Going to Jail

I have to move out of the teepee I’m occupying in the front yard of a friend of a friend’s house. I don’t have any money, a job, or place to stay, and I can’t live in a homeless shelter.

So a few days ago, I asked the guy if I could borrow his van to go to the beach, drove to the basement of a Zen monastery I’ve stayed at a couple times, casually rolled out a couple bikes and loaded them into the van.

I sold the first bike after a couple days and was now emailing back and forth with this guy about the second. If I sold this one, it would not only insure rent money for the month, but I’d also have enough left over for food. This desperate, fundamental need caused me to ignore my subsequent suspicion.

It took him maybe an extra minute or two to respond to one of my emails. He said he was sorry but needed to talk with his girlfriend for a second. It seemed like such a needy and pointless message. I thought, cop. Fucking dumbass cop.

Still, I hesitantly agree to meet him in front of a supermarket in an hour.

As a precaution, I roll into the back of an office complex across the street, sit at a picnic table, take a rip out of my pipe and scope it out. My suspicions aren’t exactly eased but the $450 offer eventually drowns them out.

I’m standing next to the shopping carts in front with the bike and can tell he’s a cop immediately as he’s walking towards me, despite the casual clothes. Some combination of his sunglasses, clean-cut and beefy build.

“Are you Jeff,” he says. My alias.

He starts asking questions about the bike but it’s obvious I don’t have his full attention. He looks over his shoulder every few seconds.

I can’t remember whether he asked where I got it or how long I had it, but my response either contributed to the final puzzle piece or he was just tired of stalling.

“What if I told you you were full of shit,” he said.

Seconds later a black Escalade followed by a couple cop cars pull up.

The guy’s partner comes out of it and they take turns badgering me with questions. I can tangibly feel the distane and thrill they’re getting from this and I’m not going to just take their shit.

After five minutes of me smirking and laughing off their questions, I’m put in the back of a cop car.

“You’re real fucking smug,” his partner leans down and says as she walks by the window.

“Wow those people are pathetic,” I say to the driver.

I can tell she agrees.

“Yeah, I’m sorry. I’m just the driver.”

As we near the jail, anger gradually gives way to anxiety. She stops at a building nearby and I’m put in a room I’m assuming is an interrogation room but looks more like small lounge.

The female detective stops by and says very politely someone will be with me in a minute. I think she’s playing “good cop” but when she leaves I notice the camera in the top corner. I promptly flip it off and shake my head.

I wait for a while and try to stay centered through mindful finger movements and attention to breath.

Another woman walks in and sits across from me. She presses for information about the other bike, says she thinks several were taken, but I tell her I’m not talking unless a lawyer’s present. She picks up her paperwork and assures me they’ll figure it out even without my help.

I’m then put into another police car. The woman who questioned me comes up to the window, says a number and some other foreign jargon to the cop. When she leaves he says something about the “devil’s lettuce” and “dropped charges.”

For a second I actually think I’m being let go. Maybe they don’t have enough evidence or they realize putting me in jail would only further alienate me, which prompted the “criminal behavior” in the first place, and do nothing in determining or preventing future behavior.

I ask him what the “devil’s lettuce” is and he seems surprised I don’t know. He tells me it’s the small bag of marijuana they found and then rifles off a bunch more synonyms. He says she’s cool like that but it seems pointless to even mention.

He stops the car outside of a loading dock. Opens the door, pulls me out.

“You don’t look like someone who would steal a bike,” he says.

We enter a small room and he motions for me to sit on bench while he speaks with someone. On the wall across from me, a sign reads: “No crybabies here.”

I’m ushered into a larger room and he leaves. A woman comes over -half-nurse, half-cop- and has me stand on a scale and measures my height. I’m then fingerprinted comprehensively on a high tech computer, saliva’s extracted by cotton swabs, mugshots are taken and I’m given my very own prisoner id.

At one point I’m filling out some forms in front of this guy seated behind a computer on a raised platform. He’s simultaneously asking questions, very impatiently.

“Can you treat me with just a little respect?” I say.

He’s defensive but sheds some of his previous detachment.

He asks if I have any requests and I ask if I can be put in a cell by myself. The reason I stole the bike was because it’s too overwhelming for me to be around people or sit at a computer, which makes it tough to find a job. He tells me the judge will look down on me for the request.

When I’m done being processed, I’m told to sit on a shiny plastic chair in the first row of the waiting area of the same room. A flat screen in the corner is playing some corny movie on TBS or TNT.

A guard walks over, barks orders to another prisoner, then leads me into a holding cell a few feet away.

I lay down and continue my mindful finger movements until another guard brings me my pink prisoner clothes and has me dress in a nearby bathroom.

Before I’m about to enter the prison, I’m asked briskly if I need a phone card and a snack pack. I don’t have time to think so I say yes to both because they seem like they might be necessary.

The snack pack turns out to be gross gas station nachos, sausages and other artery-clogging, sugary processed foods. Since I don’t consume animal flesh or cow’s milk I only eat a pack of crackers and some obscure, nasty candy from the $25 worth of junk. I don’t even use the $20 phone card.

All in all, about a $500 swing from where I expected to be.

I’m brought into my designated pod with some other prisoners, led to a single guard seated behind a large desk befitted with several security monitors and a phone. He informs me that I have a cellmate but says he sleeps most of the time anyway. The guard seems genuinely decent, which I guess makes sense as he has the most interaction with the prisoners.

My cellmate wakes up when the door is opened and I’m greeted by a skinny, white guy, probably in his late 30’s. He falls asleep soon after but when he’s up again, I find out he’s on methadone to help come down from heroine. He’s here for petty theft and expects to stay for a few months. It’s not his first stint.

“What’re you in for?” He asks in his New Orleans drawl.

I tell him about the bike and he cringes but says I should be optimistic about my upcoming trial. Then he tells me a story about a guy he knew that stole some type of metal to sell to a junkyard and got six years. We’re also reminded that uptight Marin County isn’t likely to be lenient.

Plus, between the judge and prosecution, there’s about a 100% chance one of them is a biker. For christ sake, we’re only a few miles away from a bicycle museum.

I’m not exactly optimistic.

Anyway, speaking of pointless buildings, our dinner is passed through a chute in the middle of the door. My cell mate says I can use the table and he sits on his bed. I look over and he’s inhaling the food.

He says they get mad if you don’t have your tray ready when they come to collect them, which just makes me want to slow down even more. But seeing as how the only things I will eat are the banana and the bread from the plain baloney sandwich, and I won’t drink the milk, my tray is ready on time.

As night descends, we realize weren’t not getting let out for the allotted half hour. I settle into the plastic mattress and cotton ball pillow and can hear loud, irritating voices of prisoners next door, through the vent directly over my head.

Hours later, still talking and laughing almost non-stop, I grab the toilet paper and begin tearing off and crumpling pieces to stuff into the small, square cracks of the vent. There are so many holes that I stop about halfway through, finding it not only tedious but unhelpful. They go on all night.

The next morning we’re served another meal that barely resembles edible food, but my stomach is growling so I quickly shovel whatever it is down my throat. We both try to catch a little more sleep but it’s no use for me.

Later in the day there’s a class going on about Shakespeare a couple feet from our cell. The teacher is annoying and the prisoners sound retarded as they attempt to read the material. My cellmate and I alternate between silently calling the woman “a dumb fucking whore” and many other creative insults. Otherwise I’m cupping my ears.

A little bit later I’m visited by a woman who was present when I was admitted to the psychiatric ward a couple years ago. We meet in a room with a table between us and I think she may be able to aid my case but she says she can’t do anything. She’s there for moral support, I guess.

In the evening, we’re finally let out and I take a cold five minute shower, reminding myself that I’m in the pod with mild offenders. Someone coming through the door to rape me is probably unlikely.

The next morning is the trial and I try to stimulate my brain by reading and considering any pertinent information I might offer to the case. Me and about seven other prisoners are taken into a cramped room with benches and a toilet. One by one we’re called, until it’s me and this old black guy.

I tell him why I’m here and he says I should be fine. Then he says that he doesn’t understand why I don’t go live with my mom and that white kids seem to be too proud to do that. I told him I’d tried that for awhile, that my mom lives on a tiny boat and is a nightmare to deal with, but he doesn’t understand.

Finally, I’m retrieved, brought into the courtroom and meet my public defender. He’s cordial, has a vintage look, a beard, and looks me in the eye as we talk. He assures me I’ll be fine and he’s right. It’s over pretty quickly.

I sign a diversion agreement to do 40 hours of community service, pay about $300 in different fines, take a “theft awareness” class, see a psychiatrist regularly and report back to court each month, and stay away from the monastery. If I meet all the requirements in a year’s time, the offense will be wiped off my record in two.

I’m taken back to my cell but have to wait another six or seven hours before I’m released. My mom is there to meet me. I’m surprised and tell her I really don’t want to see her right now. She says she knows.