Bogs Diamond is tertiary antagonist who appeared in the early part of The Shawshank Redemption and in the film adaptation. He was the leader of a group of prison rapists called the Sisters, who took a liking to the main protagonist Andy Dufresne shortly after his arrival. Red would later tell Andy that Bogs and the other members of his group were not homosexual, they committed their brutal acts simply for the fun of it.
History[]
Bogs first spotted Andy Dufresne in the cafeteria at breakfast the day after his arrival. Bogs later confronted Andy in showers, where he sizes him up. He makes a pass at Andy, who rebuffs him. Bogs and the other Sisters waited until Andy was alone, then attempted to rape him. They ended up beating him up after Andy would not submit. Over the next two years, Bogs continued to target Andy, who often showed up with fresh bruises - Red noted that sometimes Andy managed to fight them off, other times he didn't. Even so, Andy never said who beat him up.
(he was 23 years of age) In 1949, Andy and the other inmates were watching Gilda. When Andy leaves, Bogs confronts him and forces him into the projection room. Andy hits Rooster with a reel of film, breaking his nose. The Sisters overpower Andy and force him to his knees. Bogs then draws a knife and tells Andy that he must perform oral sex on him and Rooster or else he will stab him in the head. Andy says that anything Bogs puts in his mouth he will lose, and if he stabs him Andy will bite down hard and his jaws will have to be opened with a crowbar. When Bogs asked Andy where he learned that, Andy insulted Bogs' intelligence. The Sisters ultimately do not rape Andy, instead, they beat him to within an inch of his life, forcing him to spend a month in the infirmary.
Bogs is caught, however, and subsequently spent a week in the hole for his actions. When his time was up, he returned to his cell, only to find Captain Hadley and Guard Mert waiting for him. As Andy was now useful to the prison, they, in turn, proceeded to attack Bogs, hitting him with their batons for what he did to Andy. Bogs attempted to flee but they dragged him back and continued their assault.
The attack was so savage and brutal it left Bogs paralyzed, and according to Red, he never walked again. Bogs was then transferred to a minimum security hospital upstate, where Red heard he spent the rest of his life "drinking his food through a straw". After the attack, "the Sisters never laid a finger on Andy again".
Trivia[]
- According to director Frank Darabont, there was another scene in which Bogs blew Andy a kiss during breakfast. The scene was cut because it made Bogs out to be homosexual, when he was a prison rapist, which Darabont drew a line between.
- The movie merges two different episodes from the book into the fate of Bogs Diamond. In the book, Bogs Diamond is beaten and raped in 1948 after the group assault on Andy. The book implies that Andy organized the assault by paying off the guards. While the beating is not as severe as in the movie, it leaves Bogs psychologically broken and he is no longer a threat to anyone, The Sisters gang, though, continues the harassment until the episode on the roof in 1950, after which any attempt to harm a very useful prisoner would lead to immediate retaliation by the guards.