In June, Tramp was released, but life on the outside hasn't been good for her. She has no permanent home, no family and on one to love her except her foster mother, Sue Recher of Gaithersburg.

Last weekend, Tramp spent part of Saturday and Sunday agin behind bars, curled up on a scrap of carpet, waiting for someone to adopt a lovable calico cat like her.

Now that the prison is about to close, Lorton cats like Tramp are looking for new homes through the weekly Friends of Montgomery County Animals adoption fair at the Germantown PetSmart.

And no one wants to see the cats get good homes and three squares a day any more than the inmates.

"It's funny to think of her escaping from Central, but she did. She ran away from her mom and dad on winter when we had inches of ice on the ground. Me and another guy ran to the gate and saw her skidding on her heinie across the ice. She was so ugly, she was cute," said Michael Crigger, who was convicted of second-degree murder in 1984.

Crigger is a trustee at Lorton's maximum security prison where he cares for 29 cats, like Tramp , that roam the prison.

While at the prison, Tramp was one of Crigger's favorite cats because of her outgoing nature and her cleverness.

Tramp is a smart cat who knows how to get around the prison's rules, he sad. Although cats are not allowed in inmates' cells, Tramp often found a way around the prohibition.

"Tramp knows how to go into the lockdown blocks and up the staircases. She goes into cells and stays for days. They [inmates] loved her," Crigger said.

Tramp and the other cats are very important to the inmates, he said. "You gotta understand, they are locked up for 23, 24 hours a day, and some are never going home. So to have and animal - a real animal not a cockroach or spider - that you can love, touch and look at is really special."

Tramp was that special animal for many of the inmates, he said. She visited the friendly inmates frequently, but avoided the hostile ones, he said.

She was a regular on the block, so she knows the good ones and bad ones. A lot [of the inmates] are very evil. They don't like cats, they think they are evil, but Tramp; everyone liked her. I didn't want anyone to hit or kick her after I leave here," he said.

So Crigger placed Tramp up for adoption with the Lorton Cat Project.

The story is the same for Rico, an orange tabby male who was also born and raised at Lorton six years ago. "he was my favorite. I have 29 cats left and I still look for Rico at feeding time," Crigger said.

Rico was nicknamed "my little marine" by Crigger because of his fastidious cleaning rituals and hygiene practices. Rico is very intelligent, well-manned and enjoys a lot of physical contact. Like Tramp, Rico spent part of Saturday and Sunday afternoon curled up behind bars next to his toy mouse waiting for someone to take him home.

Tramp and Rico are just one of the 200 to 400 cats being left behind as the Lorton Correctional Complex in Fairfax County prepares to close in 2001. Over the 83-year life of the prison, inmates at Lorton have been allowed to name,feed and care for the cats that roam the facility. Now that Lorton is being closed and its inmates transferred to other prisons, cats like Tramp and Rico are being left behind each week.

Crigger said he is very concerned that Tramp and Rico find good homes.

Penny Moore, a licensed veterinarian technician at an animal hospital in Centreville, VA., started the Lorton Prison Cat Project in 1993 to help find homes for the cats. She was joined in her efforts by Friends of Montgomery County Animals, the Feline Foundation or Greater Washington, the SPCA, and many other groups and individuals.

So far, the group is getting plenty of publicity and will be featured this month in People magazine, but the task of finding homes for so many cats is enormous, Moore said.

We started in 1993 and so far we have spayed and neutered some 600 cats and placed 500 cats. We still have, I'd estimate 200 to 400 cats left," she said.

The cats are multiplying faster than she can get to them, Moore said. "The cats are having kittens before we can get them,. If there are 20 females we miss [spaying],and each has litter with kittens, that's nearly 100 new kittens," she said.

Leigh Hughes, a volunteer with Friends of Montgomery County Animals, said her group agreed to help find homes for the cats from the maximum-security section of the prison. The Montgomery County group received five Lorton's cats and have found homes for three through its adoption fairs for cats and kittens held on Saturdays at Petsmart in the Milestone shopping center off Route 355.

The Lorton maximum-security cats are different, said Recher. Prison life seems to have had a positive effect on their disposition. Although cats are often though of a aloof, the intense contact with so many people at the prison has made Tramp and Rico very friendly, she said."Rico is very people-oriented, because that's all he knows."

Still some people hesitate about taking on a Lorton cat, Hughes said.

"With the Lorton cats, some people have been concerned that they would have contact with the prisoners if they take one of its cats, but that won't happen. There will be no contact," Hughes said. "We do notify them [prisoners] though, that their cats have been adopted, because they are very concerned about the cats they had to leave behind."

Crigger said adoptive parents have nothing to fear. He loves his cats and wants them to have good homes, but he does not intend to try to find them once he is out of prison. "I'd like to know that Rico went to a good home, but the last thing in my mind when I get out of here is hanging around trying to find out where he is. No, I'm going straight to Florida, You'll never see me agin."

Meanwhile, Friends of Montgomery County Animals is taking care of the health needs of Rico, Tramp and the "regular cats" in their charge. All the cats are spayed, neutered, and vaccinated before they are put up for adoption. The organization even provided the cat carrier for the new owners, said Hughes. The group does all it cant o make adopting a cat easy, but it is a challenge with the older cats, Hughes said.

However, when last weekend's adoption fair was over, 32 cats had new homes, but not Rico or Tramp. The pair went home with Recher, who will bring them back to Petsmart again Oct. 16 for another chance at finding a loving home outside the prison walls.

Gaithersburg Gazzete
Donna Evans - staff writer