One feature that I'll put up intermittently on the site are stories about terrible things, ranging from frightening and upsetting to crime against humanity (this is for you, Lexi). I was going to skip it for prison week because, well, the topic is dreadful enough and I had trouble coming up with material. But then I remembered this particular tale and it's too good not to share.
In the best tradition of third-hand hearsay, this is something that totally happened to a friend of a friend of mine (thanks Graeme!). This was a clean-cut young man, white, living in southern California. Like many other young people, he was very cavalier - insouciant even - about traffic violations, parking wherever he pleased and racking up considerable parking fines, which he then proceeded to disregard. Notices would arrive in the mail, each more sternly worded than the last, and he would immediately file them away with Abercrombie & Fitch catalogues and fundraising messages from the Sierra Club in his "take no action" stack (which I image as being a heap of paper next to moldering pizza boxes). Now, with traffic fines there comes a certain threshold - a magic number, if you like - which, if reached, triggers more forceful action than mere rebukes. I imagine the moment like this: while the number rolls up in some police computer, this young man is in a daze of cannabis smoke, reclining in a sofa while listening to Pink Floyd, when a sudden chill goes down his spine for no clear reason. At that moment, though he knew it not, he was IN TROUBLE.
I'm not clear on the details of how the law caught up to him. It likely wasn't a S.W.A.T. team busting down his door, attack dobermann hounds pouncing, men in heavy armor barking orders, but it would be funny if it were. No, I imagine him at some office - maybe renewing his car insurance, maybe taking some routine screening for a job application, maybe stopping by his college to sort out some administrative matter - and his name triggering a flag on the computer screen of an office worker. She adjusts her glasses to make sure she isn't misreading the file, and then looks at him with an "uh-oh" expression before calling it in, as she must. He gets taken into custody and charged with a misdemeanor - his infractions have piled high enough for this to be a criminal matter - and discovers that he doesn't have the means to settle his fines. Done with trusting him to cough up the money eventually, the system turns its gears and he's placed into custody at the county jail until some family member or collection of friends can ransom him out.
And so our nameless protagonist, the clean-cut white boy, goes to jail, in the same holding cells that house gang members, murders, rapists and thieves. He is terrified, and should be.
This is not real prison - turnover is high, with no one in there for more than a week or two pre-trial, and those inside haven't yet been convicted of anything. The outside world is close by, almost at hand, and he just has to bide his time. But these are real criminals, and they, much more than the guards, determine what will become of him, and they know softness when they see it.
He discovers that the jail is strictly segregated by race. It's small, and split roughly evenly between black gangs and Hispanic gangs, with a negligible number of inmates of other races (this was apparently the result of prison gangs, with the white skinheads sequestered at a different facility). Each gang (or perhaps federation of gangs) had its own hierarchy, with leaders and enforces. Upon arrival, he was greeted by two members of the Hispanic crew, a hulking giant and a small talker. The talker introduced himself, and asked if our protagonist would prefer to speak with him or the brute beside him. "I'd rather speak to you, sir."
Rules were laid down. The two bathrooms were divided up between the two camps. He was never to enter the bathroom claimed by the black gangs. He could use that controlled by the Hispanic gang, but only if it were empty and he had to leave if anyone else came in. He should eat separately from both groups, and refrain from small talk. Finally, he was asked if he had any money. What little he did have was claimed by the pair, and he was told to get more, quickly. And cigarettes. Then they left.
He passed the rest of the day either in desperate activity (trying to call friends to bring him cash, super quick) or anxious waiting. I imagine him lying prone on his bunk (bottom, of course), staring up at the quilt of wires supporting the upper mattress, trying to come up with some existential argument for why this couldn't actually be happening. It then became night, and he did not sleep.
The next day, he discovered his one and only advantage. Newspapers were distributed by race - one was given to the black gang, one to the Hispanic gang and, as a member of neither group, he was entitled to one for himself. The newspaper was valuable - everything is valuable under the condition of artificial scarcity created by incarceration - and he could barter the different sections in exchange for favors (the number one favor being, of course, don't beat me). This bought him time, enough time so that resources outside the jail were motivated and brought to bear on his predicament, and he was finally sprung from the prison.
Of course, seeing what terrible conditions prevailed inside the penal system, he decided that from that moment on his life would be dedicated to improving the welfare of inmates. No, just kidding, that didn't happen, but he did become much more careful about where he parked.
