Santos then restarted the tape to continue my hearing, and after again stating the players involved, dealt me my immediate fate.
“Goldstein, as to the charge of 120.20, refusing to abide by a previous disposition, I find you guilty,” he said, in an all-businesslike voice, with no hint whatsoever as to a sense of vindictiveness or enjoyment. “The penalty imposed is thirty days of keeplock, and thirty days of loss of rec, telephones, commissary, and packages.”
“You’re sending me to the box for this?” I asked incredulously, as if he was even going to believe that I wasn’t actually expecting it to happen eventually, given the constant amount of tickets I had been receiving without being shipped over to my own private cell up until that point.
“Shut up, Goldstein,” interceded Weston, in what was his first, last, and only time speaking in all of the times I had been in his presence during a disciplinary hearing. “The lieutenant isn’t finished with you yet.”
“I am also invoking thirty days of keeplock from a previous disposition which I had deferred earlier,” revealed Santos, and I was now believing that it was getting personal. “Inmate Goldstein, do you have any procedural objections to the way this hearing has been conducted?”
“Not yet off the top of my head, but I will soon,” I replied, as Weston shoved an appeal form in my back pocket. LaPlante entered the room, frisked me, and proceeded to order me to put my hands behind my back while he slapped on the cuffs and shackles.
“We’re ready to escort Goldstein out,” LaPlante then said over his radio.
But to whom, I had absolutely no idea whatsoever. I was about to find out, though.
“As I walk you out now, don’t even try to look up,” LaPlante ordered, “and make sure to keep your head down at all times.”
Obviously, aside from being a ploy to give those still waiting for their hearings something to think about, this perp walk was all brand new to me, so I simply followed instructions, and as I was led out of the tier office, a few of the guys yet to see the judge told me to hold my head, that it’ll be alright, and things of that nature, in order to lift my spirits.
But, of course, they had no idea who was waiting for me in the van outside to drive me over to the box.
“When we start moving, you are to continue keeping your head down,” ordered the very familiar voice of none other than Sergeant Donald Hash. “Do you understand, dickhead?”
I didn’t say a single word, but as my silly way of retaliating for that last comment by Hash, I snuck a few peeks out the window while he and the officer who was driving the van were talking.
And wouldn’t you know that I saw Paulie Argenzio walking toward the draft room with all of his personal property. He was finally becoming a free man.
Of course, even though I didn’t really like him as a person, and was certainly glad that I wasn’t him, I wouldn’t have minded being in his very shoes on that particular occasion. He was heading home to freedom, while I was about to be locked up for two months in a stinking, dirty cell, no bigger than fifteen by ten feet.
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