I said - "Go down to the bottom of my shaft and stay there 'til Christmas!"

Kind folks of reddit, My family and I appreciate the outpouring of love and generosity. There has been a large misunderstanding. The poster which I'm told was found at the Gardner Stop & Shop was more a local notice for people that know him. It was in no way to indicate that he is alone. He has 7 children, many grandchildren, and even great grandchildren. In his younger years he was a foster parent to dozens of foster children. He is well liked in the community, and will be fully supported on his 90th birthday. I ask that if you don't know him, to not attend the party, as it is for his friends and family. The venue for the party is a very small hall, and will be full to capacity with people he knows and loves.

By all means, send cards and well wishes, but please refrain from sending gifts/strippers/cakes/candies/etc. and instead please make a donation in his name to a local vetrans charity.

Thank you again for all the love and well wishes, we certainly never expected this. You are awesome reddit, now please help me spread the word to other outlets and make sure this is a smaller, enjoyable party for him.

Edit: There are so many replies, I can't begin to respond to them all. I love the fact that the internet has rallied behind this as a cause, and my family is overwhelmed with what we've seen and read. I've made this my soapbox to talk to "internets" and I feel it's a good place to do so. The outpouring of love, respect, and generosity has been amazing to say the least, but really... please... there are so many others less fortunate than my Grandfather that deserve this as well. This Labor Day weekend, go to your local VA hospital, sit, and visit with the men and women there. Stop off at a nursing home and visit there. Donate to a vetrans charity. Do some good for those who fought for you, and really do have no one to call family or friend. Still do all the nice things you wanted to do for my grandfather, please do. Use that positive energy and make someone super happy. They'll appreciate it more than you'll ever know.

edit again: For those of you still thinking of sending cards, please use the following address: William J Lashua c/o American Legion 132 Williams Road Ashburnham, MA 01430 Thank you.

I have a friend that lives in Cottonwood. His sons birthday is tomorrow and he is supposed to compete in an Airsoft tournament on Saturday. He called me tonight and asked if I knew where he could find one. They go for about $255. So the winner will be awarded $355. I believe the power of Reddit can make this happen. So there is no confusion this is the Airsoft rifle he is looking for. http://www.airsplat.com/Items/GR-KSC-MP7-PDW.htm

[edit] I have no affiliation with airsplat, it was just the first site that came up on a Google search.

[edit] Why the downvotes already? Please give this a chance, it will make some people very happy.

We haven't been in contact for 5 years. I left town before he went to jail for shooting a police officer. I tried to visit him a few months ago, but the prison denied my request, saying that they had changed their policy. Only his immediate family is allowed to see him now.

This letter is the first contact I've had with him since we used to hang out downtown with our friends and drink coffee, smoke hand-rolled cigarettes, and talk about philosophy and politics.

He is asking for support at a protest against human rights violations this Saturday. If anyone else cares to join, it is outside the Sussex I State Prison in Waverly, VA.

Here is the letter (edited & pics removed, sorry folks).

Dear <me>,

As you probably already assumed, I'm not doing very well. In another letter I will tell you about the ridiculous circumstances that put me here. This letter is about a few things that makes this death camp one of the most vile places on Earth.

Where Death Row prisoners are being housed used to be the Hole. The prisoners who previously occupied these cells threw feces, urine and vomit into the air-vents. These airducts have yet to be cleaned.

To save money on heating and cooling, the air in this building is overly recirculated. This means, of course, more carbon dioxide and less oxygen.

Worst of all, they will turn the air flow down so much that we often cannot feel any air coming out of our vents for months at a time.

Because of all this, we are suffering Hypoxic Hypoxia. All of us prisoners are lethargic and couldn't exercise even if we had the space to do so. We all have short term memory loss and trouble concentrating. It is probable that we are all suffering at least mild brain damage.

Disease is running rampant here. It takes a lot of effort for prisoners to protect themselves even though it is one of the easiest things for the prison to control. Rather, it should be easily controlled but these places are ran but people devoid of empathy and compassion.

This place is never properly cleaned. There is thick black grime lining the bottom edge of every wall.

On several occasions, raw sewerage has overflowed from drainage pipes and flooded into our cells. Every time this happened, the guards took several hours to bring us only spray cleaner and paper towels to clean up the mess.

We have to share the same nail clipper. The same filthy nail clipper has to be passed from one person to the next, even to prisoners that have Hep-C and AIDS.

The toilets in our cells can only be flushed once every five minutes. If you even accidentally touch the flush button more than once in a five minute time period then the toilet will shut off for one hour.

Our drinking water is a fairly thick yellow-brown color. I have no fucking idea what's in it but I'm sure it cannot be good.

For breakfast today we were served grits, pancakes, potatoes and maple flavored corn syrup. We will go for days without getting a single piece of fruit. We never get enough protein.

Malnourishment and oxygen deprivation is causing our bodies to grow old very rapidly. Prisoners not even thirty years old are going gray and losing hair. We have bone joint and muscle problems. We have lines in our faces that young people should not have. My body is so broken down, especially my mind.

You would think that the medical treatment here was something out of a horror film.

The dentists here have performed oral surgeries without using anesthetics. A dentist accidentally stitched one prisoner's cheek to his gum and ripped out half of another prisoner's tooth.

The doctors here seem to have an adversity to treating people's illnesses but love dishing out painkillers and sleeping pills.

I don't think you know this about me, and I'm sorry that I have to explain it to you, but I have severe Irritable Bowel Syndrome. Without proper treatment I get lesions and regular diarrhea. The diarrhea removes my probiotic flora which leaves the lesions susceptible to infection. The doctor refuses to let me take over-the-counter Acidophilus supplements.

At the first jail, I beat up a man who tried to assault me. The police did not like that very much because the man I beat up was one of their snitches, so they chained me up and threw me face first into the cement floor. This dislocated my jaw and now I can only chew with one side of my mouth and my jaw now grinds against my skull which causes me to have a constant headache. The doctor here tried to put me on pain killers but I refused.

For recreation we get to go into separate cages for about an hour, five times a week. I have not been able to run for several years.

Everywhere else in the world allows prisoners to have conjugal visits except here. So it is alright for guards to sexually harass prisoners but not for prisoners to have sex with their wives.

Then they took away contact visits where we could sit with and hug our family and friends. Instead we were locked into booths with our visitors sitting on the other side of a Plexiglas window.

But that was clearly not enough dehumanization because now we can only see our visitors through a television screen.

For passover, the prison refused to serve me kosher food so far that whole week I ate nothing. I'm not exactly religious but my father was a Holocaust survivor so some Hebrew rituals are important for me.

The prison chaplain mocked passover and later told one of the guards that Jews are a bunch of Christ-killers. I should probably explain to the chaplain that I am only half Jewish so I'm really only half a Christ-killer. I really only threatened Jesus and smacked him around a little.

There are countless publications that we are not allowed to read. Many of these books and magazines are about political and social reform. Many religious books are banned. We can't have almost anything with erotic content.

We can't receive nude photos through the mail. I have not had sex for five fucking years (it's punny) and I can't see a photo of a girlfriend.

All jails and prisons in the U.S. conduct in activity that the world court condemns as torture.

Guards will shock people with electricity, strap naked prisoners to a chair and hose them down with ice cold water, spray C-S gas and pepper spray into the faces of chained prisoners, deprive people of sleep, and deny medicine that treats painful illnesses.

According to the U.S. Constitution we are slaves and have no civil rights. That's why our torture is legal.

Me and several prisoners are asking our friends and anyone who cares to rally outside this death camp on Sept. 4, at 3:00pm, to protest the human rights violations that are conducted here.

I know it is very short notice but I really need your help.

Your friend, <name removed to protect privacy>