How often do prisoners try to escape from jail/prison, and how many of them succeed?

Two days later I was in L.A.. I had made it but a day later as I’m headed to Venice Beach to try and find someone who I used to work with, I pass out on the bus. I wake up drenched in water on the floor of the bus with a couple of paramedics hovering over me and about 50 bus riders hovering over them. I jump up, say I’m ok, and get off of the bus. I make it back to where I was staying and end up having to go to the hospital later that night. Turned out that those 8 or 9 days I spent in Phoenix with very little water, and food had caused me to not only catch a case of pneumonia but also caused me to have a heart attack.

Sorry, it’s taking so long, but here is where it gets interesting. At Tucson, I met up with two bank robbers who I had become close to four years prior at MDCLA as I was fighting my case. The first night we stay up talking about what we are going through with each of our situations. After I tell them about my indictment and stating that I've resigned myself to dying in Federal custody, they both start plotting my liberation. I’m not able to get into specifics, however, escaping was something that I had no thought of even attempting, and kind of played along with their planning it over the next couple of weeks. As the plan came together and they were wholeheartedly actually putting the necessary people and materials together for it, at which point it was becoming a felonious endeavor which I had no plans of actually doing I told them to stand down, I was not going to go through with it. That was not what either of them was expecting to hear, and for the next few days, we argued as angrily as possible while whispering constantly. Finally, Bob said to me that if I got caught I’d get an additional 4 years added to my sentence, and since my sentence was so long I wouldn’t be going back to a camp anyway, so what have I got to lose? The argument got me thinking that I had nothing to lose, I mean at this point I was dead anyway, and if it did work I’d be able to live my life for some time before I was eventually caught and locked up for the remainder of my life.

And even with all that, running was still the best decision I ever made in my life.

What’s the worst thing you caught anyone in your family doing?

And best of all, since it is such a prime place to serve your Federal sentence there is no violence, no politics, no programs, no race separation. It is “Club Fed”.

In all honesty, I was facing a 34-year sentence in Federal Prison about 15 years ago. I can’t go into too many details, but I did run, and it was one of the hardest, yet best decisions of my life.

Ok, now I can go into a little more detail. First to answer your question regarding clothing. Wear whatever you want when you turn yourself in. You’ll be processed immediately and will be issued your prison uniform. Federal prisoners receive khaki pants and a tan button-up long-sleeved shirt, belt, socks underwear, and two pairs of shoes. A pair of canvas “Keds” type of tennis shoes, and a pair of black high topped, steel-toed work boots (which blew me away). The clothing comes in 5 of each, along with two washcloths and two bath towels. The whole mess is enclosed in a mesh laundry bag, and the shirts will include your name and reg #, military style. You’ll be able to purchase higher-end tennis shoes (New Balance) and sweats from the commissary. Depending on what your classification is you’ll be going to anything from high security full-on hard-core prison with gangs and political protocols, mandatory programs, race separation, and lots of violence. To the least secure, and easiest time you can do the Disneyland of every prison system in the world, the Federal Camp. I don’t think that you’ll qualify for a camp though due to your lengthy sentence, however, if you do your first 18 years at wherever you end up, without causing too many problems or getting additional charges I think you may be camp eligible for your remaining 12 years.

Have you ever forcibly sucked someone’s dick?

So I agreed and put my life in their hands. I can’t get too detailed but my escape involved being snuck into the kitchen after the last count and being sealed into a trash bag then thrown into a large dumpster and waiting for the trash truck to arrive early in the morning. At that time the dumpster would be forklifted up over the cab of the trash truck and dumped into the back of the truck. At that time I had to get out of the trash bag, climb over the trash bags that were in front of me, and quickly get out of the way of the next trash bin being emptied into the truck. Then I had to climb down the outside of the truck, scoot underneath it, and wrap my legs around the undercarriage while holding onto another part of the frame with my hands pulling the upper part of my body up. Straddling the driveshaft from underneath it. Oh, and I had to do this as three guards stood near the front of the truck, bullshitting with the driver. After the last bin is emptied I hear the driver's assistant climb up into the passenger side of the cab. I’m beginning to feel a little excited like this worked. Then I see the boots of one of the guards walk to the side of the truck almost exactly parallel to where my head is. He stops, and then I watch him manipulate a pole with a large mirror on the end of it underneath the truck. For a brief moment, the mirror is angled perfectly so that I can see his face, and he is looking right at me. But he keeps walking down the side of the truck, goes around the back, and up the other side. This time I’ve got my head turned and my eyes squeezed shut when he moves up to where I am. After less than a minute, I feel the truck shift into gear and we slowly begin to drive off. As it turns out the truck has to continue on a dirt road for about 5 miles before getting on the freeway. I’ve been told that I’ve got to release before the truck gets on the highway, but it would be best to do so at the end of the dirt road so I can hopefully get picked up and get out of the area before the morning count. It’s immediately apparent when the truck begins rolling on a smooth paved road and as it stops at a signal I try to drop off, but now my arms and legs which have been holding my 200 lbs body up off the ground for dear life over the past 15 minutes or so refuse to cooperate. Panicked I get my legs untangled and as the truck begins to roll I’m dragged for a little bit but the pull of my body dragging on the ground helps pull my arms free and I end up stationary on the road as the truck slowly rolls over me. It’s early morning, no light yet and traffic is non-existent. I get up walk over to the side of the road and frantically begin trying to look like anything other than an escaped Federal prisoner. Luckily I find a discarded T-shirt in a pile of garbage next to the bus stop I’ve discovered. I put it on, it’s dirty, stinks, it’s black and it has a faded pink image of the B-52s band on it. And it’s about three sizes too tight. But it’s not a button-down khaki with my name and reg number on it. So I’m happy about that. Not 10 minutes later a group of Latin women gets dropped off by a station wagon, while a bus pulls up at the same time. I know I look like shit, and I smell even worse so I’m thinking about how I’m going to scam this bus ride. The driver is a long-haired white boy a few years younger than me. So I go with a story about getting wasted last night at a party with my girlfriend who ends up taking off with a friend of mine, and I got pissed attempted to drive myself home to Phoenix and ended up getting my car stuck in the dirt when I drove off the road a few miles back. And somewhere along the way, I lost my wallet. He smiles, says something like “Dude I’ve been there” and not only lets me on the bus but gives me transfers and instructions on which lines I’m to take to get back home. So far so good. But it’s August, I’m in fucking hell and I need to get back to Los Angeles if I’m going to make this escape work. I plan to hook up with one of two women who used to work with me four years ago and get their help to get to L.A.. One lived in Phoenix and one lived in Scottsdale. I don’t have a dime on me and I’m not even considering that they could have moved, they are my only options so all I’m focused on is getting to one of them asap. One thing that I didn’t consider was that they had been interviewed by the FBI and to save their asses had given the Feds total cooperation. So when I get to Phoenix and arrive at #1's apartment she doesn’t answer the door. I wait around for most of the day, trying not to look too suspicious as I knock at her door every couple of hours. August in Phoenix is a place where there isn’t anyone outside during the day. It’s as if you are on a different planet that has no atmosphere and everyone must stay inside or in their climate-controlled vehicles when venturing outside. So it’s difficult not to stand out, and of course, I’ve just escaped from a Federal prison, so there is that paranoia thing going through my head. By nightfall, I’m too fidgety to remain where I am any longer so I decide to walk to the #2 location.

Now about my going on the run. Near the end of my 4 year sentence like my last 3 or 4 months my lawyer visited me. I thought she was there to make arrangements for the $18k I still owed her. She was there to inform me that I was going to be indicted on new charges and that I may be looking at the 34 years that she had saved me from four years prior. Initially, I was charged with 5 counts of security fraud, and this was when the Mandatory Sentencing Laws were in force. Under those guidelines the Feds used a graph made up of your criminal history levels, the dollar amount of your crime, and some other data to come to your sentence. The judge held a discretion of only 6 months up or down on your sentence. And that was when you had to do 96% of your sentence. At 5 counts of Security Fraud, with the dollar amounts involved, I had been looking at a 34-year sentence. However due to the lead FBI Agent on my case not going back to a judge and getting extensions on the phone taps they had on my cels, my attorney argued that the evidence that the Feds had that was associated with four of my counts was inadmissible “fruit of the forbidden tree” she said. The judge agreed, and 4 counts were dismissed, I pled guilty to the remaining count and received four years.

As I had been in a state of suspended animation at my faux college campus in Taft, the lead FBI agent who fucked up on the wiretaps had continued with his investigation into my criminal enterprise. Concentrating on my operations in Scottsdale AZ they had been able to obtain computers, video footage, witnesses, paperwork all those things they had not been able to find when they arrested me in Los Angeles. She was telling me that at 46 years old, my life was done.

How do you emotionally react to when others seem to feel sorry for you?

My crime was white-collar (securities fraud), and my sentence was four years so I was totally camp-eligible from the gate and did my time at Taft near Bakersfield. 1600 inmates, no walls or fences, 4 COs on duty at all times (two of which were smokin' hot babes, one rode an Indian Chopper, the other drove a Cadillac Alente) 8 Tennis Courts, an actual Pool Hall, jogging track, football field two soccer fields, 4 baseball diamonds, frisbees, Bocci Ball, a full Library with most National weekly magazines stocked four deep. Nearly every major newspaper 3 deep daily. 5 or 6 different TV rooms where you listened through your Walkman. The commissary was limited to $500 a week and you can purchase everything from lunch meats, fresh veggies, ice cream, soda, milk, juice just about everything available from the neighborhood market, short of cigs and alcohol.

Now as wonderful as that term was, it was still four years of my life. And given the fact that everything that I had accumulated during my life before my arrest by Federal agents was either seized by the Feds, repossessed by the banks, or liberated by the criminal element that I associated with I spent that 4 years trying to figure out how I was going to survive upon release. Very, very stressful.

Just as she said, within a few days I was told to roll my things up and I was escorted to a military air base in Palmdale, where I was put on a Con-Air flight (not a C130, a confiscated 707, white with no markings) it had all the seats replaced with benches, and had I-hooks screwed into the floor in front of each prisoner which we were then chained to. The plane was piloted by an air-force fighter jock who flew the airliner like it was an F-16 climbing as vertically as possible with every take-off and coming in hot on every landing. And it seemed as soon as we reached altitude we would immediately dive back down to the next stop to pick up another inmate. Up and down at least 10 times as we made our way to Kansas City, KS. Arriving at the airport in Kansas City we taxied to a terminal at the far end of the airport and unloaded onto a gangplank that was directly attached to a Federal Prison right there in the airport. The facility is a processing center for Federal inmates. Kind of like how FedEx routes all of the shipments they collect daily through Tennessee, and then out to their destination. Two days there then I’m once again. Back on Con-Air, and ending up at FCI-Tucson. The Federal Prison facility for pre-trial inmates.

Why cant I stop thinking about counsellor between sessions?

Arriving in Scottsdale I head to the laundry room first, which is now locked. Then to the door which is not answered even though I am now pounding on it like a cop would, hard and fast. Nothing. As I leave I make one more try at the laundry room, and as luck would have it there is a woman inside doing laundry. I wave at her, she lets me in and I go straight to the sink slurping up tons of water in a most animalistic way as she just looks at me, disgusted I assume. I ignore her and soak my head under the faucet, then flip my hair back and once again suck down water as if I’d been lost in the desert for days.I turn the water off and kind of nod toward her as I turn to leave. She grabs my arm and says hold on a minute. She returns to her purse and I’m thinking that she is going for her phone to call the police. I’m getting ready to bolt out of there when she pulls a bunch of bills out of her purse and nearly throws them toward me. I gather up the bills nod to her again and leave. It was $56.00 in total, and it saved my life. I immediately hit up the Circle K on the corner, buy a couple of bottles of water and two hot dogs, and then head to the bus stop for the trip back to Phoenix. Get to the number 1 door again no answer so I head over to my spot behind the hill to lie down. Sometime in the early afternoon, I can’t sleep. I’m covered in sweat and I’m uncomfortable as fuck. I go to the number 1 door, and pound on it. No answer and I head to the market for food and water. I’m beginning to have doubts that either of these women will ever answer their doors, and am quickly losing my will to continue. I’m pretty much defeated at this point. I don’t know what to do and start to believe that my only option if I seriously want to live will be to turn myself in. As I’m sitting on the bus bench resigning myself to turning myself in a guy about my age, dressed in a fireman's outfit, complete with helmet and the thick coat they wear sits down next to me. I look at him and notice that his face is scarred. He looks at me, introduces himself as “Jason”, and begins to tell me his story. Starting with the facial scars he tells me how a year earlier while on the roof of a burning warehouse spraying water down into a massive fire, the roof collapsed. Dropping him into the inferno and melting his breathing apparatus to his face. Escaping that fire with his life he spends the next six months recovering. Not wanting to leave the department, but not really into fighting fires anymore he becomes a paramedic. Last night he was called to a terrible accident and one of the vehicles was his family in which he lost his parents and his sister. His Captain told him to go home, and since he couldn’t drive he was catching the bus. The bus arrives, and we continue to talk. My stop in Scottsdale comes up quickly and we continue to talk as he follows me off the bus. All day he stays with me and the time seems to pass by quickly. That night we stayed in a park sleeping on the picnic benches. The next day we passed a newspaper stand which has a paper inside with my picture on the front page. I get a bit concerned and he starts laughing. Which does not help my anxiety. He guides me over to a storefront window and says look at yourself. I hadn’t thought about my appearance, other than to think that I looked like a bum. But in reality, I looked nothing like the clean-cut businessman in the four-year-old picture the Feds had provided the Gazette. I had lost at least 30 lbs., and I hadn't cut my hair in four years, additionally I had grown a goatee. The only person who would associate that picture with me would be me. I also noticed that my khakis were now completely white. The salt that I had been sweating had turned my clothes completely white. With the black steel towed boots I looked more like a baker, or milkman than a Federal prisoner. Feeling better at that point than I had in days, we continued. I can't remember how many days later it was but it had to be a couple because I was out of money and was back to walking my track between Phoenix and Scottsdale. It was mid-afternoon and I was continuing robotically when someone in a passing car yelled my name. Looking up I see a white van skidding to a stop and reversing. A girl is hanging out of the passenger door window, long strawberry blonde hair covering her face, and waving excitedly. I’m not in fear, but I think that she has mistaken me for someone else. The van stops next to me and she is jumping out of it flying at me, wrapping her arms around me. And I’m embarrassed by her being so close to me as I know that I smell and am a total mess, and she is mistaking me for someone else. I gently push her away and she can tell I have no clue as to who she is. She is attractive, light-skinned, with dark blue eyes, petite with long bright strawberry blond hair, and a huge smile. She tells me her name, it does nothing for me. I know that I don’t know her. Then she mentions the name, Victor. The strip club in Hollywood. The Russians I used to sell color photocopiers to, how 5 years ago I helped her to escape a bad situation she had gotten into with the Russians and how I did a favor for my friend Victor I sent her to Phoenix to stay with one of my girls there. It didn’t come rushing back to me, but I slowly began to remember the situation and who she was. I asked her how she recognized me, and she told me that she recognized my walk. My fucking walk is unbelievable! I turn to Jason and begin to make the introduction, and suddenly right there next to this white van pulled over on Camelback Rd. Jason just goes poof. Turns to dust right in front of my eyes. He never existed. I knew right away that my mind had created him. I realized immediately that I had created him and was shocked. Katrina just stood there holding the van door open for me, waiting for me to get in the van. Thanks to her help I was able to get some money sent to her so that I could catch a bus to L.A..

Scottsdale is about 6 miles away, but it’s a straight shot on Camelback Rd.. I head out trying not to look at each car that passes by and trying not to appear as if I’m dying of thirst, hunger, or too tired to go on. I get to the number 2 location early morning 3 or 4 am. A time that I'm sure my friend should be home, in bed by now no matter who she was out fucking last night. I knock, I knock again, and again. Louder each time. Nothing, no answer, not a sound from behind the locked door. I go to her complex laundry room and drink from its utility sink. I sit down and fall asleep. I’m awakened a few hours later by the maintenance guy who is perplexed by my being there, but this is long before the homeless crises so it’s a new occurrence and he isn’t really upset, just confused. I apologize mumble some bullshit and get going. Once more at the number two door. Again no answer and I’m quickly on my way, as the maintenance guy has kind of followed me and is watching to make sure I leave the complex. Back to Phoenix via Camelback Rd.. It’s mid-afternoon by the time I get back to the number one door, and I’m drenched in sweat. Not to mention thirsty, hungry, and very tired. I took the T-shirt off and put my khaki prison shirt back on, but I was able to rip off my name and reg number. I try the door again and get no response. I’m tired more than anything and decide that it would be better if I travel at night so I need a place to hold up for a few hours. Thankfully Phoenix is still kind of a backwater shithole even though it’s the 5th most populated city in the country, so I’m able to find a little hill just off Camelback that keeps me hidden and provides a shady spot to lie down in. Now I can rest in a 95-degree spot out of direct sunlight instead of the 115 degrees I’ve been existing in for 14 hours a day over the past two days. Night comes and I begin my trek back towards Scottsdale again. Now I’m driven more by the fact that there is water in that laundry room than I am in believing that number 2 will be home.