It was my first time in a prison cell since last August.
Fortunately, no matter how real it felt, it was just an exhibit at the National Museum of Crime and Punishment in Washington, DC. You might say that’s an odd place for an ex-convict who spent 21 years in the federal Bureau of Prisons to be posted up, but there I was, taking in the sight, sounds, and artifacts just like a regular tourist.
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For whatever reason, our country is obsessed with crime and criminals. They permeate our movies, TV shows, and video games. Anything gangster or illicit or criminally-related is a viable commodity in Hollywood these days. From rich alleged killers like Robert Durst to the gangbangers on the street, crime is an endless source of national fascination.
Let’s just say I much preferred the prison cell at the crime museum to the real thing.
The author in a prison cell at the National Museum of Crime and Punishment in Washington, DC. All photos by Diane Ferranti and Tracey Brown
When I walked up the winding stairs at the museum, the first thing I saw was an image of good ol’ Charlie Manson, the counterculture icon and psychopathic killer. Manson’s just about as notorious as you can get, but the Crime Museum was full of established figures, and while I was never locked up with Manson, I am in tune with the criminal underworld.
My wife was with me on this visit, and it wasn’t long before I was joking about putting her in the Shrew’s Violin, a popular form of punishment for suspected witches and quarrelsome wives centuries ago. The apparatus holds the arms and head of the victim in a rigid and unnatural position, which caused terrible cramps and painful muscle strain over hours or days. As soon as I voiced my opinion, however, my wife turned it around and ordered me into a worse predicament: the stocks.
Crime and punishment go together. I know this as fact because I committed a crime by selling LSD and went to prison for it. Maybe for longer then I should have because I didn’t kill anyone, but with the war on drugs in full swing in 1993, it was something I had to endure. There are worse fates—like being beheaded—but I paid my debt to society, and also used the time to make something productive out of my life and become an author. Now I write about crack-era gangsters from America’s inner cities, the street legends who are venerated in hip-hop.
At the Crime Museum, I found that the kind of writing I do goes back a long way.
The dime novels from the Old West helped launch America’s national obsession with outlaw heroes. My own stuff is just a byproduct. Hollywood has glamorized the gunslinger, gangster (and gangsta), and infamous criminals maintain a grip on our national consciousness. The Jesse James Stories exhibited in the Crime Museum are an integral part of the American outlaw mythology that has been romanticized since our country’s founding. Viewing the original dime novel just validated what I do every day.
Of course, no crime museum would be complete without figures from the Wild West, but the pirate exhibit and the lifelike Blackbeard statue caught my eye. Maybe some people go to this museum for the history and to analyze trends, but I was there to see my heroes. For an ex-con like me, the bad guy is the thing. In prison, we always rooted for the bad guy. Tony Montana from Scarface was the man.
As I moved on in the museum, I came across the gangster section, and then came the guns. Even though I cannot legally possess a firearm, I still enjoy looking at them. What criminal or ex-criminal doesn’t?
Checking out the stuff on John Dillinger, Al Capone, and Bonnie and Clyde, I finally felt like I’d moved into the modern era. These were criminals I could understand. They were not only notorious, but they had become Hollywood’s darlings. Their criminal exploits were emblazoned across the walls on large posters; Dillinger’s death mask and the wooden gun he used to break out of jail were in the display case. The car from the Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway Bonnie and Clyde film was on display, bullet holes and all. A shrine to Al Capone was in full effect. This was home.
The halls were packed with people, so many that I had to wait to get photos of myself with all the relics and artifacts in the exhibits. They even had an exhibit with the Don of Dons, the baddest gangster on the planet, John Gotti, with a Tommy Gun and suit on display. (In prison, we used to joke around, like, “Hey you’re a tough motherfucker, what, you got John Gotti on the phone?”)
I eventually made my way to the serial killer section: Manson, John Wayne Gacy, and Ted Bundy. Sick fucks in my book, but our society does seem enthralled with these guys. I took the obligatory photos, including some of the clown outfits associated with Gacy. They seemed sort of out of place, but as I learned in prison, crime takes all types. It’s not always the loudest dog you have to be scared of, either, because the quiet ones will bite you just the same—and usually when you least expect it.
Next was the “You’re Under Arrest” section, where the booking, lineup and prison process was explained to the uninitiated. I’m a seasoned pro when it comes to this stuff, so it didn’t faze me to be around it all. Still, I’d never been in a lineup, so I enjoyed standing there, and it was funny to hear the voices on the intercom telling me to step up and say, “Give me your money!” so a witness might identify me.
From there I moved on to the prison cell. I felt at home, having been in plenty of them. If you do 21 years, you will inhabit quite a number of cells, and I was comfortable sitting on the bed, the top bunk, the desk, or the toilet. I felt like the bright colors I was wearing really set me apart in the drab room; if I’d had that polo shirt in prison, I could’ve sold it for a fortune.
Surprisingly enough, the museum had very little on the prison gangs that control most aspects of prison life. The big four prison gangs from California—Aryan Brotherhood, Mexican Mafia, Black Guerrilla Family and La Nuestra Familia—were all mentioned, but this attraction in the museum seemed somehow incomplete.
Finally, I entered the law enforcement section. Not my favorite spot, for obvious reasons, but between crime and punishment usually comes the police. I got on a police motorcycle to see what it would be like—not really my style, but still.
The crime museum isn’t like the Smithsonian or other museums in DC because it’s privately owned. But even—no, especially—as an ex-con, I enjoyed it, and as a true crime writer, I liked it even more.
Now if I can just figure out a way to get them to cover the crack-era gangsters that I write about—if they’ve got Gotti and all those guys, why not their successors?
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