This blog is actually a speech that was performed on January 5, 2022,for an Oral Communication class taught by Keri Thompson at Emerson College. Emerson College has a prison program called EPI, Emerson Prison Initiative which is held at MCI-Concord.
Thanks to my college partaker, Anya, I was recommended to post this on my blog.
"Ending Prison Sentences of Life Without Parole"
By: Peter Bin
Imagine waking up to something you hate everyday. Imagine never having any privacy or never being able to eat your favorite food. Imagine having to live in a 6x10 bathroom. Imagine never being able to enjoy the milestones of your love ones. Imagine having to deal with these scenarios for the rest of your life. In the book Dante's inferno, he describes a similar situation, where one of the stages of hell is a place where you are tortured by the thoughts and images of the things, people and events you once loved, but never to be able to touch it or enjoy it. Today I will be talking about what some consider a form of hell, I will be talking about life sentences without parole and why we should end these sentences.
This is an important subject to me because I am serving a natural life sentence for a crime I did not commit and for I life I did not take. So I know how easy it is in this State to be sentenced to life due to certain laws.
This topic should matter to all of us, because it has been a growing trend in America to imprison people and to imprison them to life sentences. According to the Harvard Political Review, America is the world leader of incarceration, with the most prisons on the planet. America has more people serving life than the entire prison population of Denmark. This topic is part of a bigger picture, which is prison reform, the way we are incarcerating people effects our community financially and mentally.
So today I want to tell you why we should end these life w/o parole sentences, by explaining how easy it is to be convicted to life w/o parole, by explaining to you why people serving life sentences w/o parole should be released, and what I think justice means to me.
Life without parole can be imposed on individuals who never took a life. Under Massachusetts's joint venture/felony murder law it allows individuals to be sentence to natural life "without evidence" that the person intended to cause any harm. For example they could be outside waiting for an individual, not knowing that individual is committing a crime or even just provided an item used in the crime but remained at home. Under this law, if a person does anything that the State consider as furthering a criminal enterprise you are liable to be sentence to life without parole. The New England Innocence Project states this law disproportionately effects people of color. The State and law enforcement has commonly labeled people of color as gang members even if they may not be. When law enforcement see a group of people of color wearing the same type of baseball caps, they're consider gang members. When people not of color are all seen wearing the same baseball caps, they are just baseball fans. When a person is label a gang member the bar is even set lower for the state to convict someone to life without parole. Because the State looks at anything a gang member does as an act of furthering a criminal enterprise. For example, if a person label a gang member answers a phone call that may be from a person whom just committed a crime of murder. The state can assumed because your labeled a gang member and you answered a phone call you may of helped that person and you are liable to a life sentence. Even if that call had nothing to do with a crime. This commonly happens to people of color.
In 2012 Massachusetts passed house bill 4286 that gives a three strikes penalty that can sentence individuals to life without parole for crimes that do no involve murder. It makes 20 crimes eligible and repeated offenders eligible to be sentence to natural life.
I bring up these scenarios because I believe no one deserves to die in prison for someone's elses actions and no one deserves to die in prison because of harsh laws.
Why should we give lifers a chance to come back to the community? The cost of housing prisoners are high and effecting tax payers dollars. According to the Vera institute research, the cost of housing a person in Massachusetts is over $50,000 and can rise to $140,000 for an elderly person . In Massachusetts there are over 10,000 people in prison, which means we are spending over $500 million dollars a year in this state alone to keep people incarcerated. When this money can be used for prison reform in helping people get mental health assistance, programs and education to lower recidivism rates.
There is a misconception that lifers are the most violent inmates and likely to re-offend because they have this "nothing to lose" mentality. This theory is completely wrong. A number of studies have shown people convicted to life are unlikely to recommit crimes and misconduct is low compared to nonlife prisoners. In many prisons across the country life prisoners are frequently called upon to act as role models and mentors. Look at the father program we have here, almost everyone in that program who mentor is serving life without parole. In another scenario, in 2012 in Maryland over 100 lifers were set free due to a due process violation in their case, til this day not one of them have returned to prison.
In Massachusetts we know these lifers would not re-offend. How do we know this? When Massachusetts passed a law that ended life without parole for anyone who was charged with 1st degree murder under the age of 18, the parole board was able to see many people who thought they would spend the rest of their lives in prison. The parole board was surprise to see these individuals who had served 20, 30, 40 years had completed every D.O.C. program and some even had college degrees before the law passed. The parole board ask these individuals why did they do all of these programs knowing they may never be able to use these learned skills in society. One of the men who was up for parole answered "although I thought I was never coming home, I still had some hope and I wanted to become a better person for myself, for my family, and for the mistakes I made in the past". According to Harvardpolitics.com prisoners who participate in education have a 43% lower chance of incarceration, and every dollar spent on prison education saves the government $4-$5 dollars on re-incarceration. As you can see in this class room, many of us are lifers, we can all live by the misconception of what society thinks of us, but I believe we are all here because we believe our lives still have meaning.
Last I want to tell you want justice means to me. I know in free society justice usually means sending someone away to prison for the rest of their lives. I do not believe justice should be an eye for an eye solution. I do not believe justice is knowing another person and their family is suffering for how ever long. I know I do not have any right to tell a victim of crime how they can cope with their lost. But what I can say is, from a person in prison, I believe justice is to be able to face the ones we hurt and make reconciliation and forgiveness.
There is a program called "Restorative Justice", where people in prison meet victims of crime to find a place where they can reconcile and help the ones they hurt heal. I know for many people that is a lot to ask for, but I hope we can all be open to these ideas. Because people who served a long time are eager to make things right, for forgiveness and eager to earn and demonstrate their capacity to contribute in a positive way to society.
I like to end this speech with this quote from a former lifer, Michael Mendoza, "We are not convicts or ex-convicts, we are not felons, we are not inmates, we are PEOPLE, people that have a way to give back". Thank you.
Cites and sources:
-My attorney Cynthia Mousseau of the New England Innocence Project
-"The Price if Prisons - Prison Spending in 2015" by Vera Institute, www.vera.org
- Commonwealth v. Brown 477 Mass. 805 (2017)
- "Recidivism Imprisons American Progress" By Liz Benecchi, August 8, 2021, Harvard Political Review. www.HarvardPolitics.com/recidivism-american-progress/
- "A New Lease On Life" by Ashley Nellis Ph.D, Sentencing Project, www.sentencingproject.org
- "Americas Increasing Use of Life Long Term Sentences" by Ashley Nellis Ph.D, Sentencing Project, www.sentencingproject.org
To help end these sentences please visit: www.change.org/p/tell-massachusetts-to-change-felony-murder-law
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