Criminal - Looking Out

Episode Date: July 17, 2020

People incarcerated in California’s San Quentin State Prison aren’t allowed to have pets — but some people, like Ronell Draper, have found ways to work around that. Meet Ronell Draper, also known as “Rauch,” plus Ear Hustle’s Nigel Poor and Earlonne Woods join Phoebe to talk about the impact of Covid-19 at San Quentin. Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow. We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery. Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop.  Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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That's BotoxCosmetic.com. That's BotoxCosmetic.com. Hi, it's Phoebe. Today we're bringing you a story about life inside California's San Quentin State Prison, produced inside the prison itself. And then we'll get an update on the COVID-19 outbreak inside the prison. This episode contains language that may not be suitable for everyone. Please use discretion. I love animals, oh yeah. Since I've been in prison, I've had black widows, tarantulas, a lot of grasshoppers, beetles.

At San Quentin, inmates aren't allowed to have pets, but some guys get creative, like Roadchair. Gophers, rabbits, I had four swallows, a toad, praying mantis, 21 snails, frog, red-breasted finch whose arm broke, pigeons, I had a desert mole that was partially paralyzed, teddy bear hamster just really lazy with an attitude, a centipede, and it was a wolf. It was partially paralyzed. Teddy bear hamster, just really lazy with an attitude. The centipede, and it was a wolf. It was a bad little monster. I had two fish that had babies twice.

I had a tarantula broke out one time. My cellie said, yo, spider got out. I'm Erlon Woods. Erlon is serving a 31 year to life sentence for attempted second-degree robbery and he's the co-host and co-producer of Ear Hustle. And that's Naja Poor. She's a visual artist and works with incarcerated men here at San Quentin and she's a co-producer and my co-host and together we're going to take you inside. I've been coming to San Quentin as a volunteer for about six years now.

And when I get here, my routine is always the same. I park my car, I go through a few checkpoints and gates, and once I'm inside the prison, I check in with a few of the correctional officers that I know, and then I make my way down to the media lab. And to get to the media lab, I have to pass through the yard. When I walk down into the yard, the first thing that I notice is that there's hundreds of guys hanging out in different areas. There's some guys playing basketball, there's other guys playing tennis,

and there's guys hanging out in small groups, maybe talking and playing dominoes. And it's a really strangely friendly atmosphere. Everyone you walk by is really friendly. They make eye contact. They ask how you're doing. They say hello. And I'm wondering, do you have the same experience?

Yeah, this is pretty much a very friendly environment. I mean, from the volunteers to the prisoners to the staff, individuals know how to communicate with each other. And I think by them being able to express themselves and make this place like a cool place. But I really think San Quentin is the perfect soil for rehabilitation for real, though. I mean, you have people coming in here saying that they feel safer in here than they do in society. Yeah, I've heard that, actually. Well, one of the things I've noticed is that there are all these different areas.

And so, Erlon, I've just discovered this new area called Hippie Row. Right, right, right. And there's nothing distinctive about it. It's just a paved part of the yard, but it's called Hippie Row because that's where you're going to find Roach. And the funny thing about him is that he's always sitting on the ground without shoes. When I see Roach, he be drawing something. And in the process of him drawing, he be having these extra pencils in between his toes, like his reds, his blues, his greens. And he'll have them there like pencil holders. Yeah, it's like his desk organizer.

So how would you describe him? To me, I think Roach looked like the original Jesus Christ. You know? I mean, he got the dreadlocks. He looked like he's from the earth. And if he could, he'd probably just be wearing a leaf. And he got this one little thing that he do. He'll just start sniffing on his dreadlocks.

I know. I've seen him do that. He grabs his hair and he pulls it in front of his nose and just sniffs. Why are you whispering? Because I feel like I'm talking about him behind his back he knows he does it right yeah it's not like he's gonna hear this and go oh my god i sniff my hair hey he'll catch himself you just be looking at him he's like uh fyi i do smell my dreads I put different oil on each one of them. They smell good. They smell like I just came out the dirt,

hanging out with roots and stuff. But you know what though? When people from the outside look at Roach, they be like, oh dude weird, man, I ain't talking to dude. But Roach is a cool dude. My name is Rennell Draper, but I go by Roach. My relationship with people is pretty strained. I don't trust them. From early on, they have been a source of pain for me.

So Roach is about 40 years old, and he's a pretty shy guy. Until you know him. When I was a child, before I was removed from the care of my mom's custody, she tried to drown me a couple times in the tub. When I was a child, before I was removed from the care of my mom's custody, she tried to drown me a couple times in the tub. And then she stopped and she left the bathroom and she was crying. I knew she was unhappy or sad at something I did. I wanted to actually comfort her, but I didn't know how to do it.

I don't remember her face, and I haven't seen her since. Roach said he was six or seven years old before he had his first real connection with a person. And that was with Sister Maria. She had something about her that I really enjoyed being around. She seemed to care in a different way than I was used to people caring because up until that point I had been into different homes, hospitals, and now I was in an orphanage. Roach was in the St. Vincent orphanage in South Philly. It was when he was there

that he had his first memorable encounter with the animal kingdom. I remember one time when I was at the orphanage, I wasn't there long, and Sister Maria took me and several other kids to Atlantic City Beach in Boardwalk. The day was overcast, and we were the only people out there, But it was a trillion birds out there. It was a lot of birds, seagulls. And I got a clam. And she said, go and give it to them. Renell, you can feed the birds. Feed the birds. It's okay. But I was scared of them because they were aggressive.

Super aggressive. When they seen that, the clam, like a thousand of them came and said, yeah, we need that. And it was frightening. It was frightening. So I threw it and ran behind her. She was my protection. Roach didn't stay afraid of birds or any other animals. At 10 years old, he left the orphanage and he moved into a group home in Philadelphia

where they didn't seem to mind his love of animals. I used to bring home everything, lizards, snakes, kittens from down the street, and bringing pigeons home. Dogs, it was bad because they didn't know where to come after a while. And I'd come home from school and there would be a bunch of cats or dogs. The pigeon didn't last long because I think the cat ate it. But I didn't know too much then. I wanted all the animals to be my companion and friend.

I do not call animals pets. I call them critters. I hang out with these guys or girls. They're friends. I don't own them. Roach actually spells his name R-O-A-C-H. No, wait a minute. That's how you spell Roach, right? That's how you spell Roach, yeah. Okay, Roach spells his name R-A-U-C-H. Is his name Roach because of the critter? Or was he just... Okay, I was talking to him one time off mic.

And the thing about his name is, when he was a teenager, he was homeless. And he lived in different people's homes in the rafters, like secretly in people's houses. And he felt like a roach. He was hiding behind the scenes, and his friends knew that he was there. But the parents wouldn't necessarily know that he was there, but the parents wouldn't necessarily know that he was. And that's how he got his name. But he changed the spelling of his name because people thought it was insulting to call him a roach. Damn, that's cold. Yep. Everybody don't grow up the same. I got into crime for survival, and I was hurting. And I thought it was a way to get back at people.

This was the way to make them feel the pain that I felt. Then it slowly became just a part of what I did. I'm incarcerated for second-degree murder. We got in a fight with someone, and I ended up killing him. This is probably a good time for us to say that we are not investigative journalists. No, we're not. We invite people to tell us their stories, and there's really only so much fact checking we can do. Right. But what we do know is that Roach got a sentence of 15 years to life. And the other thing we know about Roach is that when he got to prison, he managed to make animals

a big part of his life. I like animals because I communicate with them better than I can with people. The first critter I had in prison was a moth. And I only had it for a day because I had to tell it who came back and killed it when I went to the yard and left it on the floor. Sometimes I believe I can see or understand or know what an animal is thinking, how it's feeling, when it's depressed, when it's unhappy, even when I watch it on TV. I had a frog once who was not cool. Everywhere I moved in the cell, it would move somewhere to watch me. He constantly would keep his eye on me. I'd move over here and get out of view, he would come up and look at me.

I think he was letting me know that, you know what, you go to sleep, I'm going to pee on you, dude. So I ended up letting it go. I used to have a pet black widow and I used to letting it go. I used to have a pet black widow and I used to feed it insects. I'd be out in the yard being pimped by a spider and then I'd come in with bugs, bees, crickets, and I'd put them in a container and nature take its course or the bees would run around up in there,

fly around in there for not long and then they get caught in the web and then she spray them with a webbing and then wrap them up and then eat them. It was action. It was theater, comedy. It was really good. Better than watching TV. You never know what's going to happen. You never know how she was going to do what she was going to do.

One time I had four swallows at once, and they ended up dying. That year, I think I lost maybe ten. Along the building, they would always fall down, and people would come get me. I got some more, got some more, got some more. And so I had to smuggle them into the building. And then they would look really strong. They would even look like they were doing well, but I would leave and come back and one will be down, two will be down. I found out they ended up dying because they needed to be

touched and to feel a connection with some other, with the parent. So when I have to take care of another baby swallow, oh, it will happen again. I will keep it in my shirt pocket on my person so it can hear my heartbeat and my voice and feel connected and nurturing. I take care of animals because they teach me what I can't learn from people. It's unconditional affection or appreciation. Unconditional love is here. No, it's yours, you know?

No nothing, no, it's all you. Support for Criminal comes from Apple Podcasts. Each month, Apple Podcasts highlights one series worth your attention, and they call these series essentials. This month, they recommend Wondery's Ghost Story, a seven-part series that follows journalist Tristan Redman as he tries to get to the bottom of a ghostly presence in his childhood home. His investigation takes him on a journey involving homicide detectives, ghost hunters, and even psychic mediums,

and leads him to a dark secret about his own family. Check out Ghost Story, a series essential pick, completely ad-free on Apple Podcasts. to do it. So what is enterprise software anyway? What is productivity software? How will AI affect both? And how are these tools changing the way we use our computers to make stuff, communicate, and plan for the future? In this three-part special series, Decoder is surveying the IT landscape presented by AWS. Check it out wherever you get your podcasts. Having pets in prison is considered contraband, but it seems to me that some of the correctional officers ignore the tiny critters that Roach keeps. But there's this one group called the squad. I've had some interaction with them and they're pretty intimidating. Hell

yeah. We call them the jump out boys, the alphabets, the black patches. The alphabet? Yeah, it's like the ATF, the FBI, they the ISU, which is the investigative services unit. But when they do come, they come for business. They're not just bothering you to bother you. They come in because somebody sent them to you. One time I did have an experience with them. And I will say that before they actually show up, something changes in the air. It's like everyone has this sixth sense about it, and then all of a sudden the door opens, and you see these guys come in, and you're like, that's why the temperature changed in the room.

One time the squad came to the cell, and they were searching for contraband, but they found the desert bowl instead. And they said as long as I was taking care of it, that they weren't going to trip on me keeping it. It was cool. This time for Roach, the squad wasn't tripping. But sometimes, prison officials aren't

so accommodating. I recently have lost 21 snails. They threw it in the trash, so it depends on the officer. Some don't mind, others see it as a health violation. Now if I'm in a cell and a mouse wanders in there and says, you know, I'm going to hang out here, it's cool. I'd be willing to take care of it, hang out with it, chill with it. I wouldn't chase them out. I'd be willing to take care of it, hang out with it, chill with it.

I wouldn't chase them out. I'd let them stay as long as they wanted and be my friend. I know you're not really supposed to have pets in prison, but Roach found kind of a way around it. In reality, you really can't have regular pets like dogs and cats and, what, bunny rabbits? No, you can't. You can't have pets in prison. But there are some special projects in San Quentin where guys do train service animals.

I definitely hear stories about animals in prison. Like what? Do you know what hear guys talking about it? Okay, so one time this guy told me that he was in, let's say it was high desert, in the middle of nowhere, and he was there for 10 years, and he hadn't really seen much nature, and he hadn't heard any animals,

and then one day he heard a dog barking, and he was so overwhelmed by it. Bullshit. Why do you say bullshit? Come on, it's such a sensitive story. Why is that bullshit? In his 10 years in High Desert, High Desert is a state prison, he never heard a dog. Nope, never heard a dog. He kind of even forgot that such things existed. Well, first off I'm thinking of, you know, I can watch TV and see dogs. Different sized dogs from a chihuahua all the way up. Second, ISU, which is the squad we've been talking about, they have dogs.

So their dogs is going to walk through the institution, through the buildings, and they're going to bark. All right. Getting back to Roach's story, he has such a powerful urge to take care of critters, to nurture really, and we all have that urge one way or another, whether it's having kids or taking care of pets, maybe it's even working with young people, and we wanted to find out what other guys inside do to nurture. Except most guys aren't going to call it nurturing. They're going to say looking out. We went around with our microphone for some yard talk on the subject. It ain't worth it, no, it ain't worth it.

Tell me, was it worth it? One thing for certain, this game is so confusing, but a young nigga's still learning. Well, you know, my friends in here, you know, like they come in, you feel me, like sometimes they may need like some hygiene or some food and, you know, it feels good to be able to actually help out my people. I kind of see it kind of difficult because there's not really too many things to nurture. When I used to have more free time, I kept lizards. That's how I, you know, satisfied that need.

You know, like taking care of something, that gives you a little satisfaction too, right? Thinking how the game is so wrong and this new shit, I swear it's getting old. It ain't working, it ain't working. How'd you feed it? Come out and catch flies, like spend hours every day, you know, know catch flies especially in the winter. There's no flies around, you know Yeah, you just it was a hassle to catch flies but catching flies is kind of like meditation too You know you're in your own zone and you know with all these buzzing around your whole focus is focusing on one fly and trying

To know how to approach it to catch it no it's kind of like it's really soothing. Think about my niggas in the grave, BIP, Lil Reggie at least you in a better place man. Think about my young niggas gone, Rail Nation damn I wish heaven had a phone forever forever I'm keeping they name alive yeah the real niggas die, but only the strong survive, man. I was feeding the geese and like helping them with the babies and stuff. I was just checking on them, you know, pretending like I'm helping them and giving them advice and feeding them everything. Where they should teach them how to learn to fly and all that stuff. And you should go over there and hide from the people and all that.

But I enjoyed the parents raising their children corny as that is you know getting nurturing vicariously felt good to be able to see that you know because been away from that kind of stuff for so long so. Thinking when I'm sitting in the cell I ain't never been to heaven but I know I've been to hell man. Thinking how it all went wrong. We was all getting money, but jealousy fucked it off, man. What happened to keeping the circle strong? The guy singing there is Jovan Mills, known on the yard as Scoob Stacks. He just happened to be beating on the table and singing while we were out recording our yard talk. I don't want to get too explicit. I don't want to get too explicit. I don't want to get too explicit.

I don't want to be disrespectful towards you. That's why. So taking care of friends, lizards, geese. E, what's your work around? What do you look out for? For me, it's my guy kids. You know, I like to nurture them from here, like through letters, through phone calls. That's my nurturing is just to stay in contact with them and try my best to raise them from here. So do they actually come to you for advice? If I end up calling my goddaughter, she'd be like, man, I've been waiting on you to call me. And we just go there, you know, because I always be like, you know, we only got 15 minutes for this, right? That is definitely a story for another podcast. Yeah, the 15 minute phone call. Well, I know in prison, there's a lot of deprivation. So it's really cool that you

can keep the connection so strong with them. That's very important to me, you know. Well, I know we're talking about deprivation, but there are two things that can never be taken away from you in prison. And that's your fantasies and your memories. So I've got a question for you. Since we've been talking about animals, I'm curious, if you could be an animal, what would you be? A beluga whale. What? What? Wow. There's no rhyme or reason for it, but it just sounded cool. But we did go to the yard and ask some guys what type of animals would they be. If I could be any animal, I'd be a penguin. They're super cute in tuxedos, and they're like the coolest animals ever.

And they slapbox like crazy, too. I would want to be a panther, and the reason why is I like the sleekness of the animal. Dog, because I know that someone will adopt me. A Galapagos turtle, because they live to be over 150 years old. Lion, because it's keen. Marmot, because they're misunderstood. Everybody thinks they're weasels. And they're not. They're marmots. I want to be a water bottle, because it's diligent and because it says very little.

It would be an eagle eagle because they can fly. So that means I would always be free. I would always be safe. Tiger because tigers love their independence. A jellyfish because it has no natural enemies. I asked Roach what kind of animal he'd want to be, and his answer is pure roach. I want to hear that.

If I could be an animal, any animal, it would be a wish dragon that would only appear when a kid needed it, because my experience with imaginary friends, they were needed. So the thing about being a dragon is they eat meat and I couldn't do that so I'd have to be a vegetarian dragon. A thin vegetarian dragon because I would spend a lot of time looking for food. That's a lot of carrots, that's a lot of apples, oranges, that's just a lot of vegetables. Who's gonna ungrow those vegetables for a giant dragon? Unless I'm a a tiny dragon then i just eat a little slice of cheese i didn't think about that This episode aired in 2017.

It was one of the earliest of your show. I think it was the third episode you ever made. What's changed since then? It has changed a little bit. I think just, you know, the biggest, I guess the biggest hurdle for me was getting out of prison. In November of 2018, then-Governor Jerry Brown commuted Ear Hustle host Erlon Wood's sentence after 21 years of incarceration. Getting out, you know, and having a full-time job, having a career was definitely a blessing for me, you know.

Well, I mean, one of the great things is that, I mean, we were colleagues inside, but now we get to be like the kind of colleagues everyone else gets to be that work together on the outside. We get to travel together. We get to talk to each other on the phone whenever we want. We can email. We can meet for lunch. So it just brings personally a little bit more joy to me.

I don't think the work has slowed down at all. No. I even think shelter in place is making it harder no not even harder but making it more maybe you you just being that you sheltered in place you just like all right man it's eight o'clock at night let me go over here and do this and then you find yourself doing a little bit more work i think yeah and you know the other thing that one of the dreams we had when Erlon was still inside was to be able to do stories in other prisons and to be able to

do stories that had women in them. And when Erlon was inside, it just wasn't feasible because it would mean I would be doing those stories without him, which neither of us wanted to do. So when Erlon got out, it made that dream that we had for a long time possible. So we're able to include stories about other prisons and, you know, hopefully that will continue. Erlon, now that you're out of prison, do you have any pets? No, no, I don't have pets at all. You know, I understand that pets are like kids. You have to do a lot of taking care of them. And I haven't found that time yet.

Now, I don't have any pets, but I do like when I do go over to people's house and they have pets. It's cool. So it's just like kids, you know. It's like my nieces and nephews. You know, I can pick them up, kick it with them, and then i drop them back off so that's cool you'd like to like rent a pet i gotta know though um i gotta ask you this i laugh because i don't think you're a pet guy but if you had to have a pet what would you have oh if i had to have a pet what would i have yeah you have to yeah yeah yeah if you didn't have maybe maybe maybe a bird low maintenance

you know there's very low maintenance. You know, you put some pebbles in there and let it fly around and put it back in there and you're on about your business. You'd put it in a cage? You'd have your bird live in a cage? Yeah. Free roaming? I'll be like everybody else, you know, with their bird living in a cage. I don't know.

Now, speaking of birds, I was just with someone last night, and they just showed me some pictures where people put suits on birds, like clothes on birds. I was like, really? Like, okay. Tell me, do you know how Roach is doing? How is Roach doing? Well, I could say the last time I walked into San Quentin and I ran into Roach and talked to him for a quick second.

And he was a different cat than I had seen previously because I think this time he had cut off all his dreadlocks. And I think he had maybe one left that he held on to. So he was making this change. He was going through meeting people. I think he, Nigel, did he have a girlfriend at the time? Yeah. He got a lot of attention after that story.

After that story, he got a ton of attention and he got a lot of letters and that was you know after that story he got a ton of attention and um he got a lot of letters and that was really great for him um but he you know he's he's a particular kind of guy and um he he struggles a little bit you know it's life is up and down for him and um he the thing that's consistent about him is that he always goes back to his critters. I think that's where he finds the most comfort. So yeah, he did cut his hair off. He was struggling. But the last time I saw him, when time actually existed in a way that we understand before COVID, he was doing okay. I saw him almost every day I went in. He still had critters he wanted to show me, and we talked a lot. Yeah. I want to ask about what's going on

in San Quentin right now with COVID. What are you hearing? I'm hearing things that there's some very big outbreaks and problems right now. Yeah. I think maybe about, let's say, what is this, July, maybe in June, you had a lot of prisoners move from Chino Prison in Chino, California, to San Quentin and to another prison. And those individuals were infected with the coronavirus. And when they sent them to San Quentin, San Quentin didn't have no cases of the coronavirus. And within a matter of days, it went from, of those prisoners arriving, it went from like none to 10 cases to 15 cases to 100 cases to 300 to 500. Now it's at like 1400 cases and seven deaths. So there's definitely a lot changing. A lot has changed, you know, and I think Nigel, you stopped going in.

Nigel stopped going in before they even did the shelter in place and all that stuff. Yeah. So she wouldn't be. Yeah. The last time I was in was March 17th. And that was right around when when California started sheltering in place. And that feels like a lifetime ago. So it's it's desperate in there. And what makes it hard for us is that we have

the lack of contact. So all of a sudden, all our colleagues in there are so far away from us, it's very difficult to talk on the phone. Obviously, we can't go in. We hear the news every day getting worse and worse. It's frightening, frightening. Well, you know, I love your show so much, and we all love it here at Criminal. And so thank you both for speaking today, and I'm really happy to talk to you and to hear that you're both healthy. Oh, thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. And glad to hear your voice. to hear that you're both healthy. Oh, thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much.

Glad to hear your voice. You have that soothing voice. Thank you very much, both of you. And talk to you soon. All right. Thank you. Appreciate you. Bye.

On July 10th, California Governor Gavin Newsom announced that because of coronavirus concerns, the state would grant early release to eligible people incarcerated in California prisons. As many as 8,000 could be eligible for early release this summer. Since we spoke to Nigel and Erlon, four more men incarcerated at San Quentin have died of coronavirus, bringing the total to 11 as of July 16th. More than one-third of the prison population and staff have tested positive for the virus. Ear Hustle's co-founder and sound designer is Antoine Williams. For this episode, Pat Massidi-Miller was their outside production advisor. The story editor was Curtis Fox,

and Ear Hustle's executive editor from Radiotopia is Julie Shapiro. You can find more episodes of Ear Hustle at EarHustleSQ.com or wherever you get your podcasts. Criminal is created by Lauren Spohr and me. Nadia Wilson is our senior producer. Susanna Robertson is our assistant producer. Audio mix by Rob Byers. Criminal is recorded in the studios of North Carolina Public Radio, WUNC.

We're a proud member, with Ear Hustle, of Radiotopia from PRX, a collection of the best podcasts around. We'll be back with a new episode in a couple of weeks. I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal. Radiotopia. From PRX. make moderate to severe frown lines, crow's feet, and forehead lines look better in adults. Effects of Botox Cosmetic may spread hours to weeks after injection causing serious symptoms. Alert your doctor right away as difficulty swallowing, speaking, breathing, eye problems, or muscle weakness may be a sign of a life-threatening condition. Patients with these

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