CHAPTER 5
(No keys for you but please hold this stop sign)
Not even a chuckle. I was certain the Schneider recruiter I was talking to on the phone was an African American woman. In fact, she didn't even have an interest in hearing any parts whatsoever to the story. As soon as she heard the word "bomb" my phone interview with Schneider had come to a brief halt. I can even remember her verbatim words right before she hung up the phone.
"Oh I'm sorry um-mm we can't work with that." *Click*
It was like the shortest interview ever. Even as I write this story almost ten years later I still haven't been able to successfully squeeze into their pumpkin. But that desire eventually went away after I finally met a military man much, much smarter than me named Dave that worked in safety that explained to me why I might want to think twice about jumping into a truck with such an ostensible color like orange. Sure it would be nice when trying to locate an empty trailer among a big lot full of trailers but you should probably be 100% certain you're a super trucker because your bright orange is gonna stick out like a sore thumb on the highways because the majority of the trailers out there are white so do you really want to be the only orange?
I remembered in class that there was an easy company to get into called Warner so I thought I would give them a try. This time I tried a little harder at sugar coating the mail bomb story. I tried to recall some of the more benign terminology I learned behind bars. I was noticing that all the recruiters for these trucking companies were women. I had a Werner recruiter on the phone. I knew eventually the question would arise.
"Ok. Congrats on completion of the schooling. Just one thing though I have to ask. Do you have any felonies on your record?"
"Yes I suppose."
"Okay well what are they. I'll see if I can work with them."
I tried to think of something benign instead of flat out telling her I mailed a Weapon Of Mass Destruction. The Feds really had me screwed with that trumped up Class A felony. Even Mirriam Webster dictionary stated that my little Co2 cartridge couldn't possibly fit the criteria of creating mass destruction. ATF Special Agent John Hageman had even stated in verbatim words "If you wanted to kill somebody this would not be the way to do it."
That's mostly because my teeny tiniest ever IED was never intended in the FIRST PLACE to kill Dr.Sheldon Oscar Burman. I was merely extorting him for the $8,500.00 I felt was stolen for me. Even as I once stated to freelance writer Seamus Mcgraw. "How could I possibly get my money back if the doctor was dead?" And the journalists reply? "You're making a good point."
I tried to fish quickly for a reply for the recruiter of why I had been off the time clock for so many years.
"I umm...I sort of mailed an incendiary device to a plastic surgeon."
Somehow she was able to read through my bullshit and flat out blurted out the cold hard truth.
"You mailed a bomb."
There it was. The cold hard truth. But was it? She stated the word "mailed" in past tense. Wouldn't that mean the recipient would have to have received the parcel? His surgeon hands still looked fine to me in the YouTube video he made still trying to drum up new patients despite Illinois forcing him to surrender his medical license in April 2005, right around the time my Public Pretender double crossed me and got Washington DC involved in my case and I miraculously went from two class C charges to 3 class C charges and the big A, use of a Weapon of mass Destruction. There's a lot of foul play involved with Federal Case number 59017-066 that the public just never came to know about. Like how I almost made bail until a woman barged into the courtroom and greatly frightened the judge during an arraignment hearing stating "Your Honor! The defendant has Bipolar depression and schizophrenia! He needs to be detained!"
And it was a real close one that day too because the old Federal Judge was in a really good mood that day. Just prior to it being my turn in the courtroom he overlooked a real skinny harmless looking old man that violated his parole for failing his drug test. He put that queen trouble maker right in her place that was hellbent on incarcerating the world. I giggled at his comment to the prosecutor.
"Well " Said the soon to retire laid back judge, "I guess we ALL smoked a little bit of pot in our days."
I wasn't a drug user but I had to side with the judge on that one. The skinny old parole violator looked completely played out by the system and it wasn't like he was dealing it. He wasn't contesting anything and he looked so played out with the look in his eyes I honesty felt the system had him buried so deep he really didn't care what the judge decided to do. But as far as what was going on with me? I was digging a hole the size of Niagara Falls and not even realizing it. I had never been in this kind of serious trouble so with my plaguing mental illness I was deeply disgruntled and confused. Initially when I was arrested on 2-12-2005 I was only charged with two federal charges.
Mailing an explosive and interstate commerce for mailing it in Youngstown OH. It wasn't until my public pretender deemed me a lunatic that he opted to bring DC into the picture and get authorization to tag the WMD charge in there as well.
Sometimes six months would pass before I would see my public defender but I always noticed he always made a point of visiting me last as we went down in groups. He was bilingual of course with a last name of Ortiz and once even described my father as a "Hard Ass". It was part of the main reason they didn't want me to make bail was because they couldn't get my family to agree to have me live with them. I'm quite certain the courts were utterly confused because my Great Grandma had left them with over a quarter million dollars when she passed and the courts couldn't discern why my family agreed upon a cash bail but didn't agree to have me dwell with them until the final hearing.
I was still stuck on the phone with the recruiter from Werner trucking trying to sugarcoat my Federal crime. I still felt like I had a good argument that the word "mailed" didn't fit the crime and in actuality should be worded "attempted to mail" as I had in fact called 911 just hours after placing it in a blue drop box in Youngstown OH. But how could these prying employers not fully understand all the mitigating circumstances? Would not the mailer know upon mailing a parcel utilizing regular postage stamps that there would be at least a couple if not a few days before the package would reach the recipient? Why were these judges not taking the 911 call into consideration to pacify my guilt?
"I, uh,mam, to be fair I wouldn't technically say I mailed a bomb I attempted to mail and then phoned 911."
"Yes were sorry but we don't work with violent crimes. I'm just sorry about our policy sir. Good day now."
I was getting irked and confused. What violence? What violence had occurred with Federal case #59017-066? And most importantly, where were the marks for proof violence had ever occurred?
After months of each and every trucking company spinning my wheels I finally took my probation officer's advice and looked for work on Craigslist. That would not only pan out to be a huge mistake, that would land me a one star job and an easy ticket RIGHT BACK TO JAIL.