Prisoners he encountered in various locations would ask (and still do) for him to pray for them. Through his work, Snook began to gain a reputation among not just those he shared the facilities with, but the system as a whole. “If I could make them hungry for God, and get them to start fasting and start praying more often, the change was radical.” “That made a powerful impact, they would become hungry for God,” he says. Many of those he interacted with were gang members seeking reform, searching for meaning in the words Snook spoke. Drug addicts would occasionally spend time in solitary confinement with Snook, with whom he would converse about faith. Many, he says, were ‘born again’ just like him, as he preached and told stories through the bars of his cell, shouting down the hallway to anyone asking for him to speak. Snook read the Bible more times than he could count, eventually elevating him to a level of pseudo-counselor for those he shared space with. He says an encounter with Jesus was needed, sparking the shift his life demanded.
But that didn’t stop a change in perspective. For much of his childhood, he says, abuse and violence were the common practices of the household. Snook’s family didn’t grow up going to church. It was time for a change, he says, and to give his life over to a greater power. That’s when he realized his negative impact was much broader. Six months into his sentence, he discovered his brother was involved in a devastating accident, attributing his own behavior as a cause. That included time in solitary confinement, serving a year of time during one period.įor most, Steven’s sentencing sounds like a punishment. Over the course of that time, he was transferred to eight different federal facilities across states like Florida, North Carolina, and Virginia.
And by 26, he was arrested by the DEA for smuggling cocaine, sentenced to 22 years in the federal prison system. After turning 19, he was transporting marijuana from South Texas into Central Illinois. By the age of 15, he was involved with drugs.
There, he grew up in extreme poverty over the course of his upbringing. Steven Snook’s first memories are of life in Virginia foster care, before being taken to his then-new home in Danville, Illinois. That’s the mission of a Peoria man who, after nearly two decades behind bars, wants to follow a new calling. PEORIA (25 News Now) - Trying to help as many people as possible.
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