Scott Before Prison

He had a way of listening that made you feel heard. A way of fixing things—not just machines, but moments. He wasn’t flashy. He was steady. And he carried a kind of emotional intelligence that couldn’t be taught. You could see it in how he handled conflict, how he protected dignity, how he showed up even when it was hard.

This page isn’t about timelines. It’s about truth. The truth of who Scott was before the system tried to flatten him into a statistic. He was a son, a seeker, a man who chose motion over stagnation. And when I met him, I saw the kind of strength that doesn’t shout—it endures.

I was 18 when I met Scott—young, chaotic, and under the influence of a mix that blurred the edges of everything. We met at his house through a mutual friend, and even through the haze, I felt something different about him. He didn’t push. He didn’t perform. He just was. And that presence stuck with me.

A day and a half later, I showed up at his doorstep in trouble. I won’t say what the trouble was, because that’s not the point. The point is that Scott didn’t turn me away. He listened. He helped. He showed me concern and compassion that I hadn’t expected—and certainly hadn’t earned. That moment marked the beginning of something real. Not just a relationship, but a recognition. He saw me. And I saw him.

🌙 Early Days with Scott: A Bond Beyond Chaos 

From the moment Scott helped me through that first storm, I knew he was different. I couldn’t explain it, couldn’t name it—but I felt it. He wasn’t like the other men I’d known. There was a steadiness in him, a quiet kind of compassion that didn’t ask questions or make demands. I was drawn to it. Whether it was romantic or just friendship didn’t matter—I just wanted to be near him.

I started visiting often. We struck up a friendship rooted in honesty and shared space. We partied together, but it was never reckless. Scott didn’t do heavy drugs, and even as a drug addict, I had my morals. If you didn’t do it, I didn’t bring it around you. So I kept it simple—pot and alcohol, which was his lane too. That boundary wasn’t spoken—it was honored. And in that space, I found something rare: a connection that didn’t ask me to be anyone but myself.

When I met Scott, I was deep in addiction. The kind of mix that blurred reality and numbed pain. But he didn’t know that. On that day, he saw a young woman in trouble and offered help—not because he understood the full story, but because he didn’t need to. His compassion didn’t come with conditions.

I never told him the depth of it until years later, after prison, when we reconnected. By then, I had lived through storms he couldn’t have imagined. And when I finally shared the truth, he didn’t recoil. He didn’t judge. He listened. Just like he did the first time, like he always did. That’s the kind of grace that stays with you. That’s the Scott I knew. The Scott I still know. The Scott he still is.

What we didn’t realize was that the Pacific had other plans. The tide had crept in, quiet and bold, and Scott’s truck had become unexpectedly amphibious. We were so wrapped up in our conversation that we didn’t notice the surf licking at the tires—until someone knocked on the window, wide-eyed and urgent, trying to tell us we were about to float away.

I’d forgotten that day until Scott reminded me years later. At first, it was a blank. But the more I sat with it, the more the memory surfaced—salt air, slurred laughter, and the strange comfort of being adrift with someone who made even chaos feel safe.

That was Scott. Steady in the storm. Present in the absurd. The kind of man who could turn a near-disaster into a story worth keeping.

We went to Jade Cove, California, on a day when the tide was low and the storm had just passed. Scott knew the timing mattered—he was after jade. The kind of white stones that, if you licked them and they turned green, meant you’d found treasure. We were tipsy, but not drunk. Focused. Determined. Lost in the hunt.

What we didn’t notice was the ocean creeping in behind us. The second part of the beach—the one only accessible at low tide—was vanishing. Scott saw it first. Our way out had been swallowed by the surf. We were stuck.

I asked, “What are we going to do now?” He pointed to the top of the cliff. I followed his finger, wide-eyed. Then he said, “Don’t be scared. I will help you. We can do this.”

I was a tomboy back then—strong, athletic, always climbing. He wanted me to go first, and he’d follow in case I fell. “I’ll catch you,” he said. “Or die trying.”

Halfway up, I got stuck. A smooth rock blocked my path, and the ledge was just out of reach. Scott climbed around me like a monkey, found the ledge, and reached out his hand.

When I took it, our eyes locked. Just for a moment. And in that moment, I saw something I couldn’t name. He saw it too. We didn’t understand it then, but it stayed with us—through years of silence, through distance, through prison walls.

Later, when we reconnected, we finally named it: soulmates. “Not just cosmic truth—but romantic truth, forged through time, distance, and devotion.” We were bound—not by circumstance, but by something older, deeper, and unshakable.

Not every love story is written in candlelight. Ours was written in cookouts, rock ‘n’ roll, and the quiet kindness of a man who never asked for anything in return.

I’d come over to Scott’s place, sometimes too drunk to drive home, and he’d let me stay without question. Always a gentleman. No expectations. Just safety. We’d sit in his living room, music pouring through the speakers, the kind that made you feel like the world could wait.

He still reminisces on the phone about those days. About the meals I cooked—meals that made his kitchen a disaster zone and his taste buds sing. He laughs about the beef soufflé I made once, saying, “You made my kitchen a disaster area, but that soufflé was superb. And I didn’t mind being the one to clean up the mess.”

There was the time I fed his Oscar fish, and one of them nipped my finger trying to snatch the shrimp. I remember that one all too well. And the time he injured his thumb and couldn’t write—he came to me for help with book receipts for a job near my home. I didn’t hesitate. I was happy to help.

These weren’t grand gestures. They were the quiet kind. The kind that build trust. The kind that say, I see you. I choose you. And now, even from behind bars, that love continues. Not because it’s easy. But because it’s real.

In the middle of my second trimester, Amanda’s father left me—for his ex, who had just given birth to his son. The heartbreak hit hard, and my pregnancy suffered. I went into early labor and spent weeks in and out of the hospital.

When Amanda was finally born by cesarean, I was alone. Her father had taken my other car—permission I’d apparently given under Demerol—and disappeared. My 1982 Buick Regal LTD was still parked in the hospital parking lot where I’d left it weeks earlier, but I wasn’t allowed to drive. I had no way home from San Luis Obispo to Grover Beach.

That’s when I thought of Scott.

I didn’t have his number memorized, so I looked it up in the phone book and prayed he’d be home. He was. I told him what had happened, and asked if he’d come. I also mentioned the hospital’s candlelight dinner for new parents—and asked if he’d share it with me.

Scott didn’t hesitate. He took the city bus and came right away.

He didn’t come for the meal. He came for me. And in that moment, when I needed someone to stand beside me in the absence of everyone else, Scott showed up. Not with fanfare. With quiet loyalty. With love.

When Scott walked into my hospital room, I was changing Amanda’s diaper. He stood in the doorway, smiling—his face slightly flushed, like an expectant father seeing his child for the first time. Maybe it was just the joy of seeing me after so long. Maybe it was something deeper.

He watched quietly as I bundled Amanda in her receiving blanket and lifted her into my arms. I motioned for him to come in. And when I placed my baby in his arms, his face lit up—bright as a Christmas tree.

It wasn’t just a smile. It was a moment of recognition. Of connection. Of something unspoken that had waited patiently to be felt.

Years later, when Scott and I reconnected, he told me something that stopped me in my tracks.

He said that the moment he walked into my hospital room and I placed Amanda in his arms—when he looked into her crinkled little face—something happened inside him. Something he couldn’t explain at the time. But he thought about it often. Over the years. Through silence. Through separation.

And the only word he could find for that feeling was love.

Not obligation. Not curiosity. Not even romance. Just love. Pure and unshakable.

After our candlelit hospital meal, Scott helped me pack up everything the hospital sent home—diapers, wipes, bottles, formula. He took Amanda’s car seat down to my Buick Regal and drove it around to the front. Then he carried our things, walking beside me as the nurse wheeled me and Amanda out.

But instead of taking us to Grandma’s in Grover Beach, Scott drove us to his house on Rockview in San Luis Obispo. He took care of both Amanda and me until I was strong enough to drive again. And even then, he insisted on driving us to Grandma’s himself.

When we pulled into the driveway, he noticed the yard—overgrown, neglected. “Who does your yard work?” he asked. I told him Grandma only had a junk electric mower. He didn’t say another word.

The next morning, he showed up in his little Chevy LUV, loaded with lawn care tools. No questions. No hesitation. Just work. Grandma made lemonade and kept it flowing. By the end of the day, her yard looked like it had been touched by a professional—which it had. Landscaping was Scott’s trade.

When Grandma asked, “How much do I owe you?” Scott simply said, “Ma’am, you don’t owe me anything.”

He came back twice a month after that. Never asked for a penny. Grandma adored him. One day she asked me, “Althea, why don’t you leave those good-for-nothing boys alone and go with Scott?”

I smiled and said, “Scott is a great friend, Grandma. That’s all we are right now.”

🪁 The Kite, the Wind, and the Angel in the Yard 

There’s more to Scott Dackerman than meets the eye.

After Grandma Nora passed and my family endured homelessness, I returned to San Luis Obispo and stayed at the shelter. They gave me a black 10-speed bike to help me find work. For two days, I rode from place to place, filling out applications, hearing “We already filled the job” more times than I could count.

One afternoon, as storm clouds gathered, something told me to stop and check the phone book for Scott. I did. And there he was—now living on the Pike in Grover Beach. I dropped a dime into the payphone and called. A man answered and said Scott would be home around five. That was all I needed.

I took the long way—down old Highway 227, winding through Arroyo Grande. Somewhere along the way, the sky opened like a zipper and the rain poured down. By the time I reached Scott’s door, I was drenched, standing beside my bike like a ghost from the past.

He opened the door, eyes wide, and shrieked, “My God! You’re soaked. Get in here!”

He ushered me to the bathroom, handed me a towel, a tee shirt, and a pair of his shorts. Then he took my clothes and washed them. I told him everything—Porterville, the shelter, turning my kids over to CPS. And he didn’t flinch.

He gave me a place to stay until I was back on my feet. I got my kids back. I got my husband back. And I never forgot the man who opened his door in the rain and said, without hesitation, “Get in here.”

This is the man they won’t let out of prison. This is the man they say is unfit for society. I say they are wrong.

Scott Dackerman is still the man who held my newborn daughter like she was sacred. The man who mowed Grandma’s yard without asking for a dime. The man who remembered my son’s first kite decades later. The man who opened his door in the pouring rain and said, “Get in here.”

He made one mistake. And they’ve condemned him for life. He was not convicted of murder. He was not sentenced to life without parole. Yet they treat him as if he were. They’ve labeled him with an unauthorized sentence—attempted murder in the first degree—even though the jury never found premeditation or deliberation.

Scott has done the work. He completed rehabilitation programs. He stayed out of trouble. He earned the removal of his violent code—a designation that only changes when the system agrees you are no longer a threat.

And still, the parole board says not enough. But what is enough? How do you appease those who hold the keys to your freedom when they refuse to see the man you’ve become?

If you believe Scott Dackerman deserves another chance— If you believe redemption should mean something— If you believe that love, growth, and transformation are real—

Then stand with me. When I’m ready, I’ll launch a petition. And I’ll ask you to sign it.

Because Scott is not a danger. He is a man who showed up when others vanished. And it’s time the system saw him the way I do.