Fear Me

21

If ever there was a prison that was inviting an uprising, it was Shaddock Valley.

It was an ancient place, dating from the early 19th century and precious few improvements had been made in all that time. It was cold as a mountain ice house in the winter and hot enough to make paint run in the summer. A drafty, leaking, bug-infested hellhole that was old by the time of the First World War and positively decrepit as the millennium approached and then passed. As Shaddock limped into its third century of existence, it remained what it had always been: a dump where the state stowed away its garbage and then turned a blind eye when the rats and maggots started coming out.

Prisoners complained about everything from the food to sanitation to accommodations and were answered by stony silence. Same went for improved medical care and visitation rights, simple things like better mattresses and access to a dentist once every third year.

The guards were vicious and beatings were commonplace… as were weeks spent in the hole over minor and often manufactured offenses. The white boys had it hard and the blacks and Hispanics just a little bit harder. The guards were corrupt and would smuggle in anything from bone movies to drugs if you paid them to do so. But what cost a white man $20, cost a Latino $30, and a black $50. The guards encouraged snitches, even paid inmates to rat on each other… which they did with unsettling regularity. The guards also believed in divide and conquer. Sometimes, out of the blue, they gave certain black prisoners privileges, while denying them to whites, thereby increasing race hatred and encouraging violence which always came sooner or later, usually in the form of blacks and whites going at each other out in the yard with sawed-off pipes and shanks. Sometimes the guards gave special treatment only to certain individuals within a racial group, then made bets on how long it would be before his friends threw him a beating… or worse.

The guards spread rumors, routinely told prisoners lies about their wives and family, anything to stir the pot and make their rodents run the maze. On any given day, inmates could expect their cells to be tossed. Personal belongings were confiscated, drawings made by their children ripped up, pictures of girlfriends taken away and sold to other inmates… and particularly if said girlfriend was wearing a bathing suit or a sexy outfit.

The guards were, for the most part, country boys.

Big, brutal rednecks who hated anyone darker than white on sight. The blacks were beaten on a regular basis and the Hispanics just barely tolerated… unless their English wasn’t real good, then they were officially made prime targets. White criminals such as organized crime types were fawned over and idolized by the guards who waited on them hand and foot, bringing in food from Italian delis for them, wine, fresh fruit and select cuts of meat. Black organized crime figures of no less stature could expect to be thrown in the hole or beaten if it looked like they might try to unify the loose collection of black gangs into a single entity.

Jailhouse lawyers were also hated by the guards.

Starvation rations were commonplace for so much as hinting at filing a writ. Country music was tolerated, but rap and hard rock would get your radio or boombox confiscated and particularly if the guards fancied having it for their own. Letters from home were stalled if you were considered a troublemaker and any outgoing mail was read before being posted. And any tidbits of a personal or intimate nature they could glean from your mail were used to harass you with.

Such was life at Shaddock Valley.

The DOC liked to talk prison reform, but it was yet to be seen at Shaddock. And like old sores that have never been properly treated, only allowed to scab over, the bile and poison built up until it contaminated every nerve ending and strand of muscle, made the blood run toxic, and the entire diseased body of the prison was filled with infection.

And it was only a matter of time before somebody lanced it.