Can I get a material witness?

Real quick: this piece accompanied a story by Sarah Stillman on The New Yorker website yesterday, about material witnesses (victims, or witnesses of a crime, that are essential to the prosecution of the suspect). It details the way authorities around the country jail innocent victims of crimes in order to secure testimony from them. In some cases, material witnesses have been jailed for years.

It is due to an arcane statute, based on the rational reasoning that criminals should not go free because no one is available to testify against them. However, it is used overwhelmingly against minorities, the poor and homeless, and often times against victims of domestic violence and sexual assault. Read the piece here. The sad part is just how many stories nowadays involving the criminal "justice" system in the U.S. can be described as Kafkaesque. From episodes like these, to Guantanamo Bay, to the story of Kalief Browder, to so many others. Thanks to my AD, Kara!

He's seen the needle and the damage done.

This piece of mine ran in last Friday's Boston Globe. It accompanied an Op-Ed by Steve Tompkins, the Sheriff of Suffolk County (which includes Boston, Chelsea, Winthrop and Revere). He advocates for more and better drug addiction treatment and recovery programs, recognizing that the county jails are often the only means of obtaining any sort of treatment for individuals that cannot afford treatment programs outside of law enforcement.  As he states in the op-ed: "...our fellow citizens should not have to go to jail in order to receive treatment."

He and the Sheriff's Department propose things like expanding detox centers, giving medically-assisted substance abuse treatment to inmates in county jails, and more. Read his op-ed here.
Here's a close-up of the piece:

Thank you to Nathan, my AD!