Crime, Reform & Abolition

562 posts

To keep coronavirus from spreading, we must reduce the jail population, report says

A new report released last week from The Justice Collaborative and Data for Progress taps into the concerns that have been arising over the past month about the impact that COVID-19 will have on U.S. correctional institutions. The report, “Local officials should quickly reduce jail populations to slow the

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4 Min
By: Tamar Sarai

From PPE to hospital laundry, COVID-19 outbreak exposes America’s dependence on incarcerated labor

Rapid response efforts to quell the spread of the novel coronavirus are revealing deeply embedded structural inefficiencies within countless institutions in American society—the criminal legal system being no different.     Earlier this month, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that the state’s new hand sanitizer would be manufactured by

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6 Min
By: Tamar Sarai

Bloomberg’s stop-and-frisk policy hurt women and LGBTQ+ people. Their stories should be told too

Michael Bloomberg’s short-lived presidential bid ignited national scrutiny of the billionaire’s behavior toward women and the policies he promoted during his tenure as New York City mayor between 2002 and 2013. Above all, Bloomberg experienced the most criticism over New York City’s stop-and-frisk policy, a controversial practice

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8 Min
By: Tamar Sarai

How Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors uses art and organizing to fight for justice

Nearly seven years after launching one of the most meaningful racial justice movements in modern history, Patrisse Cullors isn’t ready to slow down anytime soon. The Los Angeles-based artist, activist, and co-founder of Black Lives Matter has dedicated her life to reforming the criminal justice system and putting public

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4 Min
By: Carolyn Copeland

Electronic monitoring is hard enough. Coronavirus shelter-in-place requirements make it harder

As the country adjusts to a new, precarious normal, people are making last-minute dashes to the supermarket, scouring their corner stores for soap and disinfectants, and heading to their local pharmacies to care for any medical needs. One by one, cities and states have been directing their residents to shelter

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5 Min
By: Tamar Sarai

‘I’m dreaming as big as I can’: A Q&A with human rights activist Rukia Lumumba

Rukia Lumumba has no plans to slow down. The Mississippi native has spent her life as an activist and organizer fighting for the basic rights of people in and out of the prison system. A daughter of the former mayor of Jackson, Mississippi, and sister of the city’s current

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9 Min
By: Carolyn Copeland

The long fight for police accountability and economic justice: A Q&A with Gicola Lane

Black women like Gicola Lane have been at the forefront of Southern organizing since the first movements took shape. Based in Nashville, Tennessee, and currently an electoral justice fellow with the Movement for Black Lives, Lane was first inspired to action when local police killed Jocques Clemmons after a traffic

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8 Min
By: Anoa Changa

Incarcerated people are bracing for COVID-19: Q&A with a woman whose brother is on the inside

Since the onset of the COVID-19 outbreak, people around the globe are being forced to shift the way we relate to work, school, and nightlife. In California, the virus has impacted the entire state, and Gov. Gavin Newsom and city governments are taking drastic measures to ensure citizens are able

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3 Min
By: Patrisse Cullors

Organizers hustle to bail people out of jail amid coronavirus pandemic

Coronavirus has arrived in the prison system. Last weekend, a second employee within Washington’s Department of Corrections tested positive for the coronavirus. In New York, an employee at Sing Sing prison and a guard and a incarcerated person at Rikers Island have tested positive as well. As concerns escalate

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7 Min
By: Tamar Sarai

When an old weed arrest means you can’t cash in on the cannabis boom

The legalization of medical and recreational marijuana sales has generated more than a trillion dollars in revenue nationwide, making the cannabis industry a lucrative economic engine across the country. The most recent and 11th state to legalize marijuana, Illinois, collected a revenue of nearly $3.2 million dollars in the

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4 Min
By: Miranda Perez

Incarcerated elderly and chronically ill people could be hit hard by coronavirus. Are prisons ready?

Jose Saldana understands the kind of harm a pandemic like the coronavirus could pose to incarcerated communities. He’s seen it before. “Unfortunately, the Department of Corrections has a terrible history of adequately addressing health crises in the prison system. They have failed at every occasion that I’ve been

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4 Min
By: Tamar Sarai

Nathaniel Woods, executed in Alabama, faced religious injustice in both life and death

“Hell on Earth.” According to Imam Yusuf Maisonet, that’s the nickname that’s widely used to describe the William C. Holman Correctional Facility in southwest Alabama, which houses the state’s death chamber. It was the last place on earth inhabited by Nathaniel “Nate” Woods, an incarcerated Black Muslim

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7 Min
By: Maha Hilal

Showing 12 of 562 total posts

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