In America, especially in Virginia, everyone knows prison has become about retribution; vengeance based punishment, and has absolutely nothing to do with restoration, with intent to heal a person or a community. One of the most common and under reported forms of psychological punishments is being forced to watch others suffer at the hands of the DOC [Dept. of Corrections]. Whether it is a toxin environment of the prisons or the abuses by staff, anyone with a shred of humanity quietly hurts inside with every deprivation or harm witnessed, and when it happens to someone who has clearly never earned it, and spends his or her energy fighting to expose the truth, that is even worse.
David Annarelli is one of these good people, wrongfully convicted for surviving a police assault – two on the same night, to be specific. He has also survived and reported assaults by jail and prison staff, a decade of targeted harassment by the staff, and, just recently, a severe assault on his first amendment rights as a journalist and a citizen. That assault has had clear and impactful physical and psychological ramifications. It was a conspiracy, documented, and now a claim in a lawsuit to prevent the investigation into an allegation of a crime by Virginia DOC staff. Watching him struggle every day to hold himself together can be heartbreaking. And, through it all, he continues to hold vigil and risk his well being by writing and reporting all the wrongs against all of us who are held captive, including here at Prison Radio.
David has a mental health history. He also survived a near fatal traumatic brain injury, one that has mortality rates upwards of 60%. For those who are aware of what to look for, it is obvious. I can see the pain, and it’s obvious to me. To those who are not aware, he is just a weirdo and struggles that much more for having to navigate the social environment. As a result of one of the two police beatings, he now has permanent vision damage, double vision, listed as neurological and the result of a head trauma. While he is never silent on a matter, he is more likely to use these issues to raise awareness than to claim victimhood; to advocate, rather of a means of entitlement. David, a musician and glass artist whose hands are now partially crippled as a result of medical deliberate indifference, has become a journalist and a member of Jailhouse Lawyers Initiative, not wasting his time, and using his experiences for pushing change. His wrongful conviction has been proven and documented using strictly the state’s own documentation, and so has the majority of his reports about staffs’ misdeed.
He gives everything he has to give, for change, and rarely asks for more than emails to be sent or his links to be shared. He has earned so much more, exoneration, certainly, but mostly peaceful peace, and a quiet place to live and ease. I hope you will, people will look his name up, read his words, share them as he would ask and demand justice for him. To contact him you can go to davidannarelli.wordpress.com, the justiceartscoalition.org, minutesbeforesix.com, prisonwriters.com, or prisonjournalismprojects.org. Thank you.
These commentaries are recorded by Prison Radio.
