Simon Adebisi

He is also shown to have a severe addiction to heroin, suffering a nervous breakdown due to withdrawals in season 2, for which he is subsequently thrown into the psych ward where his insanity is further explored through various psychotic episodes.

Adebisi is serving life without the possibility of parole for beheading an undercover police officer with a machete four years prior to the events of the first episode.

As one of the leaders of the Homeboys (the main black gang in Oz), Adebisi is considered one of the prison's most dangerous inmates, and becomes one of the most recognizable characters on the show.

Adebisi is Nigerian - specifically Yoruba - and speaks with a strong accent, but had lived in America for about 15 years prior to his incarceration.

In one rare instance, he shows compassion; when fellow inmate Bob Rebadow raises $3,000 to send his terminally ill grandson to Disneyland, Adebisi convinces his men not to rob him, remarking "sometimes it is good to be human."

After Kareem begins to change Jefferson's mind and eventually converts him to Islam, Adebisi remains opposed, calling Said's teachings "bullshit" and continuing to side with the rest of the Homeboys.

Following Keane's execution in Episode 4, Paul Markstrom takes over as the new leader of the Homeboys until Adebisi and Kenny Wangler kill him when it is discovered he is an undercover cop.

Adebisi agrees and the two form somewhat of an alliance, successfully carrying out their plan over the following weeks as Schibetta is eventually killed in episode 7.

In the Season 1 finale, Adebisi, along with O'Reily, Said, Miguel Alvarez and Scott Ross, is one of the leaders of the Emerald City riot, representing the Homeboys.

Throughout the episode, Adebisi and the rest of his gang are constantly seen abusing heroin, until they run out and are unable to source any more in the wake of the riot.

However, two distractions hold Adebisi's attention: first, his crush on death row inmate Shirley Bellinger, who flirts with him through notes before rejecting him upon discovering that he is black.

The Italian Mob, seeking revenge for Schibetta's rape, takes advantage of this when new inmate and Mafia boss Antonio Nappa gets Adebisi put into drug rehab through his staff connections.

Another Nigerian Yoruba prisoner, an elderly man named Kipekemie Jara, comes to Oz, and begins to rehabilitate Adebisi, but at the same time the stress of the change brings on schizophrenic visions and severe psychosis.

The shock and trauma of the event triggers a nervous breakdown in Adebisi and he is moved to the psych ward, placed in a cell right next to Peter Schibetta.

The first step is to convince the impressionable Correctional Officer Clayton Hughes to help his African American counterparts behind bars as opposed to keeping them locked in.

Hughes, after seeing a few white officers make racist statements, starts accusing other black staff members, including Warden Leo Glynn, of betraying their own people and working for an oppressive white-run system.

With four blacks including one correctional officer dead at the hands of a white inmate, Adebisi's goals are accomplished and his plan is set in motion as Glynn fires McManus for overlooking the gun smuggling incident.

Over the course of the season Adebisi, with the help of Zahir Arif, persuades outside community leaders to pressure Glynn into hiring a black man to replace McManus.

Head guard Sean Murphy, an ardent supporter of McManus, is appalled by Querns' system, especially because it makes Adebisi, Pancamo, and Morales the trustees.

Adebisi now has the freedom to satisfy all his vices, installing a curtain in his cell and creating his own version of "paradise", although he could not escape the fact that he was still in prison.

When these two groups are sent to Unit B, two of Adebisi's lieutenants, Poet and Supreme Allah, are named trustees to replace Pancamo and Morales.

At the same time, two of the few white inmates left in Emerald City, Chris Keller and Ryan O'Reily, decide to work together to bring Adebisi and Querns down.

Said learns of Adebisi's video recordings of drug parties in his cell, and resolves to find a way to supply Glynn with this damning evidence of Querns' misconduct.