Prison Camp – York County, South Carolina

“You have to focus on your own program. Keep to yourself and fly under the radar. Be anonymous. Don’t volunteer any information about anything. Don’t talk about how short your time is. Don’t draw attention to yourself. Don’t talk too much or be overly friendly. Respect boundaries. Keep yourself neat and clean. Organize your personal items and don’t make too much eye contact with anyone – at least at the beginning.”

The Prison Camp is next to the York County Detention Facility. The entire complex is part of the Moss Justice Center. The names are misleading because the detention facility is actually the maximum security facility and the prison camp is a minimum security work dormitory housing inmates who are in for unpaid child support and unpaid traffic tickets. All things are relative in their scope and interpretation.

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Los Angeles County Men’s Central Jail

“I watched a deputy turn the pages of a Heckler and Koch firearms catalog and converse with his comrade about a personal weapons purchase. The jail complex is a labyrinthine warren of passegeways and stairs and locked rooms.”

You bend over and spread your cheeks and the cop checks your anus for contraband. You are all standing around the stainless steel table naked. Your filthy blue pajamas wadded in a bundle with a big plastic zip-lock bag holding your personal papers and few inmate snacks, cup o’ noodles and candy bars.

The full spectrum of body types from the street emerge, rib cages showing, emaciated bodies of the homeless, the muscular marked tattooed gang bodies of the homies and the aerodynamic gorilla anatomies of the street Africans. The young shaved-head white sheriff deputies yell at you to squat down “like you are taking a shit in the woods” and lift up your balls. You stand back up facing the putty colored cinderblock wall, lift one foot at a time and wiggle your toes while a trustee takes your dirty clothing and throws a new bundle of pajamas and towel on the cold cement floor next to your feet.

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