Through Leadership Savannah, I recently toured the Chatham County jail. Although corrective services like Savannah Impact Program are impressive, the job of deterring crime is daunting. Recidivism is reality. My toe-blistering walk through long hallways of teeny windows was enlightening. Yet, a different walk I had with a friend also sheds light.
Strolling along a dirt road, Ronnie asked, “You see that moss on the tree over there?” Ronnie didn’t call it “Spanish moss.” “That’s how you scrub squirrel.” As we wandered, Ronnie shared his frustration of a night spent in jail when he was “falsely” accused of stealing. The conversation developed into a great lesson in hunting.
Ronnie encouraged me not to hunt in the summer. That is when the red bugs, diseases and more are prevalent, and it’s dangerous to eat the animals you shoot.
“Wait till that first day when you come out of your house and you see that glittering water on the grass. That frost is winter and it kills all them bugs. Also mating season is done,” he said.
I wondered why mating season is important, but didn’t ask.
“Till I knew about not shooting during mating season, I got me a coon, cleaned her up and cut her open. Lord, there… there was a whole bunch of coons, it was terrible. No. Wait till fall and winter and don’t hunt in mating season.”
Ronnie’s heart truly broke when he killed the baby raccoons. I contemplated this fact with interest in light of his next story. “I’m going to tell you something,” he started. “You asked me if I ever went to jail. I was in prison 11 years, 8 months and 21 days.”
He continues, “I took a life. He tried to rape my baby sister. My dad left me in charge, told me to take care of my three sisters and this guy tried to rape her. He beat her. The furniture was all knocked over. She was half-undressed. I came in and scared him away. She was OK, he didn’t rape her. I thought it was over. One day I sees him at the bar. I walked in, saw him there and I turned around and started to walk out. I should have. I wished I had. But I thought I can’t always keep out of places because of other peoples being there. So I went back in.
“He saw me and right away, began ‘Someday I am a gonna finish what I started.’” Ronnie recounts the threat. “‘Yeah, I am gonna get her. She is mine,’ he carried on and on. I turned to leave. He had a gun. He shot at me. I shot back. Really, it was just self-defense. But I didn’t miss. I was mad. Right there I walked back to him and shot him again. I stood over him and unloaded my gun, nine bullets.” As he spoke, Ronnie pointed an imaginary gun down at our path and counted off the nine shots.
My heart raced as I gazed at Ronnie’s towering 6-feet, 3-inch, 325-pound image. We talked about the noise, the commotion and how he waited right there for the police. Ronnie reiterated his commitment to care for his sisters and reassures, “When someone says I am dangerous, I asks, ‘you wanna mess with my sisters? You don’t wanna hurt my sisters, I’m not gonna hurt you.’”
Ronnie continued telling me about prison. The first two years were hard before he met Charlie, a mentor who explained, “Time was time. How you spend it is your choice.” Ronnie chose masonry, construction and studying the Bible.
I wish I could report that Ronnie’s life has totally changed and that he is an upstanding citizen. I can’t. I would like to report a cure for crime, but I can’t do that either. Corrective services are important. My personal skills are in job creation so I spend my days chipping away at unemployment, as I believe job creation creates hope and positive attitudes.
Where are your skills? Are you deploying them with earnest to make our community the best it can be?
Bea Wray is the executive director of The Creative Coast, a not-for-profit organization that promotes the creative and entrepreneurial community within the region. Bea can be reached at 912-447-8457 or bea@thecreativecoast.org.