A southern sheriff's jail, part 1 of 2

[maumann]

So you've probably read the "why." And are fascinated with the "what."

I now know some new phrases that I hopefully won't need again: Down the road, in the hole, tossing a cell, Bob BarKer, turtle suit, pumpkin, jailhouse Christian, prison Spades, tiers and blocks.

Understand that my experiences over 36 days were a minor inconvenience compared to the people who actually face real stress and danger every single day. I am in awe of anyone who willingly places themselves in constant fear. I could not be in a submarine for six consecutive months. Or facing snipers and IEDs every single minute in the Middle East. It's like being from Detroit.

I'm just a former Boy Scout, National Merit Scholar, college graduate and career journalist who never expected to be placed in an environment so foreign to me (but unfortunately a fact of life for many other people) that it's difficult to describe fully.

To sum up jail in three words: Extreme sleep deprivation. I was physically, psychologically and mentally exhausted by the time my sentence ended.

The whole purpose of jail appears to be to keep you from achieving REM sleep. There's nothing but concrete blocks and steel, so any noise reverberates, day and night. The lights never go completely off (with the exception of the day the power went out) and the guards slam the steel doors between blocks on their rounds every hour between midnight and 6 a.m. The one television is on full volume the rest of the time.

Imagine being stuck in a windowless CRJ700 on the tarmac for 36 days, with the temperature either freezing or boiling, surrounded by mothers with screaming toddlers. Or trying to sleep in a small high school locker room with a constant loop of the Beastie Boys echoing off the walls for six weeks.

Try as I could, I wasn't able to block out the noise long enough to actually dream. But I did find out I have sleep apnea (I had no idea I snored, to the irritation of my cellmates), so that's one positive.

Jail is less about the physical discomfort of being confined. That's just sheer monotony. Instead, my fight was within my own head, attempting to reconcile the two things that I struggle with all the time: a lack of patience and loss of control. Oh, and having extreme claustrophobia is such an excellent trait when you're locked with three other guys in a room smaller than a standard walk-in closet for 24 hours at a time.

You have zero ability to control your surroundings or anything that's happening to you the entire time you're there. All you can do is submit to the fact that crazy things will happen, nothing will go as planned and you have to be prepared to mentally toughen yourself to not completely wig out. Because things can always get worse.

So with that preface, here we go. YJMV (Your jail may vary):

 

[maumann]

I was given the option by the judge to begin my sentence at my convenience, within reason. So I had three days to settle my affairs, start my caffeine withdrawal and send my anxiety medications to the dentention center nurse (who denied all but one of them).

On a hot Friday evening in early August, I kissed my wife at the front door, went up to the window and signed myself in. That would be the last time I'd see outside until the second week of September, when I could have used a jacket and long pants instead of shorts.

I was put in a holding cell, fingerprinted, photographed, asked to remove my clothing, wedding ring and all forms of identification. I was handed a khaki-colored jumpsuit and Gator orange shower shoes, a clear plastic storage bin with a sheet, two blankets, a Motel 8-sized towel and a mesh bag. The guard then escorted me down a series of winding hallways to a circular room with eight steel doors. I was instructed to pick up a vinyl sleeping mat (a yoga mat stuffed with wood pulp) and a pillow (think a bag of Quikrete) from the pile, they opened the door to one of the cellblocks and I was officially inmate 182. (I actually have an nine-digit Georgia Department of Corrections case number, but the county only used what was on the storage bin.)

Our county jail is laid out much like a Trivial Pursuit game piece: Eight pie-shaped blocks connected by this central "hub." Most of the blocks hold 36 inmates, although some are 18. The county separates inmates by gender and level of confinement. There are two blocks for women, one block for trustees, one block for low security, two blocks for medium security and one for high security. (Two additional blocks are storage and plumbed for future expansion.) As someone with "time to serve," that landed me in medium general population.

Each block has a central open area, with nine square, steel tables surrounded by stools bolted to the floor. On the perimeter of the pie are six four-man cells, three on the lower tier and three on the upper tier. On the right hand wall are six more two-man cells. The block has a concrete floor, concrete block walls that reach up probably 30 feet, and the cells are pre-fabricated seamless steel boxes sprayed with some sort of scratch-resistance surface and welded to each other. The guards sit above the access door, behind a one-way glass -- and from my guess, can see into any of the blocks from that one vantage point. In addition, there are security cameras positioned in areas where direct view is impeded. The only additional source of light was a painted-over skylight which gave the impression that it was constantly overcast, day or night. We could hear thunder and raining hitting the roof. And one time, a fighter jet flew overhead. But those were the only outside sounds I remember hearing, with the exception of a garbage truck early one morning.

As I said, each of the cells is like stepping into an all-steel walk-in closet. Mine was fortunately slightly larger than the others, because it was handicap accessible. Still, you're talking no more than 10 feet by 14 feet with an eight-foot ceiling. The steel toilet, sink, shower and "bedframes" were also pre-fab. I did try out a two-man cell, but could almost touch both walls with arms outstretched, and when the door was closed, I lasted less than five minutes before panic set in.

One thing I didn't realize: With the exception of meals, only 18 inmates are allowed out of their cells into the central area at any given time. So one tier -- upper or lower -- is on lockdown from 3 p.m. to 3 p.m., every other day. That's not including mandatory lockdown between 11 p.m. to 7 a.m., or any unexpected reasons why the block (or entire jail) gets locked down. And that happens with more frequency than you'd expect.

However, other counties only allow their inmates as little as four hours of free time a day. So I'm somewhat thankful for the time I could at least be in a bigger smaller room instead of a shoebox.

Here's your schedule: 6 a.m., lights on; 6:30 a.m. roll call; 7 a.m., breakfast; 7:30 a.m., cell inspection for open tier; 8 a.m., nurse's rounds; 10 a.m., showers on for an hour; noon, lunch; 3 p.m., tiers switch; 4 p.m., mail/Thursday commissary/Friday library; 5 p.m., dinner; 7:30 p.m., razor 2x week/laundry 2x week/new jumpsuit 2x week; 10 p.m., showers on for an hour; 11 p.m.; lights out.

Notice there's no mention of recreation, no exercise yard, no work details, no conjugal visits. In the 36 days I was in the block, I left that space just seven times: three to visit the nurse and the four times my pastor came to speak with me behind a glass partition for 20 minutes. My wife was allowed to schedule a 20-minute Skype-like videophone call with me every Saturday morning. There were also three push-button phones in the block where I could call her and talk for a maximum of 10 minutes a day.

Your entertainment? The single 30-inch TV bolted 20 feet off the ground and controlled by the guard. Each tier gets to ask for three channel changes in one 24-hour day. Of course, with 15 channels available, that wasn't always a hard decision. Although it was painful when the guy on the upper tier demanded CMT every other morning. And even worse, when Wolf, the loud, obnoxious alcoholic who kicked the doors off a police cruiser when he was arrested, used up all three channel switches in five minutes one morning, leaving us with the Hallmark Channel for the rest of the day.

Each month, we were given one deck of cards for the entire block, one chess set, one game of Scrabble and a 1,000-piece puzzle. The local newspaper was delivered (minus the front page and arrest report) every Thursday and a box of 36 beat-up paperback books came on Fridays.

The food was relatively decent, particularly for what I expected. It all came on a tray with separated spaces, just like in school. You also got an eight-ounce styrofoam cup of sweetened fruit drink. However, I realized I was dehydrated after several days and ended up stashing one of the cups in my storage bin so I could drink more water. No coffee (with the exception of buying instant coffee from the commissary. No soft drinks.

Breakfast was either cold cereal, pancakes or biscuits with gravy. Of course, a daily portion of grits. Lunch was always exactly the same: A bologna and "cheese" sandwich on white bread, a small portion of round tortilla chips and two sugar or oatmeal cookies. Dinner rotated on a 28-day calendar which was hand-copied and posted on the wall of each cell. No pork, no beef. Nothing fried. Mostly turkey: ground turkey, turkey franks, turkey sausage, turkey burgers. Sometimes chicken: chicken patties, chicken nuggets, ground chicken. That included a small salad, a serving of some canned vegetable and a small piece of cake or brownie (usually very good).

First thing I requested when I got out was a pork chop. And I felt awful afterward because my stomach wasn't used to such an extravagance. And I'll never eat another bologna sandwich for the rest of my life.

I lost 10 pounds in six weeks, which wasn't exactly my idea of dieting. But with less than 1,800 calories a day, many of the younger, larger guys were literally starving. They'd trade me for anything I didn't want, so I'd swap the grits for their lunch cookies or chips. My bunkmate coined me "The Squirrel," because I'd squirrel away the extra snacks to munch on while we were locked down.

Since this jail was a "smoke-free" facility, cigarettes weren't the method of legal tender. Instead, it was RAMEN NOODLES. Yes, the staple of most college kids were available through the commissary every week and used as barter for everything from clothing to settling gambling debts. The Chicago Board of Trade has nothing on county jails when it comes to wheeling and dealing in ramen noodle futures. And they didn't come cheap. I think they were 50 cents a pack, and some guys would buy 75 or 80 of them at a time.

OK, those are basics. I'll provide the ancedotes next. All additional questions are welcome.

 

[Regan MacNeil]

That guy who stole all three channel changes should be thrown in the forking hole for the duration of his sentence.

 

[maumann]

First, the definitions. I went over the tiers and blocks in the previous post.

Down the road: State or federal time. As in, "He's going down the road." Or, "How many times have you been down the road?" Only a handful of guys in our block, including my bunkmate, had been down the road.

In the hole: Solitary confinement. A single-bed cell with minimal lightning, space and contact. You're fed through a slot in the door. A serious breach of jail conduct lands you "in the hole" for a period of time. Also, if you're in danger from other inmates (child molestation charges, for example), you probably will be placed here for your own protection.

Tossing a cell: Exactly what it sounds like. If the guards have reason to suspect contraband, the other inmates go on lockdown and all of the contents of the cell in question are thrown into the community area until they find what they're looking for. Happened once during my time, but not to our cell.

Bob BarKer: Not the famous game show host, but a North Carolina businessman who has a virtual monopoly on products for correctional institution. Everything from jumpsuits to toiletries to bedding is stamped with his name. No idea why the K is capitalized, either.

Turtle suit: "Are you or have you ever been suicidal?" If you answer yes or you're the dude who shot up Parkland High School, you're going to be completely undressed, have your arms, legs and head strapped into a large polyurethane contraption that is then velcroed shut so you cannot harm yourself. And you will stay in it for the rest of the time you're there. Apparently closed, it looks like a huge turtle shell. It's apparently not pleasant.

Pumpkin: A jail trustee, because they wear an orange jumpsuit rather than khaki. "Pumpkins" have been given special privileges. They are either given jobs in the jail (work in the kitchen) and moved to a block with no lockdowns or get to keep their cell doors open for both tiers. My bunkmate was named a trustee four days before I was released.

Jailhouse Christian: Guys who suddenly "get religious" in jail but revert to their old ways when they get out.

Prison Spades: An offshoot of regular Spades, the card game. However, there are some differences. You play partners and can discuss everything but your actual cards, cannot bid nil and must bid at least four "books" (not tricks). You play to 50 points and lose automatically if you miss your bid twice. We played for fun, but I was told some of the worst jailhouse fights were due to someone losing a large wager on a poorly-played game of Prison Spades.

 

[Azrael]

well done.

two good threads.

glad you made it out in one piece.

 

[swingline]

What we really want to know is, Lay-Z-Boy or bed when you got home?

 

[ChrisLong]

You're a damn good writer. You should have stuck to that instead of being a jailbird.

 

[playthrough]

Why wouldn't they allow the front page of the newspaper?

 

[maumann]

Why wouldn't they allow the front page of the newspaper?

Because most local crimes are reported there. And page 2 is the weekly police/arrest report. They don't want information spread that might start trouble.

Until I went back through the newspapers Gwen had saved, I had no idea I was having breakfast every morning with a guy who was responsible for the biggest meth ring in the county.

One of the most surreal moments was watching Atlanta morning news and realizing the "suspect" pictured in a story about a kidnapping was standing directly in front of me, waiting for his breakfast tray.

 

[Batman]

That guy who stole all three channel changes should be thrown in the forking hole for the duration of his sentence.

I'm amazed he didn't get his ass beat to a bloody pulp on the spot.

 

[Baron Scicluna]

Excellent writing. Thanks for telling your stories. A few questions:

When you were being sentenced, did your lawyer try to get it to where you could serve your sentence on weekends? Seems doable with a short amount of time and it could have given you some mental breaks.

Any gang issues or fights, or suspected sexual assaults?

 

[Evil ... Thy name is Orville Redenbacher!!]

Yeah, I would have thought, given you were a upstanding member of society - granted one with a $150K HOA eyesore - who worked for a living, weekend jail might be option.