Louis Singleton | Walk In Those Shoes

After being in this prison system more years than I have lived on the streets, I’m feeling things I’ve never felt before – like my life was a waste. The world is almost thirty years ahead of me. When I think of people, I think of what life was like outside this prison in 1994. I still see the people who were once my school mates as kids. I still feel like a kid. I was one when I came here. I don’t still think like a kid, but I still shoot basketball and exercise just like when I left the world. I am 44.

I’ve spent over half my life thinking about the events that led up to the night of January 11, 1994 – the day before my eighteenth birthday. Mobile is different now. If I lived there now, it never would have happened. There is a Coalition Against Bullying now. They have Anti-Bullying Awareness Weeks. There is something called a ‘Bullyblocker’. You text a number if you are being bullied – your text goes straight to the District Attorney’s office. I guess it’s too late for me to text that. I did contact the right people at that time though. I went to my parents, the school, and the police. It’s all on record. I just didn’t have that Bullyblocker number. I would have used it if I had – and I wouldn’t be here.

What makes me different than a kid that lives in Mobile today? I was bullied by men that didn’t even go to my high school. There is no doubt the things that were done to me would have gotten a response if I had texted a hotline. It exceeded bullying. I was pushed around, chased, stalked – I was in high school and shot at on more than one occasion. If none of that had happened, what happened on January 11, 1994, wouldn’t have happened. People make excuses for themselves all the time. That’s not what this is. That’s just reality. If the people who were supposed to had resolved the issue like they were supposed to, I, Louis Singleton, Jr., would never have done what I did. I wasn’t raised to hurt anyone. That’s not who I was or am.

I’m smarter though. I refuse to give into the criminal life. I get on to young brothers who can’t seem to give up the drug life – until I break it down for them. They have big dreams of being Big Time Drug Dealers. They call me Unk. I try to encourage them to get out and do better for themselves. The at-home training my late mother gave me is embedded heavily in me. Knowing the difference between right and wrong will always be in me, no matter where they send me.

I’m living in the Alabama prison system, one of, if not the, worst prison system in America. Respect is at an all time low, but I never disrespect anyone, never have, never will. My mom taught me better. I hope those that were affected by my actions forgive me. I don’t expect them to understand because, truly, you’d have to walk in my shoes. You’d have to be the seventeen year old kid who was getting shot at. I don’t want that for anybody.

They see me as a ‘violent offender’. I’m not violent. That label doesn’t make me violent. I was seventeen, and it was a violent crime that never would have happened if I had been able to text that magic number and get help. I’m not even allowed to talk at my own parole hearing. They don’t see me. They see ‘violent offender’.

My first coach told me to never give up, no matter how badly you are losing the game. I haven’t forgotten that to this day. It’s the fourth quarter, the score is 44-10, the other team has the ball with 3:54 left on the clock. Play hard until the clock says 0:00. One time I was in a game playing defensive back, and a guy beat me on a broken coverage. He was running to the end zone, and I was chasing him. He got so far in front of me, I stopped pursuing him. He scored. I got chewed out heavily for that. Anything could have happened. He could have dropped the ball. From that day on, I’ve never given up.

ABOUT THE WRITER: Mr. Singleton’s story can be found here. WITS is grateful for his honest and heartfelt writing, and I hope he continues to write about his life in the Alabama Department of Corrections. Louis Singleton can be contacted at:
Louis Singleton #179665
Fountain Correctional Center
9677 Highway 21 North
Atmore, AL 36503

“My mind was racing with thoughts I couldn’t even grasp mentally. I went home and sat in the house with all the lights out, scared to move, didn’t know what to do nor to say. My mom was gone to a choir convention in Mississippi during the time of the incident. While I sat in our house quietly and somberly in the front room, my mother pulled up with no clue of what just happened. When she came in the door, turned to lock the door, I was sitting there in the dark room. I scared her out of her wits. As a mother who knew her child, she instantly asked me, ‘Boy, what’s wrong with you sitting in here with all the lights out?’ I was so discombobulated I honestly couldn’t speak, it seemed like somebody had my soul…”

It’s been twenty-six years for me now. I’m in solitary confinement and have been for almost six months. It’s the first long stretch I’ve done in lock-up, and I’ve learned if you aren’t mentally strong, it can break you. I’ve thought about everything from being three years old, to that day, to this place I am in now. I’ve probably aged ten years in the last six months, but I think I’ve made it. My blood pressure is crazy, but I think I’ve put it under control by relaxing and focusing on better things.

I was seventeen and still in high school when my mom came home that night. I’d just shot at some men. For months I’d been shot at, intimidated, ‘bullied’, by an adult. I’d sat in a car as it was beaten with a crow bar. I’d had a gun pointed at my head. My parents knew, the school knew, the police knew. They all knew. I can never take back what happened that night.

I now understand what they mean when people talk about the school to prison pipeline. Things are a little different now in Mobile, Alabama, where I came from. I hear there are anti-bullying laws in place to protect kids like I was. There are laws to keep kids from being followed around and shot at, as well there should be. No kid should ever have to grow old in a place like this. No kid should ever be expected to know how to make people stop shooting at them.

I went from going to high school, playing football and dreaming, to living in a nightmare. No, I can’t take it back. I should never have had to. It should have never gotten to that night in my living room.

ABOUT THE WRITER: Mr. Singleton’s story has been shared here, but this is the first time he has written for WITS. I hope he continues to write about his life in the Alabama Department of Corrections. Louis Singleton can be contacted at:
Louis Singleton #179665 0-24
Fountain Correctional Facility
9677 Highway 21 North
Atmore, AL 36503

Walk In Those Shoes

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