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You Are Only Innocent Once, and Once Is Not Enough shows how one man manages to break free of the recidivism cycle and maintain his freedom by going to college while in prison and achieves unparalleled success after his release.
A former drug abuser and ex-felon, Martin Terrell is arrested for a crime he didn’t commit and sentenced to six to twenty-five years in prison. His claims of innocence are dismissed by all who know him because of his past record. Forced to face the injustice alone, he vows to write a new life story, one that no longer fits the story he’d written as a youth in Cincinnati.
Inside again, he manages to control his environment to his advantage and attends the college program offered by the Chillicothe Correctional Institution and Ohio University. Five years later, he graduates summa cum laude with a bachelor’s degree. In an unprecedented move, he is awarded a graduate scholarship to the Scripps School of Journalism at Ohio University upon his release.
The rest of the book follows Martin’s new script as it unfolds through graduate school at OU and his following career. He becomes the coauthor of a textbook while still a master’s student. After working for two years as a member of Ohio University’s development office, he is appointed the assistant dean for development in the College of Arts and Sciences. With stops at Florida State University and eventually the United Negro College Fund, he becomes his own man as the vice president and campaign manager for development at Stony Brook University in New York.
In this age of civil unrest with its focus on civil injustice and an unjust criminal justice system, You Are Only Innocent Once, and Once Is Not Enough offers a strand of redemption. The story of a man unfairly stripped of his freedom, primarily because he’s black and has a previous record, contains all the elements that are under assault for criminal justice reform and penal reform. Martin’s use of education to win a victory over that injustice gives us a success story that anyone can identify with.
