This past Saturday, I attended the 22^nd Annual Virginia C.U.R.E. “Organizing for Advocacy” conference in Richmond, Virginia.

In a room of forty people or more, each one touched by the prison system in some way, it becomes clear that many of us have taken the life we have been dealt and have decided to make it in to a bigger story; a story in many cases that has a beginning, middle and no end.

In this crowd, you hear the voices of mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, wives, nephews, and ex-offenders, each chipping away at their piece of the criminal justice system, whether we fight for geriatric prisoners to live their final days in freedom, or cry foul for our juveniles whose justice too often forgets the differences between a child and an adult.

From the inundation of the sex offender registry where the system fuses the dissimilarities between peeing in the park and pedophilia to the prisoners trapped within an old law, languishing, as their freedom is cunningly and craftily being denied by a board that continues to apply the new law to an old way of doing business. The ailments of the criminal justice system should make all of us sick.

As I paraphrase one board member, “If you wonder if what we do make a difference, you only have to listen to the stories to know that it does”, every letter, every call, every voice makes a difference.

They came. They saw. They continue to advocate for you and me.  Aren’t you glad there is a C.U.R.E.?

To learn more about the Virginia Cure, visit their website.