"Chappy"

As I mentioned earlier, God lives in the Yavapai County jail. It’s a very good possibility that He has a myriad of clones that live in jails and prisons all over the world, or perhaps He truly does have the ability to be everywhere at all times. I don’t know for sure, but I do know that no matter how evil and black a person’s deeds may have been to land him or her in jail, they all seem to find God and repent while they are incarcerated.

After working as a detention officer, I then spent five of my years in the jail as an inmate counselor, which gave me a lot of insight into inmate behavior and thought patterns, but I would venture to say it did not hold a candle to the stories and tales Chappy heard. Being a jail or prison Chaplain certainly takes a special kind of person. He or she must be not only kind and forgiving; they must also have the ability to know when they are being manipulated and flimflammed. In Chappy’s case, I would say he was the most streetwise Catholic I have ever known.

Chappy was a rather diminutive man; just slightly round, with a graying beard and merry hazel eyes. He might have resembled Santa Claus if his beard had been longer and he had worn a red flannel hat to cover his balding pate. You rarely saw him without a smile on his face and a good word on his lips.

I don’t know how long Chappy had been Chaplain there in the jail but it was a good while before I came to work there. He was a Deacon in the local Catholic Church and had retired from a secular life working in electronics. Chappy was a very bright guy. I don’t know if he learned his street knowledge from the jail surroundings or if he had had it before he started there. Maybe it was just natural to him.

His favorite activity was in the field of Religious Bullshit. If an inmate came into jail claiming he was a member of The Church Of The Divine Pomegranate and had to have pomegranate wine at every meal, Chappy would take it upon himself to investigate this claim and locate any and all information available regarding The Church Of The Divine Pomegranate. If the inmate’s claim was factual, Chappy would go out of his way to be sure the religious rules be followed, but if not, well, Chappy could be really amusing.

The most common religious claim was that of Judaism and the refusal of the inmate to eat pork. Chappy had very little trouble verifying these claims. He would ask for the inmate’s Rabbi’s name and the temple where he attended. If this information was unknown by the inmate, Chappy could be pretty sure the guy was not a practicing Jew.

If an inmate was a Seventh Day Adventist, and Chappy could verify this, he would see that the inmate got his pastoral visit on Saturday. A true Islamic would be allowed a copy of the Quaran; a Mormon would be allowed a copy of the Book of Mormon. Chappy looked at this as not only the inmate’s Rights, but also the humane thing to do. He was extremely fair and also very patient, but even Chappy had his point of no return.

It all came about when the local police booked a transient named Hobie into the jail for lewd conduct, public consumption and criminal trespassing. It is said that alcohol magnifies a person’s true personality, so if that person is a jerk to begin with, the use of alcohol will turn him into a Super Jerk. That’s pretty much what occurred in Hobie’s case. He came in spitting and cursing and threatening the world, which leads me to pause here and wonder why so many inmates spit? They use it as sort of a means of attack and communication. It’s very common. So common, in fact, that the jail has a supply of “spit masks”, which are mesh hoods that are placed over an inmate’s head so he or she cannot assault every passerby with a glob of spit. Hobie was fitted almost immediately with a spit mask, but not before he managed to get the booking Sergeant and an officer and a nurse.

Fortunately, I was out of range that day and, as I look back, I cannot recall ever being the recipient of a spit attack. I consider myself lucky, and also very agile, which is why I haven’t yet been hit. I suppose the spitting comes from frustration, being the only weapon a handcuffed person has at his or her disposal. Women spit as much as men do, in fact I might wager they are more apt to spit at an officer than their male counterparts. They are also much nastier drunks than men.

Hobie was just not a very nice guy to begin with. His public consumption of Ripple had accentuated his nasty demeanor to the level of Disgusting and he was sharing that with anyone and everyone in sight. He was too difficult when he came in to attempt to print and book him, so, as is protocol in the jail, Hobie was taken upstairs to a holding cell to wait until he sobered up or exhausted himself with his behavior. Once safely secured in the cell, he could yell and spit and carry on to his heart’s content and still not reach anyone physically. There was a small window in the door of the cell, with metal mesh and a hard plastic flap that could be lowered to keep fluids from being propelled across the room.

Chappy was on duty that day and had been observing Hobie’s behavior and the process at hand with his customary quiet interest. He did not generally get involved in such scenarios because he knew very well that there was no use counseling with a drunk. Chappy generally handled more of the social services end of things and offered religious counseling when it was requested. He didn’t enjoy inmates like Hobie any more than the rest of us did and he had a heart that did not ever bleed for them. But he had his clerical collar on that day and happened to have some work to do at the computer just across from the holding cell where Hobie was being housed. It took about ten seconds for Hobie to recognize him as a Chaplain, even in Hobie’s drunken haze, and that was when the tirade began.

“Gimme a Bible an’ I’ll show you all about how I’m being imprisoned for God!” Hobie proclaimed.

Chappy made the fatal error of glancing up.

“It says so! Right there in…in Revelations! It says the innocent are gonna be imprisoned for God!” Hobie continued, now pounding his fist against the metal mesh in the window. “Are you gonna let them imprison me? I got work to do for God!”

Religious ideations are extremely common among the mentally ill and drunks. Don’t ask me why, it’s just a fact. Chappy was used to it and there wasn’t much he had not already heard. Some of them knew their Bibles very well; most knew bits and pieces, like Hobie, and put them together into rambling accounts to suit the occasion. If Hobie had been sober, or even calm and courteous, Chappy might have taken the time to chat with him about his God’s Work, but Chappy knew it would have been a waste of time and he had other things he needed to accomplish that day. So he pretty much ignored Hobie.

This annoyed Hobie - a lot. He began to demand and pound on the door, “I said gimme a Bible! I got a right to have a Bible! Gimme a fuckin’ Bible!”

Hobie was right. He did have the right to have a Bible. All inmates had that right and Chappy was happy to provide Bibles to anyone who asked, even though he still believed his theory about God living in the jail. But in the state Hobie was in, a Bible would have served no useful purpose and would probably have ended up in shreds on the cell floor. Experience had taught Chappy that you don’t give ammunition to a whacko, because he or she will use it against you. He did try to reason with Hobie just a little, telling him that if he would calm down and stop his pounding and threats, he would see about getting him a Bible.

Hobie was not satisfied with that, nor was he willing to try and obey. His voice kept escalating, his pounding intensified, and his demands grew more and more belligerent. “I want a fuckin’ Bible! Gimme a fuckin’ Bible or I’m gonna sue! I have a right to have a fuckin’ Bible!”

This went on for over an hour, his cursing growing more intense by the minute until his demand for a Bible could be heard from one end of the jail to the next. It was only after Chappy had completed his work at the computer and taken his time to be sure he was in control of his own annoyance, that he walked casually over to the holding cell and looked Hobie right in the eye, with a peaceful, knowing smile on his face,

“I’m really very sorry, sir,” Chappy said, “I’ve checked everywhere and I’ve located a King James Bible, a New Testament Bible, a Holy Quaran, a Mormon Bible, a Christian Scientist Reader, a Spanish language Bible and a Jehovah’s Witness Bible and Watchtower…but we are completely out of Fucking Bibles.”

Hobie’s mouth closed with a klomp! And Chappy walked quietly away.