Editor’s note: Because of the nature of his story, the subject wished to withhold his real name.
In the summer of 2005, David Cole was imprisoned for possession and delivery of marijuana and cocaine.
“I was asking, but no one was giving me anything, so I had to sell drugs to feed my family,” he said.
Not long after entering his cell and exchanging greetings, the lights went out and Cole found himself in a fight with his cell mate. Before he knew it, he was beaten, hog-tied and shipped off to solitary confinement by four officers. The only thing that stopped him from being charged with assault was that his white cell mate had confessed to attacking him because he didn’t like black men and wanted the prison to respect his wishes.
This experience let Cole know early on that his prison stay had nothing to do with rehabilitation.
“It’s a business,” Cole said. “Once they privatized the prisons, it became a money thing.”
The prison industrial complex is one of the rising businesses in America. Private prison groups are even included in the New York Stock Exchange.
The industry has manipulated public policy. According to the Huffington Post, the major push to pass harsher immigration laws in Arizona came from pressure by prison lobbyists.
After spending a week in solitary confinement or “the hole,” Cole has seen the negative effects of this industry first hand. His cell was small enough that he could only stretch out on one side, and he was given a steel bed, toilet and a table that came out of the wall. The wall was six feet high. Prison guards kept the lights on at all hours, which is considered a form of torture because darkness is equated with comfort, according to impeachforpeace.org.
“I had to keep a T-shirt or a towel over my face,” Cole said.
He was only given 30 minutes to shower every other day, and the prison restricted him from making calls. His hygiene kit only lasted for one day.
Cole was let out of his cell for an hour daily so he could exercise with a ball, usually a basketball, in another six-foot-by-six-foot cell. He spent the rest of his time doing push-ups and reading the one book of his choice that the prison allowed him.
Anything else granted to Cole depended on how much money he had. This included writing tablets and food.
“If you don’t have assistance or family giving you money, then you don’t get enough food,” Cole said. “If you want a jacket or shoes, you pay for it.”
Upon release from solitary confinement, Cole was transferred back to the general population where he further witnessed prison’s demoralizing effects: Prisoners were segregated by race and couldn’t even choose where they wanted to sit at meal times. They had to wait for other prisoners’ invitations.
Cole says there were lifers and short-timers. As a short-timer, the lifers tried to get him to do anything to keep him in prison with them.
“Prison teaches you how not to get caught,” he said. “There are no programs to get back to school or learn a trade.”
He witnessed a couple of riots. Most were between the black and Latino blocks, who Cole said made up the majority of the prisoners. Although blacks and Latinos make up 12.3 percent and 12.5 percent of the U.S. population respectively, they account for 38.9 percent and 32.8 percent of the country’s prison population according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
Prisons systematically target blacks and Latinos through such measures as drug laws. Currently, the law punishes crack cocaine offenders with sentences 18 times that of powder cocaine offenders. The Obama administration lowered the ratio from 100-1 to 18-1 earlier this year. Crack cocaine is more prevalent in communities of color, but the main ingredient in both drugs is the same.
“You can get 10 to 15 years for crack. They crucify you. There was a white guy in for 2-3 bricks (kilograms) of coke and he only got five years,” Cole said.
Upon release, prisoners are forced to get jobs, but many people are afraid to hire them because of their criminal history. They have to pay for community service and classes, which provide avenues to employment. However, if no one gives them money, then they’re forced to find ways to get quick payoffs. According to Cole, this leads to selling more drugs and helps explain why the U.S. has the highest recidivism or repeat offender rates in the world: A whopping 67.5 percent of felons return to prison within three years.
“When you get out, you wear it as a uniform,” Cole said. “Probation tries to break you and put you back in prison.”
He said that the state receives $100,000 per prisoner, even when they’re on probation, because on paper, they’re still in custody.
Still, Cole said that there were some positives, such as being able to read people’s intentions better and making a few lifelong friends. He sends letters any chance he gets because they help remind prisoners that someone cares about them.
It gives them a break from languishing about all they could do if they were free.
“After six months, I was craving a cheeseburger and fries,” Cole said while laughing. “I couldn’t wait to go to the bathroom and close the door.”
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