The guys found me an old mattress. It was the most gnarly, disgusting, smelly thing I ever viewed in life. Stains on top of stains. Years of sweat had created a smell most repulsive. But it was the mattress or the bare floor. There was a reason Little Joker had the top bunk. So I took my two wool blankets, used one as a sheet, then crawled under the second and fell out.
At six-thirty Little Joker was up and making himself a cup of coffee. So I got up and used the john while he stood at the front of the cell. A curtain hung between us, an old sheet hung from a line. The line ran from the left wall to the right. It was secured to the wall in the most ingenious way. The line end was wrapped around a piece of cardboard. This was then painted and applied to the concrete wall while the paint was wet. As it dried it glued the cardboard piece to the concrete wall. Then you went to the other side and pulled the line tight, repeating the process. Now this line was solid enough to hold a sheet in place.
There was a curtain in every cell, and the guards did not try to take the curtain down. For if they did jerk one down, a set of circumstances would fall into play. The convict in that cell was required to knock that guard on his ass immediately. If he did not take care of his business then he would get a violation—a most severe beating at the hands of the gang enforcer, a muscle-bound brut hell bent on breaking something. Intimidation was the game applied to both sides. The correctional officer working at the gallery knew what he could do, and what would get him beat up if you pushed the boundary. There was an agreement with the warden here: he would keep his men in line while turning a blind-eye to certain activities, and all would live together and get along.
See, a prisoner could not touch an officer without approval by his chief, unless the officer violated a standing policy in place. For an officer to jerk down a curtain and look in the cell was an act of war, one to be met by a swift act of retaliation. So the convict had to make a choice—get a beating himself, or carry out the beating and go to segregation. Once in seg, the staff would give him another tune up beating for touching one of theirs. It was the name of the beast here. But the staff knew that one of theirs would pay the price in retaliation. So there were rules and boundaries in place. Neither side wanted to kick off a war. For the prisoners out numbered the guards three to one.
I was learning on my feet. The first thing that morning was to figure out a way to put a bottom back in the bunk I was given. My bed was just the rectangular angle iron box. Nothing left of the inside to hold up a mattress. The steel bed springs had long been taken out and used to make weapons—jailhouse shanks or a crude, homemade knife, deadly as any in the world. They were real craftsman locked up here. They could turn out a shank you could shave with.
Russell worked in the maintenance department. He was a white guy who was a branded Latin King, muscle bound and mean as a cobra. He brought me his knife to hold while he went to work. Once count had cleared, and all the bodies were accounted for, the day began. I was given a yellow legal pad and a black device to place around my lower stomach. It was made of velcro and elastic sewn into a black fabric that wrapped around my waist and was hidden by my shirt. It was here I placed all the knives given to me by the guys leaving to work assignments, visits or hospital call passes.
So I took Russell’s pig-sticker, a real nice piece of steel, and slid it in between my skin and the brace. Each knife had a scabbard with it. Some were just cardboard wrapped around the blade. Others were real pieces of work made from wood or plastic bearing the owner’s personal touches. It was serious business here, and everyone carried a blade, or had access to one. For the street rivalry between the gangs was constant, a deadly game that could be rocked at any minute.
At times during the day I had twenty or more knives wrapped around my waist, so many I could no longer sit down. In the first day I often wondered how far under the prison staff would bury me if they caught me with all these weapons, for they were not allowed. The staff looked for them all the time, but would not brace any convict trying to remove one from his person. This would be an act of war—retaliated by a stabbing of that fool. So I was learning the rules of the longhouse. I had been sent to gladiator school, and I was not missing any lessons here.
On the street I had been a pugilist, a boxing champion with a second degree brown belt in karate. But this did not mean shit in a knife fight. So I knew I needed to get steel and find a few friends. I learned there were three white guys on the wing with me—Russell, Nomad, and Joker—three white guys I could tap for knowledge along with the supplies and material needed to repair my bed.
Nomad was a biker. He was like me, a white guy riding under the Latin Kings. Joker was a member of the Chicago Street Gang that road under the Latin Kings in prison. Neither had a job. Nomad was cool and after the guys left and the morning rush was over, he came to scope me out. Joker was an alcoholic and dope fiend who never left his cell. No help there.
But Nomad and Russell were tight. A white thing. So we talked and he told me once Russell returned from work, after three in the afternoon, they would help me rig my bed so I could sleep on it. Nomad pulled out a joint and fired it up. He offered and I did not resist. I told him my crime and my time. He said one sentence, “You must have some enemies with juice.” For he understood sixty-five years for armed robbery was not right. But he left it there. It was not cool to ask many questions.
So I did security until three o’clock count time. Shift changed and the three-to-eleven staff came on duty. We were locked in our cells until count cleared. Then the evening meal started, which they ran gallery by gallery. When seven gallery was run I fell in with Russell and Nomad. At chow I was questioned about the things I needed. After a trip to the round-house for chow we returned to the long-house to be free until the ten pm lockdown for the night. So I went to my cell to write a letter to my wife. I was still married then. Wendy was home and I was gone. I would try to get her to send me some cash.
I was about done with the letter when Russell came to the cell. Behind him was Nomad. They rolled into the cell and went to work with rope. They wove a pattern from side to side and cinched it tight. Then they gave me a set of sheets and a nasty old blanket from Nomad’s floor. He had been using it as a carpet. I did not look a gift-horse in the mouth. I threw it on the rope box springs. Then I tossed my mattress on it, threw the sheets on it, and tossed my two wool blankets on my dressed down bed.
Russell and Nomad told me to grab my shower shoes, which I did not have. Nomad took off and returned with a beat up old pair. I shoved them in the laundry bag with my other stuff. In the long house the showers are at the end of the cellblock, on the Three Gallery deck, a floor above the Sargent’s cage and office.
In the max joint everyone is at war with their rival gangs from the street. The only difference is the six-point guys and the five point guys all group together for numbers and power. Six and five point rivals on the street now get along and fight as one unit. But each gang has its own policy and hierarchy and each mob lives in their own cells. But when push comes to shove it is six and five lines drawn. The walk to the shower put this into place for me.
The shower was a large concrete bunker with a gate where the commanding officer took care of the key stands, letting only a certain number in at one time. Once he opened the gate it was an eight-foot walk to the large steel door encased in concrete. Once you stepped through this store you were in gladiator land. The steel door is in the center of the shower room. One small exhaust fan is at the end of the right side. Everything else is a concrete death chamber once that steel door is locked behind you.
As you entered the door the five point showers were on the right, the six point on the left. On the wall with the door was line of shower heads in the concrete wall. A brick floor ran to the concrete wall on the other side. There were two wooden benches on each side of the opposite wall. The guys placed their clothes on these benches as they showered.
I looked at the opposite wall to find a man standing there holding several knives. His boys were showering while he stood security. Russell and Nomad walked over to the fin side and found a place open on the bench. They placed me with my back to the wall. They handed me their knives, and went about getting their showers while I stood guard.
I stood there thinking, “If a fight jumped off in here many guys would be fubar before it was over. (Fubar: f——— up beyond all recognition.) For no staff would hear or know until that guard opened the death’s door again. The guys on each side stood mean-mugging the other side.
Nomad finished and I passed him the razor sharp knives each had given me. Then I hit the shower. When there was a bunch of guys ready to leave each sent a man to kick at the door. After a few minutes the guard opened the door. Bodies left and more entered. This was life in the Wild, Wild. Then we headed back up to the Seven Gallery in the long house. There Russell and Nomad explained the yard and gym line times to me.
I settled in that night with a better understanding of my new world. I could go to the yard each day and exercise for a couple hours if I was not on security duty. To shower, I had to wait for a group each night. Three meals a day were served in the chow hall back then. You had to get up and catch the line to eat. The Latin Kings went in numbers. They lived together, shopped together, went to yard together, went to shower together. So I quickly understood the point: one did not want to be caught alone by the opposition. For that fool would become a human pin cushion.
This was my life. So I got a law book and started learning the rules of the house of law I now dwelt in. I was not digging this guard duty crap. This had been Little Joker’s gig before the new fish showed up, so I knew I had to look for bigger and better opportunities. Russell and Nomad soon had me learning the moonshine game.
The Latin Kings store was called the caju. They allowed commissary items to be traded there. If you borrowed something you had to pay two back. The guy, Tony Montana, ran the business. Generated the revenue. He was the man I needed to see. I sold my gold wedding ring with the two diamonds slices and got fifty in cash.
Now I come from a long line of Kentucky Ridge Runners, whisky makers way back to the Revolutionary War days. I know brandy and whiskey. In here I quickly got a handle on the job. Copper lines, rubber tubing, a plastic five-gallon bucket was twenty-five bucks to Tony. Then another twenty dollar bill for three, three-hundred-watt stingers—the brass heating elements used to boil the wine in the still.
I set up as a cook at first. For each four-gallon batch of jailhouse hooch I cooked off I got paid. For every four ten-ounce “Honey Bears” I cooked, I got a ten-ounce “Honey Bear” for my work. Yes, the Honey Bear you buy honey in. This was ten dollars in store. (Trading value.) After a week of cooking, and trading, I had all the things I needed to start my own batch of mash. The little plastic bears full of moonshine were piling up.
Cash money got you the better deal in trading—all the bosses wanted cash. My friends on the deck were alcoholics. So they wanted the better deal. For honey bears fit into a one-liter soda bottle. This sold for twenty-five dollars cash. So I got two liters full of fire. Then I sold them for fifty dollars cash. I took this fifty and went to see Tony. I placed the following order: two large cans of fruit cocktail in heavy syrup; four bags of sugar-laced Kool-Aid; two boxes of sugar cubes; two milk crates of orange juice; and a bottle of “Kicker,” the fermented fruit used to start a fresh batch of wine fermenting.
Now while I sat on security all day, I was cooking brandy inside my cell, as my security post was right outside my cell door—the buffer cell between the Vice Lords and the Latin Kings cellblock.
Meanwhile, I read the law and started to study the game afoot. For I needed to beat the man at his own game if I was to find my justice and get my life back.
The business had rules. Everywhere you went their gang guys had assigned jobs, selling every vice you wanted. There was cocaine, marijuana, heroin, speed, and downers; there were the jailhouse girly boys turning tricks. So if the chief wanted to keep making money he had to keep his boys in line. No staff assaults and no gang wars. For this brought lockdown and the Orange Crush Team booted and suited—the tactical response in orange jumpsuits had large, lead-filled oak sticks, helmets and bullet-proof vests.
These guys would toss the cell and confiscate the liquor, drugs and money. When the bosses were not making money somebody had to be held accountable, so you did not put your hands on any opposition or guards without a really justifiable reason. For if it was not justified you would receive a pumpkin head—a beating that left your face swelled into a round mass of misery.
They liked my hooch. Soon I was relieved of security to cook full-time. My meals were brought to me. So I fell into my routine. I went to yard in the morning and played handball to stay in shape—handball is the jailhouse game where the hand serves as a racket. Courts are set up against the wall of the prison and the game is played with tennis rules.
At night I showered and cooked brandy—brandy is made from fruit, whiskey is made from grain. In the long house brandy was the moonshine made with what supplies we could get. So I cooked moonshine and studied the law. Word went out: “Hands off the whiskey man.” This was the start of my life at Statesville. But the best laid plans of mice and men go awry. Richard Speck was about to rock my world from his grave.
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