Hello, Everyone…

I am steadily plugging away on Chapter 8 of my memoir. The writing is arduous and yet, cathartic. Finally being able to tell the story of losing my son, Josiah, to homicide in 2019 is liberating. The 40 months of feeling silenced are over.

Everything seemed to come to an end when the Clouds were finally sentenced for the White Swan Murders. Without digging deeper into the story, I imagine it might be confusing as to how a conviction in a seemingly unrelated case would bring freedom in another, but it’s simply because most of what went on was hidden behind the closed mouths and closed doors of the FBI and the Eastern District of Washington Federal Prosecutors office. The don’t-ask-don’t-tell policy they operate under is probably the biggest reason why I now feel so compelled to tell the story of what happened to my son.

Josiah’s name is still not spoken publicly by law enforcement and the reporters who got in touch with me after sentencing have subsequently vanished. It seems that at least for now, there will be no interviews, no articles, no one wanting to provide a platform for Josiah’s truth to be told. I can’t help but wonder if it is because they do not believe me. And yet, conversely, I still get emails which acknowledge the reality of what happened to him. Sometimes, it feels like a double life, two parallel truths — the one they are silently selling by way of a massive omission, and the other — the one I have lived for the past 3 1/2 years.

Do know, I will not be silenced.

Early Monday, just as I was starting my morning dog walk, I received an email from the Victim Notification System (VNS) informing me that James Cloud had been moved. As Josiah’s mom, I receive updates about hearings and movement within the prison system for both James and Donovan Cloud.

“You have requested to receive notifications for Josiah Hilderbrand regarding JAMES CLOUD, an inmate incarcerated at this facility. During the investigative phase of the case pertaining to the above-referenced inmate, the investigative agency identified you as the victim’s contact person.
The case has proceeded through the criminal justice system and the inmate is now incarcerated within the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP). We have been informed of your status as a victim/victim contact and have been provided with your name and address. It is the responsibility of the BOP to provide you with information regarding the release proceedings of the inmate. We fully recognize that the impact of crime is devastating to innocent victims, witnesses and their families. Therefore, we will make every effort to be responsive, informative and sensitive to your needs…
… JAMES CLOUD is currently incarcerated at NCR – Florence USP and is sentenced to life in prison. The inmate is not eligible for parole. Please be assured that, unless otherwise requested, we will keep you informed of all significant release-related activities pertaining to this inmate during the period of incarceration.”

There is some sort of dark irony — a real kick in the shorts — in being informed about the goings-on in the life of the man who murdered my son. It is unsettling at best.

It brought up reasonable questions for me. Questions like, “Where is this place? What is it like? Will he be comfortable there?”

Oh dear god, don’t let him be comfortable there.

And then I looked it up online. And from what I could tell, he was in the ADX – a prison dubbed “The Alcatraz of the Rockies” – from which no one has ever escaped.

A quick google search brought up an article from August 2019, written just two months after Josiah was murdered and left on the side of Highway 97 in Washington to rot.

Some of the country’s most violent criminals are housed there including Mexican kingpin El Chapo, Ted Kaczynski (aka the Unabomber), and Boston marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. Reading those names and others, seemed fitting considering the killing spree that James Cloud went on with cousin Donovan in June of 2019.

The article also described the conditions at ADX including 23 hours a day of solitary confinement in cells measuring 12′ x 7′ which have solid doors, thick, soundproofed walls and cement slabs to sleep on. The article was updated in 2021 stating that conditions at the facility were thought to be so inhumane that a London court refused to extradite Julian Assange, Wikileaks founder, to the US for fear that he would be assigned to the ADX, stating that the conditions at the facility “can have serious negative effects on an inmate’s mental health.”

My first thought after reading this was, “Good, he deserves it.” And then, I read further.

A 2015 article in the New York Times, Inside America’s Toughest Federal Prison, dives much deeper, telling the stories of multiple inmates, their decline in mental health, along with gruesome stories of self mutilation and suicide attempts. I can tell you in all honesty, I could not finish the article.

So there I was, left with all of my feelings — the deep grief and lingering ptsd from losing my son to homicide along with everything that came after while simultaneously being overcome by what felt like a bizarre, sympathetic concern for the inmate in Colorado who murdered him. Josiah was shown no mercy — nor was I while I spent 14 months frantically trying to find him and yet, I felt a creeping concern for the man who remained stone faced through his sentencing hearing, only showing emotion with the anxious wringing of his hands as his sentence was handed down by Judge Bastian.

And then, hours after getting swallowed up by such horrific information, of the inhumanity that is the ADX, I discovered that he is not housed in the ADX. He is housed next door in Florence-High, a prison which has health services, educational program areas, visitation, laundry, a barbershop, commissary, chapel and an exercise area. And to be frank, that just sounds too nice.

Is there a way to settle somewhere in between inhumane torture and what seems like an institutionalized summer camp? I do not know.

I suppose I could go on about my life not thinking about his level of suffering as I am fairly positive he does not consider mine, but I’m not sure that I can. Time will tell.

For now, I will sit at my computer every morning writing in tandem with hundreds of others at the London Writers Salon, remaining disciplined in the time I have to get Josiah’s Story written.

Just after I posted Chapter 7 to this blog, I was warned by an editor specializing in memoir to stop sharing publicly as she is convinced that a publisher will definitely want my book and sharing with all of you will prevent that from happening. So, after many tears were shed, I surrendered to the idea and have decided to keep the rest to myself to protect the possibility of it being published far and wide. More than anything, I want Josiah’s story told and the wider the audience, the better.

So, I do hope you will continue to follow along here as I promise to keep posting, keeping you updated on my progress and sharing tidbits that you will only find here.

As we move towards the solstice, the darkest time of the year, I do hope you will turn to those around you and share your light with what feels like a progressively darker world.

Signing off while wishing you and yours a warm Holiday Season,

Liz

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