Reginald Richardson says most people who hear his gospel music group perform are completely unaware of its members’ dark pasts. People are often shocked to hear that Richardson and most of the other members of Spirit ‘N’ Truth are ex-convicts who spent large portions of their lives in Ohio penitentiaries.
Richardson said when he was young he performed as an R&B artist, but was friends with “unsavory” people, and he spent his time doing drugs, drinking alcohol and partying.
He eventually found himself in trouble with the law, and in the summer of 1985 ended up in the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility, a maximum-security prison.
While he was there, someone saw him singing on a television show that had been recorded before Richardson was imprisoned, and invited Richardson to sing at the prison’s church service that Sunday.
Richardson wasn’t a Christian, and he admits that he knew very few gospel songs at the time, but he agreed to the performance and made quite an impression. After the service, a man named Herbert Hinton approached him and asked him if he would like to play guitar with him.
They became friends, and Hinton introduced Richardson to Raymond Towler, who to this day serves as the group’s bass guitar player. All three were later transferred to the same medium-security institution, where they stayed for about five years.
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article courtesy of TheChristianPost.com
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