YES FOR OUR WORK OF PRISON REFORM IN VIRGINIA WE NEED CRITIQUE AMONG OURSELVES By William Thorpe

Pictures are taken from the internet and are used for illustrative purposes only

The reason the work of holding the Virginia prison official accountable and its concurrent reform of imprisonment in Virginia, is herculean is because we have to shed ourselves of all the backwards thinking and concepts that have determined our idea of self and in extension how we see and are with the terms we are on and the relationship we have with The Commonwealth's Social Contract. How many Virginia families with members Imprisoned have thoughtlessly supported, endorsed and defended the savage and barbaric behavior of the Virginia prison official of meticulously and comprehensively dehumanizing their imprisoned family member by voting for Politicians who implicitly and explicitly provided cover for the Virginia prison official by philosophizing, justification for the dehumanization of the Virginia prisoner? Still though we don't indict the people of Virginia for their thoughtlessness, what we will indict over is the unwillingness and reluctance by the people to accept that the only responsibility as duty is to pay attention, because as soon as we start paying attention we are 99% of the way to realizing Prison Reform. Because during the political debates and discourses of "who wants to assume leadership of the People", we can correctly frame questions as is needed to expose all those multitudes of flies in the ointment of all that is being done in the name of THE PEOPLE, because without the people there is no system, there is no one to be violated, there is no one to be subjected to hypocrisies, there is no one to be ruled, subjugated, controlled, there is no one for the feeble, small and idealistic minds to preen for, in so many words if no one is buying into the contradictory and antagonistic b.s, there is no need for the narratives as set in stone constructs of Virginia's Social Contract, then because we are paying attention we can honestly to the best of our ability exercise equality under law and its unity of the people. Currently the impunity of the Virginia prison official has two tracks, (1) the individual prison official's inherent disposition to savagery, sadism and masochism, then (2) the inherent systemic and structural corruption that is the system proper. Forever indicating and pointing out the impunity has been the work of reform advocacy. I think its time I addressed this point, there is that existing critique that the analysis and its speech of reform is diametrically opposite that of revolution and as a matter of fact the speech of reform is in service of and in collaboration with the status quo and if the strategy of reform is honest, with the clarity of doing the peoples work, the speech will be that of revolution. Well whether or not I'm in agreement or disagreement with either formulation is besides the point, the only aspect and element that is relevant in any Social Contract and for purposes of prison reform in Virginia, is the realization of the accountability-function. Meaning to what extent is our critique and analysis correct, practical in exposing and identifying contradictions and antagonisms, because those dehumanizing factors of the Virginia prisoner are not simply limited to just the petty-tyrannical savage urge fulfillment of the Virginia prison official, but are fundamental aspects of the entirety of Virginia's Social Contract as such any work of holding the Virginia prison official accountable is actually the work of demanding that the Commonwealth democratizes its articulated Constituted aspirations and we can only realize it by paying attention and self-critique.

By William Thorpe

I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982

WHY THE NEWLY MINTED "PAROLE" LAW--[and I place Parole in quotes] --VIRGINIA CODE 53.1-151.1---ISN'T A STEPPING STONE BUT ANOTHER TIRED BRICK IN THE WALL By William Thorpe

Pictures are taken from the internet and are used for illustrative purposes only

First of all it passed The Virginia House of Delegates as HB-1030 without any dissenting vote, then it passed the Virginia Senate unanimously and anything and I mean anything, that presently can receive consensus, meaning reactionary and supremacist Republicans agreeing with Democrats Nationally or State doesn't bode well, especially when the issue is Prisoner related, as such it clearly fits the bill of that proverbial mouth of a "gift horse".This newly minted Virginia law 53.1-151.1,titled SUITABILITY FOR RELEASE ON PAROLE DISCRETIONARY PAROLE CRITERIA GUIDELINES, is for all purpose practically insidious. It came out of a frame work structured by a couple of Virginia prisoners, Jonathan White and David Carmichael who like a sizable amount of Virginia prisoners, should be exempt from, Virginia's abolishment of parole but are being illegally and slyly subjected to it and violated, by what is for all practical purposes, the Ex Post Facto application of the 1995 abolishment of Parole, even though no one in Virginia's Government has the courage to state such. Their frame work that became 53.1-151.1 SUITABILITY FOR RELEASE ON PAROLE, was presented to the Virginia criminal justice reform advocacy group, VALLEY JUSTICE COALITION, who then pitched it to Virginia Delegate Tony Wilt who relatively agreed and with his assistant Chad Funkhouser, crafted it into HB-1030.Along the way elements of Prison reform advocacy in Virginia, specifically, Kenneth Hunter of VIRGINIA INTERFAITH CENTER FOR PUBLIC SAFETY, David Smith of S.A.L.T, Rob Poggenklass of JUSTICE FORWARD VIRGINIA, Taj Mahoney and Shawn Wanetta of THE HUMANIZATION PROJECT lent their labors to its existence.I BEGIN: The People least culpable for the insidiousness of 53.1-151.1 are THE VALLEY JUSTICE COALITION, who have time and time shown to stand on the side of Parole doing its intent, because they can be excused for the ignorance of not clearly knowing and factoring in that Virginia prisoners as Jonathan White and David Carmichael along with all those others who still have the legal right to parole in Virginia are being illegally subjected to the dynamics of its1995 abolishment. The issue with Virginia prisoners legally eligible for parole, yet denied it under political gambits, particularly those of Virginia Republicans, isn't about a set of statutory guidelines, which were not in existence during the circumstances of imprisonment as such,(and here is where we find the insidiousness of 53.1-151.1) cannot be applied retroactively and the only implied justification for 53.1-151.1,is its retroactivity which is no where to be found in the law, because the only class of Virginia prisoners 53.1-151.1 applies to are those still legally eligible,yet it cannot.So it isn't any surprise and wonder why Virginia legislators, both reactionary and supremacist Republicans along with Democrats unanimously Ayed it, because its a win win for all of them to then claim Bonafide's on prison and criminal justice reform, knowing perfectly well that not only wouldn't it enable paroling Virginia prisoners, but it will now impede it as another unstated and undeclared ex post facto application. The issues with the games played by Virginia's Government over Parole as function of imprisonment is simply that of impunity and extra-judicial presumptions, which is where the debate should be. Because the status quo or the beneficiaries of Social Contract narratives want to exist outside of law and its imperatives which the People are subjected to, as such what we encounter are the conveniences of contradictions.

The flaw and it is a dehumanizing one, in the base animating logic of 53.1-151.1, is it continues that mindless argument, that the issue and problem is the very fact and existence of the Virginia Prisoner, as such the onus and purpose of the imprisonment is the prisoner's responsibility. Well this line of thinking stands without opposition and scrutiny, because the Virginia prisoner is mute in its formulation, yet its object. In other words whether or not the intellectual intent of its proponents is misanthropic is besides the point, the reality nonetheless is a defacto universal misanthropic stance with all of the Virginia People. Due to the history of Virginia's imprisonment scheme and the fact that it hasn't been challenged and required to defend, its logic, what we have is that existence of "the road to hell is paved with good intentions" and 53.1-151.1 is another cobblestone. Because what we find in Virginia's imprisonment scheme is the imprisoned Virginian is not human simply on account of the condition. If Virginia's imprisonment scheme stands on the position that behavior is defined by dehumanization, then we should see The Commonwealth's Educational system as it prepares Virginia's youth for adulthood (because that's where we find its quintessential value) plying and practicing "dehumanization", and for certain Virginia demographics that is exactly what we see. But I make a more fundamental point, which is the people of the Commonwealth speaking as and through Government, are not simply sequestering the imprisoned Virginian but implying that the imprisoned Virginian is something less than the non-imprisoned and as such most be brought in line. Whether or not Virginians are prescient of this reality is irrelevant, the fact of the matter is the imprisoned Virginian due to the imposition of sentence will explicitly return to Society, which is implicit of the Commonwealth's pursuit of " bringing the prisoner in line", as such Virginia's imprisonment scheme has to defend only this one objective of realizing the imprisoned and returning Virginian into Society as a full and all around mature participant, anything less takes away any and all claims of legitimacy. Yet this isn't what we see, what we instead see is the Virginia prisoner is confronted with an existence that assumes and presumes humanness, because the humanness cannot be denied, yet abjectly and unconditionally is dehumanized in the most socially idealistic and speculative manner and we see this for example in 53.1-151.1with this.....["IF A PRISONER'S SCORE IS WITHIN THE TIER 1 RANGE, SUCH PRISONER SHALL RECEIVE FAVORABLE CONSIDERATION FOR PAROLE.IF A PRISONER'S SCORE IS WITHIN THE TIER 2 RANGE,SUCH PRISONER MAY BE CONSIDERED A SUITABLE CANDIDATE FOR PAROLE.IF A PRISONER'S SCORE IS WITHIN THE TIER 3 RANGE SUCH PRISONER IS PRESUMED TO BE UNSUITABLE FOR PAROLE. IF THE PAROLE BOARD DEVIATES FROM THE RECOMMENDATION BASED ON THE DISCRETIONARY PAROLE CRITERIA WORKSHEET SCORE FOR A PRISONER SCORED AT TIER 1 OR TIER 3, THE BOARD SHALL PROVIDE A WRITTEN EXPLANATION FOR SUCH DEVIATION. NOTHING IN THIS SECTION SHALL PROHIBIT THE BOARD FROM MAKING IT'S FINAL DETERMINATION ON WHETHER OR NOT TO GRANT DISCRETIONARY PAROLE BASED ON THE INDIVIDUAL FACTS AND CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE PRISONER".] (and I challenge any lawyer or legal scholar to show whether the pronouncements of 53.1-151.1 are worthy of its print paper).This is the crux, the exercise of imprisonment by the authority of organized violence in all its various forms, is a base antagonism of the human condition, as such is what we have to confront and wrangle accountability on. Accordingly it is the work of prison reform in Virginia and without confronting it what we end up with is a farce.

By William Thorpe

I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982

FIRST OF ALL THE COMMONWEALTH'S LEGAL AND POLITICAL-ECONOMY SCHOLARS ARE NO WHERE TO BE FOUND ON ANALYSIS OF PAROLE AS FUNCTION OF VIRGINIA'S IMPRISONMENT SCHEME By William Thorpe

Pictures are taken from the internet and are used for illustrative purposes only

I BEGIN: This absence by The Commonwealth's scholars on issues and questions that define and defend the terms and relationship of Virginia's Social Contract isn't only limited to The Commonwealth's imprisonment scheme and its Justice Infrastructure, but, it cuts to a basic lack of analytic honesty of the very nature of Virginia's Political-economy formulations of the Social Contract. What has then historically passed as analysis of Virginia's political-economy are reactionary colloquial suppositions cloaked in Opinion Pieces spoon-fed the People of The Commonwealth by the Corporate Media, specifically, The Richmond Times-Dispatch. So on issues of Virginia's imprisonment scheme and accounts of the practices and professional behavior of the Virginia prison official, the Virginia people, in whose name the imprisonment scheme is imposed and executed are groomed under the guise of educative information by the existence of idealistic, reckless and self-serving pronouncements in Virginia's corporate media, to in rote form endorse such practices and professional behavior from the Virginia prison official without any second thoughts or any thought at all. We saw a classic example of this during the Virginia Republican exploitation of the abolish parole in Virginia gambit of 1995 under the leadership of the racist of Macaca infamy Republican Governor George Allen, with The Richmond Times-Dispatch being a pure and simple propaganda amplifier selling the People of The Commonwealth a bill of goods that to this day in 2026 is still that proverbial "gift horse in the mouth".We would think that after the Human Condition's monstrous encounters with articulations of a "Final Solution", this and a "Final Solution" that, those who would presume leadership and provide it's speech would at least recognize and realize that, notwithstanding and despite the passage of time, that inexorability of resolving the diametrical dialectic is inevitable, which is where we find the question and issue of Parole as function of Virginia's imprisonment scheme. There isn't any aspect of the Human Condition and its variegated Social Contract forms that isn't an approximate existence and the application of Justice as terms and relationship isn't exempt. As such the dogma of ideology shouldn't have any hint, any breath on it, which were our Virginia Scholars satisfying and fulfilling their function, We as The People would be equipped and armed with it's relative insight to grasp, that "certainty", exactitude as expressions of zealotry have no function in matters of Justice, which Parole as aspect of Virginia's imprisonment scheme and its Infrastructure is a derivative. Parole in Virginia has a genesis as its National presence. Which as analyzed in the 1833 case, UNITED STATES v. WILSON 32 U.S 150 [" Parole did not develop from any specific source or experiment but is an outgrowth of a number of independent measures: the conditional pardon, the apprenticeship by indenture, the transportation of criminals to America and Australia, the English and Irish experiences with the system of ticket-of-leave, and the work of American prison reformers during the nineteenth century"].So we see in 1942,the statutory creation of a Virginia Parole Board, with 5 members selected by the Governor, to grant, deny, revoke and supervise conditional release. Then in 1995 we see the abolishment of Parole in Virginia save for what is described as Geriatric Parole. We also find that Virginia legislators lied about the impact abolishing parole has on those pre its abolishing, because those prisoners are being denied Parole.

By William Thorpe

I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982

THE REAL QUESTION IS IMPRISONMENT IN VIRGINIA A PRODUCTIVITY AND HUMAN CAPITAL DESTROYING HARM ? By William Thorpe

Pictures are taken from the internet and are used for illustrative purposes only

I BEGIN: Virginia State and Federal Courts have fundamentally recognized, loss of earning capacity, human capital, opportunity and liberty as economic harm. Nonetheless, Courts have treated the loss of liberty as a primary baseline cost of imprisonment, but when conditions of the imprisonment exceed Virginia and United States Constitutional limits, causing measurable physical or psychological injury or deprive the prisoner of opportunities the State is not entitled to take then the harm becomes compensable and once harm is compensable, loss of productivity becomes a valid economic measure of damages. The question is also this, Virginia legislators along with the Courts bandy about supposed jurisprudential definitions of primary Social Contract terms as Liberty, Human Capital, Opportunity and Productivity that only are reflective of biases and interests, that require a general baseline of acceptance from the People of Virginia, in other words, if imprisonment is practiced in the name of the People of Virginia, it must and should require a denominator of cognizable purpose that is firmly in pursuit of the "unity of the people", yet its absence is what we have as observable facts of Virginia's Social Contract. So when the Commonwealth or State of Virginia deprives the Prisoner of opportunities it is obligated to provide, as codified in Virginia Law at Title 53.1,as mandated education, vocational training, rehabilitative programming or imposes conditions that destroy human capital, despite the fact that this formulation of issues of Virginia's imprisonment scheme is the least developed, the prisoner can then argue, you didn't just confine me, but you destroyed my productive capacity which you had no right to do. But because the Virginia citizenry isn't cued in on what is required for that perfection of the unity of the people or simply put that pursuit of unconditional equality under law, there isn't the necessary scrutiny of Virginia's imprisonment scheme, that will excavate it with clarity that it isn't a crass availability, a means of satisfying sadistic impulses. If imprisonment is supposed to be only a loss of liberty and the actual conditions destroy human capital, because the State of Virginia has purposefully and deliberately left vague and ill defined what its imprisonment conditions are beyond the deprivation of a relative and approximate freedom of action, what it presents then is the argument that Prison is not merely a deprivation of liberty but a State-engineered destruction of human capital. The State in its pursuit of Imprisonment may seize liberty, but it may not destroy the person and when it does the economic value of that destruction is compensable, because the State of Virginia primarily already sees the human being categorically in the political-economy terms of value. The State of Virginia as intimated and hinted by debates and fights over its imprisonment scheme in debates over overcrowding, solitary confinement, reentry, Department of Corrections budgets, rhetoric over Rehabilitation vs. Punishment. All of this reveal that Virginia knows that imprisonment destroys more than liberty, it destroys capacity, opportunity, and long term human potential. However no mainstream Virginia figure has the courage to say such outright, because saying it forces a moral and fiscal reckoning the State isn't prepared to face. Nonetheless every time the Virginia Politician talks about, workforce shortage, the need for "second chances" or the economic benefits of reentry programs is an implicit admission that the prison system suppresses human capital and reduces future productivity.

We also see this tacit admission in the fight against Solitary Confinement as exploited and deployed by the Virginia prison official, with opponents standing on arguments that show cognitive decline, psychological deterioration, and long term-functional impairment, which is the logic of "loss of productive capacity", just expressed in clinical terms. Virginia's wrongful conviction compensation is based on the idea that the State took more than it was entitled to take and the "economic value" of that loss must be repaid. We also see it in Juvenile Justice Reform, with the argument that Youth incarceration destroys, educational trajectories, earning potential and life time opportunity which are explicitly without euphemisms describing human capital destruction. What all of this shows and reveals is that systemic fly in the Social Contract ointment of The Commonwealth of Virginia, which fundamentally is an unwillingness to unconditionally without qualification recognize Human Life. Because the recognition of human life is due to the acceptance and understanding of terms of interaction and its stability as Law and its process that is due in its application. But because human life is recognized "conditionally", meaning it isn't accepted equally under law, which then reveals impunity or abuse, mistreatment, violations under the generality as, dehumanization. In otherwards even as the Social Contract as political-economy valuation and terms of relation of human life are firmly grounded as basis of the human condition and its variegated expressions. We see it accorded distinctions, classes, groupings, characteristics that show an extreme form of intellectual dysfunction and conceptual confusion irrespective of basis, even though purporting to realize the intellectual work of maintaining the social contract, what we see is just a crass indulgence of cutting off the nose to spite the face. In other words, even as human life is denigrated and dehumanized, it still is the only means and mechanism of actualizing value or that one and only purpose of it as the business of creating those conditions and circumstances for the existence of human life. Now, despite these herculean efforts of misinformation we as a people are bombarded with, by all the idealistic reactionary agents of futility, we are not stuck and caught up in an informational black hole of decrepit models of the ignorance's of the human condition. As a people we might not readily posses the characterizing language of our experienced antagonisms, but that doesn't mean that for example we are blind to the fact that if The Commonwealth will use the imprisonment model as application of its justice, the imprisoned shouldn't be subjected to conditions and circumstances that destroy their humanness. There is nothing about Virginia's construct of imprisonment that can be shown to be nothing less than sadism as implicit attitude towards human life and this isn't even indictment based on Virginia's history of the chattel enslavement of Black People, instead what we state is imprisonment cannot continue as its surrogacy.

By William Thorpe

I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982

IMPRISONMENT IS THE HIGHEST FUNCTION OF THE PEOPLE OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA IMPLICITLY REQUIRING UNITY OF SPEECH By William Thorpe

Pictures are taken from the internet and are used for illustrative purposes only

Speech for purposes of our Human Condition and in extension, formulations of the Social Contract is everything. In the Commonwealth of Virginia, it is the governing administration of Government meaning, compulsion and its organized violence medium, which is expressed and for purposes of this work takes on the character of imprisonment and the function of the Virginia Prison Official. As such there has to be a unity of understanding among the people of what is being done in their name by the Virginia prison official, who is privileged with the task of administering imprisonment. This unity of understanding among the people is, primarily and basically achieved and realized as "equality under law and its due process" or holding the Virginia prison official accountable. Despite the fact the Commonwealth has a lattice of the availability of process, implying that potential of accountability or the accountability-function of the governing imperative it exist idealistically, meaning it is not satisfying its intended function and this impracticality is the achilles of Virginia's Social Contract. My motive is how do we subordinate the Virginia prison official to the will of the People of Virginia, meaning that actuality of accountability. I BEGIN: The Commonwealth of Virginia is a constituent of the People, but when we get into the nuts and bolts of not only is what, but who are the people, that's when we are confronted with layers upon layers of its compromise or impunity, meaning who falls into the category of the controlled and the controlling, which naturally has its logic and sophistry in defense. What I want to introduce with this work is this. The Governor or Executive of the Commonwealth is Constitutionally required to declare, "what is the state of the Commonwealth ", to the People via both branches of Virginia's Government, specifically both houses of their elected Representatives in the Legislature and The Virginia Supreme Court. This address is a sort of pro forma availability to the People of The Commonwealth and its implicit satisfaction of a level of the accountability-function. However it is idealistic and has long lost its intended function and intent. Because not only are the people alienated from its substance, even when asserted, they don't experience and feel that there is any illusion that they are considered and taking into account and to give the Commonwealth credit, this unity of understanding compromise isn't a deliberate ploy and insidious calculation on the part of the system in general, but its a result of the means and forum of availability. What we expect and require of Virginia's Government is responsiveness and its ensuing natural state of under actual due process of law. So what we as the people of Virginia ask for is a Constitutional amendment and legislation requiring, that the Governor and all Department heads or designee, post state of the Commonwealth address immediately present and make themselves available to the People of The Commonwealth at locations representing the Central, Northern, Eastern and Southwestern parts of The State, for no less than an hour to answer questions from the people or representative groups based on practical formula. This availability should not be construed to relitigate electoral issues that were completely, thoroughly and exhaustively debated during the campaign process, which the people resolved by stating their intentions with the ballot. This presents the People that specific opportunity for example to publicly question.

By William Thorpe 

I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982

William Thorpe and the Long Arc of Virginia’s Carceral History

 

How one incarcerated writer diagnoses four centuries of punishment in Virginia

William Thorpe’s writing does not merely critique the modern Virginia Department of Corrections. It anticipates and exposes the entire historical character of imprisonment in Virginia, from the colonial era to the present. When you place his arguments alongside the documented evolution of Virginia’s punishment system, the continuity is unmistakable. Thorpe is not describing an aberration — he is describing a 400‑year operating system.

Below is the full comparative analysis.

---

I. Colonial Virginia (1607–1776): Punishment as Social Control

Historical Character

• No real prison system; jails were temporary holding pens.
• Punishment was public, corporal, and meant to humiliate.
• Law existed to protect hierarchy, not justice.
• Enslaved Africans were controlled through violence, not courts.

Thorpe’s Anticipation

Thorpe repeatedly argues that Virginia’s system was never designed for justice, only for domination. His insistence that the state’s power structure is inherently corrupt and self‑protective mirrors the colonial reality exactly. He writes as if he knows — intuitively — that the system’s moral foundation was rotten from the beginning.

Thorpe’s core claim:
“This system was built to control, not correct.”
That is precisely the colonial model.

---

II. Antebellum Virginia (1776–1861): Two Systems, One Logic

Historical Character

• Virginia builds the Richmond Penitentiary in 1796.
• Reform rhetoric for white offenders; labor discipline for them.
• Enslaved people remain under a separate, extrajudicial regime of violence.
• Criminal law is selectively applied.

Thorpe’s Anticipation

Thorpe’s writing is obsessed with dual systems — one for the powerful, one for the powerless. He describes:

• selective enforcement
• manufactured criminality
• racialized punishment
• the state’s refusal to apply its own rules to itself

This is exactly the antebellum structure:
a penitentiary for whites, and a plantation prison for Blacks.

Thorpe is diagnosing the same split logic: punishment as a tool of racial hierarchy.

---

III. Reconstruction & Jim Crow (1865–1900): Criminalization Replaces Slavery

Historical Character

• Black Codes and vagrancy laws criminalize freedpeople.
• Convict leasing and chain gangs extract labor from Black bodies.
• The penitentiary becomes a racial labor machine.
• The state discovers the economic value of incarceration.

Thorpe’s Anticipation

This is where Thorpe’s writing becomes prophetic.

Thorpe argues that:

• conviction is the new slavery
• prisoners are commodities
• officials profit from captivity
• the system is racialized by design

He is describing the exact logic of convict leasing — the most brutally exploitative period in Virginia’s penal history. Thorpe’s analysis of economic extraction, racial targeting, and bureaucratic cruelty is a direct continuation of the post‑war carceral economy.

He is writing from inside the afterlife of slavery, and he names it with precision.

---

IV. 20th Century: Bureaucratic Expansion & Administrative Violence

Historical Character

• More prisons, more categories of offenses.
• Parole boards, classification systems, administrative layers.
• Racial disparities deepen.
• The system becomes more “professional,” but not more humane.

Thorpe’s Anticipation

Thorpe’s critique of:

• administrative opacity
• procedural cruelty
• “policy as punishment”
• officials hiding behind paperwork

…is exactly how historians describe the 20th‑century shift from overt domination to bureaucratic domination.

Thorpe understands that cruelty no longer needs a whip — it only needs a form, a policy, a signature.

---

V. Post‑1995 Virginia: Abolition of Parole & Permanent Warehousing

Historical Character

• Parole abolished for new offenses.
• Truth‑in‑sentencing entrenches long‑term confinement.
• Pre‑1995 prisoners stranded in a system that pretends to offer release.
• Mass incarceration becomes the default.

Thorpe’s Anticipation

Thorpe’s writing on:

• the collapse of parole
• the political weaponization of “public safety”
• the abandonment of rehabilitation
• the moral bankruptcy of VADOC

…is a direct continuation of the historical arc. He is describing the logical endpoint of a system that has always preferred control over correction.

Thorpe sees that Virginia’s modern prison system is not a break from the past — it is the past perfected.

---

VI. The Continuity: Thorpe’s Central Insight

Across all eras, Thorpe identifies the same structural traits that define Virginia’s punishment system:

1. Control over justice

From colonial whipping posts to modern classification systems.

2. Racial hierarchy as the organizing principle

From slave codes to Black Codes to disproportionate sentencing.

3. Economic extraction from captive bodies

From plantations to convict leasing to prison labor.

4. Bureaucratic self‑protection

From planter courts to modern DOC administrators.

5. Manufactured criminality

From vagrancy laws to modern “technical violations.”

Thorpe’s writing is not merely commentary — it is a theory of the Virginia carceral state, one that aligns with every major historical phase.

---

VII. Conclusion: Thorpe as a Historian of the Present

Thorpe’s work anticipates the entire history of Virginia’s imprisonment scheme because he is living inside its final form. His writing is the culmination of four centuries of:

• racial control
• economic exploitation
• bureaucratic cruelty
• political manipulation

He is not just describing the system — he is revealing its deep structure, the part that has remained unchanged from 1607 to 2026.

---

By vapac

VIRGINIA PRISONERS ARE NOT THE ONLY ONES EXPOSING THE LAW VIOLATIONS OF THE VIRGINIA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS,SEE WHAT IT'S OWN EMPLOYEES ARE SAYING IN COURT ABOUT THEIR UNCONSCIONABLE EXPERIENCES By William Thorpe

Pictures are taken from the internet and are used for illustrative purposes only

In a recent work, titled, VIRGINIA REPUBLICANS/CONSERVATIVES/MAGA AND LAW VIOLATIONS BY THE VIRGINIA PRISON OFFICIAL.I made the point that the work of holding the Virginia Prison Official accountable needs unimpeachable facts that go beyond the abuse and dehumanization of the Virginia Prisoner. Now just making this point shows and is revelatory of how the cognizance and understanding of the Constituted aspirations of The People of The Commonwealth of Virginia has been deliberately, purposefully assailed and insidiously degraded by the generality of impunity and its concurrent exacerbation and utility of weaponizing the, and ensuring disunity among the people, due to the strategy of conditionality of access to the Due Process of Law and its Equality wielded by the Commonwealth's reactionary elements and forces, specifically the Virginia Republican, Conservatives and their currently manifested Maga spasming, allied with among others, the Virginia prison official as representative and reflective of the actual function of Virginia's Justice Infrastructure, as a pining for a savage, decrepit and counterintuitive political-economy formulation, that has no more a claim to purpose, than a mere fleeting hedonistic gratuitous violence and its name is sadism. In other words Virginia's Social Contract is a rudderless vessel lurching hither, thither in the tempest of impunity, which then is the environment, the work of wrangling the accountability-function of governance on the above-the-lawism of the Virginia prison official, is engaged on. In pursuit of perverting the Constituted aspirations of the People of The Commonwealth, its foot soldiers, the usual reactionaries have successfully associated the work of the equity of equality under law and its anti-impunity function of holding the Virginia prison official accountable, as "being soft on crime", as such the Virginia prison official can be caught red handed committing the most egregious violation against the imprisoned Virginian and the Republican and Conservative ally will be trotted out, spouting and spewing the most inane comments in it's defense and the Virginia citizenry, by being inoculated against recognizing that the prison official's professional behavior is pure, simple and unbridled criminality, compromising the necessary faith and trust they have to have in the Rule of Law will bristle against being reminded that it is. So what the work of holding the Virginia prison official accountable requires is a more complete and practical narrative that reveals and exposes the systemic impunity of the Virginia Department of Corrections from its own employees. Listed are some claims in court actions by employees, ranging from sexual assaults, gender discrimination, hostile work environment, employee on employee assault, racism and all-around egregious behavior.

ALCAZAR v. Va. Dept.of Corr.2024 U.S. Dist. Lexis 156850 PATTERSON v. Va .Dept.of Corr.2024 U.S. Dist. Lexis 72197 BLACKSHEAR v. Va. Dept. Corr. 2021 U.S. Dist. Lexis 264460 GEORGE v. BROWN 2025 U.S. Dist. Lexis 259131 [pay ATTN.to the behavior of Sgt. BROWN] Va. Dept. of Corr .v. COMPTON 47 VA.App.202 HALEY v. Va. Dept. of Corr. 2023 VA. App. Lexis 493 COMMONWEALTH v. NEEDHAM 55 VA. App.316 Va. Dept. of Corr. v. BISHOP 75 VA. App.1 SPICER v. VIRGINIA 66 F.3d 705 FLORES v. Va Dept .of Corr.2021 U.S. Dist. Lexis 31857

KNOSKIE v VA Dept of Corr 2017 U.S. V Dist. Lexis 22719

McCURDY v. Va Dept of Corr 2016 U.S. Dist. Lexis 169611

McCURDY v, Va Dept of Corr 2017 U.S. Dist Lexis 142788 The People would know about these if our Media did their job.

By William Thorpe

I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982

VIRGINIA REPUBLICANS/CONSERVATIVES/MAGA AND LAW VIOLATIONS BY THE VIRGINIA PRISON OFFICIAL By William Thorpe

Virginia Republicans/Conservatives/Maga are yet to encounter law violations by The Virginia Prison Official in their professional behavior that causes them to "act" like they remember that they are the ones who perennially claim to be all about "law and order", which is a sneaky, sleight of hand way of deceiving the People of the Commonwealth, that, law and order means anti-impunity and its equality under law thesis. But the truth and reality is the Virginia Republican/Conservative and Maga have a more backwards and insidious characterization and motive of and for their "law and order" parrot, which has nothing to do with the left to the people to swallow its hook and sinker, self-checking utility by having them fill in its definition blanks, according to The People's naveté, biases, fears, ignorances, illiteracy, suppositions and that ever present, self-interest. In other words, the Virginia Republican "law and order" polemic is your classic Rorschach test. I BEGIN: In our work of holding the Virginia prison official accountable, in extension compelling the accountability-function of our Virginia Government and the administration of governance, our focus isn't to get caught up in the mindless mire of chasing hypocrisies and corruption, because Republicans/Conservatives/Maga haven't cornered the market nor monopolized that human disposition to be "full of it", (which as an aside is the reason why the narrative exposing the all too real crimes of The Trump administration and his merryband, is in this up hill battle of " why can't the people see the obvious".Because, how can a Democrat or Progressive indicit MAGA, when for example that wink and nod of "law and order", is also exploited as, Class Interest ?) But what our work firmly stands on is no one is irreproachable and its above-the-lawism impunity. In other words we are not concerned with idealistic recognitions of humanness, which at this juncture I make my point with this soliloquy as homily from the movie CONCLAVE,as delivered by the character CARDINAL LAWRENCE and I quote, "CERTAINTY, CERTAINTY IS THE GREAT ENEMY OF UNITY. CERTAINTY IS THE DEADLY ENEMY OF TOLERANCE.EVEN CHRIST WAS NOT CERTAIN AT THE END, "MY GOD, MY GOD WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME? "HE CRIED OUT IN HIS AGONY AT THE 9th HOUR ON THE CROSS.OUR FAITH IS A LIVING THING PRECISELY BECAUSE IT WALKS HAND IN HAND WITH DOUBT, IF THERE WAS ONLY CERTAINTY AND NO DOUBT, THERE WOULD BE NO MYSTERY AND THEREFORE NO NEED FOR FAITH" [from THE MOVIE CONCLAVE].So what is the Virginia Republican position? It is "certainty" that the Virginia prison official is irreproachable and above the law and this stance is extended to all law enforcement in general, despite the fact the Virginia Republican isn't that delusional to deny that accountability is an inexorable fact. Still, due to the intoxication of self-interest and its nihilism along with the complicity of The People regardless of reason we lurch from one antagonism to the next, at the expense of our Constituted Social Contractual aspirations. As such what our work requires are unimpeachable facts, on which our narrative of prison reform in Virginia is realized. Our unimpeachable facts are not intended to accomplish nothing less than present to the People of The Commonwealth, that the narrative of accountability of the Virginia prison official isn't simply limited to Prisoner abuse, but is symptomatic of their anti-subordination attitude to the will of the People of the Commonwealth.

By William Thorpe

I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982

IN 2024 THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES, OVER TURNED A 1984 CASE, CHEVRON U.S.A INC. v. NRDC 467 U.S 837 THAT JUDGES HAD BEEN USING TO ALLOW PRISON OFFICIAL B.S, SO LETS TALK ABOUT IT'S REPLACEMENT By William Thorpe

Pictures are taken from the internet and are used for illustrative purposes only

In 2024 The Supreme Court of The United States ruled in a case LOPER BRIGHT ENTERS. v. RAIMONDO 603 U.S 369 and I quote "Chevron, U.S.A INC. v. NRDC INC.467 U.S.837 is overruled. Courts must exercise their independent judgment in deciding whether an agency has acted within its statutory authority as the APA requires. Chevron deference precludes Courts from exercising the Judicial Power vested in them by Article III to say what the law is. The only way to ensure that the law will not merely change erratically, but will develop in a principled and intelligible fashion, is to leave Chevron behind." [okay that was in summation the sophistry of those 6 Justices, namely, ROBERTS, THOMAS, ALITO, GORSUCH, KAVANAUGH and BARRETT who agreed to overturn Chevron and the 3 dissenters were KAGAN, SOTOMAYOR and JACKSON. There is something funny about a lot of this stuff and its more pronounced and in a lot of ways childishly striking with how it comes across that they've forgotten that its supposed to be about the People, that they're dealing with people, yeah the human being, the socio-person and personhood, yes socio-personhood] Before I continue I need to stipulate that, I'm not flag waving or burning it over none of the jurisprudence coming out of the current Supreme Court of The United States, but their work actually does serve a real and consequential purpose, which is it enables the amplification of that necessary speech of that, 3.5% of the population, who are clear eyed and clamoring, that the Emperor has no clothes. Here is a reminder of what The Chevron case which came to be characterized as the Chevron Deference, or for the Prisoner and as it concerns this work the Virginia Prisoner. So in 1984, The Supreme Court of The United States ruled, "That if a statute was silent or ambiguous with respect to the specific issue, the question for a Court was whether the Agency's action was based on a permissible construction of the statute. Further considerable weight was to be accorded to an Agency's construction of a statutory scheme." [again the sophistry of this also cuts both ways, for one "agencies" mean and are function of the Executive or The President or as specific to Virginia The Governor, the executive is tasked with executing and defending the law, with the implication, of as is fit. Now what I want to point out is this simple fact.

The only absolute is ACCOUNTABILITY, regardless and irrespective of context, which is to simply say, if you are unable to swim, regardless of reason, it's accountability, is drowning. However at any point in the accountability process of drowning, there can be intercession, again irrespective of means. So for example a Dolphin can intercede and save the drowning person. The point of all of this, the Supreme Court's rulings in both Chevron and Loper are inexorable formulations of that Social Contract, organic accountability-function that is that regardless of sophistry masterless relationship, irrespective of whether there is that stabilizing honesty of maintaining the integrity of the principle or that logical pursuit of, how do we do our human condition efficiently, meaning that accountable adherence to the business of the human condition, or we stay stuck in the delusional indulgence of the sophist permissibility of idealistic-dictatorship and its fiat bureaucracy of impunity, which is whether its Chevron and its colloquial deference or Loper and its tautology of "The only way to ensure that the law will not merely change erratically, but will develop in a principled and intelligible fashion....", the fact is neither jurisprudence is speaking to the existence of the accountability-function. During the reign and supremacy of Chevron and its kowtowing to agency interpretations and the relative applications, Judges had no problem with accepting the impunity of the prison official and as it relates to this work, the Virginia Prison Official, under the logic that the prison official shouldn't be second guessed because the job of administering the prison environment was an improbable undertaking, so Law, its application and supposedly all-seeing eye had to avert its gaze from the debased professional behavior of the prison official, nevertheless the fact that the pursuit of justice and its repair of harm, is again supposedly blind, meaning a purported "equality under law". The issue however is the human condition and its Social Contract expression anticipates the emergence and presence of, "contradictions", which arguments evidenced as the Chevron Deference are, but what is human condition bane are antagonisms, which denials and reluctances to recognize and acknowledge, that cause and effects are systemic ,is. So now that we are in this LOPER BRIGHT world, how do we understand it's activity for our purpose, our work of holding the Virginia prison official accountable. First of all since the Supreme Court gave us LOPER BRIGHT, only two States have confronted it in State criminal justice circumstances. Namely, Minnesota in KAMBON v. STATE 23 N.W 3d 576 (2025) [ and in this Minnesota encounter the existence of Loper Bright caused Minnesota to make a farce of its very own jurisprudence, which proves and underscores the tautology of Loper Bright]. Then, Florida tangled with Loper Bright in a State Habeas construction, BATES v. STATE 416 So.3d 312 (2025) [again another comical encounter with Loper Bright].But then in this Connecticut State case we see a defiance to the dismissal of Chevron, so in WILLIAMS v. ARI of CONN.INC. 2024 CONN SUPER LEXIS 1786, we see a Connecticut court declaring that the annihilation and dismissal of Chevron and its colloquial deference doesn't mean it "no longer applys in State Court". Both CHEVRON and LOPER BRIGHT deal with the the actual practice of Government and governance, through the agents or "Agencies" of its administration. The Virginia Department of Corrections as Agency, an agent of The Government of The Commonwealth of Virginia, under VIRGINIA'S ADMINISTRATIVE PROCESS ACT. Code 2.2-4000 is directed and tasked with imprisoning people, while denying Prisoners its process.

By William Thorpe

I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982

A UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS-AMHERST PROFESSOR NAMED JAMIE (something) SAID GOVERNOR ABIGAIL SPANBERGER IN CONTRAST WITH TRUMP'S FLUNKIES IS SERIOUS, BECAUSE SHE CRITIQUED CORRUPTION IN HER RESPONSE TO TRUMP'S 2026 STATE OF THE UNION (whatever) By William Thorpe

Pictures are taken from the internet and are used for illustrative purposes only

Well Professor Jamie (something) of University of Massachusetts-Amherst, you clearly are a Johnny come lately, to Virginia speech. Professor Jamie (something) of Univ. of Massachusetts-Amherst, you're a regular on Arnie Arnesen, presenting a quasi and pseudo-Progressive perspective. You said one of your students gave you the thumbs up endorsement of Governor Abigail Spanberger's 14 minute response to Trump's 2026 State of The Union (whatever) and it dawned on you that, the student was animated by, "trust", that she trusted Gov. Spanberger. I BEGIN: This current cresting of a National and State across the board practice of impunity and the concurrent reality of selective prosecutions and persecutions embodied as Trump and his merryband of the various forms, levels and types of reactionaries, isn't novel nor unique, not to our history, not to the human condition and as a matter of fact it is perversive to suggest that this cresting impunity is exceptional, because it then denies, distorts and impedes, the necessary motive force of analysis. Progressivism as it stands in opposition to the reaction of Conservatism and its natural state of impunity is primarily, critique and analysis. This isn't a reality that needs and requires explanation. What this work however is concerned with is, confronting and giving clarity to the developing narrative that Gov. Spanberger, as she should, correctly and actually, understands that, the fundamental motive force of her historical presence and political emergence is to breath air to the primary critique that corruption is euphemism for impunity. Despite this obvious fact, Governor Abigail Spanberger, her aides and Virginia Democrats as their brethren across the Nation are showing, firstly an inability and secondly the unwillingness, regardless of reason to provide and present the People with that, notwithstanding its conventional tardiness, the inevitable critique and analysis of the work of perfecting the unity of the people, meaning that general and specific application of "equality under law", which its nemesis exposed the neurosis of their, thought and position by the indulgence of a Civil War in opposition and the perfidious incorrigibility of their logic, expressed in the shameless and pathetic pursuit of the revisionist " Lost Cause", then that betrayal of, perfecting the unity of the people, with the embrace of impunity by the Compromise of 1871.The Rule of Law and its Due Process underpins and determines the dexterity of a political-economy, meaning the value exchange, its circumstances and conditions as business of the human being, organized as terms of The Social Contract then demands that unity of law and its process of repairing that naturally accompanying harm as dialectic of the business of being human.

The objective of Leadership regardless of context, which as it concerns this work, is its expression and state as embodied by Governor Abigail Spanberger, is that clear articulation of the unity of law and its process of repairing harm, which is the honesty of that aspired to and condition of social stability, theorized as, the unity of the people, as equality under law, which in its quintessential being, is unequivocal, unambiguous and unconditional accountability which in its natural state and dynamic is implacable, or the transparency of cause and effect. So when Gov. Spanberger grounded her response to Trump on the corruption critique, which she also exploited in achieving her historic electoral triumph, it was a postural delve, baby steps in presenting a side or facet of its polygonal presence as that natural congruent of the value exchange of the human condition. Is Gov. Spanberger aware of this congruent component nature of corruption of course she does, she is human and even if in the primitive generality of her humanness, she lacked its communicative language, her cog function in the Social Contract, instructed and provided her with its language. So yes Gov. Spanberger understands perfectly well and clearly that the tugging at that loose thread end of the sleeve, as corruption critique is and should also have the analytic transparency of its systemic cause and effect, sleeve completely historically falling off anticipation, which is the "unity of the people" intolerance towards impunity, as a war of no quarters. If quintessentially The State or Government is the organized violence of coercion and if The State is the aggregated speech and will of the people as collective, which for purpose of this work, The Commonwealth of Virginia, then the first object and its fundamental subject and facet, impunity, must be wrangled onto and upon are all expressions, exhibitions and practices of, its means and mechanism, Law. So one of the first acts Gov. Spanberger did was designate by selecting a Director of The Virginia Department of Corrections. Which the function of imprisonment in the name of the People, epitomizes, coercion and organized violence. This act, accordingly would then be instructive and revelatory of her relative intention of engaging, impunity and its corrosive and corrupting activity on all things Virginia's Social Contract. Well I hate to be the bearer of, yup you guessed it, that sort of news to our University of Massachusetts-Amherst Professor Jamie (something), that Gov. Spanberger chose to play footsie with impunity, by retreating to the complicitous and accomplice status quo function that exist in opposition to that "perfection of the unity of the people", with the selection of one Joseph Walters, an apparatchik of the Department whose hands are fossilized and crusty with the historicity and epigenetics of impunity and its siamese corruption self as the dehumanization of the imprisoned Virginian as professional behavior of the Virginia prison official. Now does this failing indicate anything besides status quo impulses?, no it doesn't, but what it does require is analytic maturity from our sister Professor Jamie (something) of U Mass-Amherst, that impunity and its euphemism, corruption, isn't a topical or localized fact and it isn't an emergence that is secondary but it has a dialectic that is primary, historic and original. So yes salute Governor Abigail Spanberger as a breath of fresh air and now we need the effusion.

By William Thorpe

I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982