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Well
do I remember Claude. He was a youngster, an orphan, who had been
living with his uncle in one of Northern California's counties. The
uncle used to get drunk and would abuse the boy, beating him
unmercifully, and often threatened to kill him. On one of these
occasions, Claude, who was a husky kid, fought back, and in the fight
he killed his uncle. He was tried and convicted of manslaughter and
sentenced to San Quentin. When Claude arrived at San Quentin he was
thirteen years old and wearing knee pants. In those days there were
no juvenile courts, juvenile halls, or Youth Authority, so they had
to send him to State Prison.
The
authorities at the prison were faced with a problem; what to do with
this smiling, handsome kid, just entering his teenage years. To place
him among the so called hardened criminals would be wrong. They gave
him a job as messenger boy outside the walls of the prison. They
sometimes even let him join in our games in the school yard. We all
liked Claude. I once asked him why he had killed his uncle. He said
it was in self defense. His uncle was going to kill him, so he killed
him first.
Author:
William J. Duffy, Jr.
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