Almost Home (22 page)

The guards at this place (the Monroe County Jail) were different from any I’ve ever seen since. These people were nice, polite, well groomed, and not abusive in any way. I was fooled into thinking all guards were this way. I didn’t realize I was experiencing a miracle. They treated us like human beings, and even let us do
Damien Echols

124

things the other prisoners didn’t get to do, like stay up all night. The four of us never went into the cells, we made small pallets on the day room floor, and lived like we were having an external slumber party.

Kilo and I both looked with great anticipation to Saturday at midnight, when a show called
Night Fright
came on. We were so starved for music that we’d listen to anything, and this was our only fix. It wasn’t the music either of us preferred, but it was all we had. You never know how much you need music until you don’t have it. I missed it so much my heart hurt.

My mother, father, and Domini came to visit me once a week. We were

allowed twenty minutes, and had to talk through bulletproof glass. Domini had been almost five months pregnant when I was arrested, but you still couldn’t tell it by looking at her. In the last three or four months of the pregnancy she grew at an alarming rate. Her entire body was the same size it had always been, but her stomach became huge and tight. I wouldn’t get to be there for the birth of my son. That was one more thing taken from me. A guard stuck her head in the door one morning and told me that I was now a father. So much for a celebration.

We had a boy, who is now nearing his eleventh birthday. Domini gave him my first name, only spelled differently—Damian. I gave him the middle name of Seth, which is what everyone calls him. We gave him a third name, Azariah, just to be certain he’d never have an inferiority complex. I wasn’t there to sign the papers, so he has Domini’s last name. She brought him to see me for twenty minutes every week, but I couldn’t touch him.

They brought me five paperback books from a local second hand bookstore every week, and I’d usually have read them all by their next visit. I had always loved reading, but it now took on much more importance. Those books became my only way to forget about the nightmare of my life. I hid in them and went someplace else for hours at a time. The other guys were amazed by how much and how quickly I could read. It’s a trend that has continued to this day. I’ve read a few thousand books over the time I’ve been locked up. Without books, I would have gone insane long ago. I adore them, and would love to one day have my own second hand bookstore. Learning has become my passion.

The only people to do any work on my case during this time period were two private investigators from Memphis named Ron Lax and Glori Schettles. Ron hit the streets and came up with useful information on an almost daily basis. Unfortunately, my lawyers (I was given two) used absolutely none of the information
Damien Echols

125

he found. They didn’t even call the witnesses who could have testified to my whereabouts on the night of the murders. They never attempted to prove my alibi.

Glori came to see me nearly every single weekend, and always brought pizza.

You could tell she really cared about this case, because she and Ron both went to tremendous effort even though they were never paid a penny for it. On my birthday, Glori even brought me a box of cupcakes. We sat alone in a small office eating cake and going over the case. She gave me hope.

About a month before my trial, I was transferred to a jail in the town of Jonesboro. It was nothing like Monroe County. The guards were all unnecessarily cruel and abusive. They talked to you as if addressing a lower life form, no matter how polite and civil you were to them. I witnessed them beat prisoners on an almost daily basis. About two weeks ago I was lying here in my cell watching the news when it was announced that five guards had been fired in Jonesboro because they had handcuffed a prisoner and beat him unconscious. They were fired. No charges were filed against them. Most of the time they’re not even fired if they’re caught, only demoted in rank. That’s because prisoners aren’t considered human to society at large. If you walk up to a man on the street and punch him in the face you go to prison for assault. Do the same thing to a man in prison and you get demoted. They had a small Mexican guy in jail there who suffered from cata-tonic schizophrenia. He sat or stood in an odd position for hours at a time due to mental illness. The guards beat him just to see if they could make him move. It was like a game to them. They often spit in your food to see if they could get you to fight. If you even say anything to them they’ll call in five or six of their friends to beat you. Once you’re behind the walls there is no help. The world doesn’t care.

In Jonesboro, I was put in a cellblock by myself. There was no one to talk to, no books to read, no television to watch, and no going outside. I was locked in an empty concrete vault all day and night. I knew Jason was in the next cellblock, because I could hear the guys on that side through the wall. He was on a block with about ten other people. It would have been a huge comfort to be able to sit in the same room with him and carry on a normal conversation, perhaps try to figure out what went wrong, but the guards made certain we never even saw each other.

I gradually slipped deeper and deeper into depression and despair. When you’re in total isolation there’s nothing to take your mind off your fears. I had also recently heard the results of Jesse Misskelley’s trial/circus. He had been found guilty and given one life sentence plus two twenty-year sentences. Life plus
Damien Echols

126

forty. It wasn’t the death penalty, but it amounted to the same thing. Without a miracle he would die in prison. Jason and I were scheduled to go to trial together, though the attorneys were all fighting tooth and nail. It seemed like the entire world was howling for my blood.

XXX

The first morning of our trial, Jason and I were given bulletproof vests to wear to and from the courthouse. Emotions were running high and the cops were taking no chances. We arrived at court everyday in a convoy of police cars—about six of them, to be exact. When we pulled up out front, we had to walk a gauntlet.

There was a huge crowd of reporters, and people who wanted us dead, and we had to walk right through the middle of them like Moses parting the Red Sea.

The screams of hatred were so loud you couldn’t discern individual voices. It was like fighting your way through a black wall. Reporters shoved cameras and micro-phones into your face at every step, all shouting questions at once.

Another interesting thing began to happen as the days progressed. People who supported us, and believed in us, began to trickle in one or two at a time. They smiled or gave me a slight nod as I made my way in or out. They were mostly young boys or girls standing apart from the rest, many dressed in black. I started to receive little bits of poetry scratched onto scraps of paper. Someone sent me a single red rose. The supporters never matched the haters in number or volume, but it mattered a great deal to me. There were a few odd cases, too. Ron started a ritual of pointing out the girls he said were “eye-fucking” me. As I got out of the car one morning a girl screamed, “Oh my god, he looked at me!” like she had just seen John, Paul, George, and Ringo rolled into one.

The reporters were the worst. If people knew how much of what they read in the papers or saw on the news is distorted or outright lies, media corporations would soon go out of business. I’ve seen more fiction on local news broadcasts than I’ve read in novels. Quite often, the newspaper accounts didn’t match anything I saw go down in the courtroom. Valuable information went unreported.

During a post-trial hearing, new evidence was presented—they had found teeth marks on one of the bodies, and they did not match my teeth. There was no mention of it in the next day’s paper.

It’s maddening to sit there hour after hour, day after day, on trial for something both you and the cops know you didn’t do. You can feel hundreds of eyes drilling into you, taking in your every shift and move. Many seemed to think this 127

Damien Echols

128

was the greatest form of entertainment they’d ever witnessed. Vultures were stripping the flesh from my bones while I was still alive.

I never stood a chance. During breaks the judge and prosecutors told jokes about me and smiled like they were awaiting a pat on the back. The judge commented on what a nice ass one of the female potential jury members had, and the prosecutor’s teeth stuck out while he yuk-yuk-yukked it up. Convincing twelve people they should vote to have me murdered was just another day at the office for them.

Whenever evidence was introduced that could have helped me, the jury was escorted from the room so they wouldn’t hear it. The stepfather of one of the children was discovered to have a knife with blood on it that matched at least one of the victims. We were not even allowed to ask him, “Did you murder those children?” in the presence of the jury. Why? Because he wasn’t the one on trial here, I was. It wasn’t really a trial. More like a formality to get out of the way before the guilty verdict.

It would be redundant to go over every detail, because the world could view the whole thing by renting a DVD. With the rise of the internet you can even go online and read all the paperwork. I’ve never actually seen either a DVD or the Internet, but I’ve heard of such things, even in here.

We were both found to be guilty. I didn’t need to call a phone line psychic to see that coming, but it was still crushing to the spirit. Perhaps it’s human nature to clutch at any little bit of hope you can conjure up. I did, all the way to the very last second. It’s devastating, even when you see it coming a mile away. When they read the verdict, I heard Domini start sobbing and run from the courtroom. I couldn’t turn around to look, because my legs would have buckled. I was determined not to let them know how bad they were hurting me. I refused to give them that satisfaction. I would not cry, I would not faint, and I would not show weakness. I had to hold myself up by placing my hands on the table, but I tried to make it look casual. Inside, I started to die. There was no safe place in all the world for me. My stomach was filled with ice water. Hearing Domini was the final straw. Something in me was broken. All the King’s horses and all the King’s men would never be able to put me back together again.

I was sentenced to death, Jason to life without parole. After the reading of the sentence I was immediately rushed out of the courtroom and to a waiting car. As I was going out someone screamed, “You’re going to die!” Someone else screamed, “No you’re not!” The car door slammed, and we pulled out of the parking lot. I was on my way to death row.

XXXI

To get from the courthouse to the prison took about three hours. That’s an eternity to a man who doesn’t know what kind of situation he’s walking into. Everyone in jail has horror stories to tell about prison. A lot of people think jail and prison are the same place, and that they know what the penitentiary is like because they were once picked up for being drunk. Jail is pre-school. Prison is for those earning a PhD in brutality.

My mind was numb and I couldn’t think. I now know this was a combination of shock and post traumatic stress disorder—the same thing experienced by sol-diers who have been in a fire fight. I shivered uncontrollably, though I didn’t feel the cold outside. My life was over. That’s the closest thing I could formulate to a thought. My execution date was set for May fifth. That was a couple of months away. The attorneys had told me don’t worry about that, your first execution date means nothing. Everyone gets one of those, but getting a stay of execution is automatic. I’d like to see how well they laughed it off if it was their names on a piece of paper with a date next to it. Har har har, you jokers. That’s a good one.

Most people who go to prison first make a stop at what is called the diagnostic center. That’s where they give you a complete physical and mental evaluation. If you’re going to death row there’s no layover at the diagnostic center. What was the point? Physical and mental health don’t really matter if you’re standing before a firing squad. My trip ended at the bighouse itself.

It was dark outside when we pulled up, but the place was still lit up like a Christmas tree. The lights are never turned completely off in prison, and there are searchlights constantly moving to and fro. I was taken out of the car and into a small building where I was strip-searched and given a pair of “prison whites.”

That’s what they call the uniform you’re issued.

There was some fat clown in polyester pants, a short-sleeved shirt, and clip-on tie issuing orders. His air of self-importance led you to believe he was a warden or something. He had a horrendous little boy’s haircut and the requisite 70s porn mustache. He was not the warden. In truth, he was assigned to the mental health division and had no authority whatsoever.

129

Damien Echols

130

That’s a common thing in the prison industry. They take some loser who has spent his life bagging groceries or asking, “Would you like fries with that?” and put them in a polyester guards uniform, then the would-be losers blow up like a puffer fish and march around like baby Hitlers. This is the only place they can feel important, so they fall in love with the job. It becomes their life, and they’d rather die than lose it.

The ass clown screams in my face, “Your number is SK931! Remember it!” I happened to glance at a digital clock that read 9:31 P.M. I wondered if everyone’s number was the same as the time they came in (It was just a very bizarre coincidence). A nurse checked my temperature, blood pressure, and heart rate. They seemed to find it hilarious that my pulse registered like a rabbit in a snare.

After they finished, they took me to a filthy, rat-infested barracks that contained fifty-four cells. This was death row. You’d be amazed at how many letters I get from people saying they’re sorry I’m on “death roll.” I always picture that thing alligators do when they grab you and start spinning around and around. It rips you to shreds and drowns you at the same time. The death roll. I was put in number four call, and immediately fell asleep. I was exhausted from the trauma.