business card. But holding the target letter made it all real again.
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Denial: A Year of Silence and Survival
Suicidal thoughts became routine. Every day while driving to work I imagined jumping from the nearest downtown high rise. I recalled a friend once telling me that eight stories was maximum.
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Portrait of a Sex Offender: An Unlikely Criminal
I performed well in school. I was a model student and routinely made honor roll. Teachers loved me; students ignored me. My grades paid off with scholarship money for college.
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Five to Twenty: The Disparity in Sex Offense Sentencing
I received a postcard from the police alerting me that a high-risk sex offender had moved into the neighborhood. I was half-expecting to see my own face printed on the back of it.
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The Interrogation: My Hour with FBI Agents
The humiliation, fear, and shame I'd felt at the beginning of the interview dissolved over the course of the hour. Eventually I became numb to the investigators' questions.