Augustus Hill

Augustus Hill is a fictional character, played by Harold Perrineau on the American television show "Oz".

Character overview

"Prisoner 95H522. Convicted November 6, 1995 - Possession of a substance, murder in the second degree. Sentence: Life imprisoment, up for parole in 20 years. "

Mentored by his godfather Burr Redding, Hill has been selling and using drugs since his teenage years. In 1995, a SWAT team came after him on a drug warrant on a tip from a friend named Kevin Ketchum who gave up his location to avoid going to jail on an old warrant himself (this wasn't revealed until the fourth season of the show). The details of his capture are revealed in the second episode of the show. The SWAT team busted his apartment door down while he and his wife were making love. He escaped out the window and raced up to the roof. Cornered there, Hill shot and killed one of the SWAT officers. In retaliation, he was thrown off the roof of the building by another cop and was left paralyzed from the waist down.

Hill serves as the narrator of the show, appearing in surreal segments where he gives monologues addressing some theme of the episode, and he also introduces other prisoners to the viewer by showing a flashback to their crimes. In prison, he remains a neutral figure until Redding shows up and takes charge of the black inmates. As he is confined to a wheelchair and not associated with any gang members, Hill remains as one of the more consistently decent characters on the show, struggling to avoid moral compromise while staying alive in the dangerous world of Oswald Maximum Security Prison. In the fifth season finale, Hill is accidentally killed by the Italian inmates, although he continues to show up in narration segments.

eason 1

Hill is one of the inmates let into Em City. Confined to a wheelchair, he poses no threat to any inmate or guard and remains a neutral figure, getting along with everyone for the most part. In Em City, he works in the dress factory with inmates such as Bob Rebadow and Tobias Beecher. Hill does not really like Beecher, as he was a lawyer on the outside, a profession that he despises. When conjugal visits are allowed, Hill sleeps with his wife Annabella for the last time. Being paraplegic, he has no sensation below his waist so he cannot determine the pleasure received during sex. When Simon Adebisi asks him why he even wants to have sex with his wife without sensation, he claims that it is all for her.

Hill also takes part in the drug rehab program and has been clean for almost two years. He takes a break from this however when his hero NBA player, Jackson Vahue, arrives in Oz and encourages him to use drugs. After using one time and seeing how much of a bad person Vahue really is, he stops using drugs.

Hill admires new inmate Eugene Dobbins who has a gift for playing the cello. When Dobbins is harassed by Vahue for no apparent reason, Hill tells him stop and recognize the gift that Dobbins has.

Meanwhile, the tension in Em City erupts into a riot where Muslim inmate Kareem Said leads the takeover. Hill forces Vahue to carry out the wounded Dobbins who gets stabbed by a black inmate during the riot and then hides with the rest of the prisoners as the SORT team recaptures the unit.

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The inmates from Em City are transferred to the general population as the unit has been destroyed through the riot. Law school dean Alvah Case investigates the causes of the riot and asks Hill several questions pertaining to its causes. Hill is then told that Eugene Dobbins died and the unit that the inmates stay in becomes overcrowded. When Em City is reopened, Hill is let back in as an "Other" inmate with Bob Rebadow, Agamemnon Busmalis, and his new cellmate Tobias Beecher. Hill is angered and thinks Unit Manager Tim McManus should have classified him as one of the Homeboys, the black gangsters in Oz. Augustus is also wary of rooming with Beecher as Beecher had recently bitten off the tip of inmate James Robson's penis. Hill cannot sleep with Beecher as his roommate, constantly protecting his genitalia at nighttime and is relieved when Chris Keller arrives and replaces him as Beecher's cellmate.

In the Em City council, Hill represents the Others. Augustus then sees that his judge during the trial has been imprisoned for receiving bribes during the sentencing of various inmates. Angered, he gets Said to represent him in an attempt to free himself. Said speaks powerfully in Hill's favor but the judges and defense attorneys conclude that the judge had fairly sentenced him, as no mention of a bribe occurred during his trial. Frustrated, Hill spends the rest of the season figuring out ways of escaping Oz.

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In this season Hill faces a major conflict. Inmate Malcolm Coyle confesses to Hill that he murdered an Italian-American family for fun and never got caught for it. Hill is sickened to find out that he is telling the truth about the murder. He then talks with Said about what he should do. After listening to Said, Hill convinces Coyle to send up a video tape proving his guilt. Hill and Said then tell Warden Leo Glynn, who immediately contacts the local district attorney. Scheming for revenge, Kenny Wangler and the Homeboys look to murder Hill, who is placed in protective custody. Said sees this and then convinces Antonio Nappa, Carmen Guerra, and even Aryan Brotherhood leader Vernon Schillinger to have their respective gangs help the Muslims protect Hill. All three agree and then Nappa makes Hill's protection easier by murdering Coyle before his trial. Wangler then sees not to touch Hill at all getting a loud and clear message about what will happen. Simon Adebisi then comes back and takes over the Homeboys. In taking over the Homeboys, he stirs up racial issues in Oz to the point that the inmates in Em City lose their pornographic magazines. Adebisi then urges Hill to take a confiscated magazine in order to earn a trip to solitary confinement. As Hill is led away, Oz's black inmates shout "Set Hill Free" and organize to take over the prison. As this happens, Oz is locked down.

eason 4 Part I

Let back into Em City after three weeks, Hill sponsors and rooms with Desmond Mobay, a Jamaican drug dealer. Unknown to Hill, Mobay is actually a police detective named Johnny Basil who is looking to put a bust to the drug trade in Oz. Mobay asks Hill who to buy drugs from, and he points to Kenny Wangler and Junior Pierce. In the visiting room, Mobay is visiting his girlfriend while Hill visits his wife. Augustus thinks he recognizes Mobay's girlfriend (who is indeed an undercover cop) and states this to Mobay. Mobay tells her to stop visiting for a while as a result. Hill then states that he thinks his wife is losing him as the visits seem more and more meaningless. Later, a shootout in Em City occurs killing Wangler and Pierce, among others. Guillaume Tarrant, an intimidated white inmate, shoots them after Simon Adebisi places a gun in his cell.

This shooting stirs up issues in Em City that lead to the firing of Unit Manager Tim McManus and the pressure to hire an African American unit manager from both black inmates and community leaders. Meanwhile, Mobay is snorting excessive amounts of heroin and must kill a random inmate to get in the good graces of the gangster inmates. Mobay asks Hill to help him; Hill initially refuses, but is manipulated to do so and watches as Desmond pushes inmate Bruno Goergen down an elevator shaft. Mobay also accidentally loses his accent one night, drawing Hill's suspicion.

Hill recognizes Mobay as a cop and calls him a fraud who breaks the law to enforce it. He also recognizes Mobay's supposed girlfriend Kina as a uniformed officer who was present during the night of his arrest. Furious, Mobay beats Hill out of his wheelchair, but gets the message and turns himself in for murdering Bruno Goergen. Shortly afterwards, McManus' replacement, Martin Querns, is fired and Adebisi dies after making an unsuccessful attempt on Said's life.

eason 4 Part II

Em City is running back to normal as McManus is rehired as the unit manager. The Homeboys, meanwhile, are in disarray and out of the drug trade in the wake of Adebisi's death. Possible salvation appears when Hill's stepfather, Burr Redding, comes to Oz and immediately takes control of the Homeboys from current leader Arnold "Poet" Jackson. Hill is glad to see Redding and becomes more involved with the Homeboys as a result. Chucky Pancamo, the leader of the Italians, and Enrique Morales, leader of the Latinos, look to eliminate Redding, who intends on taking their power away from them in the drug scene. Supreme Allah, whom Redding despises, is then released from solitary confinement and offered a third in the drug trade from Pancamo and Morales. When Hill asks why Redding hates Supreme Allah, he tells him the truth about his arrest. Redding tells him that on the night of his arrest, Supreme Allah was arrested on an old warrant and gave up Hill's location to the police as a means of beating the charge. Furious, Hill attacks Supreme Allah, who merely throws him out of his wheelchair and kicks him to the point of hospitalization. Angered, Redding calls in Tug Daniels, the brother of a man Supreme Allah killed. In the visiting room, Daniels uses a sharpened toothbrush to try and kill Supreme Allah, who nevertheless lives.

Redding then plans to eliminate all the enemies of the Homeboys, a move that Hill questions. Hill does not want anyone to die, so he alerts head guard Sean Murphy of Redding's plan. Murphy gets the SORT team to break up a murder attempt on the Italian and Latino inmates. Furious, Redding casts Hill out of the gang.

Meanwhile Hill sabotages the parole of Jackson Vahue, whom he feels has no remorse and should not leave Oz. As the war between the Homeboys, Latinos, and Italians escalates, Supreme Allah decides he wants to ally himself with Hill. For his part, Hill feels he is insincere and is right, as Supreme is only trying to use him to kill Redding. For informing on Redding, Hill is harassed by Tug Daniels, who Supreme Allah warns to back off. Daniels dies shortly afterwards when Redding has discovered that he is a traitor and Supreme Allah warns Hill that they are next in line to die. When Supreme Allah is set to kill Redding on his own, Hill remembers some information critical to Supreme Allah's health. After paying inmate Harden to see the medical records, Hill sees that Supreme Allah is lethally allergic to eggs. With this information, he informs Poet who works in the cafeteria who then with the other Homeboys mixes Supreme Allah's food with a heavy concentration of eggs. Supreme Allah dies in the cafeteria and Redding forgives Hill, allowing him to rejoin the Homeboys.

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As Em City is reopened following the explosion that closed the fourth season, Hill is let back in and is awaiting a visit from his mother, Eugenia. Eugenia is coming to warn him that his wife wishes to divorce him. His mother dies when the visitor's bus crashes, but Hill finds this information out from a letter sent by her lawyers in the city. Distraught that his wife is divorcing him and his mother has died, he becomes a complete emotional wreck.

Hill then goes to Poet wanting some heroin to relieve his pain. Under the influence, Hill forgets to clean his catheter and goes into kidney failure. In the hospital Hill nearly dies, and Dr. Gloria Nathan informs McManus that heroin has engulfed the prisoner's blood. Furious, McManus attacks Redding, whom he believes is responsible for selling Hill the drugs. Redding then explains he had nothing to do with it and will bring down the men responsible.

Redding first goes after Poet, who denies having anything to do with it. Poet then gets Agamemnon Busmalis, a witness with no vested interest, to say that Italian inmate Salvatore DeSanto sold Hill the drugs. Angered, Redding who now runs the cafeteria has Poet put a lethal amount of LSD in DeSanto's food, causing his brain to fail. The food is cleaned up, however, and the staff thereby has no evidence to convict Redding of the murder. In the hospital, McManus interrogates Hill as to who sold him the drugs. Hill will not give up Poet but does say that the Italians are innocent of selling him the drugs. McManus passes this information to Redding, who demands to see his stepson. McManus then refuses to let Redding see Hill, as he does not want to help Redding kill the men who gave his stepson the drugs.

Angry, Redding searches for Busmalis to find the men responsible. Poet forces Busmalis to say Carmen Guerra and the Latinos were behind it. The Homeboys are allied with the Latinos during this time but that alliance dies when Redding angrily accuses Guerra to Latino leader Enrique Morales. Morales and Redding both go to the hole and upon their release Augustus is released from the hospital. When released Poet begs him not to snitch which is something Hill would not have done any way. Redding then has a long talk with Hill, stating that he is sorry for ever encouraging him to do or sell drugs in the first place. During this talk, the Latinos and Italians renew their alliance on the condition that the Italians kill Redding. Frank Urbano charges at Redding with a knife but is stopped in the way by Hill, who dies defending his stepfather. His death puts Redding in complete disarray and motivates him to have the Homeboys drop out of the drug trade in Season 6.

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Augustus Hill continued to narrate the show, but he was doing it as a spirit in the Afterworld. He was assisted by deceased Oz characters such as Dino Ortolani, Jefferson Keane, Shirley Bellinger, the Schillinger Brothers, and Antonio Nappa.

Hill's presence was also felt as a book he wrote about his experiences in Oz was published, with the Muslims doing the binding themselves. This book, titled "OZ: Behind These Walls: The Journal of Augustus Hill" is available in the "real world" from Amazon.com.

External links

* [http://www.hbo.com/oz/cast/character_hill.shtml Official character biography at Oz website]