“When will we understand that jail, no matter who’s inside, makes nothing better?” 

This is a profound question that was posed in a blog by summer of sam at Quirky Black Girls.

Since the Oscar Grant case verdict was issued, I have actually been pleasantly surprised at the number of bloggers and commentators that I have read who are grappling with the question: “What is justice?”  This is an important and needed conversation that we must all have in our communities.  I hope that this verdict is a catalyst for more such dialogue.  This, it seems to me, is an important moment for those of us who believe in and practice transformative justice to offer our ideas and solutions.  In the coming weeks, I am planning to launch two series: one will focus on documenting the upcoming american correctional association conference and the other will focus on sharing some lessons of transformative justice.  Stay tuned!

Take a look at the exponential increase in our incarcerated population over time.  These numbers really hit home when you go back as far as 1880. 

Incarcerated Population and Rates, 1880-2008
Prison and Jail Inmates Rate per 100,000
1880	58,609	116.9
1890	82,239	131.5
1904	97,308	118.4
1910	128,314	138.9
1923	120,284	107.4
1933	210,418	167.5
1940	274,821	207.4
1950	264,557	174.8
1960	346,015	193.0
1970	328,020	161.4
1980	503,586	220.4
1990	1,148,702	458.2
2000	1,937,482	682.9
2008	2,304,115	753.5
Source: 1880-1970, Cahalan (1986); 1980-2008, CEPR analysis of BJS data.

I think that cultural work is integral to movement-building. A lot of hip hop culture is devoted to reflecting on the prison industrial complex. Some artists and cultural producers do a better job at creating impactful messages and artifacts than others.

I first saw Pat’s Justice on Season 5 of Def Poetry Jam. Yes, I know that this is a “Russell Simmons” production… No comments please. Anyway I heard Pat’s Justice perform a spoken word piece called “Innocent Criminal.” I thought that he had a unique voice and something powerful to say. Here is that performance:

I thought that the juxtaposition of the terms “innocent” with “criminal” was brilliant at the time. I still do. He is talking about the fact that as a young black man in America his identity is already marked as “criminal.” He proclaims his “innocence” from that charge.

Last year, Pat’s Justice produced a music video based on his spoken word performance called “Innocent Criminal Anthem.” The video is both problematic and powerful. It makes you think and begs for its own popular education workshop. Watch and discuss with your friends.

Over the past 18 months since the Democrats took control of Congress and the White House, we have heard constant Republican whining about the deficit. Well, do you ever hear those same Republicans advocating closing prisons to save money? No. For the most part, they are the worst of the worst in terms of promoting “get tough on crime” laws and policies. Yet, this graph shows that we are wasting BILLIONS on so-called “corrections.” Tomorrow’s Crazy PIC fact of the day will illustrate how much could be SAVED by halfing the number of non-violent prisoners in the U.S.

I am a big fan of the late Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish. One of my favorite poems of his is called “The Prison Cell.” Read it out loud and revel in the beautifully evocative words.

The Prison Cell

It is possible…
It is possible at least sometimes…
It is possible especially now
To ride a horse
Inside a prison cell
And run away…

It is possible for prison walls
To disappear.
For the cell to become a distant land
Without frontiers:

What did you do with the walls?
I gave them back to the rocks.
And what did you do with the ceiling?
I turned it into a saddle.
And your chains?
I turned it into a pencil.

The prison guard got angry.
He put an end to the dialogue.
He said he didn’t care for poetry.
And bolted the door of my cell.

He came back to see me.
In the morning.
He shouted at me:

Where did all this water come from?
I brought it from the Nile.
And the trees?
From the orchards of Damascus.
And the music?
From my heartbeat.

The prison guard got mad.
He put an end to my dialogue.
He said he didn’t like my poetry.
And bolted the door of my cell.

But he returned in the evening:

Where did this moon come from?
From the nights of Baghdad.
And the wine?
From the vineyards of Algiers.
And this freedom?
From the chain you tied me with last night.

The prison guard grew so sad…
He begged me to give him back
His freedom.

—Mahmoud Darwish (1941-2008)
Translated by Ben Bennani

This is a poem about the power of imagination and about the capacity of human beings to survive in terrible environments. The walls of the prison cannot cage his mind. He chooses freedom.

I just stumbled upon this wonderful blog post titled Justice or Just Us?. It was written by Jakada Imani of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights.

I hadn’t yet seen Jakada’s blog when I wrote my own post immediately after the Oscar Grant verdict came in. In words more eloquent and arguments more cogent, Jakada reflects my sentiment about how best to address the unjust verdict.

Here Jakada speaks for me:

I have been an activist for far too long to think that sending someone to prison ever sets things right. Prison adds damage-to-damage and trauma-to-trauma. We don’t want prison to be the only option for young folks who make mistakes. Is it really the only answer for police who make mistakes?

And again here:

In all the media hype surrounding the trial and the cops vs. protester coverage, something is lost. That something is healing, transformative justice. How do we transform the system that recruited, trained and armed Mehserle and thousands just like him? How do we change the fact that police and civilians alike see young men of color as threatening? How do we build a powerful social movement and not just participate in one-off flash mobs?

I wish that these questions could be blared from loud speakers in all of our communities on a daily basis. They are so relevant and profound. Indeed my work is devoted to developing restorative and transformative ways to repair harm caused by violence and crime. While it is a heavy lift to be a prison abolitionist, honestly it is an even heavier one to be a proponent of restorative and transformative justice. Even some of my anti-prison activist friends can’t as they tell me often “wrap their brains around” these concepts.

And so the work goes on at organizations like mine and at the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights. The current US Social Forum that just wrapped up in Detroit posited that “another world is possible.” This must be true.

Jakada ends with these beautiful words which I will appropriate for my own:

As we heal our society so that there can be true and transformative justice, I am reminded that there is just us- we are all we have. We must come together to find the answers and move forward with our heads held high and our commitment to real solutions always lighting our path.

Read Jakada’s entire blog post, you will not regret it!

This graph clearly illustrates the DISCONNECT between crime rates and incarceration rates. Incarceration has had a small effect on the violent crime and property crime rates over time. However when you put this up against the collateral and direct damage caused by the expansion of prisons, one has to ask: “Is this small drop in crime worth the high economic, social, and moral costs of incarceration?” The answer to this must be an unequivocal “NO!” We have expanded the numbers of people under “correctional’ supervision over the past 30 years with no concomittant precipitous drop in rates of crime.

It’s time for a different solution. And fast.

This from Erik Ruin posted at the Just Seeds Blog:

Leonard Jefferson is a prolific artist who has used his art to provide analysis and commentary concerning Pennsylvania’s criminal justice system and his lived experience behind bars. His art is typically small/medium-sized pen & ink drawings of prison settings; he has used his art to do outreach to the general public by sending it to various individuals and organizations, including human-rights groups.

In April 2009, he completed the drawing Sista-matized, (displayed above), which was confiscated from him during a cell search in July 09 at State Correctional Institute (SCI) Albion, at the discretion of the corrections officers who were conducting the search. The reason they gave on the official prison paperwork was that the drawing was “racial artwork”. Mr. Jefferson filed requests and grievances for the return of the drawing, which were denied. The justification given on the final denial by the Secretary of Corrections’ office (the head of the PA state prison system) was that the drawing had “negative connotations towards Corrections Officers, Judges, and the Criminal Justice System”. That is to say, they didn’t like it because it calls these people and groups perpetrators of racial oppression and genocide.

Mr. Jefferson finished the necessary paperwork in October ’09, and filed a pro se (representing himself) civil suit with the county court, asking for a list of redresses– including court costs, damages ($1000), the return of his artwork and an order preventing the prison from further arbitrary confiscations. As of June, 2010, the suit is still in litigation. He continues to create art that has negative connotations towards corrections officers, judges, and the criminal justice system.

Write him!

Leonard Jefferson
CL-4135
SCI Albion
10745 Route 18
Albion, PA 16475

Please visit Erik Ruin’s blog post at Just Seeds for more details including a template letter to send to the Judge. Make sure to send a copy of your letter of support to Mr. Jefferson as well.

I’ve always liked DMX. At one point it looked as though he was going to be one of the rappers who made the transition to acting similar to LL Cool J, Tupac, Ice Cube, and Ice T. I never knew much about his background or personal life.

In 2000 or 2001, a song by DMX caught my attention; it was called “Who We Be.” I was captivated by the staccado beat and its repetitiveness. It was strangely hypnotic. Then I saw the video and I was mesmerized. Here was this beautiful black man sitting in a prison cell and the song took on new meaning for me.

I later looked into DMX a bit further and found that he had countless run ins with the criminal legal system with multiple arrests and jail time. The rapper’s troubles have continued over the years and so watching his video again today is even more poignant.

I am bringing up DMX today because I was reminded of his plight when I read a recent post by Marc Lamont Hill. Hill writes that over the past 30 years black male suicide rates have climbed over 200 percent. A friend of mine named Sean Joe who is a professor at the University of Michigan school of social work studies mental heath issues in the black community. His work supports this statement about the increase in suicidal ideation among black men. I recommend reading the following essay if you are interested in knowing more about this subject. Joe, S. (2008). Suicide patterns among black males. In E. Anderson (Ed.), Against the wall: Poor, young, black, & male (pp. 218-241). Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Finally, I also recommend a new video and study conducted by MEE Productions Inc. Both the study and the video focus on promoting mental wellness and resiliency in youth of color (and in particular young African Americans). This is a big focus on my work and so I really want to promote this focus. We cannot overlook how mental illness intersects so significantly with the prison industrial complex.

Just for old time’s sake… Here is DMX performing “Who We Be.”

I think that this graph tells the story better than words can.