My experience with solitary confinement, as defined by the United Nations1, began in early May of 2013. At that time i was confined in the Harris county jail. The day of my conviction and sentencing, to life without parole, i was subsequently housed in solitary at the 1200 Baker Street jail. i was placed there, purportedly, because of the lentgh of my sentence, administrators deemed such a sentence to be traumatic enough for one to have an uncontrollable desire to harm themselves or others or attempt an escape. At the instance of one gavel slam, i went from being in a normal jail setting surrounded by a multitude of other prisoners, an arrangement i had been in for NEARLY two years without much incident, to the ‘New Boogey-man’ incapable of rational emotional expression. This pretext for my story in solitary confinement would re-appear at a later date once i entered TDCJ.

My stint in 1200 Baker Street’s solitary unit on the 2nd floor was brief. Only a few things stick out in memory. i recall my father, Monsour K. Owolabi, came to visit me. To this day it is the last time we’ve seen eachother or heard the sounnd of eachothers voices. My father lived in Atlanta at the time and had come to Houston to attend my jury trial.

As i recall it, the speaker in my cell sounded off, ‘ you have a visitor get ready!’ i had been expecting the visit and was already ready, i simply awaited the escorts to arrive. Prisoners in solitary at Harris county were the only prisoners escorted and shackeled wherever they went, including visit. They arrived, cuffed my hands, and walked me, one in front one in back, to the staircase that sat in the middle of the pod. As i strolled by his door, i recall a young Chad Holly calling out to me, ‘keep ‘ya head up ‘hood, have a good visit’. i walked to the stairs, raised one fot at a time and allowed the too tight to walk shackels to be secured then connected to my waist and wrists, constricting my movements.

We made the short walk to the 2nd floor visitation, which had a select row specifically for those in 23 & 24 hour lockdown, i was the only one at visit. In the county’s visiting area we speak through metal plates in the middle of a glass plate. My father and i hollered some words i can’t recall, but i do remember not being comfortable and trying to take a seat on the concrete stool. i remember sitting down, and eventually upon attempting to get up, the shackles on my legs were caught around the stool preventing me from moving. i fell to the ground on my back , my feet in the air, hands cuffed to my waist, unable to get up on my own accord. i looked over to the glass, my father and i locked eyes, he began to cry, i turned my head, frustrated and unable to accept the fact i was alone ,wholly confined, constricted, and helpless. My father couldn’t stand the sight of me struggling to get up, he motioned to leave. Alone, isolated, captive, de-humanized. That was my introduction to solitary confinement and initiated key themes in my experience, loneliness, isolation, complete captivity and de-humanization.

The second thing i recall about that brief stint were the people i interacted with. The aforementioned Chad Holly was a guy from Southwest Houston, Alief, like myself. He was a couple years younger than my then twenty-one. He was isolated for being ‘high profile’. In 2010, the city of Houston watched as a 15 or 16 yearold Holly was beaten and pulverized by Houston Police Departments’s agents of repression. i remember being in Harris County watching the footage on the news, knowing the area the incident occured and months prior having had a similar run-in with some of the same pigs. Chad’s family was filing a suit against the HPD. By the time i met Chad in 2013 he was there having had Another ‘newsworthy’ run-in with police, the latter one, a supposed burglary.

If memory serves, young Chad received probation and had to do a stint in jail before release. He was doing that stint while we were around eachother. i recall listening and questioning Chad on what his plans were. Our conversations distracted me from the misery i was feeling. I felt good for him. that he would be given another chance, and that he seemed highly intelligent and capable. i recall telling him my own story, and advising him to use me as an example, that we were around eachother at that opportune time so that he could observe the direction he was headed in, through me. i encouraged him to live out his highest potential, that guys like me live out our dreams through people like him. Today i wonder whatever came of him?

In late May or early June 2013 i was transferred with other county jail inmates to TDCJ’s Gurney unit. i remember entering the ‘BlueBird’ bus and trying to plug all the scenery of downtown Houston to memory, thinking,‘ Is this really my last time seeing this?’ Trying to psyche myself up with hopes of. ‘i’ll be back on appeal.’ Immediately after my conviction i entered into the Direct Appeal phase, usual procedure for a capital case.

We arrived at Gurney where i was eventually separated from the pack. Having LWOP i wasn’t allowed to freely walk on what is classified as a ‘transfer unit’, i was immediatelytaken to solitary confinement to await another transfer to Byrd unit for diagnostic. i didn’t know anyone, so i was quiet. i remember reading over a bible i brought with me from county and intensely staring at the few photos that made it through the scrutiny of overzealous gang investigators. Surrounding me were one Chicano prisoner from Southwest Houston to the right  of me. We didn’t speak then, but would re-unite years later in solitary yet again. Everyone else within eye or ear shot were loud,obnoxious blatant white supremacists. They were all awaiting transfer to ‘I.D. units’ having been confirmed ‘STG’ members. Their constant banter about niggers, monkeys, faggots, punks, and the subordination of women was driving me MAD! i recall an older brother cell warring with them and the kicks they got out of getting under his skin. i decided to discipline myself not to showcase my own antagonism. Years later i would reflect on that incident when reading George Jackson’s Soledad Brother, where he narrates a similar situation. i felt myself a kindred spirit to him and leaned on his example for strentgh in the tougher times that laid ahead for me in solitary confinement.

Soon i was transferred to the Byrd unit, where at least i was allowed a cellmate. i stayed there about a month, maybe less. i only remember that the food was relatively good, and the female staff was abnormally attractive and friendly. i didn’t wanna leave! i recall leaving for Clemens unit in Brazoria Texas on the last friday of June 2013. i arrived at the unit familiar with quiteaa few prisoners, but i recall being displeased with the way the guards interacted or handled most prisoners. There was a mixture of disrespect, paternalism and superiority complex that i detected. 98% of the captives there were twenty-six years old or less. Most staff were around the same age. i was irritable, every little thing had me on edge. i recall atending the procedural UCC hearing and then Major Cody Wolfrum forewarning me that any little incident would have me sent off ‘his’ unit and to ‘seg’. He wasn’t a fan of my being able to move relatively freely around ‘his’ unit simply because the amount of time i have. He further worried about my possible influence of the young impressionable men around me. Most of which were relatively short-timers, but were without exception, still in the ‘riot stage’ of rebellion, and caught up in the wheel of gangsterism, as was i.

The very next friday morning at breakfast i had an altercation with a guard  that developed from a verbal exchange of insults, to his attempt  to strike me and my defending myself with one hand cuffed. The result being that the cuff made contact with his eye socket fracturing it with the one and only punch i threw. i was roughed up, assaulted by a group of pigs, while restrained to the ground in the chowhall. The area having been cleared of all inmates except those working in the kitchen. They threw me in solitary confinement. At the Clemens unit the solitary cell has double doors, one a heavy metal one that leads into the cell and to a door of cell bars which locks you into a cell with one bed and a commode. Enough space to take two steps. i recall being thrown in there and both doors being shut. It was hot as one would imagine hell is. It was southeast Texas in early July with no aircondition, no fans, no electrical outlets, no air flow once so ever. i stripped to my boxers, wet them in the toilet water(the sink water was turned off) and laid down. The mosquitos tormented me the whole time i was there. i grew tired of swatting them. Some days in, i hadn’t been fed, the water was still off, and i broke out with a heat rash that comprised my entire body.  head to toe. i endured the treatment quietly without complaint. At the time  the colonized mentality infected my observation of the world and my place in it. According to such misguided thinking i had been ‘bad’, had misbehaved, i was a subject and had to accept , noblely, the retribution of that misbehavior. Only years later would i be empowered after coming to the same conclusion os Mao Tse-Tung, that the oppressed, the enslaved, the colonized, the captive had the right to rebel for the duration that their subjugation continues.

During that experience on Clemen’s unit’s solitary, i recall being enthused whenever one of many Nigerian officers worked. My father is Nigerian, and any time a Nigerian recognizes my name they immediately embrace me as one of their own. An extended family member whose seemed to have lost his way. At that time they observed my physical state and would make sure i was provided food, extra to make up for the days i was being starved. They made sure i was allowed shower and/or water. Although they were just doing their jobs i considered this as kind treatment, and such treatment re-kindled a source of pride in my African heritage that has had an effect on my development even today.

Eventually i would see classification and Major Wolfrum would request  i be transferred to Allred unit’s ad-seg/solitary confinement for assault on staff with a weapon causing bodily injury. My evidence that i was being handcuffed by another officer when the one in question attempted to assault me, was ignored. i learned that the inmates in the kitchen who were working had filed witness statements on my behalf, which never made it into the record. i didnt learn of them until informed by one of the inmates themselves after the case. 

Upon my arrival at Allred in August 2013 i remember being met by a squad of guards, some ranking officials some not, all males, all white. It often happens upon arrival at a prison that the administration organizes a squad of their meanest, biggest, toughest guards in an attempt to intimidate new arrivals into obedience and sub-servience. The only standout about Allred was its objectively white supremacist overtones. They called out, ‘From this moment on you will forget wherever you come from, you are in my house now and me and my boys rule this house with iron fists.” Said one ranking officer.

The atmosphere of the unit spoke more than he could’ve. For the first time while being in captivity i truly felt out of place, i felt ‘different’ and felt targeted for that ‘difference’ and that the structure was in place to keep my ‘difference’ in check. This’difference’ was that of National contractions that expressed themselves  through cultural clashes. Some 90% of the staff were white males, largely middle-aged, rural, country north and west Texas backgrounds, whereas the prisoners were from urban areas in Texas. Most Chicanos were from San Antonio or Dallas, while most New Afrikans were from Houston or Dallas.

My initial housing assignment  was on level 3, F-pod 68 cell. A younger homeboy from my block was a few doors down. We passed the time, until i was moved a few weeks later. My next cell was Level 2 Epod, 68cell. A younger homeboy from my block was a few doors down. We passed the time, until i was moved a few weeks later. My next cvell was level 2 Epod 59cell. i interacted with an older brother from Houston, alias, Loco who informed me on the way things operated in this new world of ad-seg. He was the first to hip me to the fact that there were so many guys from Houston in seg on Allred unit which is almost eight hours away.This, it should be noted is contrary to state law;see Tex.Gov.Codes501.099. Most of these cats were longterm prisoners, all were combative, and insubordinate in their own ways. It seemed that Allred unit was a place administrators secluded us, isolated us  in all ways possible, where we would lose ourselves and ultimately be broken. In those days we leaned on eachother. In the free(er) world, while in the streets of Houston, being from there is of little significance. Particularly in the sub-culture of inner-city tribalism, when ones worst enemies maybe a two minute drive away, We never had camaraderie. On Allred unit’s ad-seg in 2013, it became an expression of resistance to display in anyway the uniqueness of ‘H-Town’ culture. At RaRe moments of ‘congregation’ (loud yelling while in dayroom) We would recite ‘DJ Screw’ and Screwed Up Clique’ songs. Most of us displayed ‘South-side fade’ haircuts( a real high and tight bald fade) even those not from the South-side did so. It was a small symbol of defiance. The ad-min would hassle us about our haircuts, sometimes forcing us to cut it, or threatening us with disciplinary cases. They said it was a ‘gang’ identifier. we understood that they were criminalizing Our culture, criminalizing where we’re from, attempting to suppress who We were, and this realization  brought the broader reality of the prison industrial slave complex and its role in suppression of the self-determination of oppressed nations and people into sharp focus. This suppression exceeds mere cultural wars, as it acts to subvert socio-economic and political developments. The prison,in general, is a tool for forced subordination erected by the state for that sole purpose. The use of solitary confinement/ ad-seg is the highest expression, the sharpest, most intense form of this subordination. 

When i looked around me on level 2 and 3 pods i only saw  certain demographics of prisoners. i saw that the administration bent the rules simply to place, or rather displace us(mostly) on level 3 and 2 pods. i observed that the treatment of inmates on level 2 and 3 was significantly worse in comparison to level ones. i began to feel slighted. I felt slighted  by the harris county courthouse, which didnt allow me a jury of my ACTUAL peers2. i felt slighted by god. i felt slighted by major Wolfrum and the pigs at clemens unit . i felt slighted by incompetent appeal lawyer who wouldn’t return my letters. i felt slighted by prison officals for their day-to-day oppressive operations, and for me the fertile soil for radical-politicalization was in place, although i was unaware of it.

i gained level 1 status and was sent to high security, the expasion cell block. The ECB is a ‘high-tech’ isolation chamber where sound is distorted, where air control is used for behavior modification, where there is no contact with outside elements like sun, rain or the like. i was housed on J-pod 106cell. i stayed there eight months, before i was sent back to level three after a cell extraction. i had no idea that the gas they sprayed me and countless others was ‘illegal’ for use in warfare, but continues  to be used for domestic dissenters and captives.3 i feel slighted. i arrived back on F-pod 55 cell, burning from the gas, fully naked with blood dripping from my ankles where the shackles had been tightened as i was made to hobble the distance from ECB to 12bldg. Loco and another brother sent me some boxers and soap and i settled in. i would interact with other brothers and eventually we would band together. We were all bonded by the oppression we endured from the authorities. i recall the incident that set things in motion. There was a Muslim brother, Jihad, who often suffered from psychosis. Even when at his worst, Jihad was never a bother to anyone. Hw would usually yell, ‘Allahu akbar!’ for hours at the top of his lungs. But we all understood his mental state and didn’t let it bother us. 

Each morning like clock work, no matter his mental state, Jihad would make the call to Fajr prayer. Never knowing if others joined him or not, he would go through the entire process of salat, reciting prayers in Arabic so that all could hear. In truth, those were some of the most peaceful moments each day for me.

There were some white nationalist pigs whom didn’t like Jihad’s behavior, and moved to suppress it. They crept through one night. Jihad was down stairs in 61 cell i believe, while i was upstairs in 64cell. There is a red light that acts as a signal letting one know one of the doors are open on a particular section. i saw the red light, then heard thumping and banging as if someone was brawling. i asked the brother next to me did he hear that and where were the guards, ‘Jihad’s cell.’ About a minute or so passed before six guards came walking confidently out of his cell and exited the section. i recognized them , they were a group of admitted members of a white supremacist organization that was functioning out of nearby Bowie, Texas . We, inmates began hollering and banging on the metal doors, attempting to bring attention to the situation. Our efforts were fruitless, as those who were supposed to prevent things like that from occuring were the ones doing it. We began hollering to Jihad. He was beat up but functioning well. He didnt wanna make a big deal out of  it. He said they wanted him to cease making Salat as he had been doing, he said he would continue. He did.

    The rest of us wanted retribution. The pigs continued attacking other prisoners, all of which were New Afrikan, most were noticably what we called ‘psyched-out’. In prison there’s this idea that one shouldn’t defend one whose not defending themselves. We tend further marginalize those who’re already marginalized and/or vulnerable. This practice opens the doors for incidents of targeted abuse against physically and mentally disabled people, those with diverse sexualities and/or gender expressions, or those perceived of having those things, and those who’ve come under fire from the ad-min. Once the agents of the state observe  that a particular person has been marginalized and isolated they fell more free to excessively oppress them.

Eventually an incident occured that pushed many into action. i won’t name names here but there was an ex-gang member turned staunch believer of the Nation of Islam. i’l call him B. B was a talented writ writer and was a thorn in the side of administrators because he always documented abuse and malpractice. Pigs labeled him a snitch, reactionary inmates were manipulated by those claims, and B was marginalized and isolated and open to attack. B was hated by white supremacist gangs(inmates) because he was bravely outspoken about his NOI beliefs. These two realities converged when B was isolated further by being housed  on a section which inmates called ‘the Trailer Park’, a section where the most staunch white reactionary inmates were all  housed on one section. A section consists of 14 cells, 7 on each tier. B was the only exception. As part of a gang initiation one prisoner was directed to assasinate B, and the reactionary inmates collaborated with a reactionary big-guard to open the prospective gangmembers door while  B was handcuffed and escorted by a guard going to shower. The prospect beat B with a fan motor wrapped in a sock, although B didnt die from this incident of attempted assasination, it is needless to say that it sparked  rebellion amongst myself and other New afrikan prisoners.

That phase of my development was highly significant in who i am today. The veil of inner-city tribalism was removed from my observation of the world. It was the first time  i had banded together  with oter New Afrikan nationals for a non-criminal act. we unified beyond sets and cities and states, We defied the Willie Lynch syndrome. We operated under a ‘New Unity’ a revolutionary and national unity, although we were unaware of such a concept at the time.

Besides physically combatting national oppression by prison reactionaries, my development was advanced by  the literature several good brothers shared with me. i, Like Ajamu Niamke Kamara (stanley Tookie williams) had said, “ i had poked so many holes in the thin fabric of my thug experience  that i could no longer sustain a conscious apologia for Crippen.”

This new reality left a hole in my mind, and the literature that i was beginning to internalize was well welcomed by my hungry mind and starving intellect.

The material was primarily different notions  of cultural and religious metaphysical nationalism. i have observed that usually the lumpen 3elements, as they first begin to put on a cloak of social responsibility, gravitate to these idealist schools of thought. Immediately awaiting the colonial-criminal subject who desires something else for themselves, are Jesus Christ, Allah, the God of Self, and many other doctrines that often distract the subject from the objective root causes of their condition. This is an effect of the usual lack of formal education, a de-based moral code that they realize needs adjusting, and an abnormal and excessive tendency of group/ community longing that leads to unhealthy relationships.4 The same tendencies  that drew one  into the gang culture brings one into the cultural-religious  nationalists, and metaphysical doctrines. Like many i went through this phase. 

From 2014 until June 2016(when i was released from ad-sef) i read anything i could get my hands on. i read anything of substance  in the prison library. i started writing and debating, both of which developed confidence in my capabilities and ideas. i was still in the elementary stages of development. i still had no understanding or familiarity with political economy, class divisions, or philisophical trends. i was gathering a basic understanding of who i was and subsequently re-molding my understanding of my people. i was slowly being mentally de-colonized through my own efforts of auto-didactics. The most memorable book i read at that stage was Manning Marable’s Malcolm X: A Life Of Re-invention.

When i left Allred in June 2016 i was re-housed on Telford unit’s medium and closed custody. No matter how good i behaved i couldn’t be classified any higher. i was being judged for the one punch i threw in self-defense on Clemens unit. i would be thus judged for ten years, as i write this i am still being judged as a security percaution  for that incident, nearly a decade later. i repeat, for one punch, in slf defense, while handcuffed. 

    The most significant memories from my year and a ½ on Telford(in population) were the constant internal battles i had, trying to suppress fits of rage. Those fits began while in solitary confinement. In order to be eligible or considered for release i had to stay disciplinary free for awhile. i believe i went 14 months  without a case. In order to do so however i had to accept constant humiliation, debasment and harassment from guards. Constantly feeling disrespected but having to swallow it because i wanted to go to population. This is prisons’  idea of rehabilitation. It is how they modify behavior5. For me and i am sure many others, this was the trigger to my fits of rage which have carried on until this day. Behavior modification, rehabilitation, and spirit breaking are all synonymous in the context and confines of prison and its relation to it’s subjects. It is generally true what Nelson Mandela observed,

“Prison is designed to break one’s spirit and destroy one’s resolve. To do this, the authorities attempt to exploit every weakness, demolish every initiative, negate all signs of individuality. All with the idea of stamping out that spark that makes each of us human and each of us who we are.”

Prison is a violent and unforgiving place. Some prisons are worse than others, more volatile. Aside from the frequently talked about gang elements there is a general predatory culture that permeates prison colonies. The captives themselves have not created this culture, it is a reflection of the broader society that the prison is merely a microcosm of. The basic capitalist mentality of dog-eat-dog, and indifferent individualism create, foster and perpetuate the predatory mindset.