Tom Barton in the Savannah Morning News:
From outside, you can only visualize what it’s like for the 1,500-plus inmates inside.
One is Cedric D. Arrington. He’s 50 years old, according to the inmate registry on the state Department of Corrections Web site. He’s serving 18 years without parole for an armed robbery he committed two years ago in Houston County, just south of Macon.
Why a middle-aged man with only one other conviction (theft by receiving stolen property in 2002) would rob someone isn’t spelled out. Clearly, he wasn’t good at it.
However, Arrington wrote a two-page, heart-felt letter to this newspaper last week. In it, he expressed his gratitude to Savannah-area volunteers who spent four days with him and 35 other inmates last week in serious soul-searching as part of the Kairos Prison Ministry.
“This event laid the foundation for a transformation of the spirit by renewing the spirit of the mind,” Arrington wrote. “These men sacrificed time away from their families this past weekend, so that a spiritual awakening could take place in our lives and that we could become part of God’s spiritual family within ourselves.”