Facts & Fallacies
By
David Savard
I spent 10 years at the state prison in southern Michigan and then three more in the Utah State Prison. Sex
is something that everyone thinks about. Most convicts revert to masturbation to satisfy their needs, but a lot of
sex goes on, too.
There was one man that came to my cell every morning at 6:00 am. and satisfied me orally. His
approach was good and the sex was excellent. He stood about five foot six, was muscular, and talked politely and softly.
I didn't think he was a physical threat until one day in the yard he hit a man and knocked him out. He
smashed him so hard with one punch that the man's face was contorted and driven inward.
One morning he came to my cell and I had been high all night on benzedrine. My mind was racing
with thoughts about experimenting with him so I greased up and waited under the sheet on my bed. When he came
in he stood at the bottom of the bed and I kicked the sheet off to give him a good view. After a time he was
ready to enter me, but another convict stopped and bummed a cigarette. That ruined the moment and I never
came close to that point again.
My sex life in my late teens was with prostitutes, and when I went to prison at 22 years old, it was
with the gay crowd. When I discharged in Michigan, I had the same sexual preferences that I learned in prison
and they have never changed. Today I rent a room in a home with a lady landlord and we get along fine. But
nothing has ever developed but friendship.
Prison rape, in my experience, is almost unheard of. When it does happen, the person who gets
raped really asks for it with his words and actions. Prison is a synthetic society and every flaw in a person's
make-up stands out after 90 days. Older convicts just watch, wait, and hope.
Sex in prison can be humorous or sad, and sometimes causes problems for those who participate in
the games.
In Jackson Prison in Michigan, the world's largest walled penitentiary, one guard was harassing a
gay inmate who worked in the culinary department. When the convict would walk through the back door of
the kitchen through the hallway that led to his cell block, the officer would forcibly shake him down while
he screamed at the man.
Finally the man got sick of being shook down all the time and debased by a verbal barrage. What did
he do? He tore the pocket out of his pants on the right side, then built up a huge erection and placed it where
the pocket used to be, and covered the bulge with his hand. When he walked out of the door the guard pounced
on him. He saw the bulge and knew that he finally had his man.
"Hey slick, what have you got in your pocket?" he yelled. "You bastard, I finally got you."
"Stay away from me!" the convict yelled as he backed away.
The officer was undaunted and he grabbed the man's arm, then reached into the pocket.
His face turned red and he sputtered, "You're going to the hole." About 30 other convicts saw this
happen and they all laughed and razzed the guard.
He marched the convict to the Main Hall Office, and it was shift-change time. There were 250
officers lined up in rows awaiting role call.
The officer got 15 feet from the counter and screamed at the captain on duty, "Captain this man had
a hard-on and when I shook him down I grabbed it."
The Captain looked at him and calmly asked, "What do you want me to do about it?"
All of the officers lined up heard him and they all laughed. During the following week the officer
was laughed at and scorned by officers and inmates alike. At the start of the second week he transferred to the
wall towers, which the inmate was hoping for. He couldn't harass anybody there.
Jackson had a Special Activities Office that helped convicts get into AA, NA, the Chess Club and
other groups that might help the man eventually stay out of prison. The office had a huge closet that was never
used. So the clerical staff of convicts rented it out to lovers and to others that had a strong desire for sex. After a
time the word got out and convicts changed the name of the office from Special Activities to Sexual Activities.
The clerks had to give up the lucrative business because it wouldn't be long before someone snitched and the
office was raided when the closet was being used.
There was also animosity and hate that went with sex in the prison. Two convicts were caught
making love in the library and they were thrown in the hole and then isolation. To make matters worse, they were
taken to the town of Jackson to be tried for sodomy. They were both young, about 22, and the jury felt sorry for
them. They got a hung jury and the charges were dropped.
One of the convicts told the corrections officer who busted him that he was going to sue him for
everything he had. The officer told the warden and once again they were brought to the Jackson Court and
charged with sodomy. This time the jury had no mercy. They were found guilty and sentenced to 10 to 15 years,
which was added to the sentence they were serving. Had the young man been smart enough to keep his mouth shut
and not anger a sleeping giant he would have gotten away clean. But he saw dollar signs and retribution that
he didn't have coming.
One black gay convict used to pad his buttocks with toilet paper and go to the yard and walk in
a provocative manner. Many fights were fought over him. As a matter of fact, three men were stabbed to
death over this inmate. It turned out that he had given about ten convicts gonorrhea and was then locked up in
six block. That is where they kept the trouble makers, mental cases, and those needing protection. He was given
so much penicillin that he almost turned white. Because of the deaths and his spreading a social disease, he
stayed in six block for five years. He wasn't allowed to work and had no funds for tobacco and toilet articles. When
he left on parole he was broke, except for the ten dollars the state gave him to use to catch a bus back to Detroit.
In many relationships in prison, discretion was never used. For example two young men got into
a heated tryst and fell in love. As luck had it, they would see the parole board during the same month and
be released with in days of each other. They didn't have much money nor a job to go to, and they wondered
how they were going to get started in life together and be self-supporting.
One convict told the other, "I have an idea. I'll write my parents and explain the situation to them.
I know they will help us by letting us live there."
His lover said, "Great, I'll write a letter too, and let them know just how much we love each other
and want to get a good start in our new way of life."
Both convicts started their letters "Dear mom and dad."
The parents got the letters and with in five minutes the warden's phone was ringing. Within another
ten minutes, both youths were in the hole and facing isolation for 90 days. One convict was given a
six-month extension on his release date and the other was paroled on time. Nobody knows if they ever got together
again, but they were the talk of the prison for a week.
Another closeted gay liked to go down on convicts. He was finally caught and sent to isolation.
He couldn't stand the exposure of being gay, so he decided to hang himself in his cell. He used a bed sheet
and stood on a chair. After he kicked the chair over he had a change of heart. It was too late. The
investigating officer could see shoe-black scuff marks on the sink and the wall where he tried to get some leverage, but it
was too late. He died a senseless death because of guilt.
Rape is not prevalent in prison. Some convicts get pressured to have sex, and if they are weak
emotionally will give in to the menacer.
Seven Block is the receiving center for all convicts just coming to the prison. There was a base floor
and then four tiers. Each tier had over a hundred cells and the cell block was always crowded.
In the back of each tier and the base floor was a catwalk. This area was used to fix pipes that leaked,
and a convict would always keep it clean with broom and mop. One inmate on the maintenance crew was
a weightlifter and threatened many other inmates, who gave in because of his size and tough demeanor.
A youth of 17 came to the prison and was celled on the third tier. He was serving a life sentence for
two murders. This is the lad that the weightlifter chose to press for sex. He walked up to the back of the cell from
the catwalk and told the youth he wanted hips or lips and he wasn't fussy which he got. The youth acted scared
and told him to stick it through the bars. The would-be tough guy stuck a nine inch erection through the bars and
the youth held it lovingly with his left hand. Then with his right hand, he cut the weightlifter's penis straight up.
He used a single-edged blade and it cut about one-half inch deep from the base of the erection to the tip of
the penis. The weightlifter screamed in agony and was heard all over the huge cell block. Two officers ran up
and asked him what happened.
He screamed, "That bastard cut my prick."
The guards calmly told him, "Had you left it in your pants, this wouldn't have happened." The
humbled tough-guy was rushed to the hospital and received about 20 stitches. After that incident he never
bothered anyone about sex or anything else.
It's interesting that most gay inmates will go in either of two directions. The first is that they
become religious. The second is that they tell everyone they are serving time for bank robbery. Gay prisoners, at
least those not serving time for sex, are also the first ones to get paroled in a hard-core prison like Jackson.
The reason is simple: their release causes less problems and they are very seldom violent.
Another story about prison sex is worth telling. An older convict, about 60, took a 21-year-old gay
lad into the shower. He gave the youth a carton of cigarettes so he could sodomize him. Once in the shower
he couldn't raise an erection no matter how hard he tried.
The young man got tired of waiting so he turned the older felon around and told him, "Hey old man,
let someone screw that can." He used grease that the older convict brought into the shower. After that the
senior citizen swore off sex.
One inmate at the Ionia Reformatory for youths had some sort of sickness that doctors couldn't
diagnose. He was shipped to Jackson for testing. X-rays showed nothing unusual other than a pencil in his back
pocket. Then they realized what had happened. The youth was masturbating with the pencil. The doctors removed it
and he was as good as new after receiving medication that stopped the infection.
Another inmate at Jackson went to the hospital with a Skippy peanut butter jar jammed in his anus.
It was a short, round jar and about three inches wide. The doctor sent a male nurse to the convict's cell to
retrieve the top of the jar. When he returned, the doctor put a screw and bolt in the top, then worked it into the man
s anus and screwed it onto the jar. The inmate screamed loudly because of the pain, but his anguish fell on
unsympathetic ears. Once the lid was on, the doctor took pliers and grabbed the top of the screw and pulled the jar
out. To make matters worse, the officers displayed the greasy jar in the Main Hall Office for a day so everyone
could see what the inmate had done.
When he was asked how the jar got lodged in his anus, he replied, "I took a shower and when I
came back to my cell, I sat on it." Everyone laughed at the lie, and this didn't help the inmate's shame of
being caught.
On the average that was true. How a gay inmate would turn a non-gay out was very simple. He
would give the inmate what he wanted and talk nice to him. Then after a time, when the convict trusted the gay in
the situation, sex would be discussed. After that the inmate would let the gay do what he wanted. It would start
with a simple kiss, then touching, and then the sexual act. For the most part it never failed.
The reality of sex in prison isn't what is read in magazines or seen on TV. Most convicts just want to
do their own time as quietly as possible and then leave when their time is up. **
Editor's Note: From The Guide, September 1998
| Author Profile: David Savard |
| David Savard spent 10 years at the state prison in southern Michigan and then three more in the Utah State Prison. |
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