A Reflection: IN A PRISONER’S EYES

By David Bomber

One of my fondest memories was playing an extra in the movie “War of the Worlds.” As it turned out, I played the role of a survivor who, among others, was migrating to God knows where after the aliens invaded.

Basically, the filming entailed walking around in a field for two days in which we pretty much froze! However, my efforts did garner me a few precious seconds in the movie. Of course, you have to know where to look but I can honestly point me out. Nevertheless, it was an exhilarating experience considering that I was able to rub elbows with the likes of Steven Spielberg, Tom Cruise, and Dakota Fanning.
The thing that I loved most about the entire experience was that there was no judgement, no “I’m better than you” attitude from these celebrities. In their eyes, we were an integral part of the production of the movie and it was obvious that sentiment meant a lot to us extras.

In comparison, there is a greater sense of gratitude in knowing that there are people, such as yourself, who invest their time and energy in a platform that truly benefits and inspires someone such as myself, who is incarcerated.

In a prisoner’s eyes, it is you who is truly distinguished and notable and words cannot adequately express the gratitude that someone who is imprisoned has for your willingness to interact with them and show your support.

Thank you for taking the time to read this. If you would like to contact me, feel free to reach out to me via my enclosed contact info. below.

To email me directly, please visit http://www.jpay.com and submit Virginia ID #1130793 (Jpay is a service that the Virginia D.O.C. utilizes for prisoner communications with the public)(Note: this service does require users to purchase virtual stamps in order to send messages).

In the alternative, you can reach me via email at davidbomber99@outlook.com or davidbomber73@yahoo.com (Note: these accounts are managed by a third party and may take some time to receive messages from them).

To connect with me on social media:
https://linktr.ee/freedavidbomber

To join the conversation about my case:
#freedavidbomber

To contact me via snail mail:
David Bomber #1130793
Nottoway Correctional Center
P.O. Box 488
Burkeville, Va. 23922

A Poem: “If Never, Forever”

If ever our lives and minds free our hearts and souls,

Will you dance with me to their rhythm…
and sing with me their song?

If ever our fears and scars relent,
free of lament…

Will you brave the abyss with me
and give me respite upon your shores?

If ever the rains stop falling and the clouds dissipate,

Will you spend the night awing with me over starry seas,

And ride the breeze through trembling leaves of whispering trees?

If ever your eyes see me here,
down on my knees,
this blood on my hands,
oath on my lips,
cheeks wet with tears,

Will you lift me into your fire,
and fill the air with smoke and ash of burnt desire?

If forever ever ends,

Will you never let me know… never let me go…

And, with each new dawning day,
only ever say a hushed ‘hello’?

-Bernie Ranson, Lawrenceville Correctional

Background: I recently wrote this for my ex, but she filed for divorce before I could send it… I think it might illustrate the longing and yearning experienced by so many effected by the division and separation of prison – both inside and out.

A Breeding Ground for Sociopaths?

One of the more interesting – and disturbing – correlations I’ve found in my seven years of incarceration is the relationship between the length of stay one endures in prison, and their tendency to display and employ sociopathic, harmfully-manipulative behavior. Naturally, one must ask: post hoc, ergo propter hoc – does one thing actually proceed from the other? Or is this merely bias-infected coincidence? To be fair to logic, I must preempt my argument with that caveat.

I tend to see prison as an incubator of anti-social behavior. This, in my experience, is one of the fundamental flaws of the “system.” One may enter this environment, after truly making a bad decision, as an otherwise upright, moral and ethical person, complete with the normal range of empathetic regard for other people. But after years and years of grinding it out in such a hostile, negative environment, rife with personalities who are and have always been truly predatory, these normal, good people can adopt antisocial, manipulative behavior pattern as means to survive. And, after years of stewing in this muck, the system chucks them back out into polite society, declaring them rehabilitated, when in reality, they are anything but. They now have a whole new set of skills, skills which are detrimental to society.

This is a systemic failure.

Prison resembles a bit of a command-type economy: resources are doled out by the administrators, and there are zero ownership rights to anything, even the property you buy; in an instant, anything you “own” can be seized by the state, under any pretext. This isn’t a conducive environment, on economic grounds, for social harmony, to say nothing of viewing it through the other human sciences.

There are many people in a housing unit, but limited phones, limited kiosks (an email-esque service), limited ways to stay connected to the outside world. Likewise, there is limited sustenance, as well as limited means to make a “living,” as if slave wages can be considered as such. From a Maslowian perspective, prisoners are kept far, far away from the pinnacle of the human experience: self-actualization. And if Maslow is even half right – which some would regard him to be – humans will do what they must to claw their way up his pyramid.

So people adapt. And after years of fighting for the most basic of necessities, they maladapt. Can anyone really blame them?

In my life, I’m exposed to two extremes of prisoner: very short timers and very long timers. By and far, it is the very long timers who exhibit the most dangerous, zero-sum, manipulative behavior. They are, as the colloquialism would have them, thoroughly institutionalized. And there are those too who straddle these extremes, men with practical life sentences, which they are now just beginning to serve. Interestingly, it is they who help bolster my argument, as, over time, their reality sets in, and they begin to display new, antisocial behaviors; they are the transition cases that supports my hypothesis.

And I have trouble finding fault with most of these men. Truly, even I, a person who consciously, obsessively attempts to jettison his innate, and overwhelmingly normal, ego- and sociocentric tendencies, with a rudimentary understanding of metacognition, has to diligently guard against falling for the allure of an easier life by manipulating those around me, because the temptation is there. How could it not be?

So I put myself in the shoes of other people, more than I did as a free man, knowing well the temptation not to. Sometimes that’s bewildering and painful. Even just yesterday, I had a difficult conversation with a man who has done a tremendous amount of time. Respecting his privacy, I’ll call him Charles.

Charles isn’t a horrible guy, despite making a horrible decision all those years ago. Yet after so many years, his ethical framework has morphed into something totally self-serving and delusional.

Like so many contentious interactions in prison, this one revolved around a phone. Apparently I had vexed this man in my attempt to use a phone earlier than I had intended, which I actually did to conform to his need to use it at a particular time. Intentionally seeking to avoid conflict, I was confronted with it anyway. And afterwords, I was gaslighted to be made to feel that, notwithstanding my attempt to avoid conflict, I’d caused it anyway. The whole episode was bewildering; but, during it all, I couldn’t help but feel sorry for this man. He was truly just trying to look out for his own self-interest, not only in using the scarce resource of a phone, but also in trying maintain the even scarcer resource of his dignity. He’s simply a product of his environment. And had literally no idea he was acting in an antisocial manner. Total solipsism, totally unintentional.

Paradoxically, the society thought he needed 30-plus years to rehabilitate himself. And it hasn’t turned out so well, which I have a hard time faulting him for. This environment reinforces behavior like Charles exhibits. And the extra time he’s served hasn’t helped in that regard. It seems to have hurt.

This is the fault of the system, because the system, despite its Orwellian insistence otherwise, does very little to actually rehabilitate. Structurally, it can’t. It is designed on the assumption of low taxpayer cost, resource-starved to its core, totally isolated from the democratic process. Modern prison is nothing more than a warehouse, full of men and women waiting to be pulled off the shelf, when their number pops up, and shuffled out the door, “rehabilitated.”

In the interim, the longer they are here, the higher the chance of maladaptive behavior patterns forming, the higher the chance of institutionalization. What good, precisely, does this do them. And more importantly, what good does it do society?

Correlation isn’t causation. This is all anecdotal. Yet I see a trend, nevertheless.

Christopher Read
#1770228
Haynesville Correctional Center
Haynesville, VA

WHAT DOES CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM LOOK LIKE?

by Lord Serious

On September 26, 2022 Senator Jennifer Boysko and Delegate Irene Shin paid a visit to a group of prisoners at Lawrenceville Correctional Center. After introducing myself and thanking the distinguished guest for visiting us at the prison, I asked them what were their visions for prison reform and criminal justice reform. They each spoke of their record and the various bills they have sponsored and fought to get passed. I’d like to thank Q. Patterson and Sistas In Prison Reform (S.I.P) for giving me the opportunity to be a part of the group who were chosen to attend this meeting. Below is a draft of some of the speaking points I wrote to prepare for the meeting:

First, we offenders request that you amend Code 15.2-1636.7 to prohibit the Compensation Board from continuing to use the formula suggested by Virginia Association of Commonwealth’s Attorneys. This prosecutorial interest group has suggested a formula that incentives Commonwealths Attorneys offices to seek felony convictions for funding, and it deters prosecutors from using alternative methods to secure just and fair results.

This formula contributes to the mass incarceration of Black and Brown people. It encourages prosecutors to seek felony charges over misdemeanors, and it deters them from recommending diversion programs, even in cases where a misdemeanor or diversion program will result in a more just result without jeopardizing public safety. Furthermore, the formula fails to factor in the socioeconomic factors that also influence crime. All of this results in a biased criminal justice system that encourages its prosecutors to over charge and excessively sentence minorities so that their office will receive more funding.

Once this formula has been replaced with a method that will eradicate the bias and exploitative nature of the Criminal justice system. Many of your funding issues will be solved when it comes to the Department of Corrections, because prosecutors will be less inclined to charge every criminal defendant they possibly can with a felony and sentence them to prison. Those who can remain in the community without jeopardizing public safety will receive an adequate punishment without ever having to step foot in a prison, thus they will be less of a burden on the Virginia tax payer.

Next, we request that you amend Code 9.1-601 Citizen Review Panels. We ask that you expand their oversight abilities beyond the police department. We request that their oversight authority be amended to include the Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Offices and the Probation and Parole Office.

It is our position that a lot of the socioeconomic bias that infects the criminal justice system goes beyond just police brutality. The entire system neither values nor does it respect the Black and Brown life, especially when they are from impoverished communities. Therefore, we ask that municipalities be given the authority to establish Community Review Panels that will maintain the checks and balances and make these two critical departments accountable to the communities they serve.

The Community Review Panel should be allowed to play a role in determining whether Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Offices are dealing too harshly with the citizens in their community. It’s easy for an office of predominantly White people to send young Black and Brown men to prison for multiple decades for their first felony offense. But the very communities that we’re committing our crimes in do not always agree that a lengthy prison sentence is an appropriate punishment, and the voice of the community should have some influence in these matters before trial. Community Review Panels should be granted the authority to recommend eligible cases for diversion programs when appropriate.

The Community Review Panel should also be granted authority to review the practices of the probation and parole offices for biases and abuses of power. Ex-offenders on probation and parole have no right to an attorney for a revocation hearing and neither can they appeal the decision if their parole has been revoked. This leaves ex-offenders at the mercy of the probation and parole office and they are powerless to prevent abuses of power. Therefore, Community Review Panels should also be granted oversight authority to protect returning citizens from bias probation or parole officers.

And lastly, we would like you to pass a law to make financial literacy a requirement for our rehabilitation. The Uniform Crime Report data shows that poverty is a major contributor to crime. In fact, that report list economic conditions and employment availability as the #3 influencer to crime in the Commonwealth, eclipsed only by population density and population stability which were #1 and #2 respectively.

Legislators in Virginia recognize that having access to more financial resources can help prevent recidivism. This is why the law was passed that now requires us to save $1,000 in our hold account. Obviously, legislators realized that Virginia offenders were not doing a good enough job with saving their money and many were being released with only the $25 they gave you for the bus ticket and the lack of financial stability is what was leading many to re-offend. Unfortunately, with inflation steadily increasing that $1,000 will have less impact by the time many of us are released.

So that $1,000 is not enough. If you distinguished guest are serious about prison reform and preventing recidivism then the nature of the Department of Corrections will have to change course, it must turn away from it’s past when it was a system that used mass incarceration as a profitable economic model. This economic model has failed and your budget issues and the statistics all show that mass incarceration is an unnecessary burden on the tax payer and it has never increased public safety.

-Lord Serious, September 2022

A Message From Keen Mountain

Peace and chaos and confusion universe, and salute to Q always.

This is off-topic but I would like to share a jewel with you. Today is the funeral of a nurse at Keen Mountain who was murdered by her baby’s father who was a correctional officer here…

Now, this is a sad moment because she treated me as a human, one of the very few that do in the system. Thou I’m weird to almost everyone I meet, due to me claiming to be God and also short, legally blind, and walk with a limp lol. But ask anyone who knows me, I stand on all infinite because I don’t go through life looking at it as if its dangerous. I go through life as I know I control it, and life don’t control me because me and life is bond meaning together…. understand. Everything is attracted to everything when U understand you. Thus, my name is Allure meaning attraction. -smiles-. This is what im predicting (The Seer, which is the follow up of my name Allure, which means prophet) -another smile-. This was a sacrifice so the Universe can now show U that don’t have a development of realization that the material world power is unstable in the mind…the devil. And they look at us (inmates) as if we are nothing but hire deadly inmates!?

All these years the government – and when I mean government, I’m including prison guards along with police cause they all are one. Murdering us. Committing crimes while working as a crime fighter. Then they say correctional center, ha ha, yea to correct you not to know self. Look, I’m Allure The Seer Of Truth GOD! And iuno what the rest of y’all will do but peaceful talks only work with a peaceful person. The government is not peaceful. Extremely tired of talking fareal to all who just hear, rather than listen and application. Last chance, know yaself.

-Allure The Seer Of Truth God

Share this with the world:
“Change comes from knowing we are all the same.”

TALKING LOUD but SAYING NOTHING! by Jerry James

TALKING LOUD, but SAYING NOTHING!
TALKING LOUD, but SAYING NOTHING!
TALKING LOUD, but SAYING NOTHING!
TALKING LOUD, but SAYING NOTHING!

Every 2 years state Delegates run for election. They promise tax paying citizens they will do this and do that– TALKING LOUD but SAYING NOTHING!

Some of them even tell you they believe in second chances any prison reform. TALKING LOUD but SAYING NOTHING!

They get in front of cameras taking photos, talking to crowds, shaking hands. TALKING LOUD but SAYING NOTHING!

Then they go behind closed doors having meeting after meeting not taking into consideration the outcome of their decisions, they make on people lives. TALKING LOUD but SAYING NOTHING!

We say Black Lives Matter. We say White Lives Matter. We say Latino Lives Matter. We say ALL Lives Matter. But here we are 53 days and counting with the budget amendment to the enhanced sentence credit bill that affected a little over 8,000 inmates behind the prison walls. There are about 53% of Black men behind bars in VADOC. There are 38% White men behind bars in VADOC. There are about 2% Latino men behind bars in VADOC—and less than 1% of other nationalities behind bars in VADOC. TALKING LOUD but SAYING NOTHING!

July 24th there was a rally for what happened to the ESC for our loved ones to show up to have their voices heard. Sad to say only about 60 people showed up. TALKING LOUD but SAYING NOTHING!

Families are we going to stop TALKING LOUD but SAYING NOTHING and rally together to fix the injustice that was done to all of us! So that your loved ones can get the chance they have rightfully EARNED! 

If you really care, you will get on board with prison reform advocates at the next rally coming up.  STOP TALKING LOUD but SAYING NOTHING!

To the national groups like NAACP, we need your support too because you say you stand for Black Lives Matter. You say you stand for injustice to our people! STOP TALKING LOUD but SAYING NOTHING!

There are many behind bars for some 15+ years that’s spent time rehabilitating ourselves, taking programs, remaining infraction free and maintaining employment. We are not the men/women we use to be–at least some of us are not. Why penalize us for the violent crime that is still happening in VA today. We want to help make a difference and join forces with the community, advocate groups and law enforcement to make change happen.

I say to you today, “You without sin cast the first stone!”  Let’s put an end to TALKING LOUD but SAYING NOTHING and start TALKING LOUD and DOING SOMETHING! 

Written by Jerry L. James, #1157844
Brilliance Coordinator @ Deerfield Correctional Center

Sharing the Case of George M. Lynch Jr.

“I was arrested in 1991 for multiple armed robberies and malicious wounding. I had charges in Maryland, Washington D.C., and Virginia. I was convicted in Maryland for robbery, use of a firearm, and shooting in an occupied dwelling. The charges were dropped in D.C. I was extradited to VA to face criminal charges in 1992, while serving a 5 year sentence in MD. After finishing going to court and receiving my time in VA, I was extradited back to MD to finish my sentence in 1994. I made parole in MD and was extradited back to VA penitentiary in 94. I never was released in between my extradition. That was my first offense. I was sentenced to serve a total of 58 years with parole.

In 1995, I received a letter from court and legal telling me that due to the change of the law, I would not be eligible for parole. Court and legal placed me under the “three strike” rule (53.1-151(B1)). They unlawfully took my parole. In 2018, I received a letter saying I might have been placed under the wrong law. I explained to them my situation and they reinstated my parole. I was suppose to be eligible for parole in 2003. I missed 15 years of seeing the parole board. Now that I’m going up, they keep turning me down due to nature of crime and haven’t served enough time. I’ve been incarcerated for 30 years and 8 months. I was 18 years old when I got arrested.”

George M. Lynch
#1181371

Speech by Q at the Rally Against Earned Sentence Credit Revocation

Listen as Q speaks at the rally about what it’s like to be incarcerated right now, and what it’s like to do too much time. He also addresses all of us out here and reminds us how much WE can take action and show up as families of the incarcerated. Thank you to Voice for the Voiceless, Humanization Project, Delegate Don Scott and others who were able to show support today. The work isn’t done!

Our editor, Santia, holds an iPhone to the microphone for the public to hear.

THE MILLENNIAL’S UNVACCINATED BLUES (A Poem by Lord Serious)

When it comes to aborting babies,
or should a man become lady,
The progressive opinion voiced
is personal choice.

But when Kaepernick took a knee,
because Eric Garner couldn’t breathe,
The mainstream retort
was ‘athletes should stick to sports.’

The pandemic brought the economy to a stop
and finally,
Kyrie Irving refused to take a shot
But the Sambos who tap dance,
all for corporate greed,
now encourage the White man
to kick him out the league.

Today, we agree with the words of Ali,
fighting in Vietnam went against his beliefs
We condemn the decision
and the way it was dealt,
How dare they threaten him with prison
and then take his belt?

But you hypocrite, you snake,
you’re two faced and fake.
You prisoner of the moment,
you see injustice and condone it.

The media is silent when it comes to the NHL,
are there unvaccinated hockey players –
they will never tell.
How many were unvaccinated at NASCAR’s sprint cup?
These are topics they never take up.

Whether I do or don’t take the vaccine,
why do you complain?
What right have you to discriminate against me,
or subject me to public shame?
Why do you terminate my employment
and keep me out of school?
Or bar me from entering the store
when I need to purchase food.

In the Book of Revelations,
a personal decision would be made,
And those who refused the mark
could not buy, sell, or trade.

Social pressure to take the shot
is being applied through the news.
If you chose to stay unvaccinated,
you violate the rules.
The stakes have never been higher
a career, scholarship, quality of life,
social status, our soul
are just some
of what we stand to lose.

It’s becoming difficult to choose
My anxiety is through the roof
These are the millennial’s
unvaccinated blues…

Lord Serious is a blogger, a podcaster, and the author of two books “Apotheosis Lord Serious Hakim Allah’s Habeas Corpus Appeal” and “The Powerless Pinky”. You can learn more about Lord Serious by visiting his website www.LordSeriousSpeaks.com.