Day 23

Thursday, December 27, 2018

This morning I had a 9 am appointment with my “unit team,” where they access my initial classification and begin my “re-entry plan,” and let me ask any questions I may have. My question was; when will I be eligible for the camp? I was very surprised to hear that my “crime” is listed as a “greatest severity crime” and hence I would never be eligible for the camp. The only way that classification can be waived is if the Assistant Warden (or I also believe the Warden himself) recommends it is removed. So I came and drafted an email I will pray over before I type it up tomorrow. Here it is:

Sir,

My name is Philip Zodhiates (18649-084) and I arrived here at Ashland FCI on December 5, for a 3-year sentence. Yesterday, I went for my first “team review,” and was told that my “crime” is listed as a “greatest severity crime,” which I was told only you could review and make a recommendation to remove.

Sir, I would like to request that you look into the background of my case, the egregious political and anti-Christian nature of the prosecution against me, which has been confirmed to be a political vendetta mandated by Barak Obama’s White House. I request you remove the “greatest severity” factor so I can be eligible for a camp.

Simply put, I am here solely because I am a Christian practicing my faith. The young girl (conceived through artificial insemination) for who I allegedly “aided and abetted” her mother to commit “international parental kidnapping,” was being sexually abused on court-ordered visitations to the former lesbian lover of her mother. All three were Virginia residents. Her mother had become a born-again Christian, repented of her sin and former lifestyle, and dissolved the Vermont “civil union.” The mother was awarded full custody of the child and agreed initially to visitations with her former sexual partner.

However, the former lesbian partner, who had initially wanted nothing to do with the child, went for years without asking to see the young child. She had on three occasions refused to adopt her.

In the meanwhile, Virginia had passed a constitutional amendment declaring it illegal in Virginia to recognize any official designations of “marriage” or “civil unions” of any other state.

However, the ACLU, Southern Poverty Law Center, and LAMBDA Legal got wind of the case and talked the lesbian partner into allowing them to make the precedent-setting case that would nullify not just the Virginia Marriage Amendment but all the marriage amendments in more than half the states where similar protections were in place. That was the goal. And for that reason, they convinced her to request visitations.

After the child’s mother began allowing visitations is when the sexual abuse began to take place. The mother notified authorities and had affidavits from social workers and psychologists verifying the trauma to the girl, but the family court judge in Vermont refused to allow any evidence of it in court for reasons mentioned above. In the meanwhile, a judge in Virginia ruled the mother had full and complete custody of the child.

Yet the liberal groups pursued the transfer of custody – because the birth mother no longer allowed visitation because of the sexual abuse taking place. When the mother left the country in 2009 (long before the Obergefell ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court) she had full custody of her child with valid passports and freedom to travel anywhere in the world. The custody dispute, including further rights to visitation, continued to be battled in the courts till long after they were gone. Custody was not transferred to the former lesbian partner till the year after mother and child left the country. I was convicted for merely giving her and her child a ride from Virginia to Buffalo at a time in which she had full custody, and giving her $500. It did not matter to the courts that the child was being sexually abused because they had a political and social agenda they wanted to enact, regardless that the real victim was a helpless child, whose mother had to choose between leaving the country or allow her child to continue to be sexually molested with the sanctions of the Vermont authorities.

Years ago, after I accepted Christ as my Lord and Savior, I determined to abide by certain commands of all Christians, the first being: “Do not withhold good to those to whom it is due when it is in your power to do it. Do not say to your neighbor, ‘Go and come back, and tomorrow I will give it,’ when you have it with you” (Proverbs 3:27-28). Then there is: “Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do, and does not do it, to him it is sin” (James 4:17). And: “Deliver those who are being taken away to death. And those who are staggering to the slaughter, oh hold them back. If you say, ‘we did not know this,’ does He not consider it who weighs the hearts?” (Proverbs 23:11-12). And: “For I was hungry, and you gave me nothing to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave me nothing to drink; I was a stranger, and you did not invite me in; naked, and you did not clothe me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit me…truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you didn’t do it to Me” (Matthew 25:43-45). And: “Whoever receives one such child in My name receives Me, but whoever causes one of these little ones who believes in Me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea” (Matthew 18:4-6). And lastly, “But whoever has the worlds’ goods, and beholds his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does the love of God abide in him?” (I John 3:17).

At the government’s request, the court in my case refused to allow any mention of the alleged sexual abuse of the child, not any mention of the other multitudes of ways I have helped others going through difficult times, in order to falsely portray to the jury I am nothing but an agenda-driven “homophobe.”

I take heart in Jesus’ words: “Blessed are you when men cast insults against you, and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely on account of me, ‘Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you” (Matthew 5:11-12). Joseph, Daniel, Peter, John, Paul, and even Jesus were all falsely imprisoned for righteousness’ sake under false charges. I, like each of these men, broke no laws, but am merely imprisoned for my faith in Jesus Christ and God’s Word. I encourage you to watch the 12-minute video on www.wall4america.com, and to review the listing someone placed at the website, www.419fund.com about my case. There are also numerous other articles and interviews on the internet. The best document, which includes the evidence of the sexual abuse of the child, is the “Petition for Pardon” to President Trump, which can be obtained from (specifically withheld).

Thank you, sir, for considering recommending the waiving of the “greatest severity” nature of my alleged “crime.”

I read the draft of the email to the man in the neighboring cell who is a new Christian. It raised all kinds of questions about God’s love, homosexuality, the sinfulness of man, and lots of other critical topics that he has been struggling with. I told him the Christian life is one of a lifetime of transformation, and it doesn’t happen overnight. God, over time, will change the way he thinks of different things. Politically, he’s been liberal since college, and he’s having to rectify his liberal thinking with the Scriptures. Pray for me as I help guide him through this process over time.