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“Some scars don’t fade.”
“Some scars don’t fade.”
What Others Say About "The Weight of Justice"
What Others Say About "The Weight of Justice"
"Michael Cantrell's take on resilience as armor that can become your prison is excellent, and I say this as one of our nation's leading trainers on resilience. This is one of the most powerful, brilliant, clear-eyed takes on our criminal justice system that I have ever read.
Michael is one of our nation's leading trainers and speakers in this vital and essential field. His podcast has made him one of the most significant voices in this realm, and his book will be an essential resource for those who serve in it."
Dave Grossman, Lt. Col., US Army (ret.)
Author of On Killing, On Combat, On Spiritual Combat, as well as many others.
“With 32 years serving the law enforcement profession, I have rarely seen the gap between leadership theory and lived operational experience bridged as well as Michael Cantrell bridges it in The Weight of Justice.
For anyone leading or training inside corrections, this is what no training program can fully replicate: a credible, unfiltered account of what the job actually costs and what it can produce.”
John Bostain,
Founder and Owner, Command Presence Training
“Mike, I loved working with you, and I loved this book. You are one of those who walked the halls and tunnels of prisons that have broken many, or made them harder than any person should be. You walked through, and though changed, you understand, and you use that understanding to help others. This book offers stories and insights that can help those who follow a similar path walk with more understanding and arrive on the other side harder, but still intact. Thank you, Big Mike.”
Linda Sanders,
Warden (retired), Federal Bureau of Prisons
Excerpt from the Book
Excerpt from the Book
JUST BECAUSE YOU CAN,
DOESN’T MEAN YOU SHOULD
We never use the Q word in corrections. Quiet.
We never say, “Man, it sure is quiet tonight.” If you do, the skies will crack open like a wound, and whatever old gods still watch over prisons will send down chaos—not angels, not mercy—just chaos, the kind that walks in on two legs and wears an inmate uniform.
I am five and a half hours into a good shift. Mainline ran smoothly. Pill line was completed with no issues. No arguments, no problems. Everything is working the way it should. Not the way it does, but the way it should. That’s what made me uneasy.
At the Medical Center for Federal Prisoners, things are never Q. Not really. So when they are, you start watching the clock.
The phone rang. The officer in unit 3-1 needed me upstairs. The officer had an inmate who’d covered his door, and the officer couldn’t complete his thirty-minute rounds as required.
When an inmate is in lock-up or segregation, you physically see them every half hour. No exceptions. Not a suggestion. A policy requirement.
I wasn’t too concerned at first. Covered doors happen. It’s how some inmates demand attention without asking. But once it pushes past that thirty-minute mark, it stops being a nuisance and becomes something else entirely.
I went upstairs.
Unit 3-1 is a strange setup. It is a medical unit and houses every type of inmate—low and medium-security dialysis inmates in eight-man dorms, single-man cells for max custody inmates with medical issues, and at the end of the hall, four segregation cells for the problem cases. The kind of unit that keeps you sharp because you never know what you are walking into.
Roosevelt Briggs was in one of those last four cells. Briggs had no legs below the knees. People picture someone like that as withdrawn. Dependent. That wasn’t him. Not even close. He was built like a man who’d decided early on that his circumstances weren’t going to define his threat level. Broad shoulders, washboard abs, dreadlocks hanging past his collar, and a permanent chip that never seemed to wear down. What he lacked in mobility, he made up for everywhere else.
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