My Story

By Ford Strafaci

My name is Ford. I am currently serving a life sentence in the Arkansas
Department of Correction and have been imprisoned since Oct. 25, 1983. I
am trying to recount to you some of my life in the hopes that you or
someone (anyone) who may read it may benefit from my mistakes.

I had an average childhood I guess; my folks divorced when I was ten. I
stayed with mom. I was glad to see my father go or so I thought at the time,
but now I know that he was just an average father and not the monster that
I had imagined when I was a child. My mom remarried when I was twelve
and we moved to Arkansas. It took me some years to warm up to my new
dad, but I know now that he did the best that he could in difficult times and I
dearly love him for it.

I went to a small school here and I made the senior class president and
graduated with honors. I got a government grant to go to college  and off I
went. I’m sure that this sounds fairly normal and boring so far, but I went to
college in Louisiana because the drinking age there in the 70’s was 18 and I
really liked to drink beer. I found plenty of people in college to help me drink;
lots of drinking and smoking dope. My grades really suffered. I had a wreck
in the Dunkin-Donuts parking lot (I was high and had the munchies). I was
arrested for DWI coming back from the homecoming game that cost me
$800.00 that I didn’t have. I got behind in my bills and ended my first year at
college owing a lot of money. I spent that whole summer staying stoned and
never went back to school.

I spent the next six years, until my arrest, bouncing from job to job, place to
place; never committing to anything or anyone. I stayed high or stoned on
some kind of drug most of that time. I think I tried every drug but heroin and
I finally got hooked on speed (methamphetamine). I lied, I stole, and I
burglarized places trying to get money for speed, but really just any kind of
drug if I couldn’t find any speed. I stole payphones and newspaper
machines, I robbed my own grandmother’s house, and I even robbed church
houses to get money to buy drugs. That is really a pitiful, lonely, and very
dangerous way to live.

I went from an honor student with lots of friends and a bright future to a drug
addict skulking about in the night looking for a fix with few acquaintances
and far fewer friends.

I’m sure that you have heard the saying, “Bird of a feather flock together”,
and it is a very true saying. I ended up running with several other “speed
freaks” and it wasn’t long before we had the bright idea to start a “meth
lab”. All we needed was a moneyman to set us up with the cookware and
the chemicals, and we found one.

Truthfully, I entered into this deal knowing I was likely to end up in prison or
even dead because drug deals are subject to go bad. There were 6 of us
involved directly with this lab. The lab only lasted about 6 weeks. We would
stay up “wired” on speed for about a week at a time cooking this dope.
When you stay up for 7 days straight with no sleep and little food, you are
going to start acting crazy pretty fast. To make a long story short, I will not
go into all the gory details, our partnership fell apart when some of us
started thinking that the others were plotting against us to steal the lab and
split. The whole thing came down to a gunfight that left two men dead and
me with a smoking gun in my hands. I stood there looking at these men I
had killed and I felt like part of me had died as well. How could this happen?
I thought these men were my friends, they thought I was their friend, yet I
had killed them.

We buried them out in the woods trying to hide the dirty deed. We took the
lab and went to Atlanta where the moneyman lived. We tried to act natural,
to forget. I couldn’t forget. Every night my dreams were filled with slow
motion replays of my terrible deeds. It was eating me up. How could I have
killed my friends? I cried myself to sleep many nights.

Men can’t just disappear. Their family searched for them. A curious hunter
found two bodies in a shallow grave. When they were identified, the police
came searching for us and they found us. We were not really hiding and we
had a story we thought would cover it. The police didn’t really believe our
lame story maybe they didn’t believe me because my conscience was
kicking me so hard that my teeth chattered when I tried to talk to them. That
was on Oct. 24, 1983. They let us go for some reason that day, but
arrested us the next day.




We stayed in Georgia about a week before being extradited back to
Arkansas. We were charged with Capitol Murder and Manufacturing. So
many things happened around that time, endless interrogations, moving here
and there, statements, drug withdrawals, nightmares, and I deserved it all. I
had killed two of my friends. I had hurt my family and their families to the
heart. I was facing the death penalty and I knew I absolutely deserved to
die. I was a worthless excuse for a human being, one who had done just
about every bad thing there is to do. As they say in prison, I wasn’t worth
two dead flies.

About this time, a man came around from one of the local churches, just
talking and listening, and he gave us pocket bibles and asked us to read the
book of  John. I had gone to churches as a child and even as a teenager so
I had heard about Jesus, but I always said that I wasn’t ready to come to
God. I thought that I was too young or something or I wanted more
experience of the world, which is just another way of saying that I wanted to
keep on sinning for awhile.

When I started to read the book of John, I remembered John 3:16 “For God
so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever
believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” I kept reading
the first three chapters over and over and that preacher kept coming around
to talk to us. In the middle of the night on Nov. 6, 1983, I awoke from my
usual murder nightmare and I started crying and I told God that I didn’t want
to be a lying, thieving, murdering, drug addict anymore. Please forgive me
and change me into a good person, a child of God (John 1:12). Please take
away these nightmares and let me have peace.

I cried and prayed like that for a few minutes- laying on a thin mattress, on a
cold floor- when suddenly something went through me from the top of my
head to the soles of my feet, to the tips of my fingers, like a wave of some
kind that left behind calm and peace and joy. I knew that it was the hand of
God who had heard my cries and answered, washing away all that old junk,
cleansing me, making me a new man.

I never had that nightmare again- not once! I have never wanted drugs
again. I did take a toke from a joint in 1984 and again in 1985. I even let
another person talk me into shooting “meth” a couple times in 1985, but I
didn’t want it. It has no power over me and I have been absolutely drug-free
ever since. I even quit smoking cigarettes on Dec. 31, 1986. I am a work in
progress, a building under supervision of the Holy Spirit, and I am confident
that what God has begun, He is well able to finish.

I spent six months in that county jail facing trial for Capitol Murder, facing the
death penalty, but not worried. We studied the bible and did a lot of praying
and when someone came around offering a life sentence for a guilty plea, I
said, “Where do I sign?” for I am most assuredly guilty of murder. I was
confident and am confident that my God has plans for me and I am trusting
in Him and His love.

I could go on and on about what God has done for me in the last 20 plus
years. Suffice it to say that He has protected me (Psalms 27:1) and
directed my paths (Proverbs 3:5-6) even when I was stubborn or did
something foolish. My Heavenly Father has been patient and loving with me
always.

I know that you are thinking that you would never let these things happen to
you or that you would never be so stupid. It doesn’t matter because the
point is that we all face the death penalty. Every person born on this earth
will die sooner or later and we are all sinners, as it is written, “There is none
righteous, no not one.” (Romans 3:10), “For all have sinned and fallen short
of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23) The wages of sin (penalty for all of our
misdeeds) is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord
(Romans 6:23)

Think about it- the heavens and the earth did not just accidentally happen. It
is all too well structured, governed by immutable laws, for it to be
accidental. Therefore, since there is a God, a Creator, should we not seek
to know Him who created the whole universe and us?

Jesus is the Son of God. He took on the flesh of man. He performed the
work that His Father sent Him to do, work that no other man could have
accomplished. He gave Himself, literally gave His life, shed the blood of His
body to enable us to be saved. He went to hell and took the keys of death
and hell away from the prince of this world, that is Satan. He arose- He got
up- out of the grave on the third day. Now He sits at the right hand of the
most high, the Almighty Creator of all things. This Creator earnestly desires
for us to know Him and His love- That is why Jesus came- that is why Jesus
now intercedes for us. Come to Jesus. “Whoever calls on the name of the
Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:13)
                                                                            
                                                          Much Love,
                                                          A brother in Christ,