My name is Samira Jones, born, Samira Simmons, and I am a survivor of child sex abuse, a story that is not one of solitude, as many others are still suffering today in silence. I want to be that beacon of hope, that you do not have to look like what you have been through, that God's promises are still yes and amen. 

 

My journey began in childhood at the age of 12, when the person who should have protected me became my abuser. The man who adopted me at the tender age of 9 and gave me his last name. The man who I'll never forget, who also tried to convince me to change my first name as well to Keisha during the same time while we were in the process of changing my last name. Being so young, I did not realize that this was evidence of his controlling behavior. Like my mother, he wanted to change my identity. More on that in, In Her Memory.

 

His name is Clinton Price Sr., my stepfather. My stepfather took advantage of my vulnerability and betrayed my trust as his child. He was a predator. The details of what I endured are deeply painful and are shared in full in my book, "Tough Skin, A Journey of Survival and Persevering Life's Challenges", available through Amazon and Barnes & Noble. This is not a plug for my book. It is a testimony. It offers a clear and detailed account of a monster who is standing before us today, who is in our communities, hiding in plain sight, and has access to our vulnerable, innocent children. Innocent children like myself, who not only loss my peace, but my home, my family, years of not being in the picture, not being on the family vacations, at the birthday celebrations, or being celebrated. Not being in the frame... I was shattered.

​

For years, I lived in silence. The shame and trauma were buried deep inside, where I convinced myself that speaking out would not change anything, and might even hurt those I loved. I wanted to protect my siblings, because I did not know what life would look like for them had he went to jail.  For many years he and my mother operated a neighborhood convenience store, which is still the case today, except that my mother recently passed away unexpectedly. Through the years the silence only compounded the pain. The years spent hiding the truth allowed my stepfather to continue his life freely, while I carried the weight of his actions alone. What made matters worse is his admitting to what he had done to me and my mother doing nothing.

 

It was a warm summer day circa 1996. I walked into the store with a message for my stepfather. That message was, "If you ever touch my sisters, I will kill you." He looked at me with my mother standing to his right and said that he would never touch them. When I asked why did he do it to me, he stated because I am not his daughter. In that moment, I thought my mother would become my shero. Yet, again she failed to protect me. She looked at me as if I had received my answer. And in that moment a rage of fire came through me. I remember trashing the store with the garbage cans outside the door.

​

This turmoil continued for many years. I always wanted answers from my mother but was met with silence. This isn't about my mother, but a man who stole my innocence, and who I realized more in recent years was also my mother's abuser. For years her husband failed at his vows of marriage, had been caught on multiple occasions escorting prostitutes into the family business after hours while my mother was home, running errands, or at the school where she eventually started her own career. This is what made her suicidal. The even more upsetting part is he laughed about it to my sibling as if it were a joke. There were also accounts of him bringing other women around and introducing them to my siblings as his girlfriends. Two of my siblings recall one being a Jamaican woman that he bragged about paying her bills. This sunk my mother into deep depression for many years, up until her untimely death.

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​​​​​​​​​​​

 

For years I have been fighting against the system for justice and would get frustrated when I'd hit a brick wall. So I had decided to just focus on my family and move on with my life. Then in 2018, everything changed. I could no longer stay silent. I found out that Clinton had posted inappropriate images of me from my childhood on social media, with captions that were very deceptive, "There go my future wife and her pretty little girl. 1982 that was a good year." one photo read. The other, "She's a little superstar now...Mother of two children. God bless you." That was the moment I realized that remaining quiet for the sake of others was no longer an option. This was disturbing because as mentioned, my abuse began when I was 12, that was 1992. He posted this on social media in 2018 when I was 38, about a picture where I was 2 years old, (10 years before he began sexually abusing me). So at the time he posted these photos, he was indeed a pedophile that was not held accountable and demonstrating obvious inappropriateness given who he really is and what he had done years prior. I've never introduced or brought my children who are now 19 and 20 years of age around him for a reason. That should be telling in itself. 

​

The truth needed to be spoken.

​

I took to social media and exposed him. I shared not only the images but the deeper reality of the abuse he inflicted on me. I chose to speak out, not because I wanted revenge, but because silence allowed him to continue his behavior. It was time for me to stand up for myself and for every other person who had been silenced for far too long.

​

Since that moment, I have realized that the fight for justice is not just about me. It’s about every person who has suffered in silence, every survivor who feels that their voice doesn’t matter, and every person who is still hiding in the shadows out of fear.

​

This space is where the truth lives now. It's where we reclaim our voices and stand strong against those who have manipulated and harmed us. It’s where I hold my abuser accountable, but also where I call on others to join me. We are not alone.

We will no longer remain silent. We will speak our truth.

​

What follows are real conversations between my siblings, and from people on social media who reached out after I began to share the truth.

These responses speak to something deeper than my own experience, they expose the cracks in the image he carefully constructed. A man known by many faces, living beneath layers of deceit.

These moments remind me that I am not alone. That others saw it too.

And now, so will you.