criminal justice

Californians divided over results from criminal justice reforms

May 12, 2019 by Anthony Manuel Caravalho

A debate is growing on the impact of criminal justice reforms in California. Widely differing views are surfacing on reforms approved by California voters in recent years.

That includes Proposition 47 in 2014, that reduced some crimes from felonies to misdemeanors; Proposition 57, which passed in 2016 and allowed prison officials to decide which nonviolent felonies could be reduced to misdemeanors (under Proposition 47), and a 2018 measure allowed many defendants to be released without bail pending trial.

Opponents of reform argue that California’s new laws are to blame for increases in certain categories of crime or short-term fluctuations in rates of violent crime. The opponents include state police unions, court employees, some district attorneys and politicians. They blame early release initiatives for violent episodes of recidivism, according to the Jan. 21 New York Times.

Ironically, overall crime rates have reached lows not seen since the 1960s, the newspaper reported.

“Proposition 47 has nothing to do with violent crime,” said Charis E. Kubrin of UC Irvine. She is one of the researchers in a study that found no link between Proposition 47 and violent crime.

The study uncovered increases in larceny and auto thefts, but Kubrin and her co- author, Bradley J. Bartos, did not conclude that Proposition 47 was the cause.
The Los Angeles Association of Deputy District Attorneys criticized the study, adding that Proposition 47 had “arguably failed,” due to increases in crime.

“important to understand that we are in a historic decline… we are safer than almost at any time in history”

Last year, former Attorney General Jeff Sessions warned of a “staggering increase in homicides.” Violent crime did rise in 2015 and 2016, yet, when FBI figures were released, they showed violent crime had decreased in 2017. This is why some researchers and activists say that criminal justice policies should not rely on annual fluctuations, the newspaper reported.

“Year-to-year fluctuations don’t really tell you much,” said Rob Smith, executive director of the Justice Collaborative. He also told the newspaper that it’s “important to understand that we are in a historic decline…The reality is across California and across the country, we are safer than almost at any time in history.”

In California, law enforcement unions, bail bond companies and other groups are pushing measures to define new crimes as felonies and repeal the state’s recent cash bail reform.

Cori Thomas brings attention to criminal justice system with play

May 1, 2019 by Rahsaan Thomas

Thomas (center) with the cast for the first rehearsal

When the Rattlestick Theater commissioned playwright and San Quentin volunteer Cori Thomas to write a play in 2016, she penned a draft featuring a 62-year-old man who has been incarcerated since he was 16 called Lockdown. At the time, she had never visited a prison or envisioned having her first play, which debuted in New York City, become a tool for discussion about the criminal justice system.

“It’s about a group of people who are incarcerated and the challenges they face—individually and within the system itself,” said Daniella Topol, the artistic director for the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, who commissioned Thomas. “The play is also now about some- thing much larger: forgiveness, humanity and empathy.”

Thomas added, “It’s becoming a tool for prison reform conversations.”

Lockdown, which runs at the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater from April 17 to May 19, unless extended, shows the difficulty of earning freedom for a man serving a life sentence for committing a heinous crime, even though the man turned his life around and mentors youth.

“Forgiveness is a really hard thing,” Thomas said. “I made sure to go into the victim’s point of view. I want to make sure the audience sees both sides, what’s it like to suffer loss. But I think that when a person has remorse and has had a transformation because they now understand what it is that they have done, they can’t forget. They live with that forever, and that’s a form of punishment.”

After each performance, the Fortune Society, an organization dedicated to helping formerly incarcerated people become successful on parole, will host discussions with the community about issues raised in the play. Different stakeholders, including formerly incarcerated people, will lead the conversations.

Lockdown, starring Zenzi Williams, Keith Randolph Smith, Eric Berryman and Curtis Morlaye, is Thomas’ first world premiere to debut in New York City, although the accomplished Marymount- Manhattan College theater program graduate has penned several others over the years.

Her first big break was a play called “When January Feels Like Summer.” It won an American Theater Critics Award, and Sundance chose it for a development retreat. It premiered in Pittsburgh, Pa.

Lockdown may go even further than her past plays. It was chosen for the O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, and Thomas said commercial producers like Shadow Catcher Entertainment are interested in taking it to bigger theaters.

“Everything that happens with this play, I get happy because I feel like it honors the men inside,” Thomas said. “If it’s being recognized, they’re being recognized.”

Lockdown isn’t Thomas’ only play aimed to spark change.

“Pa’s Hat”, based on a trip with her father to Liberia, West Africa, where a child soldier pointed a gun at her, led to the creation of the Pa’s Hat Foundation.

“It broke my heart,” Thomas said. “Why would a young boy be on a street corner pointing a machine gun at me? I wanted to bring attention to child soldiers and how they’re forced to do that.”

The nonprofit helps former child-soldiers and other under-served citizens in Liberia, West Africa, with education and employment opportunities.

Currently, Thomas is work- ing on another play about incarcerated people, this time with the No More Tears self- help group, where she volunteers at San Quentin State Prison.

Thomas is co-writing with No More Tears the sequel, ’Til You Know My Story 2; the stimulus for it occurred back in September of 2016, when Thomas visited a prison for the first time. She came to conduct an interview for an Amazon Audible project and was surprised by what she found.

“I thought I’d meet a bunch of people whispering, ‘Hey, I didn’t do it, get me out of here,’” Thomas said. “What I met are men who are articulate, intelligent and who take accountability for the crimes they committed.”

No More Tears, founded by Lonnie Morris, an incarcerated man who has served more than 40 years, helps men address trauma and heal. No More Tears first wrote, produced and performed the play “ ’Til You Know My Story” in 2012.

Morris and Thomas met when she came into the prison’s media center. He asked her to work with him on the sequel “ ’Til You Know My Story 2”, also to be performed at San Quentin, and Thomas agreed.

“When I left this prison, I knew immediately that I want- ed to write “ ’Til You Know My Story,” Thomas said. “I met Lonnie and was struck by how intelligent and articulate everyone was. I had no idea that these types of minds existed in people who are locked up. If I don’t know, other people don’t know.”

Thomas plans to turn inter- views with incarcerated men into monologues for “ ’Til You Know My Story 2.” “I did not know a whole lot about the criminal justice system in this country,” Thomas said. “Coming in here made me open my eyes and made me want to use all the tools I had at my disposal, which is writing and words. I have the ability to let people know.

“I believe there’s a role incarcerated people, if freed, can serve in society because there’s no one better equipped to teach the young people than them. They could actually have civic duties. I think there’s a role for them that hasn’t been tapped into and that they could actually make communities safer.”

Prisoners contributed their input on criminal justice reform

February 19, 2019 by Joe Garcia

Participants sitting in a small circle share their personal experiences in the San Quentin Protestant Chapel

Criminal justice reform took center stage at a San Quentin State Prison forum that brought together inmates, social justice advocates, formerly incarcerated citizens and public officials.

“Reform has to change, as we all together are changing,” said Assemblymember Timothy Grayson, D-14th District, Concord. “We all still are rehabilitating. When I leave here, I’m going to tell people I just came from a place called ‘Project Opportunity.’

Participant Steven S., Assemblymember Timothy Grayson, with participant Ron Ehde

“In one word – Wow! For me there’s this ‘wow’ factor going on right now. I’m overwhelmed by the narrative that comes from only you,” Grayson added, referring to the prisoners.

The first-ever True Impact of Criminal Justice Reform in California Forum took place on Jan. 11. About 40 participants sat in small circles to share personal experiences and ideas about past, present and upcoming changes in sentencing policies.

Contra Costa County District Attorney Diana Becton had these comments after her time in a circle: “I’m a newly elected district attorney, who ran on a platform of criminal justice reform, so I know I’m in an environment where I’ll be working with people who aren’t on the same page.

“They don’t believe keeping the community safe can go hand-in-hand with criminal justice reform, but we need to start having the courage to say, ‘Yes, it can.’

“It was so powerful to just sit and listen and hear your hope for the future.”

Assemblymember Mark Stone, D-29th District, Santa Cruz/Santa Clara, also participated in a circle and addressed everyone afterward. “The hard work you’re willing to do allows us to go to policymakers and argue for reform. We can’t do that without your willingness to articulate the changes that happen in these groups.

“I view each of you as a partner. We know reform is always going to be an uphill battle.”

Formerly incarcerated Terah Lawyer now works as a project coordinator for Impact Justice. She served her entire prison term at California Correctional Women’s Facility. “Fifteen years, three months and eight days,” she said, giving her exact time behind bars. “Yeah, I don’t play.”

“I’m in this work for life,” Lawyer said. “I’ll never forget being a lifer and believing I would die in prison.”

She wants to see Life Without Parole (LWOP) sentences become abolished and is a passionate advocate for the Drop LWOP campaign.

“How can we say in one breath that we’re going to offer Proposition 57 credits – that everyone is redeemable, that everyone can earn their way out, but we still have people stuck with LWOP?” she said.

Lawyer also works for Homecoming, an organization that helps the formerly incarcerated find sustainable, comfortable housing.

Formerly incarcerated advocate Terah Lawyer

“It’s not about so-called ‘transitional’ housing,” Lawyer said. “It’s about placing people into community homes and semi-independent honor housing.

“Each person getting out of prison has unique needs. The only thing people getting out of prison have in common is that they just got out of prison.”

One of the inmates who organized the event, James King, expressed his appreciation for all the outside guest participants.

“It means so much, just to say you see us and you hear us,” King said.

Hillary Blout, director for the Sentencing Review Project, said she stepped away from the San Francisco D i s t r i c t Attorney’s Office after seeing cases that were not handled in a way she agreed with.

Blout described herself as a “reformer – turned prosecutor – turned reformer again.”

“I wanted to do things differently,” she told. “They called me more of a social worker.

Participants Rahsaan Thomas and John Johnson talking to Hillary Blout, director for the Sentencing Review Project

“We need to examine how likely it is people will reoffend, read their background, try and keep families together. Shouldn’t that be our goal?

“I’d like to see us move prosecution into a new direction, where it’s only the last line of defense. Putting people away in prison should be the last option.”

Blout is instrumental in supporting Assembly Bill 2942, which allows district attorneys the discretion to consider a prisoner’s past sentencing and factor in who they are today – the programs they’re involved in and their disciplinary record while incarcerated.“There are too many people that can make the argument that it no longer serves the interests of justice to keep them in prison,” Blout said. “The opportunity should be given to see people’s better side – not just the crime they committed at one moment in time.”

“It means so much, just to say you see us and you hear us”

Inmate Fanon Figgers opened the forum by explaining how, after getting sentenced to 210 years-to-life and all his appeals were denied, he started acting up in prison because he didn’t think he had anything to lose.

“It was my mother that hit me with reality,” he recalled. “She said, ‘Your daughter needs you. You have to make changes.’

“That’s when I started to ask myself, ‘How did I get here?’ I started to think about the harm I caused to my community, started to do some deep soul searching.

“I discovered things about myself and realized change is possible from within – first spiritually, then morally,” Figgers said. “Hopefully, you all can help us change these sentences because you see that we really can change.”

Inmate Nathan McKinney spoke on behalf of a “struggling sector of our community … those that can’t articulate to the (parole) board that they’re no longer a threat – guys with learning disabilities and the limited ability to comprehend.”

“We all know the stories about ‘Why didn’t that old dude go home?’” said McKinney. “Guys like that need to be given a real opportunity to be seen, not for what they say, but for what they do.

“It’s in no one’s best interest for these guys to continue to be kept in prison.”

Phil Melendez returned to San Quentin for the first time since being released in 2017. He was pointed to frequently as a lifer, who received the benefit of reduced sentencing laws and has had an extremely successful reentry.

“I know it sounds crazy,” Melendez said. “But I’m really happy to be back in San Quentin.”

Melendez now works as an outreach associate for Re:Store Justice. A paroled youth offender and former SQ KidCAT member, he has visited Lancaster, Old Folsom and Vacaville prisons to help start, develop and teach curriculum for KidCAT, the program for imprisoned youth offenders. Melendez also facilitates Transformative Justice and provides training for prisoners to apply for reconsideration of their sentence under Senate Bill 1437.

Paul Payne became the press secretary for State Sen. Bill Dodd, D-3^rdDistrict, Contra Costa County, in April 2018. He emphasized that his boss is a strong advocate for criminal justice reform.

“We’re impressed by the people here taking advantage of these rehabilitative programs and really taking it to heart,” Payne told to SQN. “Senator Dodd is extremely moved and sympathetic to your plight. It’s incredible to see people putting in the time to rebuild themselves and understand what happened in their life.

“Me, I tend to still have a skeptical side, a cynical side, so I have to wonder if this is a room full of ringers, or is this the norm? If everyone in prison were like this, we could just open the gates right now, so to speak.”