I was tentative when I started this project, not sure where it would lead and not sure I was up to the task. I’m still not sure I am. I knew finding people to write about wouldn’t be a problem, but I didn’t anticipate just how invested I would feel in their lives.
I am working on someone else’s story, but got a note from Travion today. I had written to him, letting him know of my interest in his case, and the post I wrote about him. It’s funny, but when I was originally trying to contact him, I had a little trouble finding his location. The system has him listed as “Travon.” He has been incarcerated for years, and they don’t have his name right. It seems like such a little thing, really, but it’s not. It’s his name. It is what his mother gave him. If his only contact with the outside world for most of his life is through this system, can’t we at least give him the courtesy of getting his name right? It’s Travion.
Travion changed things up for me today. Until now he was a story and information on paper. His story originally spurred me to action, but it was paper all the same. This morning when I read his note, he became more than paper. He is a person. He’s about the age of one of my sons. From that grey cinderblock home of his, he wrote the words, “hope all is well.” He said some other things, and closed with, “thank you for reaching out.”
The one paragraph letter I found in my mailbox this morning confirmed that I am doing the right thing. It made me know, without a doubt, that succeed or fail, wherever the path leads, I can’t get off it. I am not giving up on Travion. I will be copying and pasting his story to anybody I can think of, and I will keep on doing it until this wrong is made right. It doesn’t just have to be me though. I welcome anyone who wants to join me on this path.
I am not anti-government. I just want to make us better. We are better. This system has got to change.
I first read about Travion Blount in a three by five inch article, including title, on page five of the Metro section of my local paper. It was the smallest article on the page, as if it were a filler. I’m surprised I even read it. Once I did, I wanted to know more.
This is what I pieced together after I searched his name on the internet. Travion was born and raised in Virginia. His mom is Angela Blount and his father is Patrick Mills. His mom described him as ‘happy but shy,’ and from what I read, he was pretty typical up until middle school. That seems to be about the time his wheels got a little off track.
Skipping school was a problem, and Travion couldn’t seem to get past the sixth grade. He also became friendly with some slightly older boys that probably weren’t the best of influences. I would imagine Tavion looked up to them, and I am not going to try and paint him as an angel. He wasn’t. If he had lived next door to me, I would have probably viewed him as trouble.
From piecing together all the news accounts, in September, 2006, Travion and his friends, Morris Downing and David Nichols, went to a party and robbed the partygoers at gunpoint. They collected drugs, cell phones and money. Travion did not physically hurt anyone during the robbery.
It is clear these boys did something terribly wrong. I can’t imagine the fear they caused in the people at the party on that night. A few probably thought they were going to die. What the three boys did is inexcusable.
The two older boys pled guilty, one receiving a ten year sentence and the other receiving a thirteen year sentence. Travion, at the age of 15, decided to plead innocent and fight the charges, against legal advice. That is the first part of this that has me wondering about fairness. What 15-year-old should be given the responsibility of deciding what his best defense would be? I have a fifteen year old, and, as smart as she is, I don’t think she should be allowed to decide how she should plead in a criminal case.
After a three day trial, and being found guilty on 49 counts, Travion was sentenced to 118 years and six life sentences. Being a mom, and knowing just how ‘not’ grown up a boy is at the age of 17 – his age at trial – there is one thing that I read that really sums up just how young Travion was. I read that he turned to his mom and said, “What happened Mom?”
In my opinion, that sentence is criminal. In my opinion that sentence is cruel and unusual punishment. There are no words to adequately describe what I think of that sentence.
At a later date, Governor Bob McDonnell reduced Travion’s sentence to forty years. That might sound like a good thing, but in the twists and turns of our illogical legal system, it actually makes it a little more difficult for the sentence to be further reduced, as Blount had a chance to appeal the sentence as unconstitutional when it was a life sentence – he can no longer do that now that the sentence is forty years.
So what is forty years? That is 14,600 days waking up knowing that you will see the same exact things you saw the day before. To a fifteen year old, that could mean never being half of a serious relationship. That is never graduating high school. You will probably never have the work experience in place to find successful employment, even if you were healthy at the age of 55, when you got out. You possibly may not be able to spend another day in the company of your parents. A good deal of your relatives will not be here anymore when you get out, even if you did remember who they were. Did he ever slow dance, I wonder. Did he ever leave the state of Virginia? Forty years to a fifteen year old, is his entire life. His entire life.
Shouldn’t doing that to Travion Blount be against the law? Travion Blount made a stupid, irresponsible, shameful decision when he was fifteen years old, although he did not physically harm anyone. And for that, he will pay with forty years of his life. And, we are paying the price of that, both with our pockets and our souls.
