Earning Freedom: Conquering a 45-Year Prison Term by Michael Santos

Episode 10.1

Months 180-190

 

The first time I see Bob he’s carefully selecting items from the salad bar. He expertly manipulates the stainless-steel tongs, piling the freshest tomatoes, radishes, chopped iceberg lettuce, and spinach leaves on his plastic tray. He’s oblivious to the growing line of angry men standing in line and the other 500 prisoners in the noisy chow hall.

Bob stands taller than six feet, with glacial blue eyes and a full head of blond hair that he combs neatly. I know he’s new to Fort Dix, and I suspect he’s in his late-fifties.  He’s trim and clean-cut.  As I watch him from a nearby table, I can’t help but wonder why he’s here. I’ve read of professionals and businessmen who’ve run afoul of the law, but those offenders don’t generally serve time with us inside double fences laced with coils of razor wire. Bob looks like the type of man who sends people to prison, not one who serves time in prison.

Other white-collar types approach him, smiling, offering to help him settle in. Bob, however, remains tight-lipped, responding only with curt nods. When he clenches his jaw he projects defiance rather than the fear I’m used to seeing in newcomers.

A few days have passed since I saw him in the chow hall, and I see him again while I’m running around the track. He’s sitting on the railroad ties that serve as steps separating the court from the track, eating a green apple and watching Ironhead, a more typical prisoner, shoot baskets alone on the asphalt court inside the track.

Ironhead is a guy who looks like he’s been in prison all his life. His shaved head glistens with sweat and he distinguishes himself with a mouthful of gold-capped teeth. He’s tall and muscular. Arching over his shoulder blades is a tattoo with bold capital letters that spell out “destroyer.” On his stomach is another that reads “thug for life.”

I’m used to seeing Ironhead shoot baskets while I run. We don’t share much in common and we never talk. He exercises alone, and I exercise alone. Today Bob sits between our workouts, eating his apple and watching.

While running, I drift into thoughts about my writing projects and about the relationship Carole and I are building through our letters. As my steps crunch along the gravel track today, I tune into Bob, wondering whether he’s going to make the mistake of interrupting Ironhead’s workout.

“You’d make more shots if you’d set your stance before shooting,” Bob instructs.

Ironhead ignores him, takes another shot, and misses.

“See what I mean? You’re losing your balance.”

Ironhead grabs the rebound. Then he presses his left fist into his hip, and with his right hand, palms the basketball as he addresses Bob.

“A-yo Gee! Who you be talkin’ to?” Ironhead snarls, strutting toward Bob.

Bob takes the last bite of his apple and then sets the core on the step, standing to meet Ironhead.

“I’ll show you what I mean,” Bob says with a combination of innocence and coaching authority that actually disarms the unlikely student. Then he opens his hands, gesturing for Ironhead to pass him the ball. Ironhead scowls, bounces the ball twice, then hurls the ball at Bob.  He dribbles to the top of the key, plants and sinks the ball, then proceeds to coach Ironhead on shooting skills. Before I finish my run, I’m surprised to see the two are on the court together playing one on one.

Later in the afternoon I see Bob sitting alone at a picnic table beneath one of the maple trees. He’s writing a letter on a yellow legal pad, gold-frame reading glasses perched on his nose. I approach and interrupt him.

“Can I have a minute?”

He looks up, quickly evaluating me like an employer deliberating whether I’m worthy of an interview.  Then he answers with a half-dismissive “I’ll be with you in a minute.” He finishes writing his paragraph, leaving me waiting.

“Now,” he sets his pen down, “how can I help you?”

“My name’s Michael Santos,” I say, introducing myself. “I’m a long-term prisoner and aspiring writer. I’ve just finished a manuscript describing some of my experiences that I’m about ready to send to my publisher. If you’ve got time to read it, I’d appreciate any advice you might offer on what I can do to strengthen my manuscript.”

Bob removes his glasses and rubs his eyes. “Why ask me?”

“You’re new to prison, I’m guessing, and you’re as close as I’m going to get in here to the demographic I’m trying to reach.”

“What’s that, old white guys?”

“No, college-educated people who don’t have experience with confinement.”

“Let me see it.”

I pass him the envelope containing my manuscript. He pulls the document out and glances through the 400 pages.

“Did you type this here?”


“My girlfriend typed it for me.”

“She did a nice job.” He places it back in the envelope. “I’ve got a full plate right now, but if you leave it with me, I’ll read it over the next few days.”

“Sounds good. I’m not in a rush. What’s your name?”

“I’m Bob Brennan,” he says, as if I should recognize the name, and extends his hand.

******

In the weeks to come Bob and I develop a friendship. We walk the track together and I listen to his story. From his demeanor, I correctly surmised that he was a man accustomed to pulling strings at the top levels of American business.  Bob was the founder and CEO of numerous businesses, both public and private.  For many years he was his company’s spokesman on national television commercials that invited investors to grow with him at First Jersey Securities, his most well known company.  Bob owned personal jets, helicopters, and palatial homes, and thoroughbred racehorses.  Over the course of his distinguished career, he earned hundreds of millions and nurtured friendships with distinguished people such as President Ronald Reagan, President George H.W. Bush, and President George W. Bush.  A jury convicted Bob for a crime that he described to me as “lying on a government form.”  Now he’s beginning a sentence that threatens to confine him for a decade.

We sit on a steel bench beneath a cherry tree on this late summer evening in 2002. Hundreds of prisoners walk along the wide path circling the compound. Bob knows all about my story because he read the manuscript I prepared. I listen to his story with a sense of loss at what my imprisonment has cost me when he describes his career, his experiences at creating jobs for tens of thousands of well-paid people that his companies employed.

“You know what a Democrat is, don’t you?” I tease Bob.

 “What’s that?”

“It’s a Republican who’s been arrested.”
Bob laughs, but his smile fades as he scans the Fort Dix compound. “This isn’t the place to spend your life.”

“I’m used to it,” I say.

“That’s a shame,” he says knowingly.

“What do you miss most from all that you’ve lost?” I probe. Bob is a man who has lost much.

Bob looks up at the sky, thinking. “My Gulfstream jet and the freedom to fly away.”

“That’s what you miss most?” I can hardly believe him.

“There’s nothing like being able to fly wherever you want, whenever you want.” He affirms his answer with a nod.

“I guess traveling isn’t an aspiration I can relate to anymore.”

“So how’s your romance going with Carole? Did you get a letter from her today?” Bob asks, deliberately changing the subject.

“Yes, we write every day, although she might not like what I wrote back today.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s nothing serious, but something she wrote bothered me, and I let her know.”

“What bothered you?”

“She wrote about lottery tickets.”

“So?”

“Come on, a lottery ticket? It doesn’t sit well with me. When I think of people who buy lottery tickets, I think of a poverty state of mind, of people who don’t work hard enough to make things happen on their own. Instead, they’re waiting for something to happen for them.”

“You’ve got to lighten up, Michael. Not everyone in the world is like you.”

“Do you buy lottery tickets?”

Bob doesn’t dignify the question with an answer. “It’s not about what I do. I’m talking about understanding other people. People like to dream. Las Vegas is built on that concept.”

“I want her to have stability and independence in her life so she’s not worried about whether child support checks come on time, or anything else.”

“Give her a break. Why’re you trying to control her life?”

“I’m not trying to control anything.”

“The hell you aren’t. When you judge someone for buying a lottery ticket, you’re trying to control them.”

“We’re growing closer and I want her to know how I think.”

“You haven’t been with a woman in 15 years, and you haven’t even seen Carole since high school. How’re you going to build a relationship from here, when she’s living on the West Coast, and you’re locked inside a Jersey prison?”

“The circumstances might not be ideal, I’ll give you that. But the distance between us doesn’t mean we can’t fall in love, build a life together.”

Bob laughs. “Love? A life together? Listen to yourself! You’ve been locked up since 1987. This is a divorced mother of two. You’re both desperate. If you string this woman along, all you’re going to do is make both of your lives miserable.”

“I’m not stringing her along, and I’m not desperate. Neither is she. We’re two people in our mid-thirties falling in love. We’re not teenagers.”

“Michael, you’re a smart guy. Think about what you’re doing. You’ve got 11 more years to serve in prison. When you go home you’ll be heading into a world that you haven’t seen for 26 years. You don’t know anything about women, about love, about what it means to build a life with someone else.”

“You’re right about one thing, Bob. I’ve been doing this a long time. But you’re wrong when you say I don’t know anything about love. Living in prison has been like watching earth from a different planet. My separation from society has given me a chance to observe, to learn from the lives of others. I’ve read that 50 percent of marriages end in divorce. You’ve been a rich man since your early 30s, yet two of your marriages ended in divorce, and you’re breaking off a relationship now. I may be separated from the rest of the world, but I’ve studied people from a different perspective, and I’ve learned from them.”

“Oh really? What’ve you learned?” He scoffs.

“One thing for sure, in order to create lasting love, I’ll need to appreciate Carole more than I’d appreciate a jet.”

Bob grunts. “You’ve never had a Gulfstream.”

*******

As other prisoners count the days until release, I’m counting down the days until my first visit with Carole. It’s evening on October 16th, 2002. I lie on my bunk using a small, battery-powered light to read Carole’s long letters. I have my favorites, the ones I devour repeatedly. We’ve been writing daily for eight months, and when I wake tomorrow, we’ll begin five glorious days of visiting together. I’m going to hold her, to kiss her for as long as guards will permit. I stare at her photograph and fall asleep, the book light still burning.

When I wake, my smile stretches across my face. It’s a good day. Visiting doesn’t begin until 1:00, so I have time to make my bed, wash my face, brush my teeth, and then sit at my desk to write her a love letter. I want her to know how grateful I am that she flew from Oregon to hold my hand under the harsh lights of a New Jersey prison visiting room.

I stack the paper and books from my desk in my locker. While sitting on my mattress I lace my sneakers, rise, straighten the wrinkles on my bed, and look around to ensure everything is in its proper place in case the guards come in for a surprise cell inspection. I can’t leave anything visible without risking the loss of my 2-man room; a failed inspection would put me back in a 12-man room. With a final glance to make sure I’m leaving the room in perfect condition, I close the door and walk outside for an early exercise session.

I jog eight miles, watching as the wind tosses leaves in waves from the maple trees. They flutter to the grass in different shades of yellow and orange. These same trees were in their early spring bloom when Carole began typing my manuscript, About Prison. In June she was typing my second manuscript, Profiles From Prison, and our romance began. By summer’s end we were pledging our love. But it’s been all correspondence and phone calls until today.

I check my watch and expect that her plane has landed by now. She’s renting a car and is only hours away from the jolting reality of my world. She’ll see the fences with the coils of razor wire, the checkpoints with armed, uniformed guards. I wonder how she’ll respond to the metal detectors, the bureaucratic condemnation, the numerous rules, and the forms required of visitors to federal prisons.

I follow my run with pushups. As I’m finishing Bob comes out for his walk. “So today’s your day!” He smiles in good spirits, happy for me.

“She’ll be here at one.” I stand and brush the dirt from my hands.

“Will you be there until visiting ends?”

“That’s the plan.”

“Okay then. I’ll be waiting for you when you come out. We’ll walk a few laps and you can tell me how things went.”

“I’ll see you then,” I promise.

I return to my housing unit, shower, shave closely with a new, double-blade razor, and dress in clean sweats. Pancho, my friend down the hall, ironed my khakis and shined my shoes in exchange for a three-can pack of tuna. The clothes hang against my wall. With a few hours to pass before our visit, I pick up Nelson Mandela’s A Long Walk to Freedom, the biography that describes his wretched and unjust multi-decade stretch in an African prison.

I set the book on my chest and I let my mind wander. Carole’s love has given me hope for a life most men take for granted. When it’s almost one o'clock, I stand to change.

My heart beats faster when I hear my name being paged, and I walk across the compound, through the gates, toward the visiting room. The guard takes a long time answering the door after I push the button, frustrating me as I lose minutes I could be sharing with Carole.

After months of waiting, she’s finally here, on the other side of this wall. It’s been 28 years since I first played kickball with her in fifth grade and 20 years since our high school graduation.

The guard unlocks the door. “Name and number?”

“Santos, 16377-004,” I state, handing him my red ID card.

“We paged you 15 minutes ago. Where’ve you been?”

“Right here. I pushed the button,” I respond, suppressing my impatience and irritation.

“Come on. You know the drill.”

I step into the room and undress for the guard to search me. “Do you know the rules about physical contact?”

“I know the rules.”

“One kiss when you come in, one kiss when you leave.”

“Can I hold her hand?”

He nods. “Just don’t get too frisky. I don’t wanna be sendin’ anyone to the SHU today.”

“Of course you don’t.”

The guards don’t realize how their callousness dehumanizes prisoners.

“What was that?” He challenges me with his glare.

“Never mind.” Not even a prison guard can dampen my enthusiasm today.

“Can I go in now?”

“Have a nice visit.” His flat expression and flatter tone contradict his good wishes. Anticipation for a blind date with a woman I already love sends adrenaline racing through me as I open the door and enter. I scan the faces and see Carole, far away, sitting beneath a window screened with black iron mesh. Our eyes lock and she stands, smiling radiantly. Holding her gaze, I zigzag through a maze of maroon plastic chairs, remembering just in time to drop my ID card with the guard who operates the computer surveillance system.

Carole looks lovely in fitted denim jeans, black heels, and a beige knit sweater. Her long blonde hair falls past her shoulders. Seconds later she’s in my arms, welcoming my embrace. I can’t believe I’m holding her.

“Let me look at you,” I breathe her in.

She’s smiling, and in her sparkling hazel eyes, I see her love for me.

“We can only kiss once, the guards are watching,” I whisper, wanting to remember this moment with her body pressing against mine.

I tilt my head to the right and bend to meet her lips as she leans into me. With my hands on her back I feel the warmth of her flesh through her clothing. Her heart’s beating fast, and I welcome her tongue, the unfamiliar sensation of her breasts pressed against my chest, and the feminine arch of her slender hips.  It awakens the man in me, as if I’m feeling a woman for the first time. I don’t care about the other 50 visitors in the room and I kiss her as long as I can, though I’m conscious of the guards, knowing they’ll humiliate me by yelling my name and issuing a warning if I don’t release her.

“Let’s sit,” I tell her.

“Hold me for a second longer.” She presses her cheek against mine. “I love you.”

I’m so grateful that she’s in my life and I assure her of my love.  We sit beside each other, holding hands, locking our fingers together, and I stare into her eyes.  After so many years of living in prison, I feel incredibly fortunate to have her with me. When she averts her eyes, glancing down, I tilt her chin up with my index finger. “I want to look at your face.”

“Why?” she asks nervously, with her cheek twitching.

“Because you’re beautiful and I need to memorize every curve of your face. Why are you so nervous?”

“I can’t help it,” she admits, squeezing my hands. “I’m just happy to be here.”

“The fences and razor wire didn’t bother you?” I know how foreboding they can seem at first.

“The only thing that bothers me is that I can’t take you home with me. If this is where you are, this is where I want to be,” she promises, and I see the sincerity in her eyes.

“I want to kiss you again,” I tell her. Concerns that the realities of prison could overwhelm her begin to dissipate after Carole’s affirmation.

“So kiss me.” She says softly, smiling

“We can’t. Those guards sitting on the platform will give me a disciplinary infraction if I kiss you again.”

“They’re not watching us.”

“Yes, they are. Those black bubbles in the ceiling are cameras, and the guards have several monitors at their desk. They sit there with a joystick, moving the cameras around the room. If they catch me kissing you again, they’ll end our visit.”

Carole looks around, taking in the severity of the room. A guard in the standard BOP uniform walks through the aisles, his eyes scanning the room.  “I don’t understand,” she says.  “Why would they care if you kissed me?”

“Those manuscripts you’ve been typing for me aren’t fiction. In prison the priority is security, and they view kissing as a threat to institutional security.  This is my life for 11 more years.”

“You won’t serve 11 more years.”

“Yes I will, Honey.” I brush a strand of hair from her face. “I’ve already served 15 and I’ll serve 11 more.”

“Then I’ll serve them with you.”

“You don’t know what you’re saying.”

“I do know what I’m saying. My love for you is a woman’s love, Michael, not a little girl’s crush. I’ll serve this sentence with you, whatever it takes.”

“Let’s see how you feel on Monday, after our last visit.”

“It won’t be our last visit. I’m coming back.”
In those first hours together, I tell Carole how I spend each day, describing when I wake, how I exercise, and where I shower.  By using my finger as a pointer on her knee, I draw a diagram, showing her the layout of my room, where I store my belongings, even how far down the hall I am from the community bathroom. I tell her about my friends, Bob and Geoff. I answer her questions about how I plan to earn a living after my release, explaining that I’ll write about my prison experience, consult with people who face challenges with the criminal justice system, and speak on how others can employ effective strategies to overcome challenges they may face.

Carole’s eyes never leave me as I talk, and she listens closely, asking insightful questions, such as whether the prison system will give me any trouble when the books I’ve written reach the market.

I explain the reasons why I don’t anticipate any disciplinary problems as a consequence of my writing books while I serve the remainder of my sentence. “One policy says I can’t run a business, so I don’t. A different policy states that the BOP encourages prisoners to write manuscripts, and authorizes them to mail the manuscripts without staff interference. Once I send out my manuscripts, they’re not mine. I assign the publishing royalties to Julie, or my mom.”

“But your name’s on the book?”

“I’m the author, but I don’t receive any money for my work.”

“Your family’s getting the money though, saving it for you when you get out.  Isn’t that a problem?”

“Although others may receive royalty payments, I would argue that since I don’t have a right to the money, I’m within the rules. After all, if my mom or my sister choose to keep the payments they receive, I wouldn’t have any grounds to challenge them. They pay taxes on it, not me. But even if the prison did charge me with a disciplinary infraction, I wouldn’t care. It’s my responsibility to prepare for the future and I’m proud of my work. I’m determined to leave here stable and independent.”

“I want to help you.”

“You are helping me. Without you, I couldn’t have converted my manuscripts to digital files. You help me by inspiring me to work harder. Ever since my term began, I’ve been preparing for you. I willed you into my life.”

“No. I mean I want to help you more. I want my life with you. I want to grow with you. I want to get you out of here.” She squeezes my hand to emphasize her promise.

“Baby, let’s not waste time on things beyond our control, like my being released early. Let’s focus on how we can best prepare for the challenges we’ll face when I’m released.”

“Then I want to help you with that. What can we do, together?”