95% of the people who are in prison,
they're gonna get out.
So it behooves us
to find a way
to give everyone a second chance,
even some people who committed some things that were really, really bad.
Because if we leave these folks so alienated,
so marginalized from society,
their probability for committing another crime goes up.
Daryl is the embodiment of someone who
knows the change that needs to happen and is willing to do what's necessary to make that change occur.
He's very serious about these issues.
He's been impacted by these issues.
I was 23 when, you know,
I got jammed up and then arrested,
subsequently convicted about 24.
It was a very dark and desperate place.
I was incarcerated for 40 months.
While I was in prison,
I met a group of jailhouse lawyers who inspired me to go pursue the law
once I got out.
When I first met Daryl,
I really was inspired.
I was going through a hard time in my life before I had met him.
And he always used to say, 'I can't tell you to stop doing this
if I don't have something to give you to help you stop.'
My purpose in getting legal training and
organizing training was to help people similarly situated like me.
I wrote so many organizations while I was incarcerated, and nobody wrote back.
So I wanted to create an organization where the express purpose
would be to make sure that people who've been in contact with the criminal legal system
would have advocacy, would have a way to address their issues.
That's one of the main reasons Forward Justice was started.
Daryl allows me to be exactly who I am,
and I respect who he is.
I'm a recovering crack addict.
I have—I'm a habitual felon, according to the state of North Carolina.
And so I'm able to use just my existence as a resistance.
What we are saying is that we have been redeemed, we have been restored,
and we are coming to redeem and restore our people.
All of our campaigns
are gonna be rooted in the experiences of people
and how the criminal legal system is impacting them.
So our Unlock [Our] Vote Campaign, we're trying to restore voting rights.
Our End Criminal Justice Debt Campaign,
where we're trying to eliminate
fees, fines, and costs that
really prevent people from upward mobility.
We have a Clean Slate Campaign, where
in North Carolina, if you have a criminal record,
we have certain laws that allow you to seal that record.
So employers, housing providers, educational institutions can't see it
after a certain amount of time,
which prevents them from discriminating against you because you have a criminal record.
Accountability is not synonymous with punishment.
You can hold someone accountable for harm,
but that doesn't mean that they have to be punished, or that it has to be punitive or retribution.
If you lock me up for stealing and I get out,
I'm gonna continue to steal
because the basic needs have not been met.
We can engage in a process
where a person is
accountable for their behavior
and agrees to not engage in their behavior again,
because that's really what we want to see happen.
One of our sister organizations that we work in coalition with, SpiritHouse,
has this simple exercise that we use when we go in the community.
They have you close your eyes
and think about some of the times you felt the most safe in your life—
who was around,
what were the circumstances,
what was happening?
You know what they talk about?
They talk about at the community block party,
they talk about being at grandma's house at a holiday,
and what a safe and fun environment it was.
You know what they don't talk about?
They don't talk about police, helicopters, tactical gear, and 'no-knock' warrants.
Like, 'I really felt safe
when the task force showed up on my block.'
They don't say that.
So at the epicenter of safety is community,
is family,
is that social cohesion
that can provide environments for people to be safe.
And so that's what we need to try to set up a policy environment to achieve—
not more police, not more prisons.
When we get bills passed,
we are literally freezing our power in time.
We're able to break the generational curses.
We are able to break the chains, literally,
and to get our people free.
We should want to see ourselves in each other.
I mean, that, that sounds a little corny or whatever, but,
I mean, you talk to a mother from the West Bank,
you talk to a mother from the west side of Detroit,
you talk to a mother in western Appalachia,
they want the same things.
They want a safe place to be able to raise their families.
They want their children to be able to
grasp towards the ladders of opportunity and achieve what they want to achieve.
We aren't so different, right?
If we can really buy into that, we can get the best and the brightest from everybody
and hopefully create that beloved community that
Dr. King talked about.