Dylan was a folk singer that bridged folk and at the same time gave folk identity in the 20th century and even to our time. Dylan knew that folk and people are all about stories. The story he tells in "The Hurricane" is a true and awakening story.
Before there was any talk of BLM there was a man named Rubin Carter. He was a boxer who learned boxing in World War 2. One day in 1966 he visited a bar with another man named John Artis and walking out they were charged with a triple murder at the Lafayette Grill in Paterson, New Jersey. A year later they were charged guilty with life sentences.
There was a lot of controversy around the case including faulty evidence and questionable eyewitness testimonies. It seemed to be a matter of racial profiling against Carter. In all this Carter maintained his innocence and Dylan read his autobiography and decided to visit Carter in prison and talk with him.
After talking with Carter Dylan had the hurricane story in his heart. But how do you put a story like this to music? Dylan began with, 'Pistol shots ring out in a barroom night.... Here comes the story of the Hurricane.'
The song was successful, but what ever happened with Carter. It wasn't until 20 years later that justice was served. In 1985 Carter was released from prison on a petition of habeas corpus. From 1993 till 2005 Carter served as executive director of the Association in Defense of the Wrongly Convicted (Now known as Innocence Canada).
His story went on to become a movie in 1999 called The Hurricane (with Denzel Washington playing Carter). A series of interviews with the author Ken Klonsky led to the publishing of the book "The Eye of the Hurricane" in 2011.
Carter died of terminal prostate cancer on April 20th, 2014. Two months before his death he published "Hurricane Carter's Dying Wish" in the New York Daily News. It was a dying man's last request to save another convicted man. He said,
"I request only that McCallum be granted a full hearing by the Brooklyn conviction integrity unit, now under the auspices of the new district attorney, Ken Thompson. Knowing what I do, I am certain that when the facts are brought to light, Thompson will recommend his immediate release ... Just as my own verdict 'was predicated on racism rather than reason and on concealment rather than disclosure', as Sarokin wrote, so too was McCallum's"
And six months later McCallum convictions were thrown out after 29 years of serving prison time unjustly, McCallum was exonerated.
It's interesting to see that one man who takes a stand for truth influences another and another. One man's story is not an isolated story but we are all connected.
Dylan did not go to visit Carter looking for a song. He was looking for the truth and the media Dylan knew best was song writing to spread that story and it did. I knew Carter's story when I was a kid growing up but I really didn't understand. It was just a story. Actually I missed the movie. When it came out in 1999 I was in Korea and somehow never got around to watching it. Have you seen it? Maybe you can tell me about it.
But I do remember Dylan's song. My dad had this album too, of course, Desire. I remember looking at the cover and thinking I wanted a hat like Dylan's. There was so much more to that album I didn't know. The story continues decades later and it is no less important that that day in East Jersey Dylan sat down with Carter for a chat within Rahway State walls.
Pistol shots ring out in the barroom night
Enter Patty Valentine from the upper hall
She sees a bartender in a pool of blood
Cries out my God, they killed them all
Here comes the story of the Hurricane
The man the authorities came to blame
For somethin' that he never done
Put in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world
Three bodies lyin' there does Patty see
And another man named Bello, movin' around mysteriously
I didn't do it, he says, and he throws up his hands
I was only robbin' the register, I hope you understand
I saw them leavin', he says, and he stops
One of us had better call up the cops
And so Patty calls the cops
And they arrive on the scene with their red lights flashin'
In the hot New Jersey night
Meanwhile, far away in another part of town
Rubin Carter and a couple of friends are drivin' around
Number one contender for the middleweight crown
Had no idea what kinda shit was about to go down
When a cop pulled him over to the side of the road
Just like the time before and the time before that
In Paterson that's just the way things go
If you're black you might as well not show up on the street
'Less you want to draw the heat
Alfred Bello had a partner and he had a rap for the cops
Him and Arthur Dexter Bradley were just out prowlin' around
He said, I saw two men runnin' out, they looked like middleweights
They jumped into a white car with out-of-state plates
And Miss Patty Valentine just nodded her head
Cop said, wait a minute, boys, this one's not dead
So they took him to the infirmary
And though this man could hardly see
They told him that he could identify the guilty men
Four in the mornin' and they haul Rubin in
They took him to the hospital and they brought him upstairs
The wounded man looks up through his one dyin' eye
Says, wha'd you bring him in here for? He ain't the guy!
Here's the story of the Hurricane
The man the authorities came to blame
For somethin' that he never done
Put in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world
Four months later, the ghettos are in flame
Rubin's in South America, fightin' for his name
While Arthur Dexter Bradley's still in the robbery game
And the cops are puttin' the screws to him, lookin' for somebody to blame
Remember that murder that happened in a bar
Remember you said you saw the getaway car
You think you'd like to play ball with the law
Think it might-a been that fighter that you saw runnin' that night
Don't forget that you are white
Arthur Dexter Bradley said I'm really not sure
The cops said a poor boy like you could use a break
We got you for the motel job and we're talkin' to your friend Bello
You don't wanta have to go back to jail, be a nice fellow
You'll be doin' society a favor
That sonofabitch is brave and gettin' braver
We want to put his ass in stir
We want to pin this triple murder on him
He ain't no Gentleman Jim
Rubin could take a man out with just one punch
But he never did like to talk about it all that much
It's my work, he'd say, and I do it for pay
And when it's over I'd just as soon go on my way
Up to some paradise
Where the trout streams flow and the air is nice
And ride a horse along a trail
But then they took him to the jailhouse
Where they try to turn a man into a mouse
All of Rubin's cards were marked in advance
The trial was a pig-circus, he never had a chance
The judge made Rubin's witnesses drunkards from the slums
To the white folks who watched he was a revolutionary bum
And to the black folks he was just a crazy nigger
No one doubted that he pulled the trigger
And though they could not produce the gun
The D.A. said he was the one who did the deed
And the all-white jury agreed
Rubin Carter was falsely tried
The crime was murder one, guess who testified
Bello and Bradley and they both baldly lied
And the newspapers, they all went along for the ride
How can the life of such a man
Be in the palm of some fool's hand
To see him obviously framed
Couldn't help but make me feel ashamed to live in a land
Where justice is a game
Now all the criminals in their coats and their ties
Are free to drink martinis and watch the sun rise
While Rubin sits like Buddha in a ten-foot cell
An innocent man in a living hell
That's the story of the Hurricane
But it won't be over till they clear his name
And give him back the time he's done
Put in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world
