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Journals Ellis Mosher 2007
Due to the ammount i have decided to put this up first, the rest will follow A.S.A.P. Friday; Where to begin is perhaps the biggest question. I never really did deicide so instead I will merely tell you the source of my reservations and see where my mind takes us from there. I do not really see myself as a very good writer. Although I graduated from High School I actually only attended for a single year. I often feel at a disadvantage in writing because of this, especially when dealing with those who I know have a college education, such as a lawyer. I have a limited vocabulary and cannot always find the words in which to express what I am feeling. I’ve tried really hard to better educate myself over the last few years. MY girlfriend Elizabeth (or perhaps not my girlfriend, I’ll speak on that later) says I have done a good job with my writing, but I don’t know if that is true or simply her way of supporting me. So I still feel very self-conscious when I write. I guess I will have to do my best, and hope that if my words are lacking you will be able to see the intent rather than judging me for my lack. Anyways, as I said I just come in. I am exhausted, my legs hurt and I am nearly sick. Nothing is wrong with me, I just pushed myself harder than I really wanted to. I was working out with several other inmates doing what is known in prison as “burpie.” You would likely know this exercise as a 3 count squad thrust. I am in decent shape; some of the guys are in better shape than me, some are worse. If I was able to be sensible I would simply have done what I needed to do for a good workout then stopped. It never works out that way though. I had to keep going for as long as everyone else. If we were at the gym where you work out and I did this, you would laughingly put it off as just being ego and my being hardheaded. And in a setting such as you are used to that would probably be true. That is not the case here in prison. I really don’t care who is or who is not in better shape than I. I prefer to do my thing and not worry about anyone else, but that isn’t possible here. In prison perception is everything. People are constantly watching, looking for little signs that might give them insight into your nature so that they can use it against you. Prisoners do not think in ways which you are used to, and they read into the actions of others things which would never occur to you. When you see someone stop working out before their workout partner it means little to you. Perhaps they were just tired or having an off day, Here people see it as a sign of weakness. If you stop a work out early it is seen as an indication of your character, that you will not follow things through, and that you may back down if threatened. These thoughts can cause something as simple as stopping early in a set of burpies to become a reason for you to be targeted for assault, robbery, rape or murder. There are many instances in prison where a person who wants to remain safe has to do things they would rather not do. This is one of the simplest examples. I met her about 19 months ago through an add on the internet. I can hear you laughing because you are of course thinking of the prison / pen pal cliché. Popular wisdom would have it that I would only want to scam her, and that she must be too dumb or too ugly to get a man who is not in prison. That is so far from the truth in our case, it’s not even on the same planet. I took the ad out without any great expectations, just in hopes of finding someone to talk about things that do not have to do with prison. I needed that because without it it is so easy to get caught up in a “prison mentality.” When everyone you talk to, everyone you have contact with, is another inmate or a guard the topics never range far from prison. Those people seem to gossip, eat, sleep, and breathe prison. I’m tired of prison stories. I don’t want to hear about prison. I want to hear about the outside world and try to escape mentally from this place, if only for a short time. I didn’t really care who I wrote. They did not have to be leading an exciting life, going to exotic places, driving a fancy car or have super model good looks. I would have been happy just having an average person tell me about their average day. Much to my surprise the girl wrote to me is anything average. She is beautiful, intelligent, funny, - all the things people wish to find in a perfect companion. I expect that you think that I am exaggerating, but I assure you I am not. Of course I am biased in her favor because during the course of writing to her I fell in love with her. Even so my bias is not why I say these things. I say them because they are true. Where I looked only for a friend and a little conversation I found a wonderful women who I can love. I think that she fell in love with me as well. I’m not sure why. She is beautiful and smart enough to have pretty much any guy she wants. So why she prefers me I can not guess. But perhaps I should say preferred rather then prefers, because I am not sure were we stand at the moment. When we first bean to speak of our feelings of one another all of my insecurities came to the fore. Since I came to prison young I am not exactly an expert when it comes to women. As I have nothing to offer her I wondered if she might be playing a game with me; merely teasing me with saying she was in love, and would drop me when she grew tired. But eventually I became convinced that she was sincere. You cannot begin to understand how much better that made my life. In prison you are treated badly, looked down upon and reminded every single second that you are not part of society, and that you are worthless. After being treated that way for so long you begin to feel it is really true. That you are worthless and that you deserve to be treated badly. I’ve read books on psychology and been amazed to find that the same feelings felt by prisoners are also felt by children who are abused by their parents, and women who are abused by their spouses. In every case these feelings are untrue. Logically I know I am not worthless, I know I don’t deserve to be treated the way I am in prison, and I know that any feelings that I do are simply psychological response pattern to abuse. But that knowledge is no defense, and logic is no protection. So I have the feelings as everyone else caught up in an abusive situation. That
is until I was with I fear that is all gone now. I’ve been honest with her since the start of our relationship and told her about a lot of things that I have done and seen in prison. But once I had been indicted on these murder charges, I guess all of her insecurities came to the fore. She is not a criminal, she has no experience with prison, a fact of which I am very glad. But by the same token she does not understand how things can really be. She has the average citizen view of the world in which the cops are the good guys and the prosecutors never lie. So of course her assumptions when she learned that the prosecutions version of what happened was different than mine I must be the liar. I
have done a lot of bad things in my life. I’ve been accused of many
things; some of which I have done and some which I have not. But of all
the accusations that one that cuts the deepest is her belief that I have
lied to her. I don’t really know how to convince her that I have been
honest. Her doubt about the veracity of my stories have led to other
doubts. And those doubts have led her to jump to erroneous conclusions
about other things as well. Even if I win this case I don’t see how I
can convince her of the truth of my feelings. So not only is this case
causing me to stay locked down in a room the size of the average persons
bathroom while outside that room the entire Federal Government work
toward finding a way to kill me – it has destroyed the only thing
meaningful in my life. Relationships are a real bitch. Half the time I
pray for a way to bring The hair itself is not what’s really on my mind this moment. It is the circumstances of the cut. Four officers came to my cell and took me out to get it done. Although I was left handcuffed and shackled the entire time, two of them stayed in front of me, and two of them behind. Staring at me the whole time as if I would suddenly burst free from the chains and wreak havoc. I
really have never understood the guards attitude. It reminds me of a
book I heard of a few year ago. It was written by some biker, and
although I did not read it the name stuck in my mind. “Fear and
loathing in Mindless illogical hatred such as that really gets to me. Plenty of guards have done things to me in the past, hurt me, been disrespectful to me, lied about me, yet I don’t hate all of them. When I get angry it is only at the ones who have done something directly to me, and deserve my anger. It seems to me that they should give me some benefit of the doubt, and only dislike me if I do something to them. It just doesn’t work that way – not in prison. I wished people understand that better. When you try to explain to the average person how guards who have had zero personal conflict with you will beat you, lie about you, fabricate evidence and commit many other illegal acts against inmates, they don’t want to believe it. They apply logic to the situation, and say it just does not make sense. I agree wholeheartedly; it does not make sense, but nevertheless it is still true. It does not take a conspiracy aimed at you personally for personal reasons to get guards to do that. It’s hard for me to guess at their motivations, maybe it is just that “Blue Team” mentality, where they can generate fear and loathing for anyone who is indicted for any reason, and the same mentality which makes them want to help those people to prosecute in anyway possible, regardless at how dishonorable their actions may be. I read a quote once by Mark Twain if I recall correctly. He said; “If you want to see the absolute dregs of society go to any prison… at the charging of a guard. That is just as true now as it was then. I think that is what makes the prison atmosphere so pervasively oppressive and demoralizing. Not the loss of freedom. Not even the physical danger. But simply the mindless reactions of everyone around you, the hatred of guards for inmates, of inmates for guards, the knee jerk reactions and stereotypical mindset of those who let their surroundings influence them rather then thinking for themselves. Now that I am on that subject and thinking about it, I guess that sort of reactionary thinking or not thinking as the case may be, is not restricted to prison. While the guards baseless reactions to me bothers me it is something I’ve come to accept. What really bothers me is when people outside of prison react to me without bothering to know me. This may sound silly coming from somebody in my position who most people would expect to be thick skinned and not easily bothered by anything, but the worst I have felt in quite some time was when my girlfriends sister wrote to me. The contents of the letter is irrelevant at the moment. The thing that bothered me was what she had to say at the end. She wanted an answer from me, but did not want it sent to her home because she said she was afraid for me to have her address. Afraid? Of me? That seems ludicrous beyond belief at least from my viewpoint. Despite my past history I just do not feel like I am a bad guy. I don’t feel dangerous. I suppose that would be because I know I am not a murderer. I know that the only times I have engaged in violence is when I’ve been forced into it. So in my mind I perceive myself as pretty much a normal guy. The dislike and the fear most guards seem to hold for me has never based that perception. I don’t expect them to be my friend or to like me. But when it comes to my girlfriends sister I want her to like me, to realize I am a decent guy, to trust me and to know that I am someone she can believe in. And because of my perception of myself I actually expected that to happen. It did not, of course. She needed only to hear the charges against me to believe everything was true, and worse besides, without bothering to find out anything about me. Perhaps I am foolish for having expected anything different, but I really did. It’s times like this when I occasionally wish everything ever said about me was true. If I was a cold blooded murderer I would expect no one to trust me, and my feelings would not ever be hurt when I am distrusted. Maybe that would be better because it would protect me. But no matter how I may sometimes try to make myself hard, to insulate myself, against everyone I still never have managed to keep from feeling hurt when someone believes the worst of me. That probably ridiculous, but there it is. Letting my mind go along these lines makes me worry. If I cannot make the people who work around me everyday understand I am not a bad guy, if I cannot make my girlfriend’s sister believe that – how can I possibly imagine that I convince 12 total strangers that I am not a murderer??? The dictionary I have defines a peer as “someone of equal status to another.” That is all well and good , but who ends up as a defendant in most trials? They are usually young, poor, have been in trouble repeatedly and are disaffected with the government. At the same time those who end up as jurors are usually older, affluent, have never been in trouble with the law and believe the government is here to help you. So, how by anyone’s definition are those people peers? If either we’re questioned, defendant, or juror, do you think they would regard their other as peer? In a case such as my own with my own being already in prison the gap is even larger. Any juror will know right from the start that I am already in exile from society. That means I am a bad bad man, doesn’t it? So they will be even more predisposed towards finding me guilty. How can a doctor, dentist, teacher or housewife possibly understand the society in which I live, and the things I must do in order to survive? It is very easy while sitting comfortably in an armchair at home by the protection of laws to forget that anyone is in the same situation. The philosopher John Locke is the one who said; “ all of knowledge is bounded by experience.” There is no way any juror can possibly understand prison society. It will not occur to most of them that I even live in a different society then them, but believe me the society in which they live, and the society in which I live, are as different as night and day. If they are not made to understand this, then my case is lost even before it has begun. Let
me use a simple example. Imagine if you will a pretty young girl walking
down the street. She is wearing a short skirt and a midriff bearing
blouse. She smiles and waves casually to a man as she passes him. Do you
see anything wrong with that? Of course you don’t. It happens everyday
in every city in the My point in bringing this up is that prison society is as different from normal society as the U.S. is to Saudi Arabia or maybe even more so. The same standards do not apply or at least they should not. The government can make those standards apply because they have the manpower and ability to force their standards on prisoners. But they cannot make it right. I feel like it is imperative to make jurors understand everything in prison is different. What people here believe as right and wrong, how people react to certain situations, especially threats, and what one must do in order to remain safe, none of it is the same. If jurors judge me by the same standards as they judge themselves then there is no way I can see them condoning my actions. NO one on a jury would have ever been placed in a position of fearing for their life and having no alternative but to defend it. They would simply run away or call cops, neither option of which is open to me. So I really feel a need to speak to these people, let them see who I am. Facts, figures, incident reports and the like are not going to convey who I really am. Unless they put themselves in my shoes, understand the fears and pressures and pains of prison, how can they possibly render a just verdict? These are my worries and fears at the moment. The pressure cooker of prison indoctrinates people with many responses and feelings that none outside of prison has. I hope you can find some way to help me explain that because based on my own experience in trying to show the real me to other people (such as my girlfriend’s sister) I did not do a very good job. Perhaps rather than jumping full bore into things that happened which led to this case, I should go back to a time before it ever happened and explain prison to you from a time when I was seeing it with new eyes. Maybe fading into things gradually will help you understand somewhat better. My
first experience with federal prison was at the United States
Penitentiary Lewisburg; a maximum security prison which was built long
ago. I’m not sure how old it is, but with its high walls and razor
wire shrouded fences, it is very intimidating. It looms up like some
ancient castle from a gothic novel. I caught my glimpse of it as we
pulled up on the bus. There were a number of inmates on board with me.
One in particular caught my eye. He was big, much bigger then myself
with a shaved head, huge bushy mustache and covered in crude bluish
tattooing which had
obviously been done in prison. Were you to put in a call to Central
Casting in The bus stopped first at the “camp”, which is the minimum security facility near the main prison. The guards began calling peoples names and a number of men got off the bus. After all the names had been called the bald tattooed man began questioning the guards as to why his name had not been called. He obviously had expected to be going to the camp. When he began making a commotion I shrank down on my seat and tried to make sure I did not draw any of his attention. I was expecting there to be real problems if this guy got angry. When
the officers informed him that the paperwork they had showed he would
not go to the camp, but instead to the max security facility to which I
was going, I was shocked and amazed to say the least at his reaction.
This big guy who was taller, and outweighed me by perhaps 75- Needles to say, seeing this guy react in such a manner scared the shit out of me. If Lewisburg was such a bad place that it could induce that type of fear in him, how the hell was I going to cope? So eventually we were all unloaded from the bus and herded into the processing room of the prison. At this point I was pretty jumpy, having no idea what to expect next. When the guards who were doing our paper work began watching me out of the corners of their eyes, speaking together in low tones obviously talking about me, I had a real flare of paranoia. I could see no reason that they should be paying special attention to me, yet they were. When it became my turn to be separated from everyone else during the questioning that goes along with the paperwork I found out what they had been talking about. No one asked me questions I was expecting. Instead the guards began telling me things. They told me how dangerous the prison was. They told me people were stabbed, raped and murdered here on regular basis. They told me there were a number of factors that made people a target for such things. Being young was one, being inexperienced was another, being white was one, being small was one and not already having friends here was one. Since I met every single one of those criteria, they told me it was not a question of if I would become a target but only of when. They asked me what I would do when someone pulled a knife on me, what I would do if it was just not one person, but three or five or a dozen. Then after filling me with these horror stories they advised me that I should not go to the prison population at all, but that I should immediately request protected custody. Now to you this perhaps seems a sensible suggestion, but that is due only to your lack of knowledge. Even as inexperienced as I was at that time I knew that requesting protection or becoming a “P.C.” was no way to go. People in P.C. are not safe, they have placed themselves in a position of having every mans hand against him. They live miserable lives of fear because it is not just the predators who will come after them, it is now everyone. Since a person has run they have to keep running, there is no end to it. Not only are they hated by other inmates, they are despised by the guards as well, and often the guards will allow other inmates to get to them; to beat them up, stab them or whatever the case may be, simply for the guards own amusement. So as filled with fear as I was at that moment. I felt the lesser of the two evils was to fear whatever danger that may come in hopes of earning the respect of other inmates, and some modicum of safety rather then putting myself in a position of running for the rest of my life; never knowing from what direction danger may come. When I finally convinced the guards I was not going to request protection I was assigned to a unit and released into the general population. When I left the receiving room I found myself down on almost endless series of corridors, until I reached a long hallway. There were people everywhere gathered in little clumps. Every group segregated itself. A dozen blacks here, a half dozen Mexicans there, 8 white guys in another, 5 Asians there and every single one staring at me. Everyone always gathers that way when the bus arrives to look at the “new meat.” There is no hiding that you are a new guy. Where everyone is dressed in sweat suits, coats, boots, hats; all with their own little personalization, I was wearing elastic wasted khaki pants, blue t-shirt and blue slippers and carrying a bed roll. Although the distance I had to cover was not really long it seemed to take forever to reach my unit. And every step felt as if I was running the gauntlet. When I finally reached the unit and walked up to the second floor, I was receiving the same hard blank stares from everyone there. No one ever wants to be first to great the new guy in case he is no good. So there are no smiles or handshaking or any of that. Just ± 100 or so calculating looks. At the same time as I was surveying my fellow prisoners I became aware of the smells. The place reeked of a combination of stale food, urine, cheap disinfectant and other things even more unpleasant. You can say that fear and depression are intangible, and cannot possibly have a smell of their own, but I promise you that you are wrong because I smelled those things there that day. I went to the second floor to find my cubicle, on the way there I passed an area that reeked even worse than the rest of the unit. It was a disgusting burnt smell like a bad barbeque; charred meat with a sick sweet undertone that seemed to stick to your skin as if it would never wash off. I did not know what it was until later when I had dropped off my things and met my bunkmate. He seemed to take great pleasure in telling the story to me. .. The night before I had arrived an inmate in the unit had been burned alive. He had been doused with paint thinner thickened with soap , so that it would stick to him, then lit on fire. It was done because he was a snitch or maybe a P.C. case, or maybe he had nothing at all other then be at the wrong spot at the wrong time; it all depend on what rumor the person you asked happened to be passing along at the moment. The side of the burning was pointed out to me by my bunkmate. The floor was burned black, as was the front of the locker. In the midst of the charred marks were lumps of what looked like dirty Crisco. He explained to me that when a person is set on fire the fat in their body does not burn it only melts, and that was what I was looking at. He also explained to me in great detail how the burning had not been a painful death. Since it was thrown in his face the victim had immediately inhaled the flame as he sucked in his breath, which charred his lungs and killed him before he could even scream. Months later I was still told by other inmates that I had been lied to, that no one had ever been burned to death in that unit. I was never able to find out for sure which was the truth. But for me at that point in time I believed it. That night I laid in my bed unable to sleep, listening to a man s few cubicles down crying, while his bunkmate raped him. I made a promise to myself then that whatever happened I was going to survive. I was not going to let myself become a victim. I was not going to be one of the ones other people hear crying at night. I do not like some of the things I have had to do to keep that promise. I don’t like to think about it, and most days I can get through without the thoughts paralyzing me. But still I’ve kept that promise and I always will. Anyways, I meant to write more on the subject of Lewisburg last night, but I had to stop for a while. Not because I had something better to do and not because I had run out of time. I had to stop because a lot of things about Lewisburg still bothered me. You would think that when a person is arrested they would fully realize the depth of the trouble they are in. I can’t speak for others, but I know that for myself the full reality of my problems did not occur to me, did not really hit home until Lewisburg. As I believe I said before, a lot of things about that place still bothers me. I don’t like to think about them because when I do I am forced to realize that this was the beginning of my devolution. I don’t mean of course that I become less visibly human, but it is the point where I began to feel less real, less like a normal person. It’s hard to describe the feeling. Maybe you can only understand it fully if it has happened to you. So all I will say about it now is that it is nothing anyone should ever experience. Lewisburg is the place that taught that everyone wears masks (metaphorical). It is simply a matter of self preservation. Prisoners wear masks for many different situations. I wear one mask for the prison guards; I put it on when I must show them that being strip searched in front of a dozen people does not bother me. That having my face slammed into a wall when I am cuffed and shackled does not bother me. With this mask on I can show no reaction when guards throw my family photos on the floor, my toothbrush in the toilet, leave dirty footprints on my bed sheets or spit in my food. To show reaction in any of those situations only makes them occur over and over. A total lack of reaction causes them to soon move on to a different target who will give them the reaction they hope for. I wear another mask to other inmates. I wear it to cover emotions, of which they can take advantage. I do not show them my fear, I do not show them my anger. I do not let them see when I am happy or sad, angry or afraid, because anytime they know that you are feeling there is a possibility that someone will attempt to use it to manipulate or hurt me.. To you or to any normal person what I am saying may seem like paranoia, and it is. But the one thing you have to keep in mind is that in your world paranoia is a bad thing. If someone acts suspicious in your environment people say he must be crazy. In my world that is not so. Paranoia in the prisoners friend. It is a tool used to stay alert and to stay alive. When someone seems overly suspicious in prison and it is noticed by other inmates they don’t say “he’s crazy.” They say “that is a smart guy.” As I’m sure you know everyone is shaped by their environment. Different branches of psychology can argue all they want about which influence is greater, genetic or environment. But regardless of who is correct, and who you believe, it is arguable that environment shapes character. People tend to have their outlooks shaped by the positive and negative influences in their lives. When an action you take is repeatedly rewarded you tend to think of it as a good thing. When an action you take is repeatedly punished you inevitably come to look upon it as something bad. In prison one of the things that is repeatedly rewarded is violence. Violence or at least the capacity for violence is what establishes the social hierarchy of prison. With no exceptions people who are assaultive or who have committed murder are given the most respect, and are regarded as being at the top of the food chain. From there people such as robbers, kidnappers and such are slightly lower standing. Non violent crimes such as drug sells and burglary are lower, with white collar non violent crimes below them, until you reach the bottom of the social pyramid with the people such as snitches, child molesters and rapists who will not involve themselves in any violence. Because of prison social status being dependent upon violence, it is often imperative for any prisoner who seeks safety and respect to try appear as if he is willing to engage in violence. Outward appearance is often enough to ward off most problems and buy respect. An easy example of this is the big guy I saw on the bus on the way to Lewisburg. People who had not seen him breakdown as I did would likely not want problems with him based on solely his looks. Some people are not so lucky in that respect. Some people are not naturally big and hard looking. I am one of those people. No matter how much I try because of my looks people have a tendency to believe they can take advantage of me. I mostly try to deal with them in a calm logical manner, and not let it escalate into a real problem. But that seldom if ever works. People in prison see any form of politeness, courtesy or trying to talk out a problem as a sign of weakness. Once someone has made aggressive overtures towards you, trying to talk them out of it only encourages their aggression. Not only does it encourage that individual, it encourages any other person who may be aware of the situation into thinking you are an easy target, and that they can take advantage of you as well The only way to deal with a threat and be safe is to meet aggression with aggression. It doesn’t matter if you want to. It doesn’t matter if you’re afraid. It doesn’t matter one bit if you like it. It is simply the only way. Once you have done this and been involved in any kind of violence, serious or not, your entire prison experience changes. You are always rewarded immensely for any act of violence. You are suddenly accepted by those who would never have accepted you. People you have never seen are friendly to you. People want to say hi. People want to give you things. They respect you, and you find that you have taken a huge step upwards in social standing in everyone’s eyes. Even the prison guards treat you differently They hassle you less and listen to you more. That
is why so many inmates are involved in violence again and again; because
of the rewards it carries, they see it as a good thing. And that
perception of status is not just among the inmates. An easy example of
this is something I saw here at At this point they decided to go a difficult route, and were ready to fight for their recreation. They barricaded their doors and prepared to do whatever was necessary. Immediately a lieutenant, captain and associate warden arrived, none of whom had previously paid any attentions to the complains filed in the “proper manner.” They were promised that they would receive their rec. and from that point they did. In 3 hours of showing they were ready and willing to commit violence they solved that 3 months of going through the proper channels could not. To be continued....
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