The senior librarian here is a small framed blond lady who wears the most unbelievably tight shirts and yells at any inmates that gawk at her whom she doesn't desire the attention. It is a regular thing that happened on one of my first visits to the law library and one of the inmate workers warned me to avoid her unless I need to speak with her or deal with her at all. She was required for sending some legal "discovery" material to my attorneys and notarizing a legal document. The legal books that I was "compelled to donate" are also processed through her and I have bothered to inquire about them every week I have been at Dodge since my arrival. Cumulatively, the books are probably worth a few hundred dollars. Also, the library is devoid of any good legal resources. The law library has a few, but you only get up to fifty minutes when you are granted permission for legal access. As I am currently pro se on my appeal, I complained and was authorized for daily legal access but fifty minutes a day to drift through cases without any formal legal training or guidebooks is absurd to expect someone to be able to produce a competent appeal. Especially in a case as large as mine. It is more like an opportunity to "exhaust" your appeal and permanently bury yourself after the system does you wrong. Can we change it to The word games and elaborate excuses to perpetrate harm by people who are authorized such privilege by governmental powers... system? It is definitely not a system of justice by viewing it from the innocent side out.
Anyway, a couple times every week I ask the law clerk or the librarian, if I perchance pass her in the hall, if they have processed the box from intake so I might be able to reference "my" books. Just wait, things are about to melt down. Today about 2:15pm, the librarian dismisses everyone from legal access with less than fifty minutes to the session (as usual). I get up almost immediately and see that it startles her to turn and walk down the hallway toward her office. For a moment I think it would be great if she was going to show me that they finally processed "my" books and that I might be able to check them out. Oddly, she continues out of the library and across the main corridor to Unit 11 where I am housed. I am inevitably headed that way and she turns around and confronts me as I enter the unit. The unit itself is an entry space with a stairwell that goes up to another like space. From that there is a set of bars and a guard desk at the head of a hall which has cells on either side and at the far end is a larger space that is mainly used as storage but appears to have previously been used as a day/common room. It currently holds cleaning supplies, tables, and a tv for the inmate workers, called "swampers" to sort laundry. All the way back at the beginning of the unit is where she and I speak. Dodge doesn't have air conditioning so there are large fans in the hallways we need to speak over. After we exchange a quick greeting, I ask her if she found "my" books yet since I just got staffed and expect to go to my regular joint soon. She misses some of what I say to the noise of the fan but I tell her that I will be transported to my next joint any day now to which she immediately gives me a look the would skin an alligator so I apologize and say I wasn't trying to upset her (by always asking about the books) and I walk away, up the stairs to where my current cell is located. Maybe thirty minutes later, a "white shirt" (supervisor) and a number of guards are at the door. At first I am thinking they are going to shake down the cell because I tied my hair back while doing legal work and librarian asked them to, or perhaps they just looked at the camera. (Yes hair ties are available on commissary but if you use anything else to tie your hair, or tie your hair outside your cell, they take issue). From what I could guess, every guard in the entire prison has taken to the main corridor as I am escorted in handcuffs, with a guard on both sides of me also each contorting each of my wrists. There has to be at least thirty guards in the hallway in clusters and scattered along the route from Unit 11 to Unit 18. Eyes are bugged out as they gossip and gesture at me and I am just really confused. Unit 18 is a "restrictive housing unit" (RHU) where I am placed on "temporary lockup" (TLU) status. They strip me down in a tiny cell that is only big enough for a small concrete bench that could seat three people and the leg space in front of it. The "white shirt," Lt. Katze asks about if I made an inappropriate comment to a staff member. I don't recollect what I exactly said but I didn't swear at anyone or get loud. I was barely loud enough to hear over the fans and was not angry about anything. The books is really more of a joke at this point because it has been months since I went through the initial intake process. There are at least three people focused on me until Lt. Katze walks away. Then two other guys who are probably members of a junior detective squad start grilling me. They ask me why I was so willing to comply when asked to come out of my cell. This holding cell has plexiglass covering it and I am knelt down to speak through "the trap." When I tell them that I thought they were taking issue about me tying my hair back, one of them thinks he has my body language deciphered and says I looked "down to the right" when he asked me a question. I am like "what?" I said I turned my head to try to hear you through the trap. They try to validate their interests with any excuse they can find. 303.29 - Disrespect, and 303.30 - Soliciting an Employee. Tossed in Unit 18, cell 14, pending an investigation. No, I didn't! Still confused.
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aboutThese are the journal entries of Zachariah Anderson. All entries are originally handwritten by Zach and then transcribed on his behalf. Please note that occasional misspellings and grammar errors may be fixed during transcription for the sake of making the entries easier to read and sensitive information may be redacted. Archives
September 2024
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