RECONSTRUCTING A SHATTERED LIFE:
 AN INTERVIEW WITH A JUVENILE OFFENDER
by Kurt MacPhearson


    On 4-19-1995, Patrick Kinney began serving a sentence of Second-Degree Life for his part in the murder of Michael Melfi.  Both Patrick and Michael were sixteen at the time.  We've heard stories about violent juvenile offenders and the abhorrent acts they've committed.  We see their faces on the front pages of newspapers and the teary expressions of distraught parents on the local news. But no one asks "what became of them?".  Legal, physiological and philosophical issues aside, these human beings aren't old enough to join their armed forces, but they've been sent off to a war in which they receive no support (many had none to begin with).  After these kids are shackled with Life without parole, or long, indeterminate sentences, we tend to forget about them.

    Try to imagine Patrick Kinney, ten years later, sitting in his cell in Manistee, Michigan, gazing through the obstructed view of a reinforced window, wondering what life could have been like if he'd made better decisions...

    Currently, Patrick is not allowed phone calls or visits with family or the media; his only contact with the world is through letters — letters he is not allowed to personally seal.  Some would say that he's lucky to have that much. Lucky? Maybe.  He's had plenty of time to think about that.

    I wrote to Patrick during the summer of '05.  I asked him about his life both then and now...

Kurt MacPhearson:  Fredrick Nietzche wrote: "He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how." What is your why?

Patrick Kinney:  For a long time I didn't have a "why," which is one of the reasons I believe I was able to commit the offense I did.  I was so terrified of being forever trapped in what I considered to be a hopeless and meaningless existence that I let myself be conned into believing that I could only find the happiness and belonging I wanted by following someone else's plan to run away, which he convinced me required taking someone else's life.
Afterwards, of course, when I finally sobered up and came to my senses, I realized that hurting other people will never get you what you desire.  Hurting others, no matter what your reasons, will only bring you misery, pain, and mind-numbing regret.
Now my "why" is to find meaning and fulfillment in my everyday life so I will never feel the need to take what I want from somebody else.  My "why" is to think of others, to use my life to try to make this world a little better.  I know I can never make up for what I did.  I just hope to be able to give back as much as I possibly can.

KM:  Why did you kill Michael Melfi?

PK:  At the time I was 16, an extremely depressed, insecure, drug-addicted, and lonely kid.  When I was 12, my mom remarried, and I felt driven out of my
own home, replaced by my stepfather.  I sought belonging with a group of rebellious older kids, and to try to fit in I started smoking, drinking, doing drugs, and shoplifting.  My stepfather reacted by punching me, kicking me in the groin, and finally giving me a bloody eye, after which I ran away from home, only to be picked up by the police and sent to live with my real dad in another town.
    I felt twice rejected, betrayed, ripped away from the people I loved.  But I had trouble making new friends.  I started starving myself and became anorexic, which led to depression, hopelessness, and constant suicidal thoughts.  In the end I felt so lonely and full of despair that when a boy at school asked me to run away with him I saw it as my last chance for both friendship and a life with some happiness and meaning.  He said he wanted to run away because he'd been caught stealing and was going to juvenile detention, that he needed me to drive because he didn't know how.  Once I agreed, he told me his plan was to steal his parent's van by killing them and anyone who got in the way, in order to get the keys and prevent them from calling the police.  I went along because I was already so suicidal, and I thought life was empty and meaningless.
    The psychologist who later evaluated me said I was "low in social adjustment," that I had difficulty with impulsive/erratic behavior, with understanding cause/effect relationships, and with functioning with other people.  He said I was experiencing severe stress, anxiety, and depression and that I tended to over-simplify complex or ambiguous situations.  But he also said that these characteristics were consistent with youth and could be changed over time with counseling.
    So I don't blame anyone else, and I take full responsibility, but the best answer I can give to why I did it is that I was a confused, depressed, messed-up, and selfish kid.

KM:  You were 16, turned yourself in, and pled guilty to Second-Degree Murder, yet you still got a life sentence.  Many people would say that you got what you deserved, no matter how young you were.  Did you?

PK:  No.  I deserved death.  I took a life, therefore my life should have been taken.  But should juveniles like me who've really changed and shown true remorse one day get a second chance?  I guess that's a question everyone has to answer for himself.  At least some brain researchers think so.  They've found that the area of the brain that handles self-control, thinking ahead, and resistance to peer-pressure is far from fully developed at age 16.  The US Supreme Court, in striking down the juvenile death penalty, said that not only are juveniles not as morally responsible as adults, but most simply grow out of delinquent behavior.  Other researchers have found that alcohol and nicotine, not to mention drugs, impair juvenile brain functioning to a much greater degree than adults' (I smoked and was drunk and on drugs at the time), and that the blood-brain barrier, which prevents toxins in the blood from reaching the brain, is weakened by malnutrition.  Many people have joined a movement in Michigan to change the law, as has been done in other states, to require that juveniles sentenced to life be released after 25 years.
    No, I don't want to spend the rest of my life in prison, but after many long years of soul-searching, I've come to the conclusion that I can accept it.  I probably deserve worse, and ultimately it matters more who you are and how you treat others than where you happen to be.

KM:  In September 2003 you attempted to escape, and you are now in "solitary confinement" for an indeterminate time.  What was going through your mind when you decided to make the attempt, and how about now?  Any regrets?

PK:  I was afraid.  I think few people really understand what it's like to be a young, clean-cut, "pretty," white-boy in prison.  At first I had hope
that one day the nightmare would end, that I'd either be paroled or that my appeal would be granted and I'd be re-sentenced to a term of years I could actually serve. But as the years went by, I learned that the parole board releases less than 1% of parolable lifers.  All my appeals were denied.
    This was before I'd written my autobiography, examined my past in detail, and truly came to understand what led me to commit my offense in the first place (contrary to popular belief there's virtually no psycho-therapy in prison unless it's self-administered, which writing the autobiography certainly was for me).  I didn't realize how large a role my depression and hopelessness played in my offense, so I didn't recognize that I was making the same mistake in trying to escape.  I thought that if I didn't deliberately hurt anyone it would be different.
    Now I see I was wrong.  Not only did I destroy what little chance I did have for parole, but worst of all, another prisoner was wrongfully accused of and punished for helping me.  So I do regret trying to escape.  I wish I hadn't and I never will again.  I now understand that you can't commit selfish and reckless acts without hurting someone.  But at least now I can recognize and stop anything similar from happening again.

KM:  You've been in prison now for over ten years.  What is the hardest part of the whole experience?

PK:  Knowing that I took a life and ruined the lives of so many others.  It is excruciatingly painful to live with that.  It haunts me every day of my life, as it should.  But now it's nothing compared to what I put others through.  Words cannot fully express how sorry I am.  I once considered taking my own life to make up for it until I realized that nothing can make up for what I did.  It would only further hurt my family and be a waste of my potential to share what I've learned to try to make a positive contribution.

KM:  Shed a little light on your appeal process.

PK:  My first appeal was based on the rule that a judge can't consider your race or religion as a basis for your sentence.  My judge said that because I'd become a Christian, I could accept a harsher punishment.  That appeal was denied because my lawyer didn't raised the issue at the proper time.
The only way I can file another appeal is if there's a retroactive change in the law.  On March 1, 2005, the US Supreme Court retroactively banned the death penalty for 16- and 17-year-olds.  Even though I wasn't sentenced to death, this affected me because a judge can't base a sentence, even in part, on inaccurate information, and my judge said, "in some other states you could be facing the death penalty."  While this was true at the time, even the juveniles who were sentenced to death before I committed my offense cannot be executed now.  Which means that even if I had been in another state, I would never have faced the death penalty, so my sentence should not be enhanced based on that argument.
    I'm hoping to file an appeal on this issue, which at most would result in a new sentence to a term of years that I'll eventually be able to serve.

KM:  What do you do with your time?

PK:  Write short stories, poems and letters, work on my MBA correspondence degree (paid for by family), read, exercise, and try to learn as much as I can.  I'm hoping my autobiography will help increase understanding of and help prevent juvenile violence and contribute to charities for at-risk kids.

KM:  How do you keep your sanity?

PK:  By staying busy and trusting in God.  I used to try to block out all thoughts about what happened and what will likely happen, but that's been impossible with writing my book.  Reopening those old wounds was difficult, but it was the only way to learn and heal.  In fact, I never would have done
it if I hadn't failed in my escape attempt.  So even though I wish I hadn't tried to escape, I'm actually glad, in a way, that I failed because real spiritual and character growth is worth much more than empty physical freedom.

KM:  What's your faith like now?

PK:  I believe that the purpose of life, true happiness, and oneness with God comes from faith and helping and loving others and finding fulfillment in your every day life, which is how I try to live my life now.

KM:  Anything you want to say to the world?

PK:  I'm more sorry than I can say.  I did a terrible thing and I deserve to be punished.  I would ask for forgiveness, but I don't want to put anyone who doesn't want to forgive me in the position of having to refuse.  They have a right to their anger.  I understand what I did and I wish more than anything in the world I could change it.

[Patrick Kinney recently published his autobiography, All the Rivers Run.]