Cannon pt2, Derek

It occurred to me that perhaps the best place to be, when whoever showed up to restore order, was in my cell. At least I would be out of the way. I met up with a close family friend of mine, Keith Lamar, who was on his way inside to check on his property. He told me that all the cell doors were being opened and from the sound of it, certain individuals were robbing cells. Once we made it inside, I immediately questioned my decision; it was complete madness. Around 400-500 inmates were running around between pods, breaking windows and starting fires. It was CRAZY!
Keith and I didn’t cell in the same pod. He celled in L-6 and I celled in L-1, which was at the opposite end of the corridor. We decided we would go to our pods and meet back in the hallway once we checked on our property. Since my pod was further away from the exit, I had to push my way through a pack of people before I finally made it to my cell. As expected, all the cells were open and people were running around in all directions. Luckily, my cellie hadn’t left the cell; he was in there protecting our property. By then, I had changed my mind about staying inside and decided I would get the items most important to me and return to the yard. I put on my wedding band and grabbed my family photos.
I pushed my way back down the corridor to meet Keith, who was already standing by the exit. And we both proceeded outside. By then, the Muslims had begin constructing a makeshift barrier to block the exit leading to the yard, which meant those of us who had decided to not stay inside had to jump over an unstable structure to make it back outside. Jumping over this structure, I almost broke my leg, either I hit it on something or someone hit me. Still, I was back on the yard by approximately 3:40pm and stayed on the yard the entire time, watching along with everybody else as body after body was dumped on the recreation field. Almost every hour on the hour it seemed, a body was dragged out of L-side by a group of crazed inmates and discarded. This scene repeated itself until 2 or 3 o’clock in the morning, which is when the highway patrol showed up and forced us, under gunpoint, to enter K-side gymnasium.
By then, I could barely walk and had to be carried into the gym, where I was immediately stripped naked and dumped into a pile of equally naked inmates. I was traumatized. In just a matter of a few hours, I had gone from contemplating my parole to laying down naked on a cold gymnasium floor. And the madness was only just beginning.
After what seemed like days, I was rounded up with a group of about 10-15 inmates and placed in what was designed to be a single-man cell. With my leg in the condition that it was in, I was quite naturally concerned about being put in a situation where I was virtually defenseless. In addition to being denied medical treatment, I was forced, again under gunpoint, to enter the cell anyway, still naked.
We were being treated like animals. For some reason the water had been turned off, which, since we were unable to flush the toilets, we had to sit in the stench of each other’s urine and feces. Fights were erupting all over the pod and far into the night, you could hear cries and screams of inmates being raped and beaten. It was getting so bad the institution had to conduct emergency transfers of inmates to other institutions across the state; this after an inmate named, Dennis Weaver was killed. I didn’t know it at the time but Keith was among the inmates that had been forced into the cell where the murder took place.
After about three days, I was transferred to Lebanon Corrections and placed under temporary reclassification. Once it was established that my security status met with the requirements to be released among the general population, I was reassigned and given a residential cell and work assignment. As far as I was concerned, the nightmare was officially over and I could get back to the business of securing my parole. Because of the disturbance at Lucasville, I didn’t see the parole board until November 1993, after which I was given another continuance until February 1994, pending a criminal release from the riot. I went back to the parole board in February and was given another 60-day continuance because I still wasn’t criminally cleared from the riot. Since this was the only thing delaying my freedom, I promptly informed my family that I was on my way home. After the 60 days, in April 1994, I was officially cleared of any riot related charges and subsequently granted my long awaited release from prison. Finally, all my hard work had paid off and I was about to reap the benefits of all the prayers and sacrifices that had been made in the interest of my redemption. Finally, I would be able to be a father to my son and a husband to my wife, who had given up everything to see me through the darkest period of my life. But, it was not to be. In fact, things were about to get much darker.
Two weeks into the mandatory pre-release class that all recently paroled prisoners had to take, I was called into the Major’s office and questioned yet again, by the highway patrol. Once again, I related my movements and recollections concerning the riot but this time instead of feeling as though I was responding to a formality, I immediately felt as though I was being threatened. The first thing that was mentioned was my parole. I was then told that I had information pertaining to the murders that took place during the riot. I was stunned! First of all, I had already been cleared of any wrongdoing and had already told them ALL I knew. Surely, this was some kind of cruel joke! But then again, my parole was mentioned and I was now being told that what I had to say would determine whether or not I was released. Sensing my confusion, one of the patrolmen quickly pulled out a picture of his son and began explaining how rewarding it was to watch his son grow up. He then informed me that he knew I had a son and suggested that if I ever wanted to see him again, I should start talking.
I had no idea where this new line of questions and allegations was coming from but apparently someone had given them the impression that I had certain information and now the highway patrol was using my parole as leverage to get me to talk. I had nothing to do with the riot and they knew this. In fact, they went out of their way to assure me that I wasn’t being pursued as an actual suspect and yet, here they were threatening to take my parole.
I knew nothing, so I said nothing, which only seemed to enrage them. All of a sudden, I was being cursed at and degraded. They began telling me that if I didn’t start talking I would lose my parole but I would also be brought up on charges myself. “We can do it,” they said. They told me that even though I wasn’t involved, they could still indict me and get inmates to testify against me. I couldn’t understand why they were doing this but I repeated over and over again that I truthfully didn’t know anything. Several weeks later, I was picked up yet again, by the same two patrolmen, Hudson and Brink and handed an indictment for the murder of inmate Darrell Depina. I COULDN’T BELIVE IT!
It wasn’t until I was transferred back to SOCF that the pieces started falling into place. Apparently, the state had fixed their sights on prosecuting Keith Lamar and began rounding up everybody who was, in anyway, connected with him.