Ronald W. Clark Jr
Sept 4, 2012

"Another Tragic Tale"

In 1988 I was 19 years old. I had a girlfriend named Lisa, who I would marry on April 8, 1988. We were living in Savannah, GA. I was working for her father Bob on a construction company. We were slip liners. We would slip new plastic pipe inside of old concrete or clay pipe sewer lines. Which would keep the city or county from having to dig up an entire street. We, the crew, would move around from city to city, state to state. This was my first job with them. I was enjoying the work and the people on the crew, for this was a family and a family that I grew to love. Bob was the superintendent. Robert was the foreman, Tommy was the crew leader, Jimbo was the heavy equipment operator, and then you had pipe slippers Charles and Willie, and then laborers such as myself, Travis and others who were hired locally. After work, and on the weekends, Lisa and I would hang out with Jimbo who was a bit older than us at 26. We became real good friends and party.

One night in late January Jimbo had went to a bar. When he left this bar, three black guys approached him, and they beat him down, and robbed him. And they beat him pretty bad. His testicles were swollen, where they had kicked him numerous times. This kept him out of the bar scene.

One night in February Lisa and I was over at Jimbo's house, and we were smoking weed, and playing quarters with tequila, and chasing it with beer. I was pretty drunk, and I stopped and went out on the front porch. I had been taking martial arts. And I had my nunchucks and was going through a kata (routine) and three black guys walked up. I knew one of them to be Travis, so I walked over and started talking to them. Several minutes later Jimbo comes out, and he turned and went back into the house ranting and raving. I said to Travis and the two guys, Let me see what's going on with this guy. So I open the door, Lisa's coming towards me in this hallway that comes to the front door, and behind her is Jimbo with a huge a** knife. I took two quick steps, grabbed Lisa, using both our weight I flung us through a door on my right hand side. We knock the door open and landed. I extended my leg back to kick Jimbo if he entered the room. I had Lisa under me, so she would be protected. Jimbo went right by us. I left Lisa laying there, and ran after Jimbo, as I got out the front door, he had already stabbed Travis once, blow caught Travis in the face on his cheekbone. I ran up behind Jimbo, grabbed him by the wrist of his hand that had the knife in it, and catching him off balance I slung both of us to the ground. I was on top of him, he was struggling to get back up. I was yelling at the other two black guys, who was standing there in shock, to help get the knife out of Jimbo's hand. Finally they came to and pried the knife out of his hand. I was then screaming at Jimbo, "What the f- is wrong with you?" He said "That's them, that's them, they robbed me and beat me." I said, "That's not them, that's Travis." I eventually let him up and he went back in the house.

Lisa and I would examine Travis' cuts, and somehow none of them were serious. Travis stated he would not get the cops involved, and he left with the other two guys. Lisa and I put Jimbo to bed. And we then went and explained to her father what had taken place.

First thing Monday morning on the job site Bob pulled Travis and Jimbo into his office, sat them down and discussed what had taken place. Jimbo apologised to Travis and they came out with their arms around each other like lifelong friends.

In late March 1988 we were working late, the pipe was slipping good, and when a pipe is slipping you don't want to shut it down, 'cause dirt and other crud can build up and you have to bring in the cleaners to clean in front of it, in order to get it slipping again. On this night, Bob was on the backhoe, and Jimbo was helping Charles. Robert was running the fusing machine, you had others getting pipes lined up, hooking cables and I was supposed to go down in the manholes with a flashlight and crowbar to guide the pipe in and out each side of the pipe in the manhole. Travis was to stay above me with a flashing barcode, an orange light and a flag. As we took off to head down there, Bob yelled, "Ronnie wait, Jimbo you go down there, I want Ronnie to learn how to slip this pipe." So Jimbo and Travis head down to the first manhole.

The pipe was slipping nicely, everything was going good. Lisa, her mother Sharron and Lena, Robert's wife and Jimbo's sister and a few other women were on the job site. They had brought us food. We had gotten paid that day and as soon as we got off we were going to go partying. It was late at night, about 8:30, 9pm, already dark. I was standing by the backhoe, I heard someone yelling coming down the street. I seen it was Travis, and he was yelling Jimbo's been hit. I took off running, kicking off the water boots. I approached the manhole, the lid was off, and laying next to it was Jimbo. I ran to him and knelt down. I looked into his eyes, he had a blank stare. There was blood coming out of his mouth, nose and ears. Blood was puddling under his head. I touched him, and I knew he was dying. There was people all over the sidewalks looking, this was an all black neighborhood. I immediately thought Travis did this and I jumped up looking for him. But I noticed Lisa, Sharron and Lena coming. I ran to them and grabbed them and I said "You don't want to see him. He's gone." I led them away. I then seen Travis and I screamed "Mother f-er, you did this!" and I went after him, a bunch of people grabbed me. I couldn't get loose, and Bob sent him away. I don't remember much else about that night. Jimbo was rushed to the hospital and placed on life support. He was brain dead, and a couple of days later Lena had the doctors pull the plug. We buried him there in Georgia. My only memory is seeing him in the coffin and holding on to Sharron and Lisa as I cried. From that, until this very moment I've always wished that it would have been me and not Jimbo.

I was staying drunk, I think the only day I was sober was April 8, 1988, the day Lisa and I got married. Lisa and I had been living together and Bob and Sharron said y'all might as well make it legal. 'Cause had that been me, Lisa would have had no rights and she couldn't have signed and approved the surgery or anything. That's why we got married. I did love her. We were just young and our life was a mess. And between Jimbo's death and the Aug 87 car wreck, I was an emotional wreck who was using drugs and alcohol to escape it. I never would see Travis again. They never caught the person who killed Jimbo. I still wish it would have been me. Oh, how I wish I would have escaped Bob's view as I was heading down there.

Ronald W. Clark Jr