Dear Friends of The Sunny Center,
It’s all about perspective and from our point of view, our supporters and friends around the globe are an important and integral part of a worldwide movement for human rights and social justice! It is through their support that we are able to offer healing, help and a home away from home for those who have been wrongfully convicted of a crime they never committed. It is hard to imagine an injustice that could be more grievous. So we want to acknowledge all of you who have been part of the Sunny Center network of friends, family and supporters. We thank you every day for making our work possible.
And if you would like to see our healing work with exonerees at the Sunny Center continue so that we can help exonerees to help themselves, please consider a donation now. It is a very simple act that can have the most profound impact on someone’s life – someone who has suffered in ways no one deserves.
OUR EXONEREE GUESTS AND VISITORS
The Sunny Center in Ireland was first launched in 2014 and since then we are so proud of the many significant ways our non-profit has grown and evolved. We have welcomed into our home in Connemara scores of exonerees from places between California and Taiwan. We’ve had both male and female exonerees, a pair of brothers, and married exonerees cross our threshold. And last fall, we opened the first permanent community residence for exonerees in Tampa, FL, which continues to flourish in ways we could never have predicted. We have been richly and warmly welcomed into the community of Tampa by locals, who have offered donations of money, time, furniture, appliances and, most especially, acceptance.
And now as the Sunny Center continues to grow, we are looking to other exonerees to use our approach as a template for other Sunny Centers around the globe, like the one that is in the process of being planned in Pakistan by an exoneree there. We hope that the Sunny Center will serve as a model of hope and healing throughout the world for the wrongly-convicted everywhere.
OUR VOLUNTEERS
Behind the scenes and on the ground are the many members of a corps of volunteers who keep the Sunny Center running smoothly, both when we are here and when we are not. Our veteran four-time-visitor is Tress, who spent some time with us this past month and whom we miss dearly. Thank you Tress for all that you do for us!
And our very first volunteer Amy Fly is also now our very first volunteer with a newly-minted law degree! We hope that the experience she has had with the Sunny Center was rewarding and will help inform her work as she follows her legal dreams! Congratulations Amy! We are so proud of you!!!
OUR FURRY AND FEATHERED FRIENDS
We are always really busy at the Sunny Center because the need for justice never rests. But that doesn’t mean we don’t know how to relax every now and again. We take lessons from the kitties!
Our furry and feathered friends are all part of our extensive Sunny Center family and one guy that was at the heart of it all was Woody. Trained as a service dog for Sunny, but also the love bug that required no training in the heart department, we are sad to share the news of his passing this month. He will be very much missed.
OUR ACTIVISM
This past month we spent some time in Italy where Sunny’s book Stolen Time was published in Italian! The country warmly welcomed us and the book was well-received. Our book tour included stops in Turin and Carigna where we met with volunteers who work with the Red Cross and refugees. We were hosted by the community of Sant Egidio.
STAY CONNECTED
Freedom gives you the ability to stop and smell the roses, and the buttercups, clover and bluebells! We are grateful for every day of our freedom and we are also grateful for all you faithful readers who keep tabs on our work. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your interest and your support. The donations you give are the gifts that keep on giving to exonerees from near to far. Thank you!
Peace and Love,
Sunny and Peter