In an abrupt change in philosophy, more than 130 top law enforcement officials including those from New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and others now support a roll back of tough laws and rigid judicial practices that have built a criminal justice system in the U.S. with the highest incarceration rate in the world. It also costs taxpayers $80 billion a … Read More
Heroic Actions for Prisoners’ Human Rights
A Psychologist Warden in Chicago and a Federal Court Decision in California address Prisoners’ Human Rights There are now 10 times as many mentally ill people in the nation’s 5000 jails and prisons as there are in state mental institutions. And these prisoners are more likely to be kept in solitary confinement and to be beaten by guards and other … Read More
A New Lease on Life
In 1992, Rudolph Norris, 58, was convicted of possessing and selling crack-cocaine and was sentenced to 30 years in prison. 30 years. He would have received a greatly reduced sentence for the same non-violent crime today but his conviction came during the war-on-drugs debacle of decades past. According to federal data, roughly ½ of the 1.5 million federal and state … Read More
Criminal Justice Reform is Having a “National Moment”
This week President Obama visited a federal prison in El Reno, Oklahoma, marking the first time in history that any sitting president visited a prison. As the President looked into a 9 by 10 foot cell for 3 prisoners, containing 3 bunks, a night table with books, a small sink and toilet with no seat, he reflected on the life … Read More
Report on Treatment of Mental Illness in Prisons by Human Rights Watch
Those of you who have been reading my blog know that our prisons have become the largest mental illness institutions in the United States. An estimated one in five prisoners in the US has a serious mental illness including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, autism, and major depression. I thought I had read everything about the despicable treatment the mentally ill receive … Read More
Site Unseen: Incarceration
Site Unseen: Incarceration is a gallery show curated by Sheila Pinkel, Emerita Professor of Art, Pomona College, to highlight the realities and challenges confronting incarcerated people. The exhibit at Los Angeles Valley College displays the work of 7 incarcerated individuals as well as 7 non-incarcerated people who use a variety of approaches to create consciousness about incarceration in the United … Read More
Criminal Justice Reform Draws Unlikely Bedfellows
Last week lawmakers lined up to promote their criminal justice reform bills at an event, which included both Republican and Democratic lawmakers and Piper Kerman, who wrote a memoir about her incarceration in a federal prison that inspired the groundbreaking Netflix series “Orange is the New Black.” Since crime is down and interest is high in decreasing the price tag … Read More
Prop 47: California Voters Address Prison Reform
California voters are about to cast a momentous vote for prison reform with the passage of Proposition 47 on Tuesday, November 4th. The initiative to reduce penalties for illicit drug use and petty theft is part of a multi-million dollar campaign to revise sentencing laws in California and across the nation. Prop 47 would reclassify possession of heroin, meth, and … Read More
New Treatment for Mentally Ill Inmates: Reduce Pepper Spray
In an article in the Los Angeles Times, Paige St. John writes that California has decided to use special solitary confinement units to house mentally ill inmates as part of an attempt to comply with federal court orders to improve their care. Instead of using pepper spray to calm them down, isolation is the new treatment for the mentally ill. … Read More
A Paradigm Shift: Prison Re-Entry Council Project
Last October, Salinas Valley State Prison in Soledad, California hosted the first “Council” with inmates in this level IV facility. SVSP houses some of the most dangerous inmates in California. Yet, in spite of its population, six Native Americans, four African Americans, an inmate from Honduras and a pre-op transsexual met together with a couple of Council leaders for a … Read More
Two Faces of Prison
Yesterday I received my weekly email bulletin from San Quentin. A prisoner who was serving a life term with the possibility of parole, Thomas Curby Henderson, “fell” off a fourth-story tier (imagine a catwalk 4 floors up) in the infamous West Block of the prison last Tuesday. “Fell” is a euphemism for “was thrown off.” Who pushed him to his … Read More
Our Addiction to Incarceration is Not Sustainable
The United States has 5% of the world population but 25% of its prison population in spite of the fact that the violent crime rate is the lowest it has been in 40 years. Since the mid-1970s the California prison population has grown by 750% driven by sentencing laws based largely on fear, ignorance and vengeance. But in other states, … Read More
When Did We Lose Our Humanity?
Just imagine what it’s like to be entombed day and night in a 7 ½ by 12 foot cement box commonly known as solitary confinement. In spite of the fact that the California prison Hunger Strike has been in effect since July 8th and has been covered by the New York Times and Los Angeles Times and NBC to name … Read More
Why is this Mother Telling Us this Story?
Several of you have asked when my book is coming out. At first, I did not find a publisher interested enough in mental illness and addiction in the family to publish it. It just isn’t sexy. One New York editor, in rejecting the book wrote, “I wondered why [this mother] was telling us this story. The scope of this book … Read More
Mental Illness is Not Going to Go Away
Mental illness is not going to go away; in fact there is an increase in the number of people suffering from depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder. Some 30% or more Americans—that’s almost one in three– are diagnosed with at least one mental illness in their lifetimes.