OFFICE TOWER FOR MR. MARTIN

Dear Editor:

Columnist John Martin may claim to be a criminologist but he must be one of
those who spends his days in an office tower rather than in the trenches.
If he had done his own unbiased investigation rather than relying on the one
sided hyperbole provided by mealy mouthed critic Randy White while
polishing his pet peeve, our community interests may have been better
served by his commentary.

I have had the unfortunate experience of being confined in our federal
prison system when sentenced to six years for growing and distributing four
kilograms of pot.

Rather than spending my time there golfing or partying, I spent it trying
to stay alive with the terminal disease that I was infected with on my day
of admission, Black Friday, September 13, 2002.

Arriving at the prison strong and healthy, I was forced into a steel and
concrete abotoir covered in infected human blood left there with no
warning, protection or cleaning supplies, infected with Hepatis C and taken
out of the room three months later so sick and weak that I wished I were
dead. The buidling was demolished shortly after my being moved from it.

Despite dozens of documented trips to the prison "Healthcare" facility
complaining of what turned out to be the classic symptoms of Hepatitis C
infection, which I later learned is epidemic in all of those facilities,
with infection rates currently hovering at about 85 per cent. How could
these medical professionals charged with the care of those under their
control have missed that?

No one seems to know...Why were all of my requests to see an outside
physician denied? Why was my family physician's request to visit me denied
on multiple occassions? Maybe Randy White knows. No one else does.

Please report the facts on this issue. The prisoners in those dungeons have
no one to speak for them and White's criticisms of a group unable to defend
themselves is nothing more than pure cowardly bullying, something that no
doubt happened to Mr. White as a child.

Mike Patriquen.

Halifax, N.S.