Aye Batter Batter

For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been attending “alcohol/drug addiction education” classes. Not to learn how to get addicted to alcohol or drugs – that would just be silly – but rather as group counseling sessions (usually mandated by a California court) aimed at helping addicts to quit their addictions. I’m only there as a “good will” gesture suggested by my lawyer in order to get an obstruction of justice charge dropped – I am not an addict. That being said, I’ve decided to give you, the reader my analysis of just how useless I believe these sessions would be for me if I were an addict. To sum it all up, I believe these court-mandated counseling sessions for fee are just one more of the seemingly endless pieces of bullshit that our government (well, the California government at least) has decided to force on the citizens to allow the self-assuming superior people a false sense of helping others. Let me explain…

First off, let me sum-up what I have been able to learn about how “the system” here in California works. The way it goes is that, if you get busted for some sort of drug/alcohol related crime (mainly possession and DUI), there is a possibility that the court will give you the option of attending these “educational” group sessions rather than going to prison. What the odds of getting this option are is still unknown to me; however it appears that where you get busted as well as who you get busted by seems to have some impact on this happening. Of course since I’m using these sessions for a court case in Colorado, I did not experience this procedure first-hand; however it doesn’t take a genius to realize that a large majority of people presented with this choice would opt for the counseling, right…? One would think…

There’s a little bit of a twist to the counseling option though – it’s a “pay for” service. This means that, if you’re interested in taking the “education”, you need to be willing and able to pony up some cash. It’s $30 per session plus a registration fee. In my case, the registration fee alone was $260. Whether this is a conventional amount or some sort of “special” pricing they came up with for my unique case (it brought my total amount due with the eight sessions to an even $500) I am unaware; however since the typical court-ordered counseling is either a 16 or 24 week stint (one class per week), the pricing for this option can easily get out of reach for many people. So basically what we have here is a government run court of law giving “get out of jail free” cards only to those that can afford them. Isn’t it ironic … don’t ya think?

To add to this irony, the government gets absolutely none of the money that is paid for these classes – none! There are actually institutions in California that have somehow arranged it so that courts can “strongly suggest” people pay them for their services else go to jail. Courts can mandate that somebody either purchases a service being offered by a private institution or go to jail. Am I the only one who finds this fascinating? I mean yeah, there are strict rules that need to be adhered to in order to complete this counseling; but it sure beats going to prison! So basically you’ve got private institutions that have obtained the right to have people forced by the courts to buy their services. And the worst part about all this is that their services (at least as far as I’m concerned) don’t work…

Why do I say this? Well for many reasons. The first of which is the number of people in the classes I’ve been attending that have “been here before” … for quite a few, many times. Several of the students have even been to prison already and are using this option as a change of pace. For this spin through the judicial revolving door they’ve decided to take a much more expensive, somewhat more scenic route. If nothing more than positive results were used to justify the existence of these non-prison options, I seriously doubt they would be around much longer. But then what would we do with the sudden influx of people in need of incarceration? Is this no more than a way to keep prison populations down?

The main reason however that I believe these classes don’t work is based on the fact that I’ve been attending them for some nine hours now and have learned absolutely nothing. It’s exactly what I was expecting it to be – well intentioned people spouting out dime-store philosophy to a completely uninterested audience. Most (if not all) of the people are only there to stay out of jail and it’s extremely difficult (even for those with actual educational training) to teach those uninterested in learning. Having some former addict (and I do believe all of the instructors are former addicts) attempt to explain basic societal mores that I’ve been well aware of since elementary school to me seems like little more than an insult to my intelligence. Throw in their biased views on philosophy being taught as “must dos” and it becomes downright frightening.

But you can’t blame the people administering these classes. I do believe that they are actually trying to help. Unfortunately, the problem is not this counseling. The problem isn’t even the government giving people the option to buy their “get out of jail free” cards. I believe that the real problem we are facing today is the lack of responsibility shown by a large portion of the American people. Mix this in with an unrealistic need for vengeance upon the unknown for crimes that the media is doing their best to often times glamorize, slowly stir in an attempt to reach uniform consistency and let set.

What we end up with is what we currently have in California: laws becoming stricter with respect to drugs of all varieties and tolerances asymptotically approaching zero for those that try to test these law’s boundaries, prisons getting overcrowded with more and more three-strikers to the extent that alternatives need to be found quickly and finally the government mandating citizens to purchase services from private institutions else join the crowds already in prison. Has our society really come to this? Are many of the crimes committed actually worthy of the punishment they’ve incurred? I seriously doubt it…

Now you might be wondering exactly what I’m getting at here and I wouldn’t blame you at all for that – I’m kind of curious myself… It just seems to me that something needs to change. Perhaps we should get rid of the “three strikes” rule and go back to evaluating the severity of a crime on a case by case basis? Seems to me like that might just open up the possibility for a ton of new jobs considering the number of cases prosecuted each and every day. Maybe we should take a lesson from many of our friends across the pond and learn to start tolerating an individual’s decision to use drugs as long as nobody else is endangered. When you think about it, how is this any different than the use of alcohol…? Maybe we should instill the value of personal responsibility in our children so that these issues never arise.

I actually don’t know and am not about to claim that I have any answers. I will say however that the experiences I’ve been going through the last couple of months sure have posed a lot of questions…

bis später,

Coriolis

Cough, Cough...

The FDA has decided to take it upon their authority to ban all flavored cigarette products sold in the United States. Interestingly enough, menthol flavored cigarettes are the one and only exception to this ban. It’s an act targeted at removing a gateway currently used to, I don’t know, “fool?” children and young adults into becoming regular smokers.

It’s a huge piece of bullshit, though… The government can throw out numbers (pulled usually directly out of their butts) showing how this ban is going to save billions and billions of lives, right? So what?! All this is in reality is one more freedom being stripped away from the American citizen. It’s just another case where those that can have decided to mandate their own personal ideology onto those they regard as too stupid to think for themselves. Not to mention that I don’t even think it’s even indisputably legal.

Tobacco, even with its heinous image in modern society, is still a legally marketed substance. Even with this latest ban, anybody of age (what is it now, over 18???) can still legally walk into a convenience store and purchase any number of cigarettes he wishes to purchase – as long as they’re not flavored.

Now the chemicals that are currently being used to add a little “flavor” to these cigarettes are also completely legal to use. I’m positive that you will find these same “artificial flavorings” in any number of other food items being sold today. Put the two together and suddenly the FDA has the right to say that you can’t sell the resulting flavored cigarettes? Umm, why???

The argument is that this magical flavoring of tobacco makes tobacco products more desirable to children and young adults. However true this statement is – and it sounds like nothing more than pure speculation to me – it’s still not a valid reason to completely (except for menthol flavored – I guess some exceptions are justifiable?) ban a product. Hell, you can even throw out the “young adults” portion of the reasoning since young adults are defined to be at least 18 years of age and are therefore old enough to purchase tobacco if they so choose. The argument now becomes something about these flavored cigarettes being a gateway for children to become regular smokers; however children are already banned from purchasing tobacco products by their age alone…

So let’s just call a spade a spade here and admit that the purpose of this ban is nothing more than a thinly veiled attempt to force a viewpoint about the evils of tobacco into everybody’s mind with a law. We can continue to dance around the actual law of banning tobacco completely by creating more laws that make it harder and harder for someone to legally enjoy a smoke; however I’m just waiting for the actual ax to fall where the “know betters” finally do the smokers of this country a huge favor and completely outlaw this vice they are too stupid to quit on their own. After all, in this “land of the free”, it’s best not to let the citizens choose what freedoms they get. We’re all far too stupid for that…

Another interesting aspect about this newly adopted ban is exactly who it’s going to hurt. It will, in no way, hurt the “Big Tobacco” industry. They’ve even gone so far as to exclude the one flavoring (menthol) that the big boys even use. No … those that are going to be hurt by this are the somewhat smaller companies (the ones that aren’t financing political careers as much as the big boys) currently selling clove and flavored cigarettes to niche markets. It’s also going to give the FDA some precedence required for them to start making wider and wider bans on various other forms of so-called “alternative” nicotine delivery systems. I’m thinking the vaporizers (i.e. Green Smoke) will be feeling some pain soon; they rely on flavors as a way to separate themselves from competition.

Putting capitalism aside, I believe the political ramifications alone from this latest ban should scare the shit out of every freedom loving American. As I mentioned above, they (the FDA) are banning the combination of legal substances to enhance the appeal (for some, I personally am not a fan of flavored cigarettes…) of one of those substances based on shaky assumptions. Not only is the “gateway” argument purely speculative; it’s a pre-defined set of values getting prescribed to all through the enactment of a law. How long before all of our freedoms become sanitized to a point where we’re merely free to behave as our government has mandated?

bis später,

Coriolis

The Cost of Justice

So I am, once again, a free citizen. Have been for some time now… I’ve got a court date scheduled for early October for what I believe is being called my “pre-trial” hearing; however I have shelled out the money for a retainer and have successfully hired private legal counsel. There’s a lot to be said for private legal counsel – not only will it allow me to not attend my pre-trial hearing (my lawyer will be my legal representative making a trip back from California by me unnecessary) but I quickly grasped the usefulness the day after I got released from jail…

I rose early that day (heck, I actually got no sleep at all) and quickly jumped into my next task. I needed to get a lawyer. My flight was scheduled to be departing for LAX the next day at 3:15 in the afternoon and I had just been informed the day before that my bail restrictions forbade my leaving the state of Colorado. It was never clearly explained to me how long I needed to stay in the state; I just assumed that “until my pre-trial was completed” was a pretty safe guess at a minimum. There were also stipulations in which I needed to contact a specific substance abuse counseling center within 24 hours of being released from jail as well as sign up for substance abuse (alcohol) monitoring. This was all assuming that I stayed in Colorado as the court only had jurisdiction in that state. If you recall from my earlier story, this was a bit of a problem – I lived (and currently still reside) in California.

At the time it seemed a bit strange that the fact that I lived in California seemed to be unknown (or at least not a concern) to the court. I didn’t discover why this was until I actually received and was able to inspect my arrest summons. I got this along with my other personal possessions upon getting bailed out of jail the night before. The funny thing about this was that the address written on it was the address to my house in Longmont, Colorado. The somewhat more puzzling thing was that my Colorado driver’s license number (with the “state” blank marked “CO”) was also written on the summons. My Colorado driver’s license (with the newly-punched hole made by the California DMV office), however, was sitting in a drawer of a dresser located in my room at my current home in Thousand Oaks, California! The license that was in my wallet (and therefore on my possession at the time I was booked) was in fact my California license. Why this perfectly valid license was ignored and personal information for me was retrieved from “the system” is still a bit of a mystery to me … was this possibly easier…?

As a side note here, I didn’t notice the Colorado information on my summons until I had left the jail. The result of this was that, when I was asked to sign out with my signature and address, I wrote my current California address. It probably means nothing; however the addresses on the summons and my jail release do not match. I’m rather interested to find out why my California license was ignored; however that’s just one of those things (and there are quite a few of those “things”) that I will probably never know…

But I digress … back to the morning. I needed a lawyer – and fast! I gave up on any attempts at actually getting sleep that night somewhere around 7:00 in the morning and switched on my laptop. Luckily for me, the Radisson provided wi-fi access free of charge thus giving me a rather easy task to accomplish. I did a search for attorneys in Boulder, Colorado and was quickly presented with a plethora of lawyers to choose from. I found one that, according to his webpage, specialized in “Criminal Defense & DUI Since 1992”. Now granted I did not get arrested on a DUI (I’m still a bit shaky on exactly why I was arrested…); however I needed criminal defense and alcohol was a major factor in my case as well. I called the office…

I was told that the attorney, as he apparently does each week as standard business practice, was visiting the CU campus that day and wasn’t currently in the office. It was then requested that I give a brief summary of my needs so that they could be relayed to the lawyer by phone. After explaining my plight, I was told to be expecting a call back from the lawyer shortly. It was less than a half hour later when the call was returned.

I felt somewhat more at ease after speaking with the attorney. He gave me the impression that he would be able to contact the correct people necessary to get the bail restrictions (not only the travel restrictions, but all of them) removed allowing me to legally fly home the next day. We had several conversations that morning – each one with the plan changing slightly. At one point I was planning on heading down to his office in Boulder to drop off his retainer (one thousand dollars) then possibly needing to head over to the Boulder Courthouse at (if memory serves me correctly) 6th and Canyon to perhaps sign some paperwork. This changed to possibly needing to meet up with somebody in Longmont who was supposed to have the authority to legally help me out although that was still in an unknown state of readiness. The final plan was to meet up with my attorney back at the Boulder County Jail at 2:00 in the afternoon where he had successfully arranged a hearing with the same judge I was in front of the day before. We were to request that the bail restrictions be removed based mainly on the fact that I lived in California. I was a bit skeptical as the same argument was made by me the day before and seemed to fall on deaf ears; however this time I had much better ammunition – private counsel…

It was requested (by my lawyer, of course) that I bring evidence showing current residence in California as well as my plane tickets for the flight leaving to LAX the next day. No problem – I had a valid California driver’s license (which, mind you, the jail also “had” two nights before but chose to ignore), my Travelocity itinerary clearly showing my scheduled flight, a business card for my job with an address in Westlake Village, California and even a pay stub from said employer made out to my name at my Thousand Oaks address. I gathered said items, wrote out a check for a thousand dollars (retainer, remember?) and headed back to jail with ample time to arrive well before 2:00 – I most definitely was not missing this appointment!

After arriving at the jail, I noticed a posting of the 2:00 docket – my name was not on this list. I inquired with one of the guards about this absence and was informed that I was most likely an addendum. She said she believed there was one addendum to the cases posted – that was probably me. This sounded about right – I still don’t know exactly how my lawyer was able to secure this hearing. When I wasn’t armed with private counsel, I would never have been able to accomplish this. The task now became finding my lawyer. Remember, I had never actually met this guy and actually had no idea what he looked like. I wasn’t too concerned though … there was a thousand dollars in it for him to find me…

Sure enough, a few minutes before the session started, my lawyer found me. I introduced myself by presenting him with the retainer check and quickly gave him a rundown of the documentation I had brought. He needed to speak with another person he was defending during that same session so we parted ways. I headed into the courtroom (this time I was on the much larger glassed in area where I had a view of the two-bench area I was sitting in – immobilized by chains and cuffs – the day before) and took a seat. We were all asked to rise as the judge entered the main chamber – it was not the same judge as the day before…

It was interesting to once again see the flurry of activity that was the arraignment process. This time, however, I saw things more clearly. I was quite exhausted and hadn’t had any sleep for well over 24 hours, however this time I wasn’t dealing with the shock of seeing it in chains and cuffs dressed in a prison jumpsuit. I was somewhat concerned with how our request for freedom was going to be addressed by the court but this was based on the results I got the day before – before I hired private counsel…

A short while into the proceedings I was joined by my attorney and we quietly discussed our plan. I told him that I was hoping to take full advantage of my right to remain silent. I had absolutely no sleep the night before and was a little worried about the whole “open mouth, insert foot” scenario. He said he would do his best but that the judge might want to hear from me. He then told me some interesting discoveries that he had made earlier in the day.

First off, there was absolutely no public record on my being arrested and taken to the ARC (the “drunk tank”). Since I was technically arrested whilst already at the ARC, the lack of any previous record of arrest wasn’t too surprising; however the complete lack of any record on my getting transported to the ARC still seems a bit strange to me. But I do not claim to be any sort of expert on law enforcement procedures, so maybe this is commonplace…? I don’t know…

The other piece of information that he told me was that I had a 0.227 blood alcohol content at the time of my arrest. Whether this was from a breathalyzer or – from the needle marks on my right arm – possibly a blood test, I do not know. Bottom line was that I was seriously drunk. Not much of a shocker to me considering that I remembered nothing of the night since arriving at the Fusion bar; however this was actually good news for our case. The way my lawyer put it, “I was acting like somebody that blew a 0.227.” This supported the argument that I was not a habitual drinker…

I think somewhere around a half hour passed before my case was called (oh yeah, one more thing about the advantages of private counsel – cases with private counsel are prioritized before those without … probably as a way to minimize the cost for defendants paying lawyers by the hour; however I believe this useful information if you’ve got the funds…). My lawyer did an excellent job explaining the circumstances of my case. I said absolutely nothing. All the bail restrictions were removed. Sweet!

After we left the jail, my attorney suggested that I consider taking an alcohol counseling class back in California as a “good will” gesture. That should pretty much guarantee the charges get dropped. I’m currently in the process of accomplishing this although things seem to be quite different in California. I’m actually getting the impression that somebody choosing to take part in alcohol counseling on their own accord is something that they don’t allow here. I found a place that offers the course; however I can’t take it until I can come up with some sort of paperwork from the court in Boulder saying that I need it. How stupid is that? Sure, we’ll help those looking for help if – and only if – it is mandated by a court of law … seems a bit counterproductive to me. Oh well, I’ve signed the "release of information" form required for my lawyer to contact the program director. Maybe he can talk some sense into her…?

All this has got me to wondering … what if I didn’t have the means to afford private counsel? I guess it’s just one more example of capitalism at work…

bis später,

Coriolis

Free at Last

So I’m being led down yet another hallway in the Boulder County Jail. What was I doing in jail? Now’s that’s a great question. For those just joining this little yarn, you can get caught up by starting back at my What Happened??? post. Okay, caught up now? Good. As I said, I was being led down yet another hallway in the Boulder County Jail…

I’d had my possessions (sheets, blankets and the plastic coffee cup of goodies) taken from me. I took this as a good sign. I figured I was finally (from what I have been able to piece together so far, some 18-20 hours after arriving…) either being allowed to pay my own bail or – more likely –Matt or Doug had bailed me out. Either way, all was good. I was taking my last guided tour of the day and would soon be free again! It’s funny how easily one can take freedom for granted – and I was only locked up for the better part of one day. I couldn’t image actually facing hard time … I guess I’m just not built for that lifestyle…

We finally arrived at this door. The guard opened it and instructed me to head on in to another door inside and close it behind me. This I did. It was a plain little room – reminded me of one of those dressing rooms they have in the department stores. There was a bench and a large pane of glass with a little slot at the bottom. I don’t know how long I just stood there waiting for someone to show up behind the pane before it occurred to me that nobody was coming … seemed like a few minutes; I finally realized that all my possessions (the ones that I had been missing throughout the day) where within reach behind the glass. I then decided to change out of my bright red jumpsuit and back into my actual street clothes.

I was also able to get my cell phone, belt, wallet and e-cig along with a copy of my arrest summons (first time I saw that) and list of items just mentioned that were sealed under this plastic shroud that I needed to rip into. I’m not quite sure what the need for the vacuum sealing of my items was – my guess is one more piece of bureaucracy that made sense to someone, somewhere at some time who had the authority to make it procedure… I suppose it kept the items more secure … but from who? The cops…? Seems kind of silly…

Or perhaps it wasn’t…? I quickly noticed that my wallet had its standard array of useless membership cards, business cards, my California (please make a note of that, I said “California”) driver’s license and my several credit cards (usually located in said wallet) were actually outside the wallet but sealed in the plastic next to it. The one thing that my wallet didn’t have was any money in it. Now granted, I had absolutely no recollection of the entire night before. Perhaps I spent all the money? I just thought this was rather interesting…

After changing clothes and grabbing my stuff, I walked back out the door I entered through. It led to the initial door I entered from the hallway that was now shut and locked. There was another room off to the left so I decided to head that way. What I found here was yet another large pane of glass (much like the one in the room I had just left). This one had a rather large officer of the law behind it that was asking me to sign my name and address on some sheet of paper. Whilst signing the sheet, I decided to ask this officer if he knew anything about my being there and the answer I got was a definite yes. He basically told me that he was working the night before and that I was the drunkest person he had ever seen. It just sounded to me like this guy was no fan of mine and I really couldn’t figure out why (don’t forget that I remembered nothing from the night before…).

After signing out, he gave me a check for two dollars. He explained that, after paying some fee (or fine or whatever it was) with the money I had in my wallet and the $100 (which ended up being a bit over $120 for some unknown reason) that my friend paid for the bail, I had exactly two dollars left. I’m not sure why this was given to me as a check but it was… I apparently had either $32 or $37 in my wallet and the fee that I paid for something was $30 (or $35, either way…) so rather than just give me the two dollar bills, they wrote me a check for two dollars. Bureaucracy again, I guess…

He then walked around and opened the door to the hallway. This hallway ended at a room with several people in it – one of these people was my buddy Matt. Thanks Matt! You came through!! It was then that I quickly called Doug on his cell. I told him thanks but Matt had already bailed me out and he didn’t need to make the trip. Funny thing was that he was inquiring as to where we were – he was at the Boulder Courthouse since that used to be where the jail was (Doug’s lived in that area quite a long time…). I told him I appreciated his effort but that he was now free to head home. The best part now was that I was now free to “head home” (or at least back to my hotel). I was a bit curious as to how the people at the Radisson were going to respond to my coming back at 9:30 the evening on the day I was supposed to have checked out. Heck, I was a bit concerned as to what might have happened there the night before – remember that the last memory I had was sitting at the Fusion – their bar…

So while Matt’s driving me back to Longmont, I decided to give Todd a call. I was very curious about what had happened the night before and thought that he might have some information. The conversation went something like this:

“Hi Todd, guess where I’ve been all day.”

“Jail.”

“How did you know that?”

“The police told me you were in jail last night when they picked me up.”

“So you were in jail as well?”

“No, the hospital. I wrecked my car.”

Turns out I wasn’t the only one who had bad results from our well planned night of drinking. The saddest part about all this is that I honestly believe that I will never know exactly what happened that night. How was Todd in any position to even be able to wreck his car? He was supposed to be staying in my room! Why was I taken to the Boulder ARC? I was drinking in my hotel’s bar – all I needed to do was stumble back to my room and I could sleep it off. What on Earth happened that made everything go awry??? I doubt I will ever know…

After returning to the Radisson, I had a rather interesting conversation with the people working the desk. After explaining that I couldn’t check-out on time because I had been in jail all day, the guy (and I still don’t know if he was joking or not) said that he shouldn’t be letting me stay there but that he would; however if he heard one peep from me, he was calling the cops. It was weird though; he wasn’t working the night before however he seemed to have knowledge of me being taken out of there by the police. This story would later be refuted by a different employee working the desk on the next day – he claimed, after I inquired, that he called people working that night and was told that nothing happened in the hotel. I still don’t know why I was taken to the ARC or from where … there are no police records on this…

Well, that’s basically my story. Apart from dropping a grand the next morning on a lawyer’s retainer allowing me to get back in court in record time (the next day) and successfully get all of the bond restrictions removed (which was a great thing – I made my flight back to LAX the next day), I guess that’s pretty much it. I decided to write this up with so much detail as a red flag to those out there who think it’ll never happen to them. I had the night flawlessly planned. I woke up the next day in jail.

bis später,

Coriolis

Making Bail

Earlier on “My Pathetic Life” I had been forced to spend a day in jail. You can start reading from the beginning here – What Happened??? My story continues now with me sitting on a chair wondering if my call to Matt was successful or not…

It was quickly approaching 5:30pm and I was under the assumption that 5:30 was, once again, going to mean lockdown. I figured I best try to contact Doug before lockdown started. If nothing else, it would be a possibility to leave confusing messages with two of my friends on the “free side” and somewhat increase my odds at getting out of here quicker than my pleas to pay my own bail being heeded. I grabbed a phone as quickly as one became available…

Okay, so I had the procedure for making collect calls mastered now. As quickly as I could, I attempted to call Doug. I used the second number listed for him as my earlier attempt with the first number was a bust (it was another inmate’s PIN … perhaps he pressed “9”…). After once again receiving the message about the number called not being able to accept collect calls and being informed that I was getting a one-time only free connection, I heard Linda (Doug’s wife) say, “Hello?”

This time I was in the know. I wasn’t exactly sure how long it was; however I knew that the call time was limited and I needed to get my information out as quickly as I could before getting cut off. I spewed out a torrent of conversation that included a notice about the limited time, the fact that I was in jail although I couldn’t get into why right then and that I needed her to call Doug and tell him to get a hundred dollars and head over to the Boulder County Jail. She said they would take care of it. I thanked her and hung up.

It was shortly after this (I believe it was around 5:40pm) that one of the guards called out, “Lockdown!” Everybody headed back to their cells – I headed back to cell #13 – and the unmistakable sound of the magnetic locks engaging echoed throughout earshot. I once again lied down on the bottom bunk in my lone cell…

I didn’t have any knowledge as to when, or even if, this iteration of lockdown was scheduled to end. I didn’t really care. I wasn’t expecting anything to be happening for me until well after 7:00 anyway – and that was assuming Matt had the information he needed. Perhaps Doug would get there earlier, however I doubted it. There was always the possibility that I would finally be able to pay my own bail soon; however nothing that had occurred up to this point led me to put much faith in this happening. I took inventory of my cell…

Other than what I had brought in (the sheets, blankets and plastic coffee mug containing a comb, a bar of soap, a small toothbrush, a tube of toothpaste and a spork) there wasn’t much else. There was a metal bunk bed and a crude sink and toilet. There was also a large roll of some very rough, single-ply toilet paper and two small pencils that I found under the steel mirror. I also noticed, stamped on the inside of the cell door, the address for the jail. That might have been useful to me prior to making my phone calls…

I utilized one of the pencils and wrote the address on the sheet of paper given to me earlier by the guard with the phone numbers and credit card numbers. I was thinking that this information might come in handy if we ever get out of lockdown. I was running out of numbers to try; however had a couple left that might get to someone…

The main thing I remember from this time was hearing voices from other inmates outside my cell. We were in lockdown; however it seemed like I was hearing some inmates walking around outside and talking. I distinctly remember one of them being called “Skittles” on a couple of occasions. Whether Skittles was one walking around or just a nickname of a prisoner now in lockdown, I had no clue. I just remember the name.

I also noticed, when looking through the windows of my cell door, that there seemed to be some sort of hierarchy in this ward. There were a few inmates (my old cellmate from cell #14 was one of these) that weren’t wearing their red jumpsuits. If memory serves me correctly, they were wearing your standard sweat pants and grey tee shirts. I think there were about four inmates in this group. The thing about this group was that they were not required to stay in their cells during lockdown. As a matter of fact, I believe their job was to clean up the commons area during each lockdown – which appeared to be mainly mopping up the floor. They were also wearing some sort of headphones which I concluded were to pick up the audio for the TVs – I saw a note next to one of the TVs that said the audio was being transmitted on some certain FM frequency. When they completed their cleanup, they basically sat downstairs watching TV…

There were also a few guys wearing blue jumpsuits (the gentleman that requested my dinner if I wasn’t going to eat it was one of these). I later found out that these guys were from the maximum security ward sent up to this ward because of some sort of fight that occurred in their ward. As I mentioned before, there was also another area separated from the general population by yet another glass blockade. I think this was either an area for punishment or possibly a place for the more violent. I never bothered to get the complete 411 on the hierarchy … I’m just mentioning it as an observation…

At one point I heard one of the other inmates yelling something about football. He wanted the channels on the TVs changed so that he could watch the game. This was done quickly enough and I decided to slide my chair (oh yeah, a couple other items in my cell were a plastic chair – sort of your lawn-chair variety – and a small table bolted to the wall … sorry, I forgot those earlier…) over toward my cell door so I could sit and watch the game. They were small TVs. I was looking through a narrow window at a not-very-direct angle. It was a pre-season game between Miami and I don’t even remember who else and (as anyone who knows me knows) I really could care less about football. It was something to do though…

It was somewhere around 8:00 when the cells were once again unlocked.

Having nothing better to do, I wandered back out to the commons area. Perhaps I would be able to ask the new guard (the guards that were there earlier had left on a shift change) if there was anything that I wasn’t doing that I should have been doing in order to pay my bail. Heck, it had been 5 hours since I told the judge that I could pay my bail; was there something else I needed to do? Could anybody give me any information that might actually be usable by me? I had credit card information for two of my cards written down for me earlier by a guard. What, exactly, was I supposed to be doing with this? As it was throughout the day, I had no idea…

The first thing I tried was to call Doug on the first number I had listed for him. You may remember that this was the original call I attempted using another inmates PIN; the thing is, it seemed to me that this was his cell phone number. Maybe I could get in contact with him and make sure he knew what was going on – I actually had the address now… The call didn’t get answered.

I spoke with the guard that was currently on duty and asked if he could find out what was going on with me. I told him that I wanted to pay my bail and he started going off on this “it could take half an hour or 12 hours” speech when another inmate – my old cellmate from cell #14 – interrupted the guard and explained that I was wanting to pay my bail with a credit card currently located in my seized possessions. The response I got was, “I’ll look into it.”

Oh well, what could I do? The only possibility I had was to wait. Wait for what, exactly, I had no clue… Heck, it was past 7:00 now; maybe Matt would come to my rescue soon…? I sat down and watched the game…

It was going on 9:00 when a guard entered the ward and called out my last name. He then told me to get my stuff. Sweet! I’m getting out of here! I quickly headed up to my cell and grabbed my still neatly folded sheets and blankets as well as my plastic coffee mug of goodies. I walked down the stairs and plopped my stuff on a table where the guy that I had given my dinner to earlier was sitting. He congratulated me on being released which was kind of a weird thing. I mean how does one respond to that with a guy that not too long ago told you that he was doing 2 years in there? I basically said thanks and wished him luck with his situation. That’s when this other guy approached…

He mentioned being aware that I had just arrived that day and asked if he might be able to exchange his blankets with my newer, cleaner ones. Apparently, according to this guy, clean laundry is not easy to come by there. I said sure, he could have my blankets as long as he was quick about it – I didn’t know how long before the guard was going to return. One of the other guys then requested my sheets. Sure, what did I care?

The exchanges were completed; the guard entered the ward and called out my name. I walked out into the hallway and was told to drop my stuff in a corner which I did. I was standing there waiting when another guard showed up and asked if I was getting out. She said she would take me from there and started leading me down the hallway.

And that’s where this episode will be ending. I, once again, need to go grab something to eat. Besides, I’m getting quite sick of typing today. I’ll finish this story later…

bis später,

Coriolis

One Phone Call

I had just unsuccessfully made my first attempt to contact the free world. I attempted to call my buddy Doug; however I was using another inmate’s PIN. It was very kind of the guy; unfortunately the system used to make outgoing calls from the Boulder County Jail was designed to make such kindness pretty much futile. To catch up with this story, you might need to read my Stuck in the System post. Heck, if you’re just joining this story here, it’s actually the 5th episode. It all starts at What Happened??? I will now continue with the story of the longest day of my life…

It had become blatantly obvious to me that I needed to get my own PIN (Prisoner Identification Number) in order to even have the possibility of getting Doug or Matt (the only numbers I currently had) to answer the phone. Who knows? Maybe they wouldn’t even be willing to take the collect call…? Whatever the case, I needed my own PIN.

Interestingly enough, the guard that gave me my dinner tray just happened to be the same one that spoke to me prior to lockdown ending. He mentioned – whilst handing me my orange tray – that he would be delivering this PIN to me shortly. After the failed attempt to call Doug, I decided to just wait for this guard to contact me with my PIN – it’s not like he wouldn’t be able to find me… (Side note here: I never received my PIN from this guard…)

So I sat in a chair watching the silent TV on the wall for some time. I quickly noticed that using the phones might be difficult even if I had my PIN – there were only two phones and finding a period of time where either was available was rare. I don’t know how long I had been sitting there before the guy I gave my dinner to suggested that I should probably head over to the (oh, how do I explain this???) “cage” and ask for my PIN. Sounded like a good idea to me…

So I made the short walk to the metal slot in the wall that was the only access we inmates had to what I have decided to refer to as the cage. You see, there were guards (cops, police, whatever…) sitting in this cage although I seem to remember that none of the windows between this cage and the cell area were unobstructed. I most definitely could not see in and it is my impression that they (the cops) could not see out – I could be mistaken here, but that is the image I have… There was however a very low (I think it was put in the wall at about waist level) metal slot that the cops could open to interact with inmates. This is what I walked to…

Unfortunately there was already another inmate standing by this slot who appeared to be waiting for something from inside the cage. I’m not about to even try pushing my way in front of this guy so I just stand back a bit and wait. (Did I mention that I had absolutely no desire to be starting conversations with anyone in here? I figured the quickest way out was to be a model inmate and the less possibility of causing a scene, the better… Naïve, I guess; but this wasn’t my world…) In time I make it to the slot, lean way down to see in and ask the guard inside for my PIN so that I can make a phone call. I receive a piece of paper with the following written on it: “0907519____” The guard mentions that the last four digits are a code that I need to pick and then closes the metal door sealing off the slot.

Okay, I’ve apparently got my PIN. Time’s ticking away and I’m thinking that we had one hour for dinner before we would need to go back to lockdown. Not sure why I was thinking this – perhaps somebody told me – but that’s the way that whole day was. I would either be aware (or, more usually, unaware) of things and have no recollection of why. Whatever the case, half of that time was already gone and I needed to make a call or two…

I take a seat where I can see both phones and wait for an opportunity to use one. Luckily enough, I didn’t need to wait too long before one of the phones was free and I quickly rose and walked over to it. Okay … now how does one go about using these phones…?

I pick up the handset and am told to press “1” for English or “2” for Spanish. I press “1”.

I am then instructed to enter my 11 digit prisoner identification number followed by the pound sign. The number I was given is 7 digits and 4 blanks. I enter the 7 digits, 4 other numbers (I believe I used 5654) and hit “#”.

The recording then says something about, “since this is your first time use, please enter a four digit security code.” I enter the 5654 again and am requested to speak my full name after the beep. This I do…

It seems like the only option I was given at this point was to press “0” to make a collect call – which I do. I then dial the first number I have written down for Matt and hope for him to answer. As before, I get the message about receiving a call from {my name in my voice, this time} at the Boulder County Jail … blah blah blah… I hear this message a couple of times before I get a new message.

The new message says something about the number I called not being able to receive collect calls; however my call was going to be connected as a one-time complementary call from some company that I don’t remember the name of and that money could be deposited to said company at the end of this call to make future calls possible. Shortly after this, I heard Matt say, “Hello?”

Now here’s the funny thing about this – although the message mentioned that I was receiving a one-time complimentary call to my destination number, it said absolutely nothing (to me at least) about the length of the call being limited. Therefore, I was under the impression that I could chat with Matt as long as need be. I was wrong…

I inform Matt that I’m in the Boulder County Jail. He asks, “Why?” to which I obviously have no valid explanation. I give him the quick story of being at my hotel bar the night before and waking up in jail this morning. I then begin my plea for him to come bail me out. I tell him it’s only a hundred dollar bail and I will pay him back as soon as I get back to my hotel. (Oh, yeah!! The hotel issues…. Aaarggg…) He then says that he was just heading out to his kid’s school for some show that was from 6:00 to 7:00. My response was that it didn’t matter; I just needed to get out of here. Matt was then cut-off. The message I got was that the party I called had been transferred to whatever phone company was mentioned earlier where he could deposit money to receive future calls from me.

Oh no … this can’t be happening… Is Matt coming at 7:00? Did he get all the information he needed? Does he know what jail I’m in or even where it’s located? I had faith that Matt would do whatever he could – Matt’s a good guy – unfortunately there was palpable doubt in the air that he received all the necessary information. Shit! What do I do now…? Oh well, I actually did believe that Matt would come and there was always the possibility that my request to pay my own bail might, in time, make it to somebody that would do more than “look into it”. It was approaching 5:30 anyway and (once again, I don’t know why…) I was under the impression that lockdown would be coming soon enough. I sat down and stared at the silent TV…

And with that, I will leave you. I think I’m going to go grab something to eat. Don’t worry though … I do not believe there’s much left in this story. Of course the truth of the matter is that it’s not done in real life yet so I can’t quite say when this thread will conclude. Thanks for reading…

bis später,

Coriolis

Stuck in the System

So I’m lying on the lower bunk of cell #14 just after returning from my arraignment. I clearly told the judge I could easily pay my $100 bail after my personal possessions were returned; however I was still in jail. For further detail on exactly how this situation came to be, I would suggest reading my Vague Clarity post. For those already caught up on the story, I’ll continue the saga…

As I said, it’s somewhere around 3:00pm – probably a quarter after or so by now – and the only thing that I am pretty sure of is that we (the inmates) are supposed to be getting served dinner sometime around 4:30. I decided to lie down on my bunk and, as has become the norm this day, wait for whatever happens next to come ‘round. I had no idea what it would be although I was under the impression that it might just be dinner…

A short period of time passes and this rather large guy enters my cell. I assume it’s my cellmate as I vaguely remember the same guy stopping by to take a piss earlier … although I did not have any words with him on that earlier occasion. He inquires whether the very large bruise I have on the underside of my left upper arm has something to do with why I was there. I was lying on my back with my hands clasped under my head which made the bruise very pronounced to anyone that saw me. My response to him was that I had absolutely no idea. I explained how the last memory I had of the night before was sitting at a bar talking with my friend and how the next one was waking up in a prison cell. I distinctly remember his response to this: “That’s fucked up.”

I couldn’t agree more… I basically told him what had occurred and how I was waiting to pay my small bail and hopefully get out. It was then that I asked how long he had been there and was floored by the response – he said eight months!! Being the usual upstanding, free citizen that I am, I couldn’t even begin to fathom this … eight months living in this little cell. I guess that explained all the books I noticed when I first entered cell #14… Now my curiosity was getting seriously tweaked so I inquired as to how long his sentence was. “16 years,” is what he told me!!!

Holy shit! 16 years?! Apparently he was currently awaiting trial for second degree assault (or something like that, I’m not really much of an expert on crime designations) and, at least in his mind, was destined to be doing at least 16 years at the end of his trial. This was far too much for me to even comprehend and I told him I have no idea what I would do if I were in his shoes – I mentioned that I would probably kill myself. He told me that he had considered that…

One of the guards entered our cell at the end of our conversation and informed me that I was getting moved to a different cell. Oh well, whatever … it’s not like I had any control over anything going on to begin with. I basically got up, grabbed my sheets and blankets (still neatly folded), picked up my plastic coffee mug of goodies and walked out to the catwalk with the guard. I figured this would be a great opportunity to inquire, once again, about what I needed to do about paying my bail and getting out of there…

The guard explained to me something about my needing to fill out some sort of forms (where I got these, I had no clue) if I wanted to pay the bail with a credit card or that it might be quicker if I just called somebody to come down and pay my bail for me. Okay, but I needed my phone – currently being held by the jail – in order to get the necessary phone numbers. It’s not like anybody actually remembers numbers these days – we have cell phones for that… I also needed access to a usable telephone.

I explained this to the guard. He was kind enough to take down a couple names (I gave him Matt and Doug) and would see what he could do. I was then asked if I wanted to be put in a cell with a cellmate or alone. I said I really didn’t care either way … whatever was easiest…

He put me in cell #13 – right next to where I was – alone. The door was closed with the clunk of the locks engaging; I dropped my “possessions” on the lone table and plopped down on the lower bunk bed. I didn’t know what time it was although I was thinking that it shouldn’t be too much longer before we were let out for dinner. It was just before dinner (actually closer to 4:40 than 4:30) when the guard returned to my cell. It was then that I noticed a clock visible from my cell…

He informed me that he had done a “solid” for me and gave me a sheet of paper from his little notebook. It had three phone numbers for Doug, two numbers for Matt (although I really had no idea which numbers were for which phones) and two of my credit card numbers complete with expiration dates and security code numbers. He said that I needed to get my “prisoner identification number” in order to use the phones in the commons area (there were two) but that I would need to learn how to use the phones from somebody else as he would be too busy to help me. He also said that he would get my prisoner identification number to me after he completed serving the dinner trays. The cell doors were then unlocked and the inmates headed out to the commons area for dinner.

I climbed down the stairs as well and sat down on a random seat. I had no plan on eating and one of the other inmates must have picked up on this as he asked if he could have my meal. Fine with me … I hopped in line, grabbed my dinner tray and a small box of milk, headed over to the guy that requested it and gave away my dinner. (Now just in case anybody’s thinking it, NO, this was not me being “forced” to give up my meal – I was not going to eat it and figured I’d help another guy out … you quickly learn compassion for these guys when you’re forced to spend time in their world for a bit…) My only goal at the time was to make a phone call to somebody (Doug or Matt) to get me out of there as my requests to pay my own way out appeared to be falling on deaf ears…

As I handed my dinner tray to the inmate that requested it, I made a general plea to the entire table on whether one of them could help me with making a phone call. All of them seemed almost eager to help and one even said that he would set me up with his code so that I could quickly make a call even before getting my PIN. That was awfully nice of the guy; unfortunately there was a bit of a problem with this.

You see, after he had set the phone with his code, handed me the handset and told me to dial out, the little SNAFU of the plan quickly reared its head. The problem was this: The only phone calls inmates are allowed to make out of the jail are collect calls. This being the case, the party being called is given a standard message that can be broken down as follows:

“Hello. You are receiving a collect call from {inmate’s name in inmate’s own voice} who is currently in the Boulder County Jail. To authorize this call, please press 5. If you do not accept this call, please hang up. To block all future calls from this facility, please press 9.”

I attempted to call Doug on the first of the three numbers I had listed for him. As soon as I heard the message that was being sent to him, I was pretty sure that the call was not going to be answered as I was 100% sure that he did not know anybody by the name being said. I was correct and, after hearing the message repeated a few times, got another message that plainly said the call was not answered.

So I guess I’m going to need to get my own PIN before I’ll be able to get anybody I know to actually answer the phone…

Be sure to come back soon for the rest of this story. I should have plenty of time to write during this Labor Day weekend… For now however, I bid you adieu.

bis später,

Coriolis

Vague Clarity

Continuing the story from Here Come da Judge…

It’s 2:00pm on a Thursday. I’m sitting (immobilized with a chain around my waist and handcuffs) on a bench behind a large glass window looking out into a courtroom. I just had a brief discussion with some guy that I am assuming to be a district attorney and have the impression that I could very well end up doing “time” for some sort of “obstruction of justice” that I have absolutely no recollection for at all. The judge has just entered and taken his position at the bench…

The judge begins calling cases, one after the other. Little time is spent on each case. There is a substantial amount of people waiting for their case to be called (it’s not just the inmates sitting with me in my little glassed-off section – there’s another, much larger area containing civilians from the outside waiting for their cases to be called as well) and it appears like the court is trying to get through each as quickly as it can. These aren’t actual trials … I’m going to once again make an assumption here and say that I believe the process I was witnessing was arraignment. Each conversation always ended in some “pre-trial” date being scheduled and (in the case of our group – the inmates) bail amounts made known.

About an hour or so into this, the judge called out my name. I stood and made my presence known.

The judge mentions something about me being at “the ARC” last night where I was arrested for impeding or hindering an agent in completing a governmental duty by physical interference. My first question, of course, is inquiring as to exactly what “the ARC” is. Turns out it’s the “Addicts Rehabilitation Center” – the drunk tank. I, of course, remember nothing about being anywhere of the sort. The last memory I have of the night before was sitting on a stool in my hotel’s bar. So, somehow I ended up in the Boulder drunk tank … unfortunately, even now as I write this, I have no idea how this happened…

He continues explaining my situation and mentions that, as part of my bond restrictions, I am not allowed to leave the state and, since the crime is alcohol-related, I need to get in contact with some sort of alcohol recovery agency and sign up for substance abuse monitoring (which I took to mean somewhat frequent breath-testing being completed on a regular basis for a while). The problem with this latest information, obviously, is that I live in California. As a matter of fact, I had a flight scheduled back to LAX leaving on Saturday – in two days. I mention this information to the judge who merely responds that I need to get written permission to leave the state at some courthouse in Boulder and somehow arrange for the substance abuse monitoring to get transferred to California else I would be violating my bond and a warrant would be issued for my arrest.

He then inquired as to whether I would be hiring a lawyer, set my “pre-trial” court date for early October and asked if I could pay the one hundred dollar bail. I said that I would be hiring a lawyer, explained once again that I lived in California so I might have difficulty making it to a “pre-trial” hearing in October and made it very clear that I could easily cover the bail amount after having my possessions (my wallet) returned. He then said that my lawyer – since I would be hiring one – would be able to represent me at the pre-trial and that was that … he moved on to the next case.

You read that correctly, my bail was set at $100. When he mentioned this, quite a few of the inmates sitting with me couldn’t help but chuckle a bit. Most of the bails that were being discussed prior to my case were in the multiple thousands of dollars range. The lowest before mine was still $500. This made me start thinking that something funny was going on. Don’t get me wrong, although I was now technically informed as to why I was in jail, this exceptionally low bail just brought up more questions… Mainly why was I actually jailed, held without explanation for many hours against my will, immobilized by chains and handcuffs, led to believe that I would be serving time by, once again, who I believed was the district attorney just to find out that my vaguely worded crime had a whole C-note required for me to be released? It seemed to me that somebody somewhere was abusing their authority rather blatantly.

Unfortunately, thanks to the alcohol consumed the night before, I had absolutely no recollection of anything that happened. I had no way to argue anything as I remembered nothing – you can’t argue what you aren’t even aware of… Whatever the case, my plan was to pay my bail, get the hell out of there and contact a lawyer. I was hoping that the lawyer would be able to help me get the needed permission to fly back home as a number one priority … perhaps he would be able to help me find out whether my assumption on the authority abuse was true sometime later; however at that time the one thing I needed to do was be able to return to California. Assuming, of course, I could get out of jail…

You see, that’s the weird part about all this. I had my “day in court” for my arraignment. I informed the judge that I could easily pay the bail and needed to get released quickly in order to be able to contact a lawyer with enough time to get the bond restriction issues solved prior to my flight leaving in almost exactly two days time. I was thinking my next stop would be to get my possessions returned. I could pay the bail, get a ride back to the hotel (Oh yeah, the hotel – I was supposed to have been checking out today!! What about my stuff?! What about the hotel I’m supposed to be checking-in to this evening?!) and start looking for a lawyer. For then all I could do was sit and wait…

There were only a couple cases dealt with after mine before an officer instructed all of the inmates (including yours truly) to quietly head back out into the hallway. We were then lined up against a wall and the handcuffs and chains were removed. I remember the conversation I had with the guy standing next to me. He basically informed me that my case sounded to him like something I would soon be looking back at and laughing about. He apparently had a similar situation himself a few years back. The part that scared me was that he said I shouldn’t be expecting to be leaving anytime soon. It wasn’t until 11:00pm that he was able to leave.

No … I already told the judge that I could pay the bail and was expecting to do so. All they needed to do was return my personal possessions and I could leave. It was only somewhere around 3:00 – I’ll have plenty of time to get the hotel situations taken care of and get a lawyer started on my case this evening. Boy was I mistaken…

After the chains and handcuffs were removed from all the inmates, we were lead back down the series of hallways back to the holding cells. The guard standing by the door then went down the line asking for names and cell numbers. I was at the end of the line. When she got to me, I gave my name and cell number – #14. I then asked when I would be able to pay my bail. The guy that I was talking to earlier clarified my query and told the guard that I wanted to pay my bail with the credit cards in my wallet – which, of course, was in their possession… The response I got was that she (the guard) would “look into it”…

The door was opened, we were informed that it was still lockdown and instructed to head straight to our cells. I climbed the stairs, headed in to cell #14 and lied down on the lower bunk. Apparently we were having dinner sometime around 4:30…

Unfortunately this is where I need to be leaving you today. I’ll try to get the next chapter up sometime soon. For now, I need to get some work done…

bis später,

Coriolis

Here Come da Judge

For anybody just joining this story, I was sitting in the commons area of the Boulder County Jail staring at the wall. For a more detailed explanation, you can read my What Happened??? post. I’m going to continue my story from there…

As I mentioned, I was sitting in this chair staring at the wall for some unknown amount of time just waiting for something to happen. I actually had no idea what was going to – or even supposed to – be happening … all I could do was wait. It’s not like I had any other choice. It gave me some time to contemplate a bit about my current situation…

I began contemplating what could possibly have happened the night before that would end up getting me put on ice. Was I stupid enough to have driven somewhere? That seemed to me rather unlikely as my whole plan with drinking at my hotel bar was designed to make this possibility unnecessary. But did I? Where would I have been going and why? No … this seemed extremely unlikely to me…

Perhaps I got into a fight with Todd? I suppose that would be possible – I’m well aware that Todd has a rather bad habit of getting quite rambunctious when he’s been drinking. How much did he drink? I have no idea… I know that I basically blacked out the entire night; but perhaps Todd wasn’t as bad as me. Perhaps he was…? Did Todd and I get into a fight and have somebody call the cops on us? I don’t know; however this scenario also seemed very unlikely…

Did I hurt somebody? No, not me … I’m most definitely not a fighter.

It was then that I started noticing more and more pains related to my own body. The intoxication that I was still under upon waking was now quickly wearing off and being replaced by a quite mean hangover. My head hurt … my eyes hurt … my upper arms hurt (especially the left one) … my back felt like it was rather severely bruised and my right hand felt all puffed up and was severely tender to the touch. I started to notice that I was most definitely not in good shape at that moment…

During my absolutely futile attempt at trying to remember anything from the night before, I observed meals being served to the rest of the inmates. Basically, the door was opened and one of the guards had rolled up a large metal container filled with orange plastic trays. All the inmates lined up and where given one tray and a small milk carton (like the ones we used to get in grade school) each. After everyone received their meals, my last name was called out by the guard at the door. One of the meals was for me. I opted to pass…

Shortly after this I was approached by a guard and told to go ahead and deposit my stuff in cell #14. You see, around this commons area were two levels of cells with stairs on both ends. A portion of the lower level seemed to be separated from the rest by yet another area behind large glass panes. I never found out why this was; however I’m assuming it had to do with different levels of confinement. This was all new to me, so assumptions are all I had to go on… Cell #14 was up the stairs to my left. I grabbed my “stuff” and headed up to the cell.

I was a bit surprised when I saw that somebody else was already assigned to this cell. There were already items strewn about the cell – towels, clothing, books – your typical jail cell stuff I guess… I basically tossed my pile of “stuff” on the lower bunk and lied down – the hangover was kicking in big time now.

It was shortly after this when somebody below announced “lockdown.” This was rather quickly followed by all of the inmates returning to their cells and the loud thump of the magnetic locks fastening. The interesting thing was that my cell – cell #14 – didn’t get locked. How I found this out was when I actually got up from the bed, walked the very short walk to the door, opened it up and walked out to lean on the metal railing of the upper level walkway. This was apparently a stupid thing to do as it caused one of the inmates that looked to be cleaning the commons area to yell at me to get back in my cell. He mentioned something about me being out there causing a 23 hour mandatory lockdown for all. I apologized and quickly went back into my cell … I had absolutely no business being where I was – I also had absolutely no idea what the rules were nor how to go about finding out. All I wanted to do was get out of there and I had no information as to how I could make this happen. Never before had I experienced such a loss of control – there was nothing I could do…

Now I’m not exactly sure when or how I discovered this (perhaps one of the guards came up to speak with me…) however somewhere around that time I became aware that I was scheduled to be in court in something like a half hour. This, to me, seemed like good news. Maybe I would be able to discover what was going on? I decided to lie down and wait for court … what’s a half hour after what I had already been forced to go through…?

Sure enough, a little while later I heard a guard calling out various names below. When I heard mine called, I headed down and out into the hallway with the others. We were then marched single-file down a couple of halls to this waiting room that we were instructed to enter. I grabbed a seat in the corner and basically sat with my head in my hands – the hangover was intense. The guy sitting to my right then inquired as to whether this was my first time and I answered that it was. He asked what I was in for and I told him that I had no idea – I was sitting at a bar last night and I woke up in a jail cell this morning. I think many of the guys in that room got a kick out of this…

You see, most of these guys were multiple offenders. They all seemed at ease with the process – like they had done this many times before. It appeared that many of them even knew each other. Here I was, a complete outsider – pretty much scared shitless – with a huge hangover trying to cope with the fact that I found myself incarcerated earlier that day and had absolutely no idea why. I basically sat there and listened to the others shoot the shit trying not to look like I felt. You talk about your “fish out of water”…

We were then asked to come out in the hallway, one at a time, where chains were fastened around our wastes and our hands got cuffed to the chains in the front. After immobilizing us in this fashion, we were led into this small room with two benches and a large glass wall that looked out into a courtroom. We took our seats on the benches and the DA (I think it was the DA…) then came in to talk to some of us – he was going to explain the plea bargains, I guess. The first name he called was mine…

He mentioned that I was being held on some sort of obstruction of justice and the penalty for which was something like 6 months in prison. Prison, mind you!!! I couldn’t believe what I was hearing and asked, just for clarification purposes, whether I would be doing “time”… Now this whole conversation is very muddled in my memory – I suppose the shock value of it all along with my ever-agonizing hangover might explain why – however I seem to remember this guy basically confirming that I would be going to jail. He then mentioned something about probation (as I said, this conversation’s memory is a bit of a blur to me) and I excused myself for being so ignorant to the processes involved there and requested further clarification as to what was going on.

His response to this request was that he had others he needed to address and couldn’t spend any more time on me. He started talking to the next on his agenda and there was nothing I could do about it. I sat there quietly, listening to him discuss plea deals with others, waiting for whatever was to happen next. As had become common to me then, I had no idea what it would be…

Some period of time went by (How long? I have no clue… Time passing started to become meaningless to me…) before we were all asked to rise. The judge then entered the courtroom and sat down at the bench. It was then that I noticed the clock on the wall in the courtroom. It was 2:00pm. That was the first time throughout the entire day where I actually knew what time it was. It seemed to me like I had been there for quite some time; however, it was 2:00pm. How much longer am I going to need to be dealing with this place…?

Unfortunately, I need to stop now. I’ll write more later; however I think I’m going to get back to enjoying my freedom now that I actually have it. Oh yes, I do get out of there in time. Be sure to come back to get the rest of the story…

bis später,

Coriolis

What Happened???

Did ya ever have one of those days? You know … one of those days where you felt like you were living somebody else’s life if only for that day??? Probably not. I mean I never thought such a thing even possible – and I’ve lived through some weird days in my life. Please take this little story you are about to read as a warning. As both a warning to the effects of alcohol and a bit of a wakeup call for those of you out there that think prisoner rights – heck, civil rights in general – are merely concerns for others. The following narrative clearly shows there could be a situation where you could quickly become one of those “others.”

My story begins, innocently enough, in my room at the Radisson Hotel in Longmont, Colorado. It was the day after my birthday – a birthday spent completing the tasks required to basically turn what was once my property of residence into merely an investment. I had successfully transferred the tasks required to rent out my house to a property management company and had a few days left before I needed to fly back to my new home in California. It was a Wednesday. My return flight was scheduled for the coming Saturday at 3:15pm.

Since I do enjoy playing a little poker now and again, I decided that it would be much more fun to spend my last two nights at a hotel closer to the casinos in Black Hawk. There was really no reason for me to be staying in Longmont anymore so I booked a room (a suite, actually) at this hotel up in the mountains. I don’t recall the name of the place but it doesn’t really matter – I never showed up. I did however call down to the desk at the Radisson and request that my checkout day be switched from Saturday to Thursday believing that I would be heading up to this new resort the next day. They kindly obliged my request…

I called my buddy Doug – he’s a poker player as well – and let him know that I had booked this room. We arranged it so that he would be heading up Friday afternoon. That was cool, I’d have someone to hang out with on my farewell night out in Black Hawk … who knew the next time I would be returning to Colorado now that I really had nothing holding me there…? My house was basically gutted and put on the market as a rental and I was now living my life as an official Californian. As a matter of fact, I had just received my California driver’s license in the mail the day before I flew back to Colorado on this last trip…

It was then that I received a call from Todd requesting that I head on over to Old Chicago’s. For those not in the know, the Radisson Hotel in Longmont is located directly next-door to Old Chicago’s. I had no other plans for that evening so I made the short walk across the parking lot. I met up with Todd and Dave, had a few of those large warm pretzels with dips, one pint of Guinness and a couple CC Manhattans before deciding to move the festivities over to the Fusion Food & Spirits. The Fusion was the bar located inside the Radisson – the hotel I was staying at, mind you…

You see, the way I figure it, there’s really no safer place to be drinking than at a bar located in your hotel. This assures that you will have absolutely no need to be going elsewhere when you decide to leave the bar. At the worst, it’s just a short stumble back to your room where you can sleep off any condition that you may have acquired that requires being slept off. Heck, you don’t even have to worry about needing to take a cab home – you’re already there… It was decided that, if the need arose, anybody was more than welcome to crash in my room with me. What could possibly mess up such a great plan? Read on, my friend, and find out…

So Todd, Dave and I grab seats at the bar. The place was pretty much empty – I seem to recall there might have been a couple of people there, but it was most definitely not packed … after all, it was a Wednesday evening… Finding three seats together at the bar was no problem.

This is where the vividness on my recollections starts to become foggy. I remember noticing the array of rather interesting drink containers that Fusion had – they had these large glass tanks on display behind the bar with various alcoholic concoctions to choose from. There was this rum drink with large pieces of fruit floating in it as well as what could be described as the ultimate in dirty martinis made up of vodka with a whole lot of olives floating in it. The latter was called a “Dirtini” although I don’t remember the various other drink names. We began ordering drinks.

I remember Dave leaving rather early. Todd had moved to the now empty bar stool next to me (the one formerly occupied by Dave) and we were having a conversation with this other guy that had come in and joined us at the bar. I have no clue as to how long the discussion was nor what we were talking about. This was, however, the last thing I remember of that night…

The next memory I have is waking up. It was weird though – I was still a bit intoxicated however something just didn’t seem right to me. The bed that I was lying on was very firm and I was still wearing my clothes from the night before (although I would soon discover that certain items – shoes, socks, my belt, my phone, my wallet, my keys and my “Green Smoke” e-cig – were missing). And, upon rising, I noticed that I was not in my hotel room. No, as a matter of fact, the room I was in was somewhat confining. It consisted of a cot, a very crude toilet and sink and one very massive, very securely shut door. I was in a jail cell!!!

What the hell?! Why was I coming to in a jail cell?! What had I done?! What do I do now?! How the fuck do I get out of here?!?! I spent the next what seemed like hours pounding on the door, looking out the narrow window panes and trying to ignore the various ruffians that would stop by from time to time to taunt me. I had absolutely no idea what was going on; although I was somewhat expecting a police officer to be stopping by sometime in the near future to possibly explain things to me and hopefully let me out. This never happened…

What did happen (and bear with me a bit; although I remember most of this, it’s somewhat foggy as to the exact details…) was that, in time, an officer retrieved me from my cell and led me to some other location in the building. I don’t recall anybody ever telling me why I was there. What I do recall is getting finger printed and escorted to a small room where I was told to strip down and put on the clothes provided – underwear, an undershirt and a red jumpsuit with “BCOS JAIL” printed in black, block letters on the back.

I was then given a couple sheets, blankets and a plastic coffee mug containing a comb, a small bar of soap, a toothbrush, a tube of toothpaste and a plastic spork before being escorted to a large room where a couple dozen other guys – all wearing very similar red jumpsuits – were meandering about amongst loosely strewn chairs and tables. I was put into this room, the door was shut behind me and I was given no instructions by anybody. I found an empty seat and sat down. Nobody spoke to me and I didn’t try to start any conversations with anybody else. I had no idea what was going on and absolutely no instruction on what I was supposed to be doing. I figured I’d just sit there until somebody decided to fill me in…

There were a couple TVs on the wall I was facing. They were both on however the sound for both was muted and nobody seemed to be paying any attention to them. I just mention this as an observation as their existence meant nothing to me at the time. I just sat there for some unknown period of time basically staring at the wall and waiting – for what, exactly, I had no idea.

And here is where I will be leaving you today. I’m planning on continuing this story soon enough; however, being that I actually am a productive member of society I need to get back to being productive. You can rest assured that this story will be continued as I firmly believe it needs to be told. For now I am going to have to leave you starring at the wall…

bis später,

Coriolis