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NO TITLE Ivan P. Wynn *Please use another sheet to include any other information (biographical or other) you would like us to know and possibly include in the APWA. I grew up in Camden, New Jersey. I had extremely tumultuous childhood. I attended three different high schools; Camden High School, Woodrow Wilson High School, Pennsayben High School. Start my own entertainment company Wynn Production in Camden, New Jersey. I have been married three times. I'm sentenced to 42 years with 85% for 1 degree robbery, my release date is 9/19/2038. I complete close to every program within this prison facility. The Trenton Times did an article that's on the internet. In newspaper April 8, 2012. View a video of his interview online at videos.nj.com/times. I have a mother, two sisters, five sons, my father and grandmother died while I've been incarcerated here at New Jersey State prison. I lived in Atlanta, Georgia from 1990-92, I never broke the law or was arrested. We have email here and can compose on my tablet. www.Jpay.com and email my essays to APWA. May 17, 2016 Ivan P. Wynn New Jersey State Prison Second 8 Cass Street P.O. Box 861 Trenton, New Jersey 08625 The American Prison Writing Archive c/o Hamilton College 198 College Hill Road Clinton, NY 13323-1218 Re: Open Letter Dear APWA editors, The APWA must be saluted and commended for your initiative. You're given incarcerated men and women an edifying and positive voice to society. Your organization is giving us the ability to make every nanosecond in prison, a teachable and learnable moment. The years in prison some think are wasteful, are utilized. Every individual who comes to jail or prison, goes through a term I coined "reflection precipice", they may not admit it. We all make a choice everyday, and that choice or decision either leads to our progress or regression in life. There's a lot of prisoners who wants to share our plethora of experiences with society. How we have overcame the plethora of failures in our lives. So many of us behavior upon society was so deplorable and nefarious. It's extremely hard for some not to be skeptical and apprehensive about our rehabilitative, reinvented, and changed selves. This is a genuine concern, believe me, I'm a student of behavioral science, and I analyze behavior from the context of us (prisoners) reaching our realized potential and purpose in prison or in society. I wake up every day in New Jersey State Prison, a maximum security prison facility. The prison sentences in close proximity of me every day are 90 years to life, 250 years, and consecutive life sentences. I've periodic conversations with a gentleman who has three consecutive life sentences, and he's as positive and hopeful as me. I don't communicate with these men in condescending manner or putting them under condemnation, believe it or not, there's a schism culture among prisoners. My mantra is always give them the positive and most logical course of action and objective. That's why I want the APWA to know I'm at your complete disposal and utilization. I wrote the President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder, and proposed the same initiative, on how you can utilize prisoners who turned their lives around inside maximum security prison facilities. Make the program strictly voluntary basis, in depth psychological evaluations, over six years charge free (no institutional infractions, exemplary staff and unit correctional officers reports). An individual daily behavior in prison is important to substantiate changed behavior and in the vetting process. Where is their focus, what do they communicate about constantly. There are countless men and women imprisoned right now, where crime in their consciousness would be an option no more. So they need a voice, because they have extremely long sentences, where most will expire before their release, so our edifying and positive voices become an edifying apparatus that reverberate to all, our voices become our legacy. So I hope all the wonderful and intelligent people at APWA truly understand this is much more than a simple initiative, it's a dream, hope, and vision materializing right before my eyes. I thank you! So many of us wake up every day not angry and hostile towards the administrators, staff, correctional officers, or even our fellow prisoners. We appreciate and thank all the men and women who come into precarious prison environments every day to provide for their families. We appreciate and thank them for giving us the freedom to change, reinvent ourselves, and to grow and transform into productive citizens in prison or out of prison. I truly thank the administration and officers, I'm a voracious reader, and they give me the freedom to self-rehabilitate and reinvent myself unhindered. Every prisoner doesn't think the same, as there's no collective towards rehabilitation, we all don't spew the rhetoric of hatred and hopelessness. That's why it was important for me to write President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder, offering my years of experiences in a maximum security prison facility. A lot of my fellow prisoners felt this was foolish and an endeavor that would never come to fruition. But that's the wonderful thing about utilizing your edifying and positive voice, everyone may not embrace it, or even believe it, but that doesn't stop us from using it. We all have the power to make prison reform a reality. Sincerely, Ivan P. Wynn New Jersey State Prison
