When I was 3 I followed an adult out of the children’s room at a public swimming pool. When I made it to the adult pool I saw my mother on the other side. I walked out to meet her and was somewhat surprised when I hit the water and started sinking. Through the tangle of legs I locked eyes with my brother Manny swimming toward me from the far side of the pool. I relaxed, knowing my brother would be there in a moment or two to save me.
When I was 5 years old another kid down the road threw a building brick at my head. I felt the warm blood trickling down my face and spurting out inches above my hair and I was gripped by fear. An adult neighbour came out and wrapped my head in his t-shirt and instructed me to, “run home.” When I got home I banged on the front door. Manny, 5 years older than me, opened the door and with a look of utter concern said, “Oooh, Babs,” (that’s my nickname), “you can’t come in here like that. You’ll get blood all over me Mam’s clean carpet.” Then he shut the door, just in case I should get any ideas, and went to get my mother. I relaxed, knowing Manny would take care of me and grateful that he reminded me about the carpets!
When I was 7 years old our family immigrated to the United States. Manny went out immediately and began to make friends. When I told him I was too scared to go and talk to our new neighbours he told me, “don’t be afraid. They aren’t much different from us. They just sound VERY different but they are speaking English! Just go out and talk to them.” Then he went out himself and arranged for our neighbours, Michelle and her little sister, Christen, to come and meet me. Christen and I made fast, best friends and are still, 30+ years later.
When I was about 8 our older brother John decided to move back to England. Our family had never split up like this and I was devastated. That night Manny comforted me through my tears and reassured me that we would see John soon. Later that night I woke up to find Manny holding John’s t-shirt and sobbing in the corner of their shared bedroom. (Our ecstatic reunion with John happened about six months later.)
When I was 9 I told him I didn’t really think Santa existed. He said, “well, yea, it would be pretty impossible for a SINGLE man to deliver presents to EVERY kid in the world in just ONE night. What actually happens is... he delivers the presents to the stores and then sends word to the parents that it’s time to pick them up.” “Ooooh, that makes sense,” I said and continued to believe.
When I was 12 one morning we were arguing over who gets to use the bathroom first. Manny won and I yelled out, “I hate you!” and attempted to storm away. But as I said those words I knew I didn’t mean them and the look on Manny’s face as he heard them filled me with instant regret. Of course, all three of us squabbled, like any siblings do. Manny was conveniently located in the middle, the perfect age to squabble with both John and me. But that morning I learned very hard that I had crossed the line, broken the unspoken rule - no matter what we never intentionally tried to hurt one another and words could really devastate. Manny started crying and asked me if I meant it. I started crying and insisted that I did not. My mother and John started crying. I’m pretty sure I heard our dog weeping. It is a memory that still often brings me to tears, a true regret if I ever did have one.
Manny took his role as my teacher, protector and role model very seriously. I cannot tell you how many times I heard him say, “no sister of mine won’t know how to …..”, ride a bike, do an ollie, ride a snowboard, ride a motorcycle, clean a carburetor, do BMX tricks, change a spark plug, do donuts, disassemble a Nintendo, re-wire a lamp, change the oil, install a house alarm, snorkel, bungee jump and so on and so on… What I didn’t know during those late night carburetor cleaning sessions, was that my big brother had started (along with my mother, father and brother John) my feminist education. Years later I would attend The University at Buffalo for masters studies in global feminism and that would lead me into a career in violence against women, prison reform and eventually as the director of the University of Vermont Women’s Center. When people learn about my path compared to my brother’s they are often surprised but what I tell them is that my brother and I are guided by much the same ethical compass - we both have a loathing for injustice, we are both generous with our love and our time, we are both fiercely loyal, we both have a deep yearning for information and to get to the inner workings of all sorts of “machines”. For Manny many of those things, through a series of unfortunate events, led him to prison. But those traits are also what makes Manny so lovable, admirable and, perhaps, the tools he has used to get through the nightmare of the past 14 years. People recognize those things in him immediately and they gravitate toward him. My mother told me recently that she went to the ACI to collect his belongings and all of the Correctional Officers were asking after Manny’s wellbeing and expressing what a great guy he is. That’s no surprise! Believe me, I grew up in Manny’s limelight!!
Manny has always had the reputation in our family as being the one who was wearing his heart on his sleeve. If he broke up with his girlfriend or had a fight with a friend it wouldn’t be surprising to find him snuggled up with my mother, having a cry. We would all snuggle up on the couch on cold or rainy days or in the evenings and watch movies, all the while my mother would be scratching Manny’s head. He’ll probably tell me off for telling you all this but even in his twenties, before going to prison, he loved a good snuggle from his Mam.
I could always rely on him for late night talks about the meaning of life or the significance of a song or film. He often came home from work with a piece of wire he had bent into my name on his breaks or a present he had picked up. His love for his family was as big as the world and no matter where I went or what I did, I always knew he was behind me and would be my cheerleader and, of course, warn me of potential dangers. His warnings often start with, “You know, as your older, wiser, brother…”So you see, when people exclaim how amazingly Manny parents Maison (as they see in this film), it comes as no surprise to me. In my mind Manny is synonymous with love and he helped raise me, so he’s had the practice. What’s surprising to me is that people would expect anything less. I understand. Ever since their invention prisons have been billed as a place to store away the really bad apples among us, to allow certain people to lead lives free of fear. They’ve been celebrated as institutions of justice and the irony is they themselves stem from the greatest injustice in US History (i.e. the 13th amendment). But I need to call into question this ubiquitous belief. I started doing prison reform work a few years before the trouble that led Manny to prison and through that work and, eventually (much to my surprise) our families’ own experience with the “justice system”, I have heard countless stories of people being wrongfully convicted and then subjected to the inhumane experience of prison life. Manny should be celebrated as a man that has managed to retain his humanity and heart while a system, backed by massive amounts of money and force, a very well oiled political machine and a very suspect idea of honesty and integrity, using humiliating, violence and cruel tactics has tried to rip it away from him at every turn. When I talked to Manny shortly after he was charged with this crime he said to me, “I know I didn’t kill anyone that night but I also know I didn’t do anything to save a life either and I won’t ever forgive myself for that.” When he said that we didn’t know he would be convicted of premeditated murder, of aiding and abetting a primary suspect (even though the primary suspect was NOT found guilty of premeditated murder). We didn’t know that most people who choose to go to trial are found guilty. We thought, despite my professional work, that the system would be reasonable and create a punishment that fit his crime. Manny was remorseful (and remains that way) and willing to accept his punishment. We didn’t realise we had become political pawns and that the object of the game was to get the biggest prosecutorial win possible. We expected honesty and justice.
When Manny went to prison Maison was one years old. Within four years he was diagnosed with Aspergers Syndrome (we LOVE Aspies!) and his mother had relocated to California. In 2006, six months after Manny went in, our father was diagnosed with stage four prostate cancer and later died in 2010. Manny had the choice to have a final visit with our father in the hospital or to attend his funeral. He chose to visit the hospital, with shackles around his wrists and ankles. In 2017 I underwent awake brain surgery to remove a lesion on my brain. We’ve lost two grandparents during his time in prison. Good things have happened, too! In 2009 John welcomed his second daughter (his older daughter is Maison’s age) and I welcomed my first son, followed by two more in 2011 and 2017. Our cousin, Tony, welcomed his two daughters. Manny, who is so very family oriented and always going out of his way to be there for his family -- missed all of this. He couldn’t be there to talk with his son’s doctors during diagnosis or meet his kindergarten teacher (or any teacher so far), he wasn’t there when Maison joined track last year and competed around the state, he didn’t get to hold our mother when doctors gave us updates about our father, or hold our father’s hand as he passed, he wasn’t able to meet his nieces and nephews at their births or help them learn to ride a bike or take them fishing, as he so loved to do. For fourteen years his life and freedom have been taken for a conviction that would hardly hold up to any honest scrutiny. We have tried everything in our power to have Manny’s conviction vacated. During a post conviction relief hearing Manny’s sentenced was reduced to second degree murder. This was essentially a plea deal, Manny had to plead guilty. This came as a blow to Manny who had maintained from day one that he would not admit guilt to a crime he had not committed but the system literally had his back against the wall. (Manny has never suggested that he didn’t deserve some punishment as he said, he did nothing to save a life either.) Our family has rolled with the punches, struggled sometimes to get up but we have and we know that, despite all we’ve been through, another family paid the highest price that evening.
In the early months of 2019 a lawyer mistakenly informed us that Manny was technically a citizen and would not be deported. We knew Manny’s released date was approaching and this news suddenly made the light at the end of the tunnel begin to shine brightly. Maison began to imagine what it would be like to introduce his Dad to his friends or show him around his bedroom. My mother began to imagine Manny walking through the door of her home, with Dunkin Donuts coffees to share (no doubt. She really loves Dunkin Donuts coffee)! I was reluctant at first but eventually I started to imagine him visiting my home in Vermont. My children started to imagine learning to ride dirt bikes with him around our land. Then, just as quickly as we had gotten the news, it was taken away. The lawyer had made a mistake. Fourteen years served in prison and now we learned Manny would not see Maison’s bedroom, wouldn’t be there to drive him to his new high school, wouldn’t walk in carrying Dunkin Donuts or visit my boys in Vermont. He’d never get to see his father’s burial site. He would be deported. At first this news hit me slowly. England isn’t so bad. They have everything the US has with better healthcare, work life balance and fewer unpronounceable ingredients in their food. All of that is true, however, I cannot shake the feeling that this sentence is in fact a life sentence. Albeit, very different from a life sentence served in the ACI but a life sentence nonetheless. Maison’s life is here. He has also been sentenced to a life never knowing what it feels like to wake up in the same home as your father. Never knowing what it feels like to bring your father to a school event and watch as he tries to hide the tears of pride in his eyes, because you are 14 and that is totally uncool. Maison deserves to have his Dad here and Manny, I believe, deserves the opportunity to rebuild the life he left 14 years ago, here with his family.
I want to thank you for coming out to support Manny tonight, thank you for watching the film and spending a little time with my family and I want to thank you for questioning the current ongoings around immigration in this country. My brother’s are I are half English and half Cape Verdean. I thoroughly believe we are the only ones! Our parents met when our father’s ship docked in our mother’s hometown, Hartlepool. They both had a love and talent for disco dancing, so it was a match made in butterfly collar and bell-bottom heaven. They raised my brothers and me on Donna Summer, Tavares and Abba. But England had a way to go regarding race in the 70’s and 80’s. My Dad was refused residency multiple times and was often detained or turned away when returning to England to visit us. Immigration agents raided our family home to be sure he didn’t overstay his visa. In 1989 he retired from his position as a chef on a merchant ship and my parents needed to make a decision. England was very inhospitable to my father and Cape Verde was, at the time, the third least developed nation in the world. So they decided to move here, to the US, where my father knew many other Cape Verdeans and his brother and mother already lived. In a world with make believe borders drawn around arbitrary territories, what are families like mine supposed to do? In the US we were met with another sort of trouble that we had not anticipated. We had white neighbours who were angered by my parents interracial relationship. They made all sorts of trouble for my family, for example, within months of living here KKK flyers were posted on the phone polls around our house. I recall asking my mother what the KKK was and she told me it was people who didn’t think black people and white people should mix. I began to pray that the KKK men would allow my family to stay together if we agreed that we would draw a line down the middle of our house and neither parent would cross the line into the other’s side. Manny was angered and scared by these events, they further informed his need to protect the people he loved. We became accustomed to living in a place that didn’t think we had the right to be here and sometimes we believed that. We are immigrants, after all. The message has been sent to us loud and clear since the day we arrived on this planet that we do not fit neatly into these borders BUT it’s the borders, not us, that are the problem. When you are 8 or 13 (or 37 or 42) that is a difficult thing to understand. As a child I often joked that I was just going to set a raft adrift in the Atlantic and live there. Are parents like mine not supposed to fall in love? And if your home is unsafe are you not entitled, simply by virtue of being a human, to try to find safety? If your countries’ economy has been ransacked by western corporations is it not your human right to seek a life and livelihood were you can expect to be provided for and safe? Whether you choose to migrate or protest (or both), it is your god given right to pursue a life of peace, happiness and prosperity. We need allies in this fight that have the relative safety to say loudly and clearly that no human being is illegal and that all of us deserve a life of freedom and happiness and second chances when we need them.
Thank you.
Maria Teixeira, Maison’s Auntie Babs and Manny’s younger and slightly less wise sister but I sure know how to disassemble a Nintendo!
