On September 25, 2025, Red Onion State Prison (ROSP), in the mountains of Southeast Virginia, accelerated its policy of oppression and stagnation, operating under the banner of a correctional facility and offering no correctional services to prisoners.
That morning, officers swarmed D-2 pod, where I am housed. They had come for all prisoner televisions, co-ax cables, and tablets. Officers went in packs, door to door, demanding that every prisoner comply. Whenever a prisoner asked these officers why they were confiscating these items, the officers all answered with the same Virginia DOC approved response, “I don’t know.” A few prisoners refused to give up the TV that they overpaid for by a factor of ten, or the tablet that was filled with overpriced music, all of their personal emails, and family photos. Those prisoners were pepper sprayed and assaulted, and had all property removed from their cells as punishment.
After all of our electronics were taken, we were left on lockdown, until…
Today is December 7, 2025, and I still have no idea why my TV and tablet were confiscated.
There is no correctional programming at Red Onion State Prison. I know this because I have been in D-2 pod here at Red Onion State Prison for 18 months. In that time, I have had two yearly reviews done by two different assigned counselors. On both of those reviews one of the mandated accomplishments was that I participate in correctional programming. For accomplishing mandatory requirements, such as completing programming and maintaining a job, I will be rewarded with a lower security level and more rights and privileges. For those with a release date, meeting their annual review criteria will earn them good time credits that can get them home sooner.
If I do not complete mandated programming, I will be penalized on my yearly review, as I have been for the past two years. I will again receive a higher security score, and I will be denied any transfer that could get me closer to home.
This institution has not allowed a single program that I could participate in in the over the 18 months that I have been a prisoner in this D-2 pod.
This is not normal. All other institutions offer programming. If nothing else, prisoners can participate in mail-in programs, but not here in D-2 pod.
I wrote to the program director in May of 2024. I received a response saying that I had been put on lists for programs. I have written many times since. I wrote a complaint form saying I was excluded from fulfilling my mandatory treatment plan. I got a complaint form back saying, again, that I was on the list. The next time I complained about this my grievance came back telling me I should get on the list.
Red Onion further restricts prisoners from education by the act of removing the tablets from the prisoner.
There is an app called Khan Academy on my tablet. With it I can find video titles about a wide range of educational topics. I have used this app throughout my time as a prisoner here at Red Onion, to expand my knowledge of everything from math and history to ancient art and philosophy. There are also videos available that deal with topics like victim empathy, substance abuse, and suicide.
Though these videos were available for free download at the one kiosk in D-2 pod they would not count towards my yearly review. I used these videos as a way to learn because I wanted to. It is more useful than the once-monthly (if I am lucky) library book delivery when I am pressed for educational materials.
Without my tablet, even those educational videos were also out of reach. The most basic tools that a prisoner at ROSP could use for betterment were all stripped away. Red Onion State Prison is ignoring its own mandate that I participate in rehabilitative programming, showing its total lack of rehabilitative priority.
I paid for a 13-inch, clear plastic television. It has two speakers in the front that sound like a 1980’s clock radio. It has no discernible features besides buttons that come off after a short period of use. It could get 15 channels, not counting the Christian stations, the institutional programming that makes me wonder who is allowed to go to school here, and the channel that shows the same five or six movies in rotation on the weekends, if this place decides to show any movies at all. That is the TV that I thought I owned, until officers came to confiscate it for no reason. That TV cost $260. A 13-inch, clear plastic TV costs prisoners $260. It is as likely to arrive with a scratched screen as it is to arrive at all. There are no other options.
Red Onion mandates on all prisoners’ yearly reviews that a part of their rehabilitation is to qualify for, apply for, and attain an institutional job. The process for that task is simple: fill out an application, get it to your building lieutenant, and wait your turn. ROSP’s inclusion of this mandate had made it seem as if this was an important accomplishment for a prisoner’s rehabilitation.
But there’s more to this story.
Since September 25, 2025, prisoners housed in D-2 pod have not been allowed to work at the jobs that they were hired for. Instead, prisoners housed in the pod next-door, D-1 pod, come in to clean D-2 pod. These prisoners have recently been given all the jobs in the kitchen, on the outside of the buildings and anything else outside of the housing units. Though these prisoners are in prison for the same things as everyone else on Red Onion, these prisoners never lose their televisions, tablets, access to phones and visitation, in pod and outside recreation, and are able to work every day. Two residents of D-1 pod are prisoners who were moved from D-2 pod this year. The prisoners who are housed inside D-1 pod are no different than those in D-2 pod, but those in D-1 pod are being rehabilitated.
Before the lockdown there were prisoners who lived inside D-2 pod tasked with passing out food trays; there was a barber, a guy who distributed paperwork to prisoners as needed, men who cleaned the showers at night, and men who cleaned the pod several times every day. None of those prisoners are allowed to work now.
A prisoner who does not do their job is issued a disciplinary offense report for refusing to work. It is illegal to refuse to work in Virginia Department of Corrections (VDOC). This institution gives all prisoners a mandate to get a job. How can it be so important to a prisoner’s rehabilitation, and then not allowed–all at the same institution?
There is no meaningful mental health service here at Red Onion, even though when the nurse comes through D-2 pod for Pill Pass she stops at more doors than not. At least a third of the prisoners in this pod are prescribed psychiatric medications. I and my cellmate both take strong psychotropic medications at high doses. I personally receive psych meds twice a day and have done so for over 26 years of incarceration.
There are Qualified Mental Health Professionals (QMHPs) employed here at Red Onion State Prison, but the only mental health staff that ever enters D-2 pod is Doctor McDuffie. And even Dr. McDuffie will only come around to give out new and stronger pills to prisoners. His visits last two minutes at most.
I have written many complaint forms about the mental health staff here at Red Onion. Because of this, I have been abandoned by all mental health staff. All psych med recipients receive a mandatory visit from Dr. McDuffie every three months. As of writing this it has now been over 10 months since I was seen by Dr. McDuffie or any QMHP here at Red Onion. Dr. McDuffie–the same psych doctor who has had multiple civil commitment hearings so that he could issue an emergency transfer for me to the Virginia DOC inpatient mental health hospital, MCTC–hasn’t answered any of my request forms, and hasn’t been by to check on my mental health since changing my medications, without warning, over 10 months ago. Dr. McDuffie has come to my cell to speak with my roommate on schedule during this same time period.
Red Onion is housing mental health prisoners two-to-a-cell, after suddenly stripping away all outside contact and all forms of distraction, locked down 24 hours per day, with no QMHP monitoring.
This is dangerous.
There are no religious services here at Red Onion. At the start of 2025, there were days when each religion (Christian, Sunni Muslim, NOI, Odinite, Wicca) all had a day to worship in a group. At their predetermined time, they were allowed to leave their housing areas and congregate, in a chow hall or the gymnasium, to do as people who have faith are known to do. A person led the meeting with prayers and sermons and amens and things of that nature. It was a day prisoners looked forward to. It was a positive, and it was programming.
The situation now is that D-2 pod is not allowed to congregate. We do not leave the cell except for a shower after 72 hours. We do not leave the pod for anything but a trip to medical, or to be found guilty of every institutional charge that any staff member decides to write up. Without our televisions we are not able even to observe through the institution’s own broadcast of the different religious service videos they play throughout the week.
While prisoners in my pod, D-2 are restricted from all possible participation in those religious services and videos, a prisoner who is locked in the segregation pod next-door, D-3 pod, who is likely there for violating institutional rules, is provided “loaner TVs” on the days that their chosen religion’s video plays, for an hour, at least, so that they can see those same videos that we in population have no opportunity to see while our televisions are confiscated. In effect, a prisoner who has already broken less restricted access to religious services. Make that make sense.
Officers often come into D-2 pod while a Muslim prisoner is calling their hour of prayer through his cell door and unplug the digital clock in the pod so that they won’t know when the next time to pray is. Without electronics in our cells there is no way to tell time in D-2 pod.
There is no grievance procedure here at Red Onion State Prison. A grievance procedure is the process by which prisoners are supposed to address issues that they believe should be looked at by VDOC prison staff for remedy. A prisoner who wants to take legal action against a VDOC prison must first exhaust all grievance procedures before he can proceed.
A prisoner is instructed to write their complaint on a VDOC Complaint Form and submit it to the grievance coordinator through the grievance box. If the response to the complaint does not remedy the problem, the next step is to file a Regular Grievance on the same issue. If the grievance response does not remedy the situation, the final stage of the Grievance Procedure is to send the grievance response to the Western Regional Office of the VDOC for review.
I have used this procedure on many occasions. Each time, I explain my complaint. I apply it to existing policy and make the direct connection to the violation of rights and policy. As this place has become less focused on enforcing its own duly stated rules and procedures, I have been more vocal on paper this year.
Since September 25, 2025, the complaint responses, grievance responses, and even Level 2 grievance responses have almost all come back with a typed response or a sticker with the same response typed on it. The typed or sticker response, either version, are the same response. It amounts to a statement that ROSP did nothing wrong. It makes no mention of the issue that you are complaining about.
That is what you will get if your paperwork is processed at all. I have written a complaint that I was not let out of my cell to shower in over 5 days and received a response that my grievance was not processed because I did not show how the issue “affected me directly.”
I kid you not.
The grievance procedure has a strict, short time limit, and complaints and grievances routinely come back after the time to proceed to the next step has passed. And, of course, there is only one place to leave a complaint or grievance. There is a grievance box on a wall in the pod. If your paperwork isn’t placed in the grievance box it will not be processed. There is no other way to file a complaint or grievance. If you are locked inside of your cell no officer will put your paperwork in that box.
There is no outside recreation for prisoners here in D-2 pod at Red Onion. Since September 25, 2025, I have only twice felt the sun on my skin. Both of those times I was in chains, being escorted to the medical department. The windows here at Red Onion State Prison are covered with thick plastic. If your cell is on the bottom tier, you can see the vague green of grass at the bottom. There is a white or blue and sometimes grey color of sky at the top. There is no outside recreation for D-2 pod on any lockdown status or on most days when there is no lockdown, either. As of December 7, 2025 (today), I have been denied all outside recreation for over three months and for the vast majority of the year 2025 before that.
Next door, in D-3, the segregation pod, they are taken outside for 4 hours per day of outside recreation. In population, we get no outside recreation, no outside exercise, no outside air. Again, my good behavior only leads to warehousing. Instead, it will take my breaking rules to get locked in segregation for me to get outside to see the sunshine again.
Through my cell’s window I can see the prisoners of D-1 pod as they walk by, through the sally port, on their way outside for outside recreation, every day, while I can, at very best, hope that I am allowed a shower twice weekly.
There is no telephone, email or visitation, video or otherwise, allowed while on lockdown for D-2 pod. We become completely isolated. From September 25 to October 23, 2025, D-2 pod was restricted from making any phone calls, sending and receiving emails.
On October 24, 2025, prisoners’ tablets were returned. Many of them were missing. Others received tablets back that, though they were working when they were taken, didn’t work when they were returned. No reason was given for why we were suddenly allowed to have tablets again but not TVs, and we were never informed why they were confiscated in the first place.
Days after the tablets were returned my pod was allowed out of our cells for an hour per day, six cells at a time, three days per week. This was a chance to call home, send emails, download newspapers and shower. This lasted until, on November 21, a correction officer was killed at another prison. D-2 pod was only given the cordless phones once after that. It was passed down the line, from cell to cell, on Thanksgiving Day, and hasn’t been seen since. We are still not allowed any visitation of any kind. And still no outside recreation and explanation for this punishment.
There is no access to cleaning supplies or disinfectant. We are occasionally allowed to spray a rag with a thin, light pink solution made out of a dark red disinfectant that has been watered down until it has no chemical smell left. This will happen twice per week (on a good week). Two men in one cell, for 24 hours per day, are given two spray bottle squeezes of disinfectant onto one rag. This is not sufficient to clean anything and prisoners on Red Onion are allowed no cleaning supplies beyond that.
The vents in my cell are filled with decades old crust. D-2 pod was once a segregation pod. It’s common for mentally ill prisoners left to rot in segregation cells to smear feces inside the intake vent of their cell. It is called sh*tting down the pod. It is used as a form of revenge. I experienced this in my time in solitary confinement here at Red Onion. The vents in my cell have not been cleaned in forever. I see piles of crusty lumps through the holes in my vents. We all know what they are. This is all the air that I am allowed.
Sexual harassment is instituted here at Red Onion as policy. The rules here say that a prisoner cannot hang anything that might block any view of their cell–but a prisoner is also responsible for making sure no one sees them with their pants down. A prisoner caught with his pants down will be given an indecent exposure disciplinary offense, offense code, 137a., Operating Procedure 861.1, Inmate Discipline. Both of these things are true.
The cell’s toilet is three feet inside the cell door and there is no existing structure in place to block any part of the cell from view and no prisoner can block view of themselves from officers, and a prisoner who sits on the toilet must also keep from exposing himself to his cell partner, because that is also a 137a (not to mention gross), and he must not be seen by any officer who walks by. But prisoners are never in their cells alone on lockdown, so the question then becomes, do you expose yourself to your cell partner, which is a crime by institutional rules, or do you hang something between you and him which is a crime by institutional rules, or do you expose yourself to any officer who happens by, which is a crime, or do you block the officer from seeing you? That, of course, is also a crime.
There is no escape from breaking the rules when Red Onion makes a bowel movement illegal from all angles while you are trapped in a cell with a stranger.
A prisoner cannot hang clothes up anywhere to dry, and laundry bags sent out for institutional washing are as likely to come back from laundry as not. So, do you risk losing your underpants, or do you risk an institutional charge for hanging wet underpants to dry in your cell?
On 9-25-25 D-2 pod went from spending $90 per week on commissary, to spending $50 every other week on the same overpriced items. Why?
D-1 pod’s spend limit never changed.
On November 22, 2025, televisions were returned. Still no reason given for the September 25, 2025, confiscation. Now we have our electronics back but are still stuck inside our cells on 24 or 23-and-1-hour lockdown. We are allowed showers 3 days per week but not phone or kiosk access. Again. As of today, we have been back on total lockdown since the end of November. Again.
What am I being punished for?
D-2 pod here at Red Onion State Prison has been on one form of lockdown or another for three-quarters of the calendar year 2025. This year, Red Onion State Prison has used the “modified” lockdown status more than ever. “Modified” is where we get one hour out of the cells per day. Before this year, whenever this place had a regular, zero-movement lockdown we would then be on “modified” lockdown right after that for a few days, then regular movement would soon follow. Now “modified” lockdown is used whenever Red Onion wants to use it. The reasons given for this “modified” lockdown ranges from not having enough officers to run the prison, to bad weather, to no reason at all. D-2 pod has been on “modified” lockdown more often than any other status this year.
The staff of Red Onion State Prison has made denying prisoners basic rights into their policy. This institution has mandated what I must do to have a successful rehabilitation, and then denied me any opportunity to fulfill that mandate. Prisoners here are not only punished for no particular misdeed, but also punished more severely than other prisoners depending on their housing assignment.
There are zero rehabilitative services for a prisoner inside D-2 pod at Red Onion State Prison. It doesn’t matter if a prisoner obeys every rule, he will still be penalized as if he has not. I know this because I am here in D-2 pod, and I just received a free picture ticket for achieving a status of 12 months without any institutional infractions.
There is very little opportunity to take pictures here at Red Onion so…
All of these oppressive practices and arbitrary restrictions have been arbitrarily adjusted over and over again, but the one practice that Red Onion State Prison has kept constant is shooting prisoners.
When prisoners were at pod recreation, or leaving the cell to exit the pod, or going from the cell to the shower while on lockdown, officers have been shooting them, often.
Inside of the pods at Red Onion there is a raised booth where officers stand watching the pod with a gun. The gun looks like a grenade launcher. It shoots a hard plastic projectile the size of a 10-year-old child’s fist. It is filled with a green dust that chokes like pepper spray. Its impact breaks bones and splits skin. And this year staff here have shot more prisoners than I have ever seen.
Early in 2025, staff painted red and yellow lines on the floor of the pods here. If a prisoner is too close to a red line, he gets shot. If an officer gives a direct order, and it is not immediately obeyed, the prisoner is shot. If a prisoner complies with an order but moves too slowly, he is shot. Then the prisoner will be given an institutional infraction (a charge) for getting shot.
Terrorism: Using violence or the threat of violence to compel others to do as they are told.
Planning comes from imagining what will happen moving forward. It is preparation based on a reasonable assumption of what will happen in the future based on what has already happened in the past. Here at Red Onion State Prison, a prisoner can reasonably assume that their negative and positive actions will all lead to negative consequences, no matter what. There is no reward for good behavior. There is no policy that benefits prisoners. There is no incentive for progress and no recourse for this institution’s violation of prisoners’ rights or Red Onion’s repeated violations of its own stated procedure.
There will be more, because places like this, institutions that base their every action on oppression as a business model, government-funded human warehouses like Red Onion State Prison, which get away with penalizing prisoners arbitrarily, without any negative behavior to correct, are emboldened by their successes.
Things will get worse here.
Red Onion State Prison is warehousing men. There are no corrections in the Virginia Department of Corrections.
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