The county jail in Brownsville Texas was an interesting place. I was there six months, from May 5, 1975 until November 1975. I could write a book about these six months, but in the interest of moving the story along I'll keep it brief and touch only the highlights. First and foremost, it was the strangest jail I have ever been in, and I've been in more than a few. It was more like a third world jail than a U.S. one. In my brief time in Mexico a month earlier I spent the night in a Matamoros jail after a street fight, so I can say with authority that the Brownsville jail was more like a Mexican jail than a U.S. one. Few spoke English. It was not a surprise that few of the inmates spoke English, but that few of the guards did was a shocker. I felt as much on foreign soil there as I had in Mexico. The next surprise was how much I was hated because I was a gringo. Hated by inmates and guards alike. Inmates hated me enough to hurt me for no reason and the guards hated me enough to not notice.

I was there for less than an hour before my first fight. In every jail I've been in meals are delivered to the cell, or cell block which is where you eat and spend all your time. In Brownsville the meals were served in an outdoor courtyard in the center of the jail. You got your food from a serving line, then set at picnic tables and ate under the hot sun. In my first hour there I went to lunch. At the serving line I was handed a heavy stainless steel tray and a metal spoon. The food was a stew of meat and vegetables served from a pot half the size of a fifty-five gallon drum, but I did notice plenty of food put on the tray of the inmates in front of me. When it was my turn the big Mexican inmate serving the food skimmed his ladle across the top of the pot then filled my tray with greasy water. I said, "This isn't going to work out well." He responded with a fast string of Spanish that I didn't understand and a big smile.

Bob had taught me not to hit anyone with my hands when it could be avoided. I always followed Bob's advice when it came to fighting so I hit the big Mexican with the hot grease filled tray. I punched him with the narrow edge of the tray, using it like a sword and caught him just above the eye. It didn't knock him out, but it did put him out of the fight. I was surprised that no one else jumped in, the guards just watched. But when I reached for another tray a guard told me I'd already eaten, so I sat down alone and waited for chow to end. I wasn't hungry anyway. Anywhere else I would have went to the hole for fighting, but here fighting was a normal part of the day. At the most they would separate guys into different units, but they rarely did even that.

There weren't cells here, but a crowded dorm with forty beds. As I was trying to make my bed, which was difficult because of the new cast on my hand (they recast my hand in Florida), I noticed everyone had stopped talking. One consistent thing about jails and prisons everywhere is that it gets quiet before trouble. I turned around to see three Mexicans standing five feet behind me. "You want something," I asked. They said something in Spanish I didn't understand but I understood they wanted trouble. Didn't seem like something I could talk my way out of so I attacked, only I did it with a bit of finesse. I raised both of my hands, a sign of surrender and said I didn't want any trouble. As I spoke I took two easy steps towards them. The head of the guy on my right was about a foot from my newly casted right hand when I hit him in the face. The cast was thick and hard, and my swing perfect. He went down and didn't move. While everyone watched the first guy drop I kicked the middle guy below his knee. I kicked as I had been taught to, using speed, weight and power. Everyone in the dorm heard bones break. The third guy turned and ran. He couldn't go far, but he got as far from me as he could. Less than a minute had passed from when I turned around.

Other than moans from the guy with the broken leg the dorm was quiet. I thought they were all going to jump me, but they just stood there debating. It looked like it could go either way. At that point a Hispanic man of about forty stepped forward and clapped his hands. "Bravo, Gringo," he said. "Very good, but you need more training." He put his arm around my shoulder in a fatherly way and said: "Come, Tlacuache Blanco, I will train you." And he did. He had one of those proud Hispanic names, the part I recall is: Marcus Marquis Antonio Tubisio. That's half of it, and I never knew how to spell it.

Marcus was educated, cultured, he had traveled much of Europe and everywhere in South and Central America. Everywhere he went he studied martial arts, which was his first love. For six months he taught me to fight. In that time I learned far more about fighting than I ever knew. Lessons that I have built on over the years. Marquis also taught me Spanish, which I learned well enough to communicate with the other inmates and guards. Tlacuache Blanco was the name he gave me, a name that stuck through my time in the Brownsville jail. It meant "White Opossum". Given to me because I played opossum to put my attackers at ease before putting them down.

The legal stuff was interesting. I refused to talk to the police about my crime, so all they had on me was the testimony of the Florida State Trooper. No one in Florida saw me on the bike, they didn't have fingerprints and though I was beaten, I never confessed to being on the Kawasaki. I don't think the Texas authorities realized how little evidence they had on me until after they brought me to Texas. Mom hired a lawyer who said I'd never be convicted. We did pre-trial stuff with a trial scheduled, but the Florida Trooper didn't show. The trial was rescheduled for month later.

In that month the Mexicans dug a hole in the exterior wall of the dorm. They'd worked on it for a while, and in the tradition of Shawshank Redemption (this was before the book and movie) they covered their work with the poster of a famous matador. The dorm was on the forth floor so when the hole was complete they used sheets to make a rope. They waited until after count to have a two hour head start then went out the hole one at a time. The jail was two blocks from the Mexican boarder. Two countries separated by the shallow Rio Grand River. One of the International bridges was three blocks away and in easy view from several dorm windows. I stood in the window and watched a large group of men walk across together. On the Mexican side they all turned and gave the Americano's a collective middle finger farewell. I could have went with them, I had two hours to reconsider, but still didn't go. I stuck my head out the hole several times, even pulled on the rope to test it's strength. It was in my nature to go. Some people are what they call "Rabbit" some are not. It was clear which I was. Still, I didn't go. It was time to straighten my life out. It had to start now.

A week later was my new trial date. November 1975 (I have the month but not the day). Once again the Florida State Trooper refused to show up. By this point the state's attorney had figured out the trooper wasn't coming because he had beat me after my arrest. In dismissing the case the judge said something to the effect of, "This guy has pending charges in Florida, Virginia, Maryland, Kentucky (to my knowledge I'd never been to Kentucky, but there was a guy there with my name) and the military wants him for being AWOL. This case has been held up too long, so as far as the State of Texas is concerned, the Defendant is free to go. The two deputy's guarding me must have been sleeping through all of the Judge's speech because all they heard was, "...the Defendant is free to go."

My attorney and I turned and walked out of the court room and into the hall talking, him telling me that he'd call my mom and let her know, me focused on the fact that the deputies hadn't followed us into the hall. Because I was prepared to go to trial I was wearing a suit my mom had sent and not wearing handcuffs. The attorney turned to say something to my escort and realized they weren't there. He must have seen the look of freedom on my face because he said, "You can't...". "You look like a man that needs to take a leak," I said. He agreed and went to the restroom.

Expecting them to stop me at any moment I casually walked out of the courthouse. To my knowledge they never realized their mistake. I know it makes no sense that a week earlier I passed on an easy freedom, yet now given the same opportunity I took it without hesitation. The only rational I have is that going out the window would have been a felony offense, but leaving when they let me go was not. When I think about it, I just couldn't not go when they let me walk out the door.

One other unique aspect of the Mexican influence of the Brownsville jail was that inmates were allowed to possess cash. There was a $20 possession limit, but it was ignored. So when I walked out of that courthouse a free man in a new suit I also had nearly fifty dollars cash in my pocket. Fearing that I would be grabbed any moment and put back in jail, I walked briskly towards the International bridge three blocks away. In those days crossing the bridge into Mexico was simple. There wasn't even a place to stop on the U.S. side when going south, so I walked straight into Mexico. Mexican customs manned a booth, but I said, "Day Tourist", and was waved through.

I walked for a few blocks to get away from the bridge, took a few turns until I was out of the tourist zone and on to dirt roads and poverty. I needed to find a place to sit down and think. Not much was available but I did spot a booth sized restaurant with a few outdoor chairs to sit in. I was hungry so I walked up to the window and ordered a hamburger and Coke. I hadn't even thought about the language barrier, so was pleased when I realized I'd ordered my food in Spanish without thinking about it. Burger and Coke cost thirty cents, U.S. The hamburger was small but tasty. The meat was too gammy to be beef, but I liked the taste. The Coke was cold and in a tiny eight ounce glass bottle, something I had never seen in the U.S. I was used to this from my earlier trips to Mexico, so I should have known to order two. After finishing the burger I wanted another so I went back to the window. Another guy was standing there waiting for his food so I made small talk to test my Spanish while I waited my turn. I asked if he knew what kind of meat was used for hamburger. He didn't know so he asked the old man doing the cooking. I heard the exchange but didn't understand it. The guy repeated the conversation to me but I still didn't understand, so in English he said, "Dog. You ate a dog hamburger." It was clear he found my reaction humorous. When the old man asked me what I wanted I said two dog hamburgers and three Cokes. What can I say, I was hungry and it was good. It is not the strangest thing I have eaten in my life.

After eating I sat there thinking about my future. I knew enough Spanish now that I could go into the interior of Mexico and try to make a life there. I thought about it for a long time. It really wasn't a difficult decision. I knew that if I kept running I'd only further destroy my life. I wanted a future. I wanted an honorable life. So I made a decision so contrary to my normal decisions that I couldn't believe I made it. I decide to turn myself in and face the music. But I wouldn't do it here. I decided I would return to the only place I'd ever felt content, back to Taylor's Island Coast Guard station.
With that decision made I had to get there. Knowing I had to cross the international bridge back into the United States, I took off my suit coat and tie and gave both to the old man who'd fed me dog meat. I bought a five dollar pair of blue jeans and cheap straw cowboy hat to change my appearance. When I walked across the bridge and into Texas the U.S. Customs Agent asked what country I was from. Sometimes they asked for id, which I didn't have, so in my best drawl I said, "The great nation of Texas". He laughed and waved me through. I hitchhiked back to Maryland, a long but uneventful trip. I don't have the day of the month, but from the record I know I turned myself into the Coast Guard in November 1975. They were surprised to see me.