Captive Audience

The corridors outside the cells of Seattle's King County jail were filled with dozens of Sunday visitors. To the accompaniment of banjos, violins and portable organs, they sang hymns. "Nothing but the blood of Jesus will wash away my sins," warbled one woman.

Inside the tanks, most of the prisoners gazed impassively at the bare walls, muttered sullenly among themselves, glanced longingly at a TV set that had been turned off when the visitors arrived. Some played cards, others read Confidential or lay down on their cots and covered their heads.

Every Sunday afternoon for the past 36 years, a small army of evangelists representing some 13 church groups has descended on the King County jail, intent on saving the souls of its captive audience. The evangelists never bothered to ask the prisoners whether they wanted the services, and many inmates openly grumbled about them. "Here come the Jesus Jazzers," became a weekly chant.

Last summer a prisoner got a lawyer to file a suit charging that 1) the constitutional right of the 359 inmates to religious freedom was being denied, and 2) a prison rule was being broken by permitting religious services to be held outside the chapel. Last week the case came up in Seattle's Superior Court. A parade of prisoners testified that the evangelists competed loudly with each other, asked for contributions, insisted that inmates could be saved only by kneeling by the bars while an evangelist put his hands on their heads. "If you tried to talk," said a prisoner, "they'd just play the music louder and shake their fists."

The evangelists produced former prisoners who testified that the services had helped them. Robert Garling, a stocky teamster-pastor (who had been in jail three times in the late 19305, for burglary), told the court how he had been won over, despite his early hostility. Charles Henderson, a maintenance worker, was also affected by the services: "One night I seen a vision . . . right on the bulkhead there in the jail." As for denying prisoners their rights, said counsel for the evangelists: "They can put their coats over their heads if they don't want to listen."

Superior Court Judge Howard M. Findley sidestepped the constitutional issue, refused to terminate the services. But before the evangelists could get out a hallelujah, he also refused their request to abrogate the prison rule prohibiting services outside the chapel, turned the whole matter over to Sheriff Tim Mc-Cullough. The sheriff decided that services henceforth will be held in the chapel where the evangelists can reach only prisoners who want to hear them. "It's a dirty shame," said one evangelist. "Why, we've been the bulwark against Communism in that jail for many years."

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