Newsletter

Even though the United Nations considers more than 15 days of solitary confinement a form of torture, American prisons still use the practice liberally. Prolonged isolation makes imprisoned people more violent and less likely to reintegrate into society.

For people trapped in prison for decades, simple things like book clubs can be a lifeline and help people cope with the realities of the prison system. Sing Sing Correctional Facility’s club has helped give me and others a sense of purpose and belonging.

Los Angeles Sheriff Robert Luna said that, as of Oct. 18, deputies can no longer join internal gangs. But after stonewalling and hiding footage from my family for more than a year, I don’t believe Luna’s words mean much.

Violence interrupters work. But D.C.’s police union is trying to capitalize on a scandal to eliminate them.

Author Jessica Pishko’s new book argues that American sheriffs’ initial jobs were to help commit genocide against Native Americans and help settlers steal land. She warns their danger persists to this day.

Five women in Mississippi have been incarcerated longer than any others in the state. Each has been denied parole a multitude of times. Here, one of the women shares their stories.

The term short staffing is a euphemism to divert attention from the state’s continued addiction to incarceration.

Aging in prison meant realizing my son was also a victim of my crime due to my absence from his life. I try to do what I can on visits to help my son succeed.

Although my artistic pursuits began with material necessity, they have become a way for me to express myself and find inner peace within the oppressive environment in which I am confined.

“I was sentenced and put in prison for the choices I made. I was not sentenced to being raped and abused while in prison.” 

The city of Chicago is cutting ties with the gunshot detection firm ShotSpotter. But the product’s parent company—and competitors—now offer so many interlocking services that it’s nearly impossible for departments to cut the cord.

In June, I stepped into a body scanner outside the visitation room at the Washington Corrections Center and held my breath.

I’m incarcerated in a women’s prison. So-called “true crime” shows prey on us, alter our stories, and take advantage of our trauma. I would know—I’ve been the subject of at least three docudramas.

In 2011, more than 6,600 people imprisoned in California stopped eating for 19 days to protest extreme isolation inside the state’s prisons. The protests lead to state hearings and a lawsuit.

In prison, there is no space to grieve. I kept thinking that if only I was home, I could have given her the support she needed.

Six people on North Carolina’s death row have been found innocent since I’ve been here.

“I was different than the 22-year-old who had made that devastating decision, but I couldn’t say when that shift had begun.”

My checks came out to $300-400 weekly for about 70 hours of labor.

A new book uses parole to chronicle how the criminal legal system prioritizes punishment over actually rehabilitating people or making society safer.

George Floyd’s ancestors were born into slavery. Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa powerfully document Floyd’s life and lineage.

Studies show “negative public perceptions” of police contribute to low recruitment. Stripping away police oversight will only lead to more bad press for cops.

I experienced my first childbirth while I was incarcerated in a county jail.

I had to return to jail before a resentencing hearing. It meant taking a trip back through hell.

Death row prisoners rarely get last meals, writes Lyle May, who is on death row in North Carolina. But on the night of an execution, the prison staff break room is full of cookies and cake.

Incarcerated people have testified before state lawmakers about legislation that would directly impact their lives, including bills to change the cost of prison communications and rein in extreme sentencing practices and the use of solitary confinement.

A report by the Vera Institute of Justice and Black & Pink highlights the many ways in which state prisons mistreat transgender people—nearly 90 percent of respondents said they’d been placed in solitary at some point.

Free prison tablet programs rely on predatory contracts with juggernauts of prison industry, Aventiv and Global Tel Link.

A former youth social worker reckons with her involvement in an institution that often does irreparable harm to the children it is supposed to help.

A recent report by the New Jersey Comptroller’s office found that a company called Street Cop trained police to shoot indiscriminately at people, medically experiment on the injured, and treat virtually anyone who isn’t a white, straight, cisgender male with open disdain. More training like this won’t make America safer.

I realized that I had fallen victim to one of white supremacy’s greatest weapons: the war on imagination.

The Thirteenth Amendment bans all “badges and incidents” of slavery. But the use of police dogs enacts cruelty on both people of color and the dogs themselves. To fully rid society of slavery, the dogs must be retired.

On Jan. 19, New York City Mayor Eric Adams vetoed a bill that would have effectively banned solitary confinement in his city’s jails. Incarcerated writer Chris Blackwell and CUNY Law Professor Deborah Zalesne share why the practice is so horrific.

Late last year, the U.S. Department of Justice warned the state of Tennessee that its “aggravated prostitution” statute—which makes it a felony to engage in sex work while HIV positive—violates the Americans with Disabilities Act. Activists hope the measure shows how the government can use the ADA to fight ableism around the nation.

The Appeal spoke with Robert Saleem Holbrook about the long-standing solidarity among liberation movements for Black Americans and Palestine.

A study found that in states requiring permits to purchase firearms, fatal and nonfatal police shootings were 28 percent lower.

In this excerpt formerly incarcerated writer James Kilgore denounces the growing use of e-carceration technologies like ankle monitors.

We cannot punish our way out of gun violence. Instead, we must invest in dismantling the structures that allow this violence to thrive.

More than 70 million people in the U.S. have criminal convictions on their records. An expert talks with The Appeal about how they can break barriers.

Gavin Newsom’s “California Model” of prison reform isn’t the step away from mass incarceration that it purports to be.