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Comment by dvektor | Hacker News Reader

Story of how I went from international drug trafficker, to hardened convict, to a back-end web dev/open source Rust enthusiast, and college student all from my prison cell, from where I am writing this post.

Link to the blog post with my story at the bottom of the README. (or https://PThorpe92.github.io but I would prefer you check out the project ;) I tried sharing this previously, but there wasn't a blog post to go along with it. It took a while for me to decide how much to share. But either way, sorry the post is so long, that's about as short as it could be condensed into. Constructive criticism on the project is appreciated, just keep in mind it's still in pre-0.1

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Really cool story, rooting for you

Well told story. Thanks for sharing.

There is a lot to unpack and a lot of comments I could make, but the main one is that you had that chance at your current prison to both have access to resources to better your chances, to even get good employment and to not deal with basic street survival in prison. I think more prisons should offer this. There is a balance obviously some will abuse it but they should be offering an environment for people to “correct”.

The “conservative” and “progressive” politics should both want this. This reduces crime, reduces cost for government, increases tax revenue, and is humane.

This is particularly why I feel a strong sense of responsibility to succeed and not abuse any privileges. I think the obvious reasons that this isn't more normal, are that they would just be abused. Who on earth would trust an inmate with internet access?

So as one of the first, it's my particular duty to show that a program like this can succeed and there are many of us that could be trusted and want to change. Thanks for taking the time to read it.

That post was fascinating. You are a model example of what progressive prison reform can accomplish and your story should be getting major press coverage if it hasn't already.

The Maine model of corrections indeed gets a fair amount of coverage in the "space" of criminal justice reform, as they are essentially carving the path. But outside that bubble (linkedin seems to be where a lot of that space is focused, but that could totally just be my perception as it's the only social media I'm allowed :P), it doesn't appear that many people really care.

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