I do a lot: President of the Speak Easy Gavel Club; head of the prison media center (aka XSTREAM); host of Real Talk, a televised forum about issues affecting imprisoned people; showrunner for several regular TV series; producer of a daily news broadcast; events coordinator for monthly speaking engagements, graduation ceremonies, and concerts; liaison for the ERDCC book club; and more.
10 April, 2024
Thriving
21 March, 2024
Four Books I Read This Winter
Without the book club that I joined last year, this and the previous post about my reading habits would probably be shorter. We used to meet biweekly. Since December, to accommodate the professor's teaching schedule, our meetings went monthly. I read at the same pace, but now I eagerly anticipate the second Wednesday of the month.
13 March, 2024
The Great Spork Shortage of 2024
Call them disgusting, call them malnourishing, or call them gross, but prison meals, regardless of the facility serving them, have been consistently eaten at the same times of day for as long as the carceral system has existed. Routine is the foundation on which prisons traditionally operate; however, time changes all things, and even the most fervently held tradition is no exception.
07 March, 2024
Losing: It Gets Easier with Practice
Just a week and some days after my last post, the Missouri Court of Appeals issued a two-paragraph opinion denying my motion to recall the trial court's mandate. The judge's ruling said, in essence, that my claims of fraud on the court weren't appropriate for that venue. It wasn't that the issues I brought to them were invalid but that another court would have to decade them.
This is exactly what the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals, under a different judge, decided about different issues, the last time I filed anything in my case. In my appeal of the Missouri Court of Appeals' 2004 mandate, the court declined to make a ruling and passed the buck to the US Supreme Court with all the judicial thoroughness of someone in a hurry to get back to his lunch. I was as confused as I was angry. <<i>>They get to just do that!? They get to just say, "Nah, I don't feel like deciding"!? After that, I spent a several weeks preparing to submit my case to the highest court in the land — which rubber-stamped it the first day back from its summer recess. My lawyers scheduled a call with me last week. On the phone, they sounded nervous about breaking the news of this latest denial. I can't imagine how difficult it must be, delivering that kind of message to someone who's entrusted you with winning back their freedom. They did a good job. They always do a good job. "How are you feeling?" one wanted to know. "It gets easier," I told them. After twenty-three years of this, I'd be in a pretty pathetic state if I hadn't developed a decent level of resilience. My first line of defense against crushing disappointment is refusing to let hope develop into expectations (which are by their nature always unrealistic). The American court system is going to be the American court system, a source of some illogical, unjust, or otherwise shitty rulings. When that happens and deals a blow to hope, it helps to be okay with sitting in sadness awhile, giving myself permission to feel the all-over hollow ache of such a loss. It's been a week since the ruling. My lawyers are already hard at work, retooling our motion to submit a habeas corpus petition. The same day that I learned about the court's non-decision, I had to chair a business meeting in Gavel Club. Then I had to meet with the chaplain and try to arrange reinstatement of Buddhist services, which were suspended in January due to low attendance. Then I had to conduct interviews for onboarding a new hire at my job. Then I had work of my own to do — TV programs to produce, events to organize, data to crunch, deadlines to meet. Then I went to sleep. I did more the next day. The show must go on. So must I. At this point, going on is just kind of my thing.22 February, 2024
A New Hope
A motion to undo my wrongful conviction was filed in the Missouri Court of Appeals in December. Katie Moore, the reporter for The Kansas City Star who interviewed me for her article about the filing, wanted to know how it felt to have my case back in court for the first time in thirteen years. Was I hopeful, she wanted to know.
16 February, 2024
Open Door Policy
Twenty-five years ago, whenever I ventured out of my house in suburban Kansas, there was a good chance that I left the door unlocked. This wasn't forgetfulness; this was me deliberately skipping what I considered an unnecessary activity.
Yes, I'd been burglarized before. Twice. When I was twelve, someone broke into that same house and stole several household electronic items — a stereo receiver, two TVs, and some other stuff I don't remember anymore. Four or five years before that, someone burgled the family vehicle at the height of New Orleans' Mardi Gras festivities, while we were in Louisiana on a road trip.
Thus I was not unaware of the potential for theft, but those losses both took place in spite of locked doors. If a deadbolt or a car door latch didn't guarantee that my belongings stayed mine, then there didn't seem to be the same level of urgency to lock up tight before leaving it unattended.
Less logically, though, I just didn't feel unsafe. At no point in my life have I actively worried about the security of my home. That continues today, in what you might think is the least likely of places.
In this level-five prison populated by people who've robbed and stolen, abused and even murdered, I leave my cell door unsecured far more often than I lock it.
I currently live in the cell at the farthermost end of my wing, past where the guards stationed in the control center usually look. It's a prime location for an illicit entry, if anyone felt so inclined. In the past two and a half years, however, I've gone out for hours-long recreation periods, for meals, and for work — all without locking my cell door — and I've never had a problem.
For all the talk you hear about the cutthroat nature of prison, it's not all dog-eat-dog. Pockets of genuine care and trust can be found. To the extent that I'm known by my fellow prisoners, I'm generally well regarded and respected. I'm greeted with smiles and waves around the institution, and even get an occasional hug at work. This is not what one expects in maximum security, and I can't say whether my reputation has much to do with the security of my unlocked cell. All I know is that I don't worry about some scoundrel coming in to steal my radio, filch some coffee, or pilfer through my cellmate's prodigious supply of canteen food.
Contrary to catastrophists' claims that the world today is more dangerous and iniquitous than ever, I believe the evidence that we (at least in the United States and most Western countries) are actually safer now than anyone in recorded history.
Think about it. You can travel to a nearby city without highwaymen trying to kill you for your clothes. You can walk into a bar relatively unconcerned about bandits or pickpockets. And you can walk the streets at night with a confidence born of having a portable communication and tracking device — your smartphone — in your grasp, at the ready, in the event that anything iffy transpires.
I basically live with seventy-one casual acquaintances and strangers, each with a documented history of criminal behavior, yet even when I'm gone my door is more often open than not. Am I crazy?
02 February, 2024
Perspectives
The view out my cell window isn't very good, but I don't especially mind. There are good views and there are bad ones, and for as many terrible ones as I've had, the decent ones outnumber them. It's surprising how much variety exists in views from the thirty or so cells I've occupied over these twenty-two years. The cell I sleep in now has nowhere near the worst.
12 January, 2024
The Podcasts That I Enjoy in Prison
Do you find it as weird as I do that people in prison can listen to podcasts? The list of available ones is limited, for various reasons, but our for-profit service provider, Securus, offers about 2,400 in twenty-eight categories, from addiction help to technology news. They're all free and can be accessed through the podcast app that comes pre-installed on the tablets that Securus provides Missouri prisoners at no cost.
04 January, 2024
Nine Things the DOC Did Wrong in 2023
Every year, the Missouri Department of Corrections puts out an itemized list of its accomplishments from the previous year. To the straight-faced bureaucrats who run this system, I'm sure that the creation of these lists is a nice back-patting affair. To someone who sees things from the other side, however, the DOC's year-end lists read like so much cookie-seeking at best, and piss-poor propaganda at worst. The points that I find ridiculous, I laugh at. The rest of them inspire either a dismissive wave of my hand or a groan. Some evoke disgust.