The Daughter the Criminal Legal System Failed, and the Mother Who Never Did
Burying your child is a nightmare from which no parent ever fully wakes. Burying your child who died in prison is something worse than a nightmare Kwaneta Harris for Prism…
Georgia Youth Incarceration Systems Prioritize Punishment, Families say, Putting Kids at Risk in Jails
Jadelynn Zhang for Prism Reports This article was co-published with Inquest (a fellow founding member of the Movement Media Alliance) and Mainline. Jay was placed in Georgia’s Metro Regional Youth…
From Death Row to Transgender Rights: The Prison Yard as a School for Activists
Editor’s Note: This is a two-part story — first the activist speaks, and then his student follows. PART I: The Teacher, By Kevin Cooper STOCKTON, CA. — I arrived at…
The Hell Inside Hell: Solitary Confinement in Texas Hides the Sexual Abuse of Women and Girls
By Kwaneta Harris / Scalawag This essay discusses sexual abuse against adults and minors in the prison system. It also describes instances of suicide and self harm. I have called…
As an Incarcerated Person, I Feel Connected to the People of Gaza
The violence against oppressed people in both Gaza and U.S. prisons is a direct result of imperialism and the brutal policing used to maintain power and corruption.
The Harshest Pains of Prison Are Suffered Inside
In a world where all you have left are your emotions, guilt, anxiety and helplessness are the hardest to bear.
What It’s Like to Live in One of the Country’s Deadliest Prison Systems
Alabama’s prison homicide rate is among the highest in the country, leaving many changed people to die behind bars.
A Prison Librarian’s Efforts to Humanize the Stories of Incarcerated People
After an extensive career in California’s Soledad Prison, Fred Winn’s memoir ‘For the Least of These’ brings into the light the human stories of those demonized by the prison system.
Behind the Curtain: Finding Counternarratives About Death Row
Ahead of the first ever experimental execution by suffocation using nitrogen gas scheduled in Alabama next week, think about the many ways the state uses its iron-fisted power to control…
In Prison, I Lost the Right to Motherhood
My actions led to a prison sentence meant missing out on many of life’s milestones.
Food Insecurity in Prison Makes People Like Me Vulnerable to Labor Exploitation
The inadequacy of prison food exposes us to forced labor and sexual abuse in our desperation for adequate nutrition.
The Most Creative Entrepreneurs Are in Prison
Combine inflation with stagnant wages, and the prison economy gets even more busy.
Colorado Becomes One of the First to Employ an Incarcerated Professor
A new initiative at Adams State — one of the first of its kind in the country — focuses on employing incarcerated people with graduate degrees as college professors, rather…
Prison Treats Me Like an Animal. I Write to Reclaim My Humanity.
I’ve been confined for 27 years to a concrete box, and prison staff treat me like an animal branded with a number.
Dems Claim to Oppose Mass Incarceration, But Blue State Commutations Are Falling
Commutations plummeted from 2020 record highs in California and Illinois. Are presidential ambitions to blame?