Richard Stratton - In the World: From the Big House to Hollywood

ALSO BY RICHARD STRATTON :

Smack Goddess

Slam (editor, with Kim Wozencraft)

Altered States of America: Outlaws and Icons,
Hitmakers and Hitmen

Cannabis Americana: Remembrance of the War on Plants Trilogy
Smugglers Blues: A True Story of the Hippie Mafia

Kingpin: Prisoner of the War on Drugs

Copyright 2020 by Richard Stratton

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Arcade Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

First Edition

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Stratton, Richard (Richard H.), author.

Title: In the world: from the big house to Hollywood / Richard Stratton.

Description: First edition. | New York: Arcade Publishing, [2020]

Identifiers: LCCN 2019035674 (print) | LCCN 2019035675 (ebook) | ISBN 9781628727272 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781628727296 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Stratton, Richard (Richard H.) | Ex-convictsUnited StatesBiography. | ScreenwritersUnited StatesBiography.

Classification: LCC HV9468.S77 A3 2020 (print) | LCC HV9468.S77 (ebook) | DDC 812/.54 [Bdc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019035674

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019035675

Cover design by Erin Seaward-Hiatt

Cover photograph courtesy of Ray Vanacore

Printed in the United States of America

I returned, and saw under the sun
that the race is not to the swift,
nor the battle to the strong,
neither yet bread to the wise,
nor riches to men of understanding,
nor yet favor to men of skill,
but time and chance happens
to them all.

Ecclesiastes 9:11

Aint life grand... ?

Bank robber Clyde Barrow,
from the movie Bonnie and Clyde

C ONTENTS

Authors Note

DTENTE IN THE WAR ON PLANTS

F OR THIS, VOLUME three of my Cannabis Americana: Remembrance of the War on Plants trilogy, I pick up the story on that unforgettable day, Monday, June 25, 1990, when they opened the front gate at the Federal Correctional Institution (FCI) in Ashland, Kentucky, and I was allowed to walk out. After eight straight years in custody of the US Bureau of Prisons, I was suddenly free.

The outside world felt like a different realitya heightened new dimension of existence where anything is possible. The simple act of walking without high stone walls and chain-link fences strung with coils of gleaming razor wire penning me in; the horizon no longer assaulted with manned gun towers; no shackles and chains around my ankles to restrict my stride; no handcuffs linked to a belly chain around my waist to hinder my reach; no sullen, beefy guards loitering, watching, poised to order me to drop my drawers, bend over, and spread em so they could peer up my assholeyes, I was a man again, a human being, no longer an inmate identification number, no longer a prisoner. After a struggle worthy of Kafka with faceless authorities in an unfathomable criminal justice system, I was free at last.

M Y FIFTEEN-YEAR CAREER as an international marijuana and hashish smuggler prior to my arrest in 1982 is recounted in volume one, Smugglers Blues: A True Story of the Hippie Mafia . That book ends with my capture by DEA agents, deputy US marshals with the Fugitive Task Force, and LAPD cops in the lobby of the Sheraton Senator Hotel at the airport in Los Angeles. I went to trial twiceonce in the District of Maine and a second time in the Southern District of New York. In the Maine case I was convicted of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute marijuana and sentenced to the maximum: fifteen years. On my way to the penitentiary to serve that sentence, I was waylaid in New York and told that unless I was ready to cooperate with the government and become a rat, I would be charged again, this time under the so-called kingpin statute, Title 21, United States Code, Section 848, with being the manager and organizer of a continuing criminal enterprise. I faced anywhere from a minimum of ten years up to life in prison with no possibility of parole. I chose not to cooperate and went to trial again. After a second conviction, I was sentenced to a total of twenty-five years and six months in prison.

While in prison, I became a jailhouse lawyer. I studied the law and discovered an illegality in my sentence. I appealed the sentence and won in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. The appellate court vacated my twenty-five-year sentence and remanded me for resentencing before a different judge. After more legal wrangling, I was resentenced to ten years. I maxed out that sentence, but I then had to litigate with the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) and ultimately have the judge order the bureau to release me. Both federal cases and the years of legal warfare, my eight-year sojourn in the vast, brutal American penal system in custody of the BOP, and my eventual courtroom victory that resulted in my being released are detailed in volume two: Kingpin: Prisoner of the War on Drugs .

R ELEASE WAS A heady time. My novel, Smack Goddess , about a lady kingpin drug dealer, written while in prison, was about to be published. I had an advance from my publisher of $20,000 waiting for methe most legal money I had ever earned. Anything seemed possible. Freedom beckoned, and challenged: Get your life back . Or, better still: Make a new life for yourself . And a reminder: Obey the law, asshole. Stay the fuck out of prison.

Several of the friends I made while in prison who had been released were unable to make it out here in the world. They were busted for violating conditions of their parole, or they picked up a new case and were soon back behind bars. Doing serious timeanything over five, ten, or more years in a maximum-security penitentiarywill change you no matter how strong you areits inevitable. I had a lot going for me, far more than most ex-cons coming out of prison. But I was still wrestling with internal demons, doppelgangers, and the self-sabotaging tricksters of my character that had not been fully exorcised even after eight years of punishment, and were just lying in wait to resurface and play havoc with my peace of mind. As I was about to learn, getting out of prison, and staying out, and really getting free from the prison in ones head is in many ways more of a challenge than surviving long-term imprisonment.

S OME NAMES HAVE been changed to protect the privacy of dear friends and lovers, as well as those who have never been captured, and who may still be active in the marijuana underground and cannabis black market even as the mysterious outlaw spiky green-leafed plant becomes semilegal. The status of cannabis has changed dramatically since my arrest and imprisonment. It has gone from the weed with roots in hell to legal medicine and recreational refreshment available over the counter in some thirty American states, and in foreign countries, including our enlightened neighbor to the north, Canada.