A brief, moving excerpt from the recent award ceremony at the New York Public Library announcing the inaugural winner of the Inside Literary Prize, the first major U.S. book award to be judged exclusively by people who are incarcerated.
Hear from Freedom Reads founder and CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts, and from this year’s winner…
"How can we best serve those who have served us and are coming through our court system?" That question was at the center of the two-day Veterans Treatment Court Summit our Recovery and Reform team hosted at the National Veterans Resource Center in Syracuse, New York. The summit brought together more than 100 practitioners from across the country—including judges, attorneys, mentors, and more—to connect, collaborate, and learn from each other's experiences bringing support to veterans in the criminal justice system.
Watch as Basaime Spate and Javonte Alexander, co-directors of the cutting-edge new Street Action Network, take part in a candid discussion with New York City Public Advocate Jumaane D. Williams about their experiences growing up as Black men in New York City, why they care so deeply about ending gun violence, and how government and communities can work together to improve the health and safety of all New Yorkers.
This video introduces Street Action Network! Co-Directors Basaime Spate and Javonte Alexander share their cutting-edge approach to address gun violence in the communities that face the highest rates of gun violence. Led by a team with lived experience and high social capital in the streets, Street Action Network will build on the research approach from a groundbreaking gun violence report released in 2023 to combine rigorous research, community action, and policy change to engage and support people who are involved in gangs and street economy.
Despite the obvious need, most mental health interventions for court-involved people are brief and conducted inside the counter-therapeutic confines of the criminal legal system. The challenge for practitioners is making those encounters meaningful. Little research speaks to this reality. Our publication presents the highlights of a national convening we hosted to begin to fill the gap.
What would it mean to decriminalize mental health—to stop criminalizing the symptoms of what is very often untreated mental illness? And what would it mean to put racial justice at the center of that effort? The outcomes of the criminal legal system being what they are, those two questions are really one. Hear a lively discussion on our New Thinking podcast.
How can we better respond to the trauma running through our criminal legal system? Part of the Trauma-Informed Practice Strategy Lab, this guide presents lessons from a national scan of criminal courts working to better support people with histories of trauma and will inform an upcoming blueprint for making trauma-informed approaches in court work on the ground.
Infants and toddlers are overrepresented in the child welfare system and are more likely than older children to be removed from their original caregiver and placed in out-of-home care. According to this new evaluation, implementation of our Strong Starts Court Initiative in a New York City courtroom led to a decrease in removals from their original caregiver and was associated with an increase in children residing with that caregiver a year later.
Housing justice is a through line in the Center for Justice Innovation’s efforts to build safety and racial justice. In our new video, you’ll meet tenants, Center staff, and partners from the community and government working to prevent evictions, respond to tenant needs, and support access to safe, stable, and affordable housing.
The Center for Justice Innovation and RxStat convened together stakeholders in the criminal justice, court, and public health systems to discuss the treatment of drug use and prevention of fatal overdoses in the context of the criminal justice system, as well as the integration of harm reduction principles. This document, which maps many of the court-based problem substance use interventions currently utilized across New York City, came out of this forum of experts.
