Marshall Project 2018 Annual Report

THE MARSHALL PROJECT 2018 Annual Report

THIS IS WH THE M PROJEC EXI 2,200,000 are behind bars in the United States.

4,700,000

are on probation or parole limiting their ability for work, housing, and to vote.

90%

of criminal defendants qualify as indigent.

5 OUT OF 6

people awaiting trial can’t post bail.

HY MARSHALL T ISTS. 80,000 are kept in solitary confinement in a 6’8’ cell for

23 HOURS.

6,000,000

are blocked from voting.

1,500,000

are in Florida alone .

The same stripes meant to protect our freedom and liberties are the same ones oppressing us.

The American criminal justice system is broken.

WE KEEP A CLOSE EYE ON BREAKING CRIMINAL JUSTICE NEWS

WHAT WE DO | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

What is The Marshall Project?

The Marshall Project is a nonpartisan, nonprofit news organization that seeks to create and sustain a sense of national urgency about the U.S. criminal justice system.

We achieve this through award-winning journalism, partnerships with other news outlets and public forums. In all of our work we strive to educate and enlarge the audience of people who care about the state of criminal justice.

Investigative reporting is at the core of what we do.

Our reporters dive into stories that other media have missed or misunderstood. We often spend months interviewing sources, digging through documents, filing Freedom of Information Act requests, and visiting jails, prisons, courtrooms, and police stations around the United States.

We keep a close eye on breaking criminal justice news, looking for opportunities to provide context or analysis. Since our launch in November 2014, we have published a steady stream of stories, including profiles, interviews, commentaries, and first-person narratives.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS 2 4 8 10 13 A BROKEN SYSTEM US Criminal Justice Facts

WHAT WE DO What is The Marshall Project?

MESSAGE From the President

Q&A with the Editor

COMMENTARY An Unwarranted Routine Stop

21 41 50 56 58 LIFE INSIDE From Solitary to the Street

REFORM Singing A European Tune

FINANCIAL Statements

RECOGNITION The Marshall Project Supporters

OUR PLANS For the Future

THE AMERICAN CRI SYSTEM IS IN CRISI

MESSAGE | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

MINAL JUSTICE S Message from the President

If you’ve opened our annual report, you probably don’t need persuading that the American criminal justice system is in crisis. The statistics tell the story. Even in the bitterly divided world of American politics, both liberals and conservatives have vowed their commitment to reform. Achieving it will require hard work: from advocates, criminal justice experts, law enforcement, the judiciary, and yes, good and skillful politicians.

It will also take great journalism.

No social problems has ever been solved without shining a light into some dark corners. That’s what The Marshall Project was born to do. In just two years, we’ve published approximately 650 criminal justice stories and worked with a diverse range of media partners.

We’ve had an amazing launch. In our first year, President Barack Obama granted us an exclusive interview. By 18 months, we’d won our first Pulitzer. We’ve prompted federal investigations, informed a Supreme Court opinion, helped improve police training, and gotten cameras installed in a prison where abuse was rampant. Along the way, we’ve told fresh and important stories and given voice to Americans who were not being heard in our national conversation.

We both come to this issue with hopeful hearts.

Neil, a former reporter and hedge fund manager, launched The Marshall Project based on his belief that the criminal justice system is a national disgrace and high-quality journalism could help elevate the issue. Carroll, once a foreign correspondent for Newsweek, spent nearly two decades at Human Rights Watch before feeling impelled to focus on America’s biggest human rights problem: criminal justice. We’re proud to work with one of the country’s preeminent journalists, our Editor-in-Chief Bill Keller, in leading The Marshall Project.

Our aim is to create and sustain a sense of urgency about criminal justice.

We hope you will find a way to help.

Carroll Bogert President

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MORE INTENSIVE R ON SOLUTIONS Q&A with the Editor Bill Keller, editor-in-chief of The Marshall Project, worked for The New York Times from 1984 to 2014 as a reporter, op-ed columnist and editor. As a correspondent, he covered the end of apartheid in South Africa and the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Leaving The New York Times after 30 years must’ve been a big adjustment… The biggest change was going from a newsroom of 1,300 journalists, with about 1.5 million paying subscribers — numbers that open doors and assure attention — to, in the beginning, some empty desks, a few generous backers, and a mission.

What’s the thing you’re proudest of so far?

The Pulitzer was a great boost, and the interview with Obama was a proud moment for a young startup, but my favorite things about this job are, first, watching our passionate and relentless team of journalists and, second, the way we have used partnerships to amplify our voice.

Q&A | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

REPORTING In a system as rife with problems as criminal justice, what’s the role media can play?

The media has too often been part of the problem, ratcheting up fear, covering crime but paying too little attention to the systems that are supposed to deal with it. At its best, the media can draw the public eye to policing strategies, sentencing practices, alternatives to incarceration, the treatment of juvenile offenders, recidivism, and many other issues that for decades were largely off the media’s radar.

How do you think The Marshall Project adds to the media landscape?

We can direct sustained attention to the failures of the system and examine possible solutions.

This gives ammunition to policymakers, advocates and others pressing for reforms.

“...it’s become a little less risky to point out that the system costs billions of dollars, alienates whole communities, and doesn’t make us safer.”

Do you think nonprofit journalism is the wave of the future?

I think it’s one wave, especially when it comes to the deep, watchdog reporting that – because it takes patience and money – is withering at all but the best for-profit news organizations. Politicians have to have well-formed ideas on our economy, schools, foreign policy, how to fight crime even – but not, until recently, criminal justice.

Why do you think it took so long for criminal justice to get the attention it deserves?

While crime rates were high, in the 1980’s and 1990’s, politicians were afraid to touch the issue.

But now we have a whole generation that has grown up with declining crime, and it’s become a little less risky to point out that the system costs billions of dollars, alienates whole communities, and doesn’t make us safer.

Where do you get your story ideas?

Most of our story ideas flow up from the reporters, who keep in touch with policymakers, practitioners, advocates and other sources. We have a large network of experts, in and out of government, who provide data and other evidence. And then we go – to the streets, to the courts, to the prisons.

What is one thing you’d like to see more of?

I’d like to see more intensive reporting on solutions. What really works in community policing, say, or in preparing the incarcerated for life after prison.

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OLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. EFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVE EALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. S NDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POL EATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTE UVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL A AWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERAT ND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFO ON. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INC HYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL D NCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIO AIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEME MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CON ACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. UN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH ONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIG OLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. EFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVE EALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. S NDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POL EATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTE UVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL A AWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERAT OLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. ENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCE ND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. ERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENC EFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. I NCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEM ISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIE IOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN P MENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEF ONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PEN AMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUS

DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SEN ENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PE LITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. PO ENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERAT AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. TED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. M ORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMM CARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEME DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILI OLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PR ENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFE NFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENA FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JU H IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITA GENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITI DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SEN ENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PE LITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. PO ENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERAT AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. TED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. M POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRA ERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. P DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCA CE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING REFORM. FAMILIES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE MENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH IN PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. R ES OF INCARCERATED PEOPLE. INDIGENT DEFENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. G PRISONS. BAIL REFORM. POLICING. DEATH PENALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY C FENSE. MASS INCARCERATION. JUVENILE JUSTICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLIT NALTY. RACIAL DISPARITY. DRUG LAWS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. IMMIGRATION. SENTENCING R STICE. GUN VIOLENCE. MONEY AND POLITICS. SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL

COMMENTARY | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

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COMMENTARY

an

UNWARRANTED routine stop

by Jonathan Perkins

BEING RANDOMLY STOPPED and questioned by the police is par for the course for black men in America. It’s an injustice so familiar that it barely registers as an injustice. That’s something I knew intellectually. Still, I was stunned when officers stopped me while walking on my law school campus back in the spring of 2011.

From that stop and my subsequent complaint came a series of events that changed my life forever. That interaction led to the ruin of my reputation as a student and it almost ended my legal career before it started. Moreover, it confirmed for me, not just how unfairly people of color are treated by police, but the tremendous risk that comes with speaking up about that mistreatment.

The law gives police officers incredible leeway when it comes to stops. Ever since Terry v. Ohio, the watershed 1968 Supreme Court case, officers have been permitted to stop and search anyone without probable cause, so long as the officer has a “reasonable suspicion” that the person is armed, or that he or she has committed, or is about to commit, a crime.

These stops are carried out at vastly higher rates within communities of color and, more often than not, don’t result in arrests. Black and brown men are disproportionately targeted.

In fact, studies confirm that black men are as much as five times more likely to be stopped and searched by police than our white counterparts.

When translated into the everyday, that figure means that black men live our lives knowing that we could be stopped by a police officer any time we’re in public. We can’t educate our way out of that injustice; we don’t get too famous or celebrated for it, and we can’t relocate or dress a certain way to escape it.

When we share our stories about these stops—which are often unnecessarily rough and disrespectful—with others, we’re often dismissed. That’s at worst. At best, we’re encouraged to file official complaints or publicize our experiences. Doing either, however, is extremely risky. My last semester in law school confirmed this dark truth.

I WAS WALKING HOME FROM A PARTY ON THE EVENING OF APRIL 1, 2011, when I was stopped by two officers from the University of Virginia Police Department. They told me that I “fit the description” of a man they were looking for. Soon, I was pushed against their car as they searched my body for weapons and went through my wallet. Humiliated, I complied with their every command.

At the end of the encounter, which turned up nothing, the officers mocked me when I asked for their names and badge numbers. They refused to give me either but followed closely behind me in their patrol car as I hurried home.

I was fuming in the days that followed and, when I told my friends what happened, most encouraged me to file an official complaint with the police department. I was still a bit shaken up and apprehensive about interacting with police officers again so soon. Plus, I didn’t think a formal complaint would be taken seriously. But at the urging of one of my professors, I decided to write an article in the campus paper to explain to my fellow law school students what happened to me and its implications. The piece was published as a letter to the editor in the Law Weekly, the University of Virginia Law School’s newspaper. The public outcry was swift and powerful with the larger Charlottesville community in disbelief that such a terrible thing could happen at UVA. They demanded the two officers be identified and disciplined.

Within hours, the police department assured the campus community that it would lead an internal investigation and justice would be served. Outrage grew with multiple newspapers, off and on campus, covering the story. To be sure, I felt vindicated. I had successfully shared my story with the public and alerted the police department to the behavior of its officers, I thought. Even more, I was relieved that I had been able to speak the truth about the abuse of power without recrimination. For a moment, I even considered that my fears regarding retaliation had been unfounded. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

COMMENTARY | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

ON MAY 5, 2011, I was studying with a classmate when I received a call on my cell phone from an FBI special agent who said he was waiting for me at my car and needed to speak to me privately. I met the agent at the doors of the law school a little while later and I was surprised to see that he was accompanied by two lieutenants from the University of Virginia Police Department. The four of us went to a small interview room in the dean of students’ office.

What proceeded was an exchange that lasted more than two hours and felt more like an interrogation than a conversation.

I expressed surprise that the FBI had become involved. The agent responded that he had been sent by the head of the FBI’s Richmond Division and that the bureau planned to open a civil rights investigation.

But instead of asking me to recount my story as one might expect, the agent laid out a set of consequences if I continued to press my complaint.

He said that a swarm of FBI agents would descend upon Charlottesville to question my friends, family, and classmates. He said that agents would visit the office of the Philadelphia law firm where I had a post-graduation job lined up. He explained in no uncertain terms that these consequences and others were inevitable so long as I maintained my allegations.

It’s only in retrospect that I began to suspect the agent was brought in by the police department to apply pressure in order to obtain a public, police-friendly resolution to what had become a high-profile self-investigation. At the time, I was just scared. So I yielded and agreed to sign a statement, dictated by the agent, that recanted the facts set forth in my letter to the editor. Doing so has been my life’s chief regret.

The morning following the interrogation, the university issued a press release announcing my recantation. It made no mention of the FBI. Still, the recantation was widely covered in the media, causing the campus community’s outrage to mushroom and shift from the police department to me.

Countless editorials branded me a liar, a race-baiter, the Boy Who Cried Wolf, and a prime example of the problem with affirmative action. I lost the law firm job I had secured. My reputation within the legal community was tarnished before I had even received my JD. Indeed, the event continues to cast a shadow over my entire life, both personal and professional.

I was eventually brought up on honor code charges by UVA’s Honor Committee due to public perception that I had fabricated my story about the police stop. Being found guilty would mean removal from the university.

That July, an honor jury heard a full day of corroborative testimony from classmates, professors, and others who were involved in the ordeal. The jury also heard from the two lieutenants who insisted their internal investigation was above board. They even claimed to possess surveillance footage that definitively proved I was never stopped by police. (Of course, they never produced any such video footage.)

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Protesters advocating for citizen control of police

COMMENTARY | THE MARSHALL PROJECT After hearing all of the facts, including detail of the FBI’s secret involvement, the Honor Committee acquitted me, permitting me to remain at the university. In the following months, the law school’s academic affairs committee conducted a second, independent investigation. It examined all of the relevant facts and conferred my law degree.

I stayed silent through it all out of fear of making matters worse and have maintained that silence until now. The University of Virginia Police Department and FBI have also been relatively quiet in the years since. I suspect that’s more out of cautiousness than fear.

The police department refused to release any case files in response to a Freedom of Information Act request I made in 2014 and has never publicly acknowledged the role of an FBI agent in its investigation. Likewise, an FOIA request I made to the FBI in August failed to return any record of official FBI involvement in my case, further suggesting the agent’s involvement was unofficial.

All of this happened to me because I supposedly fit a description, was hassled by the police and shared my experience.

My story is unusual in that I was a law student at a top university, and I made a public complaint that snowballed into a local controversy. It began, however, with a tragically ordinary event: the routine stop of a black man by the police. And despite the unique spectacle that my case became, I was presented with a dilemma that countless others face – I was forced to decide between ignoring what I believed was an injustice and speaking up regardless of the consequences. That’s a choice that no one should have to make.

Individuals on the receiving end of questionable stops should feel comfortable to file and publicize their complaints against the police. Creating that comfort will require, in part, a new approach to handling complaints. Neutral third-party investigators, improved policies within police departments and the involvement of civilian review boards are all things that may help.

Citizen complaints are, after all, the first building

block of accountability.

If police departments are allowed to continue as they have, however–investigating themselves and intimidating complainants–I’m certain that humiliating and demoralizing encounters like mine, not to mention interactions with far graver consequences, will continue, under-reported and unaddressed. That spells disaster for our nation’s criminal justice system.

Citizen complaints are, after all, the first building block of accountability. And if we can’t clear the low bar of making it safe for citizens to file complaints, we don’t stand a chance of making the rest of the system to work.

Johnathan Perkins serves as an attorney at the Office of the General Counsel at Harvard University. After earning his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law, Perkins practiced at a Philadelphia law firm where he advised colleges and universities on a wide range of matters including compliance, investigations, employment, and student affairs.

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LIFE INSIDE

from

SOLITARY to the

STREET

By Christie Thompson

BY THE TIME HE HAD SERVED FIVE YEARS for armed robbery, Mark had lost 80 pounds. He had developed a new tic – tightly closing his eyes, as if blinking back bad thoughts. But the biggest change, his mother said, was in his face. It had hardened. A deep crease ran along the bridge of his nose.

When Mark, who had just turned 21, walked out of a maximum-security prison in Huntsville, Texas, last July, he had spent the last two-and-a-half-years in solitary confinement.

Prison officials sent him to segregation when he was 18 for allegedly threatening to run away.

Mark with his mother, Garcia, in 2009

LIFE INSIDE | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

FOR ROUGHLY 30 MONTHS, he was locked in a 60-squarefoot steel-and-concrete cell for 23 hours a day with little human contact, except a guard’s gloved hand passing food through a slot in the door. When his mother, Sara Garcia, drove six hours from Austin to visit him, she was separated from her son by plexiglass. (Mark and his family spoke on the condition that he be identified by his first name only, for fear that he could face retribution from guards.)

Mark was not approved for parole while in segregation. As in many states, parole boards in Texas consider inmates’ disciplinary histories when deciding whether to release them early.

Instead, he “maxed out” and served his full five-year sentence (the first half in a juvenile detention facility), which meant he had no parole officer supervising his return to society. On the bright July morning he was sent home, prison guards removed Mark’s shackles, handed him a check, and let him go.

Like many released straight from solitary, he would soon be back.

Every year, prisons across the country send thousands of people directly from solitary confinement back into their communities. An investigation by The Marshall Project and NPR found that 24 states released more than 10,000 people from solitary last year. The actual total is higher, as 26 states and the federal Bureau of Prisons could not say how often it happens.

These individuals go from complete isolation one day to complete freedom the next, yet they are in many ways the least equipped to make the transition home. Inside prison, those in solitary – many of whom suffer from mental illnesses that were either triggered or exacerbated in segregation – often cannot participate in the classes or services offered to other inmates approaching their release date. And in several states once those inmates in solitary are freed, they are more likely to be released without the help of a probation or parole officer. Those who make the jarring leap from solitary to the streets can easily end up jobless, homeless – or back in prison.

Or worse. Last week, 22-year-old Kalief Browder committed suicide two years after coming home from New York City’s Rikers Island jail, where he had spent nearly all of the previous 17 months in isolation. Browder received national attention after a 2014 New Yorker profile detailed the horrific three years he languished in jail awaiting trial for charges that were ultimately dismissed. His family said Browder deteriorated during his time in solitary, where he twice tried to kill himself.

He remained there until the day he was sent home.

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In Mark’s home state of Texas, 1,174 prisoners were freed straight out of administrative segregation – prison jargon for solitary units housing suspected gang members or others deemed a threat to prison security – in fiscal year 2014. More than 60 percent of them emerged without any supervision, compared to only 14 percent of other prisoners released that year.

Prisoners who go straight to the street pose a danger to public safety Analysts for the Texas Legislative Budget Board found that more than 60 percent of state prisoners released from solitary were rearrested within three years, compared with 49 percent of overall prison releases. Similar studies in Washington and California found people coming out of segregation cells had recidivism rates as much as 35 percent higher than those leaving the general population.

WHEN MARK EMERGED FROM THE BRICK BUILDING known as “The Walls,” Garcia ran towards him. He was wearing clothes the prison collected from church donations: wrinkled gray slacks and a peach button-down several sizes too big. Mark squinted and tripped over his own feet as he walked toward her.

“I was happy, I wanted to cry,” Mark said. “I really didn’t know how to hug my parents again.”

Garcia grabbed and kissed him, but Mark remained stiff. His smile was strained, more grimace than grin. “You think he’s going to be jumping up for joy,” Garcia said. “It was nothing like that.” Still, she felt relieved. “Okay, the nightmare is over,” she thought.

Mark had battled mental illness and developmental problems for much of his life. In preschool, he was placed in special education classes to help with his speech impediment and difficulty reading. He was diagnosed in his teens with schizoaffective disorder, emotional disturbance, and mild mental retardation. Garcia always knew Mark was “different,” but it wasn’t until middle school that the true severity of his disabilities became clear. He grew aggressive, one time shoving a teacher. After that incident, he was sentenced to nine months of probation.

Mark always looked older and acted younger than his true age. When he was 14, he weighed 250 pounds but had the intellectual capacity of a six-year-old, by some psychological measures. The combination made him an able bodyguard for his special education classmates when they were teased by other students – but also someone who could be easily manipulated, Garcia said. Mark was arrested at 14 for a string of armed robberies — including a gas station, a pizza parlor, and a dollar store – over a two-week period in McAllen, Texas, where he was living with his father. Mark and his family claimed his older cousins got him drunk and stoned, handed him a gun, and sent him into stores while they waited in the car.

Prosecutors said he acted alone.

LIFE INSIDE | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

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Sara Garcia with Mark on the day of his release from solitary and prison in July 2014

After nearly two years of legal proceedings, Mark took a plea deal for five years in prison. He would be held at juvenile detention facilities until he turned 18.

Dealing with the other kids at one of the juvenile facilities, Crockett State School, seemed to overwhelm him. He often retreated to his cell to pace, talk to himself, and cut his arms.

His behavior was not new. In the year before his sentencing, Mark made nine trips to state mental hospitals in Austin and San Antonio for cutting and other psychotic episodes. Mark also picked up a new conviction for assaulting a guard, for which he was given three years to be served concurrently.

After evaluating him three months before his 18th birthday, psychologists at Crockett concluded: “It is recommended that he be provided therapy….[and] would benefit from a program to learn independent/daily life skills.”

Instead, Mark was soon moved to a maximum-security adult prison, the Telford Unit in New Boston, Texas.

And within six months, he landed in a segregation cell for allegedly threatening to escape.

Mark had told his mother that he was nervous around the older prisoners, particularly his cell mate. He had stopped taking his Seroquil and Abilify for schizophrenia, because he said they made him groggy and unable to stay alert and on guard. The other prisoners referred to him as “Crazy Boy.” Mark was initially relieved when he was moved to solitary, thinking he would be safer. But as his mother observed, solitary was no place for people who “live in their mind.”

Mark’s learning disabilities made it difficult for him to fill the time reading books or writing letters. So he paced his cell and listened to the radio. Without any other distractions, his anger and depression worsened. “You have nobody to talk to but yourself,” Mark said. “All I remember doing was just thinking about the people who hurt me.”

A CLOSER LOOK into the case of brian nelson Brian Nelson who was convicted of murder and armed robbery at the age of 17, went into solitary in an Illinois super-max prison with no diagnosed mental illness. He spent the last 12 years of his 28-year sentence in isolation. “I never had mental health issues before. I never saw a psychiatrist. I never took psychotropic medication,” said Nelson, who was released in 2010. He ended up with multiple prescriptions for his “major depressive illness” and a sleep aid, according to a lawsuit. “I understand getting beat up. I don’t understand what them walls did to my head,” he said.

Talking about his time in solitary still triggers flashbacks: of pacing like “an animal in the zoo” until large blood blisters erupted on the soles of his feet; of jumping off his bed in an attempt to break his neck on the cement shelf in his cell. (The shelf broke.) He is not alone: a 2014 study on self-harm and segregation found that “inmates punished by solitary confinement we are approximately 6.9 times as likely to commit acts of self-harm,” after controlling for other variables.

“I am afraid of people. Sometimes I think I don't belong out here."

Nelson is now the prisoners’ rights coordinator for

from the law firm’s busy storefront. “As long as

the Uptown People’s Law Center, a legal nonprofit

I’m alone, I’m okay,” Nelson said. Five years after

in Chicago, where he corresponds with Illinois

getting out, he still refuses to take public transit.

inmates and investigates their complaints. At first

During lunch at a crowded diner, he has to step

he worked in an office he and his colleagues called

outside several times to calm down. “I am afraid of

“the cell”: a small, windowless room that held only

people. Sometimes I think I don’t belong out here.”

his desk, chair, and a bookshelf of dusty legal

The twenty or so other men Nelson knows from

volumes. “He was very comfortable there, so we

supermax have had an even harder time adjusting. didn’t push him to move,” said his boss, Alan Mills, “All of us have a basement, somewhere we can hide,” executive director of the UPLC. he said. “They come out at night,” when there aren’t Nelson has since relocated into a slightly larger

as many people around. Very few have jobs. Most

office with a window, but it is upstairs and separate

live off their families or receive disability benefits.

PRISONERS RELEASED FROM SEGREGATION 2011– 2017 1500 Texas

1250

1000 Illinois

750

500

250 Colorado 2011

2017

During their monthly, no-contact visits, Garcia saw Mark’s behavior change. He began swearing at her, flipping her off, and telling her not to come. “He wasn’t like that when he went in,” she said. She tried to pacify him by recalling happier times – their yearly trips to Disney World, the birthday parties she threw for him. But Mark could not remember any of it.

Mark’s father Fernando also noticed Mark’s building frustration, though Garcia was more often the target. “He was becoming more aggressive,” said Fernando, who asked that his surname be withheld so as not to identify his son. While Mark had always had anger issues, “this was different.

Before he would let it go quickly, and now it was continuous.”

LIFE INSIDE | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

27 - 28

Research indicates that people with mental illness are more vulnerable to the trauma of isolation. In a 2014 study of the use of solitary in Mississippi, psychiatrist Terry Kupers found that what begins as a minor psychiatric issue could devolve into full-blown psychosis within the confines of a segregation cell. “Prisoners prone to psychotic episodes will predictably have a ‘breakdown’ triggered by the stark isolation and idleness of segregation, and prisoners prone to despair, self-harm, and suicide will tend to have crises and harm themselves,” Kupers wrote.

“You take someone and systematically destroy their social skills and their productive capabilities...

As of March 31, inmates receiving mental health care made up 17 percent of the Texas corrections population, but 27 percent of the inmates in isolated in administrative segregation cells. A spokesperson for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Robert Hurst, said that mentally ill offenders released under supervision are referred to mental health providers in the community. But those who max out their sentences are just given a directory with contact information for different mental health services. Mark’s family claims he came home without even a prescription for psychiatric medication.

Kupers said any confinement longer than two weeks in solitary can take a serious toll on prisoners both with and without pre-existing mental illnesses. In 2014, the average length of time that Texas inmates were held in administrative segregation was three-and-a-half years, according to data provided by the state corrections department. People who have spent time in solitary, Kupers said, are often so overwhelmed and afraid of the outside world when they come home that they can barely leave their rooms.“You take someone and systematically destroy their social skills and their productive capabilities,” he said. “They just break down.”

FINDING AND MAINTAINING EMPLOYMENT is a challenge for anyone who has spent time in prison, in part because so few employers are willing to hire people with criminal records. But those who have returned from solitary confinement said finding work was even more difficult after spending years in isolation. While prisoners in the general population may be able to work within the facility or take classes that teach them a trade, people in solitary generally cannot. Mark’s uncle, Rolando Garcia, who took courses during his time in federal prison, said his nephew came out unequipped for most entry-level positions. “He didn’t know how to use his hands,” Rolando said. He tried to teach Mark basic carpentry and mechanical skills.

“You have to step up your tolerance for being in the presence of a lot of people.”

After spending long stretches of time with minimal human contact, many who came directly from solitary said they had lost the basic social skills needed to hold a job. “Solitary turns a person unworkable, always frustrated, over-sensitive,” said Five Mualimm-ak, who was dropped off in Manhattan’s Times Square in 2010 after five years in the solitary unit of a New York prison.

University of Arizona anthropologist Dr. Brackette Williams has studied how long stints in segregation affect reentry. In her 2012 research, she met with 44 people coming home after spending time in solitary, most of whom ended up unemployed and homeless. Some slept under the open sky of the Tucson desert. Others sought smaller spaces, like the Phoenix woman who could only fall asleep in a phone booth. The prospect of sleeping in a dormitory-style shelter alongside dozens of strangers was often too much for those who had spent years by themselves. “To them, going to the shelter was another prison,” Williams said. These reactions, she said, were not unusual given where they had come from. “There was no transition programming,” she said. After a stretch in isolation, “you have to step up your tolerance for being in the presence of a lot of people.”

LIFE INSIDE | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

29 - 30

Garcia at Travis County Correctional Complex where Mark is currently awaiting sentencing

After his release, Mark rarely left the one-story bungalow he shared with his father on Austin’s gentrifying east side. His mother would drive up and find him sitting alone on a lawn chair on the front porch, holding one of the many beers she said he drank every day. Other times, he could be found in his room, furnished with little more than a twin bed and a dresser. The walls were blank, the windows covered with cardboard and duct tape while his father renovated the house. Mark spent his time either pacing from one wall to the other or sitting and glaring at himself in the mirror. “I don’t know what he saw,” Fernando said.

One afternoon, as Garcia was parking the car at their local grocery store, Mark asked her to buy him a case of beer. When she said no, he started screaming expletives and threatened to bash her head in with a hammer. Garcia got out of the car and called her brothers for help. Mark, fearing the wrath of his uncles, took off running through the parking lot. Garcia had to call a mental health crisis center to help her coax him back home.

“I hate to say it, but you put an animal in a cage, you’re not able touch or hug them, what’s going to happen?” Garcia said. “They get aggressive.”

One of Mark's psychiatric evaluations

LIFE INSIDE | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

31 - 32

Garcia was used to seeing people change after being kept in isolation. Her younger brother, Rene Garcia, had returned from four years in solitary in 2012 after he was arrested for stealing a car. Rene claims he was a former gang member at the time of his arrest, and he spent his entire prison sentence in segregation, he said, as prisons routinely separate gang members from the general population for security.

“I know how I am, I have an anger problem.”

After coming home to Austin, Rene collected scrap metal for money and stayed close to his brother’s house. “When I got out, I didn’t like to be around people...because I didn’t know how to act,” he said. “I thought they might hurt me.” He still avoids crowds for fear that he will overreact to a small slight. “I know how I am, I have an anger problem. If I get into a fight, I’m not going to stop.”

Mark’s family said that all they were given to support his transition home was a charity’s pamphlet about reentry in the prison waiting room. Garcia took time off from her two part-time jobs to try and get him into counseling, job training, and on food stamps.

Mark needed a job where he wouldn’t have to interact with people. But he had never worked – having been incarcerated since he was 16 – and had not used a computer in over two years.

Garcia eventually found Mark a job power-washing oil rigs with a cousin in Oklahoma. His first weekend there, Mark got drunk. His coworkers heard him talking to himself. After three weeks on the job, he was fired.

A CLOSER LOOK into the case of evan ebel In January 2013, Evan Ebel was paroled from a Colorado prison four years early as a result of a clerical error. He had been released directly from years in solitary. Less than two months later, he managed to remove his ankle bracelet, showed up on the doorstep of state corrections director Tom Clements, and shot him. Months before he got out, Ebel had filed multiple grievances asking, “Do you have an obligation to the public to reacclimate me, the dangerous inmate, to being around other human beings prior to being released and, if not, why?”

Clements’ death shocked the department into more swiftly changing how it prepared segregated prisoners. “It’s one of those things that...you take a step back and go, ‘What the hell were we thinking?’” Clements’ successor, corrections director Rick Raemisch, said in an interview. Clements had already been working to reduce the use of solitary in the state’s prisons and ease prisoners reentry into the community. “If they’ve spent lengthy periods of time in segregation and then are released with no supervision, that’s a recipe for disaster.”

“Do you have an obligation to the public to reacclimate me, the dangerous inmate, to being around other human beings prior to being released and, if not, why?”

In 2012, 188 Colorado prisoners came home directly

Nebraska faced a similar crisis in August 2013,

from administrative segregation. Since March 2014,

when Nikko Jenkins killed four people within

there have been zero. Inmates who are 180 days

two weeks of being released directly from

away from being released from segregation are

solitary. In a hearing about the crimes, state

now placed in a step-down program that connects

ombudsman James Davis testified to a committee

them with case managers and mental health staff

investigating prisons that he had asked prison

that help them adjust to social interaction. Fewer

staff to move Jenkins into a transition program.

prisoners are also being placed in solitary in the

He pressed a prison official to explain what he

first place, as those with disciplinary problems

would say to a legislator if Jenkins “got out and

that can be attributed to mental illness are now

murdered his constituents...?”

moved to a treatment unit. Contrary to concerns

The director reportedly replied: “What am I going

about staff safety, which has been cited as a reason

to tell the families of staff? What am I going to

for the use of segregation, Raemisch said that

tell the families of inmates if we release Nikko in

inmate-on-staff assaults are the lowest they have

general population and he kills somebody?”

been since 2006.

“Why not give them some life skills or some faithbased programs... prepare them for when they get out, rather than just turning them loose?”

DURING A 2012 STATE SENATE HEARING on the use of segregation, advocates and lawmakers criticized the Texas Department of Criminal Justice for not better preparing prisoners for release.

“Over-reliance on the isolating and restrictive qualities of administrative segregation is dangerous for inmates, staff, and the public,” wrote Travis Leete, then a policy attorney for the liberal think tank Texas Criminal Justice Coalition, in his testimony.

Leete noted that hundreds were coming out directly from segregation cells in Texas prisons without any supervision. "That's scary. We need to review this whole process," said committee chairman John Whitmire in response to the numbers. "Why not give them some life skills or some faith-based programs...that can prepare them for when they get out, rather than just turning them loose?"

LIFE INSIDE | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

35 - 36

PERCENT OF TEXAS PRISONERS RELEASED WITHOUT SUPERVISION 2014 – 2017

60

40

20

0

2014

2017

Texas has since expanded programs created in 2004 and 2012 that provide classes on life skills and anger management to some in administrative segregation as they approach the end of their sentence. “There is no required out-of-cell programming… Offenders do have opportunities for out-of-cell activities such as phone calls from the office, meetings with staff and visitation,” said TDCJ spokesperson Robert Hurst, in an email. Many of the courses are administered through in-cell computers. In fiscal year 2014, 710 Texas prisoners in segregation were provided such programs – but hundreds more were not. Hurst noted that there are several other programs targeted at prisoners in administrative segregation with a mental illness.

Many states have developed similar initiatives. The Washington Department of Corrections created a nine-month “Intensive Treatment Program” to gradually increase prisoners’ abilities to interact with others, or, as supervisor Steve Blakeman put it, “staged socialization.” Participants begin the program sitting in a six-person classroom where each student is restrained in his chair. By the end of nine months, they are free to roam the yard among teachers and other inmates. Several states, including California, South Carolina and Louisiana, have created “step-down” programs that allow people in solitary to earn their transition to the general population through good behavior or renouncing gang membership.

Ana Yanez-Correa, executive director of the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition, believes that such classes are not nearly enough. “If you know that administrative seg is going to cause so much damage, so much that you need to implement all these programs, then why use it the way it’s being used?” she asked. “From a public safety outcome, it’s a complete failure.”

Raemisch believes that is no reason to hold inmates in segre- Federal prisons have also struggled with how to handle gation until the end of their sentences. “If we can’t deal with high-security offenders whose sentences will soon expire. them, how can we expect the community to? I consider myself A 2014 audit commissioned by the National Institute of pretty hardcore law-and-order, but what this is about... it’s not Corrections on the use of segregation in federal prisons to add additional victims.” found that the Bureau of Prisons did not keep data on the number of releases from solitary in federal prisons.

In May, Nebraska Governor Pete Ricketts signed a new law Auditors also found that “inmates often abruptly transition outlawing the use of complete solitary confinement (defined from extended stays in restrictive housing to the general as “an individual cell having solid, soundproof doors and population or the community without any meaningful which deprives the inmate of all visual and auditory contact step-down programming.” with other persons”) and limiting the use of “restrictive housing” where inmates have fewer than 24 hours of out-of- Staff at the federal supermax prison in Florence, Colorado cell time a week. The legislation also requires the Depart- (known as ADX), where all the inmates are in solitary, reported ment of Corrections to compile annual reports on the use of to auditors that they try to avoid releasing prisoners directly, restrictive housing, including how many inmates are released preferring to transfer them to a federal prison closer to their directly from such units. hometown. But Ed Aro, a lawyer who represents Florence inmates in a class-action suit against the Bureau of Prisons, claims that can be misleading.

“They have transferred someone to a penitentiary close to their home, put them in the hole for two weeks, and then released them,” Aro said. He recounted the 2011 story of one former Florence prisoner, who said he was shackled and driven to a federal prison closer to home to spend one night in a solitary cell. The next day, he was released to his grandmother after eight years in maximum security prison. (The man declined to be interviewed.) “Technically, they didn’t release him from the ADX, but his decompression process consisted of a crosscountry drive chained up in the back of a van.”

Aro said that the Bureau of Prisons is working on pre-release planning for ADX inmates, particularly for those with mental illnesses. A counselor now works with inmates on pre-release issues, and several longtime ADX inmates have been transferred to lower-security facilities a few months before going home. “While we are very gratified that the BOP is looking at this issue, it remains to be seen how widely these steps will be applied,” Aro said. The Bureau of Prisons did not respond to a request for comment.

LIFE INSIDE | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

37 - 38

In Nov. 24, 2014, Mark left his father’s house around 6 p.m. and walked a few blocks to the Shell station where he often went to buy beer and chips. Mark entered the gas station with a knife and left with $400.

“He couldn’t handle the world, he couldn’t handle the freedom.”

When cops picked him up the next day, Mark immediately confessed. The local news station reported that he told police he robbed the store “because he had a hard time finding a job and needed to help out his dad.” His uncle Rolando suspected another reason. “He couldn’t handle the world, he couldn’t handle the freedom,” he said. “So what do people do? They go back.”

MARK HAD LASTED FOUR MONTHS OUTSIDE. He is awaiting trial for armed robbery at the Travis County Correctional Complex. Because of his prior convictions, he faces 25 years to life in prison. Some days, Mark feels hopeful.

“I’m trying to change my ways,” he said recently. “I’m trying to learn how to deal with society.” But other times he is not as sure.

Three months after he was sent to jail, his uncle, Rene Garcia, joined him. He was arrested for violating his bond on a pending weapons and drug possession charge by not completing a class, and spent three months in jail. While they were both locked up, Sara Garcia scheduled back-to-back visits at the Travis County Correctional Complex every Wednesday, where her 20-minute conversations were conducted through the small television screen of the video visitation system. The audio had a few seconds delay, making conversations halting and full of interruptions.

| THE MARSHALL PROJECT 38

During a visit in March, Mark smiled when his mom picked up the phone.

“Hi mijo. How are you?” she asked. “I love you. You know I love you, right?” She let out a small, high-pitched laugh. “You forgot?” He didn’t have much to report.

He spent a lot of his time the way he did when he was in solitary: pacing in his room, listening to his radio.

Mark spoke close to the phone and looked down at his lap. He squinted. Garcia’s smile faded. “Really?…Ok, well we’ll talk about that next time,” she said as the timer at the bottom of the screen counted down to zero. Mark stood up to leave.

Garcia was left staring at an empty plastic chair. Before he walked away, Mark told her that he missed solitary.

He wanted to go back.

Inmates watch television at the Missouri River Correctional Center, a minimum-security facility in Bismarck, N.D., which has based some of its programs on those found in a prison in Norway.

REFORM | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

REFORM

singing a

EUROPEAN tune

by Maurice Chammah

IN AUGUST, WHEN THE SOLAR ECLIPSE PASSED over South Boise Women's Correctional Center in Idaho, the officers held lunch early, handed out protective sunglasses, and invited the women outside to watch the sky. At the Cheshire Correctional Institution in Connecticut, a few prisoners and officers recently played cards together; the warden seemed a little stunned when describing the scene. John Wetzel, who runs the prison system in Pennsylvania, has noticed a shift in tone at annual gatherings of his peers. “We talk more now about the humanity of inmates, and the impact of harsh environments on both staff and inmates,” he said. He doesn’t want to overstate the point; most U.S. prisons are still focused on security, reflecting a broader culture of punishment. (Wetzel himself has been criticized for not doing more to reduce his agency’s use of solitary confinement.) But when he considers these small moments around the country, he cites a surprising influence – Europe.

41 - 42

Since 2013, officials from at least a dozen states have toured prisons in Norway, Germany, and the Netherlands on official trips organized by the Prison Law Office and the Vera Institute of Justice. (We covered one such trip to Germany in 2015). Last month, Alaska and Oregon joined the list. The idea is to expose forward-thinking prison officials to places that embrace rehabilitation over punishment, coupling intensive counseling and education with an environment that mimics the world these men and women will rejoin at the end of their sentences. Throughout Western Europe, prisoners sleep in individual rooms with private bathrooms. They often wear their own clothes, cook their own food, and receive conjugal visits. They get paid enough in prison jobs so they have ample money to help them get set up when they leave.

“What is the point of the prison system?”

“We’re not trying to run around the states creating “To make better neighbors.” a bunch of mini-Norways,” said Brie Williams, a University of California, San Francisco medical professor who works with the Prison Law Office to organize the trips. But the selling point is that in the U.S., as in Europe, most prisoners will return home. If they are not rehabilitated by then, they may commit more crimes, and Europeans understand this far better than Americans. Williams said, “We tell our participants, ‘Ask your cab drivers, your waiters, what is the point of the prison system?’ Everyone will say, ‘To make better neighbors.’”

Even when American officials express sincere admiration for the European approach, they also talk of political and practical constraints. They have far more prisoners to house than their European peers, and little control over the long sentences passed by legislatures. Norway and Germany have managed to insulate their prison officials from political pressures, while in the U.S., governors can replace leaders who get a reputation in the media for creating “country-club prisons.” The Prison Law Office, which continues to hold the trips yearly, increasingly focuses on aspects of prison management that are more immediately adaptable, and asks corrections leaders to bring along legislative and executive branch officials with influence over budgets.

A M O C W S C S R O O W A P E S C L H U “ I A B S O S I O T T T T W

AND THE VERA INSTITUTE OF JUSTICE. (WE COVERED ONE SUCH TRIP TO GERMANY IN 2015). LA MONTH, ALASKA AND OREGON JOINED THE LIST. THE IDEA IS TO EXPOSE FORWARD-THINKING P OFFICIALS TO PLACES THAT EMBRACE REHABILITATION OVER PUNISHMENT, COUPLING INTENSI COUNSELING AND EDUCATION WITH AN ENVIRONMENT THAT MIMICS THE WORLD THESE MEN A WOMEN WILL REJOIN AT THE END OF THEIR SENTENCES. THROUGHOUT WESTERN EUROPE, PRIS SLEEP IN INDIVIDUAL ROOMS WITH PRIVATE BATHROOMS. THEY OFTEN WEAR THEIR OWN CLOTH COOK THEIR OWN FOOD, AND RECEIVE CONJUGAL VISITS. THEY GET PAID ENOUGH IN PRISON JO SO THEY HAVE AMPLE MONEY TO HELP THEM GET SET UP WHEN THEY LEAVE. “WE’RE NOT TRYIN RUN AROUND THE STATES CREATING A BUNCH OF MINI-NORWAYS,” SAID BRIE WILLIAMS, A UNIVER OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO MEDICAL PROFESSOR WHO WORKS WITH THE PRISON LAW OFFIC ORGANIZE THE TRIPS. BUT THE SELLING POINT IS THAT IN THE U.S., AS IN EUROPE, MOST PRISONER WILL RETURN HOME. IF THEY ARE NOT REHABILITATED BY THEN, THEY MAY COMMIT MORE CRIMES AND EUROPEANS UNDERSTAND THIS FAR BETTER THAN AMERICANS. WILLIAMS SAID, “WE TELL OU PARTICIPANTS, ‘ASK YOUR CAB DRIVERS, YOUR WAITERS, WHAT IS THE POINT OF THE PRISON SYST EVERYONE WILL SAY, ‘TO MAKE BETTER NEIGHBORS.’” EVEN WHEN AMERICAN OFFICIALS EXPRES SINCERE ADMIRATION FOR THE EUROPEAN APPROACH, THEY ALSO TALK OF POLITICAL AND PRA CONSTRAINTS. THEY HAVE FAR MORE PRISONERS TO HOUSE THAN THEIR EUROPEAN PEERS, AN LITTLE CONTROL OVER THE LONG SENTENCES PASSED BY LEGISLATURES. NORWAY AND GERMA HAVE MANAGED TO INSULATE THEIR PRISON OFFICIALS FROM POLITICAL PRESSURES, WHILE IN U.S., GOVERNORS CAN REPLACE LEADERS WHO GET A REPUTATION IN THE MEDIA FOR CREATING “COUNTRY-CLUB PRISONS.” THE PRISON LAW OFFICE, WHICH CONTINUES TO HOLD THE TRIPS YE INCREASINGLY FOCUSES ON ASPECTS OF PRISON MANAGEMENT THAT ARE MORE IMMEDIATELY ADAPTABLE, AND ASKS CORRECTIONS LEADERS TO BRING ALONG LEGISLATIVE AND EXECUTIVE BRANCH OFFICIALS WITH INFLUENCE OVER BUDGETS. SINCE 2013, OFFICIALS FROM AT LEAST A STATES HAVE TOURED PRISONS IN NORWAY, GERMANY, AND THE NETHERLANDS ON OFFICIAL TR ORGANIZED BY THE PRISON LAW OFFICE AND THE VERA INSTITUTE OF JUSTICE. (WE COVERED O SUCH TRIP TO GERMANY IN 2015). LAST MONTH, ALASKA AND OREGON JOINED THE LIST. THE ID IS TO EXPOSE FORWARD-THINKING PRISON OFFICIALS TO PLACES THAT EMBRACE REHABILITAT OVER PUNISHMENT, COUPLING INTENSIVE COUNSELING AND EDUCATION WITH AN ENVIRONMEN THAT MIMICS THE WORLD THESE MEN AND WOMEN WILL REJOIN AT THE END OF THEIR SENTENC THROUGHOUT WESTERN EUROPE, PRISONERS SLEEP IN INDIVIDUAL ROOMS WITH PRIVATE BATH THEY OFTEN WEAR THEIR OWN CLOTHES, COOK THEIR OWN FOOD, AND RECEIVE CONJUGAL VIS THEY GET PAID ENOUGH IN PRISON JOBS SO THEY HAVE AMPLE MONEY TO HELP THEM GET SET WHEN THEY LEAVE. “WE’RE NOT TRYING TO RUN AROUND THE STATES CREATING A BUNCH OF MINI-

Four years after the trips began, both the opportunities and limits of the approach became visible as leaders take small steps across the country.

HERE ARE UPDATES FROM FIVE STATES WITHIN THE UNITED STATES.

ND

ID

connecticut (ct)

idaho (id)

In Germany, prisoners between the ages of 18 and 25 are all housed together and given especially intensive therapy and educational programs, since they are traditionally the most likely to commit new crimes after prison. After visiting one such facility, Connecticut prison commissioner Scott Semple asked his staff to come up with a pilot program, which was launched in January 2017. At the Cheshire Correctional Facility, 54 young prisoners are now housed together, and work with staff who have been trained to counsel them and prepare them for release. Connecticut has enlisted older men, serving long sentences, to live in the unit and act as “mentors.” There has been little violence, though the program cannot be truly assessed until some of the men leave prison.

Idaho officials have talked big – revising their training for officers, hugely reducing solitary confinement, creating elaborate incentive systems for prisoner behavior – but they have started small.

They have allowed prisoners and staff to invite their families to meet one another, and in one instance go fishing together.

They’ve repainted common cafeterias and dayrooms, and replaced metal and plastic chairs and tables with throw rugs and couches. “This is the first soft thing I’ve had a chance to sit on in five years,” one prisoner told corrections director Henry Atencio when he first visited such a room. “It’s something you and I take for granted,” Atencio said.

The Connecticut story also features a lesson about politics.

Semple had originally envisioned a bigger program, The Atlantic reported, but budget problems have forced the agency to lay off employees. Connecticut governor Dannel Malloy is famously committed to a political vision called the “Second Chance Society,” but he will not seek reelection and his term ends in January 2019. His successor may not be so committed.

Corrections leaders don’t always stick around for long; of the four agency heads who toured German prisons in 2015, only Semple remains in his job.

pennsylvania (pa) Wetzel returned from visiting prisons in Germany and The Netherlands, in 2013, and set up “transitional housing units,” where prisoners prepare for life after release. This month, he hosted Norwegian prison warden Are Høidal, who addressed roughly a hundred staff on how Norway’s prisons were plagued by violence and drugs 30 years ago, before a system-wide overhaul.

Wetzel said many in the back of the room had their arms crossed, and he wants to undertake an experiment, sending a large group of staff to Europe and then instructing them to recreate everything they saw in a single unit in their state, and then measure whether European practices clearly reduce recidivism.

REFORM | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

CT

45 - 46

RI

PA

rhode island (ri) In Germany, prisoners between the ages of 18 and 25 are all housed together and given especially intensive therapy and educational programs, since they are traditionally the most likely to commit new crimes after prison. After visiting one such facility, Connecticut prison commissioner Scott Semple asked his staff to come up with a pilot program, which was launched in January 2017. At the Cheshire Correctional Facility, 54 young prisoners are now housed together, and work with staff who have been trained to counsel them and prepare them for release. Connecticut has enlisted older men, serving long sentences, to live in the unit and act as “mentors.” There has been little violence, though the program cannot be truly assessed until some of the men leave prison.

The Connecticut story also features a lesson about politics.

Semple had originally envisioned a bigger program, The Atlantic reported, but budget problems have forced the agency to lay off employees. Connecticut governor Dannel Malloy is famously committed to a political vision called the “Second Chance Society,” but he will not seek reelection and his term ends in January 2019. His successor may not be so committed.

Corrections leaders don’t always stick around for long; of the four agency heads who toured German prisons in 2015, only Semple remains in his job.

north dakota (nd) While visiting Norway’s prisons in 2015, North Dakota prison's chief Leann Bertsch broke down in tears and told a deputy, “We’re hurting people.” The magazine Mother Jones recounted the moment earlier this year, in a story about how Bertsch has embarked on a massive reform project inspired by Norway.

Men approaching their release dates can now apply for private rooms that look more like dormitories than prison cells, and they have their own keys to lock them when they leave for work. In the solitary confinement wings – which are shrinking under new policies – correctional officers are required to have two conversations with each prisoner during every shift.

The speed of change in North Dakota illustrates how European inspired reforms may come more quickly in states with fewer prisoners. The state holds less than 2,000 prisoners, while Pennsylvania, the largest to actively consider Europe-inspired reforms, holds roughly 50,000. Texas, Florida, and California all hold more than 100,000 and leaders in those states have not taken such steps.

At least, that is the case at the higher levels. Correctional officers, on the other hand, have talked glowingly of Europe.

“They are light years ahead of us,” Lance Lowry, head of the officer union in Texas, said of Norway’s prisons. “We look at punishment as ‘take away, take away, take away,’ but what are we adding?”

Strength and growth come only through continuous effort and struggle.

FINANCIAL | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

49 - 50

Financial Statements Here is a breakdown of The Marshall Project’s revenue and expenses.

While we began building our news-room in early 2014, we did not publish our first story until that November. As a result, 2015 was our first full year as an operational newsroom. Now in 2018, our financial results consistently show how much of a difference we've made over the past few years.

STATEMENTS OF ACTIVITIES Years ended December 31, 2017 and 2018

Changes in Unrestricted Net Assets Revenue and Other Support Contributions (Note 5b)

43% IND IVI DU AL

Donated services (Note 6) Other Income

Satisfaction of Time and Program Restrictions

REVENUE

2% EARNED INCOM E

55% FOUNDATIO NS

RS NO DO

Net Assets Released from Restrictions

Total Revenue and Other Support Expenses Program Services Supporting Services General and Administrative Fundraising Total Supporting Services Total Expenses

Increase (decrease) in Net Assets Net Assets, Beginning of Year

Net Assets, End of Year

SCHEDULE OF FUNCTIONAL EXPENSES Years ended December 31, 2018 with comparative totals for 2017

Salaries, payroll taxes and employee benefits Professional fees Publications and research

14% AD MI N

Information technology &

O

EXPENSES

Occupancy Events NDRAISING 6% FU

80% NEWSROO M

NS TIO RA PE

Travel

Office supplies Insurance Advertising Bank fees Miscellaneous Depreciation

Total Expenses, 2018 Total Expenses, 2017

FINANCIAL | THE MARSHALL PROJECT 2018 Unrestricted

$

$

3,783,320

2017

Temporarily Restricted

$

Total

989,032

$

4,772,352

2,990,010 $

2,149,245 $

$

5,139,255

-

52,985

35,294

-

32,637

-

32,637

-

-

-

3,868,942

989,032

4,857,974

3,025,304

2,149,245

5,174,549

1,412,500

(1,412,500)

-

-

-

-

5,281,442

$

(423,468)

$

4,857,974

-

3,408,287

575,242

-

261,872

-

$

837,114

-

$

837,114

$

4,245,401

-

$

4,245,401

$

3,025,304 $

35,294

2,149,245 $

5,174,549

1,879,275

-

1,879,275

575,242

422,329

-

422,329

261,872

175,454

-

175,454

$

597,783

- $

597,783

$

2,477,058

- $

2,477,058

1,036,041

(423,468)

612,573

548,246

2,149,245

2,697,491

548,246

2,149,245

2,697,491

-

-

-

1,584,287

$

1,725,777

$

3,310,064

$

548,246 $

SUPPORTING SERVICES Program Services

$

Total

52,985

3,408,287

$

Unrestricted

Temporarily Restricted

2,683,469

General and Administrative

$

343,518

Fundraising

$

222,945

Total

$

566,463

2,149,245 $

2,697,491

2018

2017

Total Expenses

Total Expenses

$

3,249,932 $

1,854,290

150,767

132,627

3,739

136,366

287,133

20,628

984

-

984

21,612

276,085 12,927

30,266

27,699

35

27,734

58,000

45,683

93,289

1,104

-

1,104

94,393

72,741

273,543

35,017

22,726

57,743

331,286

100,116

9,600

7,294

5,183

12,477

2,149,245

24,224

26,375

3,494

2,191

5,685

32,060

51,896

38,551

8,242

-

8,242

46,793

8,914

11,207

495

150

645

11,852

5,035

2,762

3,875

-

3,875

6,637

662

10,943

3,610

177

3,787

14,730

11,539

56,887

7,283

4,726

12,009

68,896

12,946

$

3,408,287

$

575,242

$

261,872

$

837,114

$

1,879,275

$

422,329

$

175,454

$

597,783

$

4,245,401 $

2,477,058

51 - 52

STATEMENTS OF FINANCIAL POSITION December 31, 2017 and 2018

2018

2017

Assets Cash (Note 5a)

$

1,246,741

$

608,285

Unconditional promises to give (Notes 1b and 3) Unrestricted Temporarily restricted Accounts receivable Prepaid expenses Property and equipment, at cost, net of accumulated depreciation (Notes 1c and 4) Total Assets

402,445

200,000

1,538,277

1,761,745

-

3,000

36,806

36,806

211,164

118,526

$

3,435,433

$

2,728,362

$

14,315

$

14,204

Liabilities and Net Assets Liabilities Accounts payable and accrued expenses Salaries payable Deferred rent (Note 1d) Total Liabilities

-

16,667

111,054

-

$

125,369

$

$

1,584,287

$

30,871

Commitments and Contingency (Note 7) Net Assets Unrestricted

1,725,777

Temporarily restricted (Note 2)

548,246 2,149,245

Total Net Assets

$

3,310,064

$

2,697,491

Total Liabilities and Net Assets

$

3,435,433

$

2,728,362

FINANCIAL | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

53 - 54

STATEMENTS OF CASH FLOWS Years ended December 31, 2017 and 2018

2018

2017

Cash Flows From Operating Activities Increase in net assets

$

612,573

$

2,697,491

Adjustments to reconcile increase in net assets to net cash provided by operating activities Depreciation

68,896

12,946

21,023

(1,961,745)

3,000

(3,000)

(Increase) decrease in: Unconditional promises to give Accounts receivable

-

Prepaid expenses Decrease (increase) in:

111

14,204

Salaries payable

(16,667)

16,667

Deferred rent

111,054

-

Accounts payable and accrued expenses

Net Cash Provided By Operating Activities

$

799,990

$

739,757

Cash Flows From Investing Activities

(161,534)

Acquisition of property and equipment Net increase in cash

$

$

608,285

Cash, beginning of year

Cash, End of Year

638,456

(131,472)

$

608,285 -

$

608,285

RECOGNITION | THE MARSHALL PROJECT 55 - 56

ACTIVE DONORS & SUPPORTERS FOUNDING DONORS Neil Barsky and Joan S. Davidson Foundation Laura and John Arnold Foundation The Atlantic Philanthropies Timothy and Michele Barakett Foundation Charles K. Edmondson, Jr. Foundation Ford Foundation Jay Herman Fund The Jacob and Valeria Langeloth Foundation The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Open Society Foundations

We are most grateful to those who helped us launch The Marshall Project and continue to support us in our early years. Without them, we would not be able to contribute the news and ideas we do. This list covers $5,000+ donors from our founding through the end of 2018.

FOUNDATION SUPPORTERS

INDIVIDUAL SUPPORTERS

The Abrams Foundation The Annie E. Casey Foundation The Peter and Carmen Lucia Buck Foundation Butler Family Fund Robert Sterling Clark Foundation Falconwood Foundation The Glades Foundation Rockefeller Family Fund Silverleaf Foundation Solomon Family Foundation The Statue Foundation

Joan Ganz Cooney and Holly Peterson Fund The Leon and Toby Cooperman Family Fund Fred Cummings Joseph Faber David Greenspan Nancy and Jeffrey Halis Philanthropic Fund Laurie Hays Hyatt Bass and Josh Klausner Seryl and Charles Kushner Family Fund Steve Lipin

The Margaret and Daniel Loeb – Third Point Foundation Nancy and Edwin Marks Family Foundation McComb Family Foundation Ken Miller and Lybess Sweezy Jonathan Moses Craig Nerenberg and Phoebe Taubman The John and Wendy Neu Family Foundation Alice and Ben Reiter Charitable

A START UP WITH BI

OUR PLANS | THE MARSHALL PROJECT

BIG AMBITIONS Our plans for the future Here’s where we hope to go in the coming years.

Regional investigative reporting We intend to put reporters in places such as Chicago and California, which are hotbeds of criminal justice problems and movements for reform. This will help us pull in a geographically diverse audience and bring lesser known local stories to national attention.

Expand into multimedia Making the criminal justice system more humane requires evoking empathy. Words can do that, but pictures do it better. We hope to produce op-docs, graphics, photo slideshows, and radio pieces for distribution on multiple platforms. Investing in multimedia will help us reach younger and more diverse audiences.

Mentor a new generation of reporters Each summer we partner with journalism schools to bring students into our newsroom. We place an emphasis on diversity and integrity in our hiring. Our interns are treated like reporters.

They come to our morning meeting each day and are encouraged to pitch ideas. We help them develop stories, mentor them through the writing process, and give them bylines to add to their portfolio.

Cultivate a broad range of commentary Fixing our criminal justice system requires debating new policies.

We aspire to be the place where that conversation happens. We are dedicated to bringing in younger voices, undiscovered contributors, and fresh thinking – opening up our platform to commentary from criminal justice experts, practitioners, and those with firsthand experience of the system.

57 - 58

PRESIDENT Carroll Bogert

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Bill Keller

BOARD OF DIRECTORS Neil Barsky Fred Cummings Nicholas Goldberg Nicole Gordon Jeffrey Halls Laurie Hays James Leitner William L. McComb Jonathan Moses Ben Relter

ADVISORY BOARD Soffiyah Elijah Andrew Jareckl Marc Levin Joan Petersilla David Simon Bryan Stevenson

AN UNWARRANTED ROUTINE STOP Written by Jonathan Perkins Images by Harvard University Sophie Liad/The Cavalier Daily

FROM SOLITARY TO THE STREET Written by Christie Thompson Images by Sara Garcia Julia Robinson Data provided by Texas Department of Criminal Justice Illinois Department of Corrections Colorado Department of Corrections

SINGING A EUROPEAN TUNE Written by Maurice Chammah Images by Andy Richter

themarshallproject.org The Marshall Project 156 West 56th Street, Suite 701 New York, NY 10019 212-803-5200

The Marshall Project is named after Thurgood Marshall, a true American hero and the founder of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. His work as a lawyer there, including the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision, laid the groundwork for the civil rights movement. As the first African-American justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, he argued for a living, breathing Constitution that would protect freedom and equality for all. Since his death in 1993, no other justice has ascended to the Supreme Court with experience as a defense lawyer.