There was no way to come out of this prison improved. Not the way he was being treated. He had seen parts of Hunt that seemed well-run, clean, efficient. When he first arrived and was being processed, he saw prisoners milling about freely in a grassy courtyard. But he had been confined twenty-three hours a day to his cell, with no distractions, no companionship or beauty. The environment would drive any sane man mad. The grey walls, the blue bars, the strip searches, the showers behind bars watched by guards and cameras. The lack of any mental stimuli. Unable to work, to read or build or improve himself, he would waste away here.
He had risked too much in the hopes that he might do something to match the deeds of his brother Mohammed. No, it had never been a conscious part of his motivation—he had done what he could in the drowned city because he was there, it needed to be done, and he could do it. But somewhere in his gut, was there not some hope that he, too, could bring pride to the family, as Mohammed had so many years ago? Was there not some wish that he might honor his brother, his family, his God, by doing all he could, by circling the city looking for opportunities to do good? And was this imprisonment God’s way of curbing his pride, tempering his vainglorious dreams?
* * *
As the prisoners awoke, with their rantings and threats, Zeitoun prayed. He prayed for the health of his family. He prayed that they felt at peace. And he prayed for a messenger. All he needed was a messenger, someone to tell his wife that he was alive. Someone to connect him with the part of the world that still worked.
SUNDAY SEPTEMBER 18
Zeitoun had been napping through the morning, dazed and sluggish from the heat. His sweat had soaked through his orange jumpsuit. He heard notice that they would be allowed to walk outside again after lunch, and he wasn’t sure he could stand to make it.
He was disappointed in himself. Part of him had given up, and the part that still believed stood apart from the broken half of his soul, incredulous.
The wheels of the nurse’s cart echoed down the hallway. He had no reason to think she would help him, but he stood up and made ready to plead with her again. But when he looked down the hall, it was not the nurse, but a man he had never seen before.
He was pushing a cart of black books, and had stopped a few cells away from Zeitoun’s. He was talking to whichever prisoners were there, and Zeitoun watched him, unable to hear the conversation. The man was black, in his sixties, and watching him interact with the prisoners down the row, it was clear he was a man of God. The books in his cart were Bibles.
When he finished and passed by Zeitoun’s cell, Zeitoun stopped him. “Please, hello,” he said.
“Hello,” the missionary said. He had almond-shaped eyes, a wide smile. “Would you like to hear about Jesus Christ?”
Zeitoun declined. “Please sir,” he said. “Please, I shouldn’t be here. I committed no crime. But no one knows I’m here. I haven’t gotten a phone call. My wife thinks I’m dead. Can you call her?”
The missionary closed his eyes. It was obvious he often heard things like this.
“Please,” Zeitoun said. “I know it’s hard to believe a man in a cage, but please. Can I just give you her number?”
Zeitoun could only remember Kathy’s cell phone number, and hoped it would work. The missionary looked up and down the cellblock and gave a nod. “Be quick.”
“Thank you,” Zeitoun said. “Her name is Kathy. My wife. We have four children.”
Zeitoun had no pen or paper.
“This is against the rules,” the missionary said, finding a pen in his cart. He had no paper. Now they were both nervous. The missionary had been too long at his cell. He opened a Bible and tore a page from the back. Zeitoun gave him the number. The missionary stuffed the page into his pocket and moved his cart quickly down the block.
Hope rose in Zeitoun’s heart. He couldn’t sit down for hours. He paced, hopped in place, elated. He pictured the missionary leaving the prison, getting to his car, retrieving the number, calling Kathy from the road. Or maybe he would wait till he got home. How long could it take? He counted the minutes until Kathy would know. She would know! He estimated the hours until Kathy would arrive here to free him. If she knew he was alive, he could wait. The process might take days, he knew. But he could wait if it meant seeing her. It would be no problem. He pictured it all. He would be free in a day.
Zeitoun struggled to sleep that night. There was a man in the world who knew he was alive. He had found his messenger.
MONDAY SEPTEMBER 19
After breakfast two guards came to Zeitoun’s cell. They told Zeitoun that his presence was requested.
“Where? With who?” Zeitoun asked. Already it’s begun, he thought.
The guards told him nothing. They opened his cell, handcuffed him, and shackled his legs together. He was led out of the cell and down the hall. A few minutes later they arrived at another cell, where Zeitoun was deposited. He waited there for five minutes until the door opened again.
“Van’s here,” the guard said. The guard handed him to another guard, who walked him down another hallway and to a final gate. The gate opened, and Zeitoun was led to a white van waiting outside. He squinted in the full light of day. He was inserted into the van, the guard riding with him. They drove through the complex until they arrived at the main offices at the front of the prison.
Zeitoun was led out of the van and handed over to another guard, who led him into the building. Inside, they walked through an immaculate hallway until they arrived at a spare cinderblock office.
Outside the office were Nasser, Todd, and Ronnie, sitting on folding chairs in the hallway. Zeitoun was surprised to see them all assembled, and they gave each other looks of mutual bewilderment. Zeitoun was led past them and into a small room.
In the room there were two men wearing suits. They sat down and gestured to Zeitoun that he could take a seat. They were from the Department of Homeland Security, they said. They smiled warmly at Zeitoun and told him that they needed to ask him some simple questions. They asked him what he did for a living. He told them that he was a painter and contractor. They asked him why he hadn’t left the city when everyone had evacuated. He told them that he never left New Orleans during storms, and that he had a number of properties he wanted to watch over. They asked about Todd, Nasser, and Ronnie—how he knew them. He explained his relationship to each. They asked him why he didn’t have any money on him.
“What am I going to do with money in a canoe during a flood?” Zeitoun said.
“But Nasser had money,” one of the men said.
Zeitoun shrugged. He could not account for why Nasser had money with him.
The interview lasted less than thirty minutes. Zeitoun was struck by how friendly the men were, how easy the questions were. They did not ask about terrorism. They did not accuse him of plotting against the United States. At the end, they apologized for what Zeitoun had been through, and asked if there was anything they could do for him.
“Please call Kathy,” he said.
They said they would.
MONDAY SEPTEMBER 19
Kathy was in a state. She’d just gotten the call from the missionary a few hours before. And now the phone was ringing again. Yuko, who had been fielding calls for days, no longer knew what to do. Kathy picked it up.
A man introduced himself as belonging to the Department of Homeland Security. He confirmed that Zeitoun was at the Elayn Hunt Correctional Center.
“He’s fine, ma’am. We have no more interest in him.”
“You have no more interest in him? Is that good or bad?”
“That’s good.”
“Well, what was he in there for?”
“Well, they have ‘looting’ on his arrest sheet. But those charges will be dropped.”
The call was brief and businesslike. When she hung up, Kathy praised and thanked God for his mercy. She shrieked and jumped around the house with Yuko.
“I knew he was alive,” Yuko said. “I knew it.”
&nbs
p; “God is good,” they said. “God is good.”
They called Yuko’s husband and made plans to get the kids out of school early. They had to celebrate. And plan. There were so many things to do.
First of all, Kathy had to go. She knew she had to go. She had to leave that day for the prison. She didn’t know where it was yet, but she had to go. Where was it? She looked it up online. St. Gabriel, less than an hour from Baton Rouge.
She called Hunt and was bounced around the various automated extensions until she reached a person. She could barely speak. She wanted to fly through the phone and be there with him.
“I’m trying to reach my husband. He’s in there.”
“The prisoner’s name?” the woman asked.
Kathy had to take a breath. She could not stomach the idea of her husband being called a prisoner. By naming him she was expanding this lie, the one being told by everyone involved in his incarceration thus far.
“Abdulrahman Zeitoun,” she said, and spelled it.
Kathy heard the typing of computer keys.
“He’s not here,” the woman said.
Kathy spelled the name again.
Again the sound of typing.
“We have no one by that name,” the woman reiterated.
Kathy tried to remain calm. She told the woman that she had just received a call from someone from Homeland Security, and that that man had told her that Abdulrahman Zeitoun was at that very prison.
“We have no record of him,” the woman said. She went on to say that Hunt had no records for anyone who came via the hurricane. None of the prisoners from New Orleans were in their computer system. “All of those records are on paper, and we don’t have that paper. We have no actual records of any of those people. They’re FEMA’s.”
Kathy almost collapsed. She was spinning, helpless. She didn’t have a number for the Homeland Security man who had called; she cursed herself for not asking for a way to contact him. And now she was being told that her husband was not in the institution where the Homeland Security people and the missionary had seen him. Was this some kind of game? Had he been there at all? He might have been moved already. He had been a prisoner at Hunt but then some other agency wanted him. He had been spirited away to a secret prison somewhere—
She had to go. She would go to Hunt Correctional Center and insist she see him. She had a right to see him. If he wasn’t there she would demand they tell her where he’d been taken. It was the only way.
She told Yuko and Ahmaad she was going.
“Where?” they asked.
“Hunt. The prison,” she said.
They asked her if she was sure he was there. She was not. They asked if she was sure she would be allowed to visit. She was not. They asked where she would stay. Kathy didn’t know. Already she was crying again. She didn’t know what to do next.
They convinced her to stay in Phoenix for the time being, until she could be sure of Zeitoun’s whereabouts and how she could actually help him. She needed to be smart, they said. They didn’t want to worry about her, too.
Kathy called Raleigh Ohlmeyer, an attorney they had worked with before. Raleigh had helped a few of the Zeitouns’ workers who had legal issues to straighten out. Raleigh’s father was a well-known and powerful lawyer in New Orleans, and Raleigh, though in the family business, had chosen to break away, at least in his appearance. He wore his brown hair long, usually pulled back in a ponytail. He worked downtown and took on a wide variety of cases, from traffic tickets to criminal defense. Kathy was sure he would know how to straighten out this Hunt business.
There was no answer. She left a message.
Kathy called Ahmad in Spain and woke him up. She didn’t care.
“He’s alive!” she said.
He yelled a string of Thank Gods and Praise Gods.
“Where is he?” he asked. “With you?”
“No, he’s in prison,” Kathy said. “But it’s okay. I know where he is. We’ll get him out.”
Ahmad was silent. Kathy could hear him breathing.
“How? How will you get him out?” he asked.
Kathy did not have a plan just yet, but she had a lawyer, had put in a call to him, and—
“You need to go there,” Ahmad said. “You have to see him and get him out. You must.”
Kathy was unsettled by Ahmad’s tone. He seemed almost as worried by Zeitoun’s incarceration as he had been by his disappearance.
Fahzia, Zeitoun’s sister in Jableh, called soon after.
Kathy told her the good news. “We know where he is. He’s in prison. He’s okay.”
Another long silence.
“Have you seen him?” she asked.
Kathy said she had not, but that she was sure she would soon.
“You need to see him,” Fahzia said. “You need to find him.”
In the afternoon, Raleigh Ohlmeyer called Kathy back. He had fled the city just before the storm and had been staying in Baton Rouge. His house in New Orleans was under six feet of water.
Kathy told him what had happened to Zeitoun.
“What?” Raleigh said. “I just saw him on TV.” He had seen the local news broadcast of Zeitoun in his canoe.
Kathy told him about the calls from the missionary and the Homeland Security officials, how they had seen him at Hunt.
Raleigh was reassuring. He already knew all about Hunt. After the storm he had set up a makeshift office in Baton Rouge and was already working with prisoners brought to the prison.
The system’s broken, he said. There was no means to post bail. It would take some time before it could be rectified. Raleigh promised that he would get Zeitoun released, but given the state of the courts—there were none to speak of—he could not predict or guarantee a timeline.
TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 20
In the morning Ahmad called Kathy, tense.
“Did you tell Fahzia that Abdulrahman was in prison?”
His tone was severe.
“Yes, she asked and—”
“No, no,” he said, and then softened. “Let’s not do that. Don’t worry them. We cannot tell them he’s in prison. We cannot do that.”
“Okay, but I just thought—”
“We’ll call them and tell them he’s fine, he’s home, it was a mistake. Okay? We need to tell them this. You don’t understand the worry they’ll have if they think he’s in jail.”
“Okay. Should I—”
“I’ll call them and tell them he’s fine. If they call you, tell them the same. He’s at home, he’s safe, all is fine. You made a mistake. Okay? This is what we tell them. Okay?”
“Okay,” she said.
Ahmad wanted to know which prison he was in. Kathy told him it was in St. Gabriel, and that because the legal system was in limbo, it would be some time before they could even hope to get Abdulrahman out. But she had spoken to a lawyer, and he was on the case. It was only a matter of time.
But Ahmad was thinking beyond simple cases of attorneys and bail. He did not want his brother in prison at all. A Syrian in an American prison in 2005–this was not to be trifled with. Abdulrahman had to be seen. He had to be freed immediately.
The next time Kathy checked her email she saw a message from Ahmad; she had been cc’ed. He was trying to find Zeitoun, but he had gotten the city wrong. He had done an internet search for San Gabriel in the United States, had found a match, and had written this:
From: CapZeton
To: ACOSTA, ALEX
Subject: Urgent from Spain
The San Gabriel Police Department
San Gabriel, CA
Dear Sires,
My name is: Ahmad Zeton, from Spain
Reason: I’m looking for my brother (New Orleans Katrina evacuated). On Sept. 7th I missed the contact with my brother which we talked daily by phone after the Hurricane Katrina batch, I asked every place in order to have any news about him, lastly I learned that the Police Force him on Sept. 6th to evacuated his house in New Orleans and tacked him for San Gab
riel, and he is actually still arrested at San Gabriel.
Kindly would you please if there is a possibility to learn if he is all right, and if it’s possible to talk to him, or to call me by a collected call to my phone [number omitted].
The detail of my brother is:
Name: Abdulrahman Zeitoun.
Date of berth: 24/10/1957
Address: 4649 Dart St., New Orleans, LA
Well be very kind from you just to let me know if he’s all right,
Thanking you indeed,
Ahmad Zeton
Malaga-Spain
Kathy began to see the situation through Ahmad’s eyes. What if the prosecutors, hoping to justify Zeitoun’s incarceration, tried to make a case against him—a connection, any distant connection, to some terrorist activity? Any connection, no matter how specious, might be used to justify his incarceration and extend it.
Kathy did not want to think this way.
THURSDAY SEPTEMBER 22
She called Raleigh Ohlmeyer again. He had just called Hunt, and they had confirmed that Zeitoun was there.
Kathy called Ahmad and told him the news.
“Yes, but has anyone seen him?” he asked.
“No,” she said.
“Then we can’t be sure,” he said.
“Ahmad, I’m sure that—”
“You have to go,” he said. “Kathy, please.”
He apologized; he knew that he was pushing too hard, that he was calling Kathy too often, but his mind was filled with images of his brother on his knees, in an orange jumpsuit, in an outdoor cage. Every additional hour Zeitoun was in custody increased the chances of something taking a turn for the worse.
“I’ll fly to New Orleans,” he said.
“And do what?” Kathy asked.
“I’ll find him,” he said.
“Don’t. Don’t,” she said. “They’ll put you in jail, too.”
FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 23
By now Raleigh was familiar with some of the judges and administrators working to process the post-storm prisoners being kept at Hunt. Hoping to get Zeitoun’s case dismissed, Raleigh told Kathy it was time to come to Baton Rouge. She should fly out and be ready to come to the prison at a moment’s notice; there was a chance she could visit him on Monday. Kathy booked a flight and called Adnan, Zeitoun’s cousin.