Ceci Bordayo has many notable accomplishments in her life. She’s written and recorded “House of Secrets,” a song about her family’s secrets surrounding physical and sexual abuse, which has helped countless people come to terms with their own trauma. Her painful childhood experiences also became the genesis for “Pass the Mic,” a storytelling platform she [...]
The year 2020 was a watershed for many people, including Safe & Just Michigan’s new intern Sonnet Yancey, who uses she/they pronouns. Yancey, who is finishing a bachelor’s degree in social work at Michigan State University, came to understand the depth of need for change during the tumultuous summer of 2020, as voices called for [...]
Second Look leads to second chances My name is John Halcomb. I am 60 years old. I regret my violent behavior every day as I am reminded through the violence I see in my prison environment. This prison violence, however, began my rehabilitation when it caused me to empathically place myself in my victim's place. [...]
Inside Voices is an opportunity for our members who are incarcerated to voice their ideas and opinions to the outside world. Since they can't access our monthly electronic newsletter, Safe & Just Michigan prints a newsletter several times a year that is mailed to our members who are in prison. We have invited those readers [...]
Cassie Larrieux is comfortable with data. She can talk about ratios and intervals or qualitative and quantitative information like most people can talk about what was on television last night or who won the big game. But for all that, Larrieux never loses sight of what those numbers truly show — the people whose stories [...]
One of the most rewarding things about working for criminal justice reform is getting people interested in transforming our court and prison systems and watching the momentum for change build, both in Michigan and nationwide. So, when I got a call from Sean Wilkinson, a reporter and videographer from San Francisco who is representing the [...]
We have long understood that incarceration of a parent can be traumatizing for a child — something we know from both peer-reviewed research and anecdotal evidence. Sadly, 1 in 10 children in Michigan have experienced having a parent in jail or prison, according to a 2016 study from the Annie E. Casey foundation. Children with [...]
The words Justin Counts heard from a man in a prison hospice care shook him to his core and turned him in a new direction. “You don’t belong here,” the dying man said. For a while, Justin wasn’t sure what the man meant. After all, they were both in prison, a place no one wants [...]
In his 40 years, Tamir Bell has been a motherless child, a star pupil, a drug dealer, incarcerated and a community activist. But to truly understand him, you must look beyond all those labels. “It’s a very dangerous thing to try to understand people,” says Tamir, who is now one of two development fellows at [...]
Ronnie Waters was just 17 years old when he stood before a judge for his sentencing. Waters knew what was coming, so he told his mother to stay home to spare her from hearing it. Having been found guilty of first-degree murder, he knew he would be sentenced to prison for the rest of his [...]