waiting to go to trial. i don t know when trial will be. it might be two years from now, three years from now. i don t have that time to waste because i have kids i have to go home to. but have no choice because there s nobody out there willing to help anybody once you get locked up. once you get locked up it s like, well, oh well, it was his fault. housed in another section of the jail is wilkins future brother-in-law and co-defendant michael jones. jones also says he is innocent. both men are eligible for the death penalty if found guilty. and for now, they have stopped writing each other out of fear other inmates might use their words against them and become informants in order to curry favor in their own cases. because everything is being monitored. so in order to keep everybody in safe, know what i m saying, i d rather just cut all ties from him until this is over with. jones cellmate battise hicks has already warned him about about this. ain t no honor amongst thieves,
turned predator. he s smart as hell. he been through the system stuff before, you know? that s who really helped me a lot how to make it in here. come on don t move them. you re right, you re right, you re right, you re right. i been around murderers, killers, rapists, drug dealers, i ve been around it all. i try to give him the basics. don t take nothing from nobody. know what i mean? stay to yourself, you know. you ll be all right. hicks has a wealth of experience to draw from. he has had numerous stays in jail on convictions including sale of a controlled substance, criminal trespassing, receiving stolen property, and eluding police. ain t honor amongst thieves, ain t no honor. they don t care. they will smile at your face, stab you in your back. nobody will say it too loud.
you re going to pay, pick a room, i ll beat your ass. i said, you re tripping. he said, no, you re tripping. i felt like he was trying to front on me, and i just took off, boom boom, we j.c. grabbed each other. battise hit each other a couple of times, they went to grabbing, him, battise on his back on the floor. he grabbed me, lift me, slam me, boom. he got on top of me like, oh, yeah, i got you now. hit me one time, boom. he took his shoe. it s like, i don t want to do it to you, little bro, i don t want to do it to you. and he s [ bleep ] hurt. okay, hit with a shower shoe, i give you a busted know and swollen eye. hey, swap noses with him. soon after the fight, hicks says he felt like he was swinging. after officers moved him to a segregation cell for fighting, hicks realized he was missing
several items from the jail commissary. a lot of things came up short. 12 soups, seven bags of chips, missing a bar of soap. where s my stuff at? jones admits to taking the items but says it wasn t a swindle, it was debt repayment. and i realized he still owed me some items. we call that a pc move, you try to owe somebody something but try to hurt them and get kicked out. [ bleep ]. no, no, heck, no. he took way more than what was owed. if he did collect, he took way more than what was owed him. he took way more. i told him. i gave him the game of the jailhouse. listen, this is things you do and don t. among other things he warned jones not to talk to inmates about his case because they might report that information, truthfully or not, to authorities. hicks says now he s in just such a position because of what jones has told them about his case. i m like, mike. like i know your case. like you ve told me your case. you sat down and you told me your case. it s like, a guy tel
the first chance they get, they re going to cross you. hicks is currently charged with eight felonies. the most serious being three counts of sale of a controlled substance. he has pled not guilty and is awaiting trial. just the time after going to scuffle, get into something. guys are going to try you. you might be showing, look, i don t play, i m a man, you re going to treat me like a man. if you don t, they re going to run over you. jones is one of two men accused of a double murder of a young couple. his codefendant is his future brother-in-law nathaniel wilkins, a former employee of the male victim. wilkins is housed in another part of the jail. both men say they are innocent. deep down inside it s still killing me. i had moments i could be by myself, i might bawl every now and again. i tighten up. i got to be a man first amongst thieves, i can t be a sheep amongst wolves. any sign of weakness, they ll eat you. given the gravity of his