California Institute for women

Shall I begin like David Copperfield? I was born, I grew up.

 I am slowly adapting to life in Los Angeles. This manifests in that I now more often than not take the car whenever I´m going for a cup of coffee or when I am taking out the trash, that I prefer soy milk to that of cow and that I am gradually mixing spanish with my english ("Muchos gracias man, appreciate it"). A few days have gone since I last posted and a lot has gone down since then - the most significant being our visit to the California Institute for Women in Chino. I also have a great urge to tell y´all about what I have cooking down on the stove at this very moment: the mother of all chilis. Then there is the biker after party, the Disneyland encounter with delightful jailbird Robin Keeble and so on and so forth. But first things first. I will try to tell the story chronologically and you all stop me if I´m going too fast or if there is something you don´t understand.
        At about the hour when the first rays of California sun burst through the Los Angeles smog on wednesday, we all loaded up in the Dodge and headed out for Chino. I fell asleep in the backseat and awoke an hour later to the smell of cow dung and fresh brewn coffee. Arrival Chino. The California Institute for women was the first prison built exclusively for women in California and has been around for a good 60 years. It looks more like a college campus than a prison with a number of low standing barrack like housing units encircling a large yard. Until about 20 years ago, it was the only place of its kind in California, but there is now a sister facility up north in Chowchilla. Most of the long timers are however held at CIW. We were greeted at the front gate and cordially strip-searched by one lt Felix Figueroa, a man of tall stature, oakleyshaped white markings around his eyes and a most terrific mustache. I immediately initiated my icebreaking routine and asked if he ate a lot of donuts. Lt Figueroa chuckled and said that he tried to "stay away from the stuff. It´s deadly that shit is". I was naturally disappointed but also glad that the tension surrounding us was somewhat broken.

 A number of locked steel doors later, we were standing in the small yard, or the "circle" as it is commonly referred to. The southern california sun reflected off the aging steel structures around us, meandering with the smell of country side, california spring and incarceration. I was not scared but brave. We were shown around a number of buildings that were currently empty as the inmates were at work or going about some other of the daily routines. We got to see "Deep six", the former death row unit were Annika spent a good year and a half back in 1983; a structure originally constructed to house the three Mansonwomen when they awaited conviction in 1970. The walls did not exactly speak but scribblings of various length and grammatical accuracy told the stories clear enough. The only places Lt Figueroa could not take us was SHU - the security housing unit where the most violent and dangerous inmates were held - and PTU, the psychiatric unit. Security concerns apparently. At about an hour in to our visit, Lt Figueroa took us to see four inmates we had requested to speak to, all good friends of Annikas when she was here. The first person to greet us was a handsome woman of around 60; tanned, extremely fit and with a warm, comforting smile. Should I have met her out in the open, I would have guessed retired model/new age mom/yoga teacher rather than the most infamous woman in America. Since Susan Atkins death from a brain tumor a few years ago, Leslie van Houten has become the poster child for evil in America, the very embodiment of murder. Next to her stood a stout lady with Donna Karen sunglasses and silky white hair, one Patricia Krenwinkle. (If you need brushing up click here)

We sat down with the women at a steel table in a room with barred windows that transited a hallway where other inmates passed by and sometimes lingered. A tv in the background showed talk show Jerry Springer. Lt Figueroa told the woman that they were all there to talk about Annika and that they needn´t talk about their own cases or anything they did not want to.

To be continued.