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Obscuregawdess
 Posted:
Sat May 31, 2008 4:12 pm |
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Damien Echols’ Art Auctioned at 111 Minna Tonight
OK, so maybe we’re a little addicted to crime dramas, but when we finally rented HBO’s acclaimed Paradise Lost documentaries last year they literally changed our life. We’ve been following the plight of the West Memphis Three ever since.
To give you some background: Damien Echols, Jessie Misskelley and Jason Baldwin were once three young boys in rural Arkansas who happened to listen to heavy metal and wear black. Shortly after three eight-year-old boys were found mutilated and murdered in their small town of West Memphis, local newspapers stated the killers had been caught. The police assured the public that the three teenagers in custody were definitely responsible for the murders.
These same police officers allegedly coerced an error-filled "confession" from Jessie Misskelley, who happens to be mentally handicapped. They subjected him to 12 hours of questioning without counsel or parental consent, audio-taping only two fragments totaling 46 minutes. Jessie recanted it that evening, but it was too late. Misskelley, Baldwin and Echols were all convicted of murder in early 1994.
Image: Damien Echols in prison
Although there was no physical evidence, murder weapon, motive or connection to the victims, the prosecution resorted to presenting black hair and clothing, heavy metal t-shirts and Stephen King novels as proof that the boys were sacrificed in a satanic cult ritual. Sounds crazy, right? Echols was sentenced to death, Baldwin received life without parole and Misskelley got life plus 40 years.
The three boys (now men) still sit in prison, including Damien Echols who has managed to stay incredibly busy writing a new book, maintaining a MySpace page (who doesn't have one these days?) and collaborating with San Francisco artist Anne Reagan on collages that will be auctioned off at 111 Minna tonight with proceeds going toward his defense fund.
Echols is not allowed any art supplies in prison, so his work is often created with whatever materials he can scrounge, including coffee and old magazines.
This one-night-only event includes music, speaking, and poetry readings by good ol’ Henry Rollins, veteran rocker Jonathan Richman and this SFist's personal favorite, sexy mop-headed former Supervisor Matt Gonzalez.
There will also be more than 30 other artists’ works up for auction, including Winston Smith, Shepard Fairey and Jeffrey Brown. So show up, get drunk, buy some art and feel satisfied that you've done your good deed for the year.
Gallery open for viewing 12 – 6 p.m., Reception and auction at 6 p.m..
Minimum 15 dollar donation at the door
111 Minna Gallery
415.974.1719
http://sfist.com/2006/05/12/straight_from_death_row_damien_echols_art_auctioned_at_111_minna_tonight.php
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"Bratty Mama Leci"
Joined: 02 Aug 2006
Posts: 11754
Location: Kentucky
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| Obscuregawdess
Posted:
Tue Jun 24, 2008 3:22 pm |
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Death Penalty Focus
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice
Death Penalty Focus
870 Market St. Ste. 859 San Francisco, CA 94102
Tel. 415.243.0143 - Fax 415.243.0994 - www.deathpenalty.org
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In this email:
1) Legislative Update - Action Needed!
2) New Resource available
3) Upcoming Events
Legislative Update - Action Needed!
Two of the four bills, recommended by the California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice, aimed at preventing wrongful conviction (SB 1590- electronic recording and SB 1591-eyewitness line-up procedures) failed to pass out of the California Senate Appropriations Committee just a few weeks ago. Because of the severe budget crisis, the Committee determined that these important reforms cost too much.
However, the good news is that SB 1589, aimed at preventing defendants from being convicted solely on the basis of uncorroborated informant ("snitch") testimony, and AB 2937, which improves the compensation laws for the wrongfully convicted, both passed out of their respective houses.
SB 1589 is scheduled for a hearing in front of the Assembly Public Safety Committee today, and AB 2937 is scheduled for hearing in front of the Senate Public Safety committee today.
California residents, please take 30 seconds to send another letter to your legislator in support of these bills! We can't afford to let any more wrongful convictions occur. The cost of injustice is much higher than the cost of these critical reforms.
The California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice will be releasing its final recommendations on the death penalty on Monday, June 30th. Please stay tuned for news on this important development.
New Resource
The June issue of DPF's quarterly newsletter, The Sentry, is now available.
Upcoming Events
June 28, 2008 - Los Angeles, CA
Exciting Death Penalty Panel at the Los Angeles Social Forum
Registration for the LA Social Forum Begins at 9am at Alumni Park, at the University of Southern California (USC) in Los Angeles, CA.
Death Penalty Workshop: 9:30am -11:30am
Waite Phillips Hall, Room 205
University of Southern California (USC) (University Park Campus)
Los Angeles, CA
Panelists will include: Gloria Killian (wrongfully convicted of murder in CA) and Robert Silver
Map of USC Campus
The closest parking to Alumni Park is in Parking Structure X at USC Entrance 3 off of Figueroa St. and McCarthy Way.
More info on the Los Angeles Social Forum: http://lasocialforum.org
July 28, 2008 - Claremont, CA
2nd Meeting of the Inland Valley Chapter of Death Penalty Focus
All persons interested in getting involved are invited to attend.
7pm - 8:30pm
The Claremont Forum
586 West First Street
Claremont, CA 91711
Call: 909 398 4471 or email: inlandvalleydpf@gmail.com
August 13, 2008 - San Francisco, CA
San Francisco DPF Chapter Meeting
You are invited to attend the monthly meeting of the San Francisco Chapter of DPF.
6:00pm - 7:00pm
870 Market St. Conference Room 838
San Francisco, CA 94102
Food and refreshments provided.
For more info, please contact Nancy at 415-346-7695.
The closest BART station is Powell. Parking information is available at: http://www.eofgarage.com/
September 9, 2008 - Stanford, CA
Dialogue on the Death Penalty: Faith Leaders Discussing Capital Punishment
Ordained faith leaders from Santa Clara and San Mateo counties are invited to participate in this clergy-only luncheon on
Tuesday, September 9th
10:00am to 2:30pm
Stanford Faculty Club
439 Lagunita Dr.
Stanford, CA 94309
Map: http://www.stanford.edu/group/sufc/info/maps.html
Stanford Law Professor Lawrence C. Marshall, co-founder of the world-renowned Center on Wrongful Convictions, will be the featured speaker.
There is no charge for this clergy-only event, however space is very limited. Please RSVP by Thursday, September 4th to guarantee your space. Faith leaders from all religious traditions are welcome. PRINT A REGISTRATION FORM.
Questions? 415-243-0143 or stefanie@deathpenalty.org
September 18, 2008 - Sacramento, CA
Dialogue on the Death Penalty: Faith Leaders Discussing Capital Punishment
Ordained faith leaders from the Sacramento County area are invited to participate in this clergy-only luncheon on
Thursday, September 18th
10:00am to 2:30pm
Radisson Hotel Sacramento
500 Leisure Lane
Sacramento, CA 95815
There is no charge for this clergy-only event, however space is very limited. Please RSVP by Friday, September 12th to guarantee your space. Faith leaders from all religious traditions are welcome. PRINT A REGISTRATION FORM.
Questions? 415-243-0143 or stefanie@deathpenalty.org
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"Bratty Mama Leci"
Joined: 02 Aug 2006
Posts: 11754
Location: Kentucky
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| Obscuregawdess
Posted:
Mon Sep 01, 2008 6:28 pm |
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Some sites you can get Damiens work and interviews
I thought I would put some places you good folks could find Damien Echols work and interviews.
www.Rattle.com Winter 2007
www.porcupineliteraryarts.com Volume 8 issue 2 There is an interview, poems and an exert of his book Almost Home.
www.hungermtn.org Spring 2006 issue8 This one is very supportive of Damien and his work. They are also very reseptiptive of your comments. They have sent him copies of your comments and maybe if you send them an e-mail he will get a copy of your comment also. At least let them know you would like to see more of his work in their Journal.
www.tlchicken.com issue 8 this one has a good interview in it. They copied his handwritten reponses and put them in the magazine. He is also on the cover of this magazine. The illustration I use as my picture of Damien is from this article by Erik Rose.
The last one I have for you ,for now, is a book printed in 2002. At this time in his life there wasn't many people that cared about doing interviews or printing his work but ANNA M. COX did. And this book is called Dharma Friends, no one abandoned, no one forgotten, no one discarded. It is a compulation book with many people in it. Damiens work starts on page 282 It starts under D.E. And there are a couple essays also following his thoughts. It is very good and not to be missed. www.Xlibris.com or 1-888-795-4274
Also don't forget his book Almost Home vol. 1 www.amazon.com
Thats all I have for now. I will have to research a bit and go thru some old letters to find more. There are alot more and I will blog the best ones. I hope you enjoy them as much as he enjoys writing them. He does like to hear your thoughts on his work and I know he would love to get a letter of your thoughts on his work. Takes him away from his temporary life.
It would be a great gift if you could e-mail these sites and let them know you want to read more from Mr. Damien Echols in their publications.
http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=91005397&blogID=428847770&MyToken=75271153-5d3b-42b9-9f02-9bcb641b4b56
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"Bratty Mama Leci"
Joined: 02 Aug 2006
Posts: 11754
Location: Kentucky
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| Obscuregawdess
Posted:
Mon Sep 01, 2008 6:29 pm |
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Damien in Parabola mag in November
Saturday, August 30, 2008
Damien has done an interview with a magazine called Parabola. His interview will be in their NOVEMBER issue. Please check it out. He really enjoyed doing the interview.
Damien is in good spirits. So we should all keep our hopes high!
Hope to all. See ya in Jonesboro.
Alea
http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=91005397&blogID=428786312&MyToken=75271153-5d3b-42b9-9f02-9bcb641b4b56
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"Bratty Mama Leci"
Joined: 02 Aug 2006
Posts: 11754
Location: Kentucky
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| Obscuregawdess
Posted:
Sat Oct 25, 2008 9:54 am |
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"through a glass, darkly"
Featured artworks by: Jen DeNike, Lisi Raskin, Taryn Simon, Annette Roberts-Gray, Damien Echols, and Douglas Gordon
Redline
October 27, 2008 - January 16, 2009
Public open house Friday November 7 at 7:00 pm
http://denverarts.org/exhibits/through_a_glass_darkly_at_redline.html
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"Bratty Mama Leci"
Joined: 02 Aug 2006
Posts: 11754
Location: Kentucky
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| Obscuregawdess
Posted:
Tue Nov 11, 2008 8:24 pm |
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Parabola interviewed Echols
"He is confined to solitary twenty-three hours a day in a prison cell that measures 9′X12′. The cell has a solid front, preventing any view of the outside world…Like most of his fellow prisoners on Arkansas's Death Row, he claims to be innocent. In Damien Echols's case, however, there's substantial evidence that the claim is true".
So begins the Jeff Zaleskki's introduction to the issue of Parabola just out. In line with its theme of justice, Parabola interviewed Echols, "but not because he probably is innocent. We all have suffered injustice and we all have tolerated, even caused it." Parabola is interested in Echol's case because he is a Zen master who lives day in and day out in the face of the injustice that committed him to death row.
There is clearly ample injustice in our world today– injustice that those organized linked to this site under the category of "environmental justice" dedicate themselves to changing. Injustice in climate change, for instance, that causes the oceans to rise over island nations that contribute little if anything to this global problem. And there is injustice surely in the growing disparity between the rich and poor everywhere.
But is there justice and if so, where do we find it? In God, in religion, in humanism? Some of the Parabola articles examine these directions, including the one that honors the words of the strikingly compassionate believer Etty Hillesium, who died in the Holocaust, and Seyyed Hossein Nasr, who lays out the "sacred foundations of justice in Islam".
For myself, I find justice in the natural model of reciprocity expressed in the folktales of ancient peoples. I am honored that Parabola allowed me to add my own voice to such eloquent ones as those above on this score. Such wise tales assure us that life does not abandon her children– even if a great injustices take more than one generation to redress, as expressed in an eloquent tale many of those stolen into slavery from Africa knew.
As always, this issue of Parabola indicates that we cannot know ourselves too well.
I am moved by those who meditate on this topic alongside me.
But I am moved most of all by those of you who work for justice on our shared earth.
Many public and university libraries carry Parabola.
http://holdenma.wordpress.com/2008/11/11/is-there-justice-in-such-a-world/
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"Bratty Mama Leci"
Joined: 02 Aug 2006
Posts: 11754
Location: Kentucky
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| Obscuregawdess
Posted:
Tue Nov 18, 2008 2:05 pm |
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Damien Echols Speaks
Damien Echols Speaks
Monday Nov 17, 2008 9:30PM
It has been 15 years since Damien Echols was sentenced to die for the murders of three 8-year-old boys in West Memphis.
http://cfc.katv.com/videoondemand.cfm?id=27695&ref=home
Little Rock - It has been 15 years since Damien Echols was sentenced to die for the murders of three 8-year-old boys in West Memphis.
He claims he and the other two convicted of the heinous killings have what they need to prove they are innocent. Surrounded by guards in Arkansas' only super-max prison, Damien Echols is shackled at the hands and feet.
(Damien Echols, Death Row Inmate) "Every single morning for the past 15 years I've had to wake up in a prison cell knowing I should have never been there in the first place. They took from me the entire decade of my 20's. I'm now in my 30's. They are taking my 30's. I've lost 15 Christmas', 15 Thanksgivings... my son has had to grow up without his father."
Treated as one of the most dangerous criminals in the state, Echols is one of only about 40 inmates on Arkansas' death row.
(Echols) "I can take exactly 4 steps from the back of the cell to the front of the cell. Everything is made out of concrete except for the door which is steel. ."
Now 15 years after being locked up, as he spends day in and day out in solitary confinement, Echols believes he is the closest he has ever been to getting a new trial.
(Echols) "Ever since the minute I was arrested 15 years ago, I've tried to tell them that I did not do this and they just weren't interested in listening. They said well that's what everyone says. And that's why for me the dna evidence is so important now because finally there is concrete forensic evidence that I can point to and say look I told you."
But it remains to be seen if the forensic evidence will help set him free. His case is now being appealed to the Arkansas Supreme Court which has previously upheld his conviction.
Echols was 18-years-old when he, his best friend, 16-year-old, Jason Baldwin, and an acquaintance, 17-year-old, Jessie Misskelly were arrested for the murders of three 8-year-old boys.
It was May 5th, 1993, when Chris Byers, Steve Branch and Michael Moore disappeared. They were last seen riding their bikes. The next day their lifeless bodies were found submerged in a drainage ditch in a wooded area near their homes in West Memphis, Arkansas. The second graders were naked and hog tied with their own shoelaces. All three had been murdered. An autopsy revealed Moore and Branch died of multiple injuries with drowning. The medical examiner revealed Moore and Branch died of multiple injuries with drowning. The medical examiner determined Chris Byers died before being put in the water and had been castrated with a sharp instrument.
It took one month, but on June 3rd 1993, police announced they had solved the case. Echols, Baldwin and Misskelly, now known around the world as the West Memphis three, were taken into custody.
Prosecutors would later tell jurors the murders were part of a satanic ritual. A jury came back with a death sentence for Echols and life without parole for Baldwin. Misskelly who was tried separately and was sentenced to life plus 40 years.
(Pam Hobbs, Victim's Mother) "For years I thought they were punks. I said they did it. I couldn't wait for Damien to die. I did hate those three men. I hated them with a passion."
The death of Pam Hobb's son, Steve Branch is still fresh on her mind. As she visits her son's grave, she remembers his smiling face and his bright future that was cut short.
(Hobbs) "Stevie loved life, he loved people... he could have been the president or he could have worked in a gas station. Whatever he would have done I would have been proud of him. I was robbed that chance so I will never know."
What she wants to know is who really killed her son and his two friends?
(Hobbs) "Do I think Damien, Jason and Jessie done it? At one time, yes I really did believe in my heart. I had to believe in the justice system."
Now in light of new forensic tests and DNA evidence, she's not sure.
(Hobbs) "There wasn't a lot of evidence, to me, that would have been 100% proof, solid evidence that they did it. I don't even know if they were involved. I'm not sure."
Dozens of articles from the crime scene were tested for DNA and late last year the results were made public.
(Echols) "They found dna at the crime scene 15 years ago, but they didn't have the ability to test it. Now they've tested it."
Echol's wife, Lorrie Davis, says the results prove the wrong men are behind bars.
(Lorri Davis, Echol's Wife) "There was absolutely no dna that matches any of the convicted that was found at the crime scene or anywhere associated with the victims."
The findings are spelled out in Echol's motion for a new trial which says: (page 45 of petition), none of the genetic material recovered at the scene was attributable to Echols, Baldwin, and Misskelly. Genetic material recovered from Steven Branch was contributed by a person other than any of the victims or defendants. A hair found in the ligature used to bind Michael More was consistent with Terry Hobbs, the stepfather of Steven Branch. And a hair recovered from a tree root or stump at the crime scene was consistent with the hair of one of Mr. Hobb's friends who had been with Hobbs on the day the crimes occurred.
We tried to talk to Terry Hobbs and his friend, but both declined to be interviewed. Hobbs would only tell us that he believes as he always has that Echols, Baldwin, and Misskelly are guilty.
But the tests results were enough to change the mind of Chris Byers' father, who early on was convinced the West Memphis three were responsible for his son's death. Now he believes they are innocent.
(Mark Byers, Victim's Father) "I want to see the West Memphis three set free as soon as possible. I believe this is going to be made right."
On Wednesday, hearings will resume for Balwin and Misskelly in Jonesboro. They claim they did not have adequate representation at their trials. The judge has issued a gag order in the case. More from Echols and forensic experts who dispute the state's theory Tuesday on nightside.
http://www.katv.com/news/stories/1108/570813.html
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"Bratty Mama Leci"
Joined: 02 Aug 2006
Posts: 11754
Location: Kentucky
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| Obscuregawdess
Posted:
Tue Nov 18, 2008 3:30 pm |
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Doing Justice To Life - A Conversation with Damien Echols
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Doing Justice To Life - A Conversation with Damien Echols
"ALL REAL LIVING IS MEETING," wrote philosopher Martin Buber. By that measure, death row prisoner SK913 in the "Supermax" Varner Unit in Grady, Arkansas, really lives just once a week. On Fridays from one to four p.m. he gets to sit in a monitored room without partitions with his wife, Lorri Davis, a Little Rock landscape architect, whom he married in a Zen Buddhist ceremony in 1999. The couple exchange insights about their separate and evolving spiritual practices, Davis tells me by email. Over the years, spiritual search has become their shared life. ..:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
The days thirty-three-year-old Damien Echols spends alone in a nine-by-twelve-foot concrete cell are not unreal. But how he spends his time is strictly up to him. "You can either turn it into a monastery and or it will turn itself into hell," he tells me by phone. Intended for terrorists, spies, and other prisoners deemed extremely dangerous, especially those connected to groups, super-maximum prisons keep inmates in isolation and under constant surveillance, and have earned condemnations for inhumanity from a United Nations team and other groups. Echols and all the other death row prisoners from the nearby Tucker Maximum Security Correctional Facility were transferred to the new Varner unit about five years ago.
Born Michael Wayne Hutchinson in West Memphis, Arkansas, he became Damien when his stepfather, Jack Echols, adopted him. In the midst of converting to Roman Catholicism, the boy took the name of Damien along with Echols in honor of Father Damien, the Belgian-born priest who ministered to lepers quarantined in Hawaii, eventually contracting and dying of the disease himself.
Cleared to be canonized next year, the "Blessed Damien of Molokai" has long been regarded by many as the patron saint of outcasts. But Echols, a sensitive, troubled kid from a poor family, couldn't have known that eventually he himself would transform in the judgment of some from misfit to murderer—and eventually in the judgment of many from misfit to martyr. In 1994, Echols was sentenced to death for leading two other teenagers in the horrific killing of three eight-year-old boys in what prosecutors portrayed as a satanic sacrifice. Lacking any physical evidence, the police zeroed in on eighteen-year-old Echols because he wore black, was known to be well read about occult subjects, and otherwise stood out as defiantly dark in his conservative, hardscrabble town. Even the name Damien was taken as incriminating evidence, since this had been the name of the son of Satan in the popular horror film THE OMEN.
Damien was convicted in part on a confession by one of his codefendants, a minor with a low I.Q., that was riddled with factual errors, and in part on the testimony of an occult expert with a mail-order degree. After the 1996 HBO documentary PARADISE LOST and a sequel revealed a likely miscarriage of justice, the plight of the "West Memphis Three" attracted the support of thousands, including celebrities as disparate as Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam, Marilyn Manson, and Sister Prejean, the Catholic nun who has battled the death penalty and who wrote DEAD MAN WALKING.
To many what happened to the West Memphis Three resembled what happened in the Salem Witch Trials. At any rate, there was a panic to name and quarantine off evil rather than admit it might be walking around town wearing ordinary clothes and talking about common, non-occult things. As he awaits another hearing, Echols talked with PARABOLA about what Zen and the other contemplative traditions have shown him regarding doing justice to the vibrancy and possibilities of life, no matter what.
TRACY COCHRAN WINTER 2008 | 17
PARABOLA: Why Buddhism?
DAMIEN ECHOLS: I started to feel angry all the time. Everything I had been through was really starting to turn me bitter and I knew that I had to do something about that or it was going to eat me alive.
P: Who taught you about Buddhism?
DE: The very first day I came into death row, there was another guy here who sent me a package of stuff. It was filled with shaving cream, razors, a bar of soap, uh, I think there was a grape soda in it, a couple of stamped envelopes, ink and pens, basic necessities. It had a note in it from the guy, who said he tried to do this with everybody who comes in, to help them get their feet under them. And this guy was a Zen Buddhist [Jusan Frankie Parker]. For about two years, I went to the yard with him and talked to him on a regular basis.
A couple years later, [Parker] was given an execution date. His spiritual advisor was this Zen priest who only did prison work, Kobutsu. I met him when he came for the execution in 1996. We started corresponding and eventually, I really delved into Zen and really committed myself to this practice.
I also eventually started corresponding with a Vietnamese Zen temple in Los Angeles. I first took refuge probably a year after I started practicing Zen. Kobutsu performed the ceremony. I was given the name Koson. It means "move toward the light" or "loves the light," something in that vein.
P: I read that you were also given the name Jyoti Priya Karuna, Lover of the Light Compassion.
DE: That was when I took the next set of vows from the Vietnamese Zen temple. About two years after that, I received Jukai ordination from Shodo Harada Roshi. He's a really popular Zen master in Japan. Kobutsu asked him if he would come over here to do this ceremony. He couldn't speak English either. He had to bring one of the female priests with him to act as a translator.
P: Can you describe Jukai for PARABOLA readers?
DE: Jukai ordination is whenever you really begin to take the first step on the road to serious vows and it's sort of like a renaming ceremony also. There aren't too many things to compare it to in Western religion. For example, the first thing we did, taking refuge in the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha, which could be comparable to, say, baptism in Christianity. The closest thing [to taking the rest of the precepts against all forms of doing harm] would be maybe becoming a deacon.
P: Did you feel a connection with Shodo Harada Roshi?
DE: You feel this tremendous sense of discipline that almost comes off of him in waves. The only word I know how to use to even come close to articulating it would be beauty. There's some sort of beauty in that discipline that makes you feel awe. Whenever I was around him, it was almost like being speechless. The reason I don't say "connection" is because it implies almost an equality in status, and I didn't really feel that with him. He was shorter than me physically but you still have that feeling that you're almost looking up at someone.
18 | PARABOLA
P: He opened a door.
DE: Even now, coming up on nine years later, whenever I think of it, it really inspires me and makes me want to dig in my heels and try even harder.
P: How does your practice help you?
DE: It prevents you from becoming lost. It enables you to take a step back. It doesn't happen all at once. It's a gradual thing. If someone asks me, "What are you now?" it's almost an offensive question to me. I think spirituality is the second most intimate thing a person has in their life, second only to their marriage. The reason I find it so offensive is because it is so hard to describe. For example, I'm still a member of the Roman Catholic Church. I go to Mass every week. I never miss it. It's one of my favorite things in life, yet I don't identify myself as a Roman Catholic. I have taken these vows in Buddhism but I don't really identify myself as Buddhist.
P: It's about getting in touch with who you really are, or what's nameless?
DE: The way I approach it is to try it and see if it works. See for yourself. Get firsthand experience. That's what I love about Zen. It didn't require me to surrender my ability to think. It gave me techniques I could use that actually benefited me in my daily life.
P: I read that you start every day reciting the Heart Sutra [the shortest and most popular sutra in Buddhism, expressing the insight of nonattachment and the doctrine of emptiness].
DE: For about five years, I did start every day reading the Heart Sutra. Then I would do a hundred and eight prostrations. Then I would sit for an hour, and again at night. I had a little shrine set up in my cell. I had a little fold-out cardboard Buddha statue and I would sit a bowl of water on the table like an offering. Saturdays and Sundays, I would dedicate entirely to sitting. I would get up early in the morning and do sitting and walking meditation pretty much all day long. Eventually, we went from just sitting to practicing koan.
COURTESY OF JOE BERLINGER AND BRUCE SINOFSKY
WINTER 2008 | 19
P: Rinzai Zen is known for koan study.
DE: I almost lost my mind when we first started the koan practice. The very first one I was given was "Does a dog have Buddha nature?" I would think "What am I supposed to do with this?" But then something did happen. It's like being flooded with an epiphany or a realization. There's no way to even describe the feeling of it but the weirdest part was after I did finally get that first one, no other one has ever presented a problem again. Eventually, it was let's go on to something else.
P: A lot of people think of the interdependent nature of life only in a positive way, but life can be terrible. You can suffer injustice. But allowing yourself to be consumed by negative emotions is just participating in your own destruction.
DE: It would also stunt growth and if you don't grow, you automatically start to stagnate. To me that was the nightmare, that was worse than the execution—that horrible stagnation that I see all around me.
P: Do you relate to your situation like a koan, confounding but something you have to handle somehow?
DE: It was almost like it did show me how to handle each day and each situation that would come along. It's almost impossible to articulate to someone how sitting for five hours a day and holding the question "Does a dog have Buddha nature?" in your head helps you deal with prison life. But it does.
P: What is your practice now?
DE: I still do tons of meditation, and I want to keep moving forward. The closer
20 | PARABOLA
I get to the experience of divinity the closer I want to be to it. So, I am trying to expand my own practices into Western traditions of meditation to do that. One of the things I spend an hour doing every morning now is what's called the Middle Pillar exercise. It does the same thing that Zen does only it goes about it differently.
When I started practicing Zen, the very first thing that the focus is put on is mindfulness. In the Western traditions, they'll say you have to develop a background awareness. It's almost like separating a part of your psyche and standing as an observer at all times and observing what you're doing, what you're thinking, what you're feeling.
P: I can see why you have to keep making it new. At the same time, the Jukai ordination you received and the Zen ritual you were engaged in must have thrown you a rope, connecting you with a lineage and also with the timeless, the divine as you call it.
DE: Not only that but everything that people put faith or belief or practice into, it creates a current of energy in the universe. Whenever you're ordained or whenever you receive initiation into a spiritual tradition, it forges a link between you and that energy current in the universe.
P: Has your practice helped you transform your suffering into compassion for others?
DE: In some ways, yes, and in some ways, no. I've really had a chance over the past fifteen years to study what causes people to be in this situation. You see these people who grew up in poverty with no education whatsoever and they go rob a store and shoot somebody. When you realize the hardship that they came from, that can inspire compassion. But you also
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see how they are once they are here— making no effort to change or to grow. I don't believe that anything excuses not taking personal responsibility. You know, I grew up so poor that we didn't have heat in the winter; we had to go to gas stations just to get water to bring home to drink; the whole family would have to take a bath in one tub of water that had been heated up over a fire. I know that doesn't make me a moronic zombie who has no choice but to give in to some criminal impulse. So stories like that inspire, not the opposite of compassion, but I guess people would call it tough love, where you want to grab somebody and you want to say, "You can try to blame it on society or anyone else you want to blame it on but you make the choices to do what you are doing on a daily basis."
P: The Buddha talks about how mysterious karma is. And yours certainly ranks way up there.
DE: I've heard that before, from a woman who had a Tibetan Buddhist practice who would teach these meditation classes.
P: Can you sum up your beliefs?
DE: In plain English, we shape our own realities. We don't always realize the extent to which we do. I think the main thing is that we have to take responsibility for changing our own lives. That's the thing that Lorri and I focus on all the time. We don't want to settle. I call it living ferociously. If I'm not living ferociously, if I'm not trying to transform my life, then I'm wasting my life.
P: But different branches of science say
22 | PARABOLA
there is no such thing as free will, that it's just a perception, an illusion. When you make an action, the action begins before you have the perception of willing it. Everything just happens.
DE: Will is what in the Eastern tradition is called Enlightenment. Will doesn't mean gritting your teeth and using white knuckle force. It's more like in Tai Chi when you move without effort.
P: Will is awakening to the big picture?
DE: I wrote about this in my autobiography [ALMOST HOME]. When I was in kindergarten, I was going out to play at night in front of our apartment and my mother tells me, "Do not leave the front of these apartments." And I say, "O.K." Then I take off. I'm a little kid. I'm going to go where I want to go. So, I went behind the apartments and played in this huge pile of dirt for awhile and I start to walk back around home. It's already dark outside and I know I'm going to be in trouble. When I'm walking past an apartment that was empty, I see a man standing in front. He's wearing a pair of black pants. He has on no shirt. He has shoulder length black hair and he's standing there with his arms across his chest. And when I'm walking past, he says, "Your Momma's looking for you." I
just stopped and looked at him. He said, "You know she's going to whup your ass." I didn't think anything about that. I walked on. My Mom found me and eventually she did whip my ass. Right before I was arrested, I had my shirt off. I walked into the bathroom and looked into the bathroom mirror. And I realized that I was the guy I saw that night.
P: Wow. You believe that everything that happens to us is predetermined somehow?
DE: I think reality operates like a computer. I think there are parts of our psyche that we never or almost never touch that have a hand in programming our reality or what we perceive as reality.
P: We make ourselves out to be smaller than we are.
DE: That's a very good way of putting it. It's tremendously important to practice and dedicate ourselves to so that we don't make the same mistakes over and over again through ignorance or through losing awareness.
I think we are given the abilities to do a lot of things, say lucid dreaming, for a reason. It's not just for cheap entertainment. The conclusion that I've come to is that these are tools to help us prepare for death.
In my situation, that has really been driven home because in the time I've been here somewhere between twenty and twenty-five people have been executed. Whenever I have one of those days where I think I'd rather lay here and watch T.V., I think, is that really what you want to do or do you want to continue to get ready?
P: So you practice every day and try to make it new.
DE: Of course. There was one time after an execution when I could sense the energy patterns of the person who was executed. It was like he never knew he had been a person. It had no idea who it was, where it was, anything else. It was like leaves caught in a high wind, disintegrating, being blown in every direction.
P: Because he never laid claim to his life.
DE: Exactly. Experiencing that was horrifying.
P: You still have a connection with Roman Catholicism.
DE: I believe there are a lot of good things in it. One time when the priest put the Communion chalice in my hand, I realized as the wine touched my lips that not only did I taste it, but it was tasting me. I realized that there was a sentient thing in my hand, that there was intelligence in the wine. That's why I go to Mass, for communion with that intelligence.
P: Can you say more?
DE: I just know that it was this huge, vast thing that made me feel tiny. It was like having an elephant open its eye and look directly at an ant.
P: Was it like meeting that Zen master?
DE: It was greater than that just because it wasn't in human form. I was dealing with divinity face to face not in a human body but actual face-to-face contact.
P: Is there anything that you would like to add?
DE: Just that this is what I enjoy in life. This is what motivates me. Just even having conversations like this and exchanging ideas about these kinds of things. This is what I live for.
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http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=41045221&blogID=450033026
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"Bratty Mama Leci"
Joined: 02 Aug 2006
Posts: 11754
Location: Kentucky
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| Obscuregawdess
Posted:
Wed Nov 19, 2008 9:15 am |
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Damien Echols Speaks Part II
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
West Memphis -
Tuesday Channel 7 continued our look at one of Arkansas's most notorious murder cases.
Fifteen years after three 8 year-old boys were killed in West Memphis. The three men charged with their deaths are hopeful new DNA and forensic evidence will set them free. And death row inmate Damien Echols is speaking out.
They are known around the world as the West Memphis Three.
Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley are serving life sentences while Damien Echols spends day in and day out on death row.
(Channel 7's Heather Crawford) "Did you have anything to do with the murders of those three little boys? (Damien Echols, Death Row Inmate)"I had nothing whatsoever but even being asked that is something you don't get used to. I've been asked that question by a lot of people over the past 15 years and you never get used to it. Every time someone asks you that it's like being kicked in the stomach."
Echols not only maintains his innocence he says he didn't even know the three second graders he is accused of killing--Chris Byers, Steve Branch and Michael Moore. So why was he arrested and convicted of their murders?
(Echols)" I think when I was younger I was pretty odd considering the small town I was from and just the way I looked. The music I listened to. I didn't really fit in to the place where I was and I think me standing out drew attention to me in a negative way."
A high school drop out, Echols grew up poor in a Marion mobile home park.
At his trial prosectors used the music he listened to, the books he read, and the black clothes he wore to convince jurors he was part of a satanic cult. This something Echols adamently denies.
(Echols) "During this time you had this same thing happening in other parts of the country too that they now in hindsight they call it satanic panic. That was pretty much the only thing prosecutors could come forward with to make this plausible was to say that we were part of some redneck, trailer park devil cult that for some reason or another killed these children. And it was odd at the time considering the things they would bring forward at the time as evidence of that like the things we listened to metallica or read Stephen King novels or things of that nature."
(Lorri Davis, Echols' wife) "I can honestly say from people we talked to in this investigations that it was a frenzy, people were scared, scared for their lives. And scared that there were actually people running around killing people in the name of satan."
The prosecution's case centered around a theory that the victims were sacrificed as part of a satanic ritual and the wounds found on the boys bodies were inflicted by a knife--one victim even said to be castrated.
A serrated knife believed to be the murder weapon was found several months after the crimes in a pond behind Jason Baldwin's home at the Lakeshore Trailer Park in Marion.
("Pardise Lost", Courtesy of HBO)"If you take this knife you can see it leaves a space and open space."
In November 2007 defense attorneys gathered a team of forensic experts who dispute the state's theory.
(Davis) "Without an exception they all came back saying it was post-mortum animal predation, the wounds on the kids, except for head wounds.: meaning that after the children died animals got to them in the ditch. They were found in a drainage ditch."
(Dr. Werner Spitz, Forenic Pathologist) "None of the injuries were caused during life and none were caused by a serrated knife or any knife for that matter."
The defense maintains the marks on the victim's bodies were not the result of a satanic ritual.
(Dr. Richard Souviron, Forensic Odontologist) "Give me a break. That is the most ridiculous statement I've ever heard anybody make. To sell that to a jury is unconscionable in my opinion. These are scratch marks that are from claws from some type of an animal carnivore."
But medical examiners at the Arkansas State Crime Laboratory--where the autopies were perfomed wrote in a letter dated May 30th "Physical examination of the penetrating wounds showed a lack of soft tissue bridging typical of wounds caused by tearing or biting. These wounds did show clearly incised edges, indicating they were caused by a sharp instrument."
Many believe it wasn't just the state's theory that helped get a convivction.
In the court of public perception many Arkansans at the time of the trial were convinced the West Memphis three were guilty in part because of the way Echols acted, often appearing arrogant to the cameras that followed him in and out of the courtroom.
(Crawford) "How do you explain the attitude you portrayed during the trial? (Echols)"That I was a child, I was a teenager when this was going on and I was in a tremendous amount of shock going through an incredible amount of trauma."
Pam Hobbs thinks that attitude is what swayed the jury.
(Pam Hobbs, Victim Steve Branch's mother) "They didn't have a lot of evidence to get these guys. Damien convicted himself when he got on the stand and he was asked how do you think the killer or killers felt. I think Damien convicted himself when he said they felt like a God, they felt like they were in control. that's what convicted Damien and I believe that's the only thing that really convicted him. It wasn't evidence."
Hearings to determine if Jason Baldwin and Jissie Misskelley had ineffective counsel when they were tried are set to resume Wednesday in Jonesboro before the orginal trial Judge David Burnett.
Meanwhile--Damien Echol's case is being appealed to the Arkansas Supreme Court.
http://www.katv.com/news/stories/1108/571146.html
http://cfc.katv.com/searchvideos.cfm?k=damien+echols&x=22&y=3 (video)
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"Bratty Mama Leci"
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Posts: 11754
Location: Kentucky
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