After two weeks in TDCJ’s Woodman Unit and undergoing the rigorous digging into my social, medical, and criminal history, I’m finally standing in the unit classification line, awaiting a job assignment that will get me out of the boring dorm. But when Assistant Warden Sellers takes a look at my original sentence, she decides, without further investigation, that I’m to be classified as “not suitable” and placed in a small, 8-man tank at the back of Woodman Unit.
Two hours later, the gate slams and I soon find I’m housed with three murderers and two child rapists with long or life sentences: the “non-suitables” who are locked in 23 hours per day, brought their meals and meds, and go nowhere without an officer escort. A sign on our gate reads “NS” in big, black letters. When other inmates walk by, they keep their distance as if we bite.
An officer opens the gate and demands two of the women get ready for their medical intake. He sways his baton at them. “If any of you murderers try to do anything to me, I’m going to beat you with this stick,” he threatens.
Later, I employ one of the “murderers” the task of helping me edge up my undercut. The firm grip she has in the palm of her massive hand makes me nervous. I shakily hand her the double-bladed razor, and she roughly begins shaving. My heart is beating fast and my mind wonders if she’s about to slice my jugular.
“Are we almost done?” I ask.
“Just about.”
On the last stroke, she presses the blade down hard and I feel a trickle of blood on the side of my head. “Ouch!” I jerk away and look into the crazed eyes of the killer. She is almost grinning.
“Sorry,” she says unapologetically, and smiles sheepishly. I can smell her dank breath as she hands me the razor. Fifteen minutes later I’ve wiped the blood away and flushed every razor I wasn’t supposed to have down the toilet. Then I set about the task of writing a grievance, certain that my classification status as “not suitable” is incorrect. After all, I’m just a parole violator who was sent back to prison after getting a DWI misdemeanor conviction for taking anxiety medication and driving home from my brother’s funeral.
Original sentence? Thirty years for copying a $100 bill. Seven years complete on it, leaving me with 23 years — and I’m in review for parole.
Nothing aggravated, nothing violent or immoral. So why am I housed in here? Locked down like this? If the unit classification committee’s reasoning is based solely on the number of years in my original sentence — without consideration for the crime itself or time done on it, or the fact that I’m in review for parole — the missing factors and bias judgement is putting people in danger, not safety.
When I think about why they separate the sex offenders and murderers on the Woodman Unit which houses around 1200 women, two answers come to mind:
- To protect the non-suitables from a general population that doesn’t look on them kindly.
- To protect the general population from the non-suitables capable of re-offending within the broad limits of their heinous crimes.
I now sit on my bunk, watching two of the women beat their fists on the table and rap about “not giving a shit cuz they don’t see parole till 30 years they’ve sit.”
I see parole any day now. Unless, of course, one of them uses their “not give a shit,” picks a fight, and takes that chance from me.
I think to myself, If there is anything “not suitable” about this, it’s me not suitable for them.
I never heard anything in response to my grievance. I still sit here, awaiting transfer to another prison, riding my bunk like a punk, protecting my chance to be “suitable” and make parole.
Diedre McDonald # 06729324
Crain Unit
PO Box 660400
1401 State School Road
Dallas, TX 75266
One Comment
There is defiantly more than the story. You weren’t sentenced to 30 years for that, If so you probably was a prior offender