Chapter
1
The
Tower was magnificent, rooted beneath the swelling waves and
standing proudly above the inconsistency of the water. It rose
firmly and elegantly, layered with stone over metal, tall and
sleek in the salty breeze.
Nicknamed
"Alcatraz II" by law enforcers and government
officials, and "The Boat Pokey" by inmates across the
country, the Peter Briggs Federal Penitentiary was famous for
one reason and one reason alone: the Tower. The Tower was
conceived over a table covered with cigarette butts and
half-drunk cups of coffee at 3:32 in the morning. It had been an
election year. Peter Briggs had won the election.
The
regular prison, Maingate, framed the end of a peninsula by San
Francisco that jutted into the Pacific. It contained the
expendable criminal element, those with life sentences doubled
back over life sentences. Yet the worst of the worst had a
special distinction even within Maingate.
The
Tower was fifty yards offshore at low tide. Only about eighteen
feet in diameter, it housed twelve levels of prison units, two
cells on each floor. It sat within an inlet cut into the craggy
walls of the peninsula. When the tide rose, it inched up the
side of the structure until only the last two levels peeped out
above the water.
A
peripheral fence blocked the prison from the vast expanse of sea
beyond, its enormous posts grounded with concrete plugs in the
ocean floor. Access to the Tower could be gained only by boat,
and only from the heavily guarded grounds of Maingate. The
guards shuttled back and forth on speedboats like little insects
busy at work.
The
Tower was constructed to be the most airtight security facility
in the world. Like anything built with such exuberance, it had a
few design flaws -- a few places where overzealousness lapsed
into an arrogant carelessness. However, for the most part, the
Tower was what it was designed to be: a steel trap.
Level
One was used for storage only, so the second level was the
lowest floor that housed prisoners. Because it was the darkest,
Level Two was referred to as "the Dungeon." The
loudest prisoners were kept there so their noise wouldn't
disturb the guards.
The
first eight levels were always underwater, and the only natural
light they received filtered through the steel bars from the
floors above. The twelfth level remained empty, for security
reasons. Despite the tremendous precautions, the warden felt
Level Twelve was just too close to freedom and the guards above.
A
large fan, protected by a steel gate, was situated underneath
the first level. Piping ran beneath the ocean floor from the
mainland, drawing air to feed the fan. But the sluggish movement
of the blades was not enough to sweep the musk from the air.
Only the top four levels had vents, though those on Level Nine
were never opened, as they were almost always beneath the
ocean's surface.
A
single carbon gaslight was encased in bulletproof glass on every
other level, slightly illuminating the metal walls. These bleak
lights trailed through the dimness of the Tower, making it seem
as thickly claustrophobic as a mine shaft. At night, they were
usually turned off.
The
interior of the Tower was constructed of thick steel bars. There
was barely a quarter of an inch between the bars and the outer
wall, which sat over the steel intestines like a stone hide. Not
only were the unit walls made from such bars, but also the
floors and ceilings.
Home
to men who could kill with paper clips and keys, the Tower was
designed as the barest possible livable environment. No plaster
could be risked for walls, no wood for floors. The steel bars
that composed the inside of the Tower had another advantage:
They allowed the guards to see through the levels to check on
the inmates. Initially, the architects had experimented with an
unbreakable glass, but they had found that it fogged heavily
with mist from the ocean and created a ventilation nightmare.
The
outside wall of each curved cell measured twenty feet, and the
cells were five feet in width. Each faced its mirror image
across "the Hole," an open cylinder of air that ran
straight down the center of the Tower. There were spacings of
eight and one-third feet between the units on each side; this
ensured that the prisoners never established bodily contact, and
that the guards could always remain out of reach.
Due
to the fact that the ceiling of each cell also served as the
floor for the one above it, the prisoners could most easily
communicate with the men directly above or below them. Although
this design element may have seemed a lapse in the Tower's tight
security, few of the men were tall enough to reach their
ceilings, even from their beds. Those who were could hardly get
their fingers to the bars, let alone through them. The
neck-strained interaction between the floors served the Tower's
design: to break the spirits of nearly indomitable men by
removing from them all the trappings of civilization.
The
cells each had a minuscule toilet with a small tap that swung
into place above it, allowing it to double as a sink. The
toilets caught the water before it spiraled down through the
barred floors. Each unit had a single mattress on a steel frame,
and a thick blanket for the chilly nights off the California
coast.
The
Hole formed the shaft for the platform elevator, four feet in
diameter, which was operated by a handheld unit. Precisely
framing the elevator was a two-foot platform between the Hole
and the unit doors. When not in use, the elevator was raised out
of the top of the Hole ten feet in the air, leaving only the
dark emptiness below.
When
the prisoners were unruly or when it rained (which rarely
happened), the large Hatch was swung into place underneath the
raised elevator, blocking out all natural light and moisture.
However, when the sun was directly overhead and the Hatch was
open, light shone through the metal mesh of the raised elevator,
and the two men on Level Eleven could see clearly down into the
units ten levels beneath them.
A
prisoner was shackled around his biceps and wrists when
transported, and his thighs were strapped together to allow only
minimal leg movement. He was sent down the elevator with a guard
on each side. He was always gagged, and often hooded. At all
times, one of the two guards had a gun with the safety off
trained on the prisoner. The necessity of such seemingly
paranoid precautions had been learned at painful expense.
Prisoners were only moved once, and they were only moved in.
Before
a prisoner was taken to the Tower, a small sensor was surgically
embedded in the tip of the ring finger on his left hand. If he
escaped, this device allowed his movements to be tracked. The
prisoners were put under general anesthesia while the sensors
were installed, and were kept heavily drugged until a
significant amount of healing had taken place, sometimes five or
six days. The Maingate physicians feared if the prisoners fully
awakened before then, they would dig the sensors out with their
nails and teeth.
Food
was delivered to the prisoners twice a day. It came in the form
of a large loaf containing all the necessary nutrients to allow
an animal to function. A cross between quiche and bread, the
loaves were light brown when cooked correctly. They required no
plates or silverware, part of the reason for their continued
use. They were delivered by a guard at precisely 10:30 A.M. and
7:15 P.M.; he slid them through a small rectangular slot, barely
the size of the loaf itself, at the bottom of each unit door.
A
long metal arm with two outgrowths at the end was used to guide
the loaves through the slot. The loaves were referred to by the
inmates as "shithouse bricks." They had minimal taste.
When
a prisoner behaved perfectly for a week, he was allowed a large
sheet of paper and two crayons with which to entertain himself.
A guard held a box through the bars with a metal arm to retrieve
the crayons when the time was up. This was called "Sketch
Duty."
Sketch
Duty was perhaps the only activity that the prisoners
unanimously held to be important. It was the sole end of the
prisoners' lives to obtain this hour of distraction each week.
They could keep the pictures in their cells for two days, then
they were removed and taken to be analyzed at the criminal
psychology department of the Ressler Institute on the mainland.
The pictures were often used in lectures.
Aside
from the occasional books they were allowed, Sketch Duty was all
that the prisoners had to break the monotony. Inside the Tower,
minutes could stretch to hours, hours to lifetimes.
Despair
prevailed in the bowels of the prison; nobody would ever be
released and nobody had ever escaped its dark confines. The
inmates sat pressed against the metal bars of their cramped
cells, reciting their tales in the broken tongues of idiots.
h
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