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THE POSSIBILITY OF JUSTICE FOR TERRENCE HEARD  
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Tony Vick and Brandon Arvesen
May 14, 2024
The Progressive
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_ Two bills, currently under consideration in Tennessee, could change
sentencing rules that keep many inside prisons for too long. _

Terrence Heard, (Courtesy of Adrienne Heard).

 

About fifty men are gathered in a small prison chapel. Most are
regular attendees of the only inmate-led service on the compound,
which meets every Wednesday night. There is no preacher from the free
world who has brought this group together. Instead, it is Terrence
Heard—a well-respected, learned, and incarcerated minister. Heard
strikes an imposing figure, but his smile and laughter bring an
infectious joy to anyone around him. Tonight, he is speaking to a
crowd that includes some men who are gang affiliated. 

Heard, who was convicted of charges related to a murder during a
kidnapping, has been serving a life sentence plus twenty-five years
since 1997. If he had taken the State of Tennessee’s plea deal for
fifteen years, he would be a free man right now. 

Heard claims he did not murder anyone, and court testimony
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him up. He will die in prison if the state’s sentencing laws remain
the same. There are currently bills in both the Tennessee House and
Senate—HB 2785
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lessen Heard’s sentence as well as that of many others. The bills
remove the criminal responsibility for conduct of another person—a
reversal of what is often categorized as “felony murder,” various
laws enacted around the country which hold people liable for murder if
they participated in or were present for a crime that resulted in
someone’s death. If the legislation passes in Tennessee, Heard would
be able to reverse his first-degree murder conviction.

As a member of one of several sets of the “Gangster Disciples” in
Memphis, Heard was convicted on September 15, 1998, after witness
testimony identified him as being involved in the kidnapping and
assault of Ricky Aldridge and the kidnapping and murder of Marshall
“Pokey” Shipp. 

On November 28, 1997, the Associated Press reported
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“Marshal ‘Pokey’ Shipp made a fatal mistake. He stuck his nose
in gang business where it didn't belong, a court witness said. Ricky
‘Kuboo’ Aldridge, twenty, said he and Shipp, his
thirty-one-year-old cousin, fell afoul of the Gangster Disciples, were
tried by the gang, and beaten for their indiscretions.” 

The article goes on to explain that Aldridge survived the encounter
and testified against thirteen young men, “all identified as gang
members.” Of the thirteen, five were charged with kidnapping,
robbery, and first-degree murder. The other eight faced facilitating
murder, robbery, and kidnapping. 

During the trial, Heard’s name would not appear in any newspaper
article in relation to the case, though he faced the same trial and
charges for Shipp and Aldridge. He would eventually be lumped together
as one of fifteen gang members involved. It wasn’t until October of
2021, on the back pages of _The Commercial Appeal_
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a Memphis daily newspaper, that Heard’s fate was covered in
twenty-three words: “The following was convicted by jury after
trial: Terrence Heard, first degree murder, life imprisonment; two
counts especially aggravated kidnapping, twenty-five years.” 

Heard has been in prison for twenty-six years. The story of how he got
there, buried in newspaper clippings and court records, poorly
captures the past two and a half decades of his life. Without looking
at how Heard has spent these years in prison, he would be just another
faceless gangster—one of the more than 50,000 Gangster Disciples
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the country. I’ve known Heard for about twenty-five years. I ran
into him at the first prison I was assigned to in Whiteville,
Tennessee. I was naïve to prison culture and especially gang culture.
I was told to steer clear of the gangs. My impression of him was
simply that I didn’t want to be around him—he had a seemingly
intimidating manner as he moved through the prison with his fellow
gang members.  

After twenty-eight years in prison now, I have learned more wisdom
when it comes to making snap judgements of people. When I first met
Heard, I knew nothing about the life that originally led him to join
the gang. 

I did not know that both his mother and father were in and out of
prison, and gangsters themselves. I didn’t know that he had lived as
a homeless person for many of his teenage years and that his desire to
be safe while living in the streets of Memphis pushed him toward gang
life. 

Years passed, and later, after many prison transfers, I met Heard
again in Clifton, Tennessee. At that point, he had been in Clifton
since 2003. He is now my dear friend. 

After getting his GED in prison, he embarked on self-led education,
intensely studying the Bible and other Christian texts. Many of us
have been inspired by Heard and his words. He became a moral compass
that others look to in order to find direction. He’s a gentle bear
whose strength is in words and not in violence, in love and not in
chaos. He is slow to speak, choosing his words carefully and
deliberately. He is always well prepared, well read, and fully engaged
when speaking to one person or a group of people. His life story, his
ongoing battle for freedom, and his great faith allow those around him
to believe that change is possible, and that hope is on the horizon. 

Terrence Heard and his wife, Adrienne Heard (courtesy of Adrienne
Heard).

Affiliated and non-affiliated church goers listen intently to
Heard’s sermons. “When my life began to unravel in a way that took
me down a crash course, and my soul was hurting, and my heart was
broken,” he said at one service, “the one thing that kept me from
totally sinking is my faith in God.”

I asked him one day about how he got in this predicament. He said,
“I was just twenty-four, and the organization [the Gangster
Disciples] was a big deal in my young eyes. I wasn’t bold enough to
challenge them. I was offered a plea deal for facilitation with a
sentence of fifteen years at 100 percent. I refused the plea deal . .
.  primarily because I struggled with the thought of taking
responsibility for the death of Mr. Shipp. I don’t deserve to be in
prison for his murder. The young man that I was, that associated
himself with that organization, has long turned his life around for
over two decades now.” 

I’ve learned a great deal about myself, the justice system, and the
culture of prison by observing and listening to Heard. What I can say
with confidence is that I’ve learned that we cannot always count on
the justice system to get it right and that there is always more to
the story if one takes a little time to discover what’s underneath
appearances. 

What does it say that the justice system felt it appropriate to offer
Heard fifteen years for his part in the crime, but decided at trial to
make him pay severely for declaring his innocence of murder, and give
him more than a life sentence? How is justice served by keeping Heard
in prison forever? 

The United States is the only country that still uses the “felony
murder” legal doctrine—and it has impacted
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across the country, targeting
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women, and people of color. There has been momentum toward reform,
with states like Illinois
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and California
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bills like what has been proposed in Tennessee.

There is no transparent data
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Tennessee are impacted by felony murder, but through my own experience
of incarceration, I have met others like Heard. If these bills pass,
Tennessee would join the group of states pushing for reform and
resentencing of people who did not commit murder, but are spending
life in prison under first-degree murder sentences. 

Nothing can erase the twenty-six years that Heard has been
incarcerated. But with this proposed legislation, Tennessee has an
opportunity to correct an injustice that has been placed on Terrence
Heard and many others.

_Tony Vick has served almost three decades of a life with parole
sentence in Tennessee. He writes about captivity in the hope of
contributing to the prison reform movement._

_Brandon Arvesen teaches undergraduate writing at Colby-Sawyer College
in New London, New Hampshire. He is the founding editor of 3cents
Magazine, a managing editor of True Magazine, and a nonfiction
writer._

_Since 1909, The Progressive has aimed to amplify voices of dissent
and those under-represented in the mainstream, with a goal of
championing grassroots progressive politics. Our bedrock values are
nonviolence and freedom of speech.  Based in Madison, Wisconsin, we
publish on national politics, culture, and events including U.S.
foreign policy; we also focus on issues of particular importance to
the heartland. Two flagship projects of The
Progressive include Public School Shakedown
[[link removed]], which covers efforts
to resist the privatization of public education, and The Progressive
Media Project [[link removed]], aiming to diversify our
nation’s op-ed pages. We are a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. _

* Mass Incarceration
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* felony murder
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* criminal justice reform
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* Tennessee
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