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Before
murdering Heidi Dozler, Hessel had been convicted three
times of possessing drugs. In addition, in 1983 he was found
guilty of exposing himself to three high-school girls in
McMinnville.
EOCI's
monthly payroll is $1,159,588,
and its annual operating budget is $44,500,525.
With
424 correctional officers and administrative staff, Eastern
Oregon Correctional Institute is the
second-largest employer in Pendleton, after Pendleton Woolen
Mills.
Heidi
Dozler in 1985. "If it
hadn't been Heidi, it would've been someone else," says
her mother, Juanita Yeoman.
You
can write
Brian Hessel at
SID# 4923777
EOCI
2500 Westgate
Pendleton OR 97801
It
costs $19,538.45 a year to house
one inmate at EOCI. As of July 1, 1,492 inmates were housed
there.
Eighty-five
percent of EOCI's inmates were convicted of person-on-person
crimes; 40 percent were convicted of Measure 11 crimes.
Six percent of EOCI's inmates are under 21; only 1 percent
are over 60.
When speaking of specific inmates, DOC officials like Superintendent
Jean Hill choose their words very carefully.
Brian
Hessel's Web site is at www.inmate.com
/inmates
/brianh.htm
EOCI
accepted its first female inmates in December 1998. Currently,
137 women are housed in cellblock H; 29 percent of them
were convicted of homicide, compared to 16 percent of the
men.
Under
Measure 17, all Oregon inmates are required to work. EOCI
claims 73 percent compliance. Its non-working inmates are
either housed in the segregation unit and are unavailable
for work, have medical excuses, or refuse to work altogether
.
Brian
Hessel has not worked since April. He told EOCI's dining
hall staff that it was "his job to get out of working."
Their job, according to the report, was to "try and make
him work because his dad is wealthy."
"Had
I kept a gun in my car and used it to kill Ms. Dozler when
she bit me, I would have committed a justifiable act of
homicide." --Brian Hessel
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Oregon has 9,246 people in its 13 prisons; men and women who
wear denim shirts on which is stenciled "inmate," front and
back. Some of these inmates are violent; others, psychologically
troubled. Most, however, have learned how to live within the
system's tedious regulations--when to eat, dress, shower,
read, pray, work and sleep.
Not Brian Hessel. He's too busy being Brian Hessel.
Ten years ago next month, Hessel, the eldest son of one
of Portland's wealthiest families, murdered a woman. Today,
he is an inmate at the Eastern Oregon Correctional Institution
in Pendleton, where he is serving a life sentence with the
possibility of parole.
According to records provided by the state Department of
Corrections and interviews with corrections officials, Hessel
is considered one of the most difficult inmates in Oregon.
He hatched an escape plan; committed assault; has been suspected
of extortion; was caught paying off other inmates; tested
positive for marijuana, cocaine and heroin; and nearly incited
a race riot. So egregious have some of his offenses been
that more than 25 times he has been locked away from the
general prison population.
At the same time, Hessel has used the considerable resources
at his disposal to battle his conviction. Willamette
Week has learned of an attempt to bribe the parents
of the woman he killed.
Yet Hessel remains unrepentant. Last month, he sent a 6,000-word
manifesto to WW, demanding publication. In it, he
claims that his case represents a vast miscarriage of justice.
"I feel the very reason I killed someone is because I love
life and hate violence!" he writes.
Often, a prisoner's life is a matrix of bad turns taken
within a context where making the wrong choice is the easiest
option. A few inmates are even examples of a criminal justice
system gone awry. Brian Hessel represents something else:
one who had every possible advantage in life yet cast it
all to the wind.
Early on the morning of Oct. 21, 1989, Brian Hessel killed
Heidi Dozler. He was the 34-year-old scion of the Hessel
Tractor & Equipment family, good-looking and a core
member of Portland's hard-partying yuppie crowd. She was
from Albany, a former cheerleader and homecoming queen who
often visited Portland in search of big-city excitement.
The two had met only hours before and had smoked $20 worth
of crack cocaine at Hessel's Hayden Island houseboat. When
Dozler asked Hessel to return her to her car, Hessel escorted
her to his white 1977 Mercedes-Benz sedan, then drove to
a secluded spot along North Tomahawk Island Drive.
Hessel wanted oral sex. For a moment, Dozler complied.
Then she tried to pull away, so the 6-foot-1, 200-plus-pound
Hessel forced her head onto his penis, as he later confessed
to police detectives.
Dozler bit his penis hard enough to break the skin, hard
enough to send Hessel into a rage. Moments later, he had
Dozler out of his car. He looped his belt around her throat
and pulled, pulled so hard that his forearms tired; he switched
positions and pulled again, he later confessed to police.
When he loosened his grip, Hessel told police, he heard
Dozler gurgle--the telltale sound of a respiratory system
shutting down. He found a 2-foot-long piece of concrete,
raised it overhead, and smashed it against the back of Dozler's
skull.
When then-Deputy District Attorney David Peters hefted
the concrete in front of a jury during closing arguments
in Hessel's murder trial, hanks of the brunette's hair still
stuck to the limestone.
"What was remarkable was the level of savagery involved,"
Peters recently told WW.
Ken Morrow, Hessel's attorney, offered the defense that
Hessel had "flipped out" when Dozler bit his penis, that
Hessel had essentially killed her in self-defense.
The jury disagreed. It found Hessel guilty of two counts
of aggravated murder and six counts of murder, but decided
against imposing the death penalty. Instead, it sentenced
him to life with the possibility of parole in 2019. Many
legal observers credit that to Morrow, who prevented Hessel
from testifying in his own defense.
Even if they dislike the constraints of the corrections
system, "most inmates have learned to play the game," says
Gary Perlstein, a professor of criminal justice administration
at Portland State University. John Irwin, emeritus professor
of sociology at San Francisco State University and a leading
authority on violent offenders, says that after a couple
of years of prison life, the overwhelming majority of inmates
serving long sentences knuckle under and decide that the
fastest route to the goal line of parole is to abide by
the rules and build a case for mercy within the system's
constraints.
Since entering prison in December 1990, however, Brian
Hessel has not adjusted well to prison life.
Corrections officials are leery of speaking directly to
Hessel's case; they don't want to "elevate one inmate over
another," as one puts it. Still, from reviewing the documents
and reading between the lines of officials' statements,
it's clear that Hessel is a first-degree troublemaker.
In October 1991, for example, Hessel almost started a race
riot at Oregon State Penitentiary in Salem. According to
DOC records, he was serving salad to inmates in the dining
hall while wearing a paper hat on which he'd written "Nigger
digger," along with a swastika and the phrase "You stabbem,
we slabbem." In a dining area full of 450 inmates, Hessel
was immediately surrounded by 20 African-Americans until
correctional officers hustled him out the back door.
For his offense, he received six months in segregation,
which inmates call "the hole," "the bucket" or "seg," and
six months in a so-called intensive management unit, or
"maxi-maxi" as it is also known. Neither unit is pleasant;
in both, a hardcore offender's every move is watched by
officers who wear black jumpsuits and look tough enough
to bend metal rods. While in seg, inmates can visit the
prison library and have some outdoor privileges, but in
maxi-maxi, they are locked up by themselves for 23 hours
a day.
Hessel's file includes a 1994 report of his failed attempt
to escape from OSP by staging an injury so he would be transported
to an off-site medical facility "where he will have help
from his friends to escape." Hessel said "he will kill anybody
who tries to stop him," according to a DOC document.
Hessel's prison file is filled with serious reports of
such transgressions. Independently, they suggest the outbursts
of an individual who has no respect for authority. Together,
they sketch the portrait of an inmate who has difficulty
living in his own skin, let alone in a prison cell.
Typically, prison inmates accumulate and distribute power
based on sheer physical intimidation or by buying and selling
favors.
In July 1991, only seven months after entering the Oregon
State Penitentiary in Salem, Hessel tested positive for
marijuana; three months later, he tested positive for cocaine.
Both times, his visitation privileges were reduced. In the
early '90s, before the DOC cracked down, drugs were a constant
problem in Oregon's prisons, admits Les Dolecal, DOC's inspector
general. Ten percent of Oregon's inmates tested positive
for drugs in 1989, compared with 0.1 percent this year.
Still, Hessel's drug use is an indication that he had access
to the prison spoils system.
Four years later, in August 1995, a sizable shipment of
drugs got into OSP. One inmate overdosed on heroin and was
taken to Salem Hospital. Among the 24 inmates who tested
positive for drugs was Hessel, who told officers that it
was the first time he'd done heroin. He received 42 days
in segregation.
In late 1996, Hessel was transferred to Eastern Oregon
Correctional Institution, a medium-security facility.
Although no reason for the move is documented in his
files, EOCI's superintendent, Jean Hill, says the DOC's
classification unit decided that, based upon Hessel's record,
he should be moved.
In contrast to the "big house" feel of OSP, EOCI is a former
mental hospital which was converted to a prison in 1985.
Built in 1912, it houses 1,492 inmates and is ringed by
two high cyclone fences separated by six rows of razor wire
that glint in the sun. No one has ever escaped from EOCI.
Inmates are encouraged to spend as much time as possible
out of doors, walking, running and shooting hoops. But in
the winter the wind blows hard and cold off the high-desert
plateau; an inmate's only shot at comfort while out on "yard"
is to find a patch of sunshine in a cell block's wind shadow.
If the change in scenery was supposed to soften Hessel's
behavior, it hasn't worked yet.
Records of Hessel's stretch at EOCI are filled with examples
of even more aggressive behavior than he exhibited during
his stay at OSP. He has routinely threatened and verbally
abused correctional officers and staff. In one instance,
according to a corrections document, he said that a female
prison employee "was out of her fucking mind" and "should
have an accident on the stairway"; in another, he held a
pen as if it were a knife in front of the prison librarian.
But Hessel's primary means of creating havoc at EOCI is
through the informal medium of exchange used by prisoners.
Although inmates can have as large a balance as they choose
in their prison bank accounts, they can spend only $30 a
week ($100 a week in December) on canteen items, small comforts
that give them a sense of self--like potato chips, tennis
shoes and guitar strings. It is against DOC rules, however,
for inmates to spend money on other inmates or transfer
items to them. This rule is intended to inhibit trafficking
in favors.
But Hessel's file includes reports that he has played that
game.
In some cases, the incidents have been minor. In December
1997, Hessel was caught transferring food items to another
inmate. He received seven days in segregation.
Other times, the game has been much more hardcore.
In May 1998, according to DOC documents, Hessel was suspected
of paying one inmate to assault another. A report states
that on two successive days, the victim was punched in the
face, and on one occasion knocked to his knees. The report
concludes that there was insufficient evidence to link Hessel
to the beatings, but it contains the report of an inmate
who overheard Hessel speaking to other prisoners in the
shower, reportedly saying, "Someone's going down. I don't
care how much it costs, I've got $30 a click," meaning per
beating.
The files also show that Hessel purchased new shoes at
the canteen and, apparently, intended to give them to another
prisoner. Superintendent Hill later wrote that the shoes
were given "as payment in an extortion scheme."
Hessel received 84 days in segregation for what prison
authorities called "thuggery" and "a threat to the safety,
security and orderly operation of the facility."
What is the explanation for an inmate buying shoes for
other inmates?
"A number of reasons," says Hill. "One is to get items
from the prison canteen," which are then used as a kind
of prison currency. "One is to get money. One is for protection."
Above and beyond his prison behavior, Hessel has distinguished
himself in other ways.
Just last year, correctional officers found that Hessel
had written to an unnamed Pendleton inmate who was about
to be released, asking him to shake down Jordan Schnitzer,
a prominent Portland businessman, for a $250,000 loan for
Hessel. If Schnitzer "balked," the inmate was to threaten
him that Hessel knew "of an incident that happened in the
'80s" that Schnitzer didn't "want exposed."
Schnitzer, who is the son of Harold and Arlene Schnitzer,
told WW he had dated Hessel's sister "a couple of
times" and knew their father, but only knew Hessel as someone
he bumped into on occasion at the Multnomah Athletic Club.
He said that no former inmate ever visited him to request
a loan for Hessel. He did say Hessel wrote him on two separate
occasions requesting $250,000. In one letter, Schnitzer
added, Hessel said he wanted to hire Alan Dershowitz as
his defense attorney. Schnitzer said he was "almost in disbelief"
that Hessel wanted money from him, and he adamantly denied
that there was any "incident" in the '80s.
Corrections officials found Hessel and the other inmate
guilty of conspiracy to commit extortion; each received
segregation time.
Many inmates spend a portion of their prison time working
for their release; few, however, have the resources available
to Hessel. Few have their own Web page, as does Hessel;
he uses it to seek female pen pals and proclaim that his
case was "classic manslaughter." And few inmates write letters
to the media as Hessel does. On more than one occasion he
has written WW seeking publication; his father's
secretary has then called to see if his letters would be
published.
It's not clear exactly how much financial help Hessel has
received from his family, but it has been considerable.
Hessel's original defense is said to have cost $120,000
and was paid for by his father, Jack, the chairman of Hessel
Tractor & Equipment. Founded in 1908 by Brian's great-grandfather
and grandfather, the privately held company is Oregon's
exclusive John Deere dealer and racks up more than $50 million
a year in sales.
Interestingly, Jack Hessel tried to help his son in a more
unusual fashion, according to a court record from Brian
Hessel's 1990 murder trial. Before the trial, Jack approached
Todd Maas, took him out to dinner and offered him a job,
according to the court record. Maas was a friend of Brian
Hessel; he was also the chief witness for the prosecution.
Maas turned down the job offer, according to court records,
and went on to testify at trial that Hessel had confessed
the murder to him.
Neither Brian nor Jack Hessel agreed to be interviewed
for this story. In a brief phone call on Sept. 17, however,
Jack Hessel denied that he had any contact with Maas before
the trial; a source familiar with the case says the meeting
did, in fact, occur, as described in the court records.
Since his conviction, Hessel has appealed his case to Oregon's
Court of Appeals and the state Supreme Court; both appeals
were denied.
In the most extraordinary effort to shorten his sentence,
Hessel in 1994 applied to then-Gov. Barbara Roberts for
a commutation of his sentence to manslaughter. His request--which
was denied--included a letter saying that he was a changed
man and listed a Washington woman as a character witness.
When WW contacted the woman, she said she'd only
met Hessel over a three-day period in 1988 and had corresponded
with him intermittently since he'd entered prison.
As part of his commutation request, WW has learned,
Hessel and his family sought the cooperation of Dozler's
parents, Bill and Juanita Yeoman. Salem lawyer Kevin Lafky
asked the Yeomans to sign a letter to the governor agreeing
to Hessel's commutation. In exchange, Lafky told them, the
Hessels would give them $15,000 up front and $25,000 if
his sentence was eventually commuted.
"This was a stupid thing for him [Lafky] to have done,"
says Michael Shinn, a Portland lawyer who represented the
Yeomans. It wasn't technically illegal, Shinn says, but
"you can question the morality of it."
Dozler's parents considered the offer a bribe and payment
for testimony. In late 1994, they filed a complaint with
the Oregon State Bar Association, on whose board of governors
Lafky served from 1995 to 1998. He was publicly reprimanded
by a three-member trial panel of the bar in 1997. It found
that Lafky had "intentionally made an offer to pay compensation
to witnesses that was contingent upon both the content of
their testimony and the outcome of future plea bargaining
and a request for commutation," which it considered "an
astonishing insensitivity to the emotions of the parents
in this case."
Lafky, who no longer represents Hessel, would not tell
WW whether it was Hessel's father or Hessel himself
who had prodded him to make the offer.
Hessel is currently working with an unnamed Seattle lawyer
to bring his case before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals
on a habeas corpus petition.
Despite the substantial resources that have been expended
on Hessel's behalf, Dozler's parents have had no success
in their efforts to receive compensatory damages from him
and his family. Eight years ago, Hessel settled a civil
suit with the Yeomans for $1.4 million. To date, the Yeomans
say they have received $60 from Hessel and that he maintains
he has no resources of his own.
Through it all, Hessel, now 44 years old, has remained
unrepentant. "Imagine how the Bobbitt case would have turned
out without the mutilation being publicized!" he writes
in his recent manifesto, which he demanded be printed in
its entirety before he would consent to an interview. He
writes that he doesn't "intend to minimize my action, but
merely wish to put details in context because I am not a
murderer."
Hessel argues that he is guilty only of manslaughter. He
claims that his penis was severely injured, a claim that
was disproved at trial, and that the media, the prosecution
and the police colluded to ensure his conviction.
Parole, for which he's eligible in 2019, isn't good enough
for him. He demands a retrial or resentencing of "the original
victim--me."
"In reality," he continues, "had I kept a gun in my car
and used it to kill Ms. Dozler when she bit me, I would
have committed a justifiable act of homicide. Every parallel
case to mine I have studied has ended with acquittal or
probation. Like the case of singer Al Green, who was acquitted
when he killed his lover after she poured hot grits over
his penis as he lay in the tub. In this case the prosecutor
did not withhold valuable information and the defendant
surrendered to the police. I didn't surrender because I
couldn't afford the scandal.... Women killers of their abusers
are now gaining reprieve through the 'Battered Women' [sic]
defense and being released from prison. But that sympathetic
understanding does not yet extend across gender lines--probably
because men are erroneously perceived to be less vulnerable
and the sole originators of gender violence."
Down in Albany, the past decade has not been kind to the
Yeomans. Bill had quadruple-bypass surgery earlier this
year. Dozler's mother, Juanita, keeps a small photo album
of her daughter and says she bumps into memories of her
"in a million ways." Twice a year, the Yeomans call the
Multnomah County District Attorney's Office for information
on Hessel's status. Although Hessel can petition for parole
in 2009, his earliest possible release date is in 2019,
when he will probably have to go through another set of
hearings.
"I'll be 81 then," says Juanita Yeoman, "and I don't care
if I'm there in a wheelchair. I plan to be there."
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Willamette Week | originally
published September 22,
1999
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