Personal account of confinement and attempted escape from a detention facility

another lockdown facility and if he betrayed my trust, again, he would never see me again. I would disappear for good this time and for all he would know I could be dead in no time on the streets. He looked at me and for the first time in my life he saw the many years I had grown up in the time I was gone and heard the seriousness in the tone of my voice when I made my vow to him. He put his head in his hands and told me the bad news, my Mom didn’t want me to come home and she was making his life hell for even suggesting bringing me back into their lives. I for some reason threatened her lifestyle and drove her crazy. I had been surprised about a lot of things lately but not that one. The last time | saw my Mom she ever so carefully lied to me and told me she was bringing me to an eye-doctor for an infection. Instead we walked into this tall blue building with people in uniforms holding clipboards and a few muscly guards, she ushered me inside and hurried up to close the large auto lock doors behind her leaving me there alone and imprisoned, which is what led me to recently living on the streets. My life was hell as long as she was in control of it, so when she didn’t want me back at home I was fine with that too, but there had to be somewhere else | could go. My dad said he had no choice but to put me back into the facility, but he made a sincere promise that he would not take any longer than a week to try to find a place for me to stay and to go to school. A week I could deal with, but 1 was still unsure if I could trust my father and hold him to his word, but yet again, I had no choice. Being my legal guardian he could send me anywhere he wanted and there would be nothing I could do, except for keep running. I gave in, and before he left the officers to take me back to the last facility I had run from, I gave him one last hug and reminded him “one-week and I’m gone”. Nodding his head and squeezing his arms tighter around me, I could only hope he meant it, but he didn’t look too optimistic. In the police car on the way back to the facility they had to handcuff me in case I ran again, but I had no intentions to anyways. I was going to give my dad the week before I began to search for the right opportunity to jolt again. I was like a “ghost come back,” said so many of my girlfriends from the past and there was now a lot of new faces there too. At night when we were all in bed and supposed to be sleeping, I would be daydreaming of better days and imagine myself somewhere in a comfortable bed, actually enjoying my life for a change. A week went by in this facility spending most of my days locked up in what they called “The White Room”, a bare room with concrete flooring, no toilet or even a chair to sit on. The only comfort | had was the blue sweater that was provided as part of the uniform, and my hair scrunchie filled with my stowed away cash that no one had found during my unpleasant strip- searches. I would spend hours in the white room for objecting to their 19 conformity and unwilling to participate in their drilling regime. I didn’t feel like I owed any.explanation to these people even when they brought a physiologist in to speak with me, “What was the point when I would be gone any day now” and as if any of these people even cared in the first place, I was just another number in the system and they had a job to do. There was one mega-bitch, female guard, named Evelyn and she used to either really like you or really hate you and God-forbid you were one of the unfortunates that she didn’t like, she’d make your entire stay their an agonizing nightmare. Constantly picking on girls who were not strong enough to cope with their predicament or past issues, she’d stand them up and publicly humiliate them, and even when they begged her through their sobs to let them sit down, she’d only torment them worse. Which only made the strong girls want to antagonize the fragile one’s with more malicious intent. Luckily when I had previously been there she didn’t take much notice of me, but I stayed out of harms way with her, just being quiet and observant. Being back here seemed like an eternity while I held my end of the bargain but unfortunately my Father didn’t. The first chance I saw to run L took it. | was being sent to go get my blood and urine taken for drug and disease analysis. My driver would be a volunteer from the community and it was the perfect getaway for me. | was brought from the white solitaire room and led into the bright sun, feeling like today would be favorable in my escape. We got to the doctors office, my whereabouts told me I had plenty of ways to run and I scouted out the best looking route. My plan was to barge through the volunteer’s inexperienced grip and wriggle my way out if needed, then hit the asphalt, running until my legs couldn’t carry me any further. Playing it out in my mind felt different to the anticipation that led up to actually doing it. The inner- strength I had was the only thing going to help me in this circumstance. We arrived in the parking lot and I hadn’t said a word to him the entire drive, the small framed Spanish man tried to make pleasant conversation but I couldn’t see him as anything but a challenge, so I kept quiet instead, ignoring his humorous attempts to befriend me. The car pulled to a stop and he came around the side to unlock my door, this was it, “here we go” T told myself, and pushed past the volunteer. His arms grabbed out at me but only caught me by my shirt, he didn’t even put up much ofa struggle, like some of the other trained one’s I had gotten before, they would put me into body locks of all sorts but he just tore at the collar of my shirt letting me break free. 1 had done this many times before so I knew I wasn’t gone yet, L had to first get out of these clothes. The cops would be looking for someone of my description in the area with a blue shirt and khaki pants, so my first stop was a busy shopping complex. | took the money from my scrunchie and bought myself a pair of jeans, a shirt, and 20 | Copyright Protected Material O Copyright Protected Material CONFIDENTIAL GIUFFREOO4 152 CONFIDENTIAL GIUFFRL004 133 HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_021154