A bill to fight expensive prison phone call costs heads to Biden’s desk

https://www.npr.org/2023/01/01/1146370950/prison-phone-call-cost-martha-wright-biden January 1, 20239:01 AM ET JULIANA KIMTwitter Prison inmates make one of their daily allotment of six phone calls at the York Community Reintegration Center. John Moore/Getty Images Legislation that aims to curb the costs of phone calls behind bars is heading to President Biden's desk for his signature. The Martha Wright-Reed Just and …

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In the Building

This is a chapter from my memoir about teaching incarcerated high school students on Rikers Island in NYC that was published in the literary magazine, J Journal. The memoir is titled The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island (published in 2019 by Deerbrook Editions): https://www.jjournal.org/post/in-the-building In the Sprungs, I had grown completely comfortable with my …

THIS IS NOT JUSTICE

A Philadelphia teenager and the empty promise of the Sixth Amendment By Jake Tapper https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2022/11/campaign-to-free-incarcerated-philadelphia-teenager-sixth-amendment/671527/ Painting by Fulton Leroy Washington (MR WASH). Source: Malike Sidibe for The Atlantic. OCTOBER 12, 2022 This article was featured in One Story to Read Today, a newsletter in which our editors recommend a single must-read from The Atlantic, Monday through Friday.  …

Seventh in a Series of Readings from The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRr6GvznsiM&t=1s Reading from The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island “The New Plantation takes us into the chaos of Rikers Island, giving us the vivid voices of young men–kids, really–caught in the unrelenting grip of institutional racism. I found it riveting.” –Monica Wood, author of When We Were the Kennedys, Ernie’s Ark, and One-in-a-Million Boy “It’s easy to forget …

Reading 2 – The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island – from Chapter 2

https://youtu.be/MPvUU1vFeRM Reading 2 from The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island “The New Plantation takes us into the chaos of Rikers Island, giving us the vivid voices of young men–kids, really–caught in the unrelenting grip of institutional racism. I found it riveting.” –Monica Wood, author of When We Were the Kennedys, Ernie’s Ark, and One-in-a-Million Boy “It’s easy to …

Reading of the Preface of The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island

https://www.youtube.com/embed/A7oJB0CaEE0 The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island was published by Deerbrook Editions. "The New Plantation takes us into the chaos of Rikers Island, giving us the vivid voices of young men--kids, really--caught in the unrelenting grip of institutional racism. I found it riveting." --Monica Wood, author of When We Were the Kennedys, Ernie's Ark, …

CounterPunch Review of The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island

https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/08/30/prison-classrooms-reflect-white-supremacy/ AUGUST 30, 2019 Prison Classrooms Reflect White Supremacy by W. T. WHITNEY One story is that of a young man in the midst of bizarre, even outrageous interactions with a group of boys. He is inexperienced, but perseveres, learns, and overcomes what looks like a dead-end situation. The other story is about these imprisoned teenagers …

Why American Prisons Owe Their Cruelty to Slavery

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/14/magazine/prison-industrial-complex-slavery-racism.html#permid=sContainer&permid=102092349:102092349 Several years ago, my law office was fighting for the release of a black man who had been condemned, at the age of 16, to die in prison. Matthew was one of 62 Louisiana children sentenced to life imprisonment without parole for nonhomicide offenses. But a case I’d argued at the Supreme Court was part …

A conversation with author Jason Trask (with David Daniel)

Back in December as part of our Literary Lowell series, we profiled local author David Daniel, author of the Alex Rasmussen detective series and a number of other books. Now it’s David’s turn to contribute a new author profile to the blog. He recently caught up with Jason Trask who now lives in Maine but who spent …