melissaamy
08-03-2005, 06:33 PM
My name is Melissa....I was 36464 for the state of ohio for a while...this is how it happened...
I served just under 5 years (three months in County waiting for my million dollar cash bail to be reduced)
Well it has been an adventure to say the least....
I followed the Grateful Dead for almost five years.....loved almost every min of it...
I met a guy, Isaiah....he was nice at first....then he tossed me down a flight of stairs in 93...I left him and went Humboldt for a while...he stalked me all over there...
I went home to VT where he did not know where I lived....
I had never heard of battered women, though on tour it was known some folks/groups did it....
I got a call from Isaiah late 93/early 94...we talked he said how he felt so bad and how he did not mean to scare me, but he just never loved someone as much as me...
I figured ok.....I have never been loved that much...I decided to remain friends with him....
We talked on and off...I finally asked how he tracked me down...he told me how he heard someone say they were calling me and begged for my number...
My close friend was getting ready to have a baby in WA state, and another friend had a train ticket for me to go and be with her...
I told Isaiah how I was going (at the time he was in OH taking time off of dead tour and hanging out with this good lil group of kids (on tour we were all called kids even tough we were all over 18, we were considered Jerry's kids)
My ticket would plop me off in San Fran (my second home), Isaiah said, wow how funny I am going to be driving out there with these kids...
We agreed to meet up..
That was a big mistake...
We met and that night we shared a hotel room....he told me how I could never leave him again....I told him he was nuts..'
He went into my backpack and took out my address book, he said how if I left he would pick family names out of there and kill them if I ever left again...
I struggled to get my book back, but he shoved me aside and raised his hand to hit me...
I knew then I was screwed...
I was scared...I mean scared.
Up to this point in my life the police were always enemys, with one exception...a Sgt in SFPD who always looked out for me and my friends...
after a few days I told isaiah it was enough I needed to get to WA, he beat the piss out of me...almost literally.
After that I was not allowed to speake to anyone unless he was present. I was always with him, unless we had a hotel room, then I would stay there and he had a friend watch me and make sure I stayed put...by this time I had gotten used to being beaten and I would not leave figuring he would follow through with the death threats...I turned 20 during this time...my celebration, he beat me...then apologized and would take me to dinner or out to see friends (seeing friends really was a reward, though it was usually followed by abuse because while with friends I woul look at them and if they are a guy, well he would flip when we got back toour room)
It was about this time a guy he had come from Ohio with was very sick from Heroine....he was one of the few guys Isaiah had no problem with me talking to.
I told Lee if he did not return to ohio and get help he was going to die...he went home and procedded to get off heroine....
Isahiah started to get really bad a few weeks after Lee left...he was even worse then ever....
we did not have cells back then but pagers...especially for folks on dead tour, that was the only way to keep in touch since so many of us lived on tour and when not on tour in hotels or scattered tot he winds
we were staying in a really nasty crack hotel at this time...25 bucks a night...no phone, no bathroom...you shower and pee down the hall in a bathroom per floor
He was showering and he got a page....I walked to the shower (if I had not and he saw I did not tell him when it came in he would have hurt me as usual)...I read him the number and he said it was lee, go down and call him and keep him on the phone....
I said ok..
I made the call in the lobby....becauwse I am in a nasty crakc hotel I don't want to say, hey lee, kick the dope yet...
my exact conversation was less then 45 seconds...and it wnt like this...
"hey Lee, how is it going?"
"good"
"Googd good, really good?" I was happy thinking he mean he was off heroine...
he said, "yeah I am doing really good"
just then Isaiah came down with a friend he met upstairs....
I said oh here is isaiah and went back tot eh room to shower since he was out and I am only allowed to shower when he is around.
I never heard the conversation besides isaiah saying oh hey man.....
I was arrested about 2 weeks later......
The DEA of SF picked us up on a jane doe/john doe extradition warrant for ohio....
I had no idea what was going on...neither did the SF police when I was finally brought to their jail for my extradition hearing....
I did not even know my charges just I had a warrant in OHIO...I had not been in ohio for about a year (since the last summer dead show and I never did anything wrong there)
I had my hearing and waived my right to be extridicted...
They picked me up about a month later in a van....the trip took well over 20 days.I lost track of them..driving to dif institutions (24hrs driving then they stop for 12 to rest two guards me in a tiny 3 ft by 3 ft cage in the back to keep me from the men ......
Nights would be spent in local county jails...( I lost count of how many I stayed in but it was a lot) I saw many prisons in CA, AZ, NM, KS, MO, and so many more!
Fed,and state prisoners would get on and get off..the drivers were very nice and very accomidating knowing the guys could stretch out but not me..
I finally arrived in ohio at the county jail..I was there for over two months before my bail was reduced to 500,000 (50,000 cash)
my fol.ks bailed me out....
I went to trial...they wanted me totestify but I still did not understand why I was charged with Agg drug traff over 100 bulk of LSD and complicity to the same...each carried 25-life
when we got the discovery and saw the tape conversation on there we were all appaled by the basis of the charges...Isaiah had even said in the conversation it was his and his friends deal....never was my name mentioned besides that 45 sec convo I had with lee asking how he was....
they offered me a deal to plead..I said no, I never did anything wrong, I did not even know he had sent the drugs to lee...
we went to trial....lee even got on the stand and said i had nothing to do with it...
my lawyer had the complicity thrown out (thank goodness) so I was on trial looking at 25-life...
my lawyer had isaiah on thestand and asked him how it felt to beat me...we had submitted letters from isaiah saying how he would explain it all how I had nothing to do with it, how he was so sorry he beat me all the time....after a while I never wrote back, so he would threaten and ask more and more een threatening if I did not writehe would LIE and say I was the leader of it all...
well he told the DA that, it was an election year, so they went after me as the leader...
as my lawyer pressed isaiah to tell him how it felt to beat me, he began to hit the table behind me scaring me and the jury...
after a few mins of this isaiah flipped out, made a move toward my lawyer,,,then sat back and put his hands on the bar....he leaned over and asked the judge to have his handcuffs and shackles back on....
my lawyer said what did you say, and the smart guy said it louder while looking at my lawyer with a death look...
One of the jurors, the one sitting closer to him when he did that, had herself removed from the jury later that day. He is that scary
I got on the stand and told them the story, the truth....
unfortunatly when it came time for the jury instructions the judge made it very clear, the way the law is written means without my knowledge what he does while we are residing together is still my fault...
my lawyer made it known in a legal way if convicted I would get a minimum of 25 years to life...
i did not know this at the time and after my lawyer told me it is so rare for this to be done he never would have though of it...
I was charged with 4200 hits of LSD...
in ohioin drug cases it is legal to let the jury decide the quantity...the judge added a lower charge over 3 times, under a 100....
The jury found me guilty of that....for less them 1000 of the 4200 hits I was charged with...
we knew they felt bad for me, but the judge kept pushing the living with him thing....and even if I did not know I was there living with him...
I understand how it happened..just if he had not offered that choice they would never have found me guilty..
we appealed but frankly I was out before my valid appeals could get to good courts....
when I went to the parole bopard, Ms. Rose read over my files....she could not even believe I was there to begin with and gave me my parole....
I went early release to Harbor Lights in Cleveland...I am not from ohio so hoped my parole officer could transfer me to home, but no she messed my paper work...by thisa time (2mths out) I was done at harbor lights (took them longer then expected to get me a bed there so I had to stay in NEPRC longer the expected as it was)
I had to find an apt and do my parole in cleveland
my garndmother died and I could drive to the East side of PA for the day and then return. that was it...viewing funeral home....well back to cleveland...
my PO messed up my final release papers as well so instead of being off in Jan 3rd, I had to wait til the end of March 01
I moved back home after that...was so nice...I went back to college (got my AA in ORW, finished the building tech classes, was a welding tech for a year and many other programs I managed to talk my staff into lettign me take)
I am one semester away from having a double Bachelor's of Science..one in criminal justice (specialized in forensics) and one in Political Science (spec in middle eastern politics and terrorism)
I have also since had a daughter and gotten married..
I had to have a background check because of my husbands job...that was rather amusing, lucky for me my cousin is also in the same field and very high up so he made a call and explained tot he guy what was up!
I tell close friends who I have met since I got out about what happened...not all, just some...
I even had some of the girls from ORW at my wedding...we joke we all met at college in ohio (not totally a lie, we did go to school there....we were the three muskateers inside..all in for lsd, me from nj, C from CT and P from OH)
I have kept in touch with some staff from ORW and NEPRC...they like to use me as a success story...I hope to go back there and speak from time to time about the oppertunities one can make for themselves....
That is the important..it is really easy to get sucked into the crap and the convict title especially on the job front (even I still cry sometimes when I cannot be hired because of it and I know once I grad and look for a career it will begin again)
But one needs to make those tears and then go back out there.....
I hope to help people change some of the laws that hurt me and so many I know from dead tour.....
I am doing good now and sorry for going on and on, this is my first time ever trying to put it all here....
I kept journals and wrote poems for a large percentage of my time in..one day I hope to put them all out in a memoire style.....
tlaes of a deadhead girl...the good, the bad and the imprisoned...
if you hang in there thanks for reading...sorry it is so long winded.....
I served just under 5 years (three months in County waiting for my million dollar cash bail to be reduced)
Well it has been an adventure to say the least....
I followed the Grateful Dead for almost five years.....loved almost every min of it...
I met a guy, Isaiah....he was nice at first....then he tossed me down a flight of stairs in 93...I left him and went Humboldt for a while...he stalked me all over there...
I went home to VT where he did not know where I lived....
I had never heard of battered women, though on tour it was known some folks/groups did it....
I got a call from Isaiah late 93/early 94...we talked he said how he felt so bad and how he did not mean to scare me, but he just never loved someone as much as me...
I figured ok.....I have never been loved that much...I decided to remain friends with him....
We talked on and off...I finally asked how he tracked me down...he told me how he heard someone say they were calling me and begged for my number...
My close friend was getting ready to have a baby in WA state, and another friend had a train ticket for me to go and be with her...
I told Isaiah how I was going (at the time he was in OH taking time off of dead tour and hanging out with this good lil group of kids (on tour we were all called kids even tough we were all over 18, we were considered Jerry's kids)
My ticket would plop me off in San Fran (my second home), Isaiah said, wow how funny I am going to be driving out there with these kids...
We agreed to meet up..
That was a big mistake...
We met and that night we shared a hotel room....he told me how I could never leave him again....I told him he was nuts..'
He went into my backpack and took out my address book, he said how if I left he would pick family names out of there and kill them if I ever left again...
I struggled to get my book back, but he shoved me aside and raised his hand to hit me...
I knew then I was screwed...
I was scared...I mean scared.
Up to this point in my life the police were always enemys, with one exception...a Sgt in SFPD who always looked out for me and my friends...
after a few days I told isaiah it was enough I needed to get to WA, he beat the piss out of me...almost literally.
After that I was not allowed to speake to anyone unless he was present. I was always with him, unless we had a hotel room, then I would stay there and he had a friend watch me and make sure I stayed put...by this time I had gotten used to being beaten and I would not leave figuring he would follow through with the death threats...I turned 20 during this time...my celebration, he beat me...then apologized and would take me to dinner or out to see friends (seeing friends really was a reward, though it was usually followed by abuse because while with friends I woul look at them and if they are a guy, well he would flip when we got back toour room)
It was about this time a guy he had come from Ohio with was very sick from Heroine....he was one of the few guys Isaiah had no problem with me talking to.
I told Lee if he did not return to ohio and get help he was going to die...he went home and procedded to get off heroine....
Isahiah started to get really bad a few weeks after Lee left...he was even worse then ever....
we did not have cells back then but pagers...especially for folks on dead tour, that was the only way to keep in touch since so many of us lived on tour and when not on tour in hotels or scattered tot he winds
we were staying in a really nasty crack hotel at this time...25 bucks a night...no phone, no bathroom...you shower and pee down the hall in a bathroom per floor
He was showering and he got a page....I walked to the shower (if I had not and he saw I did not tell him when it came in he would have hurt me as usual)...I read him the number and he said it was lee, go down and call him and keep him on the phone....
I said ok..
I made the call in the lobby....becauwse I am in a nasty crakc hotel I don't want to say, hey lee, kick the dope yet...
my exact conversation was less then 45 seconds...and it wnt like this...
"hey Lee, how is it going?"
"good"
"Googd good, really good?" I was happy thinking he mean he was off heroine...
he said, "yeah I am doing really good"
just then Isaiah came down with a friend he met upstairs....
I said oh here is isaiah and went back tot eh room to shower since he was out and I am only allowed to shower when he is around.
I never heard the conversation besides isaiah saying oh hey man.....
I was arrested about 2 weeks later......
The DEA of SF picked us up on a jane doe/john doe extradition warrant for ohio....
I had no idea what was going on...neither did the SF police when I was finally brought to their jail for my extradition hearing....
I did not even know my charges just I had a warrant in OHIO...I had not been in ohio for about a year (since the last summer dead show and I never did anything wrong there)
I had my hearing and waived my right to be extridicted...
They picked me up about a month later in a van....the trip took well over 20 days.I lost track of them..driving to dif institutions (24hrs driving then they stop for 12 to rest two guards me in a tiny 3 ft by 3 ft cage in the back to keep me from the men ......
Nights would be spent in local county jails...( I lost count of how many I stayed in but it was a lot) I saw many prisons in CA, AZ, NM, KS, MO, and so many more!
Fed,and state prisoners would get on and get off..the drivers were very nice and very accomidating knowing the guys could stretch out but not me..
I finally arrived in ohio at the county jail..I was there for over two months before my bail was reduced to 500,000 (50,000 cash)
my fol.ks bailed me out....
I went to trial...they wanted me totestify but I still did not understand why I was charged with Agg drug traff over 100 bulk of LSD and complicity to the same...each carried 25-life
when we got the discovery and saw the tape conversation on there we were all appaled by the basis of the charges...Isaiah had even said in the conversation it was his and his friends deal....never was my name mentioned besides that 45 sec convo I had with lee asking how he was....
they offered me a deal to plead..I said no, I never did anything wrong, I did not even know he had sent the drugs to lee...
we went to trial....lee even got on the stand and said i had nothing to do with it...
my lawyer had the complicity thrown out (thank goodness) so I was on trial looking at 25-life...
my lawyer had isaiah on thestand and asked him how it felt to beat me...we had submitted letters from isaiah saying how he would explain it all how I had nothing to do with it, how he was so sorry he beat me all the time....after a while I never wrote back, so he would threaten and ask more and more een threatening if I did not writehe would LIE and say I was the leader of it all...
well he told the DA that, it was an election year, so they went after me as the leader...
as my lawyer pressed isaiah to tell him how it felt to beat me, he began to hit the table behind me scaring me and the jury...
after a few mins of this isaiah flipped out, made a move toward my lawyer,,,then sat back and put his hands on the bar....he leaned over and asked the judge to have his handcuffs and shackles back on....
my lawyer said what did you say, and the smart guy said it louder while looking at my lawyer with a death look...
One of the jurors, the one sitting closer to him when he did that, had herself removed from the jury later that day. He is that scary
I got on the stand and told them the story, the truth....
unfortunatly when it came time for the jury instructions the judge made it very clear, the way the law is written means without my knowledge what he does while we are residing together is still my fault...
my lawyer made it known in a legal way if convicted I would get a minimum of 25 years to life...
i did not know this at the time and after my lawyer told me it is so rare for this to be done he never would have though of it...
I was charged with 4200 hits of LSD...
in ohioin drug cases it is legal to let the jury decide the quantity...the judge added a lower charge over 3 times, under a 100....
The jury found me guilty of that....for less them 1000 of the 4200 hits I was charged with...
we knew they felt bad for me, but the judge kept pushing the living with him thing....and even if I did not know I was there living with him...
I understand how it happened..just if he had not offered that choice they would never have found me guilty..
we appealed but frankly I was out before my valid appeals could get to good courts....
when I went to the parole bopard, Ms. Rose read over my files....she could not even believe I was there to begin with and gave me my parole....
I went early release to Harbor Lights in Cleveland...I am not from ohio so hoped my parole officer could transfer me to home, but no she messed my paper work...by thisa time (2mths out) I was done at harbor lights (took them longer then expected to get me a bed there so I had to stay in NEPRC longer the expected as it was)
I had to find an apt and do my parole in cleveland
my garndmother died and I could drive to the East side of PA for the day and then return. that was it...viewing funeral home....well back to cleveland...
my PO messed up my final release papers as well so instead of being off in Jan 3rd, I had to wait til the end of March 01
I moved back home after that...was so nice...I went back to college (got my AA in ORW, finished the building tech classes, was a welding tech for a year and many other programs I managed to talk my staff into lettign me take)
I am one semester away from having a double Bachelor's of Science..one in criminal justice (specialized in forensics) and one in Political Science (spec in middle eastern politics and terrorism)
I have also since had a daughter and gotten married..
I had to have a background check because of my husbands job...that was rather amusing, lucky for me my cousin is also in the same field and very high up so he made a call and explained tot he guy what was up!
I tell close friends who I have met since I got out about what happened...not all, just some...
I even had some of the girls from ORW at my wedding...we joke we all met at college in ohio (not totally a lie, we did go to school there....we were the three muskateers inside..all in for lsd, me from nj, C from CT and P from OH)
I have kept in touch with some staff from ORW and NEPRC...they like to use me as a success story...I hope to go back there and speak from time to time about the oppertunities one can make for themselves....
That is the important..it is really easy to get sucked into the crap and the convict title especially on the job front (even I still cry sometimes when I cannot be hired because of it and I know once I grad and look for a career it will begin again)
But one needs to make those tears and then go back out there.....
I hope to help people change some of the laws that hurt me and so many I know from dead tour.....
I am doing good now and sorry for going on and on, this is my first time ever trying to put it all here....
I kept journals and wrote poems for a large percentage of my time in..one day I hope to put them all out in a memoire style.....
tlaes of a deadhead girl...the good, the bad and the imprisoned...
if you hang in there thanks for reading...sorry it is so long winded.....