Raymund Narag sipped an iced coffee at a table in Espresso Royale Caffe Wednesday evening.

The Fulbright Scholar and MSU criminal justice graduate student talked and laughed with a friend and flipped through a PowerPoint presentation on his laptop computer.

But the other customers all around him - reading newspapers, ordering drinks - were unaware that Narag, 31, was in a far different place, physically and emotionally, just eight years before.

He spent nearly seven years in a Philippine jail after being falsely accused of murder. Then he wrote a book that prompted a push for prison reform in his native country.

Within the dirty, dilapidated walls of the Quezon City Jail, Narag prayed.

After being held for two years in the Philippine prison, Narag had fallen into a deep state of depression.

His incarceration forced him to break up with his girlfriend. His legal bills bankrupted his family. He was scared and alone.

"I needed something to cling on to - I was a drowning man," Narag said. "That is where I began to pray. For the first time in my life, I prayed."

Death leaves rival fraternity at blame

Fraternity member Dennis Venturina was having lunch outside the University of the Philippines' main campus library in Manila with other members of the Sigma Rho fraternity in 1994 when masked men brandishing metal pipes attacked the group without warning.

Although most Sigma Rho members escaped, Venturina was pinned down and beaten badly. A blood clot formed in Venturina's brain two days later. A few days after that, Venturina died.

The incident was immediately declared a "rumble," a common term in the Philippines used to describe fraternity-against-fraternity violence, said Narag, adding that this type of violence is common.

Although members of Sigma Rho first said they couldn't identify any of the masked men, they later changed their testimony to say that the masks fell off during the scuffle and they suspected the attackers were members of Scintilla Juris - Narag's fraternity.

"They wanted my frat to be punished," Narag said. "They suspected that our frat was responsible."

The Sigma Rho fraternity had long been influential in Philippine politics. The law firm that advises Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo today is made up of Sigma Rho members.

Just three days prior to receiving his degree in public administration from the University of the Philippines, Narag instead received a warrant for his arrest. Narag said he laughed it off at first - suspecting a mistake in the prosecutor's office.

But this was no mistake.

The university denied Narag his degree. He was quickly arrested and tortured by police. His future had crumbled.

But he was not alone. Ten others in his fraternity were also arrested in connection with the murder.

In a detention center, police beat Narag and forced him to beat other detainees. They mocked him and laughed as they told him stories of inmates being raped by other prisoners.

"The 11 of us had mutual support for each other," Narag sad. "I had to condition my mind that everything would be OK."

Prison life includes beatings, dangerous environment in cells

Narag was sent to the jail in Quezon City, the largest city in metropolitan Manila, to await his trial. The jail's reputation had been well-established before Narag arrived.

"The Quezon City Jail is a very congested facility," said Benjamin Muego, a political science professor at Bowling Green State University and adjunct professor at Ohio University's Center for Southeast Asia Studies. "It would just offend your sense of humanity. It's hell."

Narag entered a world of corruption, disease, drug use and overcrowded, unsanitary conditions - a world he hoped to quickly abandon if he was granted bail.

The jail was designed for 300 inmates, yet 3,500 packed the jail's cement living quarters. Tuberculosis was rampant. As many as 100 inmates shared one bathroom, and only 16 could be cared for in the infirmary at one time, Narag said.

The government only allotted 35 pesos, or about 62 cents, per inmate each day - some of which was pocketed by prison officials - so prisoners had to rely on visiting relatives or religious charities for their food, bedding, clothing, health care and toiletries.

Inmates cooked their food inside the crowded jail cells, and many prisoners developed lung problems from the fumes created by using kerosene in the poorly-ventilated quarters.

Drugs, and even prostitutes, were available for inmates. There was only one jail guard for every 200 inmates, but the prison was kept in order by a violent and complex inmate hierarchy that established leaders, disciplinarians, juries and other officers among prison gangs, Narag said.

If a prisoner tried to escape or was violent, the entire prison populace was punished, so a system of self-regulation was established among the inmates. Prisoners who broke the rules were punished by fellow inmates.

Some offenders were beaten with wooden paddles. Others weren't allowed to leave their cells. Some received "basag," or "breaking the skull" and were beaten in the head until death.

Although prison guards didn't actively promote the behavior, they relied on the inmate pecking order to maintain control.

About five inmates were executed or died because of poor health each month, Narag said.

"I was very young and so afraid," he said.

After nine months of rotting in the Philippine jail, Narag learned of the court's decision that would alter his future for the next six years.

Nine of the fraternity members arrested in connection with the murder at the university were granted bail, but Narag and fraternity brother Danny Feliciano Jr. were denied because, "allegedly, we were the ones who beat the man," Narag said.

Narag had dreamed of becoming a lawyer, but he knew that hope had been destroyed. He knew the average stay was 3.2 years for an inmate before he went to trial.

"It struck me now that this was the reality," Narag said.

Narag's education helped in jail

In a prison populated by accused murderers, rapists, kidnappers and pickpockets, Narag was a bit of an anomaly.

He was college educated. He could read and write. As a student, he had spent time as an activist and organizer in the poorest Philippine fishing and farming villages.

During his second year in the jail, an inmate asked Narag to write a letter for him. That inmate told other inmates about Narag and soon he was writing dozens of letters each week.

"They were lined up each morning," he said.

Narag asked his friends outside of the prison to bring him law books, and soon he was offering legal seminars to the uneducated inmates.

As the weeks went on, the seminars became an official part of the prison's program for new inmates, and Narag was reporting his progress to the warden and his superiors.

"I came to the realization that there was some reason I was in there," Narag said.

As the seminars grew in popularity and Narag's reputation grew among the inmates and prison officials, he acquired the nickname "Attorney Raymund." In his fourth year in the prison, Narag became the "mayor de mayores" - the overall leader of all the prison gangs.

Narag spent his days in jail writing down everything he saw - describing in detail the inhumane prison conditions. He was allowed to have a camera to document the success of his programs, but he often used it to document the harsh prison life. In a few years, Narag's report would be circulating through the offices of the Philippine Congress and Supreme Court.

Book carves way to freedom

After six years, nine months and four days behind bars, Narag was acquitted of the murder charge and became a free man on Feb. 28, 2002. The judge ruled that Narag was not at the scene of the crime and there was a mistake made by the prosecution.

His friend, Danny Feliciano Jr. was convicted of the murder, along with four of the others originally released on bail. Although they were given life sentences, Narag said he knows they're innocent.

"I cry for them and I pray for them every night," he said.

After being released from jail, Narag published a book, "Freedom and Death Inside the City Jail," which outlined the abuses and inhumanity of the Quezon City Jail.

Many inmates in the jail were wrongly accused. More than 80 percent are eventually found not guilty, but outdated laws and an inefficient court system keep them incarcerated, Narag said.

"Evidence could be totally made up, but there is no process to relieve these people while they are waiting," said Sheila Maxwell, an MSU criminal justice associate professor and Philippines native. As part of a Fulbright fellowship in 2004, Maxwell toured prisons throughout the Philippines, including the Quezon City Jail. "That's one of the worst places in the Philippines," she said.

Narag said that after publishing his book, he feared retribution from prison officials, police and fellow inmates who had been released, but made sure not to "name names" in the book.

"If I didn't do it, I would forever be put in jail - emotionally, spiritually," Narag said. "Writing my book was my freedom."

After nearly three years of lecturing at universities about his experiences, graduating from school and meeting with many Philippine governmental officials, Narag began classes this semester as a graduate student in MSU's criminal justice program.

He said his new dream is to learn the criminal justice system of the United States and then bring the knowledge back to the Philippines and use it to establish the country's first criminal justice school.

For Narag, the future is uncertain, but he said he is filled with hope that the prisons will change.

"I'm going to try to make sense of it," he said. "Whatever I become now, it is a product of my experiences. The more that I share my experiences, the more I am unburdened."