EL RRUN RRUN: INCARCERATED, SOME INMATES HELD IN "EL POZO" ALSO PRISONERS OF THEMSELVES

By Juan Montoya
"Carla (not his/her real name) was born a woman imprisoned in the body of a man.

Now incarcerated in one of the segregated cells in the Ruben Torres Detention Center in downtown Brownsville, she languishes lying on the cement floor wrapped in a blanket watching the guards and making small talk with jail trustees sent to deliver her meals and cleaning implements during the day.
When trustees hand her the broom, scrubbing brush, and mops through the steel bars, she asks them to turn off the light switch outside the small cell.
"Es que no estoy pintada," she says and demurs from being near the bars when the trustee places the handle of the mop through the slot. "Me da verguenza."
This are the infamous "El Pozo" cells as they are called in jail parlance. The way an inmate ends in the "pozo" is because guards have determined that they are a threat to others, are violent, or threat they will fall prey to other inmates in the general population cells.
Carla is there because guards cannot guarantee the safety of a transgender inmate in the midst of 20 or 25 male inmates who might have homophobic tendencies or would take the opportunity to harm him.
Once Carla gets to know the trustees, she ventured to show them a photo of her on the outside. The picture is that of a ravishing young woman who might easily compete in a beauty pageant and perhaps even place above real women.
"Me gusta ponerme rayitos en el pelo," she says from the darkened cell, just out of view of the people in the corridor. "Siempre me gusta andar bien pintada y con un peinado en el pelo."
Across the hallway, a Valluco gang member taunts Carla and threatens her with reprisal (don't ask how) if she messes around with the trustees. Half-taunting, half-ridicule, he warns them and her against making eyes at them.
"No le hagas pedo a mi vieja," he shouts from behind behind the bars.
The Valluco used to be the capataz (boss) of X-Ray 2 cell until he lost it when another inmate refused to do his share of the daily cleanup. A fight ensued and both were removed from the cell. The other inmate was sent to another cell block and El Valluco, because of his gang affiliation, was sent to El pozo.
Like other gang members, he goes about without a shirt, eager to show his fully-tattooed torso.
In other pozos other inmates are held, either because they are unmanageable or because their jailers think that they will prey on weaker inmates.
"Yo me los como vivos, homey," bragged one, an 18-year-old who has spent all his adult life incarcerated at Coastal Bend, Brooks County and other facilities rented by Cameron County to ease the overcrowding in its centers. "I just want to got to state to get my numero (state corrections ID # that follows you all your life).
Across the corridor, Carla fingers her picture and lies on the floor wrapped in her blanket looking out at the clouds through the large picture windows facing the recreation area in the middle of the cell units.