Gaaron Bethel is trapped in the revolving door of Alabama’s criminal justice system.
At 53, he is incarcerated at Childersburg Work Release, a minimum-security facility in Alpine, Alabama. He’s serving the remainder of a 35-year enhanced sentence for one count of burglary of an unoccupied store from an incident in 1994 where nothing was stolen. The rest of the sentence stems from two counts of illegal possession of a credit card from 1996, charges to which he pleaded innocent.
But these charges aren’t even the reason Bethel is currently behind bars. It was a parole violation that sent him back after being granted parole in October 2017.