I am sure you have noticed that I like a bit of entertainment with my information. I could pull up all kinds of statistics and numbers explaining how the poor are strongly discriminated against in the US court system. I could try and explain how people with low incomes are often bullied into plea agreement and feel they have no choice but to agree to a criminal record or face further penalties. I could also go on about how pretrial detention is punishing people that are not convicted for a crime. Fortunately for me, someone else has already collected that information.
Martin Luther King Jr.
The officer that arrested me for defending myself took me to the hospital first, but mentally, I was blacked out. I had survived another assault from my husband. Now I was handcuffed, stitched up, and thrown into a room with a heavy locked steel door.
They do not heat jails, not to what a normal person would find comfortable. They do not feed you either, not portions, sizes, or quality that most consider food.
People get thrown in jail right off the streets, so I quickly learned about heroin detox. I had survived another assault; now I was in a room full of people vomiting. The smell of body odor was overwhelming. I was cold and hungry with nerve damage over most of my face and a thumb barely attached with stiches. Sarcasm dictates that I should not have called the cops.
I cried the first few days; that is all I could do—cry. I was dragged back and forth to court, but no attorney came to see me. A domestic counselor did. I tried to get help getting away from my husband. I was turned down. My ex had strong control over the finances, and “our” income was too high for assistance. The centers did not take into consideration that I could not touch a dime of that money.
The counselor saw that I was arrested, and came to visit. One could say I had already experienced enough of what the world could dish out; believe me, I had no idea of what was about to come my way.
Jail is an interesting place. Counties differ in how they treat the inmates and what quality of care they give. At this time, in this county, there was very little housing for girls. They had more people in custody than bed space. This meant that you were given a mat for the floor and told to find a space.
They did have some rooms, but the people in them needed to be released before a new person could be assigned. It took a couple of months before I got my own room. The bathroom was open; no doors separating it from the main room, and the toilet was metal. This made it very cold and uncomfortable. They called the unit a “Pod,” and there were multiple similar arrangements down the same hallway. The officers mostly stayed on the other side of the steel door unless they needed to come in.
Your personal clothing is taken when you enter custody, and you are strip searched to make sure you do not possess any contraband. I was given a set of jail clothes that did not fit, a small plastic cup with a hotel size soap, and a disposable toothbrush.
Laundry only happened once a week, so you slept and ate in the same clothes for six days waiting for a clean set, and hoped the next change would fit better. Shampoo and deodorant were available for sale if you had someone put money in your account. Then you would have to wait until the day came that you could order and then wait another week to receive the items. They did allow people to bring you some things. Eventually, I had undershirts, socks, and underwear. That was nice since I ended up staying there much longer than anyone expected.
If you watch Law and Order, Perry Mason, CSI, or any other police officer show, please note that someone wrote a script—that is NOT how our justice system works. The DV counselor found me an attorney that said he would take my case pro-bono. I was thrilled, she did not mention that he had never done a trial before. I am not mad at her, nor the attorney. I hold the judge accountable for what happened next.
My case was a classic example of our court system. My ex’s family had money and connections. He was given an immunity contract on 11 felonies, including two assaults on me. He was also given a state-appointed attorney to go with the one his family hired. I had someone that had never done a trial before and a poor family.
My attorney’s argument was that the state would drop the charges. As far as he could see it, they had to. As it turned out my ex, had a history of beating up on women. In a deposition, he confessed to using cocaine again, and his immunity contract stated that he had assaulted me previously and on that day.
My case was tossed between a bunch of different prosecutors. I was just a file on a desk, not a person in jail. I was offered 4th degree assault, time served. If I took the plea agreement, I could walk out of jail any moment. But… he was trying to rape and kill me.
Taking a plea agreement did not seem ethically right to me. My attorney kept insisting that the state would drop charges. There was just too much evidence that my ex was the assailant. My family could not afford bail, so I sat in jail.
I did not find out until pretrial what had happened to my ex. The knife I held at my head while he attacked punctured him between his ribs. When he released me, he ran to the neighbors, and they likewise, called the police. My charge for trial was both first- and second-degree assault. This is another issue with the legal system. If you do not sign the plea agreement, they will add and up charges to further intimidate you from defending your innocence.
Pre-trial started. My attorney had asked for discovery, but the state did not give him any until the day before trial. The state’s excuse was that the prosecutor had just been assigned to my case. It was simple mismanagement.
For months I sat in jail and no-one even looked at the case to see if it should be charged. My attorney didn’t get discovery because no-one bothered to open the file.
The judge likewise ruled that although discovery was required, and my attorney did ask for it, he did not compel discovery, so the state is not at fault for giving my attorney 1 day to prepare.
Every morning, the jail guards would come handcuff me and escort me to a new holding cell. This is a room I would get very familiar with over the next month. It was even colder than the pod that I lived in, and it had no clock. I would just sit there and wait to be fetched for court. The officers that escorted me received a front row seat at the evidence my jury would never hear.
The judge ruled that my ex’s history of beating women was inadmissible because it could prejudice the jury into believing he probably assaulted me too. His drug use, ruled inadmissible, it was again prejudicial.
Two police officers testified at pretrial. One told the absolute truth, but the other lied his ass off. The judge ruled that the truth-telling police officer’s testimony was not credible since it did not coincide with standard procedure.
The judge also made a ruling that I was not allowed to cry. If at any time during the proceedings, the jury saw me cry, she would declare a mistrial and we would start all over from the beginning.
My husband killing me would have been merciful compared to what the court system put me through. The officers that escorted me back and forth were shocked and appalled at the injustice that was occurring right before them. I was frequently told that if I had killed my husband, I would have had a fair trial.
I would very much like you to look at the article below this paragraph. I am sorry, but I do not have one that plays in a humorous setting. the numbers show that men that beat their wives to death were given manslaughter and generally served 3–5 years for their murders. Women that defended from an assault and did NOT kill their assailant were frequently given 10–20 years. I think the officers did not take into account that I was a female. If my husband had died, I would probably still be in prison. Please take a look at the following link.
Women Serve Longer Prison Sentences After Killing Abusers. When men kill the women they’re abusing, statistics say they get out sooner. Jun 22, 2020, by Amanda Kippert
The trail was a sham. The jury was not allowed to hear any real facts in the case; it was all ruled inadmissible pre-trial. The prosecutor argued that I knew leaving my husband would upset him; therefore, I started the fight.
The state upped my charges to 1st and 2nd degree. Both charges were from the same moment in time and double jeopardy attaches. The jury was to decide which of these charges I could be convicted of. They gave me guilty on second degree, but first degree was not warranted.
The judge sent the jury back three times, without consulting my attorney. She would not accept the second-degree charge.
One of the jurors later told my parents that they were sorry, but the judge would not let them go unless they gave her a guilty on first degree.
Sentencing was hilarious. The state did not ask for victims’ compensation, retribution, or any of the standard things a “criminal” would be assigned, not even anger management.
When asked why, the prosecutor said that the “charges were not going to stick”. Yet, off to prison they sent me.
The intake officer looked at my folder and the 13 years they gave me. He said this is not right. I smiled and said: “I am not worried about it. My appeal is already filed.”
I am going to talk about prison in the next chapter, but for right now, I will stick to the courts. I won on the first level of appeal. This was not for the reasons I should have won, but the judges ruled that since they could overturn my case on one issue, they did not need to address the others.
My jury instructions stated that I was not allowed to defend myself when I was being attacked. The prosecutor’s case was that I knew leaving an abusive man would upset him and cause an attack. The implications legally would be very bad for the courts. The instructions given to my jury had been previously ruled unconstitutional prior to being used in my trial. This, however, is not where my legal battle ended.
They forgot me. I sat in prison another 2 years after my conviction was overturned.
Under court rules, the appellate attorney withdraws after the case is won; his job is done. There were no rules about how a person gets released from custody.
I filed on every case I could find. I petitioned every court I had access to, but there was no response. I sat in prison years neither being guilty of a crime nor charged with one.
I was just there. Every room search, body search, and fire drill. There were no charges. I was just stuck in prison because no one did the paperwork.
My brother finally contacted a clerk, just a court clerk. The clerk was surprised that I was still there and filed papers, and I was given a court date out of the prison. Only they did not tell the prison to release me.
When the county did finally pick me up, they put me in segregation, the worst of all places in custody. There was no heat and no clock. You are locked down 23 of the 24 hours. When you can leave your cell for an hour, you only have access to a shower and maybe a phone. There was no hot water while I was in segregation, but after days of being locked down, the cold shower was better than nothing. They call the segregation unit “The hole” and for a good reason.
When they did take me to court, there was no paperwork and no charges filed against me. The judge did not know why I was there.
They did this for a few days. They took me back and forth to court. There was no court record of why I was living in the “the hole,” freezing and starving.
Eventually, they released me back into general population. I was sitting there talking to some of the girls when I heard “Winters roll up.” I dismissed it. I had no day in court and no paperwork. I had not signed anything. No attorney had been to see me to describe what would happen next. The officer repeated over the loud speaker: “Winters Roll Up.”
That is how they inform you that you are leaving. “Roll up” means to get your things together, roll up your mat and blanket, and sit by the door for them to release you.
After years of being locked up, I was just pushed back out in the street with no apology, no money, no identification. There was not even an ”oops.” Years of my life were stripped away. Prison conditioning was now in place, and I was free to go. Go where? Do what now?
If you felt any pain in hearing my story, let me reassure you that I had it easy. So many more have gone through so much worse.
There is nothing just about our justice system. It is designed for the rich and people with connections. Reform is needed badly.
Now let’s talk about prison.