Death Row Diaries - 17 July 2005

Jailhouse Rock

Hey y’all,

Business first, last news on the fund raising total from Whizz Kidz HQ had the figure up to 8,228.40 (GBP). A fantastic effort and many, many thanks to you all.

After my usual entry into the US problems, resulting in me being whisked off to a room for ‘Suspicious Aliens’ where I took my place alongside all sorts of perceived terrorists, Cubans, and other undesirables, I had a further interview with officials at JFK airport. All of whom are lovely individuals, always prepared to listen to you and of course, they know that you know that any cogent case/argument put forward that makes them look a schmuck, will result in the old rubber gloves coming out. So I accepted the reduction of my Visa from 7 months to 3 with all the sardonic grace I could muster and after a few days with my amigos up there and an aborted landing later, I arrived in Atlanta or Hotlanta as I prefer to call it

I am living in a really cool place in Midtown. A stroll round my new ‘hood’ after moving in, revealed a plethora of rainbow flags. It’s the gay part of town and thus far it seems to me, that a lot of gay people have dogs and I am really not sure what that’s all about. My flat mates are Christine; who is a funny girl in a way that I have yet to decide as either being ‘funny peculiar’ or ‘funny ha, ha’ and Oscar the Texan; who really is the most laid back bloke I have met in years.

Christine sees herself as a model which is good because Oscar and I don’t. Only last week I passed up the opportunity to appear in her recent photo shoot, which featured the folks in the apartments below us in a fetish inspired ensemble! I may have been tempted but for the fact the pictures are due to be exhibited at some London fetish event. Not sure if I would be more embarrassed by you seeing me or me seeing you. However, Christine or mum as Oscar and I now call her; is one hell of a cook and it is not uncommon for her to call her boys up at work to see what we fancy for dinner tonight? As Oscar says, “Why stop when she is so clearly enjoying herself”

Anyway, why am I here? The short answer is rooted in Peru from my last trip back in 2002. I had managed to locate my Mother’s cousin in the back streets of Lima, from where she has been a missionary worker for over 35 years and was inspired by her great deeds. A few weeks later in Cuzco, and unable to do the ‘Inca Trail’, I said to myself “Right when I get back to the UK I am gonna run a marathon. That’ll show me!”

So, around this time last year and before my training went pear shaped, I started thinking that despite everything, I ain’t had a bad run really and maybe I ought to put something back. I started looking toward the landmine charities in Cambodia but caught a radio broadcast by a death row lawyer called Steve Bright, from the Southern Centre for Human Rights in Atlanta. Listening to this guy in full flow is incredible stuff and so I contacted them and the next thing you know, I am on a flight from Heathrow to Death row.

We deal with death row appeals and prisoner class action law suits -of which there are plenty. But lets be quite clear on this, some of our clients have done dreadful things and deserve to be locked up and/or in receipt of proper psychiatric care and whilst there are no acceptable excuses for some of the crimes, there is no doubt in my mind that the relationship between the quite horrendous and stomach churning stories behind the lives of these folks, means we ought not to be too surprised that it all ends up in a prison.

Currently I am working mainly on prisoners’ rights cases and whilst I agree that the prison experience should not be a holiday camp, from what I have witnessed thus far, I reckon I can confidently say that Abu Ghraib is not a one off. For example, I took a call from a mother concerned about her 19 year old son -who has a mental age of 9 and was put in the wrong prison- from where she alleges he has been repeatedly raped. This type of experience among juveniles transferring to the neighbouring adult prison appears common place.

I am helping a lad next week with his parole from the same establishment. However, his main problem is that he has a number of disciplinary records from the time he transferred and the Parole Board will not be remotely interested that he was literally fighting to save himself from being raped. His crime was first offence joy riding, for which he received a 10 year sentence at age 15!

Recently I visited a 70 year old lady who was forced to sit out in the sun, against the prison doctor’s instructions which resulted in her having a heart attack during the course of which, prison officers allegedly stood round laughing at the old lady. The system is riddled with illness, disease and mentally ill prisoners for which the prison will do anything to avoid helping. Many of the staff and officers turn a blind eye to what is going on and allegations of brutality are rife. As for the conditions these people are housed in, dogs are treated better. Trust me, I could go on.

What is really frustrating is that there is absolutely no attempt at any sort of rehabilitation so as to actively encourage prisoners from re-offending. Once in the system, it is a hell of a task to go straight on the outside. They develop no skills or training and thus, they fall back into crime within a few months of their release. The irony is, it costs huge amounts of Georgian tax payers’ money to run these facilities and all that is happening is that the same faces return, stay for longer and add to the financial burden. For every prisoner that does not return, the State would save tens of thousands of dollars per year, per prisoner.

I am here for a few months, depending on my extension application and how my new colleagues can work year-in, year-out with these cases is a testimony to their dedication. I know I could not and my time here is as much about helping them in their work as it is anything else. But I am pleased to say that I appear to have brought a little light relief to a tense environment and it is great to see attorneys buried in law books drinking from a QPR mug and my colleagues appear equally excited about the new ‘soccer’ season as I am.

Speak soon.

Cheers

JH

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