How 9/11 affected me as a prison writer
E-Mail By Seth M Ferranti Bio/Address
Having a lengthy 25-year sentence and a lot of time on my hands I decided I might as well use my time wisely. To that end I have been taking college correspondence courses through Penn State and now the University of Iowa with the goal of earning my bachelors degree. I have taken mostly writing courses in the attempt to improve my writing ability and to articulate my thoughts and expressions. I figured I have a lot to say and with the long mandatory-minimum sentence the government handed me I might be able to establish myself as a prison writer while incarcerated.
I have been in prison since 1993 and 9 years into my sentence my goal of becoming an established prison writer is looking good. My writings, musings, prose, and poetry have appeared in numerous little independent and underground magazines or zines. I have been acquiring quite a lot of writing credits in the attempt to establish myself, hopefully breaking through to the mainstream media. Rolling Stone magazine came to interview me in 1998 while I was at FCI Beckley. They did a profile on me and my case which had gained big headlines at its inception back in the fall of 1991 courtesy of the Washington Times and Post.
An introduction to Article writing class I had taken through Penn State distance education instructed by Professor Robert Gannon, a contributing editor for Popular Science, inspired me to pitch my story to Rolling Stone. I was hoping to write the article myself but at least I got them to cover my story with the interview. This semi-success showed me that maybe I had a talent and with the instruction and encouragement of Professor Gannon and my other college professors I decided that becoming a professional writer would be my goal. I figured it was a commendable and positive goal. But even more so, in my incarcerated state, I saw it as an attainable-one.
I got to the point where I was corresponding regularly with different editors at magazines like Hustler. Rolling Stone, and Swank. Although no one was willing to accept a piece for publication I was encouraged to keep trying. So I did re-writes on old pieces and started writing new pieces. I was constantly looking for stories and outlets or forums for my work. I was determined to succeed. It was my life.
I found out about a websites, phsonerlife.com, where I could publicize my case and post my writings by paying a small service fee I could have my own webpage which showed the details of my case, let people know about me as a person, and showcased my writings on the internet. To me this was a great new forum to reach out to the world. I began receiving letters and encouragement from outside these fences and started to form the basis of my network of support. A group of concerned friends, professors, and citizens who sympathized with my plight emerged. They sought to encourage me to write while they worked to change the harsh drug laws that kept me imprisoned by writing their senators and representatives.
I continued writing and getting published. The prison administrators never said anything. Some were even interested in what I wrote and asked to see the articles that had been published. After 6 years in a medium to high-level facility, with no major disciplinary problems I was transferred to a low. With one eye on the street and working on my college degree/writing career I thought I was a model prisoner. It seemed to me that I was doing everything possible to rehabilitate myself and prepare myself for life in society as a productive and taxpaying citizen. Never in my wildest dreams did I see my writing as an obstacle obstructing my path. I was all about the positive aspects of incarceration.
Still I had a lengthy sentence. I was a young man. Given to moments of despair, moments of frustration and anger, at the world, at the government and at myself. But instead of lashing out at my fellow prisoners or BOP staff I focused my anger and frustration channeling it into my work, into my writing. I had always thought this to be a positive pursuit - a sign of control and discipline. That I could channel my negative thoughts and emotions into my writing where it wouldn't harm anyone at all. Words only exist on the paper they are printed on. Words are harmless. Action is the cause of misery in our world. Not words.
At least this is what I thought. Anyway what about the First Amendment? It protected free speech right? And even in prison didn't I have this constitutional right? From everything that has happened I guess I don't.
In the winter of 2001 in a state of anger and depression I wrote a piece entitled "A White Boys Tale." I wrote it for Don Diva magazine, a hip-hop/prison publication out of NYC. The piece was radical. It drew some harsh realities and epitomized my frustration with the system. But there was nothing groundbreaking or inspiring about it. It was just a position piece. I had seen pieces like it in the USA Today's Forum section and in Ed-op pieces-from papers around the nation. I asserted my position in the piece and kept it real. I spoke from a white suburbanites perspective in a black and Latino dominated prison culture. I didn't think anything of the article. I wasn't even sure Don Diva would publish it.
In the article I borrowed different phrases and ideas I had heard during my eight years of incarceration. I mixed this lexicon in with an overview of my case and the racial disparities represented in prison in general. I then topped it all off with a analogy to the Nuremburg trials when I made a reference to a hypothetical future event I termed the Drug War crime trials. It was a nice little piece I thought. Maybe a little radical but no more so then the Forum pieces I had seen in the USA Today. I didn't think anything of it. It wasn't my creed or code. Just a piece I had written. My observations. My point of view, "No harm in that right?" I was exploring new writing styles. Tapping new vines so to speak.
At this point I was still exploring and developing my writing skills. I was finding out in which voices I could write with. I was searching for my voice and all. I wasn't sure if this piece suited me but I wrote it and could live with it. At the time though I didn't realize the price I would have to pay for writing that article.
The piece was published in Don Diva in July 2001. I didn't even know it. No one sent me a contributor’s copy or anything. The first time I found out about it was a couple of weeks after 9/11 when I was called down to the SIS Lt.'s office at Fort Dix in October 2001. The SIS Lt. was livid. Literally burning with rage. He said he was going to write me up for threatening BOP staff, which is a very serious incident report. He was treating me like I was Osama bin Laden or something. I was dumbfounded. I professed my innocence and told him I would never threaten anyone, much less a BOP employee. I was looking to get out of prison. Not stay in.
He started to quote lines of the article to me. He asked me if I wrote it. I didn't lie. I told him I did. It had my name on it didn't it? But I didn't even know it was published. So this was all news to me. I asked him to see the copy he had and he refused. He dismissed me and said he could be investigating my threats in the article. I figured the SIS Lt. was just experiencing some post 9/11 hysteria and it would all die down but I was wrong.
I didn't hear anything for almost two months. It seemed a dead issue. I had finally gotten a copy of the article and I was proud that it was published but I was disturbed by the fact that the SIS Lt. had reacted so violently and negatively to me. I was trying to make people understand and think about the harsh realities of the mandatory-minimum sentences and the war on drugs. I wasn't by any means trying to stir up prison unrest or threaten BOP staff. But the prison administrators unfortunately, took it that way. And they were the ones who controlled my life. All I had done was write a little article in a little magazine. I made no declarations of war or committed any acts of subversion. But I was about to be branded a revolutionary. I hadn't taken into account all the post 9/11 hysteria. Our country was in an uproar and I became a most likely target public enemy #1.
Around December of 2001 my unit manager called me into his office and informed me he was taking steps to ship me back to a medium security prison for threats I had made in my article. I couldn't believe it. My security, point-level was one, in effect, a minimum. The only thing holding me from a camp was my sentence length. You have to have 10 years or under to go to a camp. So in my mind I was a couple of years away from the camp and all of a sudden my unit manager was telling me I was going back to a medium. That was the wrong direction as far as I was concerned.
Like I said it was unbelievable. I talked to a lot of old timers, dudes who had done 15 to 20 years and asked them if they had ever heard of someone being transferred for what they wrote. They all told me no way. They said I wouldn't be going anywhere. I decided to approach the warden who would be the one who would make the final decision. She told me I was a racist and a threat to her staff. "A Racist to who?" I thought. White people? She told me I wasn't a normal low security prisoner. I had been in Fort Dix for 2 1/2 years without incident. No shots, no problems, no investigations but that counted for nothing. I was a couple of years a way from a camp and committed no prohibited act or broke any BOP policy but that didn't matter.
On January 3, 2002 I was transferred back to a medium level prison.
Upon arrival at FCI Fairton on January 11, 2002 I was thrown into the hole to await the captain's review. At this review the captain quoted my article to me and told me that if I wrote any more threats he would throw me in the hole forever. I hit the compound the following Monday and I took the captains word to heart. I wouldn't be writing any more radical articles. It had caused me too many problems. The transfer and all, but in reality this was only the tip of the iceberg. I have barely been in FCI Fairton for 2 months, but it has been a trying and dramatic 2 months.
One of the first things I attempted to do upon arriving at FCI Fairton was to get a hold of my correspondence course materials that I had been enrolled in at Fort Dix. Due to my abrupt transfer my books hadn't arrived in Fort Dix before I departed. Well, actually they had, but I didn't get them. They were delivered to Fort t)ix from the University of Iowa on December 28, 2001. But for some reason they didn't transfer with me. I contacted the college coordinator in the Fairton education department and told her of the problem. She said she would call Fort Dix and have the books and materials sent to her. It is March and still no books from Fort Dix. The lady here called 3 times. My case manager called twice - still no books. And these are not some government-funded courses either. These University of Iowa courses were paid for by my parents at a significant cost. Negligence? Harassment? You be the judge.
That was not the first or last event to occur to me since this whole thing began either. During my first week here the SIS Lt. called me to his office to let me know that he knew about my article and me. He told me he had some letters I had written the night before and that I was trying to circumvent the mail. He said he would let me off but I owed him a favor. He said that if someone was stabbed in my unit he would be calling on that favor. I promptly told the SIS Lt. that he better check my file because I wasn't a snitch and didn't appreciate him playing with my integrity. He said if I didn't cooperate with him I would end up in the hole. So be it I said and was dismissed with a wave of his hand.
The next week I found out a cop in my unit had been telling prisoners in my unit that I dropped a note on him. I don't know what was up with that but my homeboys straightened that out real quick, telling the cop he better check his sources before he started spreading bad rumors about convicts. The cop checked his sources and found out there was no dropped note. But I never received an apology. Was this an SIS invention or a unit cop ploy? I don't know but it was some clown type stuff. I'm glad my reputation preceded me because dudes get branded in here all the time but if you are a solid dude it will carry you through.
This same cop shook my locker down and took some of my property. He proceeded to lose it between the unit and Lt.'s office so I never got it back. So I was out of luck. It was nothing major though. Minor, petty stuff you know.
My institutional job detail was switched 4 times in four weeks for some reason. Couldn't be harassment could it? I don't know. But nobody else's job changed like that. Also my mail, incoming and outgoing, started disappearing. People would ask me if I got that letter or this letter and I would tell them no. Plus articles I was sending out to publications were never being received. Where did they go? In the trash? Some SIS files? Who knows?
Finally the covert harassment got direct. The SIS office wrote me a shot for conducting or running a business and unauthorized use of the phone and mail. Apparently they thought I owned a website, prisonerlife.com, because when I wrote or talked to someone I would say go visit my website. Crazy yes? During my whole incarceration I had been totally dependent on my parents for financial support and all of a sudden these genius SIS people discover that I secretly owned a website. Preposterous. For real, without my parents I would be working in Unicor.
My unit team threw the shot out. As an added bonus to the shot SIS had attempted to put a temporary phone restriction on me but the investigating Lt. vetoed that. I had queried my unit manager about my concerns and he directed me to write cop-outs. So I did and the very next day I was thrown into the hole for an SIS investigation. The SIS Lt. informed me that someone told him. I was planning on jumping on the officer who was holding my mail. Like I even knew who that was. That was why I had written the cop-outs. To find out where my missing was. And anyone who would take a moment to look at my prison record could see that I would never jump on anyone. So now I am in the hole awaiting investigation. Who knows were this will take me. My unit manager keeps hinting the USP. I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought I was taking positive steps toward establishing a career as a prison writer. I thought I was on my way to a camp.
But guess what? I might end up in ADX. These people are crazy. All of a sudden, after 9 years of problem free existence. I am branded a prison-militant- revolutionary who threatens staff and plans to assault them. At one point I thought I was in America but I guess I am wrong. There is no more America. It got blown up with the World Trade Center.
