It looks like I will finally officially marry my fiancé Jose inside a prison after years of delays. How many people want to go into a prison? Ours is scheduled for early morning on Sunday, June 5, 2022 (less than 2 weeks from now). We will have a short ceremony in a Visitation Room full of strangers. We can’t kiss or hold hands or eat cake. We must wear masks and sit opposite each other at a table. If I touch my foot to his under that table, the guard will tell me to move it. We get no private time together and must wait at least 2 months for 3 nights of “Family Time,” after yet more paperwork.
California Governor Gavin Newsom prevented our marriage in a private prison 2.5 years ago. We had completed the paperwork and were ready to schedule our ceremony when Newsom outlawed private prisons. He moved Jose from a dormitory situation with many programs and yard time to old Corcoran State Prison where Charles Manson lived and died. Jose was shut into a small cell with little time in the yard or Day Room. Then Covid struck, and everything was locked down for 2 years. Imagine being under prison lockdown during Covid! I couldn’t visit him freely for hours as I had done in the private prison, where we hugged and held hands, walking together alone in the prison courtyard on hot days, cold days, rainy days–as most other prisoners and their visitors stayed inside the crowded Visitation Room.
In Corcoran during Covid, sometimes Jose couldn’t even make his one daily call to me–for weeks . . . Jose accepts his punishment. I think things could be better. Jose was very young when he was given a too-long sentence (and he’s not in for rape or murder). For 3.5 years I have been trying to contact Governor Newsom who has ignored me. I have mailed cards and letters, sent emails and submit forms, filled out official paperwork, and made many calls. I think Newsom doesn’t care about the California people. He never even bothered to acknowledge me or say, “No! Go away, annoying woman!”
Please help us by calling Governor Newsom at: 1-916-445-2841. Or try writing him through his website.
Thank you. People can have Second Chances, especially if they let Jesus change their heart . . . and listen to God speak to them in prison.
Read our true prison love story (written like a fantasy) on Amazon’s new Kindle Vella chapter by chapter series: “Selah and the Prisoner.”
See my other 7 books on Amazon.
Thank you for reading this!
Lonna Lisa Williams 