Petition for Itchy of Shock Therapy

Petition against the Parole Board Michigan and the Parr Highway Correctional Facility Michigan.

Friends and fans of Gregory-John Mc Cormick (Itchy), his band Shock Therapy, fans of Wave, Gothik, Metal, EBM, Punk, Industrial, and music fans in general, I would like to draw your attention to a dreadful situation.

Itchy, head of the band Shock Therapy (best well-known album/single "hate" is (just) a four letter word), is locked up in a Michigan prison for the past 4 years. For the past 20 years Itchy lived most of the time in Europe. At the beginning of year 2000 he was visiting his native America.

After he visited Keith Jackson in Phönix (guitar player and one of the founder of Shock Therapy), he went to Michigan, to visit his father, an old granny, which is like a mother to him, and his brother. Some days, after arriving in Michigan Itchy came back to his father´s house and found the old granny raped and robbed by a drug dealer in here house. The drugdealer beat her hard and broke her arm, before he robbed her. Itchy called the police, because he knew the perpetrator, and he could make help them locate this person who lived in the neighbourhood. But the police were totally disinterested in this case and did nothing. Itchy was pissed off and despaired. Itchy´s relationship with this old Lady was always very familiar and she cared much about him, especially since his natural mother died from cancer 9 years ago. That old Lady looked at Itchys house, when he was on tour, and she cared about his dog and much more. Often people from the neighbourhood broke into Itchys house and stole away his music-equipment. Itchy called to the house of the drug dealer when he was drunk intending to talk to him but the drug dealer was not at home. As a small warning Itchy burned down a tiny pile of trash at the back of the drug dealer's garage-shed. The police arrested him for this.

What would you do, or how would you react in his situation? Just imagine, someone did the same to your father or to your mother. By the way…no life was harmed in this tiny fire because he knew that the drug dealer was not at home ( or at least he did not shows up at the door, after Itchy rang the bell!). Anyway, the drug dealer died 2 weeks later from an overdose.

Since that day Itchy is imprisoned under very bad circumstances . For a comparable crime one would get half a year, or maximum one year, in a German prison. More likely than that one would just receive probation. The Parole Board, which decides once in a year about the prisoner releases and the Parr Highway Correctional Facility, want to keep Itchy in as long as possible. The Parole Board told Itchy´s father lately, they plan to keep him in for the next years.

Itchy shits and pukes blood now every morning for the past year. His guts and his stomach hurt, he has strange blisters all over his skin, one of his eyes is blood red for weeks. He has constant Migraine headaches, nightmares every night, and strong depressions. He suffer from rheumatic fever since one year, and this poisoned his blood. Itchy and I have written to each other for 3 ½ years, often 3-4 big letters a month. I´m his closest friend and he calls me his real "brother". Thus I know all about him and his condition. Itchy is really very ill and he may not remain alive more than another six month. He often writes to me about his thoughts of suicide if his situation will not change for the better.

Itchy is well-known as a hard boiled Elektropunk-musician, but this is just one of his images, he plays for his fans. I know Itchy as the best friend anyone can have, very broad minded, success oriented, and someone who gives his best for a friend and who is always willing to help. Now he remains imprisoned for this crime, for which he has repented several times over for far too long.

I would like to state some other reasons why he should be free a long time ago:

1. Itchy has lived his life mainly in Europe, and after his release from prison he plans to leave the USA forever and he would never return there.

2. As I have already written Itchy has been jailed for too long for this crime. This is also what the lawyer Mr Gary Margosian from Michigan told us. Even this good lawyer could not do anything against the judgements of the Parole Board.

3. Each prisoner held longer than necessary in prison costs lots of money for each hard working American taxpayer. Since Itchy plans to leave the USA forever this is a negligent waste of tax money.

Instead of this the Parole Board could sanction Itchy´s release + immediate expulsion, also through the decision of Jennifer Granholm, Governeur in Michigan. All this is an unjust, senseless and overstated sadistic behaviour on the part of the Parole Board and the Parr Highway Correctional Facility which, in my opinion, is not behaving accordingly with the American sense of fairness.

Itchy has about 100 new song ideas, 3 books are in progress, I sell his paintings to earn money for a lawyer and to pay for his dinner in prison. Since the prison serves old and rotten food to the prisoners I must supply Itchy with necessary requirements. Itchy became as ill as he is now, from the grief, his depression and from his meals in prison. Actually he should be free for the reason he is unsuitable to be detained because of his bad shape, but the Parole Board and the Parr Highway Correctional Facility probably want kill him. Each consultation at the prison doctor costs Itchy 5 dollars and he can´t trust the doctor in prison anyway. Some prisoners have already died after a normal routine check up and they use the ill prisoners as subjects for unregistered medicine. Itchy can´t expect protection from these doctors since he cannot trust them.

The signatures collected will go to a very good Attorney in Michigan, to the mechanism I mentioned (Governeur Jennifer Granholm, Parole Board and Parr Highway Correctional Facility), and to most well-known magazines in Europe and America, to appeal to the sanity of the decision makers.

I've informed Amnesty International London and America, and ACLU Michigan about Itchy´s case and they won´t help us. They told us, they have not enough time for our case, and we shall hire a lawyer, but we have no money to do that. Not one Cent!

Itchy is the best friend one can have and his long suffered incarceration is inhuman and inappropriate. Please support his release from prison.

Captain Ralf Dellhofen
25. September 2004

Itchy´s address in prison is:

Gregory-John Mc Cormick 34 70 89
Parr Highway Correctional Facility
27 27 E. Beecher St. / P.O. Box 18 88
Adrian, Michigan 49221
U. S. A.