Punishing released prisoners
By Brandon Astor Jones
"I joined the army. This [was not a situation in which] they drafted me." — James Doctor
The speaker of the words above would like for us to know that he was not dragged, kicking and screaming, into the military. He joined of his own volition. Those people who have been suggesting that he is a coward simply because he was absent without leave briefly during the Vietnam War are making irrational judgments, at best.
In 1962, I too was AWOL for 19 days before I requested to be separated from the army. I was not a coward then, nor am I one now: I just wanted to be with my wife, whose health was threatened by her first, extremely difficult, pregnancy. I was not about to leave her alone in a strange town hundreds of miles from her home or anyone she knew.
In an article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's May 23, 1999, issue, Jim Wooten uses President Clinton's willingness to be less than forthright about his indiscretions as a guide of sorts for the purpose of excusing James Doctor's answers regarding his past military service. If Georgians have excused the president's behaviour, then he suggests that they excuse Doctor's. I think Wooten's comparison — his good intentions notwithstanding — does a disservice that borders on insult regarding Doctor's experiences.
Because Doctor spent a brief time as a prisoner himself in a US Army prison more than 30 years ago, some people are questioning his fitness to fill the number three spot, facilities director, in Georgia's Department of Corrections. Oh, did I mention that he is black — and that most of his detractors in Georgia are white? Ah well, but then I digress.
According to the newspaper, new commissioner, Jim Wetherington, declares, "Doc has a good track record, I interviewed five people for the job ... I believe he will make a good facilities director." The commissioner should be commended for having made such a non-political, albeit controversial, selection. It took courage to do that.
Doctor signed up for what he thought would be computer training when he joined the army, but shortly thereafter was pressed into the infantry. He did not know that the military in those days rarely honoured an unscrupulous recruiter's promises to a new recruit. Lies, and/or half truths were common practices to lure and coerce young pliant minds into military service. I know from personal experience because the same deceitful tactic was used on me in 1961.
The practice had a demoralising effect on most of the soldiers who were subjected to it. It caused an immediate lack of trust for all things military, in most cases.
Why is that so hard for so many Georgians to understand? Anyone who has not walked a mile or two in the director's shoes 30 years ago ought to be at least tolerant enough to reserve judgment until they see what kind of a job he can do as facilities director.
I know how he felt when, while on an off-post outing with a group of white soldiers, he and they sought service at a South Carolina place of business and he was told, "We don't serve n—-ers at the front door; you go around to the back". No white person can even begin to understand what words like those can do to a black person. That is especially so if the young recruit might be asked to give his or her life in war on foreign soil while fighting an enemy who may some day be served with a smile at that very same establishment.
Those who attack Doctor because of his past imprisonment and dishonourable discharge are conservative, spiteful puppets. Their strings are being pulled by the political gods of intolerance and revenge. My discharge from the service was "general", but later it was made "honourable". It was not hard for a black soldier (who cherished his dignity) to get a less than honourable discharge in the south 30 or 40 years ago.
There is a huge hypocrisy about giving fairness, forgiveness and access to the so-called "American dream" to an ex-prisoner. The kind of people who are attacking Doctor seem to be doing so because he has turned his life around.
At some point US society will have to find the courage to stop punishing its released prisoners, long after they have served their time, who try to do the right thing when they get out. Logic should tell us that those who know prison personally, as a result of having been imprisoned themselves, are in most cases far better suited to run prisons than most of those pretentious toe-the-party-line politicians who build them only for the sake of getting elected.
As a member in good standing of the kept, I do not often have cause to praise many of the keepers. Nevertheless, in situations like this one, it is clear that some of them deserve much more praise than they are getting. Let me share a little bit more with you.
I have a friend who spent several years in one of California's toughest prisons, convicted of shooting his father to death. Prison administrators hated him because (among other things) he complained a lot about not being able to vote while in prison. When he was released, he got a job as a counsellor and support person for newly paroled prisoners. From there, he worked his way up through the corrections system.
Eventually he became the warden of San Francisco County's Jail Number 8. Some of the programs he has put into place at that and other jails have been instrumental in greatly reducing the recidivism rate throughout the state. The man is thoroughly rehabilitated, and he fights for rehabilitation. The USA needs more like him.
Recently when his boss, Michael Hennessey, the elected sheriff of San Francisco County, needed someone to fill the number two spot in Sheriff's Department, he chose my friend Michael Marcum for the job. Now Michael is the assistant sheriff of San Francisco County. It is perhaps worthy of note that Michael is a white man. His appointment was opposed with vigour by a portion of the California Peace Officers Association, many of whom — ironically enough — are black. But then, again I digress.
There are people like Wetherington, Doctor, Hennessey and Marcum all over the USA. Unfortunately, some people are spending so much time and energy pointing out their past flaws and mistakes that their successes seldom get proper attention. To those self-righteous critics, I say:
Facilities director Doctor and assistant sheriff Marcum are but two of many who can be shining demonstrations and examples to the entire world of what rehabilitation and another chance really mean, if you let them.
[The writer is a prisoner on death row in the United States. He welcomes letters commenting on his columns (include your name and full return address on the envelope, or prison authorities may refuse to deliver it). He can be written to at: Brandon Astor Jones, EF-122216, G3-63, Georgia Diagnostic & Classification Prison, PO Box 3877, Jackson, GA 30233, USA.]