Sonny Johnson never had a chance.
His mother was an eighteen-year-old prostitute with scoliosis and a club foot. His father was a neighborhood pimp with holes in his arms from a hundred dollar a day habit. Sonny never knew them.
Four days after contributing to Sonny’s conception, Father died from a combined overdose of heroin and peppermint schnapps. Seven months later, Mother squatted in the restroom at a fast food restaurant, grunted a few times, and gave birth. During her pregnancy, she never saw a doctor.
Mom was back on the street by the time a maintenance woman entered the stall and found a dirty woolen coat wrapped around a three-and-a-half-pound newborn and his bloody umbilicus. His eyes were puffy, and his head was misshapen. Much of his body was covered with fine hair, and his skin, particularly on his hands and feet, was peeling. His tiny lips and fingertips were blue from oxygen deprivation, and he was mewing like a hungry kitten.
A Johnson and Company ambulance rushed him to the nearest hospital, and it was a bright, sunny day, so the nurses named him Sonny Johnson. Doctors hooked him to a respirator, feeding tube, and heart monitor. His sucking reflex kicked in; his lungs matured, and he gained weight.
A few months passed, and when it was clear he was going to survive, Sonny was transferred to the Sisters of Mercy Children’s Home, an orphanage that struggled to stay open each year due to insufficient state and local funding. So, beyond meeting basic needs, they were unable to provide much that was enriching for their residents. Nonetheless, Sonny’s life at the orphanage, while far from ideal, was likely much better than it would have been had his mother decided to take him home.
Caretakers fed, bathed, and changed baby Sonny. They gave him all he needed to grow and survive, and never once did they mishandle or abuse him in any way. But, with so many others to care for, time for bestowing much real love and stimulation was limited. Most concerning, Sonny didn’t hear a lot of organized language as he grew up. He seldom heard a bedtime story, and, as he grew, hardly anyone engaged him in one-on-one conversation. Later, his limited language skills made it difficult for him at school.
Sonny was essentially isolated as he got older. No one from the surrounding community ever asked him to visit their homes or join them in any sort of activity. In fact, he and his mates at the orphanage were outcasts, a surplus population never summoned in.
So sheltered was he that Sonny didn’t chew a piece of bubble gum until he was twelve years old. He never rode a bicycle, played monopoly, skipped rope, played ball, or spun a bottle. He learned about birthday parties, sleepovers, hanging out at shopping malls, talking on the phone, going out on dates, kissing girls, eating at restaurants, or having any sort of privacy by watching television shows or movies. Today, psychologists and social workers would likely call him “culturally deprived,” “developmentally delayed,” or some other term they discuss at their professional conferences.
He did attend the orphanage school, as required, until he was graduated at age eighteen, but in basic academic subjects—reading, writing, and math—he was functioning at a third grade level. Thus, when he left Sisters of Mercy on his nineteenth birthday, also required, he was barely literate. He couldn’t read the newspaper or order from a menu, nor did he know how to manage money or use public transportation. Equally distressing, he had no friends, no family, and a minimum wage job washing dishes, ironically, at a fast food restaurant. With little to look forward to, he hated each day and sunk into a depression before turning to drugs to lift his mood. Heroin was his mood elevator of choice.
It wasn’t long before Sonny was jobless and homeless, living under a highway with rats for roommates. He panhandled and earned a few dollars a day, and when he could, he sold dope to junkies in the neighborhood. This enabled him to buy cheap booze, a winter coat at a second hand store, and a blanket he covered himself with on cold nights under the viaduct. For protection from local gangbangers, he bought a knife. For amusement, he used it for target practice to see how many rats he could kill. Often, when he hadn’t eaten for a few days, he survived by scrounging discarded food from trash bins behind restaurants and bakeries. By anyone’s judgment, Sonny was a bum. An impoverished, black bum.
Sonny didn’t know Mary McFale, but he had seen her walking her dog on the sidewalk adjacent to the viaduct. He stayed away because he knew better than to talk to strangers, particularly white women, and he didn’t like dogs. Then, Mary and her dog were murdered. Police found them in some bushes about ten yards off the street, not far from the viaduct. The dog had his throat slit, and Mary had been robbed, raped, and stabbed eight times with a jagged knife. Their blood mingled as they bled out on a patch of mud and stringy grass. Mary had a four month old fetus in her womb.
It didn’t take long before the police came for Sonny. They cuffed him, shoved him into the back of a squad car, and drove him to the county jail. They accused him of murdering Ms. McFale and her dog. “Ain’t done the deed,” Sonny said, but it didn’t matter much, because he was just what was needed to close the case: a man without education or means, without an advocate or any type of support. And, he was black.
Black people make up 13% of our population. Since 1976, however, 43% of the people executed have been black, and the chances of execution increase when the victim is white. The words of a Texas police officer sum it up pretty well, despite the fact that he said them a generation ago. Confronted with two suspects in a murder case, one white and one black, he said, “One of you two is gonna hang for this. Since you’re the n*gger, you’re elected.” This astounding bigotry was directed at Clarence Brandley who was charged with the murder of a white high school girl. Brandley was later exonerated after ten years on death row.
Sonny’s brief life was without joy or accomplishment. It was so empty that one wonders how many times he smiled before he died. For sure, he lived a meager existence at an orphanage and under a highway until his life was taken in one of the most inhumane ways possible. And we’re still not even sure he committed the crime for which he was put to death.
Sonny Johnson never had a chance.
On Some Tuesdays in the Spring
Sonny Johnson lived under Highway 95
sharing space with feral cats and vermin
’til they moved his blanket to the county jail
because the Man said he murdered Mary McFale
he faced the court without a dollar in his pocket
next to a pale faced public defender who didn’t give a damn
a jury found him guilty in less than three hours
and sentenced him to die on a Tuesday in the spring
fatty pork and greens cooled greasy on a tin plate
as a portly priest sanctified Sonny’s soul
no stays of execution were offered up to save him
from being discarded like a mound of yesterday’s trash
they bound him to the chair; “Old Sparky,” they called it
and fastened electrodes to his limbs and head
beads of sweat on Sonny’s forehead glistened
“ain’t done the deed; how come y’all don’t listen?”
the lights in the cell block flickered
and Sonny convulsed hard against his bindings
and smoke curled from his head
and his blood bubbled and boiled
and his eyeballs melted and popped from their sockets
and his organs fried to well done
and his bladder leaked hot urine
and they waited until his body cooled
before they put him in the ground
Sonny’s fate is justified in some holy books
that tell us “an eye for an eye” is the way
but does anyone care how many men are taken
with the chilling chance we are mistaken
on some Tuesdays in the spring
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