Category Archives: Abolition Of Work

Prosecutors are the most powerful actors in the criminal justice system. For decades, they have relied on their immense discretion to impose harsher sentences that have disproportionately targeted low-income communities of color and significantly increased the prison population. For far too long, prisons, jails, and correctional facilities have acted as the solutions to obtaining justice. This is despite the fact that incarceration has been found to be very costly and ineffective at reducing crime or correcting bad behavior. However, some prosecutors have begun to recognize their myopic focus on punitive justice over rehabilitation and correction, and as a result, have shifted to progressive prosecution, which focuses on ending mass incarceration while maintaining integrity in the legal system.

Though progressive prosecution has its merits, even its supporters feel that it has too many shortcomings. For example, Rachel Barkow, a leading expert on criminal law and policy, argues that ending mass incarceration requires limiting progressive prosecutors discretionary powers and increasing the involvement of other actors in the criminal justice system. Given flaws like these, it is crucial to introduce an alternative way for prosecutors to work within the criminal justice system as agents of change. Restorative justice is one such paradigm that can help a prosecutor emphasize healing, reconciliation, and the rehabilitation of victims, the community, and the offenders in the process of addressing criminal behavior. More importantly, restorative justice paves the path for the much-needed abolition of the current criminal justice system.

Restorative justice works by bringing together all willing stakeholders to address criminal behavior in a way that makes amends, transforms the relationship between all parties, and begins the process of reintegration for the offender back into the community. Progressive prosecutors are in a unique position to promote such initiatives because their goals align with those of restorative justice namely, to find alternatives to accountability for crime that do not require the continual promotion of punitive systems. By prioritizing restorative justice initiatives in their agenda, progressive prosecutors can maximize their impact in the effort to end mass incarceration.

The implementation of radical tools such as restorative justice initiatives is not new in the criminal justice system, but it will have the greatest impact on incarceration. While some may reject the idea of restorative justice asa drastically new way of thinking about accountability and punishment, some progressive prosecutors have long been looking for programs and initiatives that substitute the need to try cases in court, unfairly negotiate plea bargains, and needlessly incarcerate individuals. Some of these initiatives have already been carried out, so the introduction of restorative justice would be an extension to these alternatives of incarceration.

In Charged: The New Movement to Transform American Prosecution and End Mass Incarceration, journalist Emily Bazelon outlines diversion as one of the most influential initiatives that prosecutors can implement to avoid incarcerating people. Diversion programs are designed to divert people from jail or prison by allowing them to participate in rehabilitation programs in order to avoid a criminal conviction and record. Bazelon writes that diversion can conserve resources, reduce reoffending, and diminish the collateral harm of criminal prosecution. But while diversion is considered the hallmark of progressive prosecution, it is not widely available to all those who want to participate. Since diversion relies on the discretion of prosecutors, it allows room for errors in judgment when deciding who should or should not be allowed to participate. Yet, the implementation of restorative justice can work as an expansion of diversion programs to have the greatest impact on incarceration.

Restorative justice avoids such bias because it does not rely on the discretion of attorneys or the justice system to decide whether or not someone can participate. Furthermore, what makes restorative justice special is that it is a fully voluntary process in which all parties involved are not forced into participation. By implementing restorative justice, prosecutors can expand upon existing diversion programs by making them widely accessible and less biased. While Bazelon believes that the promotion of restorative justice has value in reducing incarceration, she only acknowledges the process in passing and does not recognize how restorative justice can be promoted as the main focus of progressive prosecutors. Rather than using restorative justice in their arsenal of tools, prosecutors jobs should shift to prioritize restorative justice initiatives as front and center in their agenda.

The promotion of restorative justice by prosecutors within the criminal justice system has the potential to make it an alternative to incarceration. This would require prosecutors to demand legislation to be enacted or to simply establish policies in their office to adopt restorative justice. But to begin using restorative justice immediately would require prosecutors to partner with restorative justice organizations that are more knowledgeable and understanding in facilitating conversations about subjects related to crime and justice. Such collaborations are crucial but should not be the only goal of restorative justice. Progressive prosecutors can fully implement restorative justice divisions and departments within their offices. Its important to note that this does not mean expanding prosecutorial offices, but rather, shifting resources around to accommodate such programs. Prosecutors can make this happen by tapping into their access and power as the most powerful people in the criminal justice system.

The focus on restorative justice has the power to shape the future of the justice system and forever shift the way that prosecutors do their jobs. The goal of prosecution would no longer be obtaining the most punitive charge or sentence for the defendant, but making sure that the victim has the chance to heal and that the offender has the chance to grow and learn.

While such a non-reformist reform of the system is imperative, it is not the ultimate goal of the progressive prosecution movement. Criminal punishment, as it operates in the United States, puts a large burden on Black and Brown communities. While we can limit and transform how prosecutors go about doing their job, the inherently racist system under which prosecutors work will still be present. Current and future progressive prosecutors, activists, academics, and politicians should advocate for limitations to prosecutorial powers until they have no more. Abolition of the current system of criminal punishment should be the ultimate goal, and the implementation of restorative justice in the prosecution system is the first and most crucial step to get us there.

Image byTingey Injury Law Firmlicensed under theUnsplash License.

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Restorative Justice: The Path to Abolishing the Current Criminal Justice System - Harvard Political Review

Israeli Finance Minister Avigdor Liberman announced Tuesday morning that tariffs on fruits and vegetables will be abolished. The directive includes immediate abolition of customs duties on a variety of fruits and vegetables (avocados, garlic, peas, beans, figs, pineapples, berries, mushrooms and more). The remaining caps on fresh, frozen and preserved fruits and vegetables will be gradually reduced over five years to maintain local agriculture and allow for an adjustment period.

Hamodia.comquoted Liberman as saying: As we promised, we will continue to work to increase the disposable income of Israeli citizens and reduce spending. The agricultural reform that is being launched will significantly reduce the prices of fruits and vegetables and bring down prices for citizens. We do not forget the business owners, we will continue to help businesses that have been affected by the Corona virus and we will stand by them in times of crisis.

The agricultural reform has been approved in the state budget for 2022, and will immediately cancel tariffs on a variety of fruits and vegetables such as avocados, garlic, peas, beans, figs, pineapple, berries, mushrooms and more. The remaining tariffs on fresh, frozen and preserved fruit and vegetables will be gradually reduced over five years. According to the Finance Ministry, the total savings to the Israeli consumer is expected to be about 820 shekels (230) per year per household.

Source: jpost.com

Photo source: Nl.wikipedia.org

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Israel: Tariffs on fruits and vegetables will be abolished - FreshPlaza.com

If an 800-kiloton nuclear bomb was detonated at the intersection of Congress and Texas in downtown Houston, 204,150 people would immediately die. Thats 2.5 times as many deaths as the total Texas death toll since the COVID pandemic began two years ago. The fallout, reaching all the way past Corpus Christi to Kingsville, would leave around 265,610 more people with devastating injuries.

Of course, thats just a rough estimate based on a simulation. But as long as nuclear weapons exist, the potential for unimaginable mass destruction remains strikingly real.

At the outset of his invasion of Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin declared that other countries will face consequences greater than any you have faced in history if they intervened. A few days later, he ordered Russian nuclear forces to be put on a heightened alert status.

Putins words and actions underscore the inherent dangers posed by the very existence of nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons are not abstract tools for global security. They are weapons of mass destruction. They create instability, enable horrific violence and risk all life on the planet. Its past time to abolish them.

Putins nuclear threats are a wake-up call to some people who havent thought about nuclear weapons in a long time. But the danger of nuclear weapons isnt limited to these past few weeks.

On Jan. 13, 2018, people in Hawaii had a wake-up call of their own, when they received an alert urging them to take cover from an incoming ballistic missile. The alert was false, but the threat is very real. This is one of the key messages of On the Morning You Wake (to the End of the World), a new virtual reality documentary premiering in Austin at SXSW this week. I speak in the film about the urgency of nuclear abolition and am working with the producers to engage people who see it to take action against the bomb.

The film puts viewers in the shoes of people who tried to prepare for a possible nuclear attack on that morning in Hawaii. As people all around the world now confront the reality of the volatile world of systemic nuclear risk we live in, it is all the more important to educate, advocate and take concrete action toward the abolition of nuclear weapons.

As is clear from the above simulation, the use of even a single nuclear bomb would be absolutely devastating. In Houston alone, the petrochemical complex could turn into an inferno. The Texas Medical Center would not be able to provide help, as it would likely be destroyed, and at the very least would not have the beds, blood or burn units capable of providing for the citys population. Radiation would be unleashed, damaging human bodies, animals, plants, land, water and air for generations.

If it escalates into a nuclear war, we will be facing an unprecedented catastrophe. Millions of people could die. The climate crisis will be exponentially exacerbated; there could be a disastrous decline in food production and a global famine that might kill most of humanity.

Chapters 2 and 3 of "On the Morning You Wake (to the End of the World)" will be shown at SXSW from March 11-15. The documentary and associated impact campaign will be featured in a panel discussion about the power of creative storytelling in the nuclear abolition movement at 11:30 a.m. March 15.

Its not just an issue of the Russian government having nuclear weapons. Three North Atlantic Treaty Organization members France, the United Kingdom and the United States also possess nuclear weapons, and U.S. nuclear bombs are stored on the territory of five other NATO members (Belgium, Germany, Italy, Netherlands and Turkey). China, India, Israel, Pakistan and North Korea also have nuclear weapons. Each and every one of these bombs is a threat to peace and security.

As long as these weapons exist, there is a risk that they will be detonated. As long as they exist, they will be used to threaten and intimidate. As long as they exist, they will continue to harm people where they are made and where they have been tested primarily Indigenous nations and communities of color. As long as they exist, they will extract billions of dollars toward their maintenance, modernization and deployment, when that money is so desperately needed to confront climate change and provide for the well-being of people and the planet.

In 2020, the U.S. government spent more than $35 billion on its nuclear weapons. Facing Putins recent threats, elements of the U.S. nuclear complex are calling for more nuclear funding. Nuclear arms races are not part of the past. They are going on right now, and they are devastating us all. Its time to change course.

We already have an international agreement that most countries in the world support. The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons outlaws the use, threat of use, development and possession of nuclear weapons. So far, the nine nuclear-armed states including the U.S. have refused to sign the treaty, but pressure is mounting for them to do so. All countries should join this treaty and work urgently for the elimination of all nuclear weapons.

Nuclear abolition is the only answer to the existential threat of nuclear weapons. As long as nuclear weapons exist, their presence, production and potential use will only lead to violence and destruction.

But you have the power to shape the future of nuclear weapons policy. On the Morning You Wake is at the center of a long-term impact campaign launching in Austin this week, which provides a number of ways people concerned about the nuclear threat can get involved and work together to abolish nuclear weapons. One thing people in Houston and Austin can do is urge your city councils to join the ICAN Cities Appeal, which encourages the government to join the TPNW. You can also make sure your money isnt going to nuclear weapon production and get your bank to divest, too. We can all still change the story, not only for now, but for future generations.

Acheson is an Impact Fellow for On the Morning You Wake. They are director of disarmament at the Womens International League for Peace and Freedom and a steering group representative of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, which won the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize.

Originally posted here:

Opinion: Nuclear weapons put us all at risk. We must abolish them now. - Houston Chronicle

Tufts Working Group on TUPD Arming anticipates releasing new recommendations regarding TUPDs arming status this semester, Executive Vice President Mike Howard confirmed in an email to the Daily.

The working group was formed following the release of the universitys Campus Safety and Policing Workstream final report in February 2021, which recommended creating a working group focused on addressing and potentially reforming TUPDs arming status. The report estimated that if implemented, this groups work could take approximately 12 months and would include a lengthier and more comprehensive communication and engagement effort than the [Working Group on Campus Safety and Policing].

While the Working Group on TUPD Arming seems to be on track to follow a timeline similar to the one proposed in last years final report, some community members do not feel that the working group has communicated in a transparent and effective way regarding its recommendation process.

The Student Prison Education and Abolition Coalition, an umbrella organization for groups at Tufts that engage with carceral justice work including the Tufts University Prison Initiative of Tisch College, Tufts Petey Greene and Tufts for a Racially Equitable Endowment, launched a letter-writing campaign in December calling for the WGTA to release the results of its arming survey.

The survey, released to the Tufts community in September, asked participants including undergraduates students, graduate students, faculty and staff to select how comfortable they would feel with TUPD, local police departments or mental health professionals responding to various safety threats with varying levels of arming.

According to Tatum Schutt, a SPEAC organizer, little was done to communicate that survey results were made public.

While the results are now available online, the WGTA did little to publicize their release of this information, let alone directly contact anybody who expressed interest via email, Schutt, a sophomore, wrote in an email to the Daily. As a result, the data is only accessible to those who go out of their way to search for it When they knew the student interest was there, why couldnt they have announced that the data was available?

While she appreciates that the results are available publicly, Schutt added that for the university to truly embody its mission to become an anti-racist institution, initiatives must go beyond task force meetings.

We appreciate the progress reports available online. Communication and transparency are important. So are power and action, she wrote. Within liberal institutions there is an extensive tradition of co-opting of the language of change and responding with incrementalism that does not disturb the baseline power structure at play. At Tufts, this can look like waiting for student leaders to burn out, go abroad, and graduate, establishing work committees accountable to no one, drawing out timelines, and using proceduralism to excuse inaction.

Schutt hopes that the WGTAs conclusions will lead to serious reforms. She cited Tufts Action Group, an anti-racist faculty and staff organization that was formed following the murder of George Floyd, as a group that should inform the WGTAs recommendations. Tufts Action Groups demands, which include abolishing TUPD, garnered support from over 2,000 students, faculty and staff during summer 2020.

Howard noted that while the policing model Tufts currently utilizes is common, the WGTA is researching alternatives. These models include proprietary and contract security departments with varying arming statuses, including armed, unarmed and hybrid models.

One theme that we heard consistently throughout our discussions with community members is support for flexibility in response, greater reliance on mental health resources, and low preference for greater involvement of municipal police, Howard wrote in an email to the Daily. Many of those who participated in our surveys and discussions indicated that they are interested in differential response, which allows for public safety responses to vary depending on the nature of the call, the campus, and other factors.

Of the 2,959 total survey responses 2,040 of which came from the Medford/Somerville campus the majority were against an armed response to mental health calls, noise complaints and public intoxication. Some respondents supported armed TUPD or local police departments responses to physical assault and theft or robbery, with 56% and 54% favoring such a response, respectively. Over one third of all respondents were undergraduate students, and 62% percent of respondents were white. Forty-nine percent of respondents were female, with an additional 10% of respondents gender identities listed as unknown or not listed.

We appreciate the commitment of the working group over the past several months as it has studied this issue, engaged the community, and examined the universitys options, Executive Director of Media Relations Patrick Collins wrote in an email to the Daily. We anticipate that the groups findings will be made available to the community in the next few weeks.

Schutt hopes the findings will reflect the universitys commitment to becoming an anti-racist institution.

We are glad that faculty, administrators and the single undergraduate student representative seem to have discussed arming seriously, and we look forward to hearing their conclusions, she wrote. Should they conclude inaction and minimal reform, we will be ready to welcome them into serious discussion of alternatives to policing in our shared community and to resist.

Read more from the original source:

Working Group on TUPD Arming to announce recommendations by end of semester - Tufts Daily

For some of L.A.'s most outspoken left-leaning activists, the first sign of trouble came when U.S. Rep. Karen Bass unveiled her plan for ending homeless encampments on the citys streets and sidewalks.

Bass, a progressive Democrat running for mayor, promised to house 15,000 people in her first year. But she also assailed the violence that takes place in broad daylight at encampments, saying she would make sure outreach workers receive backup from law enforcement or other security personnel an approach opposed by some homeless advocates.

Leftist organizers were also troubled when Bass told a homeowner group she would not repeal a city law that allows council members to set up no-encampment zones around schools, parks and other facilities.

Still, the real uproar came weeks later when Bass called for the hiring of about 200 additional police officers at the Los Angeles Police Department, as well as hundreds of additional civilian personnel.

A coalition of grass-roots organizations denounced that approach, saying the city needs a mayor who will address murderous policing, not seek to reform an irredeemable department.

This feels like nothing more than a shallow and misguided political calculation, said Lex Steppling, national director of campaigns and organizing at Dignity & Power Now, which advocates for incarcerated people and their families.

Those responses do not appear to have inflicted any meaningful damage on Bass campaign, at least for the time being. A poll conducted last month by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies, co-sponsored by The Times, showed Bass with a solid lead over her rivals, putting her in a strong position to make the top-two runoff in November.

Bass progressive critics also have expressed unhappiness with the other big-name candidates in the race: Councilman Joe Buscaino, real estate developer Rick Caruso, Councilman Kevin de Len and City Atty. Mike Feuer.

Still, even some of Bass longtime supporters have begun warning publicly that her more moderate stances put her at risk of dampening enthusiasm among the citys progressive voters.

Pandering to affluent white Westside and Valley voters at the expense of Black, Latinx and working-class ones can cost her a base that she cannot afford to lose, said Melina Abdullah and Patrisse Cullors, two longtime leaders in the Black Lives Matter movement, in an essay published by the LA Progressive.

In their essay, Cullors and Abdullah argued that Bass public safety plan puts targets on the backs of Black people and harkens to a 1994-crime-bill-style pro-police system. Bass, who grounded herself in womanism and revolution, is now trying to out-Caruso Caruso and out-Buscaino Buscaino, they said.

Melina Abdullah, co-founder of Black Lives Matter-Los Angeles, addresses a police commission meeting at LAPD headquarters.

(Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)

Bass said she counts Abdullah and Cullors as friends. But she disputed several assertions contained in their essay, saying she has not changed her views on crime, police accountability or other issues for the campaign.

Her public safety plan, she said, does not seek to increase the LAPD budget. And it calls for far fewer officers than those put forth by Caruso and Buscaino.

Under her plan, the LAPD would grow to 9,700 officers, the amount currently authorized by the City Council. Caruso and Buscaino, by comparison, have promised to take the force up to 11,000 sworn personnel.

My goal is to be the mayor for Los Angeles city, which is very large. And a lot of Angelenos right now are not feeling safe, Bass said in an interview. And that is a reality that is important to address, and not ignore.

The fact that Bass is having to rebut such critiques is, in part, a reflection of the complicated political space she occupies.

Bass, a former community organizer, spent much of last year championing a sweeping reform bill that would have pushed law enforcement agencies to ban police chokeholds and no-knock warrants or risk losing out on certain federal funds. The bill, which ultimately stalled in the U.S. Senate, also would have created a nationwide police misconduct registry and made it easier for officers accused of wrongdoing to be prosecuted by law enforcement and sued by private citizens.

At the same time, Bass is known for publicly slamming the phrase defund police, telling the Washington Post in June 2020 a few weeks after George Floyd was murdered in Minneapolis that it was probably one of the worst slogans ever. The defund question has come up multiple times a day, she recently told Los Angeles Magazine.

Im on record radio, TV, print, hundreds of times saying that I dont support Defund the Police, she told the publication. Its like I cant fully be trusted unless I recite it several times a day.

Bass said L.A.'s black and Latino neighborhoods want police who are responsive but also act responsibly. Former Assembly Speaker John A. Prez, who has endorsed Bass and previously represented some of the citys working-class Latino neighborhoods, offered a similar take.

To suggest that those are Westside white or Valley views fundamentally misunderstands the realities of life for all Angelenos, he said. We all deserve safe communities. We all deserve responsive, properly trained and accountable law enforcement.

City Councilwoman Nithya Raman, who has emerged in recent years as one of the citys most progressive voices, praised Bass history of work on public safety, poverty and homelessness in some of the citys most underserved communities.

Most people know her record, said Raman, who has not yet endorsed in the race. And they trust it like I do.

Councilmember Nithya Raman during a February press conference at City Hall.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

Bass unveiled her public safety plan last month, weeks after the LAPD reported that the number of homicides reached a 15-year high in 2021. She said she knew Abdullah would not like the plan, but nevertheless told her about it before it was released.

Abdullah and Cullors, she said, were also highly critical of her police reform bill, because it would have provided hundreds of millions of dollars for law enforcement.

Among L.A.'s leftists, the frustration with Bass has not been limited to policing. In January, while fielding questions from the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn., she was asked what the city should do about unhoused people who decline offers of shelter or temporary housing. At the end of the day, she responded, people have to move.

What I have learned in talking to the people that do this work day in and day out is 95% of the people will move into shelter, housing or temporary housing, she told the group. But for those 5% that wont, especially if theyre breaking the law, laws have to be enforced.

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Those types of stances have alienated activists like Gina Viola, who lives in Hollywood and is an opponent of L.A.'s anti-encampment law.

Viola, who owns a temp agency for trade shows and conventions, endorsed Bass last fall. But after she learned about Bass strategy for addressing homelessness, Viola decided to rescind that endorsement.

And after she put out her public safety platform, that was it for me, said Viola, who has long called for the defunding and abolition of the LAPD.

Viola launched a long-shot bid for mayor last month, offering herself as an alternative for voters who want major cuts in police spending and an end to the citys anti-encampment law and other homelessness initiatives.

Abdullah, who donated to Bass last year and has also praised Viola, has not yet decided whom she will endorse. And she sought to make clear that her message to Bass was not meant to rake her over the coals.

It was about reminding her of her once-progressive positioning, said Abdullah, who speaks with Bass every few weeks. And urging her to come back in line with that position.

Continued here:

Some on L.A.'s left are frustrated with Karen Bass - Los Angeles Times

The proposal on amendments to the Law on Excise Duties in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) under the urgent procedure which abolishes excise duties on fuel in BiH, was adopted with 31 votes in favor, no votes against, and one abstention.

This was adopted as a measure to restrain the rise in fuel prices in our country, which reached record levels in the global market, but also the chain growth of other prices, which are also rising due to rising energy prices. Fuel should now be 35 to 40 pfennigs cheaper.

Previously, the amendments of the Croatian Democratic Union of BiH (HDZ) were adopted, according to which the changes are applied for 6 months, and after the expiration, they can be extended for another 3 months.

People are mad

In the introductory speech, the proposer of this proposal, delegate Sasa Magazinovic, said: The time left for the institutions to react is very short. That is why this is very urgent and it is the obligation of us as the Parliament and other institutions to use all the mechanisms at their disposal. This is one of the measures by which we will at least slightly protect the mental health of BiH citizens. People are mad, the ranks formed after one piece of news in the media, people are reminded of the period before the outbreak of the war. This measure will not solve economic problems, but it will reduce the price of fuel by 35 to 40 pfennigs and will send a message that we who are sitting here are responsible. There is support for this decision from the general public, Magazinovic pointed out.

Extreme times

Party of Democratic Progress (PDP) delegate Branislav Borenovic supported the law and emphasized that after the boycott, they decided to participate in the work of the BiH Parliament.

Extreme times require decisive and quick reactions and adequate measures. The most important decision that the Parliament will make today is the amendment of the Law on Excise Duties, and in that way, it indirectly helped not only the carriers but all the citizens to overcome this difficult economic crisis that has hit us.

That is why we decided to make an exception and participate in decision-making. Today, everything should be put aside, despite the political tensions that exist in our country. I hope that the House of Peoples will make such a decision, Borenovic concluded yesterday.

E.Dz.

Source: Avaz

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Proposal on the Abolition of Excise Duties adopted: Fuel is cheaper! Sarajevo Times - Sarajevo Times

The so-called smacking ban comes into force in Wales from March 21. It means that all types of physical punishment against a child are illegal. The law officially the Children (Abolition of Defence of Reasonable Punishment) (Wales) Act 2020 applies to anyone with responsibility for a child, even if it is someone caring for a child while their parents or guardian are absent. It also applies to those who are visiting Wales.

Anyone who physically punishes a child, be it through smacking, hitting, slapping and shaking or other physical assault, could risk being arrested and charged with assault. Scotland has already introduced the law and Wales is the second part of the UK to bring it in. The Welsh legislation removes a 160-year-old legal defence and provides children the same protection from assault as adults.

Currently hitting a child is common assault but if a parent or someone with parental responsibility for a child is charged with common assault against the child they could try to use the defence of reasonable punishment. From March 21, 2022, this defence will no longer be available in Wales meaning all types of physical punishment will be illegal.

Read more: Hundreds of pupils in Cardiff and Merthyr told to work from home again

The Welsh Government say that it will "protect children and their rights, to help give them the best start in life". It also brings Wales into line with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). The intended effect of the act is for to reduce the use and tolerance of the physical punishment of children in Wales.

There are lots of types of physical punishment which includes smacking, hitting, slapping, and shaking but it also includes anything where a child is punished using physical force.

The law will apply to everyone not just parents but anyone who is responsible for a child while the parents are absent. It will also apply if you are visiting Wales for example on holiday. Physical punishment is already illegal in schools, childrens homes, local authority foster care homes, and childcare settings.

Anyone who physically punishes a child will be breaking the law which means they risk being arrested or charged with assault and may get a criminal record which is the same for any criminal offence.

The Welsh Government advise that if you see a child being physically punished you should contact your local social services department and "you can also call the police in an emergency or if a child is in immediate danger".

Yes one opposition group is the Be Reasonable group. They say the ban will turn "good parents into criminals" and it should be for parents to decide whether to smack their children rather than the government. They further say "police and social workers will be flooded with trivial cases leaving them struggling to stop genuine child abuse" and "the current law already protects children from abuse", adding: "It needs to be enforced, not changed."

In 2019 two-thirds of the people who responded to plans to introduce a smacking ban didn't want it introduced in Wales. There were 650 responses to a public consultation with 562 from individuals, 29 from professionals, and 59 from organisations. You can read the sort of things people said in opposition here. One included: ""I would like to bring to your attention that smacking is not abuse or a crime but love and correction. In God's wisdom the bottom is a well-padded area for a firm but not too hard a smack."

See the rest here:

Smacking will become illegal in Wales next week everything you need to know about the new law - Wales Online

Assistant Professor of Clinical Law Vincent Southerland recalls that as a staff attorney with the Bronx Defenders early in his legal career, he often dealt with risk assessment instruments algorithm-based tools employed by the court to help determine whether his clients should be released pretrial. Southerland used the assessments to argue on behalf of his client when they were favorable, and when they werent, hed suggest potential problems with the assessment calculation. With all the other elements at work in the courtroom, he says, he didnt think deeply about the broader role that risk assessment instruments played.

But Southerland, who teaches the Criminal Defense and Reentry Clinic, has since come to recognize that the very use of those instruments has an outsize influence on criminal justice. What I also realized, he says, is that the tentacles of the algorithmic ecosystem reach into all these other stages of the criminal systemeverything from policing all the way through to sentencing, parole, probation, supervision, reentry, where youre classified when youre incarcerated.. These tools are ubiquitous across the system, and I feel like theyre just humming along without much of a challenge to them.

In his article The Intersection of Race and Algorithmic Tools in the Criminal Legal System, published last fall in the Maryland Law Review, Southerland takes a hard look at such tools and offers multiple reasons to question them. Arguing that the criminal legal system is plagued by racism and inequity, he writes that to transform the criminal legal system, advocates need to adopt a lens centered on racial justice to inform technology-based efforts rather than simply layering tools onto it in its current state. While algorithmic tools are often characterized as helping to eradicate bias in decision-making, Southerland asserts that they are infected by inevitable systemic bias.

The article begins with an overview of algorithmic tools across the criminal legal system, focusing on predictive tools. They are used by police to forecast where criminal activity is likely to occur; they are used by courts to determine risk of rearrest and failure to reappear when setting bail, and to render sentencing decisions.

The evidence, Southerland writes, casts doubt on the efficacy of this algorithmic approach. In a 2016 study, the Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG) examined the algorithm behind the predictive policing software PredPol. Inputting crime data from Oakland, California, to predict potential drug crime, HRDAG found that the algorithm suggested targeting low-income neighborhoods of color, despite concurrent evidence from public health data that drug use is more evenly dispersed throughout the city. HRDAG argued that when informed by discriminatory data, the algorithm will work to encourage similarly discriminatory police behavior.

Southerland points to existing scholarship indicating that this data is not merely something that police usethey create it as well, meaning that bias reflected in past police activity is embedded in the statistics that algorithmic tools utilize. Thus, writes Southerland, police decision-making plays an outsized role in shaping our perceptions of crime and criminal behavior. Data contain other flaws, too, he suggests. For example, arrest statistics do not indicate how the arrest is ultimately resolved, including dismissal of charges: What is reflected and read in the data is a community that appears to be dramatically more dangerous than it actually is, he writes.

Such initial distortions, he argues, can be self-perpetuating: increased law enforcement in a specific area based on previous patterns of policing can lead to more arrests, as does the mere presence of police, leading to even greater targeting by law enforcement.

Algorithmically based pretrial risk assessments used in bail decisions, such as those Southerland had encountered as a Bronx Defenders attorney, vary by jurisdiction and are created by a variety of different entities. Many use data about prior convictions and pending charges. The factors used to compute a risk score and how they are weighted are not always revealed, and most tools give a singular score encompassing the risk of both rearrest and failure to appear, even though the two risks are distinct from each other.

Southerland critiques also the algorithmic tools applied to sentencing decisions. The tools, which calculate recidivism risk, typically utilize four categories of risk factors: criminal history, antisocial attitude, demographics, and socioeconomic status. Such actuarial risk assessments operate as a form of digital profiling, prescribing the treatment of an individual based on their similarity to, or membership in, a group, he notes. He cites a recent study that found Virginias use of nonviolent risk assessment tools did not reduce incarceration, recidivism, or racial disparities; simultaneously, it disadvantaged young defendants.

The immediate abolition of algorithmic tools in the criminal legal system is unlikely, Southerland acknowledges, but he sees an opportunity to use them to shape the system for the better, using a racial justice lens. Algorithmic data sets could be adjusted to account for racially disparate impacts in policing and other areas. Applying a public health analysis, hot spots could attract support and investment rather than increased policing. Algorithmic tool vendors and users could be required to eliminate the discriminatory impact of their tools; algorithmic impact assessments, modeled on environmental impact assessments, could also be required; and algorithmic tools could be used to detect bias in decision-making in those who run the system.

Southerland stresses that it is not the tools themselves, but how they are crafted and used, that matters. These tools reflect back to us the world that we live in. If we are honest about it, what we see in that reflection is a criminal legal system riddled with racism and injustice, he writes. A racial justice lens helps us to understand that and demands that we adjust our responses to what we see to create the type of world that we want to inhabit.

Posted March 14, 2022

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Broken Tools: Vincent Southerland illuminates the problem of bias in the criminal legal system's use of algorithmic tools | NYU School of Law - NYU...

The full three-part documentary is currently screening in Austin, Texas as an official selection of the 2022 SXSW Film Festival. "Chapter 2: The Doomsday Machine" and "Chapter 3: Kuleana" premiered at SXSW on March 13. "Chapter 1: Take Cover" previously premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival in January.

Through a 38-minute VR experience, On the Morning You Wake recreates the experiences of people in Hawai'i, who spent 38 excruciating minutes preparing for a possible nuclear attack when a false missile alert was sent on January 13th, 2018. The film takes audiences on a journey exploring the risks and consequences of a world held hostage by nuclear weapons, and reflecting on how the mere existence of these weapons impacts our concepts of home, safety and security.

The film's wide release on Meta Quest 2 amplifies the conversation about nuclear disarmament and abolition at a critical moment in the public's awareness of nuclear threat. "Right now, people all over the world are confronting the reality of the volatile world of systemic nuclear risk we live in," said Cynthia Lazaroff, a disarmament activist, impact fellow supporting On the Morning You Wake, and resident of Hawai'i whose experience is featured in the film. "Now is the time to educate, advocate, and take concrete action toward the abolition of nuclear weapons."

The film is at the center of a long-term impact campaign to inspire the global public to take action to shape the future of nuclear weapons policy. "One of the goals of On the Morning You Wake is to build additional support for the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), which bans nuclear weapons," said Ray Acheson, an impact fellow, visiting researcher at Princeton University's Program on Science and Global Security, and part of the steering group of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) that helped create the landmark treaty. "There are meaningful ways that we can all support the TPNW and work together to encourage all countries to join this treaty and eliminate nuclear weapons once and for all."

The impact campaign includes a number of public screenings and events, as well as educational resources that promote a deeper understanding of nuclear risk. Executive producer Games for Change is creating educational resources and curriculum in collaboration with N Square, which will support screenings at schools, universities and museums around the world.

The first museum and education activations will take place at the Nobel Peace Center in Oslo, Norway, which will host public screenings, conversations and field trips for high school students in June. Plans are also underway for a public event and activation in New York City in May, in collaboration with the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

"The Nobel Peace Center is proud to join the impact campaign surrounding On the Morning You Wake. The Nobel Peace Prize has a long tradition of honoring people and organizations working towards nuclear disarmament. Since 1959, twelve laureates have received the prize for their efforts regarding this issue," said Kjersti Flgstad, Executive Director of the Nobel Peace Center. "On the Morning You Wake presents a powerful opportunity to draw attention to the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons."

The impact campaign is endorsed by a number of leading organizations and activists in the nuclear disarmament movement, including executive producer Princeton University's Program on Science and Global Security, and impact campaign partners Global Zero, ICAN, Ploughshares Fund, N Square, Carnegie Corporation and the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

Impact Fellows leading On the Morning You Wake's public awareness campaign include Ray Acheson, director of disarmament at the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom and steering group member of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), which won the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize; Cynthia Lazaroff, a leader in U.S.-Russian exchange initiatives since the early 1980s and founder of Women Transforming Our Nuclear Legacy and NuclearWakeUpCall.Earth; and Lovely Umayam, founder of Bombshelltoe Policy and Arts Collective, a winner of the U.S. Department of State's Innovation in Arms Control Challenge.

The On the Morning You Wake creative team includes Mike Brett and Steve Jamison of Archer's Mark, Pierre Zandrowicz and Arnaud Colinart of Atlas V, producer Jo-Jo Ellison and co-producer Kurban Kassam, who collaborated with technology studio Novelab. The script was developed by Mike Brett and Steve Jamison in collaboration with Dr. Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio, whose spoken word poem inspired the film's title and provides a lyrical framework for each chapter of the experience. Original music is composed by Bobby Krlic (The Haxan Cloak), the award-winning musician behind Ari Aster's Midsommar soundtrack.

Development, production and platform partners include the BFI (awarding funds from the National Lottery), ARTE France and Meta Quest's VR for Good program. Lizzie Francke executive produces for the BFI, with Marianne Lvy-Leblond and Lili Blumers executive producing for ARTE France. Executive producers for Meta Quest are Colum Slevin, Yelena Rachitsky and Amy Seidenwurm.

Executive producers Alexander Glaser and Tamara Patton from Princeton University's Program on Science and Global Security advise on nuclear arms control and disarmament policy, drawing on extensive expertise in nuclear security issues. Executive producer Susanna Pollack at nonprofit Games for Change advances the project's social impact campaign through their XR for Change initiative. The project was developed with initial support from the MacArthur Foundation.

About Archer's Mark

Archer's Markis an award-winning full-service independent production studio based in London, UK. Founded by creative partners Mike Brett and Steve Jamison, the company's debut feature documentary NEXT GOAL WINS premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival and won the British Independent Film Award for Best Documentary, earning Mike and Steve recognition as Screen International Future Leaders and a place on BAFTA's Breakthrough programme.

Working alongside Archer's Mark Head of Film Jo-Jo Ellison, the pair later produced the Emmy Award-winning New York Times Op-Doc NOTES ON BLINDNESS (Directed by Peter Middleton & James Spinney) whilst developing a feature-length documentary of the same name. The feature premiered at Sundance, earned six BIFA nominations (winning Best Documentary) and was nominated for three BAFTAs. It was accompanied by the multi-award-winning VR experience of the same name, which won the Tribeca Storyscapes Award and Sheffield Doc/Fest's Alternate Realities Award. It is now considered a seminal work in the immersive space.

About Atlas V

Atlas Vis behind some of the most awarded pieces in the field of New Media, with projects shown at A-List festivals such as Venice Mostra (Gold Lion 2018), Sundance (5 selections), Peabody (Future of Media award 2019), Tribeca, SXSW (Storytelling Award 2019), Sheffield, Telluride, Cannes, Busan, and Sitges. In 2020, Atlas V launched a full capacity servicing company named Albyon, with a team of real time technology specialists, who operate at the frontier of video game and movie production, and a distribution and publishing company Astrea.

About Novelab

Since 2009, Novelab has developed immersive experiences and interactive installations for entertainment, education, advertising and industrial purposes. Between a technology start-up and a content studio, Novelab leverages high-end technology to tell engaging and memorable stories. Novelab is one of the most-awarded immersive studios in the world. The projects they develop have been featured in major film festivals such as Sundance (2016, 2018, 2019 and 2020), Tribeca Film Festival (2016, 2017, 2018 and 2020), the Venise Mostra (2017 et 2018), SXSW (2014, 2016, 2018 and 2019), Sheffield Doc/Fest (2016 and 2017) and VR Arles Festival (2017 and 2020).

About Games for Change

Since 2004, Games For Change (G4C) has empowered game creators and innovators to drive real-world change using games and immersive media to help people learn, improve their communities, and make the world a better place. G4C partners with technology and gaming companies, nonprofits, foundations, and government agencies to run world-class events, public arcades, design challenges, and youth programs. G4C supports a global community of game developers working on using games to tackle real-world challenges, from humanitarian conflicts to climate change and education.

About Princeton University's Program on Science and Global Security

Princeton University's Program on Science and Global Security(SGS), based in the School of Public and International Affairs, conducts scientific, technical and policy research, analysis and outreach to advance national and international policies for a safer and more peaceful world.

About the BFI Film Fund

The BFI Film Fund invests around 25 million of National Lottery funding a year into developing and supporting filmmakers with diverse, bold and distinctive projects, that have a cultural relevance or progressive ideas, and which reflect people from different backgrounds, as well as a range of activities to increase the opportunities for audiences to enjoy them.

Feature films supported by the BFI Film Fund which screened at BFI London Film Festival (LFF) this year included world premieres of The Phantom of the Open directed by Craig Roberts and written by Simon Farnaby, ear for eye directed by debbie tucker green, and VR animation Laika directed by Asif Kapadia. UK premieres of BFI-backed films at LFF include: Mothering Sunday, directed by Eva Husson and written by Alice Birch, which world premiered at Cannes and was selected for the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF); Joanna Hogg's The Souvenir: Part II, which world premiered in Directors' Fortnight at Cannes in 2021 and is in official selection at San Sebastian; Clio Barnard's Ali & Ava, which world premiered in Directors' Fortnight at Cannes and was selected for TIFF; Terence Davies' Benediction, which had its world premiere at TIFF and is selected for San Sebastian; True Things directed by Harry Wootliff, which world premiered at the Venice Film Festival; Earwig, directed by Lucile Hadihalilovi, which world premiered at TIFF and is also in official selection at San Sebastian; The Real Charlie Chaplin directed by Peter Middleton and James Spinney, which had its world premiere at Telluride; and The Feast (Gwledd) directed by Lee Haven Jones, produced through Ffilm Cymru Wales' Cinematic scheme supported by the BFI, which had its world premiere at SXSW and is in the First Feature Competition at LFF.

Other recent and forthcoming releases supported by the BFI include: Goliath: Playing with Reality directed by Barry Gene Murphy and May Abdalla, which won the Grand Jury Prize for Best VR Work at this year's Venice Film Festival; and debut features from Reggie Yates, Dionne Edwards and Aml Ameen for Pirates, Pretty Red Dress and Boxing Day respectively.

The BFI also supported multi BAFTA-winning Rocksdirected by Sarah Gavron and written by Theresa Ikoko and Claire Wilson, Ammonitedirected by Francis Lee starring Kate Winslet and Saoirse Ronan, and Saint Maud directed by Rose Glass featuring EE BAFTA Rising Star nominee Morfydd Clark. Recently released titles include Aleem Khan's debut feature After Love; Harry MacQueen's second feature Supernova; starring Colin Firth and Stanley Tucci; the BIFA-winning and BAFTA-nominated Limbo directed by Ben Sharrock; critically acclaimed horror Censor, directed by Prano Bailey-Bond and starring Niamh Algar; and Herself directed by Phyllida Lloyd and written by Malcolm Campbell and Clare Dunne.

About the BFI

We are a cultural charity, a National Lottery distributor, and the UK's lead organisation for film and the moving image. Our mission is:

Founded in 1933, the BFI is a registered charity governed by Royal Charter. The BFI Board of Governors is chaired by Tim Richards.

Arte France

ARTE is a Franco-German and European Adventure. Public service TV channel ARTE supports creativity and culture in all forms. Programs are broadcast 24/7 on all types of screens throughout Europe and beyond. The founding fathers of ARTE believed that a joint television channel should bring French and German citizens closer on a cultural level and promote cultural integration throughout Europe. ARTE is committed to issues that are important to European citizens: combating inequality, whether social, cultural, economic, geographical, gender- or disability-related, and promoting sustainable development.

About Meta Quest

The Meta Quest team at Reality Labs lets people defy distanceconnecting with each other and the worldthrough world-class VR hardware and software. The Meta Quest content team pursues the creation of best-in-class games, narrative experiences, and new VR use-cases like fitness, productivity, and travel. Meta Quest joins other teams at Reality Labs dedicated to cutting-edge research, computer vision, haptics, social interaction, and more. Reality Labs is committed to driving the state of the art forward through relentless innovation.

Press Contact:Susan McPherson McPherson Strategies(917) 859-2291[emailprotected]

SOURCE On the Morning You Wake

Excerpt from:

ON THE MORNING YOU WAKE (TO THE END OF THE WORLD), A NEW VR DOCUMENTARY AT THE CENTER OF A NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT CAMPAIGN, COMING TO QUEST 2 ON MARCH 24...

I spent six and a half years in prison. Much of that time, I was working on one fiction manuscript or another. I had to stumble around in the darkness to figure out how to do this. So do most writers in prison. Now theres a book to help change that.

PEN Americas The Sentences That Create Us (Haymarket Books, 2022), edited by Caits Meissner, is the dream of every incarcerated writer: a collection of how-to-write essays by those who can speak to that audience best other incarcerated writers plus people who have taught writing classes in prison. The book includes pieces by famous formerly incarcerated writers like Wilbert Rideau as well as people who have never published previously. It provides lessons on writing poetry, fiction, plays and autobiography. The Sentences That Create Us is a complete manual pitched perfectly for the target audience.

Meissners book will bring some welcome and profound relief to incarcerated people who struggle to tell their important stories. I had the pleasure of interviewing her for Truthout about the book. Frequent Truthout contributor Brian Dolinar a friend, writer and fellow abolitionist activist in Urbana, Illinois joined me for the conversation.

James Kilgore: Tell us about how you came to write the book and how you got to this space?

Caits Meissner: I taught in prison for five or six years before I came to my current job as director of Prison and Justice Writing at PEN America, an organization founded in 1922 bringing together a national and international network of writers and protecting free expression. I suddenly had all these resources, famous writers, and an incredible community of incarcerated writers. This over 40-year program that was started by PEN on the heels of the Attica uprising in 1971 fell into my lap. I had the chance to bring it into this new era where mass incarceration is actually something thats talked about. Abolition is a word thats being moved from the margins to the forefront.

For years we at PEN America had created in-house and distributed a slim handbook called The PEN America Handbook for Writers in Prison. It was essentially a craft book, teaching the basics of how to write. When I came on, the director said, I think you have a different pedagogy, I think you could do a new book.

What I thought it needed was the voices of justice-impacted people speaking to each other. And speaking with allies, because we need each other as we know, writers in prison need their allies on the outside. And vice versa, we need our people in prison to be reporting from the front lines and to be in community.

The task was then looking at all the mail that came in, the hundreds of letters we get from prison what are people asking for? It became clear to me that people are really asking about not just How do I write poetry? they were really asking, How do I be a writer?

I had access to all of these amazing incarcerated writers at PEN who had made incredible things happen through the walls, really on their own steam. I wanted them to write revealing essays to codify and put into motion what that journey looked like.

I remember ideating with Spoon Jackson about his piece. Spoon has done so many collaborations beyond the walls, hes become a famous writer in prison. He said, Well, Im just real, its organic. I said, Yes, Spoon, but let me ask you this. When your writing instructor came in and it was a white woman, how did you respond to her in order to develop that relationship?

I said, Did you ask your collaborators to do things for you outside of your artistic collaboration? He said, Never! It a gift culture between two artists and I kept it there. I said, People need to understand that. Theres a lot of need in prisons. Your essay is going to be pulling apart each of these collaborations and what it took in order for each to be successful. Thats how were going to teach other people, how to show up in collaboration as an equitable artist, how to be seen that way, and how to see yourself that way.

Kilgore: Im wondering about the difficult task of how you decided who was going to be in the book. And how did you manage that team? Did you have meetings? How did you communicate? Did you visit people face-to-face?

It came together in a couple different ways. First, I knew the money we made off this book was going to go right back into sending the book inside. There was no profit to be made off the book, but I wanted to pay contributors. We first got a $25,000 grant from the California Arts Council. That dictated that all the writers in the first section had to be California-based authors, not incarcerated. For the rest of the book the contributors are largely justice-involved people.

I went through my so-to-speak Rolodex of relationships. Sometimes I had a very clear idea of what I wanted people to write about. To Piper Kerman (author of Orange Is the New Black), for example, I said, I want you to write about how you write about people you know, ethically, given that your book turned into a major TV show. And she agreed.

I was thinking about the book as being inspirational, aspirational, instructional and then historical, when we got Wilbert Rideau on board, former editor of The Angolite. He never gives interviews and decided to give us an interview because of the theme of the book, and who it was for. He closes the interview with a truth he learned and believes deeply: Writing gets people out of prison.

Brian Dolinar: Youre sending copies of the book inside. How are you making that happen? How are you getting around the censorship issues? The authorities are always looking over peoples shoulders, reading their mail, listening in on phone calls. Did you worry about getting censored?

We were lucky enough to get a grant from the Mellon Foundation to send 75,000 copies inside. We called every prison and jail in the U.S. to find out where our allies live and where we can send the book. When the book came out, we also advertised with a form that were sending these copies inside and individuals and organizations can request the book. Weve had over 50,000 requests within the first month of the books life, which tells me there is a hunger for this project.

Theres a couple of things I did worry about. This book, while it appears to be a lovely book on writing if you look a little deeper, its a book on organizing in prison. As I think of it, it is a book full of life. And often prisons are very scared of the creative life force, because thats personal power.

What I was worried about more so even than the book getting inside was what happens to some of the contributors. For example, Thomas Bartlett Whitaker is in the book. When I got my copy of the bound book, and I read it again, I remembered how profound his essay is; its called, The Price of Remaining Human. He writes about watching 161 men on death row be executed and their stories going with them. His own story is that his sentence was commuted minutes before his execution date and he has run into a tremendous amount of pushback from the prison administration because he writes about death row and he publishes online. Through his allies on the outside, he has a blog called Minutes Before Six.

As I was reading the book, I started to think, wow, Thomas is already in segregation [solitary confinement]; this is what he takes on as a writer. It started to frighten me the world could double down on the punishment he gets for exactly what weve asked him to do. Of course, he took the project on knowing the risk, thats what hes writing about.

Ill get calls from our Writing for Justice fellows who are fighting things in the prisons. Recently, one told me, Im about to go into solitary confinement for two months, you wont hear from me, wish me luck. The sense of responsibility of what it takes to become a writer in prison is immense.

Dolinar: Have you been inside since COVID has lifted and visitations have resumed?

In December 2021 I went to San Quentin, and that was special on a personal level. I did a book tour in 2016 or 2017 for my poetry book, Let it Die Hungry, when I went to prisons. I had visited a writing group run by Zoe Mullery at San Quentin. I got to come back and visit this group in December after not seeing folks for almost five years.

It was jarring to be back in a prison; it was visceral remembering how oppressive it feels. I was also reminded of the vibrancy behind the walls. One of the writers said a wonderful quote, Imagination is a toy. I shared about our new book. The men were very excited. They kept saying, We want to see this and this. I was pleased to be able to say, Its in the book!

Ive visited over 25 prisons across the U.S., so Ive talked to a lot of people. One of them is Sterling Cunio, a writer I met when he won our PEN essay contest with this absolutely beautiful essay about discovering his purpose through doing hospice work in prison, and seeing a man through his death process. Sterling was sentenced to life without parole at 16, he was part of the Oregon Five. I later sat in on his parole hearing for six hours.

Sterling became a Writing for Justice Fellow in 2019. He received money and a mentor to stage a play in prison. I got to hear the performance via phone. I was blown away. When the book came around, I said, Sterling, can you write about how you staged this play? Sterling had to lay out how he worked with administration, how he had to navigate the system and get permission to do good work. An antagonistic stance isnt going to move projects forward.

Even though Sterling did not make parole at that hearing, a year later his sentence was commuted. Sterling is now home, in his 40s.

Kilgore: How do you see your book as a tool for helping support significant change to this horrible system of mass incarceration that has dominated the landscape for the last four decades?

In order to shift the system, we need justice-impacted voices forefronted. Were hoping to bring the voices of powerful, directly impacted people into major publications [and] start to shift the needle through narrative change.

Theres a sense that I come across from publishers that prison stories are a specialized niche topic. My response is, with 2.3 million people inside at any given moment, plus parole, plus probation, plus families and friends affected, plus communities affected, this is simply another take on the American story.

Read more:

Prisons Aim to Stifle Creativity. Heres a Book That Pushes Back. - Truthout