Saturday, October 30, 2010

March 3rd, 1989 My Worst Day

 In the late 80's I was doing a pretty good job of fending off the Demon. I had some bad nights and some unconscious ones. I had preferred the later. I still could not believe that the colonel was still giving me so much hell. I will go back and bring up some of my really bad dreams and re-post them to give you an idea of how things were going. I mentioned my brother, Cornbread, before, but let me introduce him to you  all. He was a great guy. We always had each other's back. You know the saying that dynamite comes in small packages, well. that is Bread. His real name is Charles Herbert Riley, II. And do not call him junior. Chaz, Bubba, Bubba Chaz, but he will always be Cornbread, to me. We were as close as any brother could be. We have even shared the same woman. At the same time. He was a 70's rocker, long hair, guitar picking, pot smoking , coke snorting rascal. He was a hell of a friend. Through the years he was constantly totaling cars and raising hell. I was always right  there beside him. While he was in OKC he was cruising on a KZ1000 when a pick-up truck pulled out in front of him. He broadsided the truck and he landed about 75 feet past the collision. My friend from the Air Force, Henry Steele, was working at the hospital where he was transported. My parents flew out there and Henry took good care of them. Cornbread had split his skull in several places, staying in a coma for 11 days. He did wake up and was brought back to Bama when he was able. He had to start taking Dilantin, a seizure medication, and he hated it. Made him feel useless.. Bread recovered from that mishap and we went back to doing what we knew best, partying. We were the baddest Foosball team around. Everyone tried to beat us. We were unbelievable. I played back and he played front. He had a lightning fast pull shot that nobody could block. A hell of a mean toe shot, too. He got a few dollars from the wreck in OKC and bought him a GMC Sierra Classic. One beautiful truck. On the night of his birthday, the day Elvis died, in 1988, he dropped me off at my house and he was supposed to head to his place. Instead, he ended up in the ER with a broke neck. No paralysis, thank God. He did have to wear a halo for 12 weeks. It did not slow him down, though. We built cabinets with the both of us eating Tylox and he still wearing his halo. We were something to behold. 'Dain Bramage' became his new nickname. I'm sure he was battling demons of his own but I never asked. I never told him about killing the colonel, either. Life was good as long as we were stoned. Which was the majority of the time. Then I received a call from the Baptist Memorial Hospital's ER department. Chaz had been involved in an automobile accident. I told my Mom, "Let's go check on Bubba, he's had another wreck." She was eerily quiet. Hell, this was routine for him. No big deal. Mom did not say a word on the way to the hospital. Just before we turned in the parking lot Mom looked at me and said "This does not feel right." I tried to reassure her but she sat down in the chair in the ER waiting room and did not move or say a word. I could look straight down the hall and see the cubicle he was in. I saw an awful lot of feet. When someone would come out I could see that they had him in MAST trousers. I do not think they use them anymore but what they would do is like a pair of pants that you pumped air into to keep the blood in the upper extremities. Military Anti-Shock Trousers. When I saw those I thought, oh shit. This is bad. My two brothers and my sister had arrived and we were waiting on Dad. He was at work about 25 miles away. They worked on him for about 45 minutes before the doctor and a couple nurses came out and said that they did all they could do. How sorry they were for our loss. My Mom sat back down and did not move. She was in shock. My sister started crying. The doctor started to walk off and I said, "Hang on a sec, Are you telling me that my brother is dead? I never heard what was said for the next half hour. I went berserk. I busted all the glass out of every door and window in that place with my bare hands. I was pulling up chairs that were bolted down to the floor and slinging them through the coke machines. I went ape shit. The last thing I remember of that day was being surrounded by uniformed officers and holding me down to give me an injection. It was over. Cornbread, Bubba, Chaz, Charles, was never to be seen, again.   theblogmeister

Locked-Up

  It was not long after the episode with the tennis shoes that I was transferred. I was sent to Ventress Correctional Facility. The prison system just had started substance abuse programs (SAP) and I was in the pilot program. The program lasted 8 weeks and involved a lot of 12-step based models.I excelled in the program so much that I was asked by my counselor to give a speech at graduation. I did not know it at the time that Gov. Guy Hunt would be present at the ceremony. The governor of the great state of Alabama! I prepared my speech and on graduation day gave it with much enthusiasm. The governor even came up to me and told me what a good job I had done and he hoped I would continue my plan after my release from prison.
  After graduation, I wrote the parole board requesting a parole reduction. Remember, I was sentenced to 8 years and the normal parole was 26 months. A few weeks later I received a hearing date for 13 months. They had cut my parole in half. Cool! I stayed at Ventress a couple more months then I was transferred to Montgomery Work Release. It is a program where you get a job, a real job, and the camp gets 25% of your money. By the time I made it to MWR I had only 30 days left before my parole hearing. The camp would not let me work in the free world . so, I became the camp's maintenance man. I got in real good with the Captain and when my hearing was a couple days away the Capt. asked if I was going to my hearing. I told him that I did not know it was allowed. He told me to call my parents and tell them to come get me on the day of my hearing and he would give me an 8 hour pass to attend my parole hearing. Sounds good to me. The day finally arrived, my parents picked me up, and off to downtown Montgomery we went. I walked in the parole hearing waiting room with my parents in tow. There were several people already there, I guess they were family members of other parolee hopefuls. It is very uncommon for an inmate to attend his own hearing and you could tell by the reaction I received from the clerk. She asked my name, I told her, she asked how was I related to David, I told her that I was David. Her eyes got big as quarters, she then hustled us out a door and asked us to wait in the hall at the back of the hearing room. I looked at Mom and Dad and we just shrugged our shoulders. "I assume that this does not happen very often." my Dad said. I guess not. About an hour later we were called in before a five panel hearing board. They asked me a bunch of questions, then spoke to my parents, then asked me to step forward.
  "You understand that we cannot tell you whether are not that you made parole." the chairman told me. "But, I think you will be pleased." Two weeks later I am back at Glencoe trying to find a legal way to quiet my Demon. This is important to remember. My first trip to prison only lasted a few months at the county jail. My second trip was reduced and I only served half of what I was supposed to serve. Have you ever heard of the Habitual Offender Act? Well, the next time I am not so lucky. I get hammered. You will not believe what happens next.   theblogmeister

Friday, October 29, 2010

I Need Some Help

  I am waiting to receive my service-connected disability. I am presently drawing 20% which is only 243.00/month. My 20% is because of my back. U.S.C. 38 4.16(b) clearly states that if a veteran is receiving service-connected disability and is unable to sustain gainful employment because of a service-connected disability then that veteran is deemed totally disabled. I am drawing $391.00 social security disability because of my back. I have had 4 back surgeries since 2006 and am unable to do much of anything. On top of my spinal fusion I am suffering with PTSD. That is what I am writing about in my blog. It is an amazing story that is incredible to believe. It is all the truth. I have not embellished any part of my story. My wife has been diagnosed with fibromyalgia and she is, too, currently unable to work. I have $634.00 coming in to this household every month. I need some help. It is getting harder and harder to pay my bills. I am not asking for a handout but if you want to donate and help me keep my internet so I can finish my story it will come back to you in some way. I might even make a little money if you buy from amazon clicking on my site. I do not know how much longer this appeal will last but once it is over we will be okay. So, please tell your friends and neighbors to come to my site, click on amazon and buy what you need so I can keep on writing. I am going to turn this story into a book, someday, and let whoever wants to buy it they will not be disappointed. If you want to donate:  David Riley  802 Taylor Rd. Glencoe,Al. 35905.  You would be a hero. Please help and please keep reading. theblogmeister

The Big House

  No more county jails, for me. This was my second felony and off I went to Kilby Correctional Facility. It is where everyone first goes to get classified. Psychological profiles, aids testing, and a general physical. I was pretty healthy at the time but I had hurt my wrist in a scuffle at the county before being shipped to Kilby. I was put in the thunder dorm. It got that name because there were about 500 inmates in a metal building in the middle of summer. Air conditioning? Not a chance. It was a crazy place. I saw this white dude sitting on his rack (bed) when a huge black man came up to him and picked up his new tennis shoes and started to walk away with them in his hand saying, "Thanks, white boy." I thought , oh shit, surely he is not gonna let him get away with it. The white dude said nothing. About an hour later I heard a commotion going on in the latrine and the guards were blowing their whistle, which usually means there is a fight. I made my way back there and could not get through because of the crowd. Then the white dude that got his tennis shoes stolen came by me being escorted by a guard, handcuffed. I asked around and found out the white dude waited until he caught the black dude taking a piss at the latrine. The white boy took a mop wringer and hit that black dude in the back of the head, knocking him out. He then picked him up and laid him in the latrine, took his shoes, and walked off. He got ratted on and spent a few days in administrative segregation. When the white boy got out of admin seg, nobody, I mean NOBODY, would steal dust off his bed. That was prison life. If you showed any weakness they would pounce on you.
  While I was locked-up I got a reputation for being a crazy man. I had no drugs, not for a lack of supply, and had incredibly horrifying dreams, screaming out about demons and killings. No body would mess with me. It had been 7 years since I killed the colonel and it would only get worse. A lot worse. I was sitting on my rack and the hospital runner came to me and said I needed to be at the clinic. I went to the clinic and there was 2 guys sitting there. The door opened and a name was called and this black dude to my right went in. He came out about 15 minutes later and something was obviously wrong. He looked pretty shaken. I said, "Damn, dude, are you okay?"
  "Man, I ain't never fucked with them sissies. I don't do drugs."
  I said, "What did they yell you in there?"
  "Man, I tested positive for HIV." he said
   I was shocked. I did not know what to tell him. It wasn't but a couple more minutes and the police was taking him to the aids dorm. A few minutes later the door opened and they called the black guy that was sitting to my left into the clinic. After several minutes later, the other guy came out the clinic. I knew this dude was a sissy, I was in E-dorm with him/her when we first got to Kilby. "Well, I guess I'm going to Limestone."
  "Why is that?" I asked.
  "Cause I got the ninja, but I already knew it." Here comes the police to take him/her to the aids dorm.
  Okay, I am beginning to freak out. How the hell did I get that shit? My mind  was going a hundred miles an hour. How am I gonna tell my family" What am I gonna do? What seemed like an eternity the clinic door finally opened. I walked in, with my head in my hands asking the doc what I was gonna do. He said, "What do you mean? I just want to get an x-ray of your wrist."
  "WHAT? You mean I ain't got the aids?" He paused a minute, then started laughing.
  "No, no, no, you do not have HIV." I almost hugged him. I told him that he just scared the hell out of me, I was dying of aids for a few minutes. That was a nightmare of the waking kind. But, it is only just the beginning. Hell awaits.   theblogmeister

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

A Criminal's Life

  The Lortabs were just not getting it. I was having more and more problems with the Demon. He was keeping me up and terrorizing my mind. His world had become the night. I had to do something, fast. I went to jail for writing scripts once but if I am careful I could get away with it for a while. It was worth it to me. The Demon had become a formidable foe. I found a doctor that would write me Lortab-10, one hundred and twenty each month, but my tolerance was so high it was like taking aspirins. Time for the script writer. I went to a doctor in Anniston and found a pad lying around and scooped it up. A family practitioner will have the numbers already printed on the pad as an ER doctor will have to write the number in himself. Here we go, again.
  Everything was going great for a while. I was able to get a couple more pads so I had several to choose from. I would usually write for Mepergan Fortis, no more than 40, and would not stop until we got 3 scripts filled a day. That's between 90 to 120 pills a day. If you do not know what meps are they contain Meperidine( Demerol ) and Phenergan . They were very easy to shoot IV. That's what me and my buddy would do. I would pass out and have the best sleep and no memory of the Demon. That is why I loved them so much. The down side to doing those thing was that you would start dreaming while wide awake and talk to people that was not even there. It was like a light switch being turned off. One minute you are okay and the next thing you know you are dealing a hand of cards and telling the next player to hurry up. Then you were back at the table with the empty capsules everywhere. You had to have someone to baby sit you so you would not leave the house. Do you understand what I must have been going through dealing with the Demon by using drugs with such hellish side effects. Anyway, I got busted, again, for the same thing. This time, because I had went through a drug treatment center, they only gave me 8 years. I had to go to  the real prison. Let me tell you, it is nothing like the county jail. You would not believe what I have seen in the Alabama prison system. I'll tell you about it, later.   theblogmeister

Busted

  I plead with the man holding the shotgun on me to let me go. He told me to sit down and shut up. No problem. A few minutes later the St. Clair County Sheriff's deputy was putting me in hand cuffs. It took about 20 minutes before we reached the jail. I was booked in and placed in the bullpen with about 20 other thugs and this would be my home until I could find someone to post my bond. It did not take long. I was bonded out the next day. My mom put up the $250 dollars, 10%, and I was home the next day. I could not understand why the druggist called the law. It was common knowledge that he would trade pills for weed so I was surprised that he had me arrested. It would be another year before my court date would come because of the backlog of criminal cases in the state of Alabama. The Alabama Department of Corrections, the prison system, was very overcrowded causing the log jam at the county level. I mean, when you are giving 15 years for possessing one joint to first time offenders you will have a backlog.
  It had been over 5 years since I had killed the colonel and the nightmares were not going away. If anything, they were getting worse. As long as I was self-medicated, I was okay. Street drugs were too expensive for  my taste. I did not like alcohol so it had to be narcotics. I kept on building houses and buying tabs when I could find them. It makes it especially hard when I look back at what I had and see what I have become.
  I was sentenced to two years in prison for the attempting to obtaining narcotics by forgery. I was lucky and got to do my time at St. Clair County jail. The prisons were still over-crowded and they welcomed the idea. I spent 10 months in the county jail as a trusty. I was in the kitchen getting lunch ready for the guys upstairs when Terry came back and said,"Guess who we just brought in ?" I said, "Who?" Doc Wilson. Well, Doc Wilson was the dude thar made me sit down and shut up with a shotgun pointed to my face. "No shit?" He asked if I wanted to strip search him before he went upstairs. They had busted Doc for trading 100 Talwin for a quarter pound of weed. "Hell yes, I want to strip search him!" We walked down the hall and I was standing just outside the office door when Terry told Doc to go with this man to be stripped and searched. He looked up in the direction of where Terry was pointing and saw me and I watched all the color drain from his face. I told him to come with me. Terry was having a hard time controlling his laughter and so was I . Poor guy. He thought I was about to do some unspeakable things to him. He followed me back to the kitchen and apologized for holding the gun on me and calling the police. He said that he thought I was the police trying to bust him. I felt sorry for the guy and told him not to worry about it  and he did not have to take his clothes off. I also told him to tell Johnny, the trustee upstairs, I said to look out for him. Jails are not for the weak. That was my first time to go to jail. There would be many more and many stories with them. Through it all, the colonel never left me.    theblogmeister

Back To Bama

  The oil bust in the early eighties affected all of OKC's economy so we had to move back to Bama. I continued my fractured rib scam and even had a hospital admit me to ICU. I have done that scam over fifty times and have never had a doctor tell me there was nothing wrong. I was telling a friend of mine about it and he could not believe it. He said there was no way I could go to an emergency room with nothing wrong and get narcotics. I told him what he needed to do and I let him pick the hospital I told him that he would have to talk to the business office lady and what to say to her. He asked why I could not tell her. I told him that I would be busy with my acting, not being able to breathe normally, can't talk, etc. etc. In a couple hours I was wheeled out of there into my friends car having had several shots of morphine IV with a prescription for 40 Lortab-10 with 3 refills. He could not believe what he had just seen. I should have been an actor, he said. He was amazed. I told him it was simple. Having worked in the medical field and around doctors I got to know their personalities. If a patient is presented with obvious breathing difficulties and is in tremendous pain, having had diagnostic tests done, a doctor will not come out and say that he does not know what is wrong.. It is an ego thing. Doctors, for the most part have a God complex. They will not admit being seen as inept. I was such a good actor faking my symptoms the doctors had no choice. They had to find what was causing my symptoms. I gave them the symptoms of fractured ribs, remember that the first two inches of the rib at the attachment of the sternum are cartilage and do not show up on x-ray, they diagnosed me with fractured ribs. It really is amazing.. I did not think of it then but imagine how much my chest has been exposed to radiation due to all those x-rays. It is a little scary, now. It was not long before I had to stop with the rib scam and had to resort back to writing scripts. Then I was at a drug store with a script I wrote and the pharmacist picked up the phone to call and have it checked. I reached over and hung the phone up and said, "Don't do that." The next thing I know I am staring down a double barrel shotgun. This is not good.     theblogmeister

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Change of Scenery

  I moved to Oklahoma City, OK. in the early 80's. It was too hot for me in Bama. I went with my brother, Cornbread, and we found good jobs making good money. The only problem with me going to another place, guess who would follow? The Demon. I swear I could not shake Him. I went to doctor after doctor and they wanted to put me on psychotrophic drugs. Turn me into a Zombie. There was not much work for zombies in OKC so I would not take the zombie drugs. I figured out a new scam. I would get my brother to take me to an emergency room and I would act like I had a broke rib, could not breath well, stabbing pain just to the left of the sternum (breastbone). My brother would give them bogus info about how he owned a construction company and I fell off a scaffold. They are thinking workman's comp so I get the A-1 treatment. Did not have to wait. They would hook me up to an IV and give me narcotics IV, take x- rays and c-scan. They would come back and tell me I had fractured ribs and the only thing they could do for me was make me comfortable, ala, narcotics. You see, the first couple inches where the rib attaches to the sternum is cartilage, does not show up on x-ray. They would hold the films to the light and point out my 'rib fractures.' Then give me a bunch of dope to take home. In and out in 2 hours with a lot of drugs. We did that scam All over OKC for a long time. All the while the Demon was at bay. But soon, he would be in control for a long time.   theblogmeister

Monsters Inside Me

  There is definitely something wrong with me. I know this. I am being punished for what I did back in 1978. Am I punishing myself? I am no dumb ass, by no means. I am not the smartest person, either. I understand how the mind can hurt or heal. All I know for a fact is that I am being inundated by these nightmares that are debilitating. I can't give in. I have to make a living. The only way I am able to do that, right now, is to take narcotics to quiet my Demon. Otherwise, I would be a walking basket case because I could not get any sleep at night. I am in a catch-22. Thanks to the colonel I am living on the edge. I had my brother right there beside me. He had his own demons, I guess, because he would do as much, if not more, dope than I. The dope kept coming as long as I was writing. I got to the point when I had five or six prescription pads with their DEA number. I knew not to write any scheduled three drug with a refill. It is against the law. Schedule IV, like lortab, refills are possible. Percodan or Tylox, 5mg of oxycodone, thirty max. I knew enough about medicine to not slip up. But, I did. I let too many people in on what I was doing. I showed my face at way too many drug stores, so, I would get other people to get them filled and I would give them half. It worked out for the both of us. Until I let the wrong one in on my scam. He got busted and told the cops where he got the scripts and guess who paid me a visit? That was my first felony; probation. The nightmares got a lot worse as I became used to the drugs. Tolerance. I had to do something drastic. If I can live through it.   theblogmeister

It Was Time To Go

  It had taken Major C. a little longer than I had hoped to get me a discharge. He called me down to his office in February 1980 and gave me my discharge. I said goodbye to all my buddies and the drugs then I headed north to home. My home is in Glencoe, Al. about 60 miles north of Birmingham. It was good to be back home but I had left something behind that I much needed; drugs. Without the drugs is when my Demon first appeared in my dreams. I would wake up in the middle of the night drenched and panting. I was definitely running from Him. It was not an occasional dream, it was every night. The only thing that would quiet Him was the drugs. I had thrown away a potentially great medical career because I allowed my feelings for a dying man cloud my judgement. What was I to do, now. I had to work to care for myself in a new career. My brother was a carpenter, so, that is what I chose. I attempted to see the VA doctors but PTSD was not a recognized disease back in 1980. I was sent to a psychiatrist and was placed on anti-depressants, which did not work. Then the nightmares started becoming a huge problem that would interfere with my sleep, therefore, interfere with my waking hours. It is hard to be afraid to sleep and stay up half the night then try to do manual labor during the day. It does not work. I was building houses and working and walking walls sometimes 30 feet off the ground. I needed those pain pills. So, I started writing prescriptions from pads that I would steal from the doctors office or ER and taking them to a pharmacy and get them filled. This was too easy but it worked. For the next couple years I built houses and wrote prescriptions. Life was good. But, once again, life would bite me on the ass.    theblogmeister