Writing My Wrongs

by Shaka Senghor

  But the state had other things in store for me, things that made me nearly lose my mind.

  —

  AS MY FATHER and I entered the small, cramped hearing room the next day, an ominous feeling came over me. The parole board member wasn’t in the room physically, but I could feel her negative energy coming through the video conference monitor. As soon as she came on-screen, she frowned, looked down at my file, then looked back up at me with a frown that was even deeper than before.

  “Give me your name and number,” she said, tipping her head to look back down at the paper.

  “James White, number 219184,” I said politely.

  She looked back up, locked eyes, and asked coldly: “Mr. White, why did you shoot and kill another human being over nothing?” She let the question hang in the air as I tried to explain what had happened all those years ago.

  “I felt there was a potential threat to my life,” I stated quietly, “because I had been shot some months before.”

  She wasn’t having it. “You know, Mr. White, that’s a weak and pitiful excuse for killing someone. You do realize that you killed someone, right?”

  “Yes.”

  She became increasingly combative as she asked me about my incarceration and my plans for after prison.

  “I have two books I published and others I’ve contributed to,” I said. “I also plan—”

  She interrupted me.

  “That’s cute that you have books, Mr. White, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that you picked up a gun and decided to use it to kill someone.”

  It was clear that she didn’t want to hear anything about the man I had evolved into or the things I had accomplished during the last five years. She cut me off every chance she got. I did my best to present my case with integrity and objectivity, but none of it mattered.

  When my part of the interview was finished, she asked my father if he had anything to add. My father started speaking, but soon she cut him off, too. She said she had heard enough and the hearing was over.

  “Have a good day, Mr. White,” she said. “I am recommending you take AOP before being released. You will get a decision in the mail soon.” Then the camera went blank.

  As I walked back to the cellblock, I was full of mixed emotions. Part of me had wanted to believe that I had a genuine chance of getting parole, but the more I thought about the way the board member had treated me, the harder it was to see that happening. But when Ebony and I talked later that day, she encouraged me to think positive and stay focused on coming home. I trusted Ebony with my life, and her words were the comfort that I needed.

  —

  OVER THE NEXT few weeks, we continued trying to get me placed into AOP, but we kept getting conflicting information from the Department of Psychiatric Services. Just when I was wearing down, though, I was told to pack up because I was being transferred downstate to a prison where I would finally be placed in AOP. The following day, I was shipped back to Gus Harrison Correctional Facility in Adrian. I could barely contain my excitement. It had been a long two years in the Upper Peninsula for Ebony and me, and the town of Adrian was only an hour and a half south of Detroit. The long droughts between our visits were finally over.

  When I got to Adrian, I spent most of my time in my cube, writing and studying things I knew I’d need to know when I was released. I kept my interactions limited to a handful of inmates I had known over the years, all of whom were also focused on going home. I also took advantage of unaccredited classes offered by Project Community and the Prison Creative Arts Project (PCAP), both sponsored by the University of Michigan. These classes gave me a creative outlet and inspired me as a writer and an artist.

  I still hadn’t received a decision back from the parole board, and we were holding out hope that they would give me a deferral instead of flatly denying me until I finished AOP. Under this scenario, I still wouldn’t make it home on my earliest release date, but instead of having to wait until my next hearing came around, I would be considered for release as soon as I completed the program.

  During this time, I was fortunate to meet and develop some genuine friendships with a group of student volunteers from the University of Michigan, who came in and did workshops once a week. We challenged and encouraged one another as artists, and eventually put on a show for the prison. That was my first time acting and writing for the stage, and I loved it. It was also there that I met an incredible writer and theater instructor, who taught me about acting and how to share my voice in different mediums.

  A month or so after I arrived at Adrian, I received a letter from the parole board. You have been denied parole at this time, it read, because it is our belief that you are a threat to society, and therefore, shall not be released. The letter told me that I had to wait another year before my status could be reconsidered.

  It was a letdown, but I had expected as much after leaving the interview. Ebony and I felt that the worst was behind us, and now that I had finally gotten into the AOP class, there was always a chance I could be called back early to see the parole board. In the meantime, I focused all of my energy on completing the requirements of AOP. When we got our date to begin the group, I learned that our group would be led by Dr. Skinner, a therapist who had a reputation for kicking people out of the class for trivial matters. Some guys said Skinner held racist beliefs.

  I was worried. The last thing I needed was to be kicked out of the class I had waited so long to get into. But from the first day of group, I began to see that the rumors about him were unfair. He didn’t go out of his way to be harsh. He was a straight shooter who cared about accountability and wanted us to take all excuses off of the table. He came across as brash and insensitive, but I agreed with his methods. I was tired of listening to guys rationalize the actions from their past.

  Things were going great in the group. I was learning a lot more about my cognitive process and the reasons I had failed to handle conflict in the past. I deepened my understanding of empathy and compassion by listening to the stories of the other men who were in the group. Overall I felt like things were going in a positive direction, until one day when Skinner looked me in the eye and said that he didn’t think they would ever release me from prison.

  His statement came out of the blue, and other inmates jumped to my defense, asking him why he would say such a thing. Skinner replied that it was just his personal opinion based on what he had seen happen to other inmates.

  Speaking to the group, he explained, “Shaka not only has a murder case, he also assaulted a corrections officer. I have rarely seen the parole board let anyone out with that kind of record. I think it’s going to be a tough battle for him to get out of prison anytime soon.” The whole time he was saying this, he had a smirk on his face.

  Skinner’s words stung, but I was aware of the games he would play to see if he could throw a person off. Instead of expressing anger, I told him that I was confident I would be released at some point and would do something productive with my life. He nodded with a smirk—a smirk that either said he didn’t believe me, or he did but would never admit it.

  —

  THE MONTHS BEGAN flying by. Ebony came up for a visit every week, sometimes twice a week, and we continued to plan for the future in the faint hope that I would be called back to see the board early. In the meantime, we took advantage of each visit. No matter what the weather was like or how difficult her workweek had been, Ebony faithfully came up to see me, and our bond deepened with each hug, kiss, and conversation.

  One day, Ebony came to see me in the middle of a snowstorm. Neither of us knew that the weather would get as bad as it did, or that the back roads leading to the prison would not be plowed until late in the evening. About twenty miles outside of the prison, Ebony got stuck in a ditch on the side of the road. She was stranded in the middle of nowhere with no cell phone reception, and it took about fifteen minutes of sitting in the cold before someone stopped to help her.

  When Ebony finally made it to th
e visiting room, she was visibly shaken, and I felt like a piece of shit. I was tired of seeing her suffer for our love, tired of not being able to do anything about it. Though we never expressed the thought out loud, we both had the same question at the back of our minds:

  What if the board continued to deny my parole until I had served my entire forty-year sentence?

  24

  GUS HARRISON CORRECTIONAL FACILITY

  Adrian, Michigan

  March 2009

  As AOP began winding down, I was given a date of May 20 for an early parole consideration. It was the date of my father’s birthday, and also of my anniversary with Ebony. In my heart, I felt hope stir.

  Ebony and I researched the parole board member who was scheduled to interview me. We discovered that she was known to be consistently fair. The weather that day was perfect, too—one more sign of good things to come.

  When I entered the hearing room with my father, the energy was different from that of my first interview. This time, the woman from the parole board was in the room with us, and she was upbeat and friendly. After going through the preliminaries, we got down to business.

  I started by telling her about my past, using the language I had learned in AOP. I talked about the “thinking errors” I had made in my past, and how I had learned to use “empathetic role-playing” to put myself in other people’s shoes and stop reacting from impulse.

  I was talking about my journaling habits when, all of a sudden, the board member stopped me mid-sentence.

  “Mr. White,” she began, “I know they tell you to use all of this language in group therapy, but I’m not interested in that. I want to know who you were at nineteen and what was going on in your mind back then.”

  Her tone was sincere, but it didn’t make the question any easier to answer. I took a moment to gather my thoughts, then began telling her how I had felt when I got shot at the age of seventeen. I told her that I had reacted to that experience by carrying a gun every day, and that I was deeply sorry for having taken my victim’s life. I explained the work I had been doing to help other inmates and the mentoring work I planned to do when I got out.

  “I’m impressed,” she said when I was finally finished. “I’ve never encountered an inmate who’s so prepared for life after prison.” She told me that she admired my honesty and the responsibility I had taken for my actions. We wrapped up the interview, and she said I would hear something from the board within the next few weeks.

  —

  WHEN I LEFT the interview, I was on cloud nine. I couldn’t wait to talk to Ebony and share how the hearing had gone. Ebony came up to see me that afternoon, and we basked in the excitement of the moment as though we already had the decision in hand.

  Over the next few weeks, we started planning my homecoming and making a to-do list of things we needed to take care of before I came home. First on our agenda was finding me employment, because the bookstore where I was planning to work had been forced to close. We talked about the clothes I would need and the paperwork I’d have to fill out to get an ID. The world of normal living felt close enough to taste.

  Whenever Ebony came to see me during those few weeks, there was a glow to her that I hadn’t seen in a while. When she entered the building, she seemed to light up the room. She was truly my joy, my rock, and I wanted nothing more than to make her the happiest woman in the world.

  Every week, I asked my counselor if she had gotten word from the parole board. Each time, she told me she hadn’t. She believed, however, that I would be released, because the state was in a budget crunch and they had to start letting more guys go home. The way she saw it, how could they deny me considering how much I had accomplished?

  All of this positive energy had me way more excited than I could ever remember being in prison. I couldn’t sleep, and when the yard was open, I walked the track nonstop with my homeboy Terry, who was also preparing to go home. We went back and forth, detailing everything each of us planned to do when we were released. I couldn’t wait to get out, sell books, and talk to young men and women who were living on the edge and needed a lifeline.

  About a month or so after I had seen the board, my counselor came to my cube and said she needed to speak with me when count cleared. The expression on her face told me that something was wrong. She was normally upbeat and cheerful, but when I stepped into her office, her expression held a sadness that I hadn’t seen before. When I sat down, she took a deep breath and delivered the words I dreaded most.

  “They denied your release again.”

  I couldn’t believe the words that tumbled out of her mouth. I had done everything possible. I had changed the deepest parts of me, kept a clean record for a decade, and completed every last requirement they had asked of me. And after all of this, they had shot me down yet again. Skinner’s words began bouncing around in my head like jumping beans: “They’re never going to let you out. They’re never going to let you out.”

  My unit was called for chow, but I didn’t have an appetite. Just thinking of the smell of the chow hall made me nauseous. Everything about prison seemed impossible now. I felt like I couldn’t take another day of it.

  I wanted to curl up and die, mostly because I knew how devastating the news would be to my family. I was tired of seeing them get their hopes up only to have them dashed. So I decided right there that I was going to give up trying. I wasn’t going to see the parole board again.

  I was nearing my breaking point when I called Ebony to tell her about the decision.

  “This is so fucked up, Shaka! I hate this fucking system and the dumb-ass games they play,” Ebony yelled into the phone. “I’m on my way out the door. I’m coming to see you.”

  It should’ve made me feel better to know Ebony would be there soon, but it didn’t. I felt like this would be our last visit. I couldn’t picture Ebony going through another year of this torture. I had been inside long enough to know that I could do the entire forty years if I had to, but I couldn’t do another year knowing that her happiness was hinging on me coming home. Ebony wanted a family of her own, and I wanted her to have that—even if it meant her family wouldn’t include me.

  As I took my shower, I tried to piece together the words I would use to break up with Ebony. She had invested her everything into our relationship, but she deserved to have a man who was free to share life with her fully, without restrictions. She deserved a partner who could hold her at night, kiss her in the morning, take her out to nice restaurants, and dance with her whenever the mood struck. She deserved a man who could be a father to her children—who would be there to put toys together, fix bikes, and do the things a father is supposed to do. But I could give her none of that.

  —

  AS I SAT silently in the visiting room waiting for Ebony, I made peace with my decision. It had been an incredible experience, loving and being loved by her, but we couldn’t keep doing this with so much uncertainty about the future. She deserved to be free even if I wasn’t.

  When I looked up, Ebony was standing on the other side of the security doors. I could feel tears starting to form when she entered the room, and as soon as she reached me and took me into her embrace, I broke down. We held hands, and I spoke to her through sobs of despair. I looked her in her eyes as I told her that I could no longer allow her to suffer alongside me. She stroked my hands tenderly and wiped away my tears, listening intently as I told her that I wasn’t going to the parole board again—I was done playing their game.

  Ebony held my hand and looked at me. “There is no way in hell you are giving up and letting them win,” she said. Her voice rose as she continued. “We are in it to win it. I will never give up on you. Giving up is not an option, Shaka.”

  She delivered that last sentence with the same fiery conviction that had made me fall in love with her four years before.

  And she wasn’t done. She reminded me of everything we had gone through, of how we had overcome every obstacle placed in our path. She reminded me of how str
ong my spirit was to have endured four and a half years straight in solitary confinement, and how I had done the hard emotional work that others had run from. By the time she had finished, I felt as if I could pick up the prison with one hand.

  I knew then that our bond was unbreakable. As we sat together at that table in the visiting room, I felt myself taking in the strength I would need to fight for the freedom I had earned.

  So we got down to planning our next steps.

  25

  COOPER STREET CORRECTIONAL FACILITY

  Jackson, Michigan

  December 2009

  A few months later, I was transferred back to Cooper Street in Jackson. I had completed AOP, which meant there was nothing keeping me downstate anymore, and I was afraid that they were about to send me back to the Upper Peninsula. But when I spoke to my counselor, I was relieved to hear her say she was sure they weren’t going to send me up north to a camp. (In fact, because the camps up north didn’t like taking inmates with violent histories, she had no idea why I had been sent up there in the first place.)

  I spent my days working out with my brother-in-law Smiley (who had gotten locked up four years earlier) and my guy Derek Ford. I shared with them the books I had written, and they told me how much they loved my writing and how proud they were of me. They were positive lights, and they told me that they believed I would be getting called back early to see the parole board. This time, they said, I would finally be released.

  Ebony and I spent as much time as we could on visits and talking over the phone. We kept dreaming of our future together and created vision boards with pictures of her and me in front of our home in Detroit. Ebony even went out and shopped for my coming-home outfit and started preparing the house for my release.

  A few months later, I was called back early to see the parole board for the third time. It had been nearly two years since the first interview, and I felt like this was the shot I had been waiting for. Once again, my father accompanied me to the board, and this time, I was being interviewed by a board member who was an older Black gentleman, known for his toughness and no-nonsense approach.