Faith and Purpose Behind Bars

Uncle Hesham (2018) by Yassin Mohamed

There was a time when I almost gave up. My faith in God was becoming attenuated. I was losing myself, mentally and physically.

I had around 17 years in prison, and everything was looking bad, particularly my chances of going home. No matter how much I cried to the appellate courts that I was just a teen who was drinking, hanging out with the wrong crowd that night on December 19, 1997, and didn’t hurt anyone, I was denied.

Then one day, a man who was mentally ill and, from what I was told, had never spoken to anyone in his entire 42 years in prison, stopped in front of the cell I was housed in on his way to the mess hall and said to me, “God gives the hardest battles to His strongest soldiers. Don’t let an indictment define who you are. You’re a good kid, and you need to show it rather than running your damn mouth all the time.” He walked off and never said a word to me again. A few months later, he died in his sleep. His name was Tubar.

After Tubar’s death, I came to believe that God spoke to me through him, and my life began changing. Prison became a university to me, as Malcolm X once said, and I needed to be the best version of myself.

That transition led me to becoming a college graduate, working on my BA, changing the lives of hundreds of prisoners through mentoring, enrolling them into programs, schools, and self-development workshops, and showing them how to transfer their anger into art through a C.E.T.A. program I founded, and through the H.O.M.E. Project created by one of my mentors, Ralph Alicea, the Superintendent, and a few others.

I encourage gang members to drop their flag and become individuals that a community can trust. I am sincere in what I do. I refuse to allow that indictment to define me, and I am ready to change my community for the better.

I ask that you continue to support me and my fight for freedom. I thank you all. I deserve that second chance.

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Shymel Curry has spent nearly 29 years in prison serving a 50-years-to-life sentence for a crime that occurred when he was just 19. Although he did not pull the trigger or possess a weapon, he has remained incarcerated for decades. His family and friends continue to advocate for his release. You can help by signing this petition.