Corruption Officer

by Gary L. Heyward

I ran into the building wondering what was going on that was so urgent. When I got inside the apartment I saw my son putting a whole stick of butter in a frying pan to cook a grilled-cheese sandwich and I noticed my mother standing in the living room with her hands on her hips. She said to me as I went to sit down, “Ya better git ’im before I do!” I said, “What happened?” She said, “He’ll tell you.” And then she stormed off into her bedroom. I turned to my son and asked him what happened. At first he didn’t say anything. He just stood there bending up a perfectly good spatula trying to smash his sandwich in the frying pan. Then Moms came back into the living room and sat down and started watching TV (as if she was not listening to our conversation). I asked him again and this time he told me that he got kicked out of school for fighting. I asked, “Why did you do that and what were you fighting about?” He said that some kid had teased him about his sneakers in gym class, so he started fighting with him. Is this what was so important, a little fight at school? I looked over to my mother and she was looking right at me as if she was waiting to see what I was going to do. So I dared not act like making my rounds around the city was more important than this. I turned to my son and asked, “What’s the matter with your sneakers?” He said, “They’re old, Pop!” I said, “Didn’t your mother just buy you new sneakers?”

  And he said, “No, she won’t buy them or the new video games I want.”

  “Why?”

  “She’s riffing about me not passing my classes.”

  “You getting into fights, getting kicked out of school, and you’re failing classes!” Raising my voice, I said, “I can see why you’re not getting anything. She’s right. That’s the way it goes. You don’t do good in school, you don’t get shit!”

  Now my moms, aka Ironfist, chimed in, “That ain’t all. He’s back-talking his mother, too.” I looked at him and said, “What I tell you about that?”

  “I didn’t talk back to her. All I said was that the fight wasn’t my fault and she said that I talked back to her,” he said.

  I jumped up and yelled, “Who are you yelling at?” And he jumped up as well. I came around the table to meet him. He’s fourteen and a little shorter than me and weighs about 270 pounds. I’m 290 pounds. Now I was pissed. This lil Negro was trying to man up. My moms jumped up to come between us and I put my hand up like, “I got this.” I said, “What do you want to do? I see ya got those Q-tips at the end of your wrists all balled up like you’re asking for something!” My moms got in my face from the side and started barking in his defense, “I didn’t call you up here for this. How are you going to try and treat him like this now?”

  Then she said, “You don’t be around him enough to be all of a sudden beating on him.”

  I was bugging, looking at Ms. Ya-better-get-’im-before-I-do/come-upstairs-now like, “If you didn’t want me to straighten him out then why did you call me up here?”

  “What do you mean, I don’t be around him?” I said. “This is my son.”

  She laid into me like she had been waiting for this day and had a speech memorized.

  “You don’t spend no time with these kids. All you do is come in and out of here all times of the night without a care in the world. Sometimes they’re over here for days and you don’t even know it. You claim that you be working overtime but I know better.”

  Then she mimicked me in what she thought was a manly voice, “This is my son!” She went on, “You don’t even take the time out to get to know him but now you want to swell your chest up like you have the right to.” Why do I feel like I’ve just been set up? I tried to come back at her by lying and saying, “I do be working overtime so that I could make up for the child support.” Then I tried to switch the blame. “If his mother spent the money on my kids then he wouldn’t have to be fighting over sneakers. I’m running around here working overtime and working outside security jobs trying to make it, so that’s why I am not around.” Moms was looking at me but I couldn’t look her in her face because I knew that she saw right through me.

  I focused back on my son, who’s standing there looking at me, looking like me with his eyes beginning to tear up. I could tell that it was not out of fear but out of anger. At this point I didn’t give a shit, because of the lashing that I had just received from my mother. I had to save face, so I tried to lay into him and said, “You’re not a little baby anymore and you need to realize that I’m trying my best to provide for you and your sister. Don’t nobody have any money to be throwing around every time you throw a tantrum about some damn sneakers and video games. You need to grow up and start taking responsibility for your actions. You need to stop being selfish and always thinking about yourself.”

  “I wonder where I got that from?” he said, and walked out the door.

  Ooooh, I wanted to swing on his ass but I was stuck on stupid when he said that slick shit. I looked over at Moms, who was now back to pretending that she was watching TV. I could have sworn that she had a smirk on her face.

  CHAPTER 42

  IRON FIST

  “Play your beds,” I yell to the inmates, ordering them to get in their beds so I can make my rounds and count them to make sure that they are all here. I’m working in a dorm area on the midnight tour. I swapped shifts with another officer. I needed the shift so that I could handle some business.

  After the tag team that I received from my son and my mother, I stormed out of the house to go pick up my money, then go to work. I’m at work drunk. I have the bottle in my pocket as I take count of the inmates. I want their asses to go to bed so I can sleep until my meal relief comes. Tonight I’m working with CO Patterson, who is the steady officer here. She’s real quiet and so-so looking but her body is banging. She’s sitting in the officers’ station waiting for me to verify the count so that she can call it in. I notice that she has on glossy red lipstick. Besides it helping her look better, maybe she put on the lipstick to distract you from looking at her wandering eye. The eye didn’t bother me none, because earlier while we were walking to our post I was behind her focused on the way her butt cheeks seem to have a mind of their own. I come back with the count, she confirms it, and I go inside the station. I’m feeling saucy, so I begin to joke around with her, hoping she’ll laugh. I compliment her on her hair and how nice she looks. I think she’s opening up a little.

  The captain comes and makes his rounds, signs the book, and leaves. Now I can pull up a chair and kick my feet up and get some sleep. As I’m close to dozing off, CO Patterson starts talking to me. She tells me that she has on makeup because she and her husband had gone out earlier. With my feet on the desk and my eyes closed, I respond, “You look good and he is a lucky man.” She then pulls her chair next to mine and asks me if I really think that she looks good. I open my eyes and I see that she is a little upset, so I say with concern in my voice, “Yeah, why?” She tells me how she and her husband got into it tonight over a phone number on their caller ID. Apparently, it was a number that she dialed back and some woman answered. I say, “Sis, it looks like you need me.” She looks at me confused, so I pull out my bottle of liquor. She laughs, saying, “Heeell, yeah!” She admits to me that she’s not much of a drinker but needs one tonight. Not too long after, CO Patterson is as twisted as I am and becoming more and more comfortable with me.

  She begins cursing her husband, getting louder and louder with each comment. Before I know it, her chair is right next to mine and her head is on my chest. She’s talking about how she has to go the extra mile to keep her body in shape. Not looking directly at her, I tell her that I don’t see a problem with it. My comment must have made her feel better, because she starts kissing me.

  Now, I didn’t come here tonight to get some cooch, but I should have realized the signals all along. Anytime a woman starts talking about her relationship with her man to another man, the door is opened. Add a little low self-esteem, and you are pretty much in. What sealed the deal with CO Patterson
was the combination of liquor and ignoring the wandering eye.

  We’re kissing for a while when she stops. She’s breathing hard and she tells me that she doesn’t normally do this. I don’t care what she normally does because I’m at attention. I get up and tell her to go in the bathroom. I look around to make sure that the inmates are asleep, since we are in a dorm area.

  Mental note: Inmates are never asleep. There is always one of them up watching you at all times.

  I come trotting back to her with penis in hand. We are in the bathroom and she’s on her knees giving me pleasure, but she is making a lot of loud grunting sounds. I stop her because I think that I hear someone coming. We agree it’s no one and we continue, changing positions. She says, “I always wanted to know how it felt to have sex at work in jail. I mean, I heard some other female officers talk about it but I never did it.”

  I bend her over the toilet because the bathroom is small and the sink takes up too much room.

  I’m hitting it and just getting into a groove when she starts crying. I stop and ask her, “What’s up? What’s the matter?” Mind you, I’m still inside her. She continues to sob and tells me nothing is wrong and to keep going. She don’t have to tell my drunk, unprotected ass twice. So I do my thing.

  When we finish, she just collapses on the bathroom floor, in the fetal position, with her pants around her ankles. I don’t know what to do, so I try to help her up and she tells me to leave her alone. She says that this is not her and that she never cheated on her husband before. I stand there looking like, “Hey, that’s between you and him.” I wipe myself clean and walk out of the bathroom. Just then, there is a knock on our area door. It’s the meal relief and she’s right on time. I knock on the bathroom door and tell CO Patterson that I’m going to meal. She tells me to go ahead and that she’s okay.

  ­—

  I make a phone call to check things out. It’s a go.

  I’m not that drunk anymore because I sweated out some of the liquor. I walk at a quick pace to the other side of the jail, the cell side. I get to my destination and my homie, Officer Leslie, lets me in.

  He says, “You got fifteen minutes before my B officer arrives. So make it quick.” Then he hands me his black leather gloves with metal plate inserts sewn in them.

  “Okay, cool. What cell is he in?”

  “Eighteen. Use the stick to crack open his cell so that it won’t make as much noise as if we did it electronically.”

  I walk down the corridor and I put on the gloves. I had been waiting patiently for this opportunity and now here it is. I make sure that I have tape over my shield so the inmate can’t see my badge number. Then I crack open his cell. He jumps up, scared. Too late to be scared about anything; he had to know that in some way, shape, or form this was coming.

  I hit him in the gut and he goes down and curls up on the floor trying to protect himself. I don’t let him off that easy. I hit him as hard as I can in his ribs and his back. He yells out for help. I’m meticulous and not in a rush. I remember CO Leslie saying no face shots. I pull on his legs to straighten him out so that he can take this ass-whipping like a man even though he can receive a hundred of these and they will never add up to what he did. He begs me to stop and then covers up his face, leaving the rest of his body exposed. So I make him pay. As I rain down on him I let him know why I’m here. “You like to rape and kill little girls, huh? She was only fourteen!” Thud! A punch to his ribs, then another to his arm. With these gloves on I don’t care where the punch lands because I know each one hurts. Now he is stretched out on the floor and he says, “It was a mistake! I am sor—”

  I don’t let him finish. PYOW! A punch right in his face, busting his lip. I can’t resist. I have to, all the anger that I am feeling about what he did to my man’s daughter just comes out of me. He knew, coming to jail with his charges, that this was only the beginning of his treatment. He knew just like all inmates know that this was jail justice for what he did. As he lies on the floor I say to him, “If I hear about this from anybody, you know that I’m coming back, and if I don’t get you somebody else will. There is nowhere for you to go where I can’t get to you, be it by officer or inmate. Do you understand?” He nods, then I tell him, “When you go to the clinic you know what to say.” He nods and says, “The shower.”

  CHAPTER 43

  BLACKMAIL

  Two months later . . .

  It’s 7:20 a.m. and again I arrive to work late. I’m tired because I finally popped my mother’s titties out of my mouth and started standing on my own. I was up late last night moving the rest of my stuff into my own apartment. I walk through the gate and the roll call captain calls me over to her and asks me to help another officer escort some inmates from the intake area to a housing area near mine. I was going that way. I am okay with it because at least I won’t be marked late. I get inside the intake area and as usual it’s total chaos. You have inmates coming from court, going to court, or inmates who are fresh off the bus getting ready to be housed. I’m standing there watching a rookie officer try to quiet down the new inmates so that he can call out their names. I hear him say, “Excuse me, can I have your attention? Can you please be quiet for a moment?” I shake my head, then step up and yell, “Everybody, shut the fuck up.” They quiet down to a mumble. I yell again, “I don’t want to hear shit! Keep your mouth shut or I will shut it for you!” Corrections training 101: Always make an example out of one of them. I pick a herb who is still mumbling under his breath. “You, stand up. You have a fucking problem!?” I do this to show the rookie officers how to set the tone for these inmates, and to let the inmates know how their stay here is going to be. The inmates quiet down completely when they see the other officers assemble behind me. The new officer steps up and starts to call the names.

  We are in the corridor on the north side when two inmates break out into a fight. I order the other inmates to face the wall and I take off to go break up the fight. Brawling are two of the littlest inmates that I have ever seen. I separate them. Then order them to put their hands on the wall. One of them is Spanish, with teardrops tattooed under his eye. I’m cocky when I tell him that if he takes his hands off the wall I will take it as a sign of aggression and beat his ass. I turn to tell the new jack to subdue the second inmate involved in the fight and I hear something like nails scraping against the wall. The next thing I know I’m looking up thinking that the pair of black Timberland boots floating past my face look just like . . .

  I black out.

  When I come to, I see the officer wrestling the inmate that hit me. The inmate is looking at me, laughing. He says, “I’ll dance circles around you, fatboy.” I regain my bearings and go over to assist the other officers who’ve arrived on the scene to help out. After everything is over, I go to the clinic, because the new officer swore that I slipped while fighting this one-hundred-pounds-soaking-wet inmate. I go with that story because I am not about to admit that my big ass had just got knocked out. No, no, no, no, no!

  I finally get to my post to relieve the officer that was there. I let Moe out and we do our usual. Then he tells me that the dude that I beat up the other day is running his mouth. I look at him like, “What dude?” And he gives me a look like, “Come on now, this is me you’re talking to.” The fact that he knows about it is not good. I ask him how he knows about it. He tells me that he talks to the inmates in the housing area where this dude is and they say that the IGs (inspectors general) had come to see him more than once asking about his injuries because they don’t believe that he slipped in the shower. He heard that the dude described an officer that looks like me. I feel that if they knew it was me they would have paid me a visit by now. I tell Moe to send someone down there a pack of Newport cigarettes to shut him up or at least remind him of what I told him. I walk with Moe back to his cell and watch him communicate with the inmates below us by way of kite. I watch him tie a string around a pack of Newports and low
er it out of the window. He gets a note back saying that my message will get sent tonight during their recreation time.

  I go back to the officers’ station when my B officer arrives. I let out the rest of the inmates and I have begun my daily paperwork when I hear a familiar voice say what’s up to me. When I look up it is Trent.

  Shocked, I ask him what happened and why he’s here. He looks at me with a stone face and says in a low tone, “You know why I’m here,” and walks off toward his cell. I don’t know what he’s talking about, so I go to his cell to see what’s up. I order all the inmates to go to the dayroom and get out of the corridor so I can speak to him without anyone overhearing our conversation. I post up in front of his cell and ask him when did he get here. He says, “Last night.” So I ask him again, “What happened?” He looks at me with a real serious look on his face and says in a low tone, almost a whisper, “Gee, you don’t know why I’m here?” I look back at him, confused and curious, with one eyebrow raised. I say, “No, I don’t.” He takes a deep breath, then shakes his head and says, “Somebody snitched me out on that drug spot that me and you hit up.”

  I’m at a loss for words and panic immediately comes over me. A million scenarios enter my thoughts. None of them could make sense of how this could happen or who could have snitched on him. I look up at him and he’s staring at me as if he’s waiting for a response. I tell him I didn’t do it and he gives me a look like, “Who else could it have been?” Then he goes and sits on his bed and says, “I don’t know, Gee. I ain’t going to take this ride by myself. They asking me who my partner was and all that.” I’m stuck. I try to absorb what he just said and what exactly that means for me. I look at him, he looks at me, and then he throws his hands up in the air. Then he looks out of the window and says, “There is this lawyer that’s really good but I need some help getting him. I don’t have enough cash, so I need some help.”