Rubin Hurricane Carter - Eye of the hurricane: my path from darkness to freedom

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Carter, Rubin, 1937

Eye of the hurricane : my path from darkness to freedom / Rubin Hurricane Carter with Ken Klonsky ; foreword by Nelson Mandela.

p. cm.

Includes index.

ISBN 978-1-56976-568-5

1. Carter, Rubin, 1937 2. PrisonersUnited StatesBiography. 3. Judicial errorUnited States. 4. Criminal justice, Administration ofUnited States. I. Klonsky, Kenneth. II. Title.

HV9468.C376A3 2011

.6092dc22

[B]

2010038527

Interior design: Mayfly Design (www.mayflydesign.net)

Short excerpts from this book appeared in an interview with Rubin Carter by Ken Klonsky (edited by Andrew Snee) for The Sun magazine, August 2003, entitled Going the Distance: Rubin Carters Long Journey from Convict to Crusader.

2011 by Dr. Rubin Hurricane Carter, LL.D., and Ken Klonsky

All rights reserved

Published by Lawrence Hill Books

An imprint of Chicago Review Press, Incorporated

814 North Franklin Street

Chicago, Illinois 60610

ISBN 978-1-56976-568-5

Printed in the United States of America

5 4 3 2 1

Contents

Acknowledgments

Foreword

Nelson Mandela

Preface

Ken Klonsky

Introduction

A Prisoner of Ignorance:
Living in Darkness

Chapter 1

Boys Prison:
Light Where the Sun Dont Shine

Chapter 2

The Prison of Family:
What My Father Didnt Tell Me

Chapter 3

Image and Identification:
Two Ways We Keep Ourselves Asleep

Chapter 4

Surviving Prison:
Awakening to Myself

Chapter 5

The Hole in the Wall:
Finding the Higher Path

Chapter 6

Taking the Work Out into the World:
Turning Water into Wine

Chapter 7

The Rewards and Responsibilities of a Conscious Life:
The Way of a One-Eyed Man

Chapter 8

Why I Left the Association in Defense of the Wrongly Convicted:
Acting Upon the Truth

Chapter 9

Just Enough:
Home Free

Appendix

Where the Law Silences the Truth:
The Tragic Wrongful Conviction of David McCallum

To every human being on this earth who
bravely seeks perfection in themselves by looking inward.

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.

Erasmus, 1510

Kundalini is the force that keeps [us] in a hypnotic state.
To awaken for man means to be dehypnotized.

G. I. Gurdjieff, as translated by P. D. Ouspensky, In Search of the Miraculous

Who you were born to, your social status, where you were born, your religion,
the color of your skin, are all accidental, all part of what can be called the law of accident.
This level of life in which we live and breathe and exercise our beings is controlled
by the law of accident.

Dr. Rubin Hurricane Carter

Acknowledgments

Dr. Carter would like to acknowledge the following people for their contributions to the writing of this book: John Artis, for his love of Truth which allowed me to live long enough to write this book; Sam Leslie, for standing by me as the best friend Ive ever had and for his bravery in taking the work out into the world; Thom Kidrin, for being my lifeline to the world by supplying sustenance for the body and food for the mind during my long prison ordeal; Alonzo Starling, former chief of staff at Innocence International, for keeping me on track and for the pure joy of his company; Judge H. Lee Sarokin, for being my King Solomon and swimming against the current.

The authors would like to thank the late Larry Hoffman, former Canadian Ambassador James George, and the late Annie Jacobsen for their invaluable assistance and encouragement. The authors would also like to recognize Morty Mint of the Mint Agency for his diligent work in shepherding the book to its publication. In addition, they would like to thank Verna Relkoff of the Mint Agency for her incisive edit and reorganization of the manuscript. Finally, the authors would like to thank Sue Betz and Devon Freeny of Chicago Review Press for their editing and their patience.

Foreword

Nelson Mandela

Rubin Carter embarked upon a journey of reconciliation many years ago. His path was longer and more difficult than others who had preceded him, for Rubins Spirit was dead. In his powerful testament, The Sixteenth Round , written more than thirty years ago, Rubin describes the effect on him of the racism and brutality of the American prison system: The treacherous years of living in [prison] had done their job to perfection: they killed my poor heart dead.

His self-diagnosis was hardly surprising: twenty years in prison for a crime he did not commit can kill the strongest of men. The lesson he was learning in prison was that life was capricious... always subjected to someone elses whim. From that analysis it is easy to despair; it is easy to believe, especially as a black man who grew up in a segregated society, that all hope is gone.

It is to Rubin Carters credit, fighter that he is, that he refused to accept his own death sentence, just as he refused to accept the guilty verdict of the state of New Jersey. Rubin chose to live, and his means of living was to seek out his inner self. In that bleakest and most unforgiving corner of the world, prison, Rubin chose to dream, to dream of life beyond the steel bars and concrete walls, a life of helping and a life of peace. The hate that placed him in prison, the hate that was mirrored in his soul, could never be the means of his freedom.

His first step toward freedom was knowing he needed the help of others, that he lived in a larger world where the possibility of good existed. Rubin communicated with the outside world, he read voraciously, and he began to understand. As he writes in this book, The more laws we are under, the less free we are. I lived under paternal law, American law, the law of segregation, criminal justice law, military law, and prison law, so I was never any freer than a slave.... No matter who you are, you are born into the universal prison, the world of sleeping people and mechanical laws.... The only escape from the physical, the metaphorical, or the universal prison of sleep is to wake up!

Rubin woke up in prison and became a free man. Once his freedom became a physical fact, Rubin determined that he must come to the aid of all those languishing in prison for crimes they never committed, the victims of injustice. That has been the life of Rubin Carter since he was released from prison, giving back the work, as he says. At times, the personal price has been steep, but the commitment to give back has never lessened, never faltered.

I commend Rubin Carter and the dedication he has for others. He has journeyed a long way and has touched the hearts and souls of many with whom he has come into contact. His rich heart is now alive in love, compassion, and understanding.

Preface

Ken Klonsky

Highway 209, south and west of Kingston, New York, lined by prosperous villages, farmhouses, and rolling hills, looked and felt on that November morning of 2004 like a bucolic paradise, a gentle road to nowhere. Golden autumn leaves, a blue sky, and a hint in the air of summer past were marred only by the occasional sign to remind us that this was the day after election day, a day on which George W. Bush had won the presidency for the second time.

The closer we approached our destination, the shabbier the villages and the farmhouses became. That destination, Eastern New York Correctional Facility, a gray stone structure built on a disproportionate scale, appeared incongruous in this setting. The width of its frontage gave the impression that the building had no depth, like a movie set for an old-fashioned medieval spectacle. Flanking the prison were two gargantuan turrets shaped like chess rooks. The multi-tiered building with heavily barred windows sent a subliminal message: Leave all hope behind, you who enter here . Maximum security. Minimum hope.