Violent Offender Program (VOP)

In 1996, three inmates at the Missouri Eastern Correctional Center created the "Violent Offender Program."  This unique intensive self-help program is run by inmate facilitators themselves, challenging other inmates to identify their criminal patterns of thinking and behavior, take full responsibility for their actions, and create a program for changing these patterns.  The men who survive the intense 36 sessions over 14 weeks move into relapse prevention and work on restorative justice, making amends to their family members, victims, and the community.  The story of VOP is written in a 40-page book entitled AMAZING GRACE: THE STORY OF THE VOP.  This book presents a history and outline of the program, with some of the key tools and processes, plus testimonies from VOP members and several VICs (Volunteers in Corrections) working with VOP.  It concludes with some of the restorative justice projects the men are running and a copy of the Prison Pledge of Nonviolence.  Dr. James McGinnis, IPJ (Institute for Peace & Justice) Program Director, has been working as a VIC with VOP since 1998.

Prison Pledge of Nonviolence

One of IPJ’s major contributions to VOP has been to help the men formulate and implement the Prison Pledge of Nonviolence which they adapted from IPJ’s Family Pledge. The men write an essay quarterly on their efforts to put the Pledge into practice.  The best of these essays were published in the Summer 2001 issue of the PPJN/FAVAN Newsletter.  To read two of these essays, click on  "Listening Carefully" and "Forgive…"  The whole issue is available with AMAZING GRACE from IPJ.  As one VOP facilitator put it, "I was a murderer who came to prison and became a ‘murderer’ on the basketball court, causing more victims.  But through the blessing of VOP, the Pledge, and my peers really challenging me to become my best self, I am becoming a new person."

“Come on, you can do this, Kameika.  I know you can.  You’ve shown us how sharp you are.  You can do it.”  I was amazed at Gary’s positive tone and attitude toward this rebellious high school student.  But he could really identify with her, for he had been that student 35 years ago.  Now, after serving a 20-year prison term as a violent offender, he was teaching part of the “Violent Offender Program” (VOP) he helped create in prison to a group of St. Louis public school students.

It was Gary Ingram who invited me seven years ago to be an “outside” facilitator for VOP at Missouri Eastern Correctional Center, and it was Gary who helped me find my place in the program.  Besides helping to facilitate the VOP sessions and strengthen the facilitation skills of the inmate facilitators, I began helping to spread the word of this remarkable program.  First, we wrote the story of the program in AMAZING GRACE.  Then we adapted the Family Pledge of Nonviolence and made it a Prison Pledge of Nonviolence and created a special issue of the IPJ Newsletter around this Pledge.  I sent these materials to hundreds of others in prison or prison ministry across the US and brought some local colleagues in social services to experience VOP for themselves.  All the while I had this sense that these inmate facilitators had skills and values that could make a real difference in the lives of other adults and youth whose behavior had gotten them in trouble.  When Gary and another ex-VOP facilitator, Michael Nunn, were released in 2004, it was time to see if my sense was accurate.

Thanks to small grants from the Safe & Drug-Free Schools Program in the St. Louis Public Schools and from two Catholic religious communities, we were able to create and conduct several pilot programs around the nonviolent problem-solving process in VOP.  17 students with disciplinary problems at Sumner High School were mandated to be part of our 6-week program on the “SOS Process” (“Solving Our Situations”).  It was the worst possible set-up – 2 hours after a long school day for youth who clearly didn’t want to be there.  Several of the youth never showed up. Those who did show up clearly wanted to test Gary, my daughter Theresa, and I.   After three weeks I was almost ready to quit, but not Gary.  Amazingly, by the end of the six weeks, five of the students made it through and were delighted to receive their certificates.  The two Sumner teachers that we trained prior to the student program were equally amazed at the progress of the five students.  They agreed to create an on-going support process for these students and recommended to the principal that this material be incorporated into the school’s “Character Education” course.

The second pilot program on the “SOS Process” involved both Gary and Michael.  The Center for Women in Transition in St. Louis works with women coming out of prison – providing mentors as well as a range of other services.  They asked us to train a CWIT team of two CWIT staff, two mentors (one was Kathy McGinnis) and two ex-offenders.   This pilot was so successful that they asked Gary and Kathy to train the whole CWIT staff.  The original CWIT team is now finishing up its first program for other CWIT mentors and ex-offenders and a second one will begin in May.  In addition, CWIT is funding a special SOS program for 11 other ex-offenders moving into a transition home, with Kathy, Theresa, and one of the ex-offenders forming the training team.

When we hear so many horror stories about what goes on in prison and about how difficult it often is for ex-offenders to re-integrate into society, Gary and Michael are truly rays of hope.