Published: Dec 1, 2004
Modified: Dec 1, 2004 6:53 AM
Life halts at death row's door
Alan Gell has knowing words for Matthew
Grant: Life on death row is no life at all
By AMY GARDNER, Staff Writer
When a prison officer escorted Alan Gell to death row, his
young imagination had convinced him that he'd be living among the likes
of Charles Manson and Hannibal Lecter.
"The door behind me just shut and made a noise, and when the door
in front opened, people were standing around trying to see who's coming
in," recalled Gell, who was freed this year after a new trial. "I
looked back and realized I was alone. There wasn't a guard there to walk
me through."
Then, in the large common room he'd just entered, Gell heard one of the
other red-suited inmates say: "Dang. They're sending babies here
now."
In many ways, Gell, 19 when he was first arrested, came of age on death
row -- much as Matthew Grant will if he is sentenced to death this week
for shooting Wake County Sheriff's Deputy Mark Tucker. Gell learned to
pass the days reading novels and the newspaper, writing letters. His mother
and young sister learned to live without him. And he learned that, one
by one, he would lose his new friends as their execution dates came and
went.
Last month, Grant, 19, was convicted of first-degree murder. A jury now
must decide whether to sentence him to death or to life in prison with
no possibility of parole. The differences between the two are wide.
If Grant receives a life sentence, he probably will be sent to either
Polk Youth Institution in Butner or Western Youth Institution in Morganton.
Both operate full-fledged schools and require all their inmates who do
not hold high school diplomas to attend, said Department of Correction
spokesman Keith Acree.
If Grant goes to death row, however, he will be allowed to learn little.
Death row inmates may read books from a library cart or have them sent
directly from a publisher at their own expense. But there is no formal
schooling available to them. Until recently, they were forbidden to take
correspondence courses; now they may if they pay the cost, up front, themselves.
"They're not sent here for education," said Capt. Marshall Hudson,
offering a recent tour of North Carolina's death row cell block at Central
Prison in Raleigh. The pods, as the living quarters are known, have stark
white walls and brilliant red doors, stairs and railings. Two levels of
cells overlook a central day room where inmates can read, do jigsaw puzzles
or watch TV.
The reading material is stacked on the floor in a corner, and limited:
newspapers are popular, as are medieval fantasy novels and Jet magazine.
With life, it's work
If Grant receives a life sentence, he will probably work -- in a prison
laundry, in a canteen, in a kitchen or on a custodial staff.
But death row inmates must remain separate from the general inmate population
at Central Prison at all times. They can't work in the laundry or the
kitchen. There are four or five custodial jobs on the death row cell block,
and one job in the block's canteen -- a tiny closet where inmates can
buy a cup of coffee, a soda, cigarettes, candy or toiletries. The jobs
are coveted, so Grant would not get one for a long time.
"Your life stops," Gell said. "When you go to prison, everything
that you live for, everything that makes life happy and joyful, all the
things that make life meaningful, are taken from you, period. The freedom
to walk to the refrigerator. The freedom to step outside to get some fresh
air. The freedom of shopping and driving and going somewhere. Everything
is just taken from you. Dirt and grass and flowers and birds -- everything."
That part doesn't bother Sabrina Nesbitt. Nesbitt's 16-year-old daughter,
Seleana, was killed in a drive-by shooting in Johnston County four years
ago. Lamorris Chapman, then 17, was convicted of first-degree murder and
sentenced to die.
Nesbitt is not a fan of the death penalty, and she would rather have seen
Chapman sentenced to life without parole. But she is glad for his conviction.
"I think I feel more sorry for his mother than anyone else,"
Nesbitt said. "I know how it is to lose a child. I would never want
the pain I have to go through every day to be on anybody else."
The family's pain
The pain begins for the families of the convicted long before an execution
date is set. At Central Prison, visitation is through glass only. So when
Gell was granted his new trial two years ago, his mom and sister got to
hug him for the first time in years.
That experience is typical for death row inmates or their families. It's
the time, unfilled and unending -- until that inevitable date arrives
-- that defines the lives of those on death row. In other words, Grant
is likely to be left alone with his thoughts for much of the time.
For Gell, that time allowed him to stop blaming the girls whose testimony
helped convict him. Gell was acquitted of first-degree murder in a second
trial that was ordered after evidence surfaced both of his innocence and
of prosecutorial misconduct. Now 30, he lives at home in Bertie County
and takes community-college courses toward a degree in social work.
And even though he has maintained his innocence throughout his legal travails,
Gell admits one thing: his own bad choices led to them. Time in prison,
he says, allowed him to see that -- and to decide that, if he ever were
freed, he would do something to help other young men from going down the
same destructive path of drug abuse and petty crime that he unwisely chose.
"I went back to event after event in my life and looked at the bad
decisions that I made," he said. "And I said, 'I'd really like
to get out and prevent someone from making some of the same bad decisions.'
"
Young men on the row
Grant will have time for similar reflections if he is sent to death row.
He would be the youngest man on death row if he is convicted this year
-- but not the inmate who was youngest at the time of his crime. Four
of the 183 inmates on death row were 17 at the time of their crimes.
This year, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to consider abolishing the death
penalty for those under 18 at the time of their crimes. The court heard
arguments in the Missouri case earlier in the year; a decision is expected
by summer.
Whatever the outcome of that case, it wouldn't affect Grant, who was 18
when he shot Deputy Mark Tucker. If Grant receives the death penalty,
the death row cell pods, with their blazing red doors, are likely to be
his final home.
Staff writer Amy Gardner can be reached at 829-8902 or agardner@newsobserver.com.
© Copyright 2004, The News & Observer Publishing Company,
a subsidiary of The McClatchy Company
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