Morali-Dee

There’s a mid-twenties guy in here called “Dee”. His situation angers and frustrates me. Not because he’s innocent. No, he did the crime. I’m angry and frustrated at the hypocrisy of our community, our Commonwealth, this nation.



“Dee” is in prison for breaking and entering. He broke into a building on the campus of Hampden-Sydney College and stole some computers. He was prosecuted “to the full extent of the law” and sent to prison.


Here’s the thing. I went to church on the HSC campus. I socialized with the faculty. Every Sunday morning we’d clean up empty beer bottles from the church grounds, left by mostly underage men drinking to excess.


Drug use was a major concern to the HSC administration. Every weekend huge parties took place on campus. Girls from other schools crashed on campus for the night. Allegations of date rape frequently arose.


Hampden-Sydney boasts that it is a liberal arts college preparing men to be leaders and moral, productive, educated citizens.


Dee was raised by a drug addict mother. He didn’t know his father. The county public schools where he lived (coincidentally, where my sons attend and graduated from) are abysmal.


Hampden-Sydney chose to seek punishment for Dee. Here’s a novel approach. They could have gone to court and asked for leniency for Dee. HSC could have suggested to the court that Dee be placed on supervised probation and then they could hire him for maintenance and grounds keeping.


HSC could have said “our student body, by and large, hasn’t had to deal with the baggage" Dee did. They could have offered remedial classes and a chance for a college education. Instead, they took the easy way out. And the cycle of brokenness, of ignorance, of crime goes forward. In Ephesians 4:32, the Apostle Paul sets a high bar for followers of Jesus:


“be kind to one another, tender hearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake has forgiven you”.


All of us fall short. None of us are moral enough, righteous enough to overcome public scrutiny. There have been deeds we’ve all done in the dark, words we’ve uttered in the heat of the moment that we wish we could take back.


It is the real man or woman of character who tempers their demand for justice with the soothing waters of mercy, of forgiveness.


It has been written that “prison should be reserved for those whom we fear injury from, not those whom we’re mad at”. So simple, yet so true.


I embezzled in excess of $2 million. Even with the restitution I’ve already paid, I still owe in excess of $1 million. Given the sentence handed down by the court, I will be 60 on my release. It is highly unlikely I will ever make complete restitution.


I have the ability to work. I have the education, holding both BA and JD degrees. I teach GED classes here at the prison and began a writing program. Yet, the determination has been made that it is better to spend $30,000 a year to keep me incarcerated than release me in a reasonable amount of time so that I can make restitution and be a productive, tax-paying citizen (as I was up until my arrest).


What does justice require? What is the right thing to do? What is our moral obligation to each other? My conversation with “Dee” gave me a new perspective.