I am attempting to reach out to many of you in order to let you know how drastic your life can change if you allow yourself to be deceived by the euphoria of alcohol and/or drugs. I would expect that some of you reading this message are thinking that this is ridiculous because you don’t have a drinking problem. Possibly though, something happened in your life that places you in a position that allows this message to be received. Maybe you were talked into attending a meeting of Alcoholic’s Anonymous, or, just as likely, a concerned individual, or organization, saw to it that a copy of this life-saving message was placed in your hands. There could be a million different reasons for your reading this, but when you cut through all the layers of baggage, it all boils down to the same thing….. Maybe, just maybe, you have been living on the edge, unaware, so to speak, of a very dangerous consequence to a seemingly harmless action. Just remember, having a drinking problem is not a prerequisite to finding yourself on the wrong side of a very bad situation. Individuals who partake in alcohol and drugs in a socially becoming manner find themselves in tight situations as well.

The goal of this message is to make an impact on those who choose to drink and drive. I make no claim to be a talented writer. I only hope that my tragic experience will be able to benefit you. With that in mind, I will do my best to keep it simple. I will do my best to keep you from attending the Alcoholics Anonymous meeting that I am the Chairman of here at Chuckawalla Valley State Prison every Monday night. Most of those that attend this meeting now are serving a life sentence for murder.

I am also convicted of murder as a result of the accident that I mentioned due to changes in the law regarding drinking and driving. There was a time when the laws used to partially protect the individual who found themselves in a bad situation as the result of making a terrible choice while under the influence of alcohol, drugs, or both. This was called a “Diminished Capacity Defense.” This was available in regards to automobile accidents, but also, an array of criminal charges that resulted while under the influence. However, this is no longer the case, and rightfully so. Now the law is designed to protect the innocent victims from actions taken by those who, even for a second, forget about personal responsibility and the acceptable norms of our society.

Now you may not be an alcoholic or drug addict, but someone who decided to drive after consuming alcohol. This alcohol may have been consumed in an acceptable manner, among acceptable people. But, if after you drank, you made a conscious, or unconscious, decision to get behind the wheel of a car and drive that short distance home, without even knowing it, you just gambled with the lives of innocent people, including the ones that you love the most. By law, this is what is called a, “Careless Indifference to Human Life.” Truly, there can be no better explanation. The severe ramifications are the same, whether you knew what you were doing, or not. This careless indifference is occurring all the time. In fact, as I write this message inside Chuckawalla Valley State Prison, surrounded by gun towers, a lethal electrical fence and miles of concertina wire, there are hundreds of vehicles being driven around this country by drivers which are not even aware of the disaster they are flirting with. Prior to May 5, 1992, I was also carelessly indifferent to the ramifications of this type of behavior, even after numerous experiences that should have provided the motivation necessary to make some serious changes. Unfortunately, I knew that something like this would not happen to me. Never once did I think that I would be serving a life sentence in prison. I was a successful businessman, a husband, a father, a person who harbored the false rude awakening when I found myself standing before a Court of Law conceived as being harmless at the time. We must all be prepared or unconscious, justified or unjustified. The concessions that were prevalent in the past have been removed.

For the past eight years, I have endured the madness of confinement. During this time, I have come into contact with thousands of other prisoners and listened to their painful stories. These prisoners have ranged in age from 16 to over 70 years old. Through all these stories, there is one common thread, alcohol or drugs. Every single person that I have ever spoken to within the walls of prison have indicated that either alcohol, drugs, or both, played a significant role in their charged offense. This is a powerful statistic in itself which is impossible to ignore. If you feel confident that you will be able to make the right choice every single time that you indulge in alcohol or drugs, I may one day be hearing your story.

However, before this occurs, I truly hope that you will take an inventory on what you have now, and compare it to what you will have within these walls. You would surely want to take into consideration that the true tragedy of suffering a personal disaster is not to you, but to those you harm, and those you love. These are the individuals who will suffer the most as a result of your choices. After this is clearly thought through, then, and only then, can you add to the list the items you will be sacrificing personally. That list would include literally hundreds, if not thousands, of things. If you like privacy, it will be gone within these walls. If you enjoy seeing the stars at night, hearing the waves crash on the shore, watching your children grow, embracing your wife, sharing a moment with a friend, building a life, personal security, birthday parties, anniversaries, family reunions, helping your siblings, helping your parents, sports, vacations, and on, and on, and on…. Every single day in this nightmare will remind you of another thing to add to your list. Another thing lost, never to be recovered again. Once you have a partial picture of what you will lose, it may be a good idea to make a list of things that you will gain…

From the first moment you are let off from the bus that transports you, in a cage, to the intake facility for your states department of corrections, you will begin to understand the magnitude of your punishment. You immediately begin to become familiar with a society that is unforgiving and incomprehensible from the outside world. You realize from this point forward, your only goal is survival. Your goals related to your family, or your life, no longer matter. The fact that you are sorry about drinking and driving and want things to change matter about as much as the guy’s screams in the cell next to you. The sights are quite shocking unless you can imagine, in advance, living in a world that is completely made of steel bars, concrete and filth. Or, unless, you are used to looking into the eyes of predators or individuals who seem to have lost their souls and their desire to live. The first time you get a good look at the cell that will be your home tends to instill fear into the hearts of most. The realization that this small dungeon is your only refuge strikes you significantly. Then, the first time the bars are slammed shut in your face and you begin to understand that the life you used to know is gone, maybe forever, the new sounds begin to assault you.

Once you arrive here, you will never hear a moment of silence again. This alone, can have powerful physiological effects on a person. There is the constant sounds of boots scraping along concrete floors, guards practicing their accuracy of shooting at the range, prisoners yelling for guards, toilets constantly flushing, jingling of keys or the screams and unintelligible outbursts by those suffering from mental illnesses or nightmares. Of course, there is also the sound you hear that many attempt to disguise, the sound of someone crying into their pillow. But, this sound, pales in comparison to the rest.

After you have been processed at an intake center, you will be sent to one of your state’s prisons. Upon arrival, you immediately are required to learn a whole new set of rules and codes. The failure to do this can be the difference between life and death. The moral norms that you may have been used to no longer matter. You will learn to live under the stress of knowing that, at any time, you may be required to participate in a variety of actions that could have life-long affects to your well-being. If you are successful with living on a general population prison yard, then you will live a life of self-segregation. You will witness firsthand the insane politics and dangers of prison life. You will be changed. This list also can go on and on.

The biggest fallacy would be to think that because you currently have everything going well in your life, that you could never end up here. If you can think back over the last year or two and remember just one instance when you drove a vehicle with alcohol in your system, then you have already taken the gamble I mentioned. You have already decided, that you alone, have the right to mortgage the lives of many people which is absolutely unconscionable on your part. You alone, have decided that it is fine if others suffer as a result of your actions. A very selfish way to think indeed.

It took many years to gain some clarity on this problem, and on the disease of Alcoholism. The reason for this is pretty obvious at this point in my life, but very hard to explain. For most of my life, I was brought up around alcohol and it was one of the accepted norms around my house. I can remember great times that resulted from those around me consuming alcohol, specifically, my father. When you watch the person you idolize drink every single day, you become unable to find any error in the behavior. It was pretty cool when my brothers and I could grab a drink or two from him, or go looking for him at local bars to play a game of pool. Never realizing, that later in my adult life, when I was absolutely on top of the world, this accepted type of behavior would be the cause of my personal destruction. I should have taken more note of the problems that drinking caused between my parents to understand the ugly side is far more powerful. However, how many of us really want to concentrate on the ugly side of anything, let alone, a subject as personal as one’s drinking habits. When I came to prison in 1993, I started to attend Alcoholic’s Anonymous meetings as a result of my need to show the Board of Prison Terms that I had come to grips with the devastation caused by drinking and driving. Although, of course, I was not an alcoholic. In other words, I was there for all the wrong reasons. After I few years, it began to sink in that I was possibly going to spend the rest of my life in prison for a car accident. This revelation gave new definition of a drinking problem. Because of being completely irresponsible when it came to drinking, an innocent man was killed, and his family was destroyed. But, it is not only irresponsible to drink and drive, it is irresponsible to drink when you cannot predict what type of person, or what type of behavior will result from the drinking.

If you can’t be completely certain, one hundred percent of the time, of what you will do, or who will be affected, when you take this drug, why would you then do so?? If we all went to a doctor for an ailment of some sort, and he stated to us that we needed to take this pill he prescribed, but, in doing so, there was a chance that we could die, that we could kill someone else, that we could lose everything that we own, that we could lose our families, that we could become disabled, or, that we could spend the rest of our lives in prison, we would ask this person if he were crazy!! None of us would take a drug that has these types of side effects, would we?? Well, apparently, I did. This is the clarity of Alcoholism. It is a very seductive disease. It lets you forget about all the bad, all the ugly, and all the selfishness that goes with drinking. It is actually pretty amazing when you think about it. If we could harness that sort of power, and bottle it, we could make a fortune. But wait, someone already has.

There are no words available to me to clearly express my feelings on just how important it is for you to address this issue. Again, there may not be a problem with you at all. But, there must be some reason that compelled you to read this message. Whatever the reason is, be honest with yourself and take a real close look at the way your life is today, and the way it could be without alcohol or drugs in it. Or, look at someone close to you that could benefit from this knowledge and share it immediately. Surely, you can see the advantages that this could provide to you, and to those around you. No matter what you get from these words, I truly hope that you will make a conscious decision today to never get behind the wheel of a car again after you have had anything to drink that would impair your abilities to drive. If you know that you are going to drink, do yourself a favor and line up alternative transportation. Just as important. NEVER get in the vehicle with someone who is driving drunk. The laws are unforgiving in regards to this matter. It does not make a difference how the accident occurred. If you have a measurable amount of alcohol in your system, and someone gets hurt, or killed, you are coming to prison. I know nothing of your background to tell you how you would adjust to prison life. It’s not easy to say the least.

I never thought I would watch my children grow up without a father to help them. Never once, did I give thought to how hard it would be to watch my wife struggle to survive alone. How can you really give thought to such painful things? How can you see through the fog and identify a serious problem when, in fact, you may not even realize a problem exists, or if you are just indifferent to all the signs? If you are reading this, then you are lucky enough to have a second chance. You need to grab ahold of it with all your might and never let go. I can’t tell you what I would give for another shot at life, another shot at being where you are today. But I know this, it is a whole lot more than any of you would be willing to pay.

I could sit here and write all the buzz words that those who are familiar with AA would recognize. I could tell you to get involved in a twelve step program, attend ninety meetings in ninety days, read the big book, etc. I could tell you to take it a day at a time, everything will eventually get better. I could remind you of the twelve promises of the program and on and on and on. However, none of this matters until you are ready to make changes in your life.

On the night of my accident, I was having the time of my life. I was not thinking that in just a few short hours I would be involved in a horrendous tragedy. I was not thinking of what this would do to so many people, my wife and children included. This was a failure that is absolutely incomprehensible to anyone who has not suffered in this magnitude. The opportunities that I destroyed for so many people are countless. I have watched through a prison fence, those that matter the most, suffer the worst. I have listened hundreds of times to problems that my family were having, that would not have happened, had I not been so selfish. I could share so many heart breaking stories with you that have resulted from this terrible tragedy, but I won’t. It was not my intention to concentrate on me, but to concentrate on a message that would be powerful enough to force you to change your habits.

Christmas just passed a couple of weeks ago. What a terrible day to have to watch your children leave a visiting room to go home and open presents without you. What actually hurt the most, was knowing that they would not have that many to open because of me. That didn’t affect their hugs and kisses though. And it didn’t change their one question that they continue to ask, and I continue to be unable to answer, “When are you coming home Daddy?” “Don’t they know it was only an accident?”

If this message helps just one person, then all of the suffering, all of the loss and all of the pain endured by the innocent victims will not have been all the way in vain. Especially, the family and friends of Mr. Jilly Rizzo. I hope you can defy the statistics. I hope that you never have to experience this madness. Take a good look at the ones that matter in your life. Cherish them, they are such a joyful gift. I pray for you all.