Surviving Jail

This post is about the first night in jail on the night of your arrest (not about going to jail if you are sentenced to a jail term). Once you are arrested in the field you will be brought to a police station where the official blood, breath, or urine sample will be collected. After this you will be booked into jail. This means they will take your fingerprints and your mugshot. Then you will be put in "jail." I make this distinction because you will not be put in real jail, but it is actually a drunk tank where the drunks are put to sleep it off. Still, it is a horrendous experience.

I am posting this mostly as a warning for anyone who has not gotten a DUI and is curious about what it is like. This was my experience getting booked into the Riverside, CA detention center. The first step in getting booked was to store my property that I won't need while in jail. This includes anything in my pockets and my cell phone. I was wearing a sweater and a t-shirt that night so they took my sweater and left me with just the t-shirt. They took my shoes and my socks. All items went into a large brown paper bag. It was cold that night and it was very cold in jail. With no socks or shoes on my feet became cold immediately. After my finger printing and mug shot I was put into the drunk tank. I did not know at the time that it was just a drunk tank so was not sure what to expect.

The tank was a large room with nothing in it. In the room there were already 3 other people and one other guy that was brought in at the same time as me. There was a phone on the wall that only allowed collect calls to be made. You don't know your friend's phone number because it's stored in your phone? Too bad. The floor is rubber coated and there is a stainless steel toilet with a sink built into the top of the toilet tank. There is no privacy for the toilet, it is in the middle of the wall with no partitions around it. There was a large puddle of urine around the toilet where others had missed the mark before. There was no place to sit or sleep, except on the floor - next to the puddle of urine.

Sleep was impossible for me, I was not drunk. I wish I would have been so I could have slept through it. I tried to lay down but the lights were very bright in the room. There was no pillow or anything you could use as a pillow. My feet were very cold. I unzipped my pants so I could pull them down enough to cover my feet to give my feet some warmth. I was very dehydrated, too thirsty to sleep.

There was no clock or windows to the outside that would give you a hint of what time it was. There was a large plexiglass window on the door and about every 15 minutes (I guess) a deputy would peer through the window, pull out some papers that were hanging near the door and make a mark on them. There was no indication of how long we had been in there or how long we were going to be in there. One of the other guys tried asking the deputy how much longer and never got an answer. None of us were drunk anymore. I was worried about getting to work. No one cared. We would be there as long as they kept us there and that was that.

Being in there with the strangers was not so bad. They were all in the same boat and shared their stories. All we cared about was getting out of there soon. There was no food given to us. The only water was what you could get from the sink on top of the toilet. It was disgustingly filthy and we all chose to be thirsty instead.

About 6 hours later they pulled all of us out from the tank except for one guy that had immigration problems. The rest of us went to a smaller cell which had a bench in it. There we were given our shoes and socks back. I was so glad to be able to keep my feet warm. I was also given my sweater back and that was a relief. The other guys had not come in with sweaters so they were just in their t-shirts feeling cold. 

About 2 hours later they pulled us out one at a time and gave us a ticket to sign promising we would show up for our court date. My court date was 4 months away. I was also given a pink slip of paper that said my driver's license would be suspended in 30 days. With the paperwork complete we were put in an elevator that went to the lobby and were finally free.

Priority 1 for me was to get something to drink and something to eat. I found a Jack in the Box and went there and finally cured my thirst. Next I had to go get my truck from the storage yard. I was very late for work. I went to work with no sleep.

It was definitely not a fun experience. I was treated like an inconvenient and inconsequential speck of filth. The worst part was not knowing anything - how much longer? - what's next? when can we get some food? The deputies were just doing their job, and keeping us informed was not part of it. Our wants did not matter. I don't recommend the experience to anyone, and no matter what happens the rest of my life, I will not go through that again.