We will remember many complicated aspects about Michael Jackson… here’s one video I encourage us to remember as we fight to tear down the prison industrial complex from the cops to the jails.
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Gay bashers suck! Attacking people on the street, intimidating people, calling people homophobic names is a load of crap and people should not do it. It is absolutely tragic that Fabio Brandao and some of his friends attacked a bunch of queers and caused so much harm. The fear that we all begin to internalize because of attacks like this is huge and can feel incredibly unbearable. I know I get filled with rage that helps me deal with my fear but sometimes that rage isn’t entirely helpful and sometimes it can become misdirected.
The past couple weeks Bay Windows, New England’s largest Gay, Lesbian (trying to include bisexual and transgender people) newspaper has been reporting on the outcome of the court case against Brandao. Brandao pleaded guilty to four counts of “civil rights violation” and 5 other charges. He was then given a 2 year suspended sentence and required to attend anger management classes. By no means is this justice. However, we will NEVER find justice in a system that thrives on white supremacy, hetero-patriarchy, and capitalism. While it is appalling that Brandao is not truly being held accountable for his actions it is a very sad that queers in Boston actually thought the (in)justice system would provide some kind of justice. The response to it all is a bit pathetic. There is constant turning to “hate crimes” and a call for prison time as if that would provide any kind of answer to the situation we are in. You can read the coverage in Bay Windows HERE. You can read two other reflections about it here, including one from a survivor of the attack HERE.
I did send a letter to Bay Windows which they printed. You can read that short letter HERE.
This situation is absolutely complicated and forces us to ask a lot of questions. We know that the penal system does not exist for the purpose of creating true justice or to protect marginalized communities. The police are responsible for protecting private property and enforcing social norms of behavior while targeting young people, People of Color, gender non-conforming folks, poor people, addicts, etc. The reality is, however, that many people experience interpersonal violence all the time and we MUST come up with systems to deal with it. It is vital that we operate with the understanding that interpersonal violence will continue as long as any system of oppression exists. When we are taught from day one that it is okay for one group of people to have dominating power over another (whether that be through white supremacy, patriarchy, capitalism, colonization, zionism, xenophobia, heterosexism, etc.) we internalize that belief and it impacts our daily human interactions. Any attempt to end interpersonal violence must also come with a commitment to ending all forms of social and systemic violence.
I also believe that we need to teach self defense to those who are targets of violence. Queer people walking the street need to know how to defend ourselves from gay bashers. We need to know what to do and how to protect our bodies and each other. We need to be able to fight back and hold our own when someone or a group of people are attacking us. We also need lots of community education about these issues of violence. Rather than folks walking away from situations of violence we need people to go up to the situation, not call the police, but make their presence known in an effort to stop the attackers from what they are doing, a little non-violent intervention.
After attacks have occurred we also need to come up with processes that meet the needs of everyone involved in the situation. We need to do healing for those physically attacked. Fear is a really destructive force and can impact our ability to make healthy choices. We must offer healing to those who have been attacked. We also need to figure out what transformative/restorative justice looks like in each situation. How can we address the individual(s) who caused harm? How do we walk with them on their journey to find human compassion? There are many systems we can learn from. Our own communities need to be stronger for us to be able to engage with these situations but we need to do the work to get there if we ever want to see the abolition of the prison industrial complex.
This Thursday people will show up to protest the judge’s decision not to send Brandao to prison. A message needs to be there that imprisoning bashers will not make us safer but rather relies on a system that causes so much harm. I pray we can come up with something different. Lets keep talking about it and start taking some action!
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I am so incredibly thankful for the amazing work of FIERCE! in New York City. One of their incredible projects is a Cop Watch (which you can find under their campaigns on the website. You will also find the amazing video that I have posted below also on their site. Over and over again we leave our queer/trans histories behind in favor of assimilating into dominant power structures. White dykes and faggots tear and climb to the top forgetting (or more honestly intentionally harming) queer/trans people of color and poor folks. Gentrification and community destruction are so often on the gay agenda that the realities of police brutality, economic apartheid, and white supremacy are brushed to the side as non-issues. As pride season approaches don’t drop your money in the buckets for pride committees or the HRC send that money to organizations like FIERCE! and remember that a fight for queer liberation is also a fight against the violence of police.
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I watched this short film some time ago. Jean Genet was a dedicated prison abolitionist, white anti-racist in solidarity with Black revolutionary movements in the U.S. and globally, and a queer liberationist. This film depicts homoerotic love between two prisoners. I would absolutely not describe this film as prison porn but rather a depiction of prisoners resisting the control of the walls by falling in love or at least building erotic power in resistance to the system of domination they are held in. I’d love to hear what other folks think about this. For me, Genet’s personal experience as a prisoner and acting in solidarity with those incarcerated, shapes my respect for the film. Enjoy, and share some feedback.
Read a detailed and helpful review here.
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On Tuesday, June 9th, at 7:00pm the Community Church of Boston (565 Boylston Street - Copley Square) is hosting a screening of Cruel and Unusual. This film follows the lives of transgender people incarcerated in the United States prison/jail system. This film looks at the realities of sexual violence, systemic abuse, and violent trans-phobia. There are 2.4 million people incarcerated in the U.S. Please use this day during Pride Week to educate yourself about part of the queer/trans community so often hidden from view.
After the screening we will discuss ways individuals and communities can plug in to work being done on a local level to support trans and queer people behind bars in Massachusetts.
All are welcome, the screening is free!
This event is co-sponsored by the Mass. Transgender Political Coalition, Mass. Transgender Legal Advocates, TransCEND, BAGLY, the Network/La Red, and Healing Our Land.
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Firstly, many thanks to Lois Ahern for maintaining the blog at therealcostofprisons.org. The below article details the growing disparities and incarceration of people of color in Iowa, specifically Black people. This is a state that liberal gay and lesbian organizations have been celebrating for the victory of "same-sex" marriage. Will these same organizations take time to actually advocate for those queers who are marginalized by this same states incarceration system? History will say no. Challenges must continue to be brought to these mainstream G/L organizations so that they will learn what it means to be accountable to a movement of queer/trans people who are affected by the far reaches of the prison industrial complex.
Black prison population in Iowa could grow
By MIKE GLOVER | Associated Press Writer
May 14, 2009
Chicago Tribune
DES MOINES, Iowa - Blacks continue to be incarcerated in Iowa prisons
at a number far out of proporation to their overall population in the
state, and that disparity is expected to grow over the next 10 years,
state prison officials were told Wednesday.
The state began to study the racial breakdown of prison inmates
under former Gov. Tom Vilsack, and that initial study found that 24
percent of the state’s prison beds are occupied by blacks who make up
roughly 2 percent of the population.
The Iowa Board of Corrections was told that those numbers remain unchanged as of last year but are expected to grow.
"The projections are that the percent of African-Americans in prison
will slightly increase over the next 10 years," said Lettie Prell,
research director for the Iowa Department of Corrections. She said
tougher penalties for crimes like robbery will likely lead to the
increase.
Prell also said there is a disparity in sentencing practices when sentences are measured by race.
She said 48.3 percent of blacks convicted of serious drug charges
receive prison time, compared to 36.5 percent of whites. That same
disparity is seen throughout the range of felony drug cases.
Looking at the correctional population as a whole, just over 20
percent of whites in the corrections system are in prison or confined
in community facilities, while nearly 40 percent of blacks in the
corrections system are in prison or confined in community facilities.
"On the whole, incarceration rates for African-Americans is higher than for whites for the various types of crimes," Prell said.
Prell said studies have shown a broad array of social and economic forces account for the disparity in prison population.
"They go way beyond the scope of corrections itself," she said.
Prell said corrections officials have launched pilot projects in
Waterloo and Des Moines that begin before an inmate is released and are
designed to closely supervise inmates and offer a variety of counseling
programs. Early results are encouraging, though a tight state budget
has reduced available funding for those efforts, she said.
"We’re doing what we can to grow those initiatives," Prell said.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-ap-ia-blacks-prisons,0,4971654.story
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A while ago there was hype about a new movie coming out starring Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor, the gay prison movie. While I can give a pretty good guess and assumption that like most other prison movies it will be incredibly racist I will also guess, from the previews, that it will also be significantly homophobic as well. THAT SAID… it is always exciting to have movies where a prisoner escapes from prison numerous times! When I think about some of the things our abolitionist movement needs, queers breaking out of prison walls is definitely one of them, even if they do look like Jim Carrey. You can read an article from the Advocate here.
It appears as though the movie will not be released in theaters in the U.S. Studios are saying that U.S. audiences are not "ready" for gay themed prison movies. I would like to see this movie so I could share a greater critique with you. I do know that I am tired of movies about prison making jokes about prison rape (like Lets Go to Prison) or shows that continue to star primarily white people with no analysis of the white supremacist system that is the prison industrial complex (like prison break). I will give a guess that this movie will perpetuates the same problems. Tragically the media has no intention of highlighting the realities of the real heteropatriarchy and white supremacy inherent in the prison system. It is our responsibility to highlight these realities ourselves.
With that, here’s the preview for I Love You Phillip Morris…
Posted under prison aboliton, queerness
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I am excited that people are talking about the impacts of gender identity and sexual orientation in prison. I must say I am ALWAYS concerned about prison "officials" having power about deciding housing based on one’s gender identity or sexual orientation. I become concerned because I fear that the prison/jail can use these "housing decisions" as an opportunity to house all the queers and queens together and use that as an outlet for guard violence (as was the case in Columbus, Georgia) and I also am concerned that it continues on the assumption that all queer and trans people are safe among each other as if there is not violence within our own differing communities. The prison industrial complex itself is the violence, housing changes are not the solution. With all that said, I pray this bill provides an opportunity for queer and trans prisoners to have a safer experience locked behind the bars as we work to tear the walls down. Also, this article sucks, is wildly transphobic/trans-ignorant and the author’s choice of quotes are wildly offensive at moments.
- Associated Press Writer
SACRAMENTO — The state Assembly will
consider a bill as early as Thursday that would require state prison
officials to take inmates’ sexual preference and gender identity into
account when they make housing decisions.
The bill by Assemblyman
Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, is supported by gay rights groups that
cite studies showing that homosexual, bisexual or transgender inmates
are more vulnerable to abuse. It has cleared two committees with little
opposition.
Currently, state law requires officials to consider
factors such as age, criminal history and mental health in deciding
where to house inmates. The department’s policy is to classify inmates
based on their physical gender, regardless of how they identify themselves.
Just one inmate who was born a male is housed in a California women’s
prison because she is the only inmate known to have undergone a sex
change operation, said Terry Thornton, a spokeswoman for the California
Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. California does not pay
for inmates’ sex change operations, but Thornton said the inmate was
altered while serving a previous sentence in Texas.
At
least one other male transgender inmate has requested a transfer to a
women’s prison, but cannot be moved there under current prison
policies, Thornton said.
A study released this week by the
University of California, Irvine says transgender inmates,
predominantly men who dress and act like women, are particularly likely
to be assaulted.
It found 332 male transgender inmates within the
state prison system, just a fraction of its 170,000 inmates.
Researchers interviewed nearly all of them to determine whether they
had been harassed or assaulted and to get their housing preferences.
Nearly
60 percent reported being sexually assaulted by other inmates, a rate
13 times higher than for a random sample of the general inmate
population. Nearly 70 percent reported being the victim of sexual
misconduct, which was more broadly defined than assault.
Even so,
nearly 60 percent of male inmates who presented themselves as women
opposed being housed in women’s prisons. Many told researchers they
wanted to avoid the "bickering" and "drama" they believed characterized
women in prison.
"They like to be around men," said criminologist
Valerie Jenness, the study’s author. "These are overwhelmingly
heterosexual women who like to be around men and have relationships
with men."
Quintin Mecke, a spokesman for Ammiano, said the UC
Irvine study illustrates the complexity of sexual orientation and
gender issues. Corrections officials should at least be required to
consider that complexity when deciding where to house inmates, he said.
"Right now, it’s not even in the mix," Mecke said.
The
researchers found transgender inmates were more likely to be assaulted
by an inmate of another race and by someone they knew, the study found.
Those inmates also were less likely to get medical attention or
recognition from guards than were other inmates who suffered assault.
Thornton,
the prison spokeswoman, said many transgender inmates are housed in
"special needs" units for their safety even though they often don’t
want to be singled out.
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The following is a statement released by the Sylvia Rivera Law Project, FIERCE, Queers for Economic Justice, Peter Cicchino Youth Project, and Audre Lorde Project. Unfortunately there has not been an effort in Massachusetts to offer the same critique of the Hate Crimes legislation currently being advocated for by the Mass Transgender Political Coalition. We must not turn to the tools of the prison industrial complex in order to secure "rights" or "recognition" by the state. Radical transformation and justice are needed not assimilation into structures of domination and oppression.
Dear members of the GENDA coalition and all allies in the struggle for trans liberation:
We write to you today because we are deeply concerned with the
version of the Gender Employment Non-Discrimination Act (GENDA) that
was recently introduced in the New York State Assembly. We are members
of transgender and gender non-conforming communities of color, allies
to these communities, and representatives of organizations that work to
advocate for and increase the political voice of these communities. As
written, the GENDA bill adds gender identity and gender expression to
the protected categories of NY anti-discrimination law by adding it to
the State Human Rights statute.
We are excited and heartened by progress on this front, as many of us
have struggled to end discrimination against trans people for years.
Unfortunately, the GENDA bill also includes gender identity and gender
expression as a “protected†category under the NY hate crimes statute.
We want and deserve legal protection from discrimination in the
workplace, in housing, and in public accommodations.
Transgender people in New York are frequently fired from jobs;
kicked out of housing, restaurants, restrooms and hotels; and harassed
in schools and public institutions. It is essential that we have legal
recourse to take action when trans people are discriminated against in
this way. It is also essential that this form of discrimination is
publicly declared unacceptable—in our state, in our society, and across
the world.
It pains us that we nevertheless cannot support the current
GENDA bill, because we cannot and will not support hate crimes
legislation. Rather than serving as protection for oppressed people,
the hate crimes portion of this law may expose our communities to more
danger—from prejudiced institutions far more powerful and pervasive
than individual bigots. In New York, the hate crimes portion of the
penal code adds automatic penalty enhancements to certain crimes that
are deemed to be hate crimes: crimes based on a person’s race, color,
national origin, ancestry, religion, religious practice, age,
disability, or sexual orientation.
If a particular crime is deemed a hate crime by the state, the
supposed perpetrator is automatically subject to a higher mandatory
minimum sentence. For example, a crime that would carry a sentence of
five years can be “enhanced†to eight years. As GENDA is currently
written, if passed it would further expand this law, providing
additional grounds for penalty enhancement.
As a nation, we lock up more people per capita than any other
country in the world; one in one hundred adults are behind bars in the
U.S. Our penalties are harsher and sentences longer than they are
anywhere else on the planet, and hate crime laws with sentencing
enhancements make them harsher and longer. By supporting longer periods
of incarceration and putting a more threatening weapon in the state’s
hands, this kind of legislation places an enormous amount of faith in
our deeply flawed, transphobic, and racist criminal legal system. The
application of this increased power and extended punishment is entirely
at to the discretion of a system riddled with prejudice, institutional
bias, economic motives, and corruption.
Trans people, people of color, and other marginalized groups are
disproportionately incarcerated to an overwhelming degree. Trans and
gender non-conforming people, particularly trans women of color, are
regularly profiled and falsely arrested for doing nothing more than
walking down the street. Almost 95% of the people locked up on Riker’s
Island are black or Latin@. Many of us have been arrested ourselves or
seen our friends, members, clients, colleagues, and lovers arrested,
often when they themselves were the victims of a violent attack.
Once arrested, the degree of violence, abuse, humiliation, rape,
and denial of needed medical care that our communities confront behind
bars is truly shocking, and at times fatal. In popular conception,
hate crime laws were enacted to protect oppressed minorities against
bigots who would seek to terrorize a community through violent crime:
racist lynchings, gay-bashing, anti-Semitic violence, and so forth.
Unfortunately, the popular imagining of the operation of hate crime
laws does not bear out in reality. Hate crime laws do not distinguish
between oppressed groups and groups with social and institutional power.
Compared to white men, Black men are disproportionately
arrested for race-based hate crimes. The second-largest category of
race-based hate crimes tracked by the FBI is crimes committed against
white people. Every year, the FBI reports a number of so-called
“anti-heterosexual†hate crimes—incidents where members of the LGBT
community have been prosecuted for supposedly targeting straight people
with criminal acts.
If GENDA is passed with the hate crime component intact, trans
people could be subject to “enhanced penalties†for crimes against
non-trans people. The possibility of hate crime charges could arise in
any dispute that involves gender identity or expression. In the case
of the “New Jersey 4,†a group of young queer women of color were
incarcerated for defending themselves against the homophobic attacks
and slurs of a straight man, who accused them of committing a “hate
crime†against him. It is all too easy for a prejudice-motivated attack
to become a fight for survival, and for a fight to be turned against
oppressed communities.
There might be some cold comfort in “enhanced sentencing†if it
actually benefited our communities in any way. Unfortunately, the
harsher penalties of hate crime laws have not been shown to prevent or
deter hate crimes. It is hard to imagine that someone moved to brutally
attack a trans person would pause to consider that they might get a
longer sentence. In fact, there is some evidence that longer sentences
actually increase the chance that an incarcerated person will repeat a
crime after they are released. Incarceration does nothing to address
the root reasons why someone was violent or hateful; it only plunges
them into deeper poverty, further isolates them from their community,
and subjects them to further violence and trauma.
In many cases, incarceration may worsen prejudices and make
people more likely to be alienated and violent when they are released.
Worst of all, when our society incarcerates someone who truly hates
trans people, we provide them more opportunities to commit anti-trans
hate crimes while incarcerated. Our many transgender community members
in prison face intimidation, harassment, and violence on a daily basis.
Hate crime laws are an easy way for the government to act like it is
on our communities’ side while continuing to discriminate against us.
Liberal politicians and institutions can claim “anti-oppressionâ€
legitimacy and win points with communities affected by prejudice, while
simultaneously using “sentencing enhancement†to justify building more
prisons to lock us up in. Hate crime laws foreground a single accused
individual as the “cause†of racism, homophobia, transphobia, misogyny,
or any number of other oppressive prejudices. They encourage us to lay
blame and focus our vengeful hostility on one person instead of paying
attention to institutional prejudice that fuels police violence,
encourages bureaucratic systems to ignore trans people’s needs or
actively discriminate against us, and denies our communities health
care, identification, and so much more.
Anything that expands the power of a system that damages our
communities so severely is against our long-term and short-term
interests. Any legal weapon that’s created to make our justice system
more harsh and punitive cannot be trusted in the hands of institutions
that have shown their prejudices and corruption time and time again.
Because of the way this legislation has been turned against the
communities they were intended to protect, we regard “sentence
enhancement†hate crime laws as one of the greatest follies of
late-20th-century liberal politics.
Some of us have expressed this concern to (other) members of the
GENDA Coalition after we became aware of the hate crime aspect of the
proposed bill. We know that this coalition of many organizations and
hard-working community members has been working for years to make
anti-discrimination law a reality in our state and we respect their
dedication to this work. We were happy that some of us had an
opportunity recently to engage in dialogue about the hate crimes
provisions of GENDA with them. We left the conversation with the shared
knowledge that the United States criminal legal system is deeply
flawed, that it would be entirely possible to leave out the hate crimes
portion of the GENDA bill when it was re-introduced this session, and
that making such a change could mean that it would take more time to
get the bill passed because of the need to educate our elected
officials about these issues.
We are deeply disappointed that, with this knowledge, the
majority of the GENDA Coalition decided that they would rather “come
back to hate crimes legislation later†and still actively work to pass
a version of the bill that would expand hate crime laws now. Trans
communities know all too well what it’s like to be told “we’ll come
back later to protect you.†One argument made in our conversation was
that because so many other groups are covered by the New York hate
crimes statute, trans people should not be “the sacrificial lamb.â€
Unfortunately, because “sentence enhancements†actually make
communities more vulnerable to prejudice in the criminal legal system,
it is the many other “protected classes†that have already been
sacrificed on the altar of hate crimes.
The real victims who are liable to be thrown to the wolves in
this case are the most marginalized members of trans and gender
non-conforming communities: poor people, people without jobs or
housing, people who resort to survival crimes in order to get by or
access health care, people with substance abuse problems, sex workers,
youth, people with disabilities, and so many more who are
disproportionately targeted for violence, harassment, prejudice in the
courts, and incarceration. These are the same people our community must
mourn every year at the Trans Day of Remembrance. Can we really
continue to shed tears and flowers for the dead if we eagerly hand the
state more power to crush the same people?
The signatories to this letter cannot and will not support this
version of the bill. We can not help pass a bill through the state
legislature that could further endanger our communities. We hope and
plead for a better GENDA bill that will make the hard-fought dream of
anti-discrimination law a reality for all trans and gender
non-conforming people in New York state, without sacrificing the most
endangered members of our community. We also commit and ask others to
join us in our commitment to work on real ways to address hate violence.
When thinking about responding to hate violence, we believe the most
important question is not “who is the perpetrator and how can we punish
them?†Rather, we want to ask “how can we help the survivor(s) and the
community heal from this violence? How can we prevent it from happening
again?†Many people and organizations in New York and around the world
are doing creative, transformative work to find real solutions to these
questions. Some organize communities to intervene in violence without
relying on law enforcement.
Some develop alternate ways to resolve conflicts. Some help
break down prejudice and fear with public education and training. Some
help make sure that our communities have access to basic necessities in
life and are not forced to be in situations where they are particularly
vulnerable to violence. Some fight to hold the state accountable for
violence it perpetrates against our communities. Some educate
community members about ways to defend themselves and deescalate
confrontations. Some provide services, advocacy, and support for
survivors of violence.
These are just a few of the strategies that we have used and
seen others use locally to develop the approaches to hate violence that
we and our loved ones need and deserve.Please join with us in working
to make New York State a safer and more just place for trans and gender
non-conforming people. Please join us in supporting an improved version
of GENDA that will provide much-needed legal protections against
discrimination without endangering our communities and strengthening
the prejudiced system of criminal punishment.
Sincerely,
Sylvia Rivera Law Project
FIERCE
Queers for Economic Justice
Peter Cicchino Youth Project
Audre Lorde Project
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I am asking you to please take action in solidarity with Renata Hill,
one of the New Jersey 4.
In faithful struggle,
Jason
Who are the NJ 4???
On June 14, four African-American women—Venice Brown (19), Terrain
Dandridge (20), Patreese Johnson (20) and Renata Hill (24)—received
sentences ranging from three-and-a-half to 11 years in prison. None of
them had previous criminal records. Two of them are parents of small
children.
Their crime? Defending themselves from a physical attack by a man who
held them down and choked them, ripped hair from their scalps, spat on
them, and threatened to sexually assault them—all because they are
lesbians.
The mere fact that any victim of a bigoted attack would be arrested,
jailed and then convicted for self-defense is an outrage. But the
length of prison time given further demonstrates the highly political
nature of this case and just how racist, misogynistic, anti-gay,
anti-youth and anti-worker the so-called U.S. justice system truly is.
Read more - http://www.facebook.com/group.
PLEASE TAKE THE FOLLOWING ACTION, THIS IS ESSENTIAL!
You are needed to help stop the re-prosecution of Renata Hill, of the NJ4
( 9 days to stop the prosecution)
Friends and Allies,
We hope this is a call to action finds you well and with a few moments
to respond immediately. Enclosed is a sample letter addressed to
Robert M. Morgenthau, the District Attorney of New York County, in
which we state our goals of ending the prosecution of Renata Hill.
Please send your letter immediately.
On Ocober 14th, Renata Hill, one of the New Jersey 7, is scheduled to
face her retrial. We are in support of her desire to not have to go
back to trial, and demand that the charges against her cease.
Please send this letter, or one similar in your own words, to the
address listed. After sending in the letter, please let us know so
that we can tally how many letters have been sent. (freenj4@yahoo.com)
Forward widely. We will be in touch to follow up with where we are in
pressuring the DA or the possible need to escalate pressure.
For Our Defense,
Bay Solidarity
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
SAMPLE LETTER:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
[Your Name]
[Your address]
Robert M.
Morgenthau
District Attorney
New York County
1 Hogan Place
New York, NY 10013
[Date]
Re: People vs.
Renata Hill
Dear Mr.
Morgenthau:
I am writing concerning the case of Renata Hill, who is currently
awaiting a retrial on charges stemming from an incident in August
2006. Her conviction for Gang Assault was recently overturned on
appeal.
I want to encourage you to stop further prosecution in this case, and
to release Ms. Hill so that she may get on with her life. Ms. Hill has
already served two years on charges resulting from a street
altercation that she did not initiate. While she was incarcerated, she
was separated from her young son. She also suffered the death of her
mother, whose memorial she was unable to attend. Since their
convictions on Gang Assault charges, the felony convictions against
both Ms. Hill and one of her co-defendants were overturned by the
appellate courts. The two other defendants are currently awaiting
their appeal hearings.
Notably, the complainant in this matter has commenced a multi million
dollar lawsuit and runs a website, Dwayne Buckle Foundation for
Justice, seeking donations to his cause based on virulent anti-gay and
lesbian attacks.
I believe that further prosecution and incarceration of Ms. Hill would
be unjust. She has been punished enough for her role in the event –
both by actual imprisonment, and in the impact that imprisonment has
had upon her life. I appreciate any assistance you can provide in
preventing any further injustice.
Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
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