Dogfella by James Guiliani

Author:James Guiliani
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Da Capo Press
Published: 2015-03-25T17:27:51+00:00

Chapter 6

Same Old, Same Old

My last few months in prison were good ones. I’d been a model inmate. I played cards every night and engaged in the bullshit sessions with other inmates that kept us busy enough to ignore our confinement and the shitty living conditions. Prison blows, don’t get me wrong, but for a whacked-out junkie, it can serve as both a rehab and a refuge. Looking back at my time in Riverhead, it was definitely better than where I was headed on the street.

Most jail releases occurred between Monday and Thursday. When inmates were being released, they were brought to the facility at Yaphank. When my time was up, the warden processed me out on a Friday morning. I think he had a special place in his heart for me, especially since my 9.2 dive off the loading dock into a laundry boat. Until my Friday-night Halloween release in 1995, weekend releases were unheard of at Yaphank.

Some guys want to take everything they’ve accumulated while inside prison with them when they leave, but I gave away all my stuff to friends I’d made inside. My CDs, Walkman, cigarettes, and so on, all of it went to the guys I was closest with, the guys who’d had my back.

I was still worried about what might happen once I was out. Although some time had passed, I had violated one of the unwritten laws among mobsters by keeping the hijacking to myself. The guys from Our Friends Social Club might still be holding a grudge. Angelo Sforza had caught a beating from the Our Friends crew and suffered a broken jaw when he was bailed out two years earlier. I could only hope enough time had passed for the rest of the crew to give me a pass.

On the morning of my release, an announcement was made over the facility loudspeaker: “Guiliani, roll up.” It was prison-speak for a release.

I was brought to the Sally Port, where my paperwork was being handled by the guard inside the bubble office. While I was there, I received the traditional good-bye cleansing from some inmates as they dowsed me with water from cups, buckets, cans, and anything else they could store water in.

A CO walked me to the front gate and gave the traditional parting message, “Don’t look back.”

I remembered the superstition about looking back—if you did so, you’d return to prison. I didn’t look back, but neither was I looking forward.

I’d told everybody inside about my upcoming trip to Atlantic City and how my friends would be waiting for me with a limousine, but once I was outside the prison gates, I had to wait almost an hour before they showed up. In the meantime, while I stood there like a fool, the guys inside were giving me shit by shouting out the window.

“Hey, James, still waiting for that bus?”

“James, stick your thumb out and catch a ride.”

“That’s some nice limo, James. Can it fly, too?”

Eventually, when my friends did arrive, it

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