Criminal InJustice^† is a weekly series devoted to taking action against inequities in the U.S. criminal justice system. Nancy A. Heitzeg, Professor of Sociology and Race/Ethnicity, is the Editor of CI. Criminal InJustice is published every Wednesday at 6 pm CST.

Birthing Behind Bars: Fighting for Reproductive Justice for Women in Prison
By Tina Reynolds and Victoria Law

“I never thought of advocating outside of prison. I just wanted to have some semblance of a normal life once I was released,” stated Tina Reynolds, a mother and formerly incarcerated woman. Then she gave birth to her son while in prison for a parole violation:

“When I went into labor, my water broke. The van came to pick me up, I was shackled. Once I was in the van, I was handcuffed. I was taken to the hospital. The handcuffs were taken off, but the shackles weren’t. I walked to the wheelchair that they brought over to me and I sat in the wheelchair with shackles on me. They re-handcuffed me once I was in the wheelchair and took me up to the floor where women had their children.

“When I got there, I was handcuffed with one hand. At the last minute, before I gave birth, I was unshackled so that my feet were free. Then after I gave birth to him, the shackles went back on and the handcuffs stayed on while I held my son on my chest.”

That treatment, she recalled later, was “the most egregious, dehumanizing, oppressive practice that I ever experienced while in prison.” Her experience is standard procedure for the hundreds of women who enter jail or prison while pregnant each year.

Upon her release, Reynolds started Women on the Rise Telling Her Story (WORTH), an organization of currently and formerly incarcerated women based in New York City, to give currently and formerly incarcerated women both a voice and a support system.

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Criminal InJustice^† is a weekly series devoted to taking action against inequities in the U.S. criminal justice system. Nancy A. Heitzeg, Professor of Sociology and Race/Ethnicity, is the Editor of CI. Criminal InJustice is published every Wednesday at 6 pm CST.

Faith, Profits & Prisons
by Kay Whitlock

Two recent developments spurred the reprise of this post, originally published online in 2010 and now appearing in slightly edited form, here at Critical Mass Progress’ Criminal Injustice series.

Chuck Colson died in late April 2012. Like me, some of you remember him as special counsel to the president in Richard Nixon’s corrupt administration, a ruthless man, known for his devotion to political “dirty tricks,” who facilitated the infamous Watergate scandals that ultimately toppled a presidency. Colson eventually went to (white collar, minimum security, federal) prison for seven months on an obstruction of justice charge. Somewhere along the line, he underwent a religious conversion to a particular form of evangelical Christianity, and after his release, he founded Prison Fellowship Ministries (PFM), which says it operates in 1,367 U.S. prisons, has more than 200,000 prisoners involved in its programs, and now builds on its re-entry (originally supported by then-Texas governor George W. Bush and Texas taxpayers) and recidivism prevention efforts outside of prison. At the time of his death, 1,300 radio stations carried Colson’s daily 4-minute radio commentary.

Rest in peace, Mr. Colson. Some will say he changed from a political operative to a simple man of Christ, and while I have no doubt his religious conversion was real, and that his prison work has mattered to many, I have something else to add to the summing up of his PRM work. In brief: Prison Fellowship Ministries built its base on the fact of mass incarceration, and then began to expand its base to post-prison work, anticipating shifts in public thinking about the disastrous “get tough” policies that led to, support, and sustain mass incarceration in the United States. And the disturbing political subtext to this is seldom explored. But the Colson/PFM work is often cited as lending conservative support to challenges to mass incarceration. This leads us to the second recent political development deserving of our attention.

Last week, Criminal Injustice cited and summarized new research from the Pew Center on the States identifying shifts in public thinking about the disastrous “get tough” policies and practices that led to, support, and sustain mass incarceration in the United States. Polling now suggests that U.S. voters feel too many people are in prison, the country spends too much on imprisonment, and policy changes should be pursued that shift nonviolent offenders to effective and affordable community-based alternatives. With these shifts in public opinion come possible new openings that we can utilize in the ongoing struggle to dismantle mass incarceration and the prison industrial complex that profits from it. And we should seize those openings.

But as we consider next steps forward, a few cautionary notes are in order.
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Criminal InJustice^† is a weekly series devoted to taking action against inequities in the U.S. criminal justice system. Nancy A. Heitzeg, Professor of Sociology and Race/Ethnicity, is the Editor of CI. Criminal InJustice is published every Wednesday at 6 pm CST.

Tipping Point?
by nancy a heitzeg

Sometimes we do have good news.

The public, it seems, may have had enough of draconian criminal justice policies. The death penalty has been called into question in a growing number of states with the most recent abolition being Connecticut — the fifth state to end the practice in the past five years.

Now mass incarceration is undergoing similar scrutiny. Initially, state budget crises brought the issue of the direct and collateral costs of incarceration to the fore, but now public opinion is moving towards a deepening critiques of of our over-use of prisons, especially for non-violent offenders.

A recent survey — Public Opinion on Sentencing and Corrections Policy in America – shows a surprising and bi-partisan) rejection of prison as the primary mechanism for addressing crime.

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Criminal InJustice^† is a weekly series devoted to taking action against inequities in the U.S. criminal justice system. Nancy A. Heitzeg, Professor of Sociology and Race/Ethnicity, is the Editor of CI. Criminal InJustice is published every Wednesday at 6 pm CST.

For The Casualties Of Racial Ideologies*
by: Chia (Chilli) Lor
Dedicated to the Trayvon Martin Family and all those who were victims of racial hate crimes

For the justice of humanity.
For the justice of Fong Lee
For the justice of all casualties
Of racial ideologies.
For the killing of Trayvon Martin
who had a bag of skittles
But was shot for the color of his skin.

We stand up to manifest
This crime, created by mankind
Which separates us into human species,
assuming difference in pigment biology.
You know what it is: racial profiling.
Under the law, it is not a crime
to stereotype, to criminalize, a person within sight,
But it IS a crime
To be black and wearing a hoodie at night.
Recall George Zimmerman’s 911 call saying:
“This guy looks like he’s up to no good, on drugs or something.
It’s raining and he’s just walking around looking about… These a**holes always get away.”

As if the black, brown, non-white skin
carries a deep, dark secret creeping within.
As if that secret will unleash at a certain place
Therefore, you feel the need to defend yourself
By shooting that fear in the face.

I am done with “Minnesota Nice!”
I am done with taking race out of the injustice equation
so that others can be comfortable.
Comfort doesn’t bring change… the TRUTH does!!!

For the justice of humanity,
For the justice of Shaima Alawadi,
For the justice of all casualties
Of racial ideologies.
For the killing of Amadou Diallo,
who had a black wallet,
But was shot 41 times with pistols.

I am done with putting race cases in the hands of law makers
Because too often, they are judged by
A corrupted system
Run by color-blind racism,
police cover ups,
And justice where money drops.
Too often we’ve seen laws
that were twisted to benefit
the dominant culture.

The Law of self-defense seems fair.
But if self-defense is so fair,
then why are the guilty running free,
And the victims in misery?
If self-defense is so fair,
then why are hundreds of police officers’ hands red,
stained by the blood of unarmed colored citizens?
If self-defense is so fair,
Then why did Chai Vang’s case
Took only 3 hours for
For an all-white jury to find him
guilty on all counts of first-degree murder
for the shooting deaths of six white hunters?
Although, Vang’s life was threatened and he argued in the name of self-defense!
If self-defense was fair,
Scott Osborn would also be in jail for brutalizing Neng Yang, yet claiming self-defense.
If self-defense was fair,
Zimmerman would be in jail because Trayvon didn’t get the chance to defend himself!
Until I see justice served,
Don’t tell me that there is no racial bias in the law,
because it is UNFAIR!

How many more marches and rallies must civilians make,
until true justice will take place?
How much more tears will drench the earth,
and outcry will reach up to the sky,
until we stop living in a Post-racial lie?
As long as we let the color of the skin justify our actions.
As long as we let the judicial system,
discriminate our colored men and women.
As long as racial ideologies drive our minds and our hearts…
There will be more Trayvon Martins…

For the justice of humanity.
For the justice of Trayvon Martin
For the justice of all casualties
Of racial ideologies.
REST in PEACE.

*A spoken word piece that retains the power on the printed page.. Honored to have Chia as a student..

Criminal InJustice^† is a weekly series devoted to taking action against inequities in the U.S. criminal justice system. Nancy A. Heitzeg, Professor of Sociology and Race/Ethnicity, is the Editor of CI. Criminal InJustice is published every Wednesday at 6 pm CST.

Stop the Criminal-Black-Man Narrative 2012
by nancy a heitzeg

“Trayvon Martin was killed by a very old idea..”
~ Brent Staples, New York Times, 4/14/2102

The Black Man as Dangerous is a lethal idea, ironically, not to those who perpetrate and fear, but especially to those to whom it is attached. It is indeed also a very old idea, one that has evolved over centuries. The Savage, The Brute, the Defiler of White Women — honed and solidified in the Post Civil Rights Era into an archetype that scholars and activists now refer to in aggregate short-hand:

The Criminal-Black-Man.

This image is ubiquitous — it is the text and subtext of all crime-reporting and “reality” cop/prison programing. It shapes the contours of everyday racism, the school to prison pipeline, police patrols and profiles; it offers the framework for both creating and then perversely justifying the demographics of both the prison industrial complex and the face of death row.

At times, as in the Trayvon Martin case, the archetype and its’ consequences are, at least briefly, openly examined and discussed. More often, as with the noxious Kony 2012 campaign, it looms just below the surface with an eerily subconscious pull.

The Criminal-Black-Man is the visible yet untouchable specter that lies at the center of fear and violence. It is personal and yes it is political.

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From Colorlines:

Criminal InJustice^† is a weekly series devoted to taking action against inequities in the U.S. criminal justice system. Nancy A. Heitzeg, Professor of Sociology and Race/Ethnicity, is the Editor of CI. Criminal InJustice is published every Wednesday at 6 pm CST.

Prison Health Care as Punishment
by Kay Whitlock with introduction by nancy a heitzeg

Misrepresentations of the realities of prison life abound. These are a constant staple of media and public conversation, including unfounded claims that inmates are leading some sort of life of luxury, lifting weights, watching plasma TVs, dining finely and seeking college educations at the expense of taxpayers.

And this — California Inmates Get Better Health Care than Ordinary Citizens: Thanks to Justice Anthony Kennedy, California prisoners have easier access to health care than ordinary citizens.

Those convicted of “non-non-non crimes”–non-serious, non-violent, non-sex related–are liable to get early release as a result of the Supreme Court’s 2010 ruling that the state must reduce prison overcrowding in order to provide adequate medical, mental and dental health care.

Petty thieves and the like can get freed and have no more claim to health care than an honest citizen.

Killers, rapists, and armed robbers, on the other hand, are free of health-care worries until they make parole, if they ever do.

The court ruled 5-4 that the absence of adequate care for prisoners violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. The majority decision was written by Kennedy.

In an added twist, J. Clark Kelso, the overseer of California’s effort to comply with the order was a law clerk to Kennedy in the early 1980’s. He says that he gets the same question wherever he goes: “How come we’re giving felons better health care than I get?”

Well, we aren’t. California has yet to dramatically reduce over-crowding, often shuffling inmates out of state-run prisons to county jails, and despite some efforts to comply with the Supreme Court order, questions still remain as to what standards California is using to define “adequate care”. In addition, the intolerable conditions of SHU confinement recently lead to a series of on-going prisoner hunger strikes and related deaths at Pelican Bay and elsewhere.

Hardly a “health care” paradise.

The reality of prison health care – throughout the nation — is one of neglect, denial f treatment and untimely death.

In response to the false picture presented by The Daily Beast and others, CI is re-publishing a piece which outlines the on-going limitations of the oxymoron called “prison health care”.

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