On the first day of the New Year the news traveled mouth to mouth, gleaned from a local newscast, and passed from prisoner to prisoner, "Yo did you hear about…." 

Not having heard, I shook my head ‘No’, for I hadn’t heard that a prisoner at the ancient, cavernous joint known as Western, in nearby Pittsburgh, had died over the night, due to an accidental electrocution. 

It would be hours, perhaps a full day, before I heard the name and reported circumstances leading to the death of a man identified as Lawrence Baker, a "Lifer", of Philadelphia. 

"Lawrence?" – the name itched with familiarity, and his street (really, prison) name bled through to full consciousness – "Not Lawrence" but  Laurence, who is – Lonnie – Lonnie Baker – Lonnie Bones!" 

A flood of memories of over a decade ago rushed in, of younger men in another prison, another Death Row, another time. 

Lonnie was among the first to arrive at Pennsylvania’s Death Row, for a botched, drug-laden robbery in North Philly, that ended in a shooting, and among the first to leave Death Row as well. 

Sentenced to death in 1983, the State’s Supreme court reversed his sentence, and ordered life imprisonment in 1986, and Lonnie was released to the General Population. 

He was one of those guys who made you laugh, and kept you laughing until it hurt, and in the context of Death Row, his innate sense of humor kept many a man sane in the midst of madness. 

When he left the Tow there were plenty who were mixed in emotion; glad he was leaving alive, but saddened that he was leaving.  for a lot of us, a lot of light left with him. 

The Supreme Court determined that the prosecutor’s argument to Lonnie’s jury, that there would be "appeal after appeal, after appeal" in his case if they sentenced him to death, violated the US Supreme Court’s ruling in Caldwell v. Mississippi (1995) (An identical argument, made by the same prosecutor, in Commonwealth v. Abu-Jamal and in Commonwealth v. Beasley was allowed). 

It would be nice to write how all went well, but that would be a lie.  From time to time, perhaps twice a year, Lonnie would return to the ‘Hole’ for write-ups based upon drugs, or some other jailhouse hassle. 

With a life sentence (in Pennsylvania, Life means natural life) Lonnie listed into daily prison life, largely unproductive and unmotivated.  He gave expression to his religious life through intermittent practice if Islam, but in the meantime his case went nowhere.  An interminable sentence reduced the job of leaving Death Row to the bitter recognition that "Life" meant slow-Death Row – forever in a cage. 

Despite a trial where Lonnie and his rappie appeared in prison clothing ("it looks like regular jeans to me" remarked an unconvinced Judge Sabo, after the two men protested their appearance) and where the DA berated them for ‘acting like MOVE members’ Lonnie never got a retrial. 

Over 15 years later, in what is reportedly an accident, Lonnie was electrocuted whole sitting on a metal toilet, in a cell, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. 

After 15 years on Slow-Death Row, Lonnie is but a remarkable memory. 

© 1997 Mumia Abu-Jamal