45 Years Ago, Novelist Norman Mailer Helped Free an Incarcerated Man Due to His Literary Talent. Weeks Later, He Murdered Someone

45 Years Ago, Novelist Norman Mailer Helped Free an Incarcerated Man Due to His Literary Talent. Weeks Later, He Murdered Someone https://ift.tt/jOkSwdt

Jack Henry Abbott’s prison memoir, ‘In the Belly of the Beast,’ became a bestseller despite his violent history and life sentence

Jack Henry Abbott; Norman Mailer
Credit: AP Photo/David Handschuh;  Jean-Claude FRANCOLON/Gamma-Rapho/Getty

NEED TO KNOW

• Norman Mailer advocated for Jack Henry Abbott’s release, believing in his literary talent after exchanging letters with him
• Abbott was paroled in 1981 but killed a waiter six weeks later, prompting a two-month manhunt before his capture
• Abbott’s prison memoir, In the Belly of the Beast, became a bestseller despite his violent history and life sentence

Norman Mailer played a role in getting Jack Henry Abbott released from prison on parole in June 1981, only for the felon to commit another crime just months later.

Mailer was a writer, journalist and filmmaker whose career included 11 best-selling books, including The Armies of the Night, which won the Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction as well as the National Book Award. Abbott, meanwhile, spent most of his childhood in reform schools and juvenile centers before being convicted of forgery as a teenager and later killing a fellow inmate in 1966.

Abbott received a 14-year sentence, but in 1971, he escaped from jail, robbing a bank before being captured and taken to prison once more.

Convict-author Jack Henry Abbott walks handcuffed to jail in New Orleans Sept. 24, 1981
Credit: AP Photo

That was when he became a pen pal of sorts to Mailer, who was writing a book about a prisoner on death row, The Executioner’s Song, and was struck by Abbott’s writing.

After Abbott wrote about allegations of mistreatment in prison, Mailer took an interest — ultimately sharing the letters publicly and lobbying for Abbott’s release. Mailer attested to Abbott’s writing talents and promised to give him a job in hopes of keeping him on the straight and narrow after release.

Mailer’s friendship with Abbott led to increased interest in the case, with the writer arguing that the prisoner had a lot of literary talent, and Abbott was released to a halfway house in June 1981.

Around the same time, Abbott’s memoir about prison life, In the Belly of the Beast — composed of his and Mailer’s letters — was published, earning praise and becoming a bestseller.

However, Abbott’s freedom would not last. Six weeks after his prison parole, he stabbed and killed a New York waiter following an argument. Then, he fled, going first to Mexico and, following a two-month-long manhunt, was eventually captured in the oil fields of Louisiana in July 1981.

Even after his return to prison, Mailer — who was convicted of assault himself in 1960, serving a three-year probation after stabbing his wife, Adele Morales, with a penknife — continued to defend Abbott, saying, “culture is worth a little risk” in arguing for a lenient sentence.

Abbott was ultimately sentenced to 15 years to life.

As PEOPLE reported in 1982, the families of Abbott’s victims sued him for royalties of the book, with the widow of the man murdered in New York being awarded nearly $7.6 million in a 1990 civil judgment.

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Abbott died by suicide in prison in February 2002. He was 58.

Mailer, for his part, died in November 2007 at age 84.