Corruption Officer

CORRUPTION OFFICER

perp with a badge
Written by
Gary Heyward

Published by Gary
Heyward.
All rights reserved.
 
Copyright (c) 2011 by Gary Heyward.
 
All rights reserved.
 
Edited by Beverly A.
Burchett.
 
All rights
reserved.
 
No part of this publication
may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or
by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise,
without the prior written permission of Gary Heyward.
 
MADE IN THE U.S.A

‘How in the fuck did this Happen?’
 
I thought to myself as a fellow Officer gave
me a sad stare before she locked the holding pen I was sitting in.

“Yo, bigman!” a detainee soon to be inmate yelled out to me.

I ignored him because I was deep in my own thoughts, no worse
I was in shock.
 
I could not comprehend
what was going on around me.
 
My chest
tight, my breathing heavy, and my brain felt like it was too big for my skull
and was ready to burst.
 
A hundred things
flashed into my thoughts.
 

“Yo, bigman!
 
Why you in here, bigman?”

Again, getting no response from me, the detainee asked a
passing Corrections Officer, “Yo,
C.O
.!
 
Why he gets to be in a pen by his self and we
got’s to be packed in here like sardines and shit!?
 
Who the fuck is he, the president!?”
 
The Officer just looked at me in disgust,
shook his head, then turned to my tormentor and said, “Shut the fuck up before
I give you something else to worry about besides being sandwiched in!”
 
He then glared at me.
 
All I could do was put my head down.
 

I had just gotten arraigned and what I thought was going to
happen, didn’t.
 
I thought by me being a Corrections
Officer, who had gotten into trouble -
don’t
act like I am the only one
- that the Judge was going to let me go on my
own recognizance so that I could fight my case from the street
- Syke!
 
Toto, you’re not in fucking Kansas anymore...-
Instead, the D.A.
gave a speech that made me look worse than Saddam Bin Hussein Laden!
 
She hit the Judge with all sorts of hideous
and heinous acts and shit!
 
She was all
upset about me being uncooperative (not snitching) and shit!
 
Da, fuck!
 
If I didn’t know that she was talking about me
in her over exaggerated speech, I would have sworn that the dude she was
talking about
like,
killed thirty
little kids or something!
 

After the first
5
or 6 charges I lost count.
 
I just kept looking at the Judge shaking my
head.
 
As I looked over my shoulder
standing there handcuffed, it hit me.
 
I
saw her.
 
We made eye contact.
 
I crumbled.
 
I heard my heart beat get louder and it
blocked out whatever was being said about me.
 
She had the look of support.
 
I had the look of someone causing
embarrassment, humiliation and most of all pain.
 
I wanted her to see that I was sorry.
 
I did not want her to come here, and find out
about me this way.
 
I wanted to say so
many things that would comfort her, something that would make the pain that she
was hiding under her face go away, but I couldn’t.
 
I was instructed to face forward.
 
That’s when I heard this front page grabbing,
charge exaggerating;
I am bucking for
promotion on this nigga’s back
, ass bitch say “Your Honor, we are asking
that the bail be set at $100,000 dollars!”

I looked over at this crazy bitch and said, “You bugg’n!”
 
I shook my head frantically.
 
I looked back at my sister, accompanied by my
mom.
 
Her expression was shock.
 
All I thought of as my cardboard cut-out lawyer
argued to get my bail reduced, was, ‘I am sorry, Momma.
 
I am sorry.’
 
Then they led me back to the holding pen where
my man,
do-dirty
(the detainee) had
recruited a supporting cast.
 
At that
time it became a joint effort to find out why I was isolated.
 
I again ignored them.
 
Then without warning I heard the television, which
was positioned facing the pens for inmate viewing purposes, blare out the news
for the night.
 

“Three Corrections Officers and three counselors were
arrested today on drug charges!”

I turned to look up at the television in shock!
 
Right there, front and center, they had my
picture plastered all over the tube!
 
I
thought to myself, ‘No they didn’t!
 
 
No these dirty motha’s didn’t!’
 
But, yes, they did.
 
They had my picture up there first and
foremost blown up for the world to see, while they explained and exaggerated
the story.
 
All I remembered was the Newscaster
saying, “Correction Officer, Gary Heyward, could be facing life in prison.”
 
I thought to myself, ‘
For
a half ounce of coke!?
 
Come on now,
knock it off!’
 

Then
came
‘the coalition.’
 
I put my head down to brace myself.

“Ayyooo, bigman!
 
You
was
doing it like
that, bigman?”

Then one detainee to another, “Yo, son, dude was gett’n
it!”
 
He and his back-up dancers broke out
in laughter.
 
Then I was the topic of
discussion for the rest of the night.

“I bet it was a snitching ass nigga that blew it up!”

“Nigga’s don’t know how to act when they got a nigga looking
out for them.”

I sat there thinking of my family, thinking of my kids.
 
What will they think when they find out?
 
All I could think
of
over and over again was, ‘How the fuck did this happen?’

POST TRAUMATIC
STRESS

The Other Night at the Gambling Spot

“HEAD CRACK!”
Houseman yelled.
 

“Alright, nobody
move
!” he said, as
he went around the table to collect the money from the bettors.
 

The game was C-low and at this time my man, Fungler was at
the top of his game again!
 
They call me
Gary, “Gee,” or “Big Hey” depending on who is calling me at the gambling spot,
yeah, one of the many in Harlem.
 
If
you’re my Momma, she calls me Boy or Nutmo!
 

I am here on a Friday night, which is payday and I have
every dime in the
“bank”
(the guy
who’s taking on the bets) with my man Fungler.
 
I gave him that name because of late he was on a roll and I was his hype
man, meaning we combined our money to make a
bank
.
 

When Fungler would get the dice he’d shuffle them, then
shake them in his hand - pause -
no homo
.
 
In the hood when a non gay man says something
that sounds gay, he acknowledges that he is not gay by saying “no homo.”
 
It’s nothing against gay people.

Fungler and I would be on our bullshit as usual.
 
I’d be beside him screaming, “Thrilla in the
manilla dilla!”
 
He’d shake his head
indicating “no.”
 
Then I’d scream, “Feva
in the Funkhouse!”
 
He’d shake his head
again indicating “no.”
 
Then I’d scream,
“Rumble in the Jungle.”
 
Then the Fungler
would say, “Rumble in the jungle without the fungle kungle,” while
simultaneously releasing the dice and watching them register.
 
Every time we did this routine, we’d hear the
Houseman yell, “HEAD CRACK!”
 

People who had bet against him would put their heads down or
have shit-face, upset facial expressions.
 
Then a cheerleader from the side would yell, “Double or nothing, I bet
he can’t do it again!
 
A cheerleader is a
person on the sidelines with no money, talking shit about somebody else’s
money!
 
Fungler gets the dice, but before
we go into our routine, in walks Chuck.
 

Now, everybody knows Chuck’s money is long, in other words,
he has a lot of it.
 
Every time Chuck
comes in, motherfuckers who are scared and have the bank with a lot of money in
it normally pass it to the next bettor.
 
They don’t want to take a chance of losing it all in one shot.
 
Everybody knows Chuck will stop up your bank,
in other words, put large amounts of money down on a bet equal to or more than
what you have.
 

Everybody knows this, but not
Fungler.
 
Fungler’s eyes lit up.
 
He hollered at Chuck, “Get down, Nigga.
 
I know you ain’t come here to sightsee!”
 
Fungler looked at me with a shit eat’n grin
like I got this Nigga!
 
I am looking at
him like mothafucka pass the bank!
 
Then
somebody on the side said, “Look at this STD (
scared-to-death
) ass nigga!” and everybody laughed.
 

Yes, scared ass nigga, a person who tries to gamble with the
big
dawgs
but really has a low paying
security job, and has no bid’ness in nobodies gambling spot in Harlem or
anywhere else for that matter ‘cause he knows that he is living PTP (
paycheck-to-paycheck
)
.
 
If he loses his money/payday this Friday night, he will be like Sidney Poitier
in “A Raisin in the Sun,” when Willie ran off with all that money.
 

“Willie, don’t do it,
Willie, not with that money, Willie!”

Yes, scared, nigga.
 
That would be me!
 
Gary, Gee, Big
Hey, Nutmo aka scared nigga!
 
So, Chuck
drops his stack!
 
And, Fungler starts
talking shit saying, “After this roll all you working nigga’s are going to be
sick!
 
You’re gonna throw up on your way
to the ATM!
 
I love taking a 9 to 5 nigga’s
money, but taking a hustler’s money is like winning $10,000 dollars on one of
those scratch tickets!
 
What is that?”
Fungler asked out loud.

“FREE MONEY!” everybody replied.

Everybody, except me.
 
I was busy trying to get this nigga’s attention
to pass that muthafuckin bank!
 
Fungler
continues to shake the dice, ridiculing Chuck.
 

“Taking a hustler’s money is like going to Rent-A-Center,
getting a whole bunch of shit delivered to your apartment then moving to
Brooklyn!”

Again, everybody laughs, except me.
 
I am still in scared nigga mode!
 

“Getting his money is like going up in a bitch, raw dog and
not worrying about kids ‘cause she got her tubes tied!” Fungler continues and
say, “What’s that?”

“FREE MONEY!!” they all laugh.
 

I am over here sharting on myself, like when you think you
have to fart but mistakenly shit on yourself instead.
 
Chuck screams out, “Nigga, would you stop
walking the cat walk and just roll the muthafuckin’ dice!”
 
Fungler shakes them then looks at me.
 
Man, listen, the look I gave him was not a
confident one.
 
I did not even play with
this nigga.

“Fungle in the rumble jungle kungle
without the ungle dungle sungle?”
I scream out.

I was thinking to myself, ‘Whatever the fuck that
meant.’
 
Fungler threw the dice and it
seemed like it took an eternity as they flew pass my face.
 
All I could think about was my kids asking me
for Michael Jordan sneakers, my past due rent.
 
Mom dukes ain’t taking
no
shorts.
 
If I lose, how am I going to get to work next
week?
 
Willie, don’t do it!
 

The dice hit the wall and registered one-one-six!
 
Fungler screams, “HEAD CRACK!”
 
I momentarily blackout then come back
screaming, “NIIII-ZZIIIII-GAA!”
  
After
the House collected the money, totaling about $6,600, I go over to Fungler and
cop out saying, “Yo’ man I gotta go.”
 
So, Fungler passes the
bank
.
 
We split the dough.
 
I tear the door off its hinges getting the
fuck out of there.