We bring you pen pals looking for love -- that just happen to be incarcerated.

February 13, 2007 7:45 AM

Are You Lonesome Tonight?
Maybe your dream mate just hasn't gotten out of prison yet? Find them now and they'll be yours when they do get paroled in five to ten years. (somewhat NSFW). The bonus early 90's flaming gif and site design is just icing!
Be sure to read the disclaimer. Here, I'll summarize, use a PO Box to correspond with the inmates, don't give your phone number unless you want to accept collect calls and don't sue the site if your dream man gets out and chops you into little pieces. Seems reasonable enough.
posted by fenriq (29 comments total)

I can't wait until my wife gets home and starts typing hotmail into the location bar of firefox and auto-complete fills in "hotprisonpals".

"But seriously honey, I just wanted to see the early 90's flaming gif!"
posted by mcstayinskool at 7:54 AM on February 13, 2007

Are You Lonesome Tonight
posted by caddis at 7:56 AM on February 13, 2007

mcstayinschool, then my work here is done!
posted by fenriq at 7:59 AM on February 13, 2007

You ever get one of these letters unsolicited? My brother has received a couple, over the years and at different addresses, addressed to "occupant" or "resident.". One of them was spectacular, florid handwriting full of extra curlicues and little hearts all over the place.

It was all about what a kind man the inmate was, and how he would be in jail for the next thirty years or so, a life sentence or two, and how he just needed a lady to correspond with and get to know, make things bearable for him. It was a nice letter, and I wonder how many he sent out to random addresses in hopes that someone would write back. I guess if you have a lot of time on your hands, you start sending messages in bottles.

One sentence he wrote really stuck with me: "I am a gentleman first, yet versatile if necessary.". Words to live by.
posted by breezeway at 8:06 AM on February 13, 2007 [2 favorites]

My roommate got a bunch of these letters in college (for the person who had her mailbox before her). She did write the guy once or twice, but they were really creepy letters after a while.

He did stop writing eventually. I wonder what happened.
posted by sperose at 8:15 AM on February 13, 2007

There aren't many black inmates pictured.
posted by OmieWise at 8:19 AM on February 13, 2007

Which ones look like the likeliest assrapers? Seriously, what they do to each other behind bars is often worse than what they did to get there.
posted by davy at 8:23 AM on February 13, 2007

Hybristophilia is a paraphilia involving being sexually aroused by people who have committed crimes; in particular cruel or outrageous crimes.

Understanding Hybristophilia.
posted by nickyskye at 8:34 AM on February 13, 2007

I was all ready to have a good time laughing at this site until I realized that many of inmates were young enough to have submitted their high school pictures. Sad!
posted by Help, I can't stop talking! at 8:38 AM on February 13, 2007

For my own part, it would be useful to know how many of these guys were in prison for smoking or dealing dope and how many were in there for beating someone with a tire iron.

davy, that is one of the main failings of the prison system. Send someone up for a pretty minor infraction and they come out a hardened criminal.
posted by fenriq at 8:47 AM on February 13, 2007

Where do those lads find all that time to spend in the gym?
posted by Abiezer at 8:48 AM on February 13, 2007

Wow. I mean, WOW. This guy is awesome...I always wanted to corrospond with a member of the aryan youth. And this guy...just in there for traffic tickets and yet his release date is being pushed back. WhatEVER.

My husband better watch out. I want a hunk of 205 lbs of burning macho criminal man.
posted by aacheson at 8:55 AM on February 13, 2007

"Do you know an inmate who might benefit by being a penal"

OK...was that a wonderful irony typo, or just bad humor?
posted by HuronBob at 9:04 AM on February 13, 2007

penal <> penile
posted by pax digita at 9:08 AM on February 13, 2007

Back in high school, a group of girl friends and I each picked out a person from the inmate personals in a tabloid and wrote to them. My guy wrote me back, insisting that the reason why I wrote him was because I wanted to marry him, and he'd come for me soon.

I spent the next year or two in absolute fear. Fortunately I used a P.O. box number.
posted by batty at 9:22 AM on February 13, 2007

Haven't clicked the link yet...any frails in jails getting involved in this action, or just male inmates?
posted by pax digita at 9:24 AM on February 13, 2007

are you lonesome tonight? jailhouse cock .
posted by baker dave at 9:57 AM on February 13, 2007

Where do those lads find all that time to spend in the gym?

Well, by all accounts there isn't much else to do, and I imagine in a house full of violent felons an imposing physique might be a valuable thing to have.
posted by jonmc at 10:13 AM on February 13, 2007

I got bored and looked up a couple of their crimes....most that I found were drug convictions, but a couple were rape (one was sex with two minors, the other was aggravated sexual assault on a minor). I couldn't find out what the guy who had a release date of 2050 had done though. *pout*. One guy flat out said he murdered someone.
posted by nursegracer at 10:16 AM on February 13, 2007

There was a woman on television talking about this phenomenon, and she said that the women who go for this sort of thing are often former victims of abusive husbands/boyfriends, and they are attracted to a relationship with a man in prison because it's something that they (the woman) can control (i.e. they get to read flowery romantic letters with declarations of undying love, they get to feel special and needed, and yet they don't ever have to deal with the men face-to-face ~ assuming they pick an inmate who's not going to be released).
posted by amyms at 10:21 AM on February 13, 2007

Here's the quote:
"My name is Jesse. I'm 6' 195 brown hair blue eyes. I love to read and write long letters. I consider myself an entreprenuer, very driven, and believe in living life to the fullest. I have an eclectice choice of music, from Nirvana to Vivaldi. On the yard, when I'm not playing basketball, I like to jog and work out. I'm in Prison for murder. I used to be involved in the underworld, in which I had to carry a gun....I miss my cat curling up to me purring....But what I miss most is ROMANCE. If you miss it to, write me.


What a charming boy.
posted by nursegracer at 10:23 AM on February 13, 2007

I just threw up a little bit.
posted by Master Baiter at 10:26 AM on February 13, 2007

Way to over-explain me weak joke, jon :D
posted by Abiezer at 10:58 AM on February 13, 2007

More prisony Valentine goodness. (From back when I had time to post.)
posted by turducken at 11:44 AM on February 13, 2007

I was ready to laugh. Instead, now I'm going to cry...
posted by MDA38 at 11:50 AM on February 13, 2007

just in there for traffic tickets

Actually he says he was violated with traffic tickets.

I usually just crumple them up and toss them in the back seat.

Uh-oh.
posted by CynicalKnight at 12:19 PM on February 13, 2007

A Special Someone
posted by Joseph Gurl at 6:22 PM on February 13, 2007

Yeah, violated by traffic tickets must be a bitch, CynicalKnight. I'd go back to prision too!
posted by aacheson at 9:05 PM on February 13, 2007

"My name is Jesse. I'm 6' 195 brown hair blue eyes. I love to read and write long letters. I consider myself an entreprenuer, very driven, and believe in living life to the fullest. I have an eclectice choice of music, from Nirvana to Vivaldi. On the yard, when I'm not playing basketball, I like to jog and work out. I'm in Prison for murder. I used to be involved in the underworld, in which I had to carry a gun....I miss my cat curling up to me purring....But what I miss most is ROMANCE. If you miss it to, write me.


"Somewhere out there is someone who had loving parents, watched clouds on a summer's day, fell in love, lost a friend, is kind to small animals, and knows how to say 'please' and 'thank you,' and yet you are going to end up in a dirty little room with one knife between you and are going to have to try and kill that human being.

"It's a terrible thing. Not just because he's the same realization and wants to survive just as much as you do, meaning he's going to try and puncture your internal organs to set off a cascading trauma effect that ends with you voiding your bowels, dying alone and removed from everything you ever loved. No, it's a terrible thing because somewhere along the way you could have made a different choice. You could have avoided that knife, that room, and maybe even found some kind of common ground between the two of you. Or at least, you might have divvied up some turf and left each other alone. That would have been a lot smarter, wouldn't it? Even dogs are smart enough to do that. Now you're staring into the eyes of a fellow human and in a couple of minutes one of you is going to be vomiting blood to the rhythm of a fading heartbeat. The survivor is going to remember this night for the rest of his or her life."

-Greg Stolze & John Tynes
Unknown Armies

God, reading this stuff makes me depressed sad.
posted by Snyder at 11:45 AM on February 14, 2007