Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 25, 2017)
Street Roots • August 25-31 2017 News Page 8 Street Roots • August 25-31, 2017 hane Staggs grew tip in Clearwater, Calif., what he describes as “a small dead-end town” in the northern part of the state. He has never met his biological father, and growing up, he rarely saw his mother. She was battling a heroin addiction. As a kid, he lived under his stepfather’s roof, and he was the only multi-racial person in the household - a fact his cousins made sure he was constantly aware of. Staggs became so accustomed to domestic violence and abuse from his stepfather, he said, that eventually it was the mental anguish that affected him more than the physical pain he endured. When he was 9, he began stealing his stepdad's weed so he could share it with his friends. He said he got higher from the feeling of finally being accepted than from the THC. But that changed as he got older. He moved to Eugene as a teenager and began to sell drugs to college students. By age 17, he said, he was pushing large quantities of cocaine, pills and MDMA. He drank and popped pills. Pills graduated to heroin. “I was smart. 1 just had zero guidance," he said. “My priorities were all wrong." It was around this time he began to reconnect with his mother. The two would bond over methadone and OxyContin. He said these were some of his happiest memories. In his early 20s, he moved to Washougal, Wash., where he shared a four-bedroom home with a friend and his then-girlfriend. He said he had a “legit" painting business and was staying out of trouble, although he was still ■ A Solitary Mind By Shane Staggs This is a lonely place. As I wander in this state of seclusion, anxiety follows. Panic meets depression, simultaneously, colliding with many other mental and emotional deprivations I need most at this time in order to feel human. in solitary confinement, the un-requested sounds of keys and muffled radio correspondencehavebecome indicators g f ; time. They mark the nameless hours by which no clock tracks; according to our overseer the warden, inmates deserve no sense of the passing of time. I shall be content with that only because all else is silent in the sensory deprivations forced upon me by my arrival to the Oregon State Penitentiary's Segregation Unit. ■ My one-man cell: A bathroom with bars and a bed is where I spend 23 hours and 20 minutes a day by myself. Forty minutes to shower and shave before 1 must return to my box, Lost In deep thoughts and confused over how I’ve ended up residing in such a place, I’m in my head a lo t Still a strong mind is the only reason I am able to avoid suicidal using drugs. Then his mother died of a heroin overdose. In quick succession, Staggs lost everything. When he got back from his mother’s funeral in Colorado, there was an eviction notice on his front door. He headed back to Eugene, where he began selling drugs, forging checks and committing other crimes. During that time, his girlfriend gave birth to his son. As soon as he cut the umbilical cord at the hospital, the state took the boy because the mother had drugs in her system. Shortly thereafter, his girlfriend was sent to prison. Already spiraling out of control, he felt he had nothing else to lose at that point. Staggs went on a five-day crime spree, kicking down doors and robbing people. The spree escalated to kidnapping when he and his accomplice forced two University of Oregon students and another woman, on separate occasions, to drive around town and make ATM withdrawals. “I finally got caught,” Staggs said. “I can honestly say I am thankful for that." As Staggs began to detox on the floor of the Lane County jail, he was looking at an indictment for 14 counts of Measure 11 crimes, which carry mandatory’ minimum sentences. He was soon handed a 17 1/2-year sentence, which he began to serve in 2010. During Staggs’ incarceration, he’s been sent to solitary confinement three times - once for four months after a fight, and twice, nearly a year each time, for drugs. Two of those times, he was found guilty based on information gleaned from confidential informants. He maintains his innocence. Staggs wrote about his experience in solitary confinement for Street Roots while he was sitting in the Disciplinary Segregation U nit a t Oregon S ta te P e n ite n tia ry in March. contemplation, same inhumane conditions, tipping that precarious balance that is their instability, while at the same time invading my own sanity, putting me at risk of potentially becoming what I see, what I hear even as this is being wrote and read - an “unstable mind" diagnosed by forces beyond his control. familiar surface for my wife to cry on? t I look for answers to my many questions but have yet to find them, I am left to guess, or assum e.... Today one of my questiohs is why I’ve just read in the Statesman Journal that an ex teacher got sentenced to 1£Q days in county jail for molesting a child for dose to a decade; my mind is left to pray that not only does that man meet with karma for his actions beyond the half year sentence his judge imposed on him, but also that the young man he abused recovers in a way that allows him My next question is why? Why am I serving a full year (365) days in solitary confinement for an unjustified allegation in prison? I am in constant awe of the Oregon Department of Corrections. This “organization" has no organization. I cannot be convinced How does being in his cage away from others help me? How does it aid in rehabilitation? Does it make sense to remove me from general population when I am not threat to others? The judge in my case has already done the ultimate punishment if I cannot be involved in a program, or a dub, or many other pro-social activities due to non-punitive segregation, how can I succeed? If the testimony of a desperate inmate with a drug problem is all administration needs to put me in a box for a schizophrenic? year at a time, despite my achievements in self-help classes, gainful employment and mentorship, you may as well label me a “target.” I do. A target not only to the “desperate,” but also to the pathological failure who is most envious of my success. This cruet and unusual punishment on t ie other inmates and I is inhumane; worse is that the mentally vulnerable are subject to the is it fair to force me to cut ties from my life, to remove a son from his father’s reach? Is it healthy to force my shoulder, away leaving no otherwise. Furthermore, is it necessary that every night I am forced to fry and fall asleep to the off-beat drumming produced by a mentally unstable (Editor’s note: This letter has been edited for clarity. The underlines are Staggs’.) Depriving me of life and liberty? I would like to know why ODOC thinks ftiis kind of treatment is necessary in the slightest fashion. I feel it is very important to have communication from loved ones while in prison; it is evident that such connections aid in fostering healthy relationships and therefore reduce the risk of recidivism upon a prisoner's transition into society. This form of "non-punitive” solitude does the exact opposite; indeed, it presents the alternative: Immersement into the deviant lifestyle to which a previous offender is most accustomed. To be alone is a scary feeling. In a place like this, trusting is hard, and knowing who to trust is even harder. I chose the former, it is easier to trust no one. Cold, dingy, d a rk ... I feel what I witness. As I get minimal sleep tonight, I’ll prepare for tomorrow. if 1 can overanalyze just enough to make logical exceptions for my conspiring thoughts ... It just might be a good day. Page 9 general who is charged with investigating staff misconduct, he said. Now image that you are confined to a hotel But it was the lieutenant who answered the bathroom for any period of time, IPs not a complaint condition that supports human life.” Inmate Roderick Griggs also told Vega that Even though he’s six hours away from the lieutenant had threatened him. family and friends, Staggs and his fiancée are ; “If you don’t cooperate with them,” Griggs relieved that it appears he will remain in said, “especially (the lieutenant), they will Eastern Oregon. They figure the farther away threaten you and let you know that things can from the lieutenant he is, the better. happen to you. Never physically, but they Another inmate’s story bears striking have threatened me verbally.” similarity to Staggs. Like Staggs, Rafael Mora- Griggs was transferred in September from . Contreras was a model inmate before he > - the prison in Salem to Two Rivers began to have problems with the lieutenant Correctional Institution in Umatilla - 230 He was president of the Latino Chib at miles away. He told Vega he believed it was Oregon State Penitentiary for nine years, and retaliation for not cooperating with the staying out of trouble was a requirement for lieutenant’s investigations. that position. He created his own niche at the “Now I’m so far away, ! can’t even see my prison, photographing inmate weddings and son now,” h e said; fundraisers and advocating for Hispanic Snake River inmate inmates. Frederick Myles said h e When there was a large-scale investigation spent two years and six "The funny part abont ii is into drugs, Mora-Contreras was placed, into . months in Snake River’s all they have to do is listen solitary confinement for more than two IMU. months. Documents indicate there were “The funny part about it to ns and try to help us," he reports that he was involved in bringing drugs is all they have to do is told Vega. "Yon go to them into the prison, but Mora-Contreras indicated listen to us and try to help for help, and they send yon in a letter to an attorney that he believed us,” he told Vega. “You go to segregation." prison staff was targeting him because he to them for help, and they advocates for the rights of Hispanic inmates. send you to segregation.” FREDERICK MYLES, “If you go into a disciplinary segregation INM ATE A X SN AKE RÌVÈR He said investigators CORRECTIONAL INSTITUTION unit,” Mora-Contreras told Street Roots, sometimes give “most of the population there is of minority - confidential informants blacks, Hispanics.” items they’ve collected The Vera Institute ofjustice study found during shakedowns. black and Hispanic inmates were He said that with the lieutenant, “it’s his overrepresented in segregated populations. way or th e highway, basically. You’ve got one A fter review ing th e evid en ce, th e ch a rg e s Whileblaek inmates jnake up. 10 percent of , against Ramirez were affYfisfhissed. The video of two options: You-can do what h e say oryou the total prison population, they made up 17 can just get ready to get put under evidence appeared to match Ramirez’s percent of the IMU population. And while investigation and shipped to other version of events. Hispanic inmates represent 13 percent of institutions.... They can do whatever they But then in October, he was fried again for prisoners, they account for 18 percent of both want to you. You’re at the mercy of them.” the same altercation based on a new memo IMU and administrative segregation In a letter to Street Roots, another inmate, added by the lieutenant He now said Ramirez populations. Arturo Ruiz, stated that he’s been in prison had confessed to him shortly after the fight. In addition, black and Hispanic inmates f since 1984 “and I never met an officer like B Ramirez questioned why this evidence often received longer segregation sanctions (the lieutenant).” wasn’t mentioned at th e first hearing when per incident than white inmates. He said that after he was caught with Another inmate, Jose Maciel, was placed hi the lieutenant was present drugs, the lieutenant told him that he could -n “Not for one second did I say to him that I solitary confinement for two weeks following cooperate and his disciplinary report would fought That is untrue,” he pleaded. “If you a fight He has since been released from disappear, or if he refused, then he would use think about i t during the first hearing, my prison, but he wrote a notarized statement on everything in his power to make sure that case was investigated for 30 days. How come Mora-Contreras’ behalf. I Ruiz stayed locked up in IMU. just now (the lieutenant) decides to come up Maciel said that before he was moved out During an interview, Prins, the inspector with a memo saying this? It doesn’t make a of solitary, the lieutenant pulled him into his - general, refused to disclose whether the whole lot of sense, and it’s really, really office and told him that if he would submit lieutenant is under any internal investigation testimony saying Mora-Contreras had been an unnerving to tell you the truth. I’ve been jfor misconduct incarcerated 13 years. ! have never had this enabler o fth e fight, he would give him soda Of 17 official grievances inmates filed kind of experience before, and far as the and popcorn tickets along with other against the lieutenant over the past four system goes, I mean it’s never done me privileges, and he said he would make years, 10 were denied outright, mainly wrong.” Maciel’s disciplinary report disappear. because inmates failed to correctly follow the Ramirez received three months in solitary He said that because it wasn’t true, he complicated set of rules for filling out such confinement, with the cost of restitution to be refused. complaints. determined at a later date. , “Refusing to blame Rafael for the fight, In cases where a grievance against the Another inmate, Arturo Mora, told (the lieutenant) became upset, called me lieutenant had been accepted, the subsequent Pendleton-based private investigator Carlos degrading and racist names, and insulted me. investigation appeared to consist of little , Vega that he spent six months in IMU after He took me back to my cell, in the hole. He more than asking the lieutenant for his he refused to tell the lieutenant where he got took away my blanket, pillow and toilet paper version of events and taking him at his Word. the drugs found in his possession. He was for 5 days and on August 24 sent me to Snake Prins also declined to comment on whether charged with disobedience, uprising and River Correctional (Institution),” he wrote. bribery and threats are appropriate tools for disturbance as a result, he said. Ultimately, Mora-Contreras was cleared of gathering information from informants, “I’ve only been in one fight since I was all charges but was also transferred to Snake stating that he was unprepared to answer locked up, and that was 20 years ago,” Mora River, far away from his family. In July, after those questions. said. “Been here since 1984.1 am a 55-year- months of advocacy from his friends and Prins’ office is responsible for investigating old man.” < family, he was transferred back to Salem and the misconduct of inspectors, including the He went on to say that the lieutenant has is now at Oregon State Correctional lieutenant verbally threatened him and is known to Institution. According to a spokesperson for the regularly abuse his power. “(The lieutenant) corrections department, the lieutenant was has always accused you of things with no unavailable for an interview. Due process? facts.” emily@streetroots.org He said he tried to complain about the A review of disciplinary hearing audio Twitter @GreenWrites lieutenant by writing to the DOC’s inspector recordings involving another inmate, Jaime SOLITARY, from page 7 Shane’s story News Ramirez, showed just how little defense an inmate has when facing charges. In May 2016, after guards found Suboxone, commonly used to treat opioid addiction, in Ramirez’s socks, he had a disciplinary hearing in which he pleaded guilty. “It’s a shameful thing, having a drug addiction, obviously, but it’s something that I won’t deny,” he said at the hearing. He was sentenced to two months in solitary confinement, two weeks’ loss of privileges and a $100 fine. He took issue with the fine. “I don’t have a Social Security number or IT number,” Ramirez said. “Therefore when I work, I don’t qualify for an industries job, for one, and any other job that I get, I am not allowed to make anywhere above $49, so that’s my max, and my income is really low.” - Undocumented immigrants housed in Oregon’s prisons cannot obtain employment < witfr the higher-paying Oregon Corrections Enterprises operations without a tax identification (IT) number, which can be difficult to obtain while in prison. “You have a current balance of $321,” Hearings Officer Jeremy Nofziger said. “I’ve saved th a t That’s taken me years to save,” he said. The fine was not dropped. Three months later, Ramirez had another hearing, this time for his involvement in a large-scale fight. It began Aug. 5 and lasted three days, involving 200 inmates. Many inmates were swiftly investigated for their involvement , -v -•*. '•>
