Waiting and Decision Making
Waiting and Decision Making The Mental Competency Process On December 24, 2009, 24-year old Victor Carrero ran into two people on the corner of Central and Jefferson Avenues in Brooklyn. He proceeded to knock one of them to the ground, stabbing them in their head and shoulder before running away. Al Jazeera America reported that […]
Bias Behind the Badge: How Officer Demographics Affect Arrest Escalation
Bias Behind the Badge: How Officer Demographics Affect Arrest Escalation Kemonte Hampton walked out of a gas station in Tulsa, Oklahoma and was told to get on the ground; he was being arrested for jaywalking. He complied, but was pushed over on his way down and handcuffed. In the arresting officer’s haste to get out […]
Kayla’s Act Gives Hope for Victims of Domestic Violence
Kayla’s Act Gives Hope for Victims of Domestic Violence In the week of Thanksgiving 2022, Kayla Hammonds was brutally stabbed to death by her ex-boyfriend in a grocery store parking lot in Lumberton, NC. The ex-boyfriend, Desmond Sampson, had a significant prior history of violence, with Hammonds having filed multiple protective orders against him, including […]
Carrying the System: The Cost of Being a Public Defender
Carrying the System: The Cost of Being a Public Defender By 9 a.m., she’s already met two new clients, each facing felony charges. By noon, she’s given her case in front of a judge, scrambled to finalize paperwork, and returned half a dozen voicemails from frantic family members. “Sometimes it feels like my client’s freedom […]
Between a Rock and a Hard Place: Illness and Incarceration
Between a Rock and a Hard Place: Illness and Incarceration What does it mean to be ill? Going by Dr. Peter Eisenberg’s definition, it means to lose your freedom. Working as an oncologist with prisoners from San Quentin Rehabilitation Center for many years, he noticed one thread that connected all of them: they were confined […]
Breaking the Cycle: California’s Fight Against the School-to-Prison Pipeline
Breaking the Cycle: California’s Fight Against the School-to-Prison Pipeline “Walk into any classroom in California, and you’ll see so many kids filled with promise,” says a public school teacher in the Oakland school district. But for too many students, especially “Black, Brown, disabled, homeless, and foster youth,” that promise is derailed by a system that […]
Learning Behind Bars: The Growing Role of Prison Education Programs
Learning Behind Bars: The Growing Role of Prison Education Programs There are nearly 2 million people incarcerated in the United States, with most of them being in state prisons. Additionally, among the almost 600,000 people released from prison each year, approximately 60% of those are likely to be arrested and 50% incarcerated again. According to […]
Returning Home: Mountain City, TN and Chicago, IL
Returning Home: Mountain City, TN and Chicago, IL Imagine this: You just got released from prison. You have no money and no place to stay. You do not have a phone or a means of transportation. You do not even have a valid form of identification. On top of that, there is a whole world […]
Can Alternative Emergency Response Programs Save Lives?
Can Alternative Emergency Response Programs Save Lives? An elderly woman is suicidal after receiving a stage IV cancer diagnosis and feels like a burden to her family. A mother calls the police concerning her 13-year-old son with autism, who is having a mental health crisis. Someone calls 911 on their paranoid neighbor, who is too […]
Healing Over Punishment: Restorative Justice
Healing Over Punishment: Restorative Justice “When I became a lawyer, I thought the criminal justice system would meet people’s needs,” says Jon, a facilitator at a restorative justice clinic in North Carolina. “But it doesn’t. Offenders aren’t helped, they’re punished.” This is what happens in the United States’ punitive system: it is a process designed […]