Dian is now coming up on seven months
in our local jail, which I
prefer to refer to as Abu Brevard (the only difference
is not much
*physical* abuse - everything else is the same).
She spent the month of July in lockdown,
because she was "convicted
of making hooch (booze)", on the basis of a day-old
foam cup of peaches
and syrup, and a slice of bread somewhere in
the cell (I'm not making
this up, I *couldn't* make up something this
stupid).
Susan McDougal told the same story in her book, but she didn't get caught.
Dian got out a the Friday before
this past...and had her bunk, not
even her cellmates's bunk, tossed late Thursday,
and then *again*
Friday, and they claimed to have found "liquid"
in a container with the
tail-end of some peanut butter...and busted her
again for "hooch".
Then, if that wasn't enough, the
same corporal who busted her
claimed that her cellmates had "complained she
made too much noise early
in the morning", and threw her in the bubble.
The bubble is allegedly for "close
observation", or "isolation", if
they're under suicide watch or whatever. They
take away *all* their
clothes, even their underwear, leaving them only
the jail uniform, pants
and a v-necked, short-sleeved shirt in a jail
that's kept between 60 and
65 degrees F. They take their glasses, and they're
not allowed reading
material, or anything, and have to get the guard
to "escort" them to the
toilet. The lights are *bright*, 24x7, and they
sleep on a mat on the
floor. Remind you of anywhere, say, Iraq?
Again, Susan McDougal had that.
Clinton called it "the Hannible Lector cell."
A day or so later, the same corporal
claimed that she'd "stuck her
head in the toilet' (that's a suicide attempt?)
to justify the bubble.
The last week has been a *lot* of
grief, including me calling the
jail commander. She got out of the bubble Thursday,
and Dian had her
"board hearing" just today...and, backed up by
the cellmate, was acquitted
of all charges, and is back in the "general population"
of the jail.
Unless some miracle occurs, or more
is added, we're looking at her
getting out in mid-November. It's unlikely that
she'll even be able to
wave signs for Kerry. But we're still fighting
the good fight...just
today, she told me she'd heard that a lawyer
is building a class-action
lawsuit against the jail, for mistreatment of
prisoners, etc, and I'll
be contacting him for dian to join this lawsuit.
By the way, this jail has been under
a "consent decree" for ELEVEN
YEARS for overcrowding. The state took all teeth
out of the law around
'97, and since then, the county has been "overseeing"
itself. The jail was
originally rated for 384 inmates; was "upgraded"
to 764, the consent decree
limited them to 1000...and the daily average,
for years now, has been around 1400.
Trust me, she'd be writing and fighting if she could; I'm doing what I can for both of us.
mark, crazy enough to be the diehard's fiancee