For whom do prison ministers pray?

This morning at morning report, we read all the prayers left in the intentions basket in the chapel, and then added our own prayers. I asked for prayers for F____, who had just been found guilty of assault with intent. I told about his terrible childhood and that he is not eating or coming out of his cell while awaiting sentencing in 3 weeks. I asked for prayers for strength and grace for him in his hour of darkness. Afterwards, one of the members of the group took me aside and told me that it was all well and good to pray for him, but that we need to put criminals away, and that I should remember that he was not the victim in his case. That he was the perpetrator of a vicious act. I still am not quite sure how to deal with it, but here is what I sent after some thought...

Bill, your cautionary comments this morning are still rattling around in my
brain. I want to make sure that you know that I do not and have never disagreed
with the spirit of your statement that the young man is still a perpetrator and
we need to have him incarcerated. It is not that he should be freed. It is not
that he should not be repentant of his offense. He has done what he has done,
and New York must act consistent with how we treat criminals.

My sorrow and my pain on his behalf (and ours) is that as a refugee, he was
un-cared-for,as a disturbed student, not helped and as an orphan, unloved. He is
too guileless to be making this up. I asked him once if he remembered his father
or either of his uncles holding him, or putting an arm around him, or even
looking at him fondly, and he said "no." I cannot imagine the brokenness that
must create.

Now I wonder how small my corner is. I can't fix Irani or Iraqi or Afghan
society. I can't even get involved in fixing the  schools, or public mental
health. I can't fix the courts. I can only pray for him as both a perpetrator
and as a victim. I pray that he come to see his actions as unjustifiable, and I
pray that he someday forgive those who stood by or even made his horrible life
worse.

Later I decided to add ....

All I can do is offer him an atom of the love that is God, and love him despite of his crime, cry for him because of his pain and hope for him despite his bleak future.