The Precarious Balance Between Redemption and Recidivism
Feb 25, 2024
Harriet West-Moore
Can a troubled youth escape the cycle of crime and find redemption? This episode peels back the curtain on the life of a 20-year-old parolee whose past transgressions loom large over his future. We walk the tightrope of hope and despair as we reveal the intricate journey from juvenile delinquency to felonious assault in Pennsylvania, and his fraught attempt to rebuild his life in Ohio. With every step he takes towards change, the shadow of recidivism threatens to engulf him. Hear the authentic stories from the front lines of parole supervision, exploring the charged decisions and the human emotions entangled in the legal system's efforts to rehabilitate.
This week, I interrogate the complexities of aiding those youngsters branded by early mistakes. We delve into the narrative of one young man caught between the desire to reform and the gravitational pull of old habits. The ripple effects of his choices are laid bare, especially on his younger brother, in a family struggling to support but not enable. It's a candid exploration of what it takes to truly alter one's life course, the power of self-motivation, and the necessity of tough love from those who refuse to give up. As we wrap up, we set the stage for the next installment of Case Chronicles, offering you another deep dive into the stark realities faced by those on the path to redemption. Join us for this sobering yet illuminating look at the crossroads of crime and consequence.
Can a troubled youth escape the cycle of crime and find redemption? This episode peels back the curtain on the life of a 20-year-old parolee whose past transgressions loom large over his future. We walk the tightrope of hope and despair as we reveal the intricate journey from juvenile delinquency to felonious assault in Pennsylvania, and his fraught attempt to rebuild his life in Ohio. With every step he takes towards change, the shadow of recidivism threatens to engulf him. Hear the authentic stories from the front lines of parole supervision, exploring the charged decisions and the human emotions entangled in the legal system's efforts to rehabilitate.
This week, I interrogate the complexities of aiding those youngsters branded by early mistakes. We delve into the narrative of one young man caught between the desire to reform and the gravitational pull of old habits. The ripple effects of his choices are laid bare, especially on his younger brother, in a family struggling to support but not enable. It's a candid exploration of what it takes to truly alter one's life course, the power of self-motivation, and the necessity of tough love from those who refuse to give up. As we wrap up, we set the stage for the next installment of Case Chronicles, offering you another deep dive into the stark realities faced by those on the path to redemption. Join us for this sobering yet illuminating look at the crossroads of crime and consequence.
Hey everybody, welcome back to Women in Public Safety Case Chronicles Episode. This is episode number two Chronicles, episode number two. Buckle up because we're going to really dive into real, raw stories of people who've been down the path of incarceration and are not trying to repair their lives on parole while on supervision, and sometimes it's successful and sometimes it's not. So I'm not going to sugarcoat anything, just I'm going to give it the gripping truth. I am going to change names. Usually I'm not even going to mention names, I'm just going to say offender or defendant or anything like that. So buckle up and enjoy the true case studies. So here we are, let's get going this one. Today I want to talk about somebody that I personally am supervising. He is a young man and when I say young, he's only 20 years old. But it's interesting to me of the background that this young man have as far as criminal activities he's only 20. His criminal activity started as a juvenile, but anyway, I received his case back in last September. He, his case, came from Pennsylvania because he caught a case. I think it was a drug related Actually was not, let me take that back. It was a felonious assault. So it was a crime against victim. He had a felonious assault case in Pennsylvania. So he's from this state where he is now, but he, for some reason he I don't know how he managed to go to Pennsylvania and but he caught a felony assault case and he had to serve some time in the Commonwealth. Well, there's their state parole system, their state prison correctional system, but when did they let him out? But he's still on what they call compact, compact probation. So he still have supervision left to To complete, and he wanted to complete it here in the state of Ohio, where his family are. And so I Was assigned to his case and so I, you know, I have to do the the preliminary steps of approving his residence, which was at his parents house, his mom and his stepmom, his stepdad. And I Spoke with mom. You know she agreed to have him back home. Very nice, you know, lady, very nice, and I didn't have never met the stepfather, but he has the fender, my fender. He has younger siblings, I think it was like maybe a, maybe two brothers and a little baby sister. So he was approved.
Speaker 1:
He came back to Ohio, to his parents house, and you know I've met him. You know, reading when you read these cases before you actually meet the person, you kind of get a visual Idea of, well, this person. Oh, I can see, based on what he's his Criminal history, that he's gonna be. You know, this is gonna be a challenge, but when I met him he's just a little boy. No, I mean, he's just like a little boy 20 years old, but he looked like he could be like maybe 13 or 14 years old and I'm very respectful Does not have that hard Demeanor about him.
Speaker 1:
Sometimes you could tell when, especially young people, when they are Indulging you know a life of criminal activities for a long time, you know, from the time they were young kids up to you know, current point, they just have this hard demeanor about them. But this boy did not. So I Accept the case. I met him, met, you know, mom, and you know he has certain conditions that he had to follow. Well, one of the main conditions that you know get a job. First of all, you're 20 years old, you're gonna live in mom's and dad's house. You're 20 years old, you know you got to find you a job. So he claimed that he already had a job lined up, which turned out to be alive. Mind you, I met him.
Speaker 1:
He came here in September, by October he was already committing, you know, a crime. He could. He committed a violation. He hooked up with one of his little girlfriends and were to the wise, if anybody, if young there's young women out here you know, don't fall for the oaky-doke please. I mean, you got to use some basic common sense first of all. The boy doesn't have in a job, you know, what can he do for you? You know you, unless you, you know you like that thug, you know life or whatever. I like to be in that part of that culture Nothing out of it other than you coming out of your pocket because he doesn't have nothing to offer. But anyway, I digress.
Speaker 1:
So he and the little girlfriend took his, took the girlfriend's mom's vehicle and drove to New York. Obviously it's definitely a violation because he went out of state and not only that, he's got another case of received stolen property because he took this girl's mom's vehicle without the mom's permission. So he went to New York, obviously, got pulled over by one of the towns in New York and they, you know he got arrested. So they found out that he was on supervision here in Ohio. So I was notified Actually the mom notified me about what happened. So I found out where, what county and what city that he was being incarcerated because he was held in jail. So I called their jurisdiction in New York and you know they verify yes, he does have an open case. He think it was like reckless driving or something, something like that.
Speaker 1:
So they said, well, are you going to hold him? What is it that you, you know? Or are you guys planning to pursue the case? They were willing to give him a bond, but he would have to come back, you know, back and forth to court up in New York. So they let him out. They issued a bond. He came back to Ohio and I met with him and you know, of course that was a violation. So I had to let Pennsylvania know what was going on. He uh, sorry about that. He would have to have a travel permit to go back and forth to his hearing.
Speaker 1:
That was in October, so by January of this year he committed another offense here in Ohio, another receiving stolen property of a motor vehicle. That must be his MO. He likes to take people's cars, so this time I have a. I placed a hold order on him. I was not going to. I mean there was no. At this point there is no bond or nothing, even if you know and I explained to mom, you know, don't waste your money trying to post a bond because he's not getting out, because I have a hold on him, you know, through you know I don't want him to go anywhere. So he, uh, he's been held at um, our county jail. Um, he's gone through the uh courts, uh, pretrial, um and everything, and they finally found him. He fled guilty just recently, fled guilty to receive a stolen property of a motor vehicle and he now serving six months in our state prison. He still so he has a new number. He's went back to prison here in Ohio and when he gets out he's gonna be extradited back to Pennsylvania because he's violated the terms of his conditions by catching another case and he still has to deal with the case in New York.
Speaker 1:
So this is a 20 year old boy, you know, and I've talked extensively with this mom, you know she's given me the background story about him. She's like I said, stepdad didn't want to have anything to do with him. Stepdad did not want him in the house, not only, you know, because of his behavior, but he's also a thief. So mom, you know mom, had pretty much had to wash her hands of him. She was, you know, concerned that he's running around on the streets, you know, with these other, you know other so-called friends that are in doing the same thing he's doing. He can't go back, he can't go back to his home. So he's going to have to go back to Pennsylvania. They're probably going to. He's going to be re-incarcerated back in Pennsylvania after he served his sentence here in Ohio and he still has to deal with New York.
Speaker 1:
So what can't, I mean, you have to sit here and wonder, you know, what is going on with this young man and why is he? You know, why is his behavior so wild and just out of control? He's a bad influence. He's the oldest, he's a bad influence to his siblings, he has pretty much burned his bridges of all members of his family. He, you know, I think his grandmother lived in New York or somewhere out of state, but there's no option for him to even, you know, go to grandma. Grandma doesn't want him, you know, around. His biological father lives in another state and I don't think there were no any kind of relationship which could be that could be the breakdown there.
Speaker 1:
But these cases I mean this is where the social work piece comes in. When you do these type of cases, when you have these types of cases and on as a parole officer or even law or any type of law enforcement officer, when you have to deal with, you know families and the offender or the defendant, you know you just have to sit back and wonder you made a choice. I mean, you're 20 years old, you had your whole life ahead of you and you're pretty much basically throwing it away because of the dumb choices that you're making. And I've always said I always tell offenders when I first meet them and you know I do it in a joking manner, but then I'm but they also, but I also am serious when I tell them there's two reasons why you would want to go back into prison. One, because you know you're running around out here in the streets and you want to kind of get out the streets because it's hot or somebody's after you, so you want to go inside.
Speaker 1:
You know try to lay low, you know to get off the streets or there's something or someone that you miss that you want to go back to the prison you know for and thus believe I'm not talking about a co-ed prison either. You know so there's something, there's got to be something in prison, inside prison, that you meet, that you missed and want to go back to. Because if you're doing you know dumb stuff out here in the streets and going back, obviously you want to go back. I mean it is. I mean it's that simple. You want to go back because there's, you know, there's somebody out, there's somebody you know, somebody inside that you miss, that you want to go back to. And you know, when I tell them that you know, they look at you know then they say no, I'm not trying to go back, I'm not trying to go back, but then that's what you violated. You do something your probation or your parole and then you're going back to prison. So obviously there's something you know in prison that you want to go back to, or somebody. And again, we're not talking about a co-ed, it's not a co-ed type facility. I'm just saying so. I wanted to, you know, share this particular case because I mean it goes back.
Speaker 1:
This is just so common now, especially for young offenders who are just going down the wrong path, and sometimes it's not because of lack of guidance. As far as parenting, you can be the best parent and do everything you can for your child, but they still, for whatever reason, want to make the choice of going the other way. And you know, like I tell them, I mean, when you go back in prison or go, even go to jail, you know where are your friends now. Who are you going to call? They can't. You can't even call them for help, you know so. But then these are the same people that you want to, you know, run around with and you best believe they're not going to be putting money on your books or sending you food boxes and clothing boxes. Why you're locked up, you know. But you want to reconnect with the same, you know, people when you get out, unless you make that conscious decision to change your whole environment, change your whole life around and try to move forward, and, you know, just leave that type of lifestyle in the past. And that again, that is a choice that these offenders have to make.
Speaker 1:
You know we can sit here and say all day long they can say the excuse well, I never had a father, which you know that could be. That very well is a major piece. You know you have an absent father, but at some point. You know you can't ride that. That excuse all your life. When you're a career criminal, you keep doing the same thing and expecting different results. Does it work that way? So you know, this young man, particular young man, I hope I don't know what's gonna have to what's gonna have to, you know, take for him to realize that the you know what he's doing and you know keep doing is not working Because all it is you're just building. Are you collecting our number, prison numbers? That's all he's doing is collecting prison numbers, and it actually from different states. You got a number in Pennsylvania. You now not have a new number prison number here in Ohio, and if he has to go to jail or prison in New York, you're gonna have a prison number in New York. So that's it for today's Craze Chronicles. It's Chronicles number two.
Speaker 1:
I want to hear your thoughts.
Speaker 1:
What are your comments? What's your feedback? Do you think that young men like my offender, is there still a chance for him to turn his life around? It could be, but he has to want to do that. He has to want to do it and at age 20 and 21 years old I personally don't think that he's, you know, ready to do it. You know he's still, he still has a young mind, immature mind. So you know it's unfortunate.
Speaker 1:
And you know now, you know he have younger siblings, especially a younger brother that's looking up to him and, like his mom said, you know, she just doesn't want, you know she seems like she's lost him to the streets. She doesn't want to lose her other son to the streets as well. So you know she has to make a, you know, hard decision to kind of, you know, give him that tough love and say you know I can't, you can't come back here, I can't help you anymore. I can't help you until you are really ready to want to help yourself. So until we meet again, please stay warm and stay safe and please hit that like and subscribe button, hit the notification bell so you'll know when I will be coming back on. I'm going to be trying to do Case Chronicles at least three times a month in addition to our regular episode. So this is Christ the Chronicles number two. Episode 12 would be next week. So you guys, take care and I'll talk to you soon. Bye you.