FMEP is asking our supporters and advocates to take action today and sign a change.org petition seeking clemency for Joseph Navarette.
Navarette has served 31 years on a Death by Incarceration sentence. His wife is Yolanda Navarette is a leader in the movement to end LWOP (life without parole). She’s always there to serve the interests of the whole; her fight along with ours is to End/Drop LWOP. Yolanda is active in FUEL (Families United to End LWOP), Felony Murder Elimination Project, Drop LWOP, and other criminal justice reform organizations.
Please sign the petition here—>>> Clemency: Joseph P. Navarrete has served 31 yrs/Life with OUT the possibility of parole, as well as sharing the petition on your social media feeds and in your networks.
An excerpt from Joseph Navarette, taken from the petition;
I am proud to have overcome all those obstacles of addiction. I have come a long way from being that reckless young man in 1994. I realized, if I had been sober to begin with none of this would have happened. In 1996, I dedicated my life to sobriety. I just had to keep learning and growing to be a better person each day. I can think and see so much clearer making better choices. I am a humble man and have dedicated myself to our native ways and be a positive ELDER role model, not just for myself, but for all those around me, friends, Correctional officers and family.
I have many support letters from long-term staff, facilitators, friends, family and Correctional officers. They all witnessed the accountability and maturity taking place over the years. I started out as an angry addicted young man with a 26-year-old chip on my shoulder. I have worked hard on my self and am proud that I have become the positive elder to fellow brothers in here. I am now 58 years old and I have 29 years into my sobriety. I facilitate the Native American Sacred Sweat Ceremonies. I am honored to facilitate sacred ceremonial prayers for 29 years. Through prayer I have found my purpose. During this process, I have grown spiritually, physically and mentally.
Your time and willingness to share the petition can and will make a difference.
Every one of our sisters and brothers that comes home from this other death penalty makes us stronger, and so many have become active in the fight to End/Drop LWOP. A life without parole sentence is a cruel and inhumane punishment that denies human dignity, removes the possibility of rehabilitation, ignores human change over time, and fails to acknowledge the influence of factors like poverty and trauma that diminish individual culpability. It is a form of “hidden death penalty” and contradicts the principles of mercy, hope, and the potential for redemption.
Life without parole sentences have essentially the same result as death penalty sentences: a slow aging behind bars and death in prison, and the use of LWOP sentences a number that has quadrupled since 1992. The Sentencing Project reported in 2017 that about 53,000 Americans are serving this hopeless sentence which Pope Francis called “a death penalty in disguise.”
As always, we are deeply grateful for the dedication and advocacy of our supporters as we continue the hard work toward a fairer and more just criminal justice system.
