“Deuce Epidemic,” recorded May, 5-21, 2026.
The Virginia DOC and indeed most prison systems in the United States are built upon deprivation and punishment. This is most especially true in Virginia, whose entire existence as a state has been built upon oppression of everyone not wealthy, male, and white. Very little is different today as it was 100 years ago in Virginia. Although, also not different in the old maxim: “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.” While this maxim may actually require open-armed revolt to force meaningful changes in Virginia, far less is required for Virginia’s DOC captives who face the worst of Virginia’s deprivations.
The example of far less is found in the most sought-after form of escape in the Virginia DOC: inebriation. Getting drugs in is simply a matter of paying the proper staff. Occasionally people are caught, but a recent change in the drug of choice has helped to eliminate that problem. The drug of choice: bug spray. Deuce is the name most often used, and while some say it is a synthetic marijuana, I question the validity of such claims because synthetic weed has been around for decades, since at least the 90s, under brand names such as K2 or Spice.
Virginia’s captives didn’t just stumble onto a substance like this recently. The deuce cannot be found because it is just paper-sprayed and does not show up in urinalysis. The latter reason was a big selling point of synthetic weed. There is another reason I doubt the claim that deuce is synthetic weed. I’ve heard more than one story about cash being made from spraying Raid bug spray on the paper. This was a dirty trick used in the 70s and 80s to make fake LSD. The strychnine —or similar chemical— affects the central nervous system, giving the impression that you are tripping. Whatever the substance is in actuality, it’s now an epidemic across the entire Virginia DOC, and they have no way to stop it.
To be clear, they have had no way to stop the flow of drugs prior to this because the Virginia DOC, the house built on lies, has almost always refused to address the root problems: toxic environments, severe deprivation and punishments, albeit ignoring modern neuroscience, and most important, its corrupt staff who mule the drugs. With deuce, the problems just became more, immeasurably worse. I’ve reached out to people across the Virginia DOC, and the deuce epidemic is in every prison. In my unit, easily 50 to 80 of the 80 people openly smoke the deuce. There may be another 10 to 15 who do so on the down-low. I’m led to believe that this is about the same ratio in every unit of every building on my compound. I am further led to believe this is to be the case across 37 prisons.
The Virginia DOC, even if they wanted to, cannot identify the substance in any way. They have lost, but won at the same time. I say that because, in truth, the Virginia DOC actually prefers their captives to use illicit substances. A tranquilized population is so much easier to control, and if no one is overdosing or testing positive in urine tests, all the better. No paperwork or messy statistics. The Virginia DOC is a national disgrace, as is the entire state of Virginia. That seems to be widely accepted and agreed upon. This most recent explosion of people smoking rat poison is just another example of the harm caused by the Virginia DOC and the desperate lengths its captives will go to in an effort to cope with the trauma that’s being caused to them. Granted, Virginia is no longer the first worst DOC in the nation after we’ve seen the Alabama solution, and similar reports have come out from Georgia, Mississippi; but still coming in third or fourth place, Virginia’s keeping it as it always has. Virginia represents a major threat to the nation, and it must be treated as a cancer of tyrannical proportions, one that is not far from metastasizing.
My name is David Annarelli; davidannarelli.wordpress.com, you can find me at Prison Journalism Project, the Justice Arts Coalition, Minutes Before Six, Prison Writers, and Google me for more. Thank you very much.
These commentaries are recorded by Prison Radio.
