one night in Hennepin county jail

Since I expect a lot of arrests to be made during the next 4 years, maybe it's worth recounting my experience 2.5 years ago when I was arrested. I spent only 1.5 days in jail. I don't have anything earth-shattering to reveal, although there are obvious problems in this government process. If nothing else, it's at least a data point for any other comparisons.

Click to read the 20 points when you have lots of time to spend...

I'll recite my points chronologically. I'm sorry it's so long, but individually they seemed like important points to mention.

1. The officers who touched me at least were straightforward and polite. I have a very different opinion of Officer Roid Rage who led them. I heard more than once that they were "just following orders", to which I replied, "A lot of bad things in history happened for that very reason."
   
   
2. I heard no Miranda rights at any point. I don't think police are required to stay silent on this point, but they are no longer required to tell prisoners their legal rights.
   
   
3. The back seat of the police vehicle was designed specifically with no ability to sit without discomfort. It's meant to annoy you from the start, with the back shaped weirdly so you can't sit normally.
   
   
4. When I changed clothes to prison uniform, I had curtained privacy and an opportunity to use a bathroom alone there, which seems considerate.
   
   
5. They took away my good air filter mask and gave me a simple surgical mask instead. It was better than nothing, at least. When I tried to sleep at night (more on that topic later), I made sure to pull the flimsy blanket up over my face to help filter the air. Later, I never got sick or tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, so I'm hopeful that I somehow escaped infection during my stay.
   
   
6. The officer who took away my personal belongings tried repeatedly to get me to unlock my phone, so I could look for telephone numbers. I declined, assuming they wanted easy access to peruse my phone. I had already written a contact number on my skin on my arm, which I always do before joining any public protest, something I learned from the Occupy experience.
   
   
7. This first intake area was at a parking area under a downtown Minneapolis building. After the photographs and clothes change, I was walked to the next area. We had to walk a long tunnel underground to a different building. I have heard stories about this hallway before. Inmates would enter one side healthy then emerge from the other side with new injuries, saying there was no camera to catch the abuse in this blind spot. When I was walked down the corridor, I did spot a camera. Whether it was functional or not, I have no idea, but at least it was there.
   
   
8. During booking, they took photographs. They took electronic fingerprints, so there's no more ink and paper. They offered what seemed at the time a requirement that I make voice recordings, so I could access the telephones in prison. I wish I had declined, wondering now what other option they could have offered me instead. The government now has my voice profile on record. Their script had me speak different sentences until the system could recognize my identity. This supposed phone access is important for later.
   
   
9. They had a small kiosk to help locate a lawyer. Great. I entered my info. It told me that I didn't qualify for a public defender, then it offered no other information whatsoever. At no point during my stay in jail did I ever know how properly to contact any lawyer.
   
   
10. I was given a paper booklet, sort of a "Welcome to Hennepin Jail" kind of thing. It was a lot better than nothing at all, but it didn't actually help me with anything important.
    
    
11. I was taken to yet another intake area. Here, a guy behind a counter asked me questions and took my answers. He asked, "Are you gay?" (Or was it "Are you homosexual?") I said, "Yes." He did a double-take. He explained that that term means I used to be female and was now male, or something stupid to that effect. I said something like, "No, it doesn't. I'm gay, but you can record it however you need to." I'm guessing I am recorded in Hennepin county records as heterosexual, because the officer lied, even about something as simple as this.
    
    
12. I was taken to a room with several beds in it, about 10. Some guys had taken double mattresses, but luckily I found a bed that already had one, so I put on the sheets and laid down. Boring place. Plenty of food and gunk on the 2-story-high ceiling. There was a television always on during daytime. At some point, I heard somebody ask the guards to change a station, and they did.
    
    
13. There were a few phones on the wall in the cell, by the bathroom, near the door. I tried and failed repeatedly to call foeclan outside, so he could feed my cat if I was stuck here for a while. I didn't care about getting out myself, as long as Hope was cared for. I never reached him. The call always failed. I didn't learn until later that it's because these jail phone systems only make collect phone calls, which many cellular networks (who has land lines any more?) do not accept. There was no free phone call for me, despite having the phone number clearly printed on my arm.
    
    
14. The prepared food trays were better tasting than I expected. No gluten-free options, so I just avoided the wheaty bits. There were occasional deliveries of medications. I think some of my cell mates were in drug withdrawal, so they sometimes had messages they asked guards to deliver to nurses somewhere.
    
    
15. At night, a guard came in every 15 minutes or so. The was a loud and heavy noise as the bolts unlocked and locked. There was no way to sleep through that kind of continuous interruption. The next day was exhausting, since I didn't sleep properly. Around 4am, I think, several more people were delivered. They were probably the 2am arrests (bar closing hour) finally getting processed and sent to the cell. A guard gently griped at people who had multiple mattresses and told them to put the mattresses back on the empty beds, so everyone could lay down.
    
    
16. Around 6am, I think, something was delivered into the room. I had no idea what it was, and the guards said nothing. A while later, another guy seemed familiar with the process and started cleaning. I guess we're responsible for all of the cleaning too? I hadn't thought that far ahead. It took some effort, but I scrubbed those metal tables to get some of the food off. Later, the cleaning supplies were taken away again.
    
    
17. I called and asked a guard for a phone number for the lawyers at ACLU. I figured, maybe they'd at least talk to me, given the nature of the arrest. A guard delivered a paper note with a number on it. I couldn't reach them by phone either. I overheard another inmate calling his public defender. I asked him if I could write down his number. There was a pencil stashed in the room, so we could write on paper booklet. I called the number, reached an answering machine, so I left a message. I explained that I couldn't call my outside contact, I couldn't reach the ACLU either, and could they notify my contact on my behalf so I could make sure my pet is fed?
    
    
18. After lunch, I think, I finally got into the shower. While I was washing my hair, a guard said I had a meeting with the public defender. (It would've been nice to know a few minutes earlier.) I dried and dressed as quickly as I could. I was taken to a nearby hall and left in an individual room. There is no sound proofing! I clearly heard another inmate talking with the public defender. This inmate said he was gay too, so I wasn't the only one there overnight. But do the nearby guards just a few meters away also listen to all of this supposedly private legal discussion? I couldn't NOT hear it.
    
    
19. Minutes before I had my lawyer talk (I could hear them "winding down" their discussion), the guard came in and said many of us were being street released. In other words, the jail was full on Friday afternoon, and they needed space for weekend arrests. I didn't think to go back to the room to recover that county jail booklet. My fellow cell inmates were already in the hallway, lined up to leave. I joined them in line and never did get to see the lawyer.
    
    
20. Exit process seemed slower than intake, but that's maybe just perspective. I eventually got my clothes back on then exited back out onto the street in downtown Minneapolis. I finally made that call to foeclan, who graciously made a long drive from south metro to pick me up and deliver me to where I had parked my car before getting arrested. Thankfully, it was still there.

Basically, everything you learned about police process from years of watching television is a complete lie. Except for the part that the police will lie about anything. They'll lie even about something as simple as whether or not I am gay. There is no more Miranda reminder. There is no free phone call, unless you're lucky and have a recipient on the right phone network. There is no free lawyer. I never actually received any of those things.

On top of that, which was just for domestic police service, Trump wants the U.S. Supreme Court to excuse him from having to return people to U.S. soil that he ordered arrested illegally, while he also proposes sending full U.S. citizens to jails in other countries. What could go wrong?