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Two days after the State of Missouri executed Imam Khaliifah ibn Rayford Daniels ‘Abdul-Qudduus, 55, also known as Marcellus Williams, Black America is still, once again, grappling with the reality that laws created and enacted upon this stolen land were neither designed to protect us, nor—at barest minimum—treat us fairly. 

We allegedly live in a nation where we are innocent until proven guilty; that’s what it says on paper. Yet, Khaliifah—who chose his name upon taking the Shahada, the formal declaration of Islamic faith—was killed with no credible evidence supporting his guilt. In fact, the opposite is true: the stunning lack of credible evidence supported his innocence. Still, in a system that is not broken—a system functioning exactly as it was created to function—the life of this father, grandfather, spiritual leader, and poet did not matter. “Beyond a reasonable doubt” did not apply to him, as it disproportionately does not apply to far too many Black and Brown people in this fraudulently named Land of the Free.

I interviewed Bryan Stevenson, founder and director of the Equal Justice Initiative. In that compelling conversation, we discussed the capital punishment and Stevenson said, in part: 

“We, in the African American community, have always known that the criminal justice system is a threat, that it will take people who are innocent or wrongly convicted and it will treat people unfairly…but we keep fighting. I became a lawyer because I really did want to have the skills and abilities to get behind the limitations of democracy…I always want to use that power to help people who are disfavored and disadvantaged, to help people like the people I grew up with.”

Sept. 21 marked 13 years since the State of Georgia killed Troy Davis. He was 42 years old. Just as in Khaliifah’s case, the U.S. Supreme Court had the power and opportunity to stay his execution again. But despite his alleged guilt not proven beyond a reasonable doubt—in fact, there was evidence supporting his innocence, as well—the nine justices declined to intervene. 

Every year, I think of him, still, even more so this year in the hours before the State of Missouri executed Khaliifah. I remember the massive outcry as every lever of our government—judicial, legislative, and executive—failed this man. There was a complete abandonment of any pretense that his Black life held any value beyond the cost to convict, incarcerate, and ultimately execute him. 

It was judicial homicide. 

And here we are again. Knowing that at any moment—whether by a police officer’s bullet, a judge’s gavel, or a governor’s pen — our Black lives, our children’s Black lives, our mothers’ or our fathers’ Black lives, our sisters’ or our brothers’ Black lives, could be snatched away without repercussion. We know this beyond a reasonable doubt, unlike the alleged guilt of Khaliifah and Davis. 

Here we are again. Left pondering the incontrovertible fact that if everyone guilty of murder were convicted, sentenced and executed, there would be police departments across this country a lot smaller tonight. 

This week, I sat down with civil rights leader and attorney Lee Merritt. Lee is known for being front-and-center, and behind the scenes, fighting for justice for Jacqueline Craig, Jordan Edwards, Atatiana Jefferson, Botham Jean, Ahmaud Arbery, and many more Black people who have been harmed—and, in too many instances, killed by police officers emboldened by the machinations of a white supremacist system that desecrates Black lives with impunity. 

The toll this work takes on him is heavy, but the responsibility and honor he feels working in service to Black people is greater. We discussed his journey as a Black attorney navigating the judicial system and how Bryan Stevenson’s work informs his own practice. We also discussed the synchronicity between the Black Freedom Struggle and fighting to free Palestine from Israel’s 76 yearslong illegal occupation and genocide—something Khaliifah so beautifully and bravely addressed in his poem, “ The Perplexing Smiles of the Children of Palestine.” And, as someone committed to justice outside of the courtroom every day, he shared his lived-in experience as a Black man in this nation who, yet again, bore witness to a legal lynching. 

Watch and listen to Lee’s powerful, poignant responses here. Be moved by them, yes; but more importantly, be called to action. To the family of Imam Khaliifah ibn Rayford Daniels ‘Abdul-Qudduus, to his friends, loved ones, and all the men incarcerated with him who found strength in his leadership, friendship, creativity, and spiritual wisdom, to Missourians to Abolish the Death Penalty (MADP), the organizers who fought so tirelessly, too often without support, to save his life: We rage with you. We grieve with you.

A controversial law professor at the University of Pennsylvania whose alleged “racist, sexist, xenophobic, and homophobic” comments repeatedly landed her in hot water was publicly reprimanded and suspended for a year—with only half-pay—after years of fighting. 

Amy Wax, a tenured professor at Penn’s Carey School of Law, was sanctioned for her controversial comments on race after a lengthy review process that took over two years. 

Wax has now become the first tenured professor at the Ivy League university to face sanctions in about 20 years.

A spokesperson for Penn told the Daily Beast in a statement that Wax “engaged in years of flagrantly unprofessional conduct within and outside the classroom that breached her responsibilities as a teacher to offer an equal learning opportunity to all students.” They said the disciplinary decision against her was now final. 

The sanctions against Wax include a one-year suspension with half-pay, set to begin during the 2025-2026 academic year. Wax will also lose her named chair position. 

When Wax speaks at public events, she will also be required to “speak for yourself alone and not as a University or Penn Carey Law School faculty member.” 

“Academic freedom is and should be very broad,” Penn Provost John L. Jackson wrote in the public reprimand issued against Wax and published in the Penn Almanac on Tuesday.

“Teachers, however, must conduct themselves in a manner that conveys a willingness to assess all students fairly.” 

According to the provost, Wax’s comments left “many students understandably concerned that you cannot and would not be an impartial judge of their academic performance.” 

Wax’s comments about race began to draw criticism after she co-authored an op-ed published in the Philadelphia Inquirer in 2017.

In a later interview that same year, Wax said “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a Black student graduate in the top quarter of the class, and rarely, rarely, in the top half.” 

Theodore Ruger, the former dean of Penn Law School, removed her from teaching any required courses in 2018, Inside Higher Ed reported, after making comments “on the academic performance and grade distributions of the Black students in her required first-year courses.” 

In a letter obtained by student newspaper The Daily Pennsylvanian , Ruger also accused Wax of telling a Black student she had only become a double Ivy League student due to affirmative action. 

In classrooms, he claimed Wax said “Mexican men are more likely to assault women and remarking such a stereotype was accurate in the same way as ‘Germans are punctual,’ and that “gay couples are not fit to raise children.” 

A complaint was filed against Wax by a group of Penn Law School alumni in 2021. The law school hired Northwestern Law School Dean Daniel Rodriguez to investigate Wax’s conduct. 

According to Penn’s record of the investigation, Rodriguez interviewed 26 alumni. Wax herself refused to participate in the investigation. 

In his final report, Rodriguez found that “Professor Wax has made a number of comments in class and a few outside of class which could reasonably be viewed as derogatory and harmful,” but also ultimately found that there was no evidence of discrimination against any individual student. 

In a December 2021 podcast with Brown University economist Glenn Loury, Wax called Asian immigration to the United States “problematic” due to the “danger of the dominance of an Asian elite in this country.” 

Later, she complained that most Asian-Americans vote for the Democratic Party, and said “as long as most Asians support Democrats and help to advance their positions, I think the United States is better off with fewer Asians and less Asian immigration.” 

More students and alumni issued complaints against Wax in 2022, shortly after her comments about Asian immigrants. Then-Dean Ruger started a faculty review process against her, writing that she exhibited a “a callous and flagrant disregard” for the student body by making “incessant racist, sexist, xenophobic, and homophobic actions and statements.” 

A board of five tenured faculty members reviewed the charges against Wax. In May 2023, the board unanimously found Wax committed a “major infraction of the University’s behavioral standards.” 

Specifically, they cited the law professor for “a history of sweeping, blithe, and derogatory generalizations about groups by race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, and immigration status,” as well as “making discriminatory and disparaging statements targeted at specific racial, ethnic, and other groups with which many students identify” both in and outside of her classroom. 

It also found that she violated the university’s policy for keeping student grades private by “publicly speaking about the grades of law students by race,” and continuing to do so after receiving a warning from the dean. 

Sanctions against Wax were approved by then-Penn President Liz Magill, but Wax appealed the decision to the school’s Senate Committee on Academic Freedom and Responsibility. The committee’s decision, also published on Tuesday in the Penn Almanac, found that “no significant defect in procedure,” allowing the sanctions to finally go into effect. 

During the appeal process, Wax remained defiant. In November 2023, she invited Jared Taylor, a writer described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as white supremacist, to speak at her class “Conservative and Political Legal Thought.” Taylor is the editor of American Renaissance, a publication the SPLC says “promotes pseudo-scientific studies and research that purport to show the inferiority of blacks to whites.” 

About 80 Penn law students showed up to the lecture to protest Taylor’s appearance, student paper The Daily Pennsylvanian reported. 

“After years of promising it would find a way to punish professor Amy Wax for her controversial views on race and gender, Penn delivered today — despite zero evidence Wax ever discriminated against her students,” the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a free speech watchdog group, said in a response to Tuesday’s announcement.

Mayor Bruce Harrell may pat himself on the back for balancing a $250 million shortfall in his newly unveiled 2025-2026 budget without levying any new taxes, but a broad coalition of 35 community advocacy and labor groups say it’s not the flex he thinks it is.

The Mayor cut 159 City jobs, $80 million in City programming, and most audaciously, Harrell raided $330 million from JumpStart revenue, a pot of money earmarked for affordable housing and Green New Deal initiatives, and economic development for small business. 

Budget Director Dan Eder said the Mayor had to make “hard choices,” but the sympathy rings hollow: The Mayor proposed $100 million in new spending, including a $62 million bump to the Seattle Police Department budget. In all, Harrell chose to appease the violent arm of the state and his wealthy donors at the expense of affordable housing and his workers. 

JumpStart to Jump Start the General Fund

In the biggest change, Harrell proposed legislation to add flexibility to the JumpStart Payroll Expense Tax, a modest tax on the City’s biggest businesses supported by a broad coalition. 

JumpStart has overperformed every year since the City started collecting it. According to a presentation in a media briefing ahead of the budget drop, the City assumed in 2020 that JumpStart would rake in $232 million in 2025. Now, the City estimates it will generate $430 million next year. 

While the City has used JumpStart to balance the budget for many years, the previous council planned to stop that practice in 2025 and return to the spending plan, which obligated 62% of the fund to go to affordable housing. Instead, the Mayor proposed taking $287 million from JumpStart to support the general fund, siphoning off an additional $43 million for a new reserve fund, and then “maintaining” $233 million in JumpStart priorities. In all, the proposed budget spends $520 million in JumpStart revenue in 2025—the entire $430 million projected to come in next year, plus $90 million in one-time JumpStart funds. 

Eder said the Mayor’s budget still manages to pull off “historic” investments into affordable housing, Green New Deal initiatives, and other JumpStart priorities despite raiding the fund. But that’s accounting for all other revenue streams.  

The Mayor allocated $31 million from all funding sources to Green New Deal initiatives in 2025, a growth of 7.6% from last year. Another JumpStart priority, the Equitable Development Initiative, got 4.4% increase from last year.

As for affordable housing, the Mayor proposed $342.2 million to the Office of Housing in 2025 and $342.9 million in 2026 from all sources. While he proposed $10 million less to OH from JumpStart this year than last year, he increased the total investment by 2.5% between 2024 and 2025 and 2.69% between 2024 and 2026. Inflation will almost certainly outpace that growth. 

Obviously, if the Mayor hadn’t sucked out more than half of the fund, and returned to the intended spend plan, they could have invested even more. The investment would have been at least $204 million greater if the Mayor used the $330 million he took from JumpStart as the council originally obligated it—62% for affordable housing. Instead, he’s spending about 30% of the $430 million the City project JumpStart to raise on affordable housing and about 25% of the $520 million in JumpStart funds the City plans to use.

Eder tried to give the JumpStart raid a positive spin. He said if Harrell has relied solely on cuts, that would mean a 14% cut to all City departments funded by the general fund or a 30% cut to all departments if he protected public safety spending. 

However, that ignores the reality that the City can impose new taxes. The recent Progressive Revenue Stabilization Task Force already came up with a list of options. But of course, that would piss off the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce. 

Other Cost Saving Measures

The Mayor will also cut 159 funded City positions. Thanks to his hiring freeze, many of those positions are already empty and won’t require any layoffs, but departments will have to do without workers promised in previous budgets. 

The Mayor could still lay off 76 people. About two-thirds of those lay offs come from internal-facing departments such as the Seattle Information Technology Department, Human Resources Department, and Finance and Administrative Services rather than public-facing positions. More than a dozen will come from the Seattle Department of Construction and Inspection (SDCI), which has less work as the City cuts red tape for developers. 

As the City Council (and I) continue to read through the dense budget proposal, I will update about other programmatic cuts. 

The Seattle City Council still has time to stop Harrell’s attack on working people over the next few weeks. But don’t hold your breath. All but one council member owes their recent election to corporate donors and they haven’t strayed from their overlords’ agenda yet. 

But change often happens in spite of who is in power, not because of it. For those organizing against budget cuts, you can tell the council how you feel tomorrow at public comment. 

If humanity ever goes extinct, scientists now have a backup plan: a coin-sized crystal storing the entire human genome. Future species could use this record as an instructional manual to recreate humans some millions—or even billions—of years from the present.

It sounds like science fiction, but it’s very real, according to a statement from England’s University of Southampton. Scientists inscribed the genetic data into a 5D memory crystal equivalent to fused quartz, a type of glass that in 2014 won the Guinness World Record for the most durable data storage material.

“We were inspired by the potential of 5D memory crystals to provide ultra-durable, high-density storage that can last billions of years,” lead researcher Peter Kazansky, an optoelectronics expert at the University of Southampton, tells Technology Networks’ Molly Coddington. “We were also inspired by the possibility that this technology could assist in the reconstruction of a person using stored genetic information, thus providing a form of information immortality that could safeguard human identity long into the future.”

In its largest size, the crystal can store up to 360 terabytes of information for billions of years—even when exposed to damaging conditions. It can survive cosmic radiation, weather extreme temperatures well below freezing and up to 1,832 degrees Fahrenheit and withstand a direct impact force of up to ten tons per square centimeter. At room temperature, the crystal can remain stable for 300 quintillion years, according to Guinness World Records—more than 21 billion times the current age of the universe.

Kazansky and his team transcribed the human genome using ultra-fast lasers that encoded the data into tiny voids in silica as small as 20 nanometers. “The information is translated into five different dimensions of its nanostructures—their height, length, width, orientation and position,” Rosa Rahimi writes for CNN. Hence the 5D.

Etched onto the crystal’s face is a visual key, containing depictions of hydrogen, oxygen, carbon and nitrogen atoms, as well as the DNA double helix and its four nucleotide bases. The team included a breakdown of a chromosome’s molecular structure, as well as how it fits into a cell, and drawings of a man and a woman.

“The visual key inscribed on the crystal gives the finder knowledge of what data is stored inside and how it could be used,” Kazansky says in the statement.

In the words of Sky News, however, “there is a catch.” We have no idea what sort of intelligent species—or machines—might stumble upon this memory crystal in the distant future, or if they’ll have the means to read it. Thomas Heinis, a data researcher at Imperial College London who was not involved in the study, tells CNN the team’s work is “super impressive,” but he has doubts about the viability of the vision.

“How will they know how to read the crystal? How will they know how to build the device to read the crystal? Will the device be available in hundreds of years?” he adds. “I can barely connect my ten-year-old iPod and listen to what I listened back then.”

Scientists are not currently able to create humans—nor plants or animals, for that matter—from just their genetic information, but recent advances in synthetic biology inspire confidence that one day, it might be possible. In the meantime, scientists are brainstorming other ways of safeguarding biological information in case of disasters, such as storing frozen animal cells in lunar craters.

“I think it’s always good to be ready for the future, no matter what,” Mary Hagedorn, a senior research scientist at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute and lead author of the lunar biodiversity repository study, told Smithsonian magazine’s Carlyn Kranking in August.

The 5D memory crystal inscribed with the human genome now sits in the Memory of Mankind archive, located in the world’s oldest salt mine, in Hallstatt, Austria. Hopefully it will remain there, unneeded, forever.

An Adams County district court judge on Friday overturned the mandatory prison sentence of a former Aurora paramedic who was convicted in the 2019 death of Elijah McClain. 

Peter Cichuniec, who was convicted in late December 2023 of criminally negligent homicide alongside Aurora paramedic Jeremy Cooper, was also found guilty of second-degree assault by unlawful administration of drugs. Cooper was acquitted of that charge. 

In March, Judge Mark Warner sentenced Cichuniec to five years in prison for the assault charge — the mandatory minimum sentence under sentencing guidelines. Cichuniec was also sentenced to one year in prison for the criminally negligent homicide charge, which was to be served concurrently. 

Six months later, Warner vacated Cichuniec’s sentence and converted it to four years of probation. 

According to our partners at The Denver Post , Cichuniec’s defense team filed a motion in June asking that the sentence be reduced because the case involved “unusual and exceptional” circumstances. The Denver Post states Warner could reduce the sentence under state law after Cichuniec spent at least 119 days in prison and after the Colorado Department of Corrections assessed his risk level and reported back to the judge, which both happened. 

The Denver Post reports that Warner “commented on Cichuniec’s lack of prior criminal history, rehabilitative potential, good character and his prior “pro-social” history, as well as his overall role in the events that led to McClain’s death” when issuing his ruling Friday. 

The Colorado Attorney General’s Office, which prosecuted the case, filed a brief opposing the sentence change . 

“A sentence modification in this case will undermine the jury’s verdict, the legislature’s mandatory sentencing scheme, and the deterrence of the abuse of anesthetic drugs for improper purposes,” the document reads. 

In its brief, the AG’s office said it was “exceptionally rare” for a mandatory prison sentence to be reduced under the state’s provision. Since 1977, only 203 sentences have been modified under the statute, according to the AG’s office. Elijah McClain’s mom to convicted paramedic: “You are a local hero no more” 

Denver7 sat down with criminal defense attorney Ryan Brackley to provide context to the judge’s decision. 

“I think that’s the most plain English way to say it. The judge, looking at Mr. Cichuniec’s past, his current presence in the Department of Corrections, decided this guy doesn’t belong in state prison,” explained Brackley. 

Colorado’s sentencing guidelines dictated that Cichuniec had to be sentenced to anywhere from five to 16 years in prison. 

“He was convicted of a crime to which the judge could not sentence him to anything less than five years,” Brackley explained. 

Another state statute, however, allows the judge to modify the sentence under certain circumstances. 

“In this particular case, the defense argued that based on his conduct in the Department of Corrections, based on the Department of Corrections’ assessment of him as not a high risk or a serious threat, based on his standing in the community, his lack of criminal history, those were unusual and extenuating circumstances which would allow the court to modify his sentence away from a prison sentence to a sentence such as probation, which is what the court did,” Brackley said. 

Cichuniec’s conviction still stands. Instead of spending five years in prison, he will serve four years of probation. 

“He will be on probation, and he will, for the rest of his life, have a conviction for what amounts to a violent felony,” Brackley said. 

Brackley said the move highlights the inconsistency in which the cases against the Aurora paramedics and police officers were charged and prosecuted. 

“The law says [Cichuniec] should do five years in prison. On the other hand, a judge found that probation was appropriate. So when we talk about deterrence and sending a message, again, we’re in this gray area, and there were a lot of gray areas in this case,” the attorney said.

The modification weighs heavily MiDian Shofner, who walked out of the courthouse alongside McClain’s mother with her fist held high after Cichuniec’s sentencing. 

“I think the first thing that I said to myself out loud was, ‘Probation is not justice. It’s not justice,’” said Shofner, who is the CEO of Epitome of Black Excellence & Partnership. 

Shofner said it’s a hard pill to swallow knowing the minimum sentence, handed down just months ago, was seen as too harsh. 

“For some reason, our lives are negotiable when it comes to justice in the system that we have,” she said. 

Former President of Colombia Andrés Pastrana on Saturday claimed that Venezuela is facing a “coup d’état” following the country’s disputed 2024 presidential elections. The leader of the IDEA group, a coalition of 31 former heads of government from countries in Latin America, emphasized the urgency of international intervention, specifically calling on the International Criminal Court (ICC) to protect the civilian population of Venezuela from ongoing abuses.

Pastrana’s remarks come amid heightened scrutiny of the Venezuelan government’s actions, which have been criticized for human rights violations and suppression of political dissent. He argues that the situation in Venezuela warrants serious international attention and intervention, suggesting that the ICC has a critical role to play in safeguarding the rights of Venezuelans.

The ICC’s involvement in the country began in February 2018 when the court announced preliminary probes into alleged crimes against humanity. This decision followed referrals from several Latin American countries, including Argentina, Colombia, and Peru, which cited widespread abuses occurring since at least 2014. The investigation was officially opened in November 2021 after a thorough preliminary examination led by ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan, which documented allegations of torture, extrajudicial killings, and political persecution.

In April 2022, Venezuela requested the ICC to defer its investigation, claiming that domestic efforts were underway. However, the ICC found that these domestic proceedings were inadequate and primarily targeted low-level offenders, failing to address high-level officials’ roles in systematic abuses. In June 2023, the ICC resumed its investigation after a temporary suspension. In August 2024, Amnesty International (AI) released an open letter urging the ICC to prioritize justice for victims of human rights abuses in Venezuela and emphasizing the need for accountability and action against those responsible for crimes against humanity.

Transformation. Redemption. Forgiveness. Remorse.  

A group of women who have served decades in Mississippi prisons use those words to describe how they have changed during incarceration and why the Parole Board should see that as evidence they can be released. 

But “disheartening” is another word. They use it to describe the cycle of seeking parole. The Parole Board holds a hearing, it rejects their petitions and they have to wait years for another opportunity. 

“I’ve taken accountability for my actions, sought to make reparations by living a life devoted to giving to others,” said Evelyn Smith, in a recording of her story in a campaign advocating for the release of her and four other women. 

“Statistically and realistically, I pose no threat to society,” said the 80-year-old, who was most recently denied parole in 2022 and whose next hearing is in 2027. “I often ponder what is being accomplished by my continued incarceration.”

Smith is one of the Mississippi Five – women convicted of murder and sentenced to life with the possibility of parole that has never come. Collectively, they have been incarcerated for over 175 years and denied parole nearly 50 times. 

The others are Loretta Pierre and Lisa Crevitt, 59; Linda Ross, 61 and Anita Krecic, 65. 

Parole denials, which include setoffs between hearings and for the duration of a person’s sentence, account for over a third of all parole outcomes, according to a Mississippi Today analysis of parole data between 2013 and 2023. 

Within the 10-year period, the highest number of setoffs was about 4,100 in 2016. Between 2017 and 2023, there have been roughly 2,000 setoffs each year. 

Belk told Mississippi Today the board looks for evidence of rehabilitation during parole hearings, but it is also exercising more scrutiny in processes and preparing people for release in a meaningful way, contributing to the parole grant’s decrease. 

Between 2013 and 2021, the average setoff between parole hearings was seven months, and in 2022, that increased to nearly 15 months. Belk has said the board has been using more two- and five-year setoff periods. 

In a decade, the longest setoff handed down was for 10 years in 2021. 

Belk said the longest setoff decided during his time on the board was eight years for Krecic, who has been eligible for parole since 1997 and has been denied 10 times. She was convicted of murder because she was with her boyfriend who fatally shot a state trooper on the Gulf Coast. He has since been executed.

Among those who received a five-year setoff was Smith, who has been incarcerated for over 30 years. Belk had told Mississippi Today’s Jerry Mitchell she was “unparole-able” because she didn’t understand the heinousness of her crime – the stabbing death of a Brookhaven woman and the transport of her body out of state. 

In a recorded interview through the Free the Five campaign, Smith said she took on jobs, mentored younger women, kept a nearly spotless institutional record on her path to become “a person worthy of (a second chance)” and redeemable in the eyes of the parole board. 

‘When is it enough?’

Pauline Rogers, co-founder of Jackson nonprofit Reaching and Educating for Community Hope Foundation, advocates for efforts to help people released from prison and reduce recidivism. 

She’s seen the Mississippi Five and other incarcerated people take steps to change and demonstrate they are ready for release and have plans to keep them from returning to prison, only for them to be denied. At a certain point, Rogers said there is nothing more they can do to rehabilitate.

“If you perpetually punish them for something … How long do you punish them?” she asked. “When is it enough?”

Belk told Mississippi Today the board looks for evidence of rehabilitation during parole hearings, but it is also exercising more scrutiny in processes and preparing people for release in a meaningful way, contributing to the parole grant’s decrease. 

It found what it saw as evidence when it released ouble murderer James Williams III, amid pushback from the family of his victims, lawmakers and members of law enforcement. 

In prison, Williams earned a GED and a bachelor’s in Christian ministry and completed other educational rehabilitation programs, which signaled to the board that he was ready for release. After a DUI arrest months after his release, the board revoked his parole and sent him back to prison, where he remains. 

Homicide remains the most common primary conviction for those denied parole – nearly 6% of all denial outcomes, according to MDOC data. 

The chance for parole release for anyone, regardless of charges, has narrowed as the board’s grant rate has declined. Within a year of a new chairman, Jeffery Belk, and members joining the board, the parole grant fell from around two-thirds before 2021 to about a third in 2022. 

Since last year, the parole grant rate has returned to above 50%. Since 2022, the board has paroled over 6,000 people.

Rogers sees issues with how parole is handled in Mississippi, including how the state doesn’t seem to give people a constitutional right to parole – leaving power in the hands of the board, including how to make decisions. 

“The Parole Board has become judge, jury and executioner,” she said. 

Seeming to support Rogers’ point, Julia Norman, the newest member of the board, said during her February 2023 Senate confirmation hearing that if someone was convicted of a violent crime and received a sentence shorter than the board thinks the person should have received, the board might deny release so the person can “finish that sentence off.”

Those convicted after 2014 are supposed to be reviewed for parole if they are not released at their initial parole date, which would be a one-year setoff, according to state law. Those convicted before that can be set off for longer than a year.

Belk said setoffs aren’t a definitive “no” because people have been paroled after trying multiple times to be released. 

Of women with life sentences granted parole between 1989 and 2022, Barbara Wilson was denied parole 12 times before her release in 2022 after 37 years, according to records compiled by parole advocate Mitzi Magleby. 

‘No chance of being paroled’

To make sure someone is ready for parole, Belk said the board might vote for a setoff to give the person time to complete a GED or a program like alcohol and drug treatment, which both have limited spaces in any given prison. 

He and Steve Pickett, the former Parole Board chairman from 2013 to 2021, said when the board has felt unsure about whether someone was prepared for release, they ordered a setoff to see how the person would react. 

Sometimes the person comes back before the board and shows improvement. Others don’t handle the rejection well and act out, sometimes landing them with a rules violation report, which can count against them in future parole hearings, Belk said. 

In the past, Belk said there were people in prison for violent offenses with continuously bad behavior in prison who were receiving six-month setoffs, which he doesn’t see as a sign that the person can follow rules if released. 

He said it was difficult for the board to continue to have to see those “who had no chance of being paroled” and to see victims and families relive and retell how the crime affected their lives each time the person had a parole hearing. 

So the board decided to extend its setoff periods to two to five years for those with violent offenses to see if the extra time would help and to provide some relief for victims and families, Belk said. 

He said this contributed to the parole rate’s decrease. 

Beverly Warnock is executive director of Parents of Murdered Children, a national group based in Ohio that advocates for parents and other survivors, including in parole hearings. 

Since 1990, the organization has worked with families to oppose parole of thousands of people convicted of murder across the country through its Parole Block Program. Through circulating petitions, the organization has helped keep more than 1,850 people in prison for a longer sentence after they became eligible for parole, Warnock said.

She said she believes the petitions send a message to the parole boards and show them that people have safety concerns if someone is released. 

“It gave (families) the strong feeling of relief that the murderer would not get out,” Warnock said. “… They feel like they’re doing justice for their loved ones.” 

To date no petitions have come from Missisisppi, she said, but that may because the organization doesn’t have a presence in the state. The nearest chapter is in Alabama. 

Study and Struggle

Members of the Mississippi Five have participated in a political educational program hosted by Study and Struggle, a collaborative that focuses on prison abolition. 

The campaign is using art to share the women’s stories and having conversations about parole and decarceration. 

A collective of artists working with Study and Struggle turned oral history interviews with the women into zines that blend text, photos and drawings. The collaboration also included the Mississippi Five themselves, who provided feedback. 

Jaime Dear, a Chicago area-based artist who worked on the zine about Krecic and helped design the others, said art is an effective way to communicate and a way to connect. 

“(The zines) are for everyone to read,” Dear said. “The five should have their stories illustrated lovingly.” 

Corey Devon Arthur, an artist and writer incarcerated in New York, created the color group photo of the women at the top of the Study and Struggle website that hosts information about the campaign and parole. An artist named Phan drew portraits for each of the Mississippi Five. 

Loretta Pierre, who has been denied parole 14 times, was 20 years old and pregnant with her only child when she was charged with the murder of her ex-boyfriend’s new girlfriend. 

She is now a grandmother to three children she has not met in person, Pierre said in her oral history interview with Study and Struggle. 

Linda Ross, 61, has had seven parole denials. She pleaded guilty and was convicted for the murder of a man in Pike County, the McComb Enterprise Journal reported. 

In her oral history interview, Ross said she was misdiagnosed at some point as mentally disabled and psychotic, but said she didn’t accept the evaluation as final and has overcome many challenges since. 

During incarceration, she has earned a GED and is enrolled at Mississippi Valley State University through a prison education partnership. 

She said she looks forward to returning home to be with her elderly mother and live out her senior years. 

“I believe I have not only transformed my mind but have risen above resentments by using this opportunity to choose forgiveness,” Ross said. 

Washington is sitting on millions of dollars collected from incarcerated people for phone calls and other fees – money that is supposed to be spent to improve prisoner welfare.

The Incarcerated Individual Betterment Fund grew by about $1 million from last July to an estimated $12 million at the end of June, according to budget documents.

Advocates, prisoners and their family members say much of the money in the fund is collecting dust. And many believe the account shouldn’t exist at all, arguing the state should bankroll programs the fund is supposed to support.

“We should really just be providing these services as a state,” said state Sen. Drew Hansen, D-Bainbridge Island. Hansen introduced legislation to make phone calls in prison free this year, which would have ended the main source of revenue for the fund. 

“The whole structure of charging people in prison for some very basic services is not terribly sensible,” he said. 

The state raised $4 million for the fund in the most recent fiscal year, largely from phone call fees. A quarter of the money went to the crime victims compensation program, which helps victims with costs related to crime injuries. The dollars used for prisoners during that time went to programs like partial travel reimbursements for families and holiday event decor. 

The Department of Corrections said that the Incarcerated Individual Betterment Fund grew significantly during the pandemic and the agency is drafting plans to spend it down, but family members of prisoners say the state’s failure to spend the dollars effectively and advertise the fund’s existence to incarcerated people is a longstanding problem. 

“Nothing really changes or happens with that money,” said Greg Mansfield, vice chair of the Department of Corrections’ statewide advisory family council. “The amount in there just grows and grows and grows.”

Welfare and betterment funds

Prisoner welfare funds like the Incarcerated Individual Benefit Fund exist across the country, said Wanda Bertram, a policy expert at Prison Policy Initiative, which has researched the issue. 

“In jails, what tends to happen is the jail will use welfare fund money for things they shouldn’t be using it for, including uses that are illegal,” Bertram said. “Prisons are more likely to be sitting on the money and not doing anything with it.” 

“There is simply so much money coming in from the telecom and commissary contracts that prisons have with their providers,” Bertram added. “Prison administrators may not even be aware of how much money is in these funds.” 

Prison Policy Initiative research suggests that nationwide, welfare funds are often used on basic essentials and staffing. Part of the reason Washington’s fund has grown so much, said the Department of Corrections, was because the Legislature began using other money to cover 28 staff positions that were previously paid out of the betterment fund. 

In Washington, the law governing the betterment fund says that it must only be used on capital or operating costs for privileges, not prison essentials. The Department of Corrections’ policy limits that further, preventing funds from being used on things like books for the law library, furniture for the visitor area and “premium movie channels” like Showtime. 

“It’s an excellent example of how DOC will interpret legislation very narrowly,” said Heather Kelly, the League of Women Voters’ criminal justice chair. “DOC will find a way to draft a policy that has the stingiest possible interpretation.”

This year, the agency approved proposals for arts programs, recreation and “wellness activities.” The department said it is also considering proposals for “therapeutic gardens and beautification projects” as well as music programs.

Ralph Dunuan, who’s incarcerated at Washington Corrections Center, wants to see the department spend the betterment fund on community-oriented and prisoner-led rehabilitation groups, like conflict resolution workshops. 

The agency’s policy prohibits spending from the fund on cultural programs or groups that don’t involve “the majority of the population” unless it is an “approved family-centered” program or event. 

“If we are talking about bettering quality of life within facilities then we should be able to tap into these funds to support programming,” Dunuan said. 

No clear way to request funds

In Washington, Department of Corrections staff and two family members who represent the statewide family council prepare a proposed funding plan annually. That plan is presented to the agency’s secretary, who either approves the plan or requests additional information. 

However, there is “no formal written process for requesting funds outside of this process,” a Department of Corrections spokesperson, Chris Wright, said, although the agency “does collect funding requests.” 

That informal process is confusing for a lot of people, including Mansfield. 

“There’s not really a way to go to a betterment fund office and say ‘I think the facility needs to spend money on this,’” Mansfield said. 

Kristel Monte, one of the two family members who sit on the Incarcerated Individual Betterment Fund advisory board, said that even she struggles to get the Department of Corrections to consider her betterment fund requests. 

“We don’t really have that much say,” Monte said about her advisory position.

Monte said the Department of Corrections encourages family members to make requests on the facility level, rather than to the agency’s headquarters, but the facility administrators at Washington Corrections Center, where her husband is incarcerated, often shut her down. It’s a sentiment shared by family members at other prisons, too.  

“We went to visiting one time…and I was like, ‘Where’s the colored pencils? There’s no paper for coloring on for their kids,’” Monte said. 

“I requested it and it went into a black hole. This has been months now,” she said. “When I complained about it, [Washington Corrections Center staff] said ‘Oh, you just need to request it.’ There’s no follow through.” 

Mansfield said a lot of the programs offered through the betterment fund are helpful, but the Department of Corrections fails to promote them. He pointed to the travel reimbursement program, which provides up to $50 twice a month for travel or lodging. Many families don’t use it because they don’t know it’s available, he said. 

“If you have $10 million, you could probably provide up to the cost of a couple nights stay in the hotel,” Mansfield said. “If I give them receipts for $200, there’s absolutely no reason why they couldn’t afford to cover it.” 

Should the fund even exist?

Mansfield and Monte said Washington officials often tout the state’s focus on keeping families together and reunification as a form of rehabilitation for prisoners, but it would be easier for families to stay connected if loved ones could use the money they pay into the fund for visits and other purposes. 

“If they’re talking about building family bonds and keeping those connections, they should be putting into that versus the families having to pay all these extra fees to build up a $12 million pot that’s not even actually being utilized,” Monte said. 

Hansen said if his bill to make prison phone calls free had passed, lawmakers would have likely appropriated additional money for the Department of Corrections to “make up for the lost revenue.” 

Lawmakers didn’t pass the bill this year due to how expensive it would be, according to Hansen. The state is studying how other states have made phone calls free. 

Monte said the Department of Corrections has renewed interest in spending the existing money. But the agency’s headquarters is failing to communicate with prisons about the request process, Monte said. She said she’s asked the agency to survey the state’s prisoners about the fund and the agency said they will, but she’s not convinced: “They’ve been saying that for years.”

“The main feedback is complaints about ‘nobody knows what they’re doing,” Monte said. “Staff isn’t even educated on what they’re doing. The [incarcerated] guys don’t even know about the funds. I had to tell them about it, and they were like, ‘What, we can spend that? That’s our money?’” 

“This is for the betterment of [the prisoners] and they need a voice,” Monte said. “The money’s just building up.”

Maryland is one of two states, with California, to pass a so-called Kids Code law — legislation aimed at providing privacy and other protections to children using online platforms.

But a federal appeals court’s decision this month to uphold much of a lower court’s injunction of the California law – on which Maryland’s law is based – is raising new fears about the vulnerability of the Maryland law to court challenge.

“There’s definitely, for those of us who are constantly looking at the legality of these provisions, there are some open questions,” said Meetali Jain, director of the Tech Justice Law Project — an organization that has supported the passage of Kids Code laws.

The Aug. 16 ruling by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held some positives for Kids Code supporters: It said a lower court may have gone too far when it issued a preliminary injunction on First Amendment grounds.

But the appellate court largely agreed with the lower court that tech firms were likely to succeed on their claim that the law violates free speech protections, by requiring them to review products they believe would be used by children looking for content that could be harmful. Those portions of the California Age-Appropriate Design Code Act amount to a restraint on speech, the court said.

That was the claim made by NetChoice, a tech industry group that has aggressively opposed state efforts to impose regulations. The group has lobbyists in more than two dozen states. The effort in Maryland is in addition to lobbyists hired by individual members including Google, Facebook parent company Meta, and Amazon.

Maryland passed its Kids Code law this year, and advocates consider it an evolved, upgraded version of the California law.

“I think a lot of people believe that the district court in California got it wrong, but just because they got it wrong doesn’t mean that folks can’t try and strengthen the bill against a legal attack in Maryland,” said Nichole Rocha, a California-based data privacy rights attorney who worked on both the California and Maryland laws. “So absolutely, there was a lot of consideration given to amendments to make it legally stronger.”

A similar bill passed this year in Vermont, but Gov. Phil Scott (R) vetoed it and lawmakers there were unable to override his veto.

The Maryland bills — House Bill 603 and Senate Bill 571 — were signed into law in May and take effect in October. It will require default privacy settings and safety measures for children. The law limits the collection of data,  including geolocation data, from minors by social media and other companies, as well as the sale of that data. And it requires that companies complete assessments in 2026 of new features, focusing on the effects on children.

Negligent violations of the law are punishable by a fine of $2,500 per child per instance, while intentional violations carry a fine of $7,500 pe child per instance.

The legislation was sponsored in the Maryland General Assembly by Del. Jared Solomon (D-Dist. 18), who represents Chevy Chase and Kensington, and Sen. Ben Kramer (D-Dist. 19), who represents Silver Spring. 

Attorney General Anthony Brown, in a letter to Moore, said that while the law was “not clearly unconstitutional,” there are “potential constitutional issues” within the act.

Key among them were the state’s data privacy provisions. Brown wrote that there is risk that “a reviewing court will construe some of the Maryland Act’s provisions … to regulate speech or other expressive conduct, and as such, subject them to heightened scrutiny under the First Amendment and find those provisions unconstitutional.”

But Brown concluded that any individual provisions struck down by the court could be severed from the rest of the law.

So far, there has been no legal challenge.

Rocha said she and others believe NetChoice could be biding its time in Maryland while awaiting a final decision on the California law.

“They’re just waiting to see what happens so they can position themselves,” Rocha said.

A spokesperson for NetChoice said the group does not publicly discuss legal strategy.

Del. Jared Solomon (D-Montgomery), who sponsored the House version of the bill, said in May that he was confident the Maryland law would  be the first to withstand judicial scrutiny. Solomon did not respond to a request for comment on the impact of the California ruling.

A key change in the Maryland law is language making it clear that there is no intent to censor content or limiting access to content, Rocha said. Additionally, Maryland more clearly defines “best interest of the child” and includes physical, financial and psychological harm.

And advocates point out that Maryland included language that prevents the entire law from being struck down if a court finds one or more provisions are unconstitutional.

Appeals court strikes down part of California law

California passed its version in 2022. NetChoice – whose members include Amazon, Google, Meta, Netflix and X – sued in federal district court on Dec. 14, 2022, and it asked for a preliminary injunction of the law on Feb. 17, 2023.

The district court agreed with NetChoice, temporarily blocking the law on Sept. 18, 2023, sparking the appeal to the 9th Circuit.

The appeals court ruling was, in some ways, a setback for supporters of the California law. In a 44-page decision handed down on Aug. 16, a three-judge panel agreed that a required data protection impact assessment in California law violated the First Amendment.

The assessment’s requirement that “covered businesses opine on and mitigate the risk that children may be exposed to harmful or potentially harmful materials online … facially violates the First Amendment,” the court panel said.

The appellate court remanded the case back to the lower court for additional review. In the opinion, the panel said it was “unclear,” based on the initial court review, if other challenged provisions of the California law “violated the First Amendment.”

Lawsuit watch in Maryland

The lack of litigation against the Maryland law so far does not mean it is in the clear.

Jain said the appeals court ruling in the California case leaves four open constitutional questions: Are data privacy protections and design safeguards constitutional; can the rest of the law stand if the court finds data privacy impact assessments unconstitutional; can social media platforms be required to verify or estimate the age of a user; and are duty of care provisions constitutional?

The Maryland law goes into effect in October. A legal challenge could still come when Maryland implements the law.

“Maryland’s law is very similar to (the California law), especially the Data Protection Impact Assessment provision, which the Ninth Circuit focused on as likely unconstitutional under strict scrutiny. That is an even higher standard than the District Court reviewed it under,” Krista Chavez, a spokesperson for NetChoice, wrote in an email response to questions.

A bipartisan group of senators is demanding immediate action from USDA Secretary Thomas Vilsack after several tribal nations reported that a federal food distribution program they rely on has not fulfilled orders for months, and in some cases has delivered expired food. 

Last spring, the USDA consolidated from two contractors to one for deliveries of its Food Distribution Program in Indian Reservations. In a letter sent to Vilsack on Friday, the senators expressed concern that Native American families across the country are experiencing “extreme disruptions.” 

“Participating households have not had consistent food deliveries for over four months,” the senators wrote. “This is unacceptable.” 

Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley of Oregon said he was stunned to hear from five tribal nations in his state this summer that they have been struggling to meet their families’ needs since the consolidation. 

“The USDA must swiftly and fully address this self-inflicted crisis,” Merkley said in a statement. “There can be no more excuses for food delays, missed deliveries, or delivery of expired products.” 

Merkley is joined in the letter by Republican senators John Hoeven and Kevin Cramer of North Dakota and Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma, as well as Democrats Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, Ron Wyden of Oregon, and Tina Smith of Minnesota. 

More than 50,000 Native American families rely on this food, said Mary Greene-Trottier, who directs food distribution for the Spirit Lake Nation and is president of the National Association of Food Distribution Programs on Indian Reservations. 

“They’re going without,” Greene-Trottier said. “Imagine showing up at the grocery store during Covid or a winter blizzard, and the shelves are empty. That’s the feeling that they get.” 

Officials with Spirit Lake Nation, a tribe in North Dakota with about 7,600 members, said one order this month arrived only partially filled, and another the month before never came. 

“We didn’t know our trucks weren’t coming until they didn’t show up,” Greene-Trottier said. 

In a July letter to Secretary Vilsack, she and other tribal officials expressed skepticism that the remaining contractor, Paris Brothers Inc., would have enough time to transition into being the sole provider for food deliveries to dozens of tribal nations. The Kansas City, Missouri-based food wholesaler was given only four weeks to prepare for the increased workload, according to the letter. 

In a statement, Paris Brothers Inc. said it is “actively addressing” the recent challenges. 

The USDA has responded with updates in weekly calls with tribal leaders, and a consultation with tribes is scheduled for next month in Washington, D.C. 

The agency said the decision to consolidate was the outcome of a competitive bidding process, and Paris Brothers was the only company that the USDA board determined could meet the need. To help the contractor scale up to handle a larger influx of inventory, the agency has provided USDA staff to assist with customer service-related work with tribes and is partnering with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to help with the company’s logistics program. 

“Our first order of business has been to get food where it’s needed,” the agency said in a statement. “In addition, we are undertaking a review of our procurement process to prevent similar circumstances from occurring in the future.” 

The agency also is assisting tribes in using other federal programs that can offer additional food and resources, and has offered $11 million to tribal nations to address the food shortages while Paris Brothers tries to catch up. 

But Greene-Trottier said that money likely won’t go far enough, and tribal leaders have been told they won’t be eligible for reimbursement of any additional costs. She’s been relying on other programs and scarce resources to fill the gaps. The Spirit Lake Nation and others have even offered to drive to Missouri to pick up their food orders themselves, but Greene-Trottier said that request was denied by the USDA. 

On Thursday, Spirit Lake Nation officials said they were told missing orders from July will be canceled and left unfulfilled. Vice Chair ReNa Lohnes said the tribe has yet to receive its portion of the $11 million, leaving them hard pressed for solutions and not knowing how, if ever, they will be made whole again. 

Lohnes said she had concerns from the beginning, when USDA announced the change, but she never imagined they would be where they are now. “Thinking that we would be scrambling for food,” she said. “We’ve been told that it’s coming, it’s coming, it’s coming. And we wait and wait and nothing.”