From a Brother Who Ran for 25 Years

To the one who keeps hitting that tab —

I see you.

You been searching. Maybe for hope. Maybe for answers. Maybe for proof that you ain't too far gone. Maybe you don't even know what you looking for — you just know you can't stop looking.

I know what that's like.

I was born to two beautiful Dominican parents. Hardworking. God-fearing. They gave me everything they had. And I threw it away.

Early 90s. One bad choice. Then another. Then another. Next thing I knew, I was on the run.

Twenty-five years.

A quarter of a century looking over my shoulder. Never home. Never at peace. Never free even when I wasn't in a cell. I missed my mother's funeral. I missed my daughter's graduation. I was a ghost in my own family's life.

And the worst part? I got good at it. Professional. I could smile at a stranger and forget my own name. I could pray Jummah on Friday and be running again by Maghrib. I became a man who didn't exist — and I almost convinced myself that was freedom.

In 2017, I stopped running.

I walked into the US Embassy with nothing but a bag of clothes and a heart full of fear. I turned myself in. They sent me back to New York City. Back to face everything I had done. Back to the place I had spent twenty-five years avoiding.

And in that cell — surrounded by brothers who had been misguided, who had lost their way, who the world had already sentenced before the judge ever spoke — I found something I didn't expect.

Hope.

Beautiful brothers. Some lifers. Some getting out next month. Some just trying to make it to Jummah without catching a violation. Black brothers. Latino brothers. Arab brothers. All of them strangers to me, all of them family by the time Fajr came.

And every single one of them — every one — had a moment where they decided: "Not today. Today I choose different."

That's not prison reform. That's not policy. That's not some program with a grant and a brochure.

That's tawba. Real repentance. The kind that makes the angels write you down like you were born again yesterday. The kind that makes Allah tell the heavens: "Look at My servant. He came back."

I didn't build Al Ghuraba for the brother who has it all figured out. I didn't build it for the imam with the clean record and the spotless reputation. I built it for you. The one who's still running. The sister who thinks it's too late. The one who hit this tab at 3 AM because the walls are closing in and you don't know who to call.

It's not too late. But I'm not gonna lie to you — the clock is ticking. And you don't have twenty-five years to figure it out. I used up mine so I could tell you: don't waste yours.

Stop running.

Write us. Call us. Walk through our door. Or just hit that tab again tomorrow — we'll still be here.

But know this, with everything I am, with every prayer I make in the dark hours before Fajr:

We are waiting for you.

And more importantly — Allah is waiting for you too.