Julio Bonilla’s Reviews > Hope: A Memoir of Survival in Cleveland > Status Update

Guards checked his cell at 6:08, and at 6:30, a guard, supervisor, and a nurse came to speak to him. He refused his evening hypertension medication, which prison doctors had prescribed after his arrest.

For more than ten years you have preyed upon three young women. You subjected them to harsh and violent conduct. You felt you were dominating them, but you were incorrect. You did not take their dignity.

They have persevered.

Are you still going to take me home at the end of June? You said you would.

You told me you were taking me home! I need to see my family!

A little after eight thirty p.m. Cleveland police officer Jim Simone was sitting in traffic on Pearl Road, about a mile from Seymour Avenue, when a motorcycle whizzed by on his right, cut across traffic, and pulled into a gas station. 🏍️
Simone noticed that the motorcycle’s license plate wasn’t attached correctly and was hanging sideways, which is illegal. He followed the rider into the….🚔

...If he quit, he wouldn't have gotten as much money, but now he can collect unemployment, and it's better for his pension, too. He says he's been egging on his boss for a couple of years, getting smart-mouthed with him and trying to get fired.

And he's always pushing me and poking me, shoving me and touching me. He loves to smack me with whatever's in his hand, like a newspaper or the cardboard tube from a roll of wrapping paper. He's like a fly that keeps landing one me that....

It's a full-on pillow fight now. All three of us are slamming one another with our pillows and laughing like crazy.

But it's no use. This is too much fun. I can't remember the last time I had fun.
Whomp!

He has been at his mother’s house for dinner and he brings me leftover rice and beans that she made. He seems to go to her place a lot, which seems weird to me because he’s always telling me how much he hates her. He calls her “whore” and “bitch” and says she beat him when he was little.🍚👵🏾

He steps out into the hallway and returns with an old vacuum cleaner, like one from the '70s. He takes the cord and wraps it around my neck and then starts tightening it. I feel it squeezing my throat, tighter and tighter.

Work is a ten-minute walk. After I pass a couple of houses and turn right onto West 110th Street, I can see the traffic light ahead at the corner of Lorain, where the Burger King is.