How do we keep our neighbors and communities safe? How does our current approach to crime, prosecution and punishment work for different Americans? Can we make it better? Lewis Webb, Jr., a graduate of Brooklyn Law School, has worked with the Brooklyn District Attorney’s office and the New York City Department of Corrections. Today, he focuses on mitigating paths to incarceration, lowering barriers for people leaving the carceral system, and improving police/community relations as Healing Justice Program Coordinator for the American Friends Service Committee. An engaging speaker, Lewis offers a hopeful vision of how we can create a justice system that heals communities, and protects and serves us all. Moorestown Friends Meeting’s Anti-Racism Committee welcomes you to join the discussion via Zoom on Thursday 19 May at 7:30pm; click here or call 646-558-8656 and enter meeting ID 873 3565 8140 to join the conversation.
Mass Incarceration
The Quaker History of Eastern State Penitentiary
Arch Street Meeting House will be hosting Matt Murphy from Eastern State Penitentiary for an evening program! Matt’s presentation will discuss the many connections between Quakers, prisons, and Eastern State Penitentiary.
Matt Murphy has served as the Tour Programs Supervisor at Eastern State Penitentiary Historic Site since 2015. Matt is responsible for creating major programming and oversees the hiring, training, and evaluation of the education staff. Matt is a seasoned expert in facilitative dialogue methodology. From Alcatraz Island to Independence National Historical Park, Matt has served as a cultural heritage interpreter at sites across the nation and has appeared on popular media outlets such as the Washington Post and the Travel Channel.
This program is presented in partnership with Eastern State Penitentiary.
[Read more…] about The Quaker History of Eastern State Penitentiary
Imagining Philadelphia without Cash Bail
Friends from Chestnut Hill and Frankford Meetings, along with many others, joined Central Philadelphia Monthly Meeting (CPMM) on Wednesday 10/24 for an evening at Friends Center on Imagining Philadelphia without Cash Bail, co-sponsored by CPMM and POWER. About 50 people gathered to hear from Public Defender Keir Bradford-Grey, an organizer for the Philly Community Bail Fund, and a woman who had personal experience with the cash bail system, about the costs and injustices of the current system (even as it is being improved) and the possibilities for ending cash bail altogether. Few of us knew that a court case is moving from the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in the South toward the Supreme Court, on the basis that cash bail is an unconstitutional violation of equal rights under the law. All of us left under the weight of grave injustice, yet hopeful that change is possible in Philadelphia and that we can be part of it.
This event was one way of acting on a minute that CPMM passed in June of 2017, saying that if we want to refer with pride to our Quaker history of support for ending slavery, we must speak up in the present against mass incarceration.
If you are interested in hosting a similar town hall meeting, or in participating in bail watch hearings, please contact Dana Reinhold at dreinhold99@comcast.net or Terry Roberts at terryroberts1998@gmail.com.
Pamela Haines
215-349-9428