This letter was written by a person incarcerated at Metropolitan Detention Center.
Thank you for your letter inviting contributions of stories by prisoners. I am enclosing a 14 page account of my experiences interspersed with commentary. Will you be posting the raw images of the letters or transcribing them? Today was a good day.
We were given, for our labor day celebration, chicken wings with spicy orange sauce, pork ën beans, corn, and a burger with mayo, mustard, and ketchup on an actual burger bun. Many jails serve burgers on regular loaf bread, which feels cheap. They also gave us a pint of Kroger peanut butter and jelly ice cream.
On the fourth of July, they gave us Kroger strawberry ice cream with real strawberry chunks. Yesterday they served some delicious pulled pork sandwiches, with plenty of meat and sauce, with tater tots. I must say, I am quite pleased with the fare lately. Breakfast is always cinnamon toast crunch with milk and cake and either watermelon, mushmelon or honeydew and sweetener for our coffee which is either the free kosher stuff or inexpensive keto brand.
I still want to go home and work on my various internet-based projects, the ideas for which I have conceived while locked up, and cook whatever I food I want when I want, and have a few beers. I like Sam Adams Yuengling but sometimes settle for hard cider wine or cocktails.
I like Woodchuck or Angry Orchard. I like Dollar General sweet red. The Moscow mules variants, the daiquiri, the margarita, etcetera are my go-toís because I like gin, rum, and tequila and it is easy to keep ginger beer, limes, liqueur, and sugar and Kosher salt around the house.
But I may be stuck here for the foreseeable future, and when I get out be banned from alcohol due to its disinhibiting qualities along with a lot of other pleasures and privileges, such as the right to use an unmonitored computer and associate with fellow felons, who are often the only friends available.
Oh well. As [redacted] once commented about his own actions that landed him on death row, it is known going in what the human toll will be. This will not even be my first time going through the federal justice system, so I had an even better idea than most of what I could expect to experience if caught.
This project focuses on life in prison during the age of COVID, but life on the outside also involved dealing with COVID-related restrictions, depending on what jurisdiction one lives in. And there are of course many other laws to obey and rules established by various institutions, such as schools one might attend, or employers one might work for, or internet companies whose services one utilizes, etcetera.
Which limit one is freedom of expression and action. Ironically, in prison, one sometimes has more opportunities for frank discussion of the realities and dysfunctions of our society and our places, or lack thereof, in it, than in free society where one has more to lose. Although many prisoners still feel a need to be politically correct lest they get an even more unsavory reputation than they already have.
I don’t fear COVID partly because I don’t fear death and sickness in general. I’m healthy as a horse and haven’t caught a flu in 25 years, despite taking no flu shots. I shrug off pretty much every injury short of broken bones. If I could get out of jail, I’d go to the dentist and get my cavities filled.
I can’t get that done in jail until I’ve been there for about a year. And then I’d basically be invincible since that’s my only weak point by which bacteria and such could gain access to my bloodstream to attack the heart and whatnot. If I do die, who cares. I’ve led about as full a life as was possible.
I could have accomplished a little more without going back to jail, but it might have just been a rehash of the past. I needed to commit some collaborative civil disobedience, which I’d never tried before, and create a civil rights test case appropriate to an era of unprecedentedly dysfunctional relations between the section.
5 September 2021
I was sitting on the bottom bunk of my cell in the special housing unit at the Los Angeles Metropolitan Detention Center when the guard slid into the mail slot a letter from [redacted] of PrisonPandemic. It was an invitation for prisoners to submit narratives of how they have been affected by COVID-19 and the resulting lockdowns and other public health measures.
I decided to begin my story at the beginning, from before I was even arrested. It was about 2 am on a December night in 2020, and I was sitting in the right hand back seat of an Uber vehicle. I’m not sure what category of vehicle. It was like a rugged jeep or van or SUV, comfortably roomy but medium-sized.
This automobile came to a stop at the agreed meeting location on a side street of a suburban neighborhood, away from the surveillance cameras of the residences. A girl, wearing a cute shirt, leggings and a red backpack and carrying a duffel bag, promptly emerged from the bushes where she had been hiding. Even in Fresno, one needs some protection against the cold.
And I opened the car door that was next to me to let her in. After an awkward moment where she tried to figure out how to step over to get to her seat, the driver had her abandon her attempt and circle back around the vehicle to get in through the left hand side. She sat down next to me and we looked at each other in person for the first time.
Her willingness to come live with me after having only chatted with me and exchanged pictures with me via Internet was part of what I liked about her. how’s it going? I asked casually. We arrived at the airport, I paid the Uber driver his 25 dollars in cash, and we left his vehicle and walked in the main entrance. A guard immediately said, masks, please and we put them on.
The airport lobby was mostly deserted. The row of chairs along the wall, empty. The airline representatives desks, unmanned. The Starbucks kiosk, dark. Till morning would bring the first sizeable flow of customers, sufficed to sustain a decent volume of business. But beyond the airport security screening station, in the waiting area to board the planes, the airports sole restaurant would remain closed.
Whether because the meager traffic or travelers in the COVID era didn’t justify opening it. Or because workers were afraid to come in. Or occupied with child care with their kids out of school due to COVID. Or because mask and social distancing requirements made seating and feeding customers in such close proximity impracticable.
We didn’t know. It was a shame because I was hungry and wanted to have a nice meal with this girl I just met. But at least we got to have a refreshing berry drink and a hot peppermint concoction as the morning light streamed in through the windows and we awaited our opportunity to present identification and receive our boarding passes.
We boarded the plane and she took the window seat she had wanted; I sat next to her. The seat to my right was vacant. The flight crew gave a speech imploring us to keep our masks on because our compliance was what made this fight possible.
The flight crew also blamed the lack of beverage service on the pandemic but I think they were just trying to cut costs. A passenger a few rows down praised them for pointing that out. Meanwhile, [redacted] sitting next to me, took her mask off. I kept mine on, not wanting to complicate our situation by attracting negative attention.
The airplane lined up on the runway and the engines began spinning up to full takeoff power. [Redacted] looked up at me and gazed into my eyes. I felt a little ridiculous in my beat-up glasses, tilted askew from losing an arm and getting crushed in my personal bag enroute to Fresno.
It had broken off during an attempt to bend it back into its proper condition after stepping, lying, or sitting on the eyeglasses. And in my mask that covered my face like a surgeonís or ninjaís whole, she remained uncovered so I commented, it’s about that time, and looked away.
She said yeah nervously and looked away too and I realized an opportunity for a memorable and emotional moment of bonding at a significant and dramatic juncture in our lives had been spoiled somewhat by self-consciousness.
After my arrest [redacted] when I was being held [redacted] in a cell by myself, I was allowed into the day room for a short period every day to take a shower, make phone calls, browse the law library computer, sharpen pencils, order commissary, grab books off the book cart, if it was around, chat with other prisoners at their cell doors, and leave food or books for the guards to give them.
Because a short period of time, say, 40 minutes had to be divided among all these activities, I had to choose carefully what I wanted to accomplish during this “out time”. A nice chat could greatly help my mental state, for instance, but might preclude getting anything else done besides a shower.
I needed to take time to vent to another human being sometimes about my experiences in order to process what I was going through, feel heard, and figure out what I was going to do about it. And it felt good to receive empathy and understanding and offer what help I could in return as well.
For example, a listening ear of my own to those who struggled with their own situations and were happy to encounter a kindred spirit; and some meal leftovers to the hungry. But it ate up time. Some people complained about not getting more out time, and the officer explained his hands were tied because COVID filled the jail with prisoners whose cases couldn’t go forward till the pandemic restrictions eased up enough to allow jury trials.
Although on the other hand, I had also heard from other prisoners about bail being granted more liberally to relieve overcrowding. And because whole units had to be set aside for COVID cases, limiting the officers flexibility to place those in protective custody where they could spend more time out of their cells.
It came time for my extradition hearing and I was taken into a room with a computer to attend court by video chat. As on previous occasions, when I had been allowed into the day room, or brought into the video chat room for court, I was told to wear a mask. However, I had always been allowed to remove my mask for the county court hearings, where my misdemeanor case was being heard.
This would be a higher-profile hearing because it was my first appearance in district court to deal with my felony charge of kidnapping. I had been told that a lot of media organizations would be in attendance. And indeed there were so many that they consumed enough bandwidth to slow the videoconference to a crawl.
The officer told me to keep my mask covering my mouth and nose at all times during the hearing. I didn’t see the reason for the requirement since there was no one else in the physical room with me other than the guard. It seemed to me they just wanted to stifle me from being fully seen on camera.
Indeed, during the hearing, the judge reminded the journalists that recording was not allowed. It seemed to me like a prohibition that might have been hard to fully enforce given we were not in a physical courtroom with bailiffs to confiscate devices and arrest anyone held in contempt of course, on the spot.
But they could use the mask requirement to prevent the curious from getting a full glimpse of the facial features and expressions of this man who had been accused of these offenses, of grooming and seducing this young girl to leave her home and or taking her away by force. The news media spoke of persuasions. The prosecutor spoke of coaxing. But the chat logs will reveal the truth.
I felt like the public was robbed of its opportunity to see the defendant in a way that would give them a greater chance to make their own judgment of his personality, his reactions to the proceedings, etcetera. Which could have some bearing on their opinions of what he did, could be capable of doing, etcetera. I was asked if I consented to holding the hearing by video chat.
I told the judge no; that I wanted to appear in person. My lawyer and I went into a private sidebar by leaving the video chat and getting into a phone call. These virtual, private sidebars with lawyers tend to be more complicated and time-consuming to arrange than one would expect since measures have to be taken to ensure no guards or court personnel or other parties to the case can listen in.
And she told me that appearing in person would be pointless because we would all be wearing masks as reporters snapped photos, and that furthermore, her health concerns about COVID made her unwilling to appear in a physical courtroom with any defendant till she had an opportunity to get vaccinated.
At any rate, when we returned to court and my stance was reiterated to the judge. The judge said that I had no right to an in-person appearance for an advisement of my rights in an extradition case anyway. There remained the question of which lawyer would or could represent me in more substantive proceedings if I demanded an in-person appearance.
Although this became moot when I opted to simply waive my right to contest the extradition at another hearing that I consented to appear at via video chat for the sake of getting it over with quickly so the case could progress. I wanted to hurry on to California so I could get a look at my discovery and see how strong the case against me was.
I also wanted to make sure any time I served in jail could actually count toward a sentence rather than being “dead time”. For example, time spent waiting for trial on charges that would ultimately be dropped or dismissed. I did have a couple more hearings by video chat in my misdemeanor case of “harboring a minor” before it got dismissed.
In one of those, the “victimís” parents appeared to argue against my bail being reduced. They were in their respective homes, appearing without face masks, while I wore one because I thought it was required. I felt bad about it because it seems to me that accusers should have to opportunity to see the accused face-to-face after going to all the trouble to appear for court.
On the other hand, when the conditions of the restraining order were being read, it may have, for political or diplomatic purposes, been just as well that my wry expression was concealed. It seemed to me ridiculous to speak of my “molesting” and whatnot a girl who was so willing. I looked at her as a co-conspirator given her involvement in the planning and execution of the trip.
And in encouraging me to go through with it when I might have otherwise been a bit hesitant. Anyway, it seemed sad that at such a momentous occasion, meeting essentially the parents of my girlfriend, albeit in an online court setting, they shouldn’t be able to see my unmasked face and get a sense of how I was taking it as they said what they said about me, and as I was called upon to indicate my understanding of the restraining order.
There were also moments when I wanted to whisper or slide a note to my lawyer but couldn’t. As when she claimed to the judge that I had no family in [redacted], when actually I have a sister in [redacted] who could’ve taken me in had I been released on bond. Unfortunately even through Zoom allows participants in a video chat to type out private messages to each other.
Prisoners are usually not allowed by jail personnel to touch the keyboard, so we have to ask for a break in the proceedings to confer with counsel which is inconvenient. Upon my arrival at Fresno Jail, even though I tested negative for COVID, I was automatically designated for a three week quarantine as a prisoner from out-of-state.
I was placed in a cell by myself in a quarantine pod with no access to the usual amenities such as the book castor, hot water for noodle soups, coffee, tea, etcetera, which is normally made available in a shared coffee pot either on a table, plugged into an outlet, in an open pod, or on a cart wheeled from cell to cell at certain times of day.
I was able to make phone calls and take showers during my out time, although as usual, the ability to actually reach people on the phone depended on their availability whenever out time happened to be. It could be in the morning, afternoon, or evening.
We couldn’t order commissary but every week we were given a small number of pencils, stamped envelopes, and sheets of paper, honey buns, Ramen noodle soups, single-serve coffees, dehydrated refried beans, tuna pouches, mayonnaise packets, tortilla wraps, hot Cheetos, honey barbeque twists and chili-flavored Fritos.
Our entertainment consisted solely of whatever was on TV, with whoever had out time at the moment getting to control the channel and volume, except when the jail staff put on DVDs such as Final Destination or Game of Thrones. We watched a lot of court TV and Jerry Springer-type shows and sometimes the news.
I found out from the TV news that my court date had been postponed due to the quarantines. I had not heard from a lawyer or from the court that I even had an appearance scheduled. Toward the end of my quarantine, I got a call from my Assistant Federal Public Defender, who read me my indictment over the phone.
We called into the initial appearance before the US magistrate judge, and I heard as a manís probation was revolved and he was sentenced to prison and told he should get his life on track. It sounded like a weighty sort of proceeding to be handling over the phone, or in video chat. I couldn’t imagine being sentenced to the kind of time.
I was looking at my charge of kidnapping is punishable by 20 to life, interstate transportation by 10 to life, enticement by 10 to life, exploitation by 15 to 30, and pornography receipt and distribution by five to 20 by such a process. In other words, without even appearing in the same room as the sentencing judge. The magistrate judge asked if we consented to appear via Zoom.
My lawyer said we did and I quickly interrupted to say that I wanted to represent myself and that I objected to holding the hearing by Zoom because research I had done before I got locked up indicated that videoconferencing tended to result in worse outcomes, such as higher bail amounts, for defendants, than if they showed up in person.
The magistrate noted I was not submitting any evidence to support my position. I did not remember the exact citation for the study I had seen, so my objection was overruled. During the hearing, references were made to various emails, written agreements, etcetera, which the government and defense lawyers had seen but which I had not, since we were not in a physical courtroom where my attorneys could show me the documents.
I felt like this put me at a disadvantage in my efforts to assist in my defense and make sure my lawyers were making decisions that were in my best interests, since looking at court documents is often the way to get the fullest understanding of what is going on given how much detail about the specifics they go into.
My lawyer, who was of Indian origin, said that she came from a family of doctors and took COVID very seriously. I told her this created a potential conflict of interests given my position on COVID and she withdrew from the case, letting a panel attorney take over. My new lawyer said he preferred, whenever possible, to appear in person to court.
He was also the first of my lawyers to come see me in person at the jail, which facilitated my taking a look at the discovery in the case, since the sensitive personal information contained therein prevented it from being mailed in to me. I would not be allowed to retain a copy, but COVID only review it in their presence. By this point, a COVID vaccine was starting to become available.
My cellmate told me that if I didnít get it, I needed to move out of the cell, but the nurses told him this was unnecessary since his own vaccination would protect him even if I got the virus. This satisfied him. He reported a few mild side effects the day he got vaccinated, but still planned to get the booster.
I appeared at another Zoom hearing. This time by videoconference instead of teleconference. I was kept shackled so as to keep me from touching the comenter. My lawyer had commented at our meeting that at every Zoom hearing, they asked for the defendantís consent to hold the hearing by videoconference and he had never seen anyone object, so it would be the first time.
This made me think he was going to follow my instructions to object, but he gave his consent instead. I spoke up to object and noted that I had filed some written objections to videoconferencing and the wearing of face masks. The judge responded that according to court rules, if we did not arrange a time for an in-person hearing with the necessary social distancing and so on, I would still need to wear a mask or the hearing would be terminated immediately.
She also told my lawyer to sum up my objections in a written filing of his own, since my filing had apparently gotten lost or never been received. Meanwhile the prosecutor moved for a mental health evaluation, partly on the grounds of my objections to the COVID precautions supposedly being peculiar behavior.
I viewed this as a punishment for not waiving my rights, but the magistrate said the CARES Act did not entitle me to an in-person hearing without masks. At any rate, the evaluation was ordered and I was shipped off to the Los Angeles Metropolitan Detention Center for a determination of my competency to stand trial. At the MDC, I was placed in a cell with a cellmate who had spent two weeks in quarantine upon his arrival from Indiana, since he lacked a vaccination.
He too was awaiting a competency evaluation and facing similar charges. We received a memo from the warden announcing a competition among the inmate housing units to see which could get 75 percent of its population vaccinated first. The winners would get free ice cream or a movie night with popcorn or other prizes.
We scoffed at such trivial incentives, having read in prison reform publications that other prison systems were awarding significant amounts of commissary money or cutting days off peopleís sentences as a reward for vaccination. It reminded me of how the Fresno Jail offered half-hour visiting privileges, over a phone with no physical contact allowed, for the vaccinated.
It was too inadequate of an incentive to motivate the seriously reluctant. Mental health evaluations are supposed to only take one to two months in the federal system, but routinely take longer. I have been here more than two months and only recently seen my evaluators who said she still has not received any discovery. She seemed to want to get in touch with my lawyer for that before proceeding further.
I mentioned to her the statutory timeframe and she said COVID created an exception. My legal research indicates even before COVID, though, it was not uncommon for evaluations to run beyond deadlines. COVID seems to offer a handy excuse but I don’t see how it should affect evaluations, unless maybe it has kept staff from coming in to the jail.
I was tempted to refuse to cooperate with the evaluation, but part of what made me willing to talk to this evaluator is that she didn’t order me to wear a face mask. Apparently she was satisfied wearing a face mask herself and being separated from me by a plexiglass barrier. I would have felt that my wearing a face mask would have been compromised the integrity of the evaluation, since evaluations need to note the defendants affect.
This whole time I’ve been locked up, I’ve noticed guards and other staff have needed to spend more time wearing their breathing-stifling and expression-hiding masks than the prisoners have. It’s like how hard-working retail staff are more likely to be required to wear masks than the customers they serve. It’s almost like workers are being punished for working while the idle get special privileges.
And guards have less freedom than the prisoners they lock up. There is one psychologist here whose nose always is peeking out of her face mask when she stops by. I respect her more, or at least interpret her sentiments as a little bit more on my side, for that one act of rebellion.
On the other hand, when the public defenders seemed unified in refusing to attend any in-person court hearings till the vaccines became available, I felt like it was an us versus them situation, where they put their concerns ahead of the defendants speedy trial rights. Like when the teachers unions kept schools from holding classes in person even when the parents wanted their kids in school.
I did at least manage to take advantage of my time spent at the facility to visit the law library and review the CARES Act for myself. Finding out the Public Law 116-136 did say that federal criminal court hearings cannot be held by videoconference without the defenders consent. I read in the Wall Street Journal about how the officer who knelt on George Floydís neck was convicted and sentenced after having worn a face mask at trials.
In contrast, the man who shot Trayvon Martin was acquitted following a trial in which he didn’t wear a mask. I also read that Theranos executive Elizabeth Holmes has expressed a strong preference not to wear a face mask at her trial. She probably wants to take advantage of jurorsí biases in favor of the physically beautiful. But that the jurors are expected to wear masks.
I have my concerns about how COVID precautions may impact my right to a fair trial. My lawyer expected restrictions would be lifted as vaccines became available, but the Delta variant created more uncertainty. It was the possibility of such variants, spreading every flu season, that made me view it as important to prevent the current state of affairs from becoming the new normal.
People have been waiting for years now for an opportunity to take their cases to a jury trials and they are finding when they finally get their day in court, they must spend it behind a dehumanizing mask, like Hannibal Lector. I want to spend the next week or two doing a legal research in preparation for trial; trying to get my family to send in the court documents that my lawyer is unwilling to provide.
And drafting requests for the court to speed up this evaluation process or disperse with it altogether. Iíve become pretty comfortable here, though. When my mind is well-rested enough to focus fully, sometimes I read the Wall Street Journal. Other times I read a novel or non-fiction book from the cart. Lately Iím re-reading Atlas Shrugged.
Earlier I read the Grapes of Wrath for the first time and re-read Romeo and Juliet for the first time since high school. Or pace around while listening to my pocket radio which gets a few decent stations. I like to write to my family too. Although I think my mom is the only one who takes the time to read my epistles as they’re typically 10 to 14 pages long, depending on how many sheets I can send for one stamp.
But I need to keep up the pressure to keep my case moving along before I lose too much of my relevancy to the outside world and give the system too much of my life before having even received a trial to determine whether I’m guilty or not. I’m going to challenge the constitutionality of the charges. It’s regrettable that Fresno lacks a federal detention center because the conditions at Fresno Jail are not on a par with those of a federal facility like this one.
The food is of lower quality and only served twice instead of thrice a day. And in some situations one can get stuck feeling chronically hungry. For example, in the single-man cells where, because of the use of small Styrofoam trays instead of the regular full-size trays, the portions are smaller. Also the commissary selection is inferior and the prices are steeper.
Mostly Fresno Jail just offers overpriced junk food on commissary. Coffee, for instance, is more than twice as expensive. The place is kept uncomfortably cold and not enough blankets and warm clothing are provided. Fresno Jail also does not provide law library access to defendant who are represented by counsel, which creates a catch-22 because often one needs to do legal research to find out how to fire oneís attorney and represent oneself.
About all I can say in favor of the place is that at least they have an open pod devoted to sex offenders so that they donít have to check into protective custody as they do at this facility. And at least Fresno Jail did issue me a nice sturdy new set of glasses to replace my broken pair. It was the least they could do after they apparently lost all the property, including a 200 dollar endorsed check for commissary money that the Fresno detectives sought to help me transfer from Denver Jail.
My wallet, with identification and everything else, was among the lost items. Fresno Jail also sells floss loops which are some of the most effective implements of their kind that Iíve encountered. Floss of any kind is unavailable in federal Special Housing Units such as where Iím housed now.
On the other hand, Fresno Jail never offered access to much of a library. All they had was a shelf of random books in various conditions, supplemented by four hours a day of access to an educational tablet computer for those in non-open pods. In the open pods, one must rely on oneís fellow prisonersí book collections for reading material.
If there is a recreational library at Fresno Jail, Iíve never seen it. Perhaps itís closed due to COVID. Even the inmate handbook does not speak of a law library, only of legal research kiosks. On the other hand, some federal detention centers donít have recreational libraries either.
Englewood FDC, for instance, has two units of 100 prisoners each with only a bookshelf to serve as a repository for books. Meaning that anyone is free to hoard all the good books in their room since there is no librarian to enforce any limits on borrowing. When one goes to a federal Medical Center, though, one sees a fuller potential of what federal facilities could be like.
They serve pizza, ice cream, fountain soda, and fruit punch and pecan and pumpkin pie, for example. Since their focus is on diagnosis and treatment, they can offer a few kindnesses. The government could, if it wanted, boost the quality of life in prisons a bit to make them more humane. Except that theyíre stuck in a mentality that prison is supposed to be for punishment.
In other words, that it needs to make people miserable. They canít spend a few more dollars to improve conditions even if the payoff would be happier, better-behaved prisoners, who have some reason to feel gratitude rather than resentment toward society. If they would offer a few more amenities to provide cheap and legal highs, for example, tasty, high-quality favorite foods and beverages and desert.
And sources of fulfillment, for example, more and better reading material, it would probably reduce the amount of illicit drug, alcohol, pornography, etcetera, consumption, incidents of insolence and uncooperative behavior toward staff, fighting and illicit sexual acts by prisoners. That said, people will remain ambitious and yearn for accomplishments, companionship, and family life of the sort that can only be enjoyed outside of prison.
So the idea of being released to participate in all that will remain an appealing prospect to work toward. The comforts and freedoms of home will always have a special allure.
