I have worked with women in prison for
close to two decades most of that time
in a program that I founded the family
preservation project in the family
preservation project we work alongside
women to become deeply rooted and their
identities as mothers and to provide for
their children the things that no one
was able to provide for them to break a
cycle going into prison is like being
dropped on another planet and I have
spent the majority of my time there
trying to understand its function and
its purpose its value how we got to this
place and wrestling with my own purpose
and value knowing that no matter how
much I believe in the work we are doing
it takes place in a place where human
beings live in cages and always wishing
it didn’t inside of the prison walls of
countless stories stories with which I
have been entrusted sad stories tragic
stories cruel stories hilarious stories
stories of violence and chaos emptiness
and longing bad choices no choices
thoughtlessness forgetfulness human
stories really prison’s themselves write
stories of their successes and heroes of
safety and transformation personal
growth and rehabilitation and in those
rare moments where prison might for
whatever reason creep into your
consciousness you tell stories to and
then there are the most troubling
stories of all these are the stories
that the women inside have learned to
tell about their own brokenness and
salvation the story where prison saved
their life because of all of the stories
that we tell this is the one that seems
to land it provides the guards and the
guarded the citizens and the taxpayers
the victims and the judges with a
somewhat coherent narrative or at the
very least a story we can live with we
have in fact built an entire system on
the backs of this story and in this
story prison gets to be a hero
this is not one of those stories this is
a true story a tale of a life not
extraordinary just a regular life
interrupted by events that led to
another caged story
Ashley was 24 when we met she had long
shiny brown hair and easy smile and a
silly side she could have been any one
of your daughters or maybe even mine
she had been a college student and
became a mother to her daughter Sophia
at the age of 21
Sophia was the love of her life
Ashley also had a long-standing struggle
with alcoholism and as an unintended
consequence of her imprisonment was on a
fast track towards the termination of
her parental rights of irrevocably
losing the right to ever be a mother
again she asked if a family preservation
project could help on the evening of
February 15 2011 Ashley made a terrible
life-altering decision after a long
familiar domestic dispute with a father
of her child during which she consumed a
lot of alcohol Ashley got into her car
with her toddler age daughter and
another young child she woke up in a
trauma center having learned that she
had blacked out driven off the road and
hit a utility pole her daughter and
especially the other young child had
sustained injuries but were stable next
a flurry of detectives Child Protective
Services the last image that Sophia
would have was of her mother being
shackled to her hospital bed after she
flew into the panic and rage that any
mother watching their child being taken
away would Ashley was facing two serious
felony convictions that would send her
to prison for close to 12 years she
accepted a plea deal for five years with
good time but no programs as an
incentive not to take her case to trial
as a part of her punishment
Ashley would be ineligible to receive
treatment she would be disallowed the
opportunity to address the very thing
that brought her to prison and there
would also be no programs available to
her
inside that addressed domestic violence
or grief or trauma or loss or eating
disorders but you and I would invest the
same two hundred and seven thousand
dollars simply to keep Ashley locked
away whether or not she had the
opportunity to get better or make
anything better you see the story that
Ashley was broken meant we could simply
throw her away at her sentencing hearing
the judge told Ashley that her daughter
Sophia who was less than three years old
at the time
would grow up to be an alcoholic just
like her and that her daughter Sophia
would end up in prison just like her and
you and I would invest $200,000 for the
state to provide for Sophia’s care and
while this story ignited a small spark
inside of Ashley to prove this judge
wrong this story of brokenness and
inevitability also wound up living deep
inside of her as stories that are told
about us often do clearly Ashley’s is a
terrible story and on that February
evening lives were changed forever
so to paint Ashley or all of the women I
have worked with as victims of
circumstance and their crimes victimless
crimes would be unfair and untrue in
fact all of the women who I’ve worked
with inside have hurt people and
especially their children but let’s be
clear that what was required in all of
their stories was an interruption and
would ultimately save their lives was
the interruption that interruption
happened to be prison which is a very
high stakes game but when people with
access to resources lies begin to spiral
out of control as they often do and even
when they hurt people along the way they
might go on a retreat or to a spa or a
high-end treatment facility no forced
separation from their children for years
on end no living in cages no state
identification number no label for life
and to those inclined to crime and
punishment I want you to consider this
most crimes that women commit are crimes
of survival
crimes rooted in addiction and the
through-line is not criminal thinking or
brokenness but poverty so no high-end
treatment center the interruption comes
in the form of human caging a solution
that we created on the backs of many
stories that aren’t true in the family
preservation project we have spent years
pounding our fists on the table trying
to convince folks that these our stories
aren’t true and to bring the stories
that are true to life do you know who
the hardest people to convince that
there are holes in these stories of
brokenness and prison as heroes are it’s
not the lawmakers or even the actors in
our criminal legal system the hardest
people to convince that these stories
aren’t true are the women inside and
inside of whom these stories live so
Ashleigh join the family preservation
project with a singular goal in mind the
same goal that we have for every mother
to rewrite the ending of a story that
had both been written and not yet
written you see not only was Ashleigh
discarded because of her brokenness so
in essence was Sophia as the story of
her brokenness was already being penned
the work ahead was to reverse the
termination of Ashley’s parental rights
to do this we would fight alongside her
tooth and nail to get into that
treatment program the one the judge
disallowed to do this she would need to
demonstrate over and over again that she
was not only fit but more importantly
worthy of being a mother and to do this
she would need to believe those things
but until she could we would believe
them for her the family preservation
project her village would surround
Ashley with love until she was able to
begin to love herself because this is
the only thing that works but prison as
the solution had the following
consequences making it hard for Ashley
to muster a fight her mental health
deteriorated her eating disorder became
exacerbated her confidence and
self-esteem were shattered as the state
went about its business of irrevocably
taking away her right to ever be
again she became institutionalized and
still suffers from PTSD from her time
inside and Sophia would suffer a long
traumatic and ambiguous loss of her
mother on the heels of an extremely
traumatic event so what did we
accomplish we created an interruption
Ashlee was removed from the community
for five years so that she would not
pose a threat and Sophia was cared for
by a safe and loving family during their
separation and that’s really it if we
were to focus on Ashlee’s actual
transgression its root causes the harm
that she caused and repairing that harm
and we hold that up to the intervention
that we offered and it’s cost both human
and financial prison as a solution was
an abject failure so if our intent is
simply to punish or on the money but
punishment alone does not ensure Public
Safety and prison does not deter crime
if it did we would see better than a 50%
rate of recidivism nationwide if our
intent is to make corrections which is
the story that we tell we are
undoubtedly missing the mark and even if
we were to heavily resource prisons with
programs that address the things that
brought people there they would still be
prisons human cages and the unintended
consequences would still be immense what
if we reimagine Ashley’s story what if
the story went something like this
Ashley woke up in a trauma center having
learned that she had blacked out driven
off the road and hit a utility pole her
daughter and especially the other young
child is to Stane injuries but were
stable folks in the hospital immediately
attended to everybody’s physical and
emotional needs and when the detectives
and Child Protective Services arrived
they assessed the situation as a whole
and determined to send Ashley to a
secure residential dual diagnosis
treatment facility where she
address the underlying issues that led
to her alcoholism an eating disorder
where her daughter could live and where
they together could begin to heal from
the trauma that they both endured took
her driver’s license away for three
years and remanded her to community
service working with teens around the
perils of junk driving and in a trauma
center where she could help others begin
to heal this might almost look like true
accountability this might look a lot
like humanity today Ashley as a mother
two years from now she will earn her
bachelor’s degree she attends to her
physical health her mental health her
sobriety and a successfully stayed out
of unhealthy relationships and prison
did not save her life because prison has
saved no one’s life at least known that
I know but when the only tool you’ve got
is a hammer everything looks like a nail
when our story is a people are broken we
can simply throw them away and if they
emerge from prison still standing and
believing that prison and not the
interruption saved their life then
prison gets to be the hero I want to
tell you a story that I know a story
with which I have had the privilege of
being entrusted a true story the women
inside the walls are not broken people
their lives needed to be interrupted yes
but they are not the stories we have
made of them Prison has become a social
services agency of last resort a place
that lives at the intersection of all of
our failures to provide interruptions
and here’s what prisons are not they’re
not hospitals or schools or mental
health facilities or maternity wards
these things exist inside in small
numbers as prisons attempt to meet the
demands and expectations we have placed
on them the system is not broken
prisons are human cages doing exactly
what they were designed to do so let’s
let’s abandon the idea of building
better prisons let’s work to create
better interruptions let’s reimagine a
world where we no longer look to repair
harm by inflicting it a world where
Ashley not prison gets to be the hero of
the story thank you [Applause]
close to two decades most of that time
in a program that I founded the family
preservation project in the family
preservation project we work alongside
women to become deeply rooted and their
identities as mothers and to provide for
their children the things that no one
was able to provide for them to break a
cycle going into prison is like being
dropped on another planet and I have
spent the majority of my time there
trying to understand its function and
its purpose its value how we got to this
place and wrestling with my own purpose
and value knowing that no matter how
much I believe in the work we are doing
it takes place in a place where human
beings live in cages and always wishing
it didn’t inside of the prison walls of
countless stories stories with which I
have been entrusted sad stories tragic
stories cruel stories hilarious stories
stories of violence and chaos emptiness
and longing bad choices no choices
thoughtlessness forgetfulness human
stories really prison’s themselves write
stories of their successes and heroes of
safety and transformation personal
growth and rehabilitation and in those
rare moments where prison might for
whatever reason creep into your
consciousness you tell stories to and
then there are the most troubling
stories of all these are the stories
that the women inside have learned to
tell about their own brokenness and
salvation the story where prison saved
their life because of all of the stories
that we tell this is the one that seems
to land it provides the guards and the
guarded the citizens and the taxpayers
the victims and the judges with a
somewhat coherent narrative or at the
very least a story we can live with we
have in fact built an entire system on
the backs of this story and in this
story prison gets to be a hero
this is not one of those stories this is
a true story a tale of a life not
extraordinary just a regular life
interrupted by events that led to
another caged story
Ashley was 24 when we met she had long
shiny brown hair and easy smile and a
silly side she could have been any one
of your daughters or maybe even mine
she had been a college student and
became a mother to her daughter Sophia
at the age of 21
Sophia was the love of her life
Ashley also had a long-standing struggle
with alcoholism and as an unintended
consequence of her imprisonment was on a
fast track towards the termination of
her parental rights of irrevocably
losing the right to ever be a mother
again she asked if a family preservation
project could help on the evening of
February 15 2011 Ashley made a terrible
life-altering decision after a long
familiar domestic dispute with a father
of her child during which she consumed a
lot of alcohol Ashley got into her car
with her toddler age daughter and
another young child she woke up in a
trauma center having learned that she
had blacked out driven off the road and
hit a utility pole her daughter and
especially the other young child had
sustained injuries but were stable next
a flurry of detectives Child Protective
Services the last image that Sophia
would have was of her mother being
shackled to her hospital bed after she
flew into the panic and rage that any
mother watching their child being taken
away would Ashley was facing two serious
felony convictions that would send her
to prison for close to 12 years she
accepted a plea deal for five years with
good time but no programs as an
incentive not to take her case to trial
as a part of her punishment
Ashley would be ineligible to receive
treatment she would be disallowed the
opportunity to address the very thing
that brought her to prison and there
would also be no programs available to
her
inside that addressed domestic violence
or grief or trauma or loss or eating
disorders but you and I would invest the
same two hundred and seven thousand
dollars simply to keep Ashley locked
away whether or not she had the
opportunity to get better or make
anything better you see the story that
Ashley was broken meant we could simply
throw her away at her sentencing hearing
the judge told Ashley that her daughter
Sophia who was less than three years old
at the time
would grow up to be an alcoholic just
like her and that her daughter Sophia
would end up in prison just like her and
you and I would invest $200,000 for the
state to provide for Sophia’s care and
while this story ignited a small spark
inside of Ashley to prove this judge
wrong this story of brokenness and
inevitability also wound up living deep
inside of her as stories that are told
about us often do clearly Ashley’s is a
terrible story and on that February
evening lives were changed forever
so to paint Ashley or all of the women I
have worked with as victims of
circumstance and their crimes victimless
crimes would be unfair and untrue in
fact all of the women who I’ve worked
with inside have hurt people and
especially their children but let’s be
clear that what was required in all of
their stories was an interruption and
would ultimately save their lives was
the interruption that interruption
happened to be prison which is a very
high stakes game but when people with
access to resources lies begin to spiral
out of control as they often do and even
when they hurt people along the way they
might go on a retreat or to a spa or a
high-end treatment facility no forced
separation from their children for years
on end no living in cages no state
identification number no label for life
and to those inclined to crime and
punishment I want you to consider this
most crimes that women commit are crimes
of survival
crimes rooted in addiction and the
through-line is not criminal thinking or
brokenness but poverty so no high-end
treatment center the interruption comes
in the form of human caging a solution
that we created on the backs of many
stories that aren’t true in the family
preservation project we have spent years
pounding our fists on the table trying
to convince folks that these our stories
aren’t true and to bring the stories
that are true to life do you know who
the hardest people to convince that
there are holes in these stories of
brokenness and prison as heroes are it’s
not the lawmakers or even the actors in
our criminal legal system the hardest
people to convince that these stories
aren’t true are the women inside and
inside of whom these stories live so
Ashleigh join the family preservation
project with a singular goal in mind the
same goal that we have for every mother
to rewrite the ending of a story that
had both been written and not yet
written you see not only was Ashleigh
discarded because of her brokenness so
in essence was Sophia as the story of
her brokenness was already being penned
the work ahead was to reverse the
termination of Ashley’s parental rights
to do this we would fight alongside her
tooth and nail to get into that
treatment program the one the judge
disallowed to do this she would need to
demonstrate over and over again that she
was not only fit but more importantly
worthy of being a mother and to do this
she would need to believe those things
but until she could we would believe
them for her the family preservation
project her village would surround
Ashley with love until she was able to
begin to love herself because this is
the only thing that works but prison as
the solution had the following
consequences making it hard for Ashley
to muster a fight her mental health
deteriorated her eating disorder became
exacerbated her confidence and
self-esteem were shattered as the state
went about its business of irrevocably
taking away her right to ever be
again she became institutionalized and
still suffers from PTSD from her time
inside and Sophia would suffer a long
traumatic and ambiguous loss of her
mother on the heels of an extremely
traumatic event so what did we
accomplish we created an interruption
Ashlee was removed from the community
for five years so that she would not
pose a threat and Sophia was cared for
by a safe and loving family during their
separation and that’s really it if we
were to focus on Ashlee’s actual
transgression its root causes the harm
that she caused and repairing that harm
and we hold that up to the intervention
that we offered and it’s cost both human
and financial prison as a solution was
an abject failure so if our intent is
simply to punish or on the money but
punishment alone does not ensure Public
Safety and prison does not deter crime
if it did we would see better than a 50%
rate of recidivism nationwide if our
intent is to make corrections which is
the story that we tell we are
undoubtedly missing the mark and even if
we were to heavily resource prisons with
programs that address the things that
brought people there they would still be
prisons human cages and the unintended
consequences would still be immense what
if we reimagine Ashley’s story what if
the story went something like this
Ashley woke up in a trauma center having
learned that she had blacked out driven
off the road and hit a utility pole her
daughter and especially the other young
child is to Stane injuries but were
stable folks in the hospital immediately
attended to everybody’s physical and
emotional needs and when the detectives
and Child Protective Services arrived
they assessed the situation as a whole
and determined to send Ashley to a
secure residential dual diagnosis
treatment facility where she
address the underlying issues that led
to her alcoholism an eating disorder
where her daughter could live and where
they together could begin to heal from
the trauma that they both endured took
her driver’s license away for three
years and remanded her to community
service working with teens around the
perils of junk driving and in a trauma
center where she could help others begin
to heal this might almost look like true
accountability this might look a lot
like humanity today Ashley as a mother
two years from now she will earn her
bachelor’s degree she attends to her
physical health her mental health her
sobriety and a successfully stayed out
of unhealthy relationships and prison
did not save her life because prison has
saved no one’s life at least known that
I know but when the only tool you’ve got
is a hammer everything looks like a nail
when our story is a people are broken we
can simply throw them away and if they
emerge from prison still standing and
believing that prison and not the
interruption saved their life then
prison gets to be the hero I want to
tell you a story that I know a story
with which I have had the privilege of
being entrusted a true story the women
inside the walls are not broken people
their lives needed to be interrupted yes
but they are not the stories we have
made of them Prison has become a social
services agency of last resort a place
that lives at the intersection of all of
our failures to provide interruptions
and here’s what prisons are not they’re
not hospitals or schools or mental
health facilities or maternity wards
these things exist inside in small
numbers as prisons attempt to meet the
demands and expectations we have placed
on them the system is not broken
prisons are human cages doing exactly
what they were designed to do so let’s
let’s abandon the idea of building
better prisons let’s work to create
better interruptions let’s reimagine a
world where we no longer look to repair
harm by inflicting it a world where
Ashley not prison gets to be the hero of
the story thank you [Applause]
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