JULIUS JEROME MURPHY

ABOUT ME:

Hi, my name, as you have seen, is Julius J. Murphy. I am currently 47 years old, and have been incarcerated on Texas Death Row for 28 years now; its been 29 years in total. I am a good friend to Stefan Heikens (Admin) and have assisted him on his book project „A Quick Guide to Death Row„. It is his desire to shed much light on what life is like for all of us here on Death Row. I can tell you it is
nothing easy, it requires you to have strong nerves at times. Having been here all this time has taught me a lot about myself. It makes me really appreciate who I am and have learned throughout the years. I pursue the betterment of my own soul and that of others. It is important that we recognize that alone we will accomplish much but not without losing who we are. But together with like minds, we can accomplish so much greater. We can bring restoration to the world but to do so we all must really examine ourselves. Egos must be checked at the door all this thinking others want to control our lives, because they want to help us make adjustments to our way of thinking.

I wanted to share a little a bit about myself. I am from Texarkana, Texas, born to James and Lottie Murphy. I have three other siblings, James Jr., LaTasha, ChaQuietha. I am the third oldest. I am a proud father of two young adults, Destinie and William. Destinie is my oldest. I have not finished school so all I have learned in the way of academics, has been behind these walls. I am an active person and love exercising and running. It is so invigorating. Smiling!

The literature I prefer reading is books in Consciousness, Neuroscience, Psychology. I am a practicing member of Judaism. I love listening to alternative rock but enjoy other genre of music. I have to be in the mood for other genre of music. But I listen to alternative rock to bang my head the music and I sing to the top of my lungs. I am currently in the process of having my book republished. It is my desire to write three further books. I also write articles for a few platforms: Mind of Reflection on Facebook, Humanizing Death Row, and for my friend Stefan.

I am a family man and love my friends and supporters. It is my desire to keep them feeling at their best. So that is who I am and will be working with Stefan to bring quality context for your reading pleasure.

WRITINGS:

I recently had a conversation with a long time friend and brother, Tony. We were in the dayroom together — he in E-Dayroom and I in D-Dayroom. The conversation was on the weight of this environment. How it causes wear and tear on one’s psychological well being. I’d confided in him how the inconsistencies of this place was really disturbing me. If any of the brother back here know me, they can tell you on thing: I have always been laid back, cool, calm, and collected. I never appeared to anyone as a man who’d allow this environment to affect my personal stability. I must admit I never thought it would happen to me.

The truth of the matter is it took some time to start really affecting me. I can safely say it began when I had first gone on bench warrant. I has longed to see my family and just be on home soil. You know, you can get to a place in life where you just learn to cope. In that ability to cope you develop a constitution that keeps you sane. There is a level of turmoil you’ll allow yourself to fall into. You also tend to sense it well in advance and make the necessary adjustments to maintain that level of control you feel you have. Well I was that kind of person and all it took was for me to be back home. Just experiencing home brought back all the memories of childhood, family, and old school friends yes, and even the crime to which was tried and convicted. It was quite raw. It brings to mind that old saying, „Out of sight, out of mind“. As long as I was out of sight of reality, I didn’t need to deal with it. I had high hopes of something so much greater for myself. I’ll not say my hopes were dashed again a stone. No! That would prove not to be the case. But in the process of my getting off death row to returning, I kind of spiraled out of control! psychologically.

A lot of things that I thought I had a handle on, started to slip from my level of control. You see I had traversed corridors of many environments I was not quite used to. Internally I was aware of how I felt. But I was not quite aware it was affecting my patterns of behaviour.

I felt I was coping well because I didn’t lash out nor feel I needed a psychologist.

It wasn’t until I returned to Death Row many of the brothers said I had changed. I thought that was odd. Why? Because they thought I had changed. No! I didn’t change. What happened was that all that suppression I was engaged in, somehow became caught up in how I thought I was coping before. I wasn’t.

I started to treat people much differently than I used to. It is sad that so many people think that being cool, calm, and collected means that we are okay with how others want to be. That is by no means true. However, experiencing all of the various characters and environments made me feel much differently and view people differently. And to this day I still see how much I am affected by others. I have begun to rein it in and regain that constitution I developed for many years. But I find sometimes I use profanity and my temper tries to flare. I now see why a lot of people have that self harm tag on their doors. It is disturbing to me and I hope not to be the one who succumbs any further to the degradation of this place.

I still like to encourage everyone to keep well mannered and stable people in your lives, to keep you maintained. You never know what will happen in life that pulls you out of your stability.

GET IN TOUCH:

Julius Jerome Murphy
TDCJ #00999279
P.O. Box 660400
Dallas, Tx. 75266
USA

Or online at SECURUS using the contact number #05597363