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LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 3.16 65 6 5 mouth was open, I was teaching law, peri- od. I eat law, breathe law, shit out law." No time for ball or poker or haircuts or noth- ing unless the pen was on lockdown — lack of guards, bad assault, fog threatening escapes, kitchen utensil missing — and the law library closed. When Porter was locked up, he'd look out the windows, memorize the weather, watch the planes fy over, wish himself there. After 9/11, no planes for days. Tought it was a joke at frst, 9/11. Tought the goofy guard was setting him up for a punchline. Porter in the TV room and everybody shocked and silent. "Qui- etest I ever heard the pen in my almost 15 years stuck there," he says. Only other time he'd fnd quiet like that was in "the Hole." Solitary confnement. Porter always looked forward to the Hole. "I found my best joy there. Peace," he says. "At chow and in the shower, people asking me about this case law and that." In the Hole: freedom. Each walk there accom- panied by a couple big guys with 60- and 70-pound laundry bags full of law on their shoulders (the weightlifters demanded the heavier ones), stepping in time, like sol- diers, Porter in the back of the formation, typewriter in his arms. He trusted no one with his typewriter. "You can break my CDs, Walkman, cooler, but not my type- writer," he says. Porter would step in time to the beat, sing slow and low, like a fying monkey from Te Wizard of Oz: "Oh-we- oh. On the way to the Hole." Te Hole. Where he read John Grish- am's nonfction Te Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town, one of the only books he's read in full, along with Nelson DeMille's Te General's Daughter and the learned quote, "Whoever fghts monsters should see to it that in the pro- cess he does not become a monster." Ten the quote from Te Innocent Man's inno- cent man. Porter remembers the exact page number. "What was the reason for my birth? If I had to do it all again, I wouldn't be born." Had to put the book down for two whole days because it struck such a chord. "I laughed for two days because I couldn't bring myself to cry, couldn't un- derstand any of it at all," he says. Te Hole. Where he typed and typed, added to his piles of brainstorms, letters, poems. Brainstorms. Lists of reasons it couldn't be him, one starting RED FLAGS IG- NORED OR KNOWN. Another a handwritten diagram with a center circle screaming JURORS DEPRIVED OF ISSUE ABOUT OTHER SUSPECTS OF REASONABLE SUSPICION. Te 25 lines shooting from that circle are like spokes from a wheel. Te letters. Addressed to judges, pro- claiming innocence, asking for a retrial. A fair one. He believed the murder trial was corrupted. Te eyewitness originally said he would not be able to identify a suspect because of distance and darkness. Te same eyewitness was shown a picture of Porter before the photo lineup and subsequently picked him. Corrupted by snitches. Porter signed each letter "Te Fall Guy" or "Falsely Con-victed" or "Actually Innocent" or "Neverending Fighter" and folded it into a self-made envelope. (He learned a lot of tricks in jail to save money. Deodorant as glue to reseal a used stamp. "Necessity is the mother of invention," he says.) A poem he sent to the judge called "I Do or I Die": Now, for thirteen years, living in my cell in fears and tears. Tat I could die, but no time to cry, I must try. I do or I die. Four-thousand-eight-hundred-and- ffty-eight days. Tat's how long Porter was in prison for the murder charge before being exonerated. Tat's 13 years, three months and 18 days and two difer- ent prisons till freedom. (He'd transferred to Eastern Kentucky Correction Complex, aka "the pink place," in 2003. "Tey'd make you wear pink shirts and underwear. Try to break your spirit," he says. At one point, Sanders lived on the same block as him. "I slept with one eye open," Porter says.) Porter walked the gray "Road to Justice" (which is Eastern's street name) on Dec. 19, 2011. On the drive home, he marveled at the car with its new amenities, the anti-theft system. He ate McDonald's. "I ate it slow and embraced the feeling of being free," he says. He wore his favorite hat — a frayed thing an inmate gave him and that he considered good luck. Tat night, he slept under the Christmas tree on his mom's foor like he'd done as a kid. "Te Legend," as he calls himself, credits the Kentucky Innocence Project, which he wrote in 2001 after he learned about them in the newspaper. KIP started working on his case in '06 and issued a DNA test that showed Porter's fngerprints were not the male prints found on the gun silencer. (Te case is still open because those prints haven't been matched.) His attorney, KIP's Melanie Lowe, called the prosecution out for "tunnel vision," pursuing only one suspect. Porter also credits cold-case worker and current state representative Denny Butler, who joined the cause in '09. He uncovered withheld evidence: Francoise Cunningham, a part of the gang Murder Inc., stated in a C-J article that Sanders had ofered him 50 grand to kill Camp, but then just did it himself; the article says Sanders was unavailable for comment. Cunningham setting Porter free. What Porter wants is sorry, but there's no sorry. What he'd like is the lawsuit he fled in 2012 against the city of Louisville and eight police ofcers to result in com- pensation. (Porter knows it took 27 months after exoneration for Edwin Chandler to receive his $8.2 million.) Porter believes his time behind bars is worth $18 million. (He fgures this by dividing Chandler's total by the number of years locked up. Takes that total and multiplies by 15.) Tough, he says: "Whatever amount they give me is an insult. It's all blood money, because some- one's dead that can't be brought back." Four years since freedom and freedom isn't free. Still, the .22 bullet bounces. "It's the deadliest gun because the bullet stays stuck there," he says. "Like a ricochet." Porter is but a shell of a man, hollow on the inside. Scraped like fruit from the rind and the fies do gather. All his beliefs inverted. He doesn't look at his family the same anymore. Resentment toward his mother for not showing up at his trial. His brothers for not doing the lightweight work he'd wanted them to do, like asking around on the street about what really happened. Still no word from Little Kerry, who Porter heard joined the Marines. Porter last saw him at the '98 trial. Te last words he heard him say: "Hi, daddy." Porter sent his son so many letters from prison, all unanswered. "I will never get closure. I'll always wonder: Why did they decide to make me the fall guy? Why did Little Kerry not get in con- tact with me?" he says. "I can't get Little Kerry back." So many unanswered questions. What's been lost: Teeth that didn't need to be pulled. "Tey'd rather numb you up and yank it out your mouth than do the right thing," Porter says. What's been gained: Pain. Te stress on his light-skinned face, beard, everything. Te idea of swallowing all those sleeping pills that he fghts so well. His girlfriend's grandkids who keep him alive, who he shakes orange-and-black pom-poms for and takes camping. "All those years vanish when they're around," he says. Continued on page 111