Ex-inmate launches thrift store to help others

ARABI, La. (AP) - Maryam Uloho describes her life by “The Four P’s”:

Projects, for the life of the poverty she knew growing up in Dayton, Ohio. Palaces, for the extravagant world she was shown by her husband in Warri, Nigeria. Prison, for the over 10 years she served in the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women in St. Gabriel, where she says much of her time was spent in what she described as solitary confinement.

And paradise - for Sister Hearts, the cluttered Arabi thrift store and “de-carceration” program she has built over the past five years, starting with $40 and a suitcase.

“I love this store. It might not look like much, but it’s paradise for me,” Uloho said.

Uloho, 61, was born Maryam Henderson in Arkansas, but spent most of her life in Dayton, Ohio. Her father died when she was young, and she grew up poor with her mother and eight siblings.

In 1973, Uloho met her first husband when she was just 16. Augustine Uloho was a Nigerian exchange student at Central State University, and the two married when Uloho became pregnant with their first son. Augustine was 22 when they met, and despite their age difference, Uloho described her first husband as patient and kind, and said he taught her the importance of education.

She and Augustine moved to Nigeria in 1976, when her father-in-law died. There, she learned her husband’s stories of his family’s wealth were no exaggeration.

“It was like that movie, “Coming to America,” Uloho said, describing the blue Rolls Royce and servants that greeted her.

However, a few years later, a military coup forced Uloho to flee the country and return to Ohio, “right back to the projects,” she said. Her four sons were stuck in Nigeria for some time, but Uloho was eventually able to get them back into the United States.

Life wasn’t easy, she said, and at times Uloho and her children were forced to live out of her car.

Even so, Uloho managed to put herself through school and graduated with a degree in real estate management and property investment, and her life turned around once more. Within eight years, Uloho said her net worth was $5.5 million. Dayton property records show Uloho owned several properties at the time, including multiple apartment buildings.

“I was like the Oprah Winfrey of Dayton, Ohio,” she said.

When Uloho and her first husband divorced, she remarried and had two more sons and a daughter. After ending her second marriage, Uloho met another man, who she was visiting in Louisiana in 2001 when her world came crashing down again.

The man, Elton Thomas, was driving with Uloho in a rented Lincoln Continental on March 3, 2001 when Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office deputy Brent Coussou pulled them over in Lafitte. Coussou accused Thomas of robbing an armored truck driver at gunpoint at an Albertson’s Grocery Store in Marrero. According to court records, about $15,000 in cash and checks was stolen, as well as the victim’s gun.

Both were arrested and Uloho was accused of accessory after the fact to armed robbery. She said she was held in Jefferson Parish Prison for 14 months while she awaited trial, only to have the charges rejected by the district attorney. Elton was found guilty in the robbery and sentenced to life in prison, court records show.

Within two weeks of her charges being dropped, Uloho was accused of a new crime - obstruction of justice. According to court records, investigators believed Uloho hid the money from the robbery underneath the police car’s front seat while she was detained in the back. The cash was found by a different officer the day after her arrest, court records show.

Uloho denies putting the money underneath the seat and claims she was set up. However, she was convicted in November 2002 and sentenced to 25 years at hard labor. She ultimately served just over 10 years in the St. Gabriel prison before being released on parole on April 21, 2013.

During those 10 years, Uloho said her determination to stay true to herself is what got her in the most trouble, and she found herself “thrown in the hole” for minor transgressions. Uloho said she converted to Islam while incarcerated and was often targeted for it. Guards used every excuse, from wearing her hijab to giving another inmate a hug, to send her to solitary, she said.

“We weren’t allowed to hug or touch, but I did it anyway,” she said. “It’s important to touch to stay connected to humanity.”

Louisiana Department of Corrections spokesman Ken Pastorick said solitary confinement is not used in the LCIW, where Uloho served her time. Instead, Pastorick said inmates are put in “restrictive housing,” which means they are kept in a separate block and have certain privileges taken away, such as “yard time,” visitation and phone calls.

Uloho closed her eyes as she described the 6-by-9-foot cells on the restrictive housing block. The beds were smaller than a twin, with an inch-thick foam mattress. A steel toilet, sink and stool were cemented to the floor. During the winter, Uloho said the toilet was so cold, it hurt. In the summer months, the metal would burn her skin. Inmates spent 23 hours a day in their cells.

Uloho said she thought many times of ending her own life. It seemed like the only way to freedom, she said.

“But had I died, they would have gotten their victory,” she said. “But I lived. I got the victory.”

When Uloho was released, she stayed briefly at The Exodus House, a home for adults with severe mental disabilities, and served as “the dorm mother.” The Exodus House staff helped set Uloho up with food stamps and some other resources, but her stay was limited, and she soon found herself on the streets again. She started squatting at an abandoned house in Central City.

Not wanting to panhandle but unable to get a job as a convicted felon, Uloho decided to collect discarded items, clean them up and sell them. When she found an old suitcase, she used it as her “mobile thrift store.” Uloho saved her first $40 and invested it into her venture, going to a thrift store to buy nicer things and turning around and selling those, too.

Eventually, with help from her mosque, she got a spot at a local flea market, and then a spot at the Healing Center on St. Claude Avenue. She moved from place to place as Sister Hearts expanded, now settling in a large two-room store on West Judge Perez Drive that is packed to the gills with clothes, furniture, toys, shoes, electronics and so much more.

Next door, Uloho set up a home for 10 women at a time to stay as they work toward re-entering society. The women staying at Sister Hearts work at the store, where Uloho tasks them with organizing merchandise. It may seem small, she said, but it’s an important step to healing the mental damage many inmates suffer.

“That’s what de-carceration means,” Uloho said. “You have to de-carcerate our minds before you can expect us to participate in the world again.”

Before she was released on good time, Uloho left her fellow inmates with a message: “If you just get to me, I got you from there. Wherever I rest my head, you’ll be able to rest your head there, too. Whatever I eat, you’ll be able to share that food too. Whatever I have, I’ll be able to share that with you, too.”

Uloho kept that promise from the start, she said. While she was still squatting in that abandoned house on Amelia Street and Louisiana Avenue, she would take in other recently released women who needed help. In addition to things like helping them apply for food stamps, Uloho showed them they were not alone.

“I want to help connect them to a network of ex-offenders, because we understand each other and can support each other better than anyone,” she said. “We know we don’t have to pretend with each other.”

Uloho also helps the women get mental health care through a partnership with Positive Living Treatment Center, a community health center in Mid-City.

Terry Mogilles, Positive Living’s administrator, said she met Uloho last year while she was donating clothes to Sister Hearts. They realized the potential their two programs could have together, with Uloho helping ex-offenders regain economic stability and Mogilles addressing their mental health.

Now, when the women are first released, they go to Positive Living where Mogilles said they are given a complete mental health assessment and an individualized care plan. For women living with chronic problems, that might mean joining an intensive daily program at the Mid-City site, while for others it means participating in group or one-on-one counseling sessions at Sister Hearts.

Mogilles said she has been working in mental health and re-entry for about 23 years, but Uloho changed the way she sees ex-offenders.

“Prior to working with Maryam, (ex-offenders) were a population we didn’t truly understand how to give the care they needed. She’s been able to provide insight and guidance on how best to help them,” Mogilles said.

Mogilles employs two counselors who were incarcerated for over a decade. She said Uloho inspired her to “put her money where my mouth is,” and help ex-offenders become economically empowered.

“Plus, who better to counsel these people than someone who’s gone through it themselves and knows what it’s like? It’s worked very well for us,” Mogilles said.

Mogilles described Uloho as “steady” and “the poster-child for resiliency.”

“What Mary wants to do is a huge undertaking, but it is so needed,” Mogilles said. “Sister Hearts is the type of program that can help people long-term, because it teaches them to help themselves.”

To date, Sister Hearts has hosted 25 women. Uloho hopes to add space for five more residents soon. Beyond that, she has high hopes for the example Sister Heart’s reentry methods set.

Uloho’s story was recently featured in a short documentary sponsored by Square, the credit card processing app and financial services company. Uloho said she agreed to be in the documentary on the condition that it would be shown to Orleans Parish Prison inmates, where she now volunteers as a motivational speaker.

“This state is the incarceration capital of the world. Then I believe, that this state should also start to be the role model for rehabilitation for the whole world to see,” Uloho said.

For now, Uloho lives in Algiers with her youngest son, Robert, 25, who helps her run Sister Hearts. Aside from her eldest, Uloho’s four other sons live in Ohio and her daughter lives in Florida. Augustine Uloho Jr. died in a motorcycle crash in 2004 when he was 29 years old.

In the next 10 years, Uloho says she wants to open 100 Sister Hearts across the state, and eventually throughout the country.

“I named my business Sister Hearts in honor of the women I left in prison,” Uloho said. “And when I say that name and when I see it, I don’t ever forget where I came from… Those women stood beside me, they stood up for me. Those women are my sister hearts.”