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You are here: Home / Archives for Dawn Reel

May 12, 2017

N.Y. must lift punitive practices of state’s parole board

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Times Union Commentary - By Mujahid FaridBy Mujahid Farid, Release Aging People in Prison/RAPP
Wednesday, May 10, 2017
Times Union Plus – Opinion & Commentary

Across the nation there is growing concern that much of the progress made in the past five years educating the federal government on the harms associated with mass incarceration will be significantly turned back. Donald Trump’s ascension to the presidency fuels that concern.

However, Trump’s counter-progressive platform does not have the power to silence a movement whose time has come. Because the vast majority of incarcerated individuals are in state prison systems, not the federal system, the primary focal point for challenging mass incarceration must be at the local and state level, and at policies championed by so-called progressive politicians that long precede Trump.

Nationwide and local coalitions of formerly incarcerated men and women have been pushing a bold vision for justice and transformation for decades. Notably, in New York state, organizations and groups have been hard at work, creating and developing coalitions and coming out of their silos to address the crisis of a punishment paradigm that has threatened the health and well-being of New Yorkers and their families and communities since the Rockefeller administration.

Today, groups like the Challenging Incarceration Coalition, which is made up of more than 60 organizations and issue-based campaigns, are demanding that Gov. Andrew Cuomo and leaders of the state Legislature join the movement to transform New York’s racist carceral state and the rise of the newly emboldened conservative right by championing policy that ends mass incarceration, state violence and torture, racism and identity-based oppression, and empowers all New Yorkers, not just those who are convicted of nonviolent drug offenses.

As a start, the governor could take steps to uproot the punitive practices of the state Board of Parole, which continues to annually deny release to thousands of people — many of whom are elders — despite the incredible extent to which they have transformed over time.

I myself was denied by the board nine times, adding an extra 18 years to my original 15 years-to-life sentence, despite having already earned four college degrees — two bachelor’s and two master’s — before my first interview with the board.

To continue to deny people parole based on one immutable factor — the nature of the original offense — without regard for their life-changing transformations, is to follow the lead of the new president, not combat him. State and local organizations and individuals will not abandon inclusive reform efforts until the governor and Legislature act accordingly by changing the composition of the Board of Parole; passing the Safe and Fair Evaluations Parole Act (A.4353/S.3095A) which, among other things, requires that incarcerated people who are denied parole be told what corrective actions they need to take; and championing incarceration-related policy that ensures New York remains a steadfast leader in the dawn of a new and uncertain day.

The on-the-ground work being done by organizers and advocates on the state and local levels will not be uprooted by a new presidential administration, but it remains to be seen whether it will be embraced by the governor and his peers.

If the elected leaders of our state wish to rout the rise of the nationally occupying radical right, then they must join the local movement seeking to penetrate its punitive roots.

PDF version of this commentary.
Link to commentary on Times Union website (subscription required).

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Filed Under: article, press

April 13, 2017

Farid & RAPP on BRIC TV

Filed Under: multimedia

September 6, 2016

False Hope and a Needless Death Behind Bars (NY Times Editorial)

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New York Times, The Opinion Pages
September 6, 2016
By Jesse Wegman, Editorial Observer

On July 26, John MacKenzie went before the parole board at the Fishkill Correctional Facility in Beacon, N.Y., and made the case, once again, for his freedom. He had been locked up since 1975 for shooting and killing a Long Island police officer, Matthew Giglio, during a bungled robbery attempt. His sentence was 25 years to life — the maximum under state law.

On Aug. 2, he learned that the board had voted 2 to 1 against him. It was the 10th time in 16 years that he had been denied parole.

Later that day, he sent a handwritten letter to his daughter Denise, saying that “they’re hell bent on keeping me in prison” and “I don’t believe I’ll last much longer.”

On Aug. 4, another inmate found Mr. MacKenzie hanging by the neck from a bedsheet tied to the window bars of his cell. He was 70.

John MacKenzie was no ordinary prisoner. In the more than 40 years he spent behind bars, he became one of the most respected inmates in the state’s penal system. He had a spotless disciplinary record. He took full responsibility for the murder of Mr. Giglio. He earned degrees in business and the arts. He started a program to give victims the opportunity to speak directly to inmates about the impact of their crimes. The state’s own risk-assessment program found that he posed little to no risk of re-offending. Prison guards, judges, clergy members and prosecutors wrote letters supporting him.

None of this seemed to matter to the parole board. Because of the seriousness of his crime, one denial said, his release would “undermine respect for the law.” Another referred to “significant community opposition.” The wording would vary, but the message was always the same: Mr. MacKenzie’s sentence, which appeared to give him a real chance at freedom after 25 years, was a sham. No matter what he did to atone for his crime, he was never getting out.

Some see this as a just result, particularly law enforcement groups, which steadfastly opposed Mr. MacKenzie’s release. But New York criminal law provides for the possibility of parole, which is based on the idea that people can change.

Under state law, the parole board is required to weigh a prisoner’s entire history: his degree of remorse, his behavior behind bars and the likelihood that he will be able to live lawfully outside prison. Those factors never got more than a cursory mention, at best, when the board denied Mr. MacKenzie’s requests. In May, a State Supreme Court justice, Maria Rosa, held the board in contempt for failing to give any reason for denying Mr. MacKenzie parole other than the nature of his crime. Justice Rosa wrote that “if parole isn’t granted to this petitioner, when and under what circumstances would it be granted?” She ordered the board to hold a new hearing, with different board members. The state appealed that order. The case was still pending when Mr. MacKenzie killed himself.

Certainly crime victims and police officers should have a voice in the parole process, but they should not have a veto. Otherwise, parole is a meaningless promise.

Some years ago, Mr. MacKenzie wrote an essay about the frustrations of living at the whim of parole commissioners. “If society wishes to rehabilitate as well as punish wrongdoers through imprisonment,” he wrote, then “society — through its lawmakers — must bear the responsibility of tempering justice with mercy. Giving a man legitimate hope is a laudable goal; giving him false hope is utterly inhuman.”

A version of this editorial appears in print on September 6, 2016, on page A20 of the New York edition with the headline: False Hope and a Needless Death Behind Bars.

For more on John MacKenzie, see RAPPCampaign.com/press

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Filed Under: article, press, slideshow Tagged With: Beacon NY, Fishkill Correctional Facility, John MacKenzie, Justice Maria Rosa, Matthew Giglio, New York criminal law, New York Times, Op-Ed, parole, parole board, prison, RAPP, rehabilitate

June 3, 2016

Longtime Prisoner Mohaman Koti Dies at 89, 2 Months After Release

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June 3, 2016
Headlines, Democracy Now!

An elderly New York prisoner who won wide support for his freedom has died just two months after he was released to a nursing home in Staten Island. Mohaman Koti was 89 years old. In 1978, Mr. Koti was convicted of attempted murder after he shot a New York City police officer during a traffic stop in which he says the officer drew his gun first. The officer later recovered, and Mr. Koti was offered a plea deal of seven-and-a-half years. When he demanded a trial, he was sentenced to 25 years to life. (Watch Democracy Now! coverage.)

Mr. Koti spent the next several decades mentoring young male prisoners. A corrections officer at Sing Sing said he had never met anyone so well respected on both sides of the bars. Ten years after Mr. Koti was eligible for parole, he was profiled in a 2013 New York Times column about prisoners over the age of 60 who are denied release based on their original crime, instead of an accurate assessment of the threat they pose. It described a parole board hearing where commissioners had to repeat questions to Mr. Koti because he was hard of hearing. He suffered from several medical problems and used a wheelchair, but he was still found to be at risk of committing another crime.

Mr. Koti was ultimately granted parole in September 2014, when a judge ruled the previous denials were irrational and called for a new hearing. Then, because of a pending bank robbery charge from the time of his arrest, he was ordered to serve an additional year in prison at a federal medical center in Butner, North Carolina.

Mr. Koti was finally freed in March. His longtime lawyer and friend Susan Tipograph told Democracy Now!, “The kind of life Koti lived when he got out—confined to a nursing home because he was not able to care for himself—shows that it was ludicrous to think he would have posed a threat to society all these years.”

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Filed Under: article, press, slideshow Tagged With: Democracy Now, Mohaman Koti, parole, Susan Tipograph

May 19, 2015

“The Nature of the Crime”—A Poor Reason To Keep Elders in Prison

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The statewide Parole Justice New York Coalition, with RAPP as a member, has released this new short film, “The Nature of the Crime,” featuring RAPP lead organizer Mujahid Farid, former parole commissioner Ed Hammock, and other experts on the issue.

The film shows how 14 people in New York State control the freedom of tens of thousands of men and women. The 14 people are called the Parole Board and they determine whether people in prison with indefinite sentences (such as 25 years to life) should be released.  Every year 10,000 incarcerated New Yorkers are denied parole. Most of these people are denied repeatedly despite the fact that they pose little if any risk to public safety. For the skyrocketing population over age 50 in the New York prisons—a group that poses the lowest risk of committing a new offense if released—this means a future of illness and death behind bars. For New York as a whole, this means the destruction of our communities and families, and the immense waste of public funds spent keeping people behind bars for no reason. It means a continuation of the culture of revenge and permanent punishment that has filled the prisons in this country and threatens to keep doing so. It means continuing a racist system of “justice” that treats Black people and other people of color as criminals unworthy of a second chance at life.

“The Nature of the Crime” refers to the reason the Parole Board gives when it denies an incarcerated person parole: no matter what you have accomplished in the 20, 30, or 40 years since your conviction, no matter how much support you have in the community, no matter how low a risk you pose of returning to prison or committing a new crime, you cannot be released because of the nature of the crime for which you were convicted, often many years ago. That is something you cannot change. And it is an unreliable measure of whether you are ready to be released. It only means that there is a political gain for the Board to deny you: they can show how “tough on crime” they are.

The film premiered in Albany at the state Capitol in May to pressure the legislature to pass the Safe and Fair Evaluations (SAFE) Parole Act. RAPP is part of a statewide effort to use this film to increase public support for the SAFE Parole Act and for the wisdom and humanity of releasing aging people from the New York prisons.

If the risk is low, let them go. Bring our grandparents, our fathers, our mothers, our loved ones and friends home. Please share the video and the campaign homepage with your friends and family, then join the campaign for justice for New York.

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Filed Under: multimedia, slideshow Tagged With: New York State Parole Board, parole, Parole Justice Now!, Safe and Fair Evaluations Parole Act, SAFE Parole Act, The Nature of the Crime

April 27, 2015

Life Outside: Rosalie Comes Home movie screening

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Life Outside: Rosalie Comes Home
April 28 @ 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm
Part of the: Release Aging People from Prison Film Series

Directed by Frances Negrón-Muntaner
Life Outside tells the story of Rosalie Cutting as she navigates finding a job and housing at 71, after serving a 27-year prison sentence.

Heyman Center for the Humanities at
Columbia University
74 Morningside Dr,
(Enter on 116th Street)
New York, NY 10027
see map

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Filed Under: multimedia, slideshow Tagged With: film, Frances Negrón-Muntaner, Life Outside, Life Outside: Rosalie Comes Home, movie, RAPP, RAPP Campaign, Release Aging People from Prison, Rosalie Cutting

March 14, 2014

“Our Elders Behind Bars, Our Families Divided”

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Video of panel at the Beyond the Bars: Breaking Through Conference on Sat., March 8, 2014, Columbia School of Social Work.

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Filed Under: multimedia, slideshow Tagged With: Ariane Davisson, Barbara Inniss, Beyond the Bars, Dequi Kioni-Sadiki, Larry White, Laura Whitehorn, Our Elders Behind Bars, Tyrrell Muhammad

February 23, 2014

Please donate!

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Your support helps the Release Aging People in Prison (RAPP) Campaign carry out public education, organizing, and advocacy work. A donation to our campaign is an investment in community-driven advocacy aimed at ending the aging in prison epidemic.

Please click “Donate” page and make a secure donation by debit or credit card. No PayPal account needed, just click on icons for debit/credit cards.   Thank you!




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Filed Under: article, slideshow Tagged With: donate, RAPP

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