In April 2023, I was sent to the receiving and distribution department at Pennsylvania’s State Correctional Institution, Fayette, to pack my property for a transfer. I squeezed all of my belongings, accumulated over three decades, into one footlocker and two property boxes. I took special care with my most important items: my books, my TV and my typewriter.

When I received the property at my new facility, SCI Mercer, it arrived with a fourth box alongside the original three. My belongings had been repacked. Then I noticed that my typewriter was damaged. The viewing screen was nonresponsive and the casing was cracked and loose at the bottom.

For the past 25 years, my typewriter had connected me to the outside world. I used it to file legal documents more easily, type letters for other people, and build my own writing practice through poetry, letters home and contributions to church newsletters. 

I rushed to file a grievance.

In prison, when you feel you’ve been wronged, you grieve the issue. This can include an improperly given ticket, a charge for a phone call you did not make or transported property that arrives broken. Grieving means filing a series of complaints and appeals to staff, prison administrators and, in some cases, the courts. 

Success is rare. Although the grievance process is the main mechanism of institutional accountability in U.S. prisons, indifferent and biased staff, strict rules governing the minutiae of filing and a disadvantage when gathering evidence often make resolution impossible. Even when a case is successful, the process is so demoralizing that it makes any win bittersweet. 

Still, I had to try. My typewriter was literally irreplaceable. The model, a word processor with memory, was no longer available from the commissary. And I didn’t have anywhere close to the $500 it would take to purchase a new, manual typewriter. 

From the time the initial offense occurs, you have 15 days to initiate the grievance process by addressing the matter interpersonally, with guards or other staff. In the case of my broken typewriter, this wasn’t so simple. 

First I had to determine who was responsible: the receiving facility or the sending one? 

I decided to speak with the receiving and distribution sergeant at Mercer, where I had just arrived. He told me the typewriter arrived in its current state. Therefore, my beef was with the previous facility. I filed a grievance with the R&D sergeant at SCI Fayette, asking for $500 or to receive a replacement typewriter through the U.S. Postal Service.

Initially, my grievance was denied via internal mail. The grievance coordinator at Fayette claimed that because I signed off on their packing of my property, they weren’t responsible for the broken item. My signature, the denial suggested, indicated that nothing was wrong. 

This is the point at which most grievances are won or lost. Not only does the filer have to clearly state the issue in the initial filing, but they also have to be prepared to gather enough evidence to prove their case if it’s denied. Without solid evidence, the incarcerated griever is at a disadvantage because it’s often your word against the word of a corrections officer.

The only evidence I had was this: When my property was initially packed, the boxes were marked with a sticker that indicated the destination facility and the number of boxes in sequence (“1 of 3,” “2 of 3,” and “3 of 3”). If there had always been four boxes, why did these stickers indicate otherwise? 

I made my next-level appeal to the facility manager. This often feels like a formality. The facility manager, who is in charge of the whole institution, is never incentivized to rule against their staff. The verdict is typically unfavorable for the griever, as it was for me: “DENIED.” 

After this second denial, you can appeal to the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections Central Office for a process called “final review,” making sure to submit copies of all relevant records, including the initial grievance and response, the appeal and the responses to all appeals. 

If a griever gets this far, the administration will often strike a deal with the incarcerated person, partially rectifying the situation while ensuring the overarching complaint record goes away. People agree to withdraw their grievances because they think that is all you can do — they’re just content to be heard, or they can’t afford to keep paying for copies, postage or court filing fees. 

A former cellmate of mine, Arthur Harris, experienced this firsthand. Harris is notorious for writing grievances against the department of corrections. In 2025, he submitted a grievance about the dietary department serving food on dirty trays. The administration acknowledged the fact that some trays were improperly washed and gave him another tray, then asked him to withdraw his grievance. 

However if, like me, you get denied again and are unsatisfied, you can take the matter to court under what’s called a “petition for review.” You are essentially suing the department of corrections for monetary relief by making the grievance a civil matter, allowing a third party, the court, to pass judgment. 

The institution often doesn’t make that part of the process clear. Luckily, prison is filled with individuals who know the law and who will not allow others to dictate how they are treated. An older incarcerated man took me under his wing when I got my first denial early in my incarceration. I can’t remember what the grievance was about, but I know that I was demoralized and wanted to let it go. This man pushed me to keep going and walked me through the process all the way to the Commonwealth Court. 

By 2023, I knew the process front and back. I went to the Commonwealth Court on a petition for review, sending evidence that staff lied and that my typewriter was damaged. I also submitted copies of a lawful petition to the court, paperwork from the grievance and appeals, commissary receipts, and dated writings showing the machine was indeed operating properly prior to the date of departure. 

The court sided with me. I won my grievance around late 2024. Over a year after the initial incident, the SCI Mercer grievance coordinator offered me a new typewriter comparable to my old one.

I felt elated but wary. If I had not come across the stickers on the property boxes, I would not have won the grievance, even though my property had been mishandled and broken by staff. No matter how right or correct you are, or how well staff know you and your character, you are not to be trusted.