Prison Systems Change Statement
As The Board of Directors of Flyaway Productions, we believe that the criminal legal system must change. The following is a summary of a year-long process, discussing the best approach to prison reform and abolition. These are the conclusions that our Board of Directors has come to in 2022.
The changes to our criminal legal system must:
- Remedy the historic and ongoing racial, gender and class inequities built into all stages of the criminal legal system, including policing, pretrial and bail, charging and sentencing, conditions of incarceration, fines and fees, and re-entry conditions.
- Center on prison closures. Systems of incarceration (including pretrial detention, probation, electronic monitoring) are failing. We aspire to support prison abolition as a radical shift to completely transform how the United States addresses violence and harm.
- Embrace restorative justice and diversion practices that are evidenced to be effective for both youth and adults.
- Reflect an enactment of gender justice and Black feminism by recognizing the burdens carried by women, mostly Black and Brown, who have incarcerated loved ones, and remedying that burden via community and financial investment.
- Reflect a divest/invest approach to community building, diverting funds away from punitive measures and systems, which over the last five decades have been proven not to reduce crime or create safety; and into education, mental healthcare, medical care, housing and work opportunities.
