Feature Photo: decade nullPhoto: jgurbisz
This article was originally published in a different magazine under a different name.
What do you do when you find yourself in a Latin American jail cell on a drug charge?
The first thing I noticed about my cell was the stench. It smelled like someone shit in a pan, then pissed in that pan, then cooked that pan on a hot stove. I gagged as the jailer slammed the solid steel door and slid the bolt into place.
“Un momento!” I cried out. “Donde está la luz?” He laughed lightly. “No hay.” Then he was gone.
I found a lighter in my pocket (their search was less than thorough) and examined my cell. I was standing in a quarter-inch of water, overflowing from a hole in the corner. That hole was supposed to be the toilet.
The cell was the size of a standard office cubicle and designed to hold four prisoners, with four concrete slabs protruding from the walls. Rats, big motherfuckers, started to squeeze under the door to investigate. I climbed onto one of the high bunks, away from the rats and the fetid water, praying to God that there would not be any more surprises. There was a small window near the bunk, but no moon.
Never had I imagined that I was going to end up in a third world jail. I’d never even been to a first world jail, and this isn’t the kind of thing a person should plunge into headfirst. You should be able to warm up to it—maybe with a disorderly conduct charge and a night in the drunk-tank back in Seattle, for practice.
But I was a science geek. My time in a research laboratory, staring at bacteria all day, did nothing to prepare me for the isolation and squalor of a Central American prison.
The story began six months earlier, on April 12th, 2007. That morning I received a phone call informing me that I had been awarded a prestigious travel fellowship. A U.S. university was going to pay me to travel for eight months, by myself, in two different regions of the world.
Photos: author
The farthest I had ever traveled before was a quick jaunt over the Mexican border for cheap tequila. All my friends were jealous.
Three months later, I flew into Cancun and hopped on a bus heading for Guatemala. The first few days were filled with apprehension and horror: I had no fucking clue what I was doing. For example: I paid an “exit tax” to a border official when I left Mexico, only to be informed by a fellow traveler some days later that Mexico doesn’t have an exit tax—which made sense, since I had watched the border guard tuck my 200 pesos ($20) into his overstuffed wallet.
I learned as I went, riding buses through Guatemala and hitchhiking across Honduras, studying Spanish and climbing mountains. I whiled away long days lounging in hammocks, reading books about Central American political history. I basked in the sun on white sand beaches, smoked joints, and went diving in the warm waters of the Caribbean.
Nicaragua is the second-poorest country in the western hemisphere, an ideal place to study Spanish if you’re trying to stretch your money as far as it will go. I arrived in Granada anxious to start a new round of Spanish classes.
The locals seemed proud of their city: Granada represents a modern Nicaragua, where $200-a-night hotels, Irish pubs, and high-end tourists line the ancient stone streets. To me, Granada represented just another tourist attraction. This was not what I expected.
The euphoric cloud I had been riding during my first two months was evaporating, and I was beginning to feel homesick. I spent the week in a state of melancholy, half-heartedly studying Spanish, anxiously waiting to finish my classes so I could get out of the city.
I was desperate to recapture a bit of the adventure that had fueled my first two months on the road. I was about to get more of it than I wanted.
On the morning of my arrest, I woke up in a funk. (I’d lost one of my three pairs of fancy travel underwear—one-third of my total underwear collection at that point.) Things started to look up when I arrived at school and my Spanish teacher, Omar, asked me if I wanted him to buy some pot for us to smoke that night.
I have been a more than casual smoker since I was 14, and decided before the trip even started that—despite the penalties—I wasn’t going to quit smoking. I enthusiastically handed over 100 Cordobas (about five dollars) and agreed to meet him in Parque Central later that night.
We met as planned and started walking down Granada’s cobbled streets towards my hostel. As we walked, Omar pulled a small plastic baggie containing about two grams of pot from his pocket and handed it to me for inspection. I quickly glanced at the bag and slipped it into my pocket as we continued on.
I was in a better mood than I had been for days when a voice yelled “parese!” (“stop!”). I turned and saw an obese cop precariously perched on the handlebars of a bicycle, peddled by an old Nicaraguan man struggling to keep the bike upright. Awkwardly dismounting from the handlebars, the cop rushed over to us. Omar said “fuck” (in English), and we were up against the wall.
After searching Omar, the cop turned to me. He quickly found the bag and said: “You are in big trouble.” This must have been one of the only English phrases he knew because he kept repeating it over and over again. That and “take it easy” any time I tried to speak to him.
The gentleman on the bicycle had ridden past us a few minutes before. I remembered him staring, but I didn’t think anything of it at the time. He had probably seen Omar hand me the bag and, thinking he might extract some money from the situation, found the first policeman he could. I offered to pay a “fine.” The fat cop refused. I offered again. He refused again, handcuffed me, and took me to jail.
We stopped at my guesthouse on the way so I could retrieve my belongings. At the jail, I was ordered to remove all my valuables from my bag so that they could be entered into the evidence log. I had been planning on leaving the next day to hitchhike the east coast of Nicaragua and went to an ATM to take out the cash I would need for two weeks. When all was said and done I had over $900.
Throw in an iPod, a camera, and a watch and there was well over $1,200 in cash and electronics sitting on the counter. It is profoundly uncomfortable to watch someone count out your traveling money, probably over half his annual salary, knowing that he thinks you are a stupid, ignorant, rich American who is about to get exactly what he deserves—which you kind of are.
I lay on my concrete slab for hours, while countless questions raced through my head: When was I going to be released? Would I be able to call my embassy? How long before my parents or my girlfriend started to worry? How long could they keep me here?
I finally willed myself into a fitful sleep. I awoke frequently, once completely confused about where I was. When the reality of the situation hit me, I curled up in a ball on my concrete pad and cried.
Around mid-morning, a female jailer came on duty. She taunted me in Spanish and laughed when I tried to ask questions. She instructed the prisoner in charge of handing out food to give me none, and refused to let me use another cell to go to the bathroom.
That afternoon, I was moved from my soiled cell into a clean(er) one with two other prisoners. My cellmates were very kind to me. When I told them that I had not been given any food, they produced a couple of small bananas and a cup of instant milk.
We spent the afternoon trying to chat. During our halting conversation, I learned that one had tried to kill his wife in a drunken rage, and that the other was an accomplice to the murder of an American woman during a botched robbery three months earlier.
I didn’t really formulate my escape plan—I just started it and realized I would have to keep going no matter what. I began clutching my chest and complaining about the size of the room, then pacing quickly and working myself into a panic. I told my cellmates that I needed medicine for my heart and asked them to call the jailer.
She looked in on us, slammed the door shut, and began walking away when my cellmates came to my rescue. They shouted at her to come back, and soon prisoners in other cells began shouting, too. Five minutes later, she returned with her boss who escorted me down to an office. He screamed furiously at me while I stood, feigning chest pain and asking to see a doctor.
Luckily, they did not want to take the chance that some American kid might actually keel over and die in their jail. Can you imagine the paperwork associated with that sort of fuckup?
Two hours later my travel-angel arrived. Inspector Amaru was one cool guy. He was like the detective you see on TV who drives a car that is way out of his pay grade, sleeps with gorgeous female officers, and busts the really bad motherfuckers without breaking a sweat. He also spoke fluent English.
He led me to the cafeteria and offered me a cigarette and a plate of gallo pinto. After I wolfed down my meal and sucked my cigarette down to its filter, he explained that he was going to take a statement. If he believed me, he would try to help me. If he thought I was lying, that was the end of our time together. Obviously, I spilled my guts.
As he had promised, Amaru went out of his way to help me. He called the police commissioner at home and convinced him to let me out due to my “medical condition.” I was released—my passport and belongings were not—and instructed to return Monday morning, at which time I would sign a formal statement and meet with the commissioner.
On Monday morning, I went to the police station filled with nervous anticipation. I spent the first hour giving a formal statement, with Amaru translating and an officer taking dictation on a decrepit typewriter that looked like it had seen action in the Nicaraguan Revolution.
Then I was led into the commissioner’s office. Again, Amaru translated as the commissioner said he could not waive the charges against me because they were drug-related. “If you had robbed someone or beaten someone up this would not be a problem, but this is out of my hands,” he said. There needs to be a trial.”
I felt as though I had been punched in the stomach. Leaving the police station, I felt like I was about to have a complete breakdown. Amaru calmed me down and told me a friend of his was a good lawyer and that we would see her immediately.
I had expected an office building, but we pulled up in front of a bar. My lawyer was sitting at the bar, drinking a beer and chatting with some friends. She came over and talked quickly with Amaru but not with me. I started freaking out again. “Don’t worry,” Amaru assured me casually. “We’ll meet her at the courthouse tomorrow morning and we’ll see the judge then. You want some lunch?”
On Tuesday morning, Amaru picked me up and I rode to court on the back of his motorbike in a complete downpour. We were soaking wet and dripped on the floor throughout the pre-trial hearing. A trial date was set for that Friday and I was released on my own recognizance, meaning I could get my passport and belongings. I paid my lawyer via Amaru and he drove me back to my hostel. When we arrived, he handed me my passport and said solemnly: “I would be out of the country by Friday if I was you.”
We shook hands and I just stood there repeating “gracias” over and over until he pried his hand away. He gave me a small grin and hopped on his bike, never asking for anything in return for all the help he had given me.
The following morning, I slipped out of my hostel before dawn and boarded a southbound bus. Three hours and three buses later, I was at the Costa Rican border. Somehow, I managed to walk through Immigration without freaking out. I was in Costa Rica.
I hitchhiked south. By nightfall, I had arrived on the Pacific coast in a small surf town called Samara Beach. After checking into a guesthouse I took a long walk, basking in the fading sunlight and enjoying the fresh coastal air. I passed a young Costa Rican surfer sitting on the beach lighting a joint. “lo quieres?” (“Want some?”) he asked grinning. “Hay policia aquí?” I asked, smiling slightly.
“Soy un policia!” he laughed. He handed me the joint. We sat chatting amicably and leaning back on the sand, watching the sun set over the Pacific Ocean. It felt good to be free.
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44 Comments... join the discussion!
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Man alive! What a riveting, terrifying story. Wow!
Thanks for sharing this story. Not everyone would be as lucky/unlucky.
Well told!
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Brilliantly told story–you had me sweating. Yikes.
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Wowwww, that’s more than a little terrifying. You captured me right from the beginning.
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Weren’t you worried that the man in Costa Rica was another trap?
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So I take it you learned nothing from the experience?
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My thoughts exactly
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This story seemed pretty dumb to me. Not only did the writer act like a pampered ass, but he apparently learned nothing from the situation and the second chance granted by a kind stranger. Reading between the lines, it just doesn’t add up right. Why would the guards treat him like that except to punish him for some sort of disrespectful/disruptive behavior? I was trying to give him the benefit of the doubt until the end of the story, when he bragged about going back to what got him in trouble in the first place. I then added “stupid” to the liar, faker, selfish weenie list of personality traits shown. Yuck.
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Heather – this is a pretty rude comment that doesn’t really add anything to dialogue here.
The story seems very straightforward and honest to me. The author isn’t trying to make himself appear to be a prince, nor is he begging for mercy or pity from his readers. He says he was naive when he began traveling and he paid an unnecessary fine leaving Mexico. He doesn’t try to boast about how much he’s learned or explain why he got duped, as many travelers would do. He admits straight up, with no pretension, that he had no clue what he was doing.
He even says : “he thinks you are a stupid, ignorant, rich American who is about to get exactly what he deserves—which you kind of are.” This is a pretty huge, humble admission that he had no idea what he was doing and, to a certain extent, he got what was coming to him. I wonder how you conclude from this that he’s a liar, faker, stupid, selfish, etc?
Besides, the article is written in a very straight-up, tell-it-like-it-is tone. It’s not meant to be a heartwarming story entitled How I Learned Never To Take Drugs Abroad. Nor is it meant to be a Please Feel Bad for Me and The Horrors I Faced kind of tale. I think the whole thing is hilarious (they show up in the courtroom soaking wet?) and terrifying at the same time. A great travel story, overall.
I wonder how many people have been in similar situations?
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I don’t know, Sarah. He certainly admits fault, but the story itself seems like its designed to illicit sympathy; I agree with Heather about the end – if he had just cut off everything before Costa Rica, I’d accept it as a reasonable, albeit misguided adventure. But he goes right back to what got him in trouble.
Reminds me of one of the books I read on an Aussie’s experience being jailed in Thailand for twenty years on drug charges. Sure, he admits fault, but the fact that he’s writing a book on the experience says more that he wants others to think the authorities are more in the wrong than he is; that’s not facing responsibility for one’s actions.
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Turner, Nicaragua and Costa Rica may be separated only by a border checkpoint, but they are socially and economically different worlds. Puffing on a joint on the beach in Samara isn’t much more of a risk than doing the same walking down any street in the Mission district of San Francisco. Being seen anywhere near a drug deal in Leon or Granada, Nicaragua, however, will have the kinds of consequences the author relates… I’ve been to both countries, many times.
You can buy bottles of Nicaraguan rum for a few dollars, get drunk, and get into a fistfight and, provided you aren’t stabbed or shot as a result and the cops break it up, be let off with a warning or a fine or at worst a few hours in a dirty cell. But light up a joint filled with a substance that turns you into a twinkie-munching tree-hugger and you’re screwed.
So yeah, the authorities ARE in the wrong, there, and most everywhere else, in my opinion anyway, on this front.
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I didn’t say otherwise; the point is, he puts more of the blame on authorities than himself.
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Can you tell me the title of that book?
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4,000 Days : My Life and Survival in a Bangkok Prison
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Interesting reflections from Billy “Midnight Express” Hayes.
http://www.seattlepi.com/movies/156011_midnightexpress.html
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Hey Turner,
Yeah, I guess I just read it as a pretty straight-up account of what happened, not as some great tear-jerking educational story meant to inform young generations of travelers how not to behave on the road. I also don’t think you can compare it to a book written by someone who spent 20 years in jail. This article has a “whew-that-was-a-close-one!” tone to it, not a “listen what I’ve learned after my trials and tribulations” tone to it.
Besides, I see it as largely his problem. I don’t really care if he takes responsibility for his actions or not – I’m not his mother or his teacher, and he’s not asking me to idolize or forgive or pity him. At the end of the day, it’s his problem. I think he can see that it makes a great story, and that’s why he’s telling it.
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my point was that in hindsight Hayes realized he was wrong and not all of Turkey
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Great story, and I’m sure that was a terrifying experience. It doesn’t bother me too much that you didn’t learn from your mistake. Although, I probably would have waited until I was out of a 3rd world country before trying it again so quickly.
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Sarah, after reading back over my post I agree that I was rude. I engaged in some name-calling instead of explaining myself respectfully. I apologize to Ben Phillips for that.
Here’s what I should have said:
It’s understandable to be outraged when violent criminals are treated less seriously than drug users and jails are unfit and inhumane. I’m sure the experience was scary, gross, and horrible, but it seems there’s some key dialogue missing from the author. The way he was treated by the guards sounds personal, not institutional. The article stood out as a glaring example of the “I’m an American and I’m entitled to do and get what I want” attitude that contributes to Americans abroad having a bad rap. The “in your face, Nicaragua!” ending seemed as immature and inappropriate as faking a heart attack instead of asking to contact the U.S. Embassy. What if his “crying wolf” and skipping town prevented the next American arrested there from being given proper medical care or the opportunity to post bail? The choices you make do not just effect yourself and the author struck me as quite narcissistic the whole time.As far as the implication that Costa Rica is free of danger, I have a personal childhood experience that indicates otherwise. While on a trip there, my father was almost arrested for helping save two drowning “fishermen” who turned out to be stowaways that had jumped ship. I don’t know about the police, but the Costa Rican coast guard doesn’t play.
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Yikes, Heather! Your father’s experience sounds disturbing. How did he talk his way out of it?
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We were in a small fishing boat headed on a day trip to a coastal island when we came across two men in the water. I remember noticing their shoelaces tied together and shoes draped around their necks and that they were wide-eyed with fear. They were pretty far from land and on the verge of drowning, with one spitting and sputtering water. They said their boat had capsized, so my father and his friends helped them on board and turned back around. When we hit land, the men acted like they were helping get the boat out but instead took off running. We guessed at what kind of trouble they might have been in while heading back out towards the island. We were met by the Costa Rican coast guard soon after we got there. They had been radioed by a ship that had caught the two men as stowaways, and were headed to pick them up after they jumped overboard. They saw us pick the men up and figured it was a planned rendezvous. My father and his two male Costa Rican friends were questioned intensely for about half an hour and then told to leave the island and go home. My father doesn’t think anything he said prevented him from being arrested, and that his wife and 3 young children being on board was the deciding factor in the coast guard captain’s decision.
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Thanks for sharing this story, Heather. Wow. Really intense. It makes you think about what locals in that country must go through. What if your Dad had been Costa Rican? Scary. I wonder what those two guys who were in the Nicaraguan prison with Ben are dealing with right now.
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I don’t even know what to say. I’m stunned. And I’d much rather have read this story than had the chance to have written it. I’m assuming we’re hoping there are no extradition agreements for two-bit (or two-gram) drug crime suspects with Nicaragua?
As for people treating folks badly just on the basis of their beliefs, appearance or nationality, I don’t know why some readers have a hard time believing it could happen in Nicaragua, if it could (and does) happen nearly everywhere.
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Thanks for the story. A writer who writes like he talks, curses, openly admits doing drugs, and whose story doesn’t have some cliche “enlightenment” moment ; it’s actually refreshing. I don’t understand the complaints about the ending of the story. Clearly the writer did learn a lesson; he asked if there were any cops around before hitting the joint. He is a man made wiser by his travels.
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What a terrifying, but gripping story. My eyes were bugging out from the very beginning. Glad to hear you’re safe!
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sweet story. loved the joint-hitting at the end. made me feel kind of nervous.
knowing there are all these kinds of sharks out there (like the fat one riding up on the bicycle), i’m only able to really relax in places they just can’t get to, places where you have to hike in.
i guess that goes for here in the US as well.
but a note on nicaragua–i got jacked at the c.r. / nicaragua border. i’d taken a taxi from liberia (mistake, take the bus), and wasn’t fluent spanish at that point. the driver dropped me off at a fake ‘checkpoint’. they put some bullshit stamp in my passport, took like $20 and then when I walked out and saw the real checkpoint I started screaming hijos de puta and swinging my surfboard around.
sometimes being the ‘crazy’ gringo gives you a little space but that was the last time i ever had to play that role. downstream i learned spanish, learned how to keep more low profile (no taxis), and yeah. . .
there’s always these sharks out there though–riding up one bikes, pretending to be your ‘friend,’ anywhere and everywhere.
cuidado.
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Wow, you have met your quota for travel adventures! I’m glad to see you made it out alright and with your sense of humor. Thank you for sharing your story!
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Hi everyone, thanks for reading the article I hope you found it entertaining. I just wanted to say a couple of things really quickly.
1. The story was really intended to be self-deprecating and amusing. I was a complete dumb-ass and ended up in a bad situation. I don’t blame anyone for what happened to me other than myself. This was definitely the stupidest thing I have ever done in my life, and I got really lucky that it didn’t have any far reaching consequences.
2. There was a huge difference between the way the police and the jailers treated me. Without exception every police officer treated me decently. There were two jailers and they were the ones who treated me poorly. I was moved to a better cell because a police officer came to check on me and saw where the jailers had put me.
Heather – I did ask several times to contact the embassy, or a lawyer, or a police officer who spoke English. These requests were answered with replies ranging from “sure, in 15 minutes” to “nope, maybe in a month or two”. I do very often wonder about my actions and whether they put anyone else in harms way. I truly hope not. Nonetheless it is something I think about even today, and you are right my attitude at the time was very self-centered.
3. As g pointed out smoking a joint on Samara beach (especially the far end about half a mile from the town with no one around) is pretty safe. The culture is a lot more tolerant there, and while it may seem that I didn’t learn a lesson from the whole ordeal I don’t think that is true. I am a much more responsible traveler these days. I thought the ending was again, more self-deprecating, and really was supposed to be funny.
Anyway, thanks for the comments everyone.
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Now knowing more of the story I feel bad about the assumptions I made and much of what I said. I didn’t get your sense of humor and mistook it for cockiness. Reading it again in the context you just gave made me enjoy it this time around. Thank you for sharing your story, providing additional details, and know that I learned something.
Also, I think it’s quite scary that they didn’t let you contact the embassy…
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Heather, you just demonstrated the positive potential of the comments feature. This is how it’s supposed to work. Thank you!
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I second that, Hal!
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Absolutely! And it goes to show how we all can read things differently, depending both on who we are and even what space we are in at the moment.
And thanks, Ben, for engaging in the conversation and not getting upset about the comments. Can’t say I always do the same!
I thought it was an amazing piece.
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to me, part of travel is about making mistakes and learning from them. thus, in short, FAIL.
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What a story! Was ended in a cocky way but I’m glad you have done the follow up comment Ben it was how the original story should have ended, I bet you won’t be smoking in Nicaragua again
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It was a great story, and I liked the guy…until the end. Like many of the previous commenters, this ruined it for me. And whether or not, as “g” replied to Turner above, Costa Rica is liberal with drug use doesn’t matter. I’d be hesitant to spark up in Amsterdam after that experience.
I did, however, think that was genius to fake a medical problem. Nice one.
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I hope you changed the name of the guy who helped you out, you know anyone can read this…
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One also needs to keep in mind that despite what movies and even the news depicts, most countries in South America look at drug offenses very seriously (officially). There are a couple of reasons, first of all, we all know where cocaine comes from. If an American agency takes a look at a South American country and sees that they aren’t arresting American’s on drug offenses, they’re going to take a hard look at that country’s drug trafficking problems. None of these countries want that reputation. Another reason, also related to reputation is that they don’t want to become what is known as a “drug tourism” destination. I would be glad you were able to slip out of there after only a few days, they could have kept you in that dingy cell for months if they wanted. Next time if you’re in a public place with weed, keep the damn bag in your pocket.
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On the upside, now you can tell friends and family that you are a fugitive in certain countries!
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No one said Costa Rica was free of danger. They said drug charges weren’t as strongly enforced. Your story has nothing to do with drugs and is thus irrelevant.
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except for the fact that he now knows that jails in south-America suck,
he also learned that no matter what people do or say u should stick to your opinion
and not be a tool of a corrupt executive, “high five” friend for righting about your experience i think we could all learn a little off of this↵ -
I’m a pot smoker, and I totally sympathized. This story had me in a panic, and proud in the end. It was entertaining and informing. It was an experience that had to be told of.
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It’s a good story — still, if there’s one thing you should know is not to mess with drugs, guns or anything else potentially illegal. The rules for the locals often do not apply to us in the same way. Any idiot could’ve told you that.
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