February 8, 2016
I'm noticing that most of the drug offenders at Bastrop FSC have little trouble admitting they committed a criminal act. Most of them correctly think their sentence was too harsh, but at least they own what they did. Some own it a little too proudly in fact, but that's another story.
The white collar offenders though, who comprise a much smaller percentage of the inmate population, are different. I've been here long enough to meet most of them and a vast majority are convinced they did nothing wrong. Obviously I lack sufficient information to know if they are honestly and accurately assessing the government's case against them. Let's just say I'm as skeptical about them as I am about the government.
So far, I'm one of two white collar offenders here who seems to know what I did was criminally wrong when I did it. My plan was to fix it before I got caught. As I wrote, "one of two", there is one other inmate who would make a similar admission, and it's no surprise we have become friends.
The two of us recently listened to another white collar inmate's story of his innocence. My only comment after his lengthy tail of prosecutorial abuse and jury bias was, "hmm". However my friend, who is older and wiser, couldn't leave it there. His follow up comment was, "Well, you're either guilty or stupid and I don't think you're stupid." The inmate, clearly offended, exited in a huff which left my friend and me to acknowledge that we were both stupid and guilty, but at least we knew it.
Knowing it is step one, right?
