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Suicide Square (Pt. 2)

Part Two

By J.K. Chenevert, BSCJ, CPSPublished 5 years ago 18 min read
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Part One

~ Chapter One ~

“No society can understand itself without looking at its shadow side.”

~ Dr. Gabor Maté ~

So… where to begin. There are periods of my life that are an absolute blur. Some are a total blank. Pieces, fragments and streams of memories collide into others. Dark moments that haunt mercilessly and others that are illuminated by the brightest, purest of lights. I guess, I’ll try to find some continuity and just pick a day that is vivid and crisp in memory and we’ll start from there… Let’s see… December… the winter of 1975… I remember it was cold and windy but sunny when this day began. As I walked the streets, the wind whipped at my face, as I tried to move faster through the run-down and tattered neighborhoods of Worcester’s Main South. The wind, gusty and constant, forced my head down, deeply between my shoulders, causing me to walk a little faster for an instant; like I had somewhere to be or a hope of getting out of the fuckin’ cold any time soon. Thing is, on this day, like many before and many still to come, I hadn’t slept in days, can’t remember when I last ate and didn’t have anywhere to go to escape the cold and bone-chilling wind. I am, instead, walking along the steel grey, granite sidewalks of Worcester, Massachusetts, in nothing but a dungaree jacket and a pair of sneakers, freezing, at Christmastime, with a screwdriver in my pocket, looking for a car to steal to provide me with a warm, safe, isolated, place to spend the night. I had been living on the streets for a while now and when I wasn’t locked up or later on, too high to feel or care about anything, most days typically ended the same way; with me terrified, unable to think cohesively or unable to stop the maddening, racing thoughts that tore through my mind incessantly or escape the feeling of desperation of needing somewhere, anywhere, that felt safe….

I couldn’t tell you what time of day it was or even the date, short of; it was mid-afternoon, a Saturday I think, sometime in December, in the winter of 1975 and I had just turned 15, a week or so prior. I can tell you, however, where I was… like exactly where I was… as in “hyper-vigilantly-aware” exactly. I had just crossed Madison from Beacon St., cutting through the Trailways bus station parking lot onto Myrtle St. and was coming up on the corner of Portland Ave. I was heading to the parking garage at the Worcester Center Galleria Mall, well known at the time for its complete lack of security, where snagging a car out of the parking garage was typically a piece of cake (the only thing that could have made it easier would be to have the damn keys, for Christ’s sake!). Down Portland Ave. was the quickest way to get to that garage, but with that shortcut came an unwelcome host of rapacious old men… lecherous, debauched, lascivious old men, lurking and watching from under awnings or in dimly lit doorways that smelled of dry urine, old whiskey and stale cigarettes. Sometimes, upon my approach, one or two of them would step out into the light, with offers to “come upstairs and watch some TV” or of a “place to stay,” or “come in and get warm”… always with the added “bonus” of warmth… and cigarettes… or food… or drugs… or alcohol… or money… always money… awaiting me; upstairs, in some room, on some floor, in some old, dark and dilapidated granite apartment building. These creeps would talk softly, sweetly to me, almost as if they were speaking to a small child or a girl even, moving slowly, ever closer, until they thought they were just close enough to tentatively reach out and stroke my shoulder length hair or broad shoulder or maybe grope my youthfully developed bicep. Two blocks of downtown Worcester that very few adults, never mind, kids, would dare to wander down, day or night... but… that particular “sense of fear,” that fear that would have instinctually stopped just about anybody from venturing down that street… had left me… and my soul. I had known many mortal terrors already in my brief life, which only few humans will ever experience; that Portland Ave. and its lurking, creeping de-generates, quite frankly, didn’t have jack shit on. And besides… they knew; those lewd, middle-aged bastards and crusty, old, degenerates that skulked in shadowy doorways on Portland Ave., they all knew, as soon as our eyes met, that it was they who needed to be deeply afraid… and in this moment of utterly profound clarity, instead of reaching out and committing themselves to some unknown but horrifying fate by daring to touch me, they would instead, retreat quickly in haste and fade back into the shuttering, uninviting and inescapable darkness from whence they came… This day, however, the trip down Portland Ave… ? Came without incident.

The Mall was full of activity that day as throngs of people milled and rushed about to locate the perfect gift for a loved one, sample some holiday chocolates from the Herbert Candy Store or sit for a photograph with a portly, rosy cheeked Santa Clause. Once in the Mall, my ears began to immediately burn, as sensation returned to them and the numbness from that fucking cold ass, wind began to go away. As I walked around trying to get warm again, there were hundreds of people of all ages, all around me, Christmas shopping; the stores and the Mall festively decorated, the Malls’ PA system piping in the timeless voice of Bing Crosby, who was having a grand fuckin’ time “Walking in a Winter Wonderland.”

I headed down to the basement and went into Filenes to try and steal a winter coat. Looking back, I must have been a sight. I hadn’t showered or changed my clothes in weeks, but no one gave me a second glance as I headed to the Men’s Department. Once there, I found a winter parka with a hood, looked around for a few minutes and then when I thought it was good, put it on and headed back towards the entrance. Just as I was leaving the store, I heard a shout from behind me and saw two men coming at me when I turned around. I didn’t stick around to see what they wanted.

I would suppose, now when I look back on that day, there were a lot of things working in my favor that made my getting away possible. Maybe it was the sheer size of the crowd in the Mall that allowed me to disappear into it. Unfortunately, the mad dash to the entrance to the parking garage on the other side of the Mall is an absolute blank. It's like, suddenly, someone just shuts the fucking camera off and it stops recording or something. Blink, blank, gone. It’s happened a lot over the years. I have lost so many memories when my brain goes into flight or fight mode. A defense mechanism in me that is highly defective and not to be trusted at all. Ever.

I am sure that much chaos ensued as a product of that insane run through the Mall, however, with Moms, Dads, children and Grandmas running amok, screaming and probably falling down trying to get out of my way. Without much regard for anything else, I ran into the garage as quick as my feet would carry me and took the elevator up to the 2nd floor. What I thought and was hoping for, when I entered the Mall earlier that day, turned, instead, into a frantic, urgent need to put as much distance between myself and the city of Worcester as quickly as I could. All over a coat. As I quickly passed between the rows of cars, I began looking for something kind of dark, nondescript, with a big, comfy, back seat, like a Lincoln, an LTD or Grand Torino but then spotted, parked in a dimly lit corner, a 1970 Boss 429 Ford Mustang, bright “Grabber Blue” and I must have lost my mind in that fucking moment because the next thing I know, I am in the car, “popping” the ignition.

Fords, in the 70’s, were hands down, the easiest car to steal. In fact, I could get into a locked, Ford, Lincoln, Mercury anything, 1970 to 1985 and have it started, as quick, if not quicker, than someone with the keys. I only say quicker because my intent was to get into the car, start it and drive away as swiftly as possible, whereas a person with the keys does not typically possess such a need to be so “I-gotta-get-the-fuck-out-of-here” expeditious. Anyways, again, looking back, the car may not have been the best of choices (as I type with a slight grin on my face… HA!!!) as far as being inconspicuous is concerned, but on the other hand, there were certainly no cops, in all of the city of Worcester, or all of Worcester County, for that matter, that could outdrive me and catch my ass behind the wheel of that Boss. Not ever. Not on their best day and my worst. Soooo… I took the Mustang. And once again, as only my fate would have it, chaos was waiting; just downstairs and around the corner.

~ Chapter Two ~

I was in the locked Mustang and had it running in like 15 seconds flat. At that point, I had been stealing cars for about 3 years and I guess I had gotten pretty good at it. The first time I stole a car, I had met this older kid named Jimmy in Webster, Mass, after being awake all night and running away earlier that morning from a juvenile group home called Anker House, near Elm Park in Worcester. I got to Webster that day by hopping on a southbound train off Southbridge Street and riding it for 27 miles in between the railroad cars from Worcester to Webster. Jimmy and his girlfriend, whose name I cannot remember for the life of me, were drinking beer under the railroad trestle that traverses the French River, near Pleasant Street, where I had jumped, stumbled, fell and rolled off the moving train. They heard me hit the ground, I guess and came to see if I was alright. The car we stole together that day, on a sunny Sunday afternoon, in broad daylight, came off a car lot in town, “Kunkle Buick,” owned by the dad of one of the kids Jimmy went to school with. This, too, was a Mustang, the first, in a long line of many; a 1971 Grande, olive green convertible, automatic with a 351 Windsor in it, parked on the lot in a place of prestige, so all who passed by on E. Main St. could see IT… and me and Jimmy sitting in IT. Ha! When we were hanging out under the trestle, Jimmy told me he had been checking out the car every day for a week but couldn’t find anyone to steal it with him. I said I would, if he would teach me how to and let me have the car when he was done with it. As it turned out, we took the car out on a dirt road in the woods on the backside of Webster Lake later that evening and ended up slamming it into a tree. But now I knew how to steal a car with just a screw driver and spent that evening in a brand new 1972 Ford LTD, stolen from Hubbard Hospital on Thompson Rd. on the walk back to town after crashing the Mustang. I think it belonged to a doctor. It had a phone. I hadn’t turned 13 yet.

When I got the Mustang started that day in the parking garage and turned out into the aisle, the rear wheels spun and squealed really loud as I gave it some gas to straighten the car out. The 1970 “Boss 429” came out of the factory with 375 horse-power, a Posi-Traction, 9 inch, .383 rear-end, a Hurst shifter and a 4 speed, top loader transmission, with a really short, stiff clutch, which engaged almost immediately. Add that to the fact that I was only 15 and did not understand then, what all the shit I just rattled off above actually translated into, with regards to the remarkable power that car had (and to think what that car is worth today... fuck… *sigh*) and you have the perfect formula for what occurred next: I spun the rear wheels rather loudly; the sound amplified by the vastness of the cement parking garage and needless to say, it did not go unnoticed. I saw the flashing blue lights way before I ever saw the cruisers and realized the cops must have been parked down on the street when I spun the rear tires, which meant, if I went out the entrance, I would have to drive by the cops. As I exited the garage and turned right onto Foster Street, a cruiser was just turning the corner and came up behind me and another was right in front of me, pointing in the opposite direction I was traveling. As I swerved to go around it, the one cop facing me immediately flipped a bitch behind the other and both got in behind me, hit their sirens and, well, I… umm… didn’t stop for cops back then.

If I had to pick a place geographically to try and elude the cops in the state of Massachusetts in a stolen car, it certainly would not be on the streets of downtown Worcester or anywhere North or East of it but from where I was, South just happened to be the best option and would have been my first choice regardless. By that time, at 15, I could drive the winding, twisting back roads of southern central Massachusetts, from town to town, at crazy speeds, fearlessly and without much regard for anything… well… almost. I was extremely afraid about running somebody over. A kid, in particular. Had that ever occurred… fuck… I don’t believe I could have survived the rest of my life emotionally or mentally intact. Too much of me had already been shattered and ground into small pieces by my early life experiences and the part of me that was able to hold onto some remaining strands of being human were fragile and I am sure, had I ever hurt anybody, I would have come thoroughly undone… so… to literally avoid all THAT craziness… I got really, really good at what I did. My Mom hit and ran over a toddler once. It was snowing. The child had wandered into the road and my Mom didn’t see her. I remember, it took a very long time for my Mom to get over that… not sure she ever did really. She didn’t drive again for a long time after. Anyways, don’t get me wrong. I certainly made a few miscalculations and mistakes along the way and as a result, I have seen the insides of a fair share of police stations, jail cells, court rooms, county jails and state prisons but when it came to stealing cars and driving, I was sort of an all-star by age 16. And… I never once came close to hitting a person. Regrettably, this notoriety would eventually come to the attention of some rather serious individuals with extremely dangerous reputations, who, through various connections and acquaintances, would seek me out to provide for them; cars, drivers, diversions and escape routes for some of the more notorious crimes committed in the state of Massachusetts during the latter half of the 1970s. None of which we will speak of here. You’ll just have to take my word for it.

~ Chapter Three ~

Damn, that car was fast! Almost too fast, as I came precariously close to losing it in the first couple of turns, even though the roads were clear and dry but once me and that car became one and I was in the car, fuck, what a rush! Being hyper-vigilant because of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), as fucked up as that is, comes with a couple of neat perks. One of the benefits of “PTSD Induced Hyper-Vigilance” is an increase of up to 44% in “visual acuity.” In other words; as a result of my PTSD; I observe 44% more, see 44% more detail, glean 44% more information from that detail and visually react to it, in acutely stressful situations, 44 times quicker, than normal people do, under the same circumstances. Kind of like a freakin’ human super power. It happens to combat vets as well, I understand. Frankly and truth be known, I give full credit to this increased visual acuity for the fact that I never came close to ever running anybody over or crashing a car I was driving (unless intentionally). Friends would describe this same thing when I got into fights. I have been told that, in my formidable years, I would become acutely aware of potential, intended or perceived violence and movements, seconds before the violence would occur… and respond to it first, with explosive, ruthless, incapacitating violence of my own... Scary shit…

I do realize, to some, many of the claims I will make throughout the telling of this tale, will seem a bit incredulous. All I can say in defense is that I am not writing this for sensationalism or the book-of-the-month club. I honestly have little to no pride in most of what I am about to disclose. The things I have done, the life I have led, most would view as incredibly deviant. I’ve lied. I’ve cheated, I’ve stolen, and I have hurt many people, in a myriad of horrible, terrible ways. Antisocial Personality Disorder with Chronic Post Traumatic Syndrome co-morbidity is a deadly cocktail for me and a dangerous combination for those I encounter. How these disorders and many other types of behaviors all came about will become more than apparent, as this story and the deeply engrained, pervasive and persistent psychosis that drove the behaviors, unfolds.

Back to the Mustang. The roads were wicked slick as I veered to the left and screamed down Green Street, heading towards Kelley Square or “Suicide Square” as we locals liked to call it. Down Green, I was able to put 10 car lengths between me and the cops, instantly, just by stomping on the gas of the Boss, so there was no doubt, at all, I could flat out run them on sheer power alone if I had to, but given my druthers, I would rather have taken them out onto the back roads where I could out drive them. Let me stop here for a moment, as I guess this is as good a place as any to get into a brief discussion about legal jurisdiction and radio communications in the state of Massachusetts in the early to mid-1970s.

See, the cops back then, between the little towns and villages of south central Massachusetts, couldn’t speak to each other directly on their single channel Motorola radios because they all had to be on a different frequency, otherwise you would have police from 15 or 20 towns, all within broadcasting range of each other, bleeding all over the top each other in a jumbled, confused, incoherent mess. So, Worcester had its own frequency and Webster had theirs and so on and so forth. However, while they did have early 4-channel “scanners” in their cruisers and could listen to police broadcast channels from the surrounding towns in the immediate vicinity, they had no way of contacting each other directly. (If you can imagine life before cell phones! Ha!) Which means, if the Worcester cops were in pursuit of someone and were coming up on the town line of say, Auburn or Shrewsbury, Worcester PD’s dispatcher, after receiving a radio call from the officer in pursuit, had to then telephone that towns’ dispatcher, to have them inform their officers, by radio, that a police pursuit involving Worcester PD was coming their way, down route such and such. If then, say, the Auburn police got to the Worcester/Auburn town line on Route 12, for example, before I did, they would have a road block set up or would be waiting to take over the pursuit from Worcester but… if I got there first, the Worcester police, at that time, were prohibited by law, from crossing into Auburn in pursuit of an alleged juvenile offender because they had no legal jurisdiction and had no power of arrest in Auburn. Had the Worcester police followed me into Auburn, at that time, and then arrested me and removed me from Auburns’ jurisdiction, they themselves could have and would have been arrested and charged with Kidnapping, Unlawful Imprisonment and Illegal Transportation of a Minor. (Serious shit and my, how things have changed!) As it is, this was later addressed and rectified somewhat by 1977 when all Massachusetts cops finally had “multi-channel” police radios installed, which then allowed all of law enforcement within the range of the other channels’ frequencies, to switch channels and speak to all police on that channel, be it local or state. Out of this upgrade in technology was born the phrase, “You can’t out run the radio.” Yeah, so they said but regardless, it all came to an eventual but abrupt, unforeseeable and life-altering halt anyways.

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About the Creator

J.K. Chenevert, BSCJ, CPS

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