The following is a list of activities that you can complete to help bring awareness to your loved one's case:
- Create a website using this website as a template. A good advocacy website should include good photographs that include the inmate smiling, posing with family members, or achieving a GED, degree, or other photos that illustrate a measure of success. The website should include a description of the crime - be specific and honest. If there were any injustices in the case, be sure to include those, but don't make the injustices the sole focus of the website. Be sure to include any certificates of Achievement or Awards earned. Support letters should also be included. The inmate should also write a letter sharing his crime, any injustices that occurred, expressing remorse, and describing how his or her time has been occupied while in prison and what their plans are for the future. Be sure to include a call to action that tells people exactly what they can do to help and give several ways to contact you.
- Create an online petition. We used www.change.org for Lenny's petition. You can reuse the same letter your inmate wrote for the website. The petition that you or your lawyer will file with the Governor's Office should be very different from this petition. We included comments and the number of signatures Lenny received from the online petition within the petition we filed, but by far, that was not all. The online petition was a small fraction of what we submitted with the Governor's office. The petition you submit to the Governor's Office should illustrate and stress the extraordinary circumstances in your loved one's case as well as any and all reforming activities your loved one has been involved in while incarcerated. If there aren't any extraordinary circumstances and your loved one hasn't been doing anything to improve themselves, then you probably shouldn't submit a petition for a conditional pardon.
- Other Social Media Avenues - create accounts in Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest just to name a few. Any and all social media avenues will need to be worked. They won't be of any use to you or your loved one if they aren't worked daily. Either let committee members all take-on posting daily to one of these, or if it is just you, choose one or two to focus on. I chose Facebook.
- Create a Facebook page for your loved one. Post the petition and the website on Facebook. Ask for signatures on the petition. You need to work Facebook for it to work for you. This means you need to make daily post, preferably different, everyday. I pretty much worked 4 hours a day for 5 years to get the attention Lenny's case got. To mix it up, I looked for articles online about mass incarceration, excessive sentencing, judicial reform, etc. - anything that was remotely linked to Lenny's case. Then I would post a comment on the article and link it to Lenny's Facebook account. After doing this for 3 years, someone from The New York Times found one of those comments and contacted us to do a story which eventually ran on the cover of The New York Times. Below you will found an example of a comment I would leave - this one can be found on www.vanjones.net.
The perfect example of why we need criminal justice reform in this country - comment on www.Vanjones.net by Lenny's wife
Posted on July 26, 2015
Vandy here! For the past 3 years I have felt so alone fighting against the criminal justice system for my fiance, Lenny Singleton. Lenny and I met over 30 years ago in high school. I searched for Lenny for over 28 years before finding him in 2012 incarcerated in Nottoway Correctional Center in Burkeville, Virginia. He committed 8 "grab and dash" robberies in a 6 day period while in the throes of his addiction to crack cocaine. For 6 of these robberies he received 2 Life Sentences plus 100 years with no chance of parole. He is scheduled to die in prison. When I heard this, I thought, "OMG, how many people did Lenny kill?" Lenny did not kill anyone. In fact, there is not one victim that made a statement against him. He stole a total of less than $600, and this was his first felony. Lenny earned a college degree and served in our Navy 3 years before he allowed his addiction to destroy his life. To date, he has served 20 years. He will cost the American taxpayers well over a million dollars to keep him in prison for the rest of his life -- for stealing less than $600 and no one filed as a victim??? When I learned Lenny's fate, I began writing everyone I could think of -- am still writing everyone I can think of to bring attention to Lenny's situation. Lenny and I also began writing each other. As I began catching Lenny up over the past 28 years I realized that I was in a horrid state of being and with Lenny's encouragement, I began walking and making better food choices. In 4 months I lost 60 lbs, so much weight that I was able to feel the lump in my left armpit. Seven surgeries later, chemo, and radiation, I am diagnosed with Stage IV Triple Negative Breast Cancer -- another death sentence. I am not paralyzed from the neck down or dead right now because of my reunion with Lenny. That reunion created a Miracle in my life and now I am trying to create a Miracle in his life. To that end, we have written and published a book together, "Love Conquers All," and I will be marrying Lenny while incarcerated this August -- because he saved my life, because we are hoping this will bring the attention to his situation, because I believe in his reformed nature 110%, because I love him dearly. I need him. I need the American public to become aware of his situation. Justice will not have been served if Lenny dies in prison. And his time while incarcerated stands testament to his reformed nature. He has not received a single infraction for anything during his entire 20 years in prison. He deserves a second chance. Learn more at www.justice4lenny.org. And anyone out there that can help me bring Lenny's situation to light, email me at vandys_nature@live.com. Thank you Van for everything that you do. You are fast becoming my own personal hero.
Vandy here! For the past 3 years I have felt so alone fighting against the criminal justice system for my fiance, Lenny Singleton. Lenny and I met over 30 years ago in high school. I searched for Lenny for over 28 years before finding him in 2012 incarcerated in Nottoway Correctional Center in Burkeville, Virginia. He committed 8 "grab and dash" robberies in a 6 day period while in the throes of his addiction to crack cocaine. For 6 of these robberies he received 2 Life Sentences plus 100 years with no chance of parole. He is scheduled to die in prison. When I heard this, I thought, "OMG, how many people did Lenny kill?" Lenny did not kill anyone. In fact, there is not one victim that made a statement against him. He stole a total of less than $600, and this was his first felony. Lenny earned a college degree and served in our Navy 3 years before he allowed his addiction to destroy his life. To date, he has served 20 years. He will cost the American taxpayers well over a million dollars to keep him in prison for the rest of his life -- for stealing less than $600 and no one filed as a victim??? When I learned Lenny's fate, I began writing everyone I could think of -- am still writing everyone I can think of to bring attention to Lenny's situation. Lenny and I also began writing each other. As I began catching Lenny up over the past 28 years I realized that I was in a horrid state of being and with Lenny's encouragement, I began walking and making better food choices. In 4 months I lost 60 lbs, so much weight that I was able to feel the lump in my left armpit. Seven surgeries later, chemo, and radiation, I am diagnosed with Stage IV Triple Negative Breast Cancer -- another death sentence. I am not paralyzed from the neck down or dead right now because of my reunion with Lenny. That reunion created a Miracle in my life and now I am trying to create a Miracle in his life. To that end, we have written and published a book together, "Love Conquers All," and I will be marrying Lenny while incarcerated this August -- because he saved my life, because we are hoping this will bring the attention to his situation, because I believe in his reformed nature 110%, because I love him dearly. I need him. I need the American public to become aware of his situation. Justice will not have been served if Lenny dies in prison. And his time while incarcerated stands testament to his reformed nature. He has not received a single infraction for anything during his entire 20 years in prison. He deserves a second chance. Learn more at www.justice4lenny.org. And anyone out there that can help me bring Lenny's situation to light, email me at vandys_nature@live.com. Thank you Van for everything that you do. You are fast becoming my own personal hero.