FLORIDA:

Introduction to Death Row----By Richard E. Shere Jr.

Florida Death Row

Upon entering the gates of Hell, better known as Florida State Prison, a dark place of despair and lack of any human emotion, my senses intensified. The smell of death on every guard and prisoner's uniform. The walls cried of the blood of young men smashed against them as each was welcomed to this cold place of destruction.

Even eye contact was feared and forbidden as an unwritten law as I walked in through the thick steal door, for each prisoner and guard already knew what was about to happen to me and others planned what they would do to me.

I was a young man, age 21, and I had never been in trouble before. Now I was convicted of a crime I did not commit and was sentenced to death. My education about Hell was just beginning. With each step into this dark place my feet grew heavy and my heart found its way to my throat.

I was guided to a small holding cell where I spent several hours waiting. I was hungry and tried to talk to anyone that passed by in the hall but I got no response. I then took notice of a group of 6 guards standing in a circle near by talking. Each taking turns looking in my direction before they headed my way. Their body language told me they were ready for battle. The leader held up a set of brass keys and yelled, "Time for your haircut Boy!" Being a small young man at the time I was snatched up in the air by this huge man and tossed into the 5 other guards. They began to beat me. This was my welcome to Florida State Prison.

After 2 hours of getting beaten up and slammed against the wall I noticed that my blood had begun to dry on the floor and wall. I began to feel it dry on my bones as well. I was then carried to a near by barber shop where I was held down and my head and face were shaved, using my own blood for shaving cream. A hot, white towel was violently rubbed all over my face. I watched it turn red with my blood.

Barely able to move I was snatched up from the barber chair and thrown into two boxes which contained my personal property and legal material. Now, for the first time, I realized that I was handcuffed with my hands in front of me. I was barely able to stand when the guards told me to pick up my two boxes and carry them or what ever I could not carry would be left behind.

Some how I managed to get the heavy boxes into my arms. I began the long walk to the cell where I would wait for my death sentence to be carried out. This was no short walk for a healthy man, let alone a beaten man carrying two heavy boxes while hand cuffed. After walking the first several meters I felt the blood dripping from my wrists due to the weight of the boxes and the hand cuffs cutting deep into my wrists. Weak from not eating in days, from loss of blood, from beatings and inhumane treatment, there was no end to this long hallway on my walk to death.

After several hundred meters, possibly one thousand meters, I was led down a dark stairway and began to hear the sounds of coughing from sick men on Death Row. The smell of smoke and death rose with each step I took. I was led to a dark cell where the handcuffs were taken off and the door was shut behind me. Barely able to see in the darkness I tore pieces off of my shirt and wrapped them around my wrists to stop the bleeding. Cold and wet from sweat and blood I curled up on my steal bed and fell asleep within seconds. I was woken the next morning by the sound of a cold, hard, steal food tray hitting my door. Every bone in my body felt like it had been broken. I could barely see due to the swelling around my eyes.

Painfully I got to my feet and walked to the door to retrieve the food tray. I gently sat down on the cold, steal bed with the tray on my lap. Still dark in this horrible place I began to scoop handfuls of cold oatmeal off the tray with my hands. I pushed it through my busted lips and broken teeth, knowing that I had to eat to survive. After several minutes of this I noticed something dark in my oatmeal. I managed to find a small light in the corner of my cell. I pulled it on and saw to my horror that what I had been eating was covered in blood. I was not sure if it was my own or someone else's. My hunger and my will to survive grew stronger...I had to eat and I finished eating with tears running down my face, while screaming inside, "What kind of place is this!" Only later did I find out that a young man had been killed in the kitchen that morning by another prisoner and it was his blood that I had eaten. Upon hearing that news I began to vomit and could not eat for several more days.

After my first meal on death row I managed to get back to sleep while silently listening to the sounds of 100 men on death row begin their day. They were sounds I had never heard before from so many people, coughing, sickness, screaming, even laughter. Smoke and death filled the air and it felt as if every man was slowly dying a horrible death. It felt as if these were all hospital beds. I wondered how many were in my condition...broken up and beaten? How long had they waited and how many would gladly welcome death? Again, I slowly and painfully fell asleep.

Once again, at lunchtime, I was woken by the sound of a cold food tray hitting my door and I managed to eat what I could. Now realizing that I had to wake up and get my day started I collected my thoughts and began to fumble around for a towel to clean myself up. As I began to move around, a man in the next cell said, "Hello, new guy. What's your name?" I answered, "Rip". I decided to use this as a nickname so no one would find out my real name until I could trust them.

This man introduced himself as Paul Scott. He passed me a cigarette which I gladly accepted, even though I did not smoke. I recognized this as a friendly gesture by a kind person who knew what I had been through to get here on death row...to get to the cell next to his. Paul Scott was very concerned about my physical condition and asked me if I needed anything. Paul had already spent 10 years on death row and helped many other new, young men adjust to this horrible death warehouse.

Now it was my turn to learn everything this kind, friendly man could teach me so that I could survive. We talked for hours that day and in the days and weeks that followed. Paul spent several hours of his time teaching me everything I needed to know. Even at his own great expense Paul took time away from his own fight for freedom to prove his innocence, to help me understand how this prison system worked. He taught me how to avoid trouble and beatings from the guards. He also taught me how to read and write letters for myself so that I could ask for help to prove my innocence.

Paul spent many valuable hours of his short, precious time listening to my stories of how I lost my family, friends, wife and child due to my conviction and incarceration. Paul became my very good friend and helped me through many rough times when I even considered taking my own life so that I would not have to deal with the emotional pain and suffering that I endured in this cold, terrible place.

After spending many years side by side in our dark, damp cells it felt as if these small concrete and steal cages were growing smaller. The roaches, mosquitoes, rats and mice took up more space than we did. Some rats were so bold and large that if you set your food tray on your bed a rat would fight you for your food, or grab a piece of food and run for his life.

Each night Paul and I, along with everyone else, would spend time trying to kill rats and mice. At night we would tie a chicken bone to a string and throw it down the hallway and then slowly drag it back and a rat would attack it, pulling hard on the bone trying to get away with the food. Once you had the rat back to your cell you had to whack it in the head with a shoe. Sometimes the rat would even fight back and try to bite you.

After months without sunlight and witnessing several men being taken to the hospital due to suicides, suicide attempts, sickness and even from beatings from the guards I managed to pull myself together somewhat and grow cold and hard in order to survive my surroundings. I also witnessed many death warrants signed and executed. I could smell men burning to death in the electric chair. The smoke and smell of burning hair and flesh would make its way through the ventilation system. I could also hear grown men cry for the friend who had just been murdered by the State of Florida. Each of us on death row has been accused of premeditated murder. Yet the state continues to perform executions without guilt or punishment.

After I had been in prison for several months I also learned from Paul that we were not allowed to operate any sort of business from prison, making it impossible to support ourselves or our families and children. We cannot legally earn any money to pay for our lawyers and investigators or to gain support to prove our innocence and obtain our freedom.

Paul explained to me that we can only write letters and tell our story until we find someone kind enough to help and care about us. Someone who cares about our cases and would spend some time and money on us, or even just donate a small amount of money so that we can buy stamps, paper, pens and envelopes to continue our search for help and justice.

Many of us with no writing or reading skills did not stand a chance...we had to rely on other death row prisoners, such as Paul, to help us. When coming to a place like this you find out who your family and friends truly are. It is not an easy reality to face.

This being my first time away from home, out in the world all alone, in prison and on death row with little education, was enough (for me) to make a grown man cry. For my first four years at Florida State Prison I cried myself to sleep. Shortly after my fourth year I was still living next to my trusted friend, Paul Scott. We had been through so much together and soon I was to learn that his death warrant had been signed, one of many death warrants signed on Paul.

I will never forget that day...I saw the captain of the guards walk past my cell and stop in front of Paul's cell. They asked him to pick up his address book and come with them, and we all knew what that meant, his death warrant had been signed, again! As he walked past my cell in handcuffs I could not stop crying because I knew they were going to kill another innocent man, my trusted friend, Paul Scott.

I could not even find it in my heart to say good bye or speak as our eyes met, even though he knew how I felt. He walked away saying, "Teach the next young man so this does not happen to him!" Again, thinking of others as he walked to what we all thought was his death.

I could not eat for days and it really bothered me that the State of Florida could murder such a clearly innocent man when they knew that he did not commit the crime of which he had been accused. But their killing machine was constant, consistent and without regard for guilt or innocence, slowly burning us to death in that chair, one by one. 360 men, lined up and waiting...including myself and Paul Scott.

Days went by before I received the good news that my friend, Paul, would live a few more years. He was now a brother to me because of the way he had touched my life...truly family now. But it would also be many years before I would see him again...before I would live next door to him once more.

During these years many battles went on between the prisoners and guards. There were also battles between the prisoners and the State of Florida. Due to the poor, severe living conditions at Florida State Prison we won a lawsuit in court and it was ordered that a new death row building be built at Union Correctional Institution. I write to you from there today, in a cell next to my trusted brother, Paul Scott. Fourteen years later we are both still alive and fighting for our freedom side by side once again. Both going through so many years of hope, disappointments, loss of family and friends. We even dealt with the murder of our fellow Death Row Prisoner, Frank Valdez. Frank was beaten to death by several prison guards only two years ago at Florida State Prison.

Our voices and pain were not known or seen even though we fought for our lives every day. Our cries of innocence are not heard, nor do they matter, because the courts only wish to hear if our rights have been violated during the process to convict us. There is rarely a case where a prisoner's rights were not violated, but without help, money, a good lawyer and an incredible investigator it is extremely hard to prove that your rights have been violated.

Even after you have proven your innocence and have shown that your rights have been badly violated, as in Paul Scott's case, the courts still do not wish to set you free, they break their own laws to keep you on Death Row. If it were not for the miracle of the internet our voices would not be heard today.

Two years ago when the guards at Florida State Prison beat Frank to death and were found innocent of the crime they committed, I was ready to lay down and die just to get away from this horrible place. Then I was moved next to Paul and he, once again, renewed my faith and taught me that there are hundreds of people out there that want to help us. Paul has taught me that I can get off Death Row and even get out of prison some day if I can just find someone, anyone, to fight for me and support me. Once again Paul is laying down his fight for freedom to help me...to teach me.

Paul and I are both what most people would think of as undereducated, so it has been an extremely long hard fight we have taken up to save our lives in addition to trying to change the laws in the process for the many others that will follow in our footsteps.

Continued..