-
ANGELA'S LONG ROAD TO A SECOND CHANCE
After years of making trouble, Angela is laser-focused on second chances for others.
Angela could no longer run from her past. She was caught writing another bad check, the same crime that had kept her incarcerated or on probation for years.
The day of her arrest in Virginia, she drew on the faith of her childhood, formed by attending church with her grandmother. Angela prayed to God, saying, “If You show me You’re real in this process, I will serve You for the rest of my life.”
Thankfully for Angela, God displayed His mercy through a judge’s ruling, which has allowed her to follow through on her prayer.
TOUGH FAMILY LIFE
Growing up, Angela lived in North Carolina with her family. Her parents were married, but her dad was in the Army and often traveling, so she, her siblings, and their three cousins were raised by Angela’s mom and grandmother.
Angela got in trouble from an early age. In third grade, Angela wrote her first fraudulent check. Her mom had given her old checks from a closed account, and Angela tried to use one of them to pay a very high bill she racked up at the school cafeteria, paying for lunches and candy.
A year later, Angela’s parents got divorced. Even though she was able to see her dad from time to time, it wasn’t the same. Her mom eventually began dating other men, but Angela was mean to them and wouldn’t give them a chance because she blamed her mom for the divorce. Around the same time, a man working at the corner store who was dating her aunt came to Angela’s 11th birthday party. He molested Angela and later tried to keep her silent through promising to buy her things, and because all Angela wanted after her parents’ divorce was a father figure, she stayed silent.
While Angela was mad at her mom and missing her dad’s presence, her grandmother paid particular attention to her. A faithful woman, she constantly prayed over Angela and encouraged her.
But that wasn’t enough to break Angela away from her pattern of trouble. She was a bully in school and would leave home in the middle of the night to hang out with her older friends. Her adventures eventually led to more bargaining with God. Angela would promise to go back to church, but her grandmother would remind her to live out her words through her actions.
Those actions became all the more important as she became a mother in 1990. She then had her second child just over a year later.
BARGAINING
Eventually, Angela’s trouble culminated in 1992 when she faced a 25-year sentence for obtaining property by false pretense. Luckily for her, she was instead given three years’ probation.
“Me and probation didn’t get along too well,” Angela explains. “I just refused to let somebody tell me what to do.”
Angela kept violating probation and returning to prison. She also had her third child during this time.
Being away from her kids while incarcerated was hard. Although Angela still had a voice in raising her kids, her mom did most of the parenting, along with the kids’ father.
Angela’s agony was compounded by the loss of her grandmother in 1998.
“When that happened to me, I felt like a piece of me left as well,” Angela says.
Around the time of her loss, the chaplain at her facility made her aware of Prison Fellowship® Angel Tree. Angela signed her kids up, ensuring they had a Christmas gift from mom and a handwritten note.
“So many people showed up for my children at that time,” she remembers. “It was such a blessing.”
But the incarceration-probation cycle continued for years. Once, while on the run for a probation violation, Angela wanted a change of scenery, so she relocated to Virginia.
But she couldn’t hide from the law for long. In October 2008, she was arrested for writing another bad check.
She was sent to prison and was released in 2010, but because Angela began writing bad checks in North Carolina years prior, she was extradited to the Tar Heel State. There, she was staring down a 21-year sentence for habitually reoffending.
She stood in court on July 22, 2010, expecting the worst. Then the judge said words Angela hadn’t expected to hear: “Today is your lucky day.” He gave her an 8- to 11-month sentence.
“Lord, I thank You!” Angela exclaimed. She believed her prayer had been answered and she had been given a second chance. Angela vowed to make the most of it.
RELENTLESS DETERMINATION
Angela served her time and was released from a North Carolina prison in March 2011. She returned to Virginia but didn’t have a job or a place to call home, which is all too common for people with a criminal record.
Angela applied for many apartments but was denied due to her history. Denial after denial weighed heavy upon her.
How much longer do I have to try? Angela wondered.
She went to live with a friend who had a goddaughter. Angela took care of that child as a condition of her living with her friend. Angela ended up staying with that friend for a couple of years as she navigated reentry.
Angela later saw God was working everything for her good. She soon fell in love and got married.
While navigating reentry and marriage, Angela enrolled in school and lived off her student loan money. Her hard work paid off when she earned an associate degree in business accounting, but she credits her success to her frame of mind being different this time around.
“Reentry, for me, started with me first changing my mindset,” Angela says. “It really started with me being intentional on doing the right thing.”
Angela taught herself how to write grants and business plans. She financially supported herself by helping people with homework for their classes.
For Angela, the willingness to do the hard work of reintegrating into society boiled down to one thing: “I was determined not to go back to prison,” she says.
“Reentry, for me, started with me first changing my mindset.”
—Angela
HOUSE OF DREAMS
Angela’s struggle to find stable housing became the inspiration for her next step in her reentry journey. In 2013, she was watching a preacher on television and felt God was sending her a message through his preaching.
Now I can use you, Angela believed God was saying to her.
She wanted to start a ministry that would help people like her. Development of a name and a business plan were the first big challenges she faced. But by 2013, she was able to establish House of Dreams Outreach and Reentry. She spent a lot of time trying to learn how to best support formerly incarcerated people with what they need, attending reentry meetings while constantly being the new person in the room. Since then, she has helped hundreds of people receive the support they need. Angela knows every bit of help is part of a long process.
“Reentry is not a race,” she says.
Angela emphasized that point during an event in 2025. She remarked that people think reintegration happens overnight, but she considers herself somebody who is still reintegrating.
In her work with others, she has found that most people genuinely want help, but they must have an internal desire to succeed.
“I tell the people I deal with, ‘I can’t want it more than you, because I’ve already been through that process,’” she says.
SECOND CHANCES MATTER
Eighty million American adults have a criminal record, which leaves them with decreased opportunities for education, employment, and housing.
Angela’s reintegration journey, and her work with House of Dreams, brought her all those things, but she found herself wanting more. She rediscovered Prison Fellowship in 2017 and became part of the first group of Justice Ambassadors, Christians who advocate alongside Prison Fellowship for laws that better reflect biblical values related to crime and incarceration.
In addition, 2017 was the first year Prison Fellowship celebrated Second Chance Month®. Throughout April every year, Prison Fellowship, Justice Ambassadors, faith leaders, and others raise awareness of the nearly 44,000 legal barriers faced by those with a criminal record. State and federal lawmakers are urged to break down those barriers so people can lead dignified, productive lives.
Angela has taken part in Prison Fellowship Days of Action in Virginia and Washington, D.C. Her advocacy and deeply-rooted belief in second chances are informed by Scripture.
“God gives us a chance to get it right with Him every day,” she says. “So we should be able to give that same opportunity to those who are the least of these.”
The way for Christians to do that, according to Angela, is to have a nonjudgmental attitude toward those seeking to make the most of their second chance.
“Get to know them for who God says they are,” she encourages. “Get to know the spirit in that person and then work from the inside out.”
“God gives us a chance to get it right with Him every day.”
—Angela
LOOKING TOWARD THE FUTURE
Angela’s work endeavors have expanded to include the Restorative Identity Lab. It’s billed as a way for people impacted by the criminal justice system to “pick up the blueprint” and build their own lives. It’s in five state prisons in Virginia, and Angela has visions of expanding it to even more facilities.
She is also set to take the next step of what she describes as her “calling” by becoming a minister.
That “calling” took years to realize. The journey was filled with testing times, tragedy, and trouble. There was a period when she was looking at extended time away from her family and missing out on major life events. Now, Angela is a proud grandmother of five.
Angela knows none of this would’ve been possible without God, the same God with whom she bargained for years. All she wants to do now is serve Him.
“I’m grateful for God even entrusting me to do what I promised Him for the last time, because I made so many broken promises before,” Angela says.
“I’m grateful for God even entrusting me to do what I promised Him for the last time, because I made so many broken promises before.”
—Angela