(Note: a new poem follows this post)

Today was primary day in the District of Columbia. As some of you know already, the winner of the Democratic primary for mayor always has gone on to win in the general election. This time, that might have been an iffy proposition. “Iffy” seems the best way to describe the situation in which we might have found ourselves this coming fall if our current mayor, Vincent Gray, had emerged as the winner, given that his attorney believes he will be indicted for political corruption. His victory would have presented quite a lot for a general electorate to forgive, perhaps too much.

Of course, we do live in a town where – with enough love and loyalty – you can become mayor, go to prison for smoking crack, and be re-elected mayor. Why, then, should the threat of a mere indictment slow a politician down? Well, first, any politician (other than former mayor and current DC Council member Marion Barry) should ask him or herself if he or she engenders that sort of support. I’m thinking the answer should be “no”, but what do I know? Mayor Gray obviously believed otherwise, hence his failed try for another term.

The thing that concerns me is not the race for mayor, it is the wording of the charging documents should Mayor Gray be indicted. It will be the same wording of any indictment of any resident of DC. If you are charged with a crime in this town, it is not you vs. the District of Columbia, it is you vs. the United States of America. What concerns me is what happens when people are sent to prison from here. If found guilty, you will not be sent to DC’s prison, as there is none. You will be sent away to one – or a few – of many federal prisons. The irony is you may have been convicted of breaking a federal law you had no part in passing, not even through your delegate to Congress, as your delegate does not have the right to vote for or against anything.

Yes, I know this suddenly has begun to seem like the same drum I beat last month, but between then and today I was given a stark example of how disenfranchisement can be deadly. I was contacted by and met with two investigators from the Capital Habeas Unit of the Federal Defender Office, in town from Philadelphia to seek assistance in their quest to save the life of a DC resident on death row in Texas.

Shara Davis and Rick Ruffin, angels of mercy doing God’s work, somehow managed to track me down after being given my name by their client, who was a juvenile placed on a brief period of probation under my supervision twenty years ago. As an adult, he was convicted of a crime here in DC, then shipped to Texas where he was convicted of a murder in prison and sentenced to death. Try as I might, I can’t say I was of any help. The most I could offer beyond what they already knew was my memory of the community in which he grew up. A question Ms. Davis asked highlighted the consequences of “our” prison system. She asked if anyone had bothered to do what she and Mr. Ruffin were doing, had anyone from Texas contacted me. It was rhetorical and real at once. You know the answer, don’t you?

DC’s once-upon-a-time prison, the Lorton Reformatory, was ordered closed in 1997 by an act of Congress (of course), and housed its last inmates in 2001. Passage of the National Capital Revitalization and Self-Government Improvement Act (Orwellian enough for you?) required DC felons to become the responsibility of the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Since then, families with loved ones in prison, including my own, have to travel great distances to see them, or give up on keeping that kind of contact. If something goes horribly wrong inside some distant prison, who’s coming to DC to seek some clarity before life and death decisions are made? Will the next mayor find such a question to be real or rhetorical?

If all this makes you think I’m an advocate for DC having its own prison once again, I have to tell you I’m a conditional advocate. Lorton was a nightmare, and not just because it was a prison but because it was a nightmarish one. Those who spent time there, then headed off to the “feds”, will tell you they were thankful for the difference. DC is not unique in that regard. Those who have experienced the differences between state and federal prisons will tell you the same thing today. It might be impossible to overcome the inherent troubles which would be attendant to a local prison, but to assume that would be to assume the Washington of 1997 is the same as the Washington of 2014. We would have to admit we remain incapable of operating such a facility in a responsible manner, and stick with the status quo. If that’s the case, we should consider asking Congress to meddle in our affairs even further, and order the feds to operate a prison locally. After all, it is “us vs. them”, isn’t it?

Marion
(from the ancient Egyptian word for “beloved”)

He was revealed to be a leader of the people as a boy,
an activist before he knew what that was.

And, when he knew,
he was revealed to be a leader of the people as a young man,
an actor on their behalf, their voice, their champion,
a provider of fishes and loaves when needed,
but poles also, and a way to the water.

And as he moved among the people,
their pain became his, their troubles,
his.

And in their turmoil he took a bullet,
and thrived,
and moved among the people,
and remained their champion.

And the people did not see his pain, his trouble,
his turmoil,
as if the leaders of people are free of human life,
as if no one had ever given us Agamemnon, or Lear.

And when the nexus of untamed desires and the unforgiving
brought him low,
he rose, and returned to the people, and remained
their champion,
an elder,
revealed to be a leader of the people.

c. 2014
g. r. adams