I remember my time on probation in 2007. When the prosecutor offered a plea agreement for 10 years deferred adjudication, I felt as though my life had been handed back to me. Ten months earlier, I had been arrested for handing a note to a bank teller asking for $500, driven by my desperation to feed a drug addiction. At that point, I assumed that I would not breathe free air again until I was...
For nearly two decades, TCJC has been advocating for justice reform in Texas. Recently, I joined Leah (TCJC’s Executive Director) and Lindsey (TCJC’s Policy Attorney) for a short trip to Round Rock, where we got to spend time with high school and college students, talking with them about the importance of advocating for criminal justice reform in Texas.
We shared how TCJC has been instrumental in influencing over 180 statewide justice policies that have helped...
The Houston Museum of African American Culture (HMAAC), the Texas Accountants and Lawyers for the Arts, and the California Lawyers for the Arts invited TCJC to participate in their Texas Art for Justice Forum on July 14 at the HMAAC. The forum was part of a series of events designed to discuss and expand the role that art programs and the arts community can play in addressing mass incarceration, especially in other high incarceration...
Over the past two weekends, the Texas GOP and Democratic Party held their respective, biennial platform conventions to determine the parties’ official policy positions for the next two years. The outcome of these conventions shows that in a time where bipartisan agreement is rare, reforming our criminal justice system remains an area of common ground for the people of Texas. I want to acknowledge Scott Henson of Grits for Breakfast, who promoted much-needed criminal...
When TCJC launched our Justice for Women campaign in March, we never expected this much momentum! In the past four months, we’ve accomplished a lot.
We released two full-length reports and a “quick guide” on the challenges facing women in Texas’ criminal justice system:
Last November, I flew to Washington state to support Tarra Simmons; a woman who, until then, I’d only known through Facebook and mutual friends. She and I have many things in common, not the least of which is having spent time in prison.
Tarra graduated Magna Cum Laude with a Dean’s Medal and received the coveted Skadden Fellowship, which is only rewarded to a handful of law students each year and provides recipients who plan...
My mother is a survivor of domestic abuse and sexual assault. Her method of coping with the trauma she experienced was to never stop moving. Literally. When I was growing up, we moved over and over again—14 times during my high school years alone. If, instead, her method of coping had been to self-medicate with alcohol or drugs, there is no doubt in my mind that she would be in prison.
Very little separates my...
TCJC’s Jay Jenkins was recently quoted in an article by NBC News about Dennis Rivera Sarmiento, a high school student who was arrested in Houston and later placed in immigration detention. Allegedly, a female classmate called him a racial slur and threw a sports drink at him, resulting in an altercation between the two students. Dennis tried to report the incident to a Houston ISD police officer but, instead of receiving help, he was arrested...
This is a MUST READ op-ed if you want to understand why bail reform is so important: Cash bail system promotes profit, not justice. Written by the folks at Right2Justice, this piece brilliantly summarizes what’s at stake in Houston’s bail process – your money for your liberty. Those who make money off the system don’t want that to change. But for those who can’t afford bail, regardless of guilt or innocence, losing their liberty...
Over the weekend, thousands of people took to the streets of Austin for the 2018 Women’s March. One of those marching was Lauren Johnson. Lauren is many things. Among them, she is a mother, an advocate, and a formerly incarcerated woman.
On very short notice, Lauren agreed to speak at the Austin Women’s March on behalf of the more than 12,000 women currently incarcerated in Texas. Because those women could not be there to march...
