It didn’t take me long to find some Mexican kid in baggy khakis and an oversized plaid Pendleton shirt who was slinging. He knew I was a shopper. “What you need, ese?” he asked. I smiled. We conducted our business in a matter of seconds, all communication done by nods, hand gestures, and quickly flashed goods. No need for fake niceties; we both knew the routine and played our parts well. It was time to go, and I trotted back to the car while the kid slipped back into the shadows. I started to pull away from the curb and into the sparse traffic when I saw that a cop car was parked on the other side of the street. He had to have known what a white boy like me was up to in this open-air drug emporium after dark. The chase was on, but, because we were on opposite sides of the street and faced different directions, he had to make a U-turn to get back around and make the stop. By that time, I was gone. That little Ford Escort was maneuverable. I turned off the headlights, swung onto a side street, and made a series of quick turns before I doubled back. This is where I fucked up. I probably should have driven to a well-traveled street like Pico and headed west, but, well, I wasn’t thinking clearly. Instead, I thought I’d be slick. I parked the car, got out, and started to walk. Big mistake. I was busted almost immediately. “Sir, could you step over here, please?” Sometimes the Los Angeles cops can be so courteous. At the same time they explicitly telegraph that they think you’re a scumbag.
“What’s the problem, officer?” I asked with as much unctuous middle-class charm as I could manage.
“Just shut it and put your hands on the car,” he said. I balanced myself with the palms of my hands flat on the trunk of the cruiser as the cop kicked my legs back and apart. He did a pat-down and came up with my newly purchased bag of dope. “And what do we have here?” he asked. He knew the answer, and there was no point in any further remarks from me. “Put your hands behind your back,” he said, and I was slapped into the cuffs. He walked me around the side of the car and opened the rear door. “Watch your head, sir,” he said, and then stuffed me inside like a pile of dirty laundry. And that was that. I was caught and it was time to take a little ride. As we drove, I noticed we weren’t bound for downtown. That could only mean one possible destination—the notorious Rampart station, a place that had a well-deserved reputation for busting heads.
Now, in gangster movies and TV shows, the advice is always, “Just shut up until your lawyer arrives.” This is a great tip in principle, but I didn’t have an attorney on retainer and cops who think you’re being a wiseass can make sure you get put into a cell with some serious dudes who will lay upon you a beat-down or worse. As soon as they brought me in to the booking desk, I used another little piece of advice I had gleaned somewhere along the way. The first words out of my mouth, before I even confirmed my name, were, “I’m gay. I going to need protection.” The booking officer looked at me—maybe with disbelief, it was hard to tell—but he didn’t have any choice but to take me at my word. That’s how it works. Once you’ve dropped that little bomb on them, they reroute you through protective custody and keep you away from the general jail population. Apparently, homosexuals are disruptive to what passes for serenity in “gen pop.” The squalid accommodations at Rampart weren’t any better for those of us in protective custody, but under the auspices of “PC,” I didn’t have to worry—as much, anyway—about the specter of random and sudden violence. I had a bigger concern: withdrawal. This was not the time or place to be dope-sick, given the upcoming court appearances and the stress of incarceration, but that was the reality.
Because of my protective-custody status, I was sent downtown to the “Glass House” facility at Parker Center instead of the nightmarish Men’s Central Jail. Not that any correctional facility is a good place to be, but Men’s Central can be downright lethal. I can’t recall much of my stay in the Glass House. The processing routine is designed to strip the inmate of whatever shred of dignity he might still possess. Everything is delivered in a stream of sharply barked orders by some jarhead sheriff’s deputy.
“Strip!”
“Walk on the blue lines only!”
“Bend over!”
“Cough!”
“Lift your nut sack and cough again!”
Then you get a shower and some ill-fitting clothes. It passed in a blur. I was as dope-sick as any junkie’s ever been, and the county doesn’t give you any methadone. You take the cure right there in lockup. After a
