I recently witnessed a man try to cut his own face off. For me this wasn\u2019t anything out of the ordinary, but as it played out, I imagined the reactions and questions that might arise in the mind of someone in society if they\u2019d observed the same.<\/p>\n
They would probably wonder in shock, \u201cWhat sort of conditions could be so unbearable that they\u2019d drive a person to suffer cutting through the skin, nerves, muscles and arteries of his own face, at the risk of permanent disfigurement, disability or even death?\u201d<\/p>\n
I, of course, knew the answer: torture. More specifically, the torture by official design of living in one of the many solitary confinement units in Amerika\u2019s vast prison system, which is why seeing this sort of thing isn\u2019t uncommon for me \u2014 I\u2019ve lived in solitary for nearly two decades.<\/p>\n
And, yes, Amerika inflicts such extreme torture on prisoners that they routinely commit such acts as could never be expected of a sane and stable mind. And this is the point \u2014 solitary confinement drives people into insanity.<\/p>\n
<\/strong>There are two types of torture. The physical and the psychological. Mental health and torture experts unanimously agree that psychological torture is the worst and most damaging of the two.<\/p>\n We all recognize that pain alerts and protects us against injury and possible death. Aversion to pain is therefore an instinct wired into most healthy living things. Torturers deliberately render one powerless to avert pain, which is what makes torture an effective method of crushing a person\u2019s will and driving them to shameless desperation. Pushed hard enough and it will also drive one insane, which is why psychological torture is the worst sort.<\/p>\n Sensory deprivation \u2014 or cutting one off from the sensory stimulation of normal social environments \u2014 is the worst type of psychological torture. Experts also agree on this. It\u2019s like isolating a wildflower and starving it of natural sunlight. It will become feeble, wither and die.<\/p>\n Sensory deprivation is the exact form of torture inflicted by design and without relief in the multitudes of U.S. solitary confinement units. Even the United Nations has denounced the practice.<\/p>\n So, one can imagine that these units are places of the greatest tragedies. And life in them is never uneventful. Like witnessing a man try to cut his face off and prison officials\u2019 indifference to such tragedies. Here\u2019s what happened.<\/p>\n On October 20, 2014 I observed two guards, here at Clements unit prison in Amarillo, Texas, move a white prisoner into the cell across from me (cell #H231). A few minutes after the new occupant moved in, he got my attention and asked if I had an extra used razor he could have to shave with. I did not. \u201cHow about a shot of coffee?\u201d he asked. I did, so I sent him some. He thanked me and we both retreated to the backs of our cells in our own worlds. We never exchanged names.<\/p>\n After a bit of writing, I nodded off to sleep. I was awakened some time later by the explosive echoes of someone nearby repeatedly kicking his cell door. Each kick sounds off and reverberates like a gun blast inside an echo chamber. Kicking cell doors is a common occurrence in solitary, most often done by one or more prisoners in protest against some guard abuse, or in an attempt to get them to respond to a serious situation. So I got up to see what the matter was and lend my support to the prisoner, if necessary.<\/p>\n Upon reaching my cell door, I immediately observed it was the new occupant of H231 kicking, that his face was covered with blood and blood was streaming down his torso like a scene from a slasher movie.<\/p>\n Several prisoners, also seeing him, began yelling to the guard working the pod, Jesus Cruz, that the man in H231 was bleeding badly and to come check on him and call medical staff. Cruz replied, \u201cI don\u2019t give a fuck! Fuck him!\u201d The din got louder as I and others joined in the demand to get attention to the situation.<\/p>\n After several minutes of our yelling and banging wearing at him, Cruz finally got up from the desk, however not to go to cell H231, but instead to stage making a security round in the pod. Guards are required to make security rounds at least hourly, walking around the pod looking into each cell to ensure the prisoners\u2019 safety. However, rounds are typically made several hours apart if at all by the guards, who would rather sit at their desk nodding off, reading magazines stolen from prisoners or talking on the telephone.<\/p>\n Cruz began his round downstairs at cell H101. Cell H231 is upstairs at the very opposite end of the pod. Walking with exaggerated slowness, Cruz completed the downstairs round, being cursed by a number of outraged prisoners as he passed their cells. He then slowly climbed the stairs to stage a round on the top tier, again beginning at the opposite end from H231.<\/p>\n When finally he made it to the bleeding man\u2019s cell, Cruz peered in and asked nonchalantly, \u201cWhat\u2019s the problem?\u201d The blood-covered occupant was sitting silently on his bed leaning foreword with blood running onto the floor from his face. Cruz stood looking at him for a moment then ordered him to, \u201cKick the razor blade under the cell door,\u201d which he did, then returned to sit on the bed.<\/p>\n Cruz at that point took out his portable canister of o c gas, opened the hatch on the cell door and emptied the can of gas into the cell spraying the cell floor, bed and occupant at length. When the canister was completely empty, he closed the slot and called over his walkie talkie, again nonplussed that a prisoner had cut himself and a supervisor and medical staff needed to report to the pod.<\/p>\n Gradually, other guards trickled in. Among the first was Desmond Finney, a guard well known for his loud mouth and going out of his way to impress his colleagues with bragging compulsively and assaulting prisoners upon the slightest pretext, typically when they are in handcuffs or locked inside a cell.<\/p>\n Upon reaching and peering to cell H231, Finney let loose a litany of curses and insults directed at the prisoner. \u201cWhat type of dumb motherfucker tries to cut his face off?\u201d he bellowed. \u201cYou stupid asshole, you shoulda cut your throat!\u201d Other guards also came to the cell and joined in the insults. A few were visibly shaken.<\/p>\n In came a lieutenant Narciso Sanchez and two sergeants, Candace Martinez and Dustin Anderson (Sanchez and Anderson also joined in the insults and name calling, and threatened to gas the bleeding prisoner from a large canister, \u201cjust for being stupid!\u201d) and finally a nurse and portable audio-video camera. When the camera was activated the verbal abuses abruptly stopped and all the guards instantly put on \u201cprofessional\u201d airs and gas masks or their own protection against the large amount of Cruz\u2019s o c gas that was now circulating outside the cell and throughout the pod contaminating everyone.<\/p>\n Finney, ever eager to play HNIC, positioned himself to be the one to order the bleeding prisoner around, beginning with compelling him to perform a lengthy strip search, as he bled profusely from the face. Finney ordered him first to hand out his bloody boxers, then open his mouth, move his tongue around, run his index finger between his lips and gums, permit view into his nostrils, manipulate his genitals, show the bottom of each foot and wiggle his toes, bend at the waist and spread his buttocks; he was then given back his boxers to put on. He was warned if he\u2019d faltered, the entire search process would be repeated until he got it right, his medical state notwithstanding.<\/p>\n The search completed, he was ordered to put his hands out the slot backwards to be handcuffed. He was then made to kneel and, when the cell door was opened, ordered to crawl out backwards on his knees. Shackles were placed on his ankles and he was made to stand. There were large pools of blood all over the cell floor and more gathering where he kneeled and stood outside the cell.<\/p>\n The nurse came over to examine his face, wiping blood away to see the cuts. Long, deep gashes ran down both sides of his face and across his forehead, with one or both temple arteries possibly cut. He was made to walk out of the pod.<\/p>\n The incident began at 2:40 p.m. and took until 2:53 p.m. for Cruz to reach his cell. It wasn\u2019t until 3:12 p.m. that he was finally brought out. Obviously, all involved staff were content to see him bleed to death. Their concern, as noted, extended only to insults and indifference. All else was just a perfunctory performance and with deliberate malicious slowness.<\/p>\n The next day Finney worked the pod and marveled loudly to anyone who\u2019d listen that the prisoner required 95 stitches to his face.<\/p>\nTodd Hines Strikes (Himself) Again<\/strong> <\/strong><\/h3>\n