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How We See Each Other

Earlier this year, international opera singer Ryan McKinny emailed EJUSA out of the blue. He told us that he was performing the role of Joseph De Rocher in a new production of “Dead Man Walking” at The Metropolitan Opera. He wanted to use his platform, the biggest of his career to date, to elevate our work, not just about the death penalty but our focus around the healing of trauma. 

Ryan isn’t new to social justice. He has worked with Search for Common Ground, an incredible global peacebuilding organization, for years. And he did much outreach the first time in the role, in 2019, in Chicago. But he had new motivation in elevating the harms of our criminal justice system and the need for healing. Years ago, he had befriended Terence Andrus. When they met, Terence was on death row in Texas, long after he struggled through a traumatic and difficult childhood. Earlier this year, after learning he no longer had any appeal options, Terence committed suicide. 

Ryan felt especially motivated to tell Terence’s story and to advocate for a system that could heal and build safety, dignity, empathy, and well-being. We are grateful that he felt this call. 

 

EJUSA: When did you learn you were going to play Joe in Dead Man Walking?

Ryan: I found out in the fall of 2020. The Met production had been postponed, and fortunately for me, the person originally in the role couldn’t do it anymore. 

EJUSA: So Terence was still alive when you had gotten the role? 

Ryan: He was. We didn’t talk about it much then, but we had talked about the opera [and our relationship] more when I first sang the role in 2019. He made a big point of “We’re friends, and I’m happy for you to talk about us. If you talk about me, my only ask is that you talk about me as a person and not just my case.” 

He was an amazing poet and a visual artist, and a really funny, thoughtful guy. It’s easy to talk about him. Talking to him made it so clear that he and I, in many ways, had we been born in opposite places—I could have been ended up like him very easily. I had a lot of troubles as a teenager, but I had a lot of support in ways that he didn’t. But we had similar interests in the way we thought about things. He had a daughter my daughter’s age, and they both played violin. It was interesting to talk to him and realize we were on these parallel but very different tracks. 

I’ve always thought that a lot of who we are as people really is about what we come from. If your experience as a young person doesn’t have a lot of opportunity for growth or support, that’s what shapes people who end up incarcerated. And people who haven’t had that experience can have a hard time understanding that.


Ryan McKinny as Joseph De Rocher and Joyce DiDonato as Sister Helen Prejean in Jake Heggie’s “Dead Man Walking.” Photo: Karen Almond / Met Opera

EJUSA: Was there a moment after Terence’s death where you realized you wanted to elevate your activism around the issue?

Ryan: Outside of being profoundly sad and missing my friend, I realized quickly that the experience of him dying was going to be a big part of my experience doing this piece. I’ve always connected him with this piece anyway. It became important to me not to just tell the story, but to connect that to folks actively doing things like EJUSA. Often in the arts, especially in the classical arts, we have a tendency to tell stories that make us feel big emotions but it can feel disconnected from the real world. And this opera is centered around a real story and an issue that is still happening. Not just the death penalty but cycles of violence in our country. 

This is the biggest platform I’ve ever had. I wanted to make sure I was pointing people so that when they have these big feelings, here’s a way that you can connect them to action and not just move on with your day. Instead, they ask who are the people making changes here in ways that already have a history of success, that are really moving the dial. That led me to EJUSA, and as soon as I read the mission statement, I knew this is exactly who I want to be aligned with. I think EJUSA really fits with my own philosophy about how change really happens. 

EJUSA: How does performing this piece today versus four years ago feel different, especially given what happened with the uprisings of 2020 around George Floyd’s murder? 

Ryan: When you’re doing something as high profile as this, you can feel very narrow about focusing on a good performance. But this piece is different. This cast has been engaged with this piece for a while and everyone feels this responsibility to tell this story not just because it’s good music but because the themes are important. I feel like I’m telling Terence’s story but also telling a story about how we don’t see each other as human beings but that we can. Forgiveness is possible. There are ways I’ve tried to weave those together. So in the show, they give my characters a lot of fake tattoos. And I asked them for a black rose because my favorite of Terence’s poems is called “The Black Rose.” It’s on my hand, and it’s a very physical feeling of carrying him through this piece. 

I certainly feel a responsibility to open people’s eyes and hearts to a bigger story that’s going on in our country, everywhere. I feel a lot of responsibility to help people understand the reality of the systemic tragedy of the justice system and the death penalty, but also the real humanity of these people. They’re not numbers, they’re not others. These people could be us.

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Evangelicals Reject a Fear-Based Criminal Legal System

religious member speaking into a mic in front of a camera

I was at the train station in Charlottesville talking to two women about our mutual appreciation for the musical Jesus Christ Superstar, which they would see in DC. They shared about their work as librarians. I shared about Equal Justice USA and our desire for every community to be safe and healthy, where violence is rare and well-being dominates. 

Then I gave them my card, which reads “Sam Heath, Manager, EJUSA Evangelical Network.” They looked up, confused. “Evangelical?” they said. “But I thought you said you cared about justice?”

My heart sank. 

I sighed, knowing that the 500-year-old word “evangelical,” based on the much older Greek word evangelion – which simply means the good news of Jesus – triggers many things to many people. In the popular imagination, evangelicalism has gone from a theological movement about being “born again” to a socio-cultural one to something vaguely political and, ultimately, highly partisan. Over time, evangelicalsim became synonymous with conservatism and, increasingly today, Christian nationalism. 

I even wrote a page on our website answering, “What do we mean by ‘evangelical’?” because I often get asked that. 

Despite these challenges, I see incredibly encouraging ways evangelicalism is moving, growing, and settling. I’ve gravitated toward the idea that, at least since COVID, evangelicalism has been sifted and sorted (as opposed to fractured), and people are landing in unexpected places. People increasingly see the truth of Psalm 89, that since justice is part of the foundation of God’s throne, it should be at the center of our life together, both in the public and private spheres. 

I want to highlight three stories – one national, one state-specific, and one local – where the Evangelical Network has been fortunate to be a part of places and spaces where Christians are eschewing tribalism and embracing proximity to our neighbors. 

National

Andre Thomas is on death row in Texas for three murders that occurred 2004, and his life story is one of abuse, mental illness, and tragedy. Faith leaders across the country signed a letter to Governor Abbott, requesting clemency for Mr. Thomas. Perhaps most notable among the signatories was Walter Kim, president of the National Association of Evangelicals. 

The letter states that Andre Thomas is “indisputably one of the most severely mentally ill incarcerated individuals in Texas history.”

The NAE has a resolution from 2015 that is cautious in its position on the death penalty, registering concern without voicing a full opposition.   

The NAE’s support, along with many other faith leaders, advocates, and attorneys, resulted this April in a trial court judge withdrawing Andre Thomas’ execution date to give more time to demonstrate that Mr. Thomas’ degree of mental illness would make his execution unconstitutional. We pray Andre Thomas’ life will ultimately be spared. 

State

In 2001, James “Jimi” Barber murdered Dorothy Epps in Alabama. Jimi – and I use his first name since I was privileged to correspond with him before he died – became a Christian, forced his prison to allow his baptism, and grew in his faith. Sarah Gregory, the granddaughter of the victim, who had nursed a hatred against Jimi for two decades, grew to a place where she was ready to forgive him through a letter. 

The EJUSA Evangelical Network helps facilitate a monthly multi-faith group called the Alabama People of Faith Death Penalty Coalition, which works to support state organizations seeking an end to the death penalty in Alabama. In one of the coalition’s meetings, Sarah Gregory shared her testimony about her years of friendship with Jimi, saying she had to learn to “walk through my fear” in engaging Jimi. She did just that to the end. 

Jimi was executed by the state of Alabama on July 21, despite faith leaders aggressively and publically calling for his commutation. Sarah Gregory witnessed the execution, which followed a rich time of praying and singing that Jimi organized. She has since shared her story nationwide and joined the Advisory Board for Alabama’s Project Hope to Abolish the Death Penalty, our country’s only death penalty group formed and run by individuals on death row.  

Local

Lastly, a very localized group in North Carolina shows how even proximity to the criminal legal system does not automatically cultivate a posture of compassion. Similar to my story, this heart change can take years. 

Pharaoh’s Daughter is a group in Raleigh, NC, that helps incarcerated and formerly incarcerated mothers access wraparound services that especially center their children. Susan Henson is the executive director, and she recently came to an EJUSA Evangelical Network In the Movement webinar about restorative justice.

We met one-on-one afterward, where Susan shared with me that even though her daughter was incarcerated years ago. Despite Susan working with women who have been incarcerated, she was very opposed to the idea of restorative justice when she watched the webinar. 

But then she said she felt her mind turned and, by the end of the time, was enthusiastically supportive of a restorative approach following harm, violence, or crime. She said, “We can’t law people back; we love people back.” 

Friends, across the country, hearts are changing; evangelicals are seeing that our criminal legal system’s response of punishment is fear-based, and Christians are given the Bible’s most oft-repeated command – “Do not fear.”

Yes, evangelicalism is sorting itself, but we are often seeing that people are settling into a place where they have a sense of justice being something other than punishment, something that instead includes at least a measure of healing for all parties – those who were harmed, those who harmed, and the surrounding community. This counter narrative of hope and healing is robustly biblical (and true) enough to combat the tribalism and stereotypes that permeate our civic discourse. 

Evangelicalism still can be and is good news.

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Revenge Does Not Heal

Photo of Tree of Life synagogue

I don’t doubt that you learned of the recent conclusion to the trial for the mass murder at the Tree of Life synagogue, in Pittsburgh. A jury delivered a death penalty sentence for the killing of 11 worshippers in 2018.

At Equal Justice USA, we focus on survivors of violence and trauma in every aspect of our work. I myself am a survivor; my father was the victim of a brutal assault as part of a robbery. He survived with a traumatic brain injury that left him incapacitated and our family devastated.

I cannot imagine what the surviving family members and friends from Pittsburgh have gone through these last years. But my heart goes out to them and I pray for their future healing.

I’m a person of faith, just like the 11 people who lost their lives. I believe deeply in God’s redemptive love. I also believe that the death penalty doesn’t bring people what they need when they are shattered by loss. The desire for revenge is completely natural and understandable, especially when someone you love has been taken from you. But revenge does not heal.

I don’t blame people for hoping that an execution might ease their pain as they navigate such devastating loss. But the reality is that killing of any kind inflicts more pain and more loss — upon families, upon communities — in a nation that is already flooded with it.

We have a long legacy of capital punishment — and its predecessor of racial terror lynchings. That history takes up so much space when extreme violence happens. But I imagine a day when punishment isn’t the sole focus of our criminal legal system. I imagine a day when our instinct in the wake of harm is to prioritize the needs of victims. I imagine a day when the justice we pursue delivers healing, safety, and accountability that repairs everyone affected by harm.

That day isn’t today, but we’re never going to stop working toward the transformational change our system desperately needs. And that requires that we end the death penalty once and for all so we can pursue healing instead of vengeance.

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What it Means to Be Racially Profiled

will and patrick standing

I recently attended the 20th anniversary celebration of Mothers in Charge, the essential organization that Dr. Dorothy Johnson-Speight founded after her son’s senseless murder. She supports and heals mothers and family members who have lost loved ones to violence and incarceration. 

MIC and Dr. Dorothy have been incredible partners with EJUSA over the years while also expanding their services in multiple ways to heal and strengthen young people who live close to violence. 

Dr. Dorothy and her amazing team did the festivities right. Hundreds of people showed up to a suite at Lincoln Financial Field, home of the Philadelphia Eagles. Some of the first mothers to find MIC two decades ago were there. The women who started MIC chapters in California, New York, and Missouri traveled for the occasion. There were city council members, a state senator. Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro came to honor Dr. Dorothy, proof of how important this work is for families.

Dr. Dorothy formed MIC because she couldn’t find another group for grieving Black mothers in need of healing. Her work has always served Black communities, and that’s not a coincidence. Some parts of Black communities bear the brunt of gun violence because they are under-resourced, impoverished, and struggling under the weight of historical trauma and generational racism and oppression. These are some of the many root causes of violence. 

So I fully expected to be in the minority at the gala, and was. Maybe 10% of the audience was white. 

Early in the evening, I was sitting at a table with my friend, enjoying a beverage. A police officer approached. He asked me, “Do you drive a BMW?” I do not. 

He said, “A guy who looked just like you got out of a BMW. He parked the police commissioner in, and she has to leave.” Philly’s police commissioner had just spoken to the audience.  

I made a dumb joke about how easy it would be to find someone so good looking. He laughed, probably politely, and continued his search. 

But it took me a couple minutes after my encounter, with the help of my friend, to realize that, technically, I had been racially profiled. 

Technically is important. I clearly benefited from his assumption. In all likelihood, the cop was looking for a white guy wearing a suit and tie, with short hair (okay, balding). 

But there is an ominous, implicit meaning in the true definition of racial profiling. Our policing system makes assumptions about Black and Brown people — that they are dangerous or violent, that they have committed some kind of criminalized behavior, that they don’t have the right legal documents — and targets them. They don’t even necessarily do anything wrong, police simply initiate an interaction. 

The outcomes of those interactions can span a wide range of harm, from getting some kind of citation to dying from police violence. 

But there is also the trauma of the interaction. I will make an assumption which I don’t think is groundless: if you’re Black and an officer approaches you, regardless of the circumstances, at a minimum you’re going to put your guard up. You’re going to expect suspicion. If you’re young and male, you might expect to be frisked. Questioned. Or worse. You could be scared. Angry. Or both. And you might believe that acting on either of those emotions is dangerous, a risk to your life or your freedom. 

All of those possibilities leave trauma behind, scar tissue that might not heal. 

None of that came up for me as I spoke with the officer. I’ve had few interactions with the police and, as a white male, I don’t anticipate hostility or mistrust. I know that the police will assume the best. They extend endless courtesies and accommodations to people who look like me. We’ve seen this in countless videos of police officers interacting with white people. We get to go home. But for Black and Brown people, the interaction could end very differently. 

I wrote this to shine a light on just one facet of safety—that an encounter with the police shouldn’t include a high likelihood of trauma. Being safe around police and walking away from the experience shouldn’t be a privilege reserved for white people. Feeling safe—in your car, on a street or at a park, in your home, and, yes, in the presence of cops—is a right. But we have a system that was built to deny that right to Black people. The DNA of that system still exists in our criminal legal system. That’s why we’re building community safety in a completely different way.

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Healing for Network Members

mural in Pensacola, Alabama

Have you ever thought about your relationship with your breath? To your body?

For Black, brown, indigenous, queer, and trans people working on the frontlines of violence intervention, the relationship to the body and breath can be simultaneously sacred, tenuous, and uncertain. BlPOC communities have experienced generations of surveillance from police, forced labor, and bodily harm. It only compounds the collective stress and tension that strains much of our society. This is especially true of our leaders at the frontlines of community-based safety and healing.

Our society desperately needs the work of community-based safety leaders. They operate as trusted first responders to violence, experts on intervention, mediators, and community-centered strategists. Many are survivors of violence themselves, making them specifically qualified to help solve it.

But how do we value and care for these leaders? How do we make space for them to heal, breathe, and not burn out during critical and life-saving work?

Those who are most impacted by our nation’s endemic violence must be most involved in our solutions. They must also be included in the myriad forms of healing, care, and rest that Black, Brown, and indigenous people have historically been isolated from and shamed from participating in.

This April, Equal Justice USA traveled to Orange Beach, Alabama, with seven leaders working across mental health, grief support, youth development, and decarceration, all with a particular lens on violence intervention and prevention. Throughout a long weekend, our team and partners broke bread, practiced various forms of radical restoration, and set the stage for future collaboration and mutual support. Each day began with a morning meditation and grounding practice, introducing and re-introducing everyone to tools for breathwork, presence, and feelings of safety within our physical and emotional bodies. The EJUSA team and our partners facilitated discussion circles, a day trip to neighboring Pensacola, FL, to learn more about the history of the area and activism to preserve Black land and business ownership amid gentrification, and an herbalism workshop that guided everyone through the medicinal properties of various herbs. Each person could create custom tea blends to suit their healing needs. Each day’s menu featured home-cooked meals with whole foods, culminating in a culinary healing workshop that simplified incorporating healthier, nutrient-dense foods into our days.

people sitting on couch meditating and deep breathing with eyes closed

EJUSA worked together to curate a healing room adorned with flowers and incense for the advisors to rest, listen to calming music, and take in ocean views. Many organizations doing direct violence intervention and prevention work face endless barriers to sustainable funding and long-term healing amidst multiple exposures to trauma and institutional violence. In sharing various tools and resources with our advisors, we hoped to expand the access they and their organizations have to simple yet effective community healing and resilience practices.

Over the course of the retreat, each of us felt and witnessed the bonds between ourselves and our partners deepen, and it drove home the importance of self-care, community care, and communal healing. For some, work didn’t stop, but they got a glimpse of what it was like to balance the pressing needs of their community and their own healing needs. Whether through morning walks on the beach, casual conversations near the pool, or breaks in the healing room, leaders were carving out time for themselves to share space and find calm. With healing practices, we can stay rooted amid chaos. This was especially highlighted during a Friday morning meditation and discussion session, where leaders expressed the weight not only of their professional and community work but also in their roles as caregivers, parents, and providers moving through their healing journeys as survivors of the same violence that they are working to end. As each person shared, support came in waves: “How can we support each other?” “what does it look like to continue this space after we go home?” “what does it look like to form organizations that can fully center our healing?”

These questions are not asked often enough for too many folks on the frontlines. From navigating the daily operations of managing non-profits, community groups, and city-wide safety initiatives to experiencing what Network Member and EJUSA Board Member Lisa Good noted as disenfranchised grief, community-centered public safety leaders disproportionately bear the brunt of the impacts of state violence, community violence, and structural inequities that leave many Black- and brown-led organizations without resources needed to secure the safety and wellness that they deserve. As public safety remains a stronghold in our collective consciousness, it is not enough for organizations and leaders to only experience healing during a single weekend away from their homes. This is why EJUSA is working to increase equity and resources for community-centered public safety in a broader sense and to sustain the individuals leading the charge in their respective cities, states, and issue areas. For safety to truly exist, it is not enough to stop violence. We must also resource the healing, wellness, and recovery of those most harmed by it, including those dedicating their lives to achieving our shared visions of safety.

Authored by EJUSA staff members, Taylor Mason and Tonjie Reese

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An Eye-Opening & Cathartic Trip to Alabama

people standing in front of building with sign "Legacy Musuem"

EJUSA staff members and partners traveled to Montgomery, Alabama to visit Equal Justice Initiative’s Legacy Museum and National Memorial for Peace and Justice. The tour group included partners from our Evangelical Network and Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty. Here are reflections from our staff.

Demetrius Minor, Manager, Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty

We are not too far removed from history. That could’ve easily been me, one of the statistics in that memorial. Especially because I grew up in one of the counties that had lynchings.  I read about one instance of a Black teenager hanging around a white person, and as I read that, I was standing next to a white person in our delegation. The very thing I was doing in that moment could have made me part of that number of lynchings. It was a painful reminder that if we don’t know where we’ve been, we can’t get to where we’re going. 

Libbie Love, Programs Administrative Manager

I remember quite vividly that I was in the elevator with someone from our conservative group. He had just spoken to his daughter, trying to explain all about the museum. But he said he was just going to have to bring both his daughters. Combined with the other conversations we’d been having, his intention presages hope for a country still mired in racial injustices. It bodes well for the future. Here’s someone who’s bringing his family, another generation to learn about something they might not get to read about in school. I have so much hope for what will come out of that. 

Nicholas Cote, Western Regional Organizer, Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty

I’ve never been so struck walking into a museum. The first room is this violent baptismal wave that confronts you. A video screen showing this wave takes up an entire wall. That word “baptismal” struck me right away. It felt like this was about the sins of our country and an opportunity to first acknowledge them before we can do anything else. I want to go back. It’s an incredibly emotional and thought-provoking confrontation with the past that links the history to what’s going on now. It forces you to think about why these connections exist. It’s called a legacy museum for a reason…It feels like a fire has been lit, and I want to see where it goes. 

Sam Heath, Manager, Evangelical Network

There seemed to be a general agreement from the attendees about the overall read of history that EJI gave, namely, that our country and its systems have at its core a stain of white supremacy, that the original sin of our country is not slavery but white supremacy. People there really resonated with the idea that our criminal legal system is functioning as intended and cannot bring healing and hope, that we as a nation must turn to a wholly other way of doing safety if we want healing to be possible. Many especially appreciated hearing that restorative justice offers a measure of healing to its participants. Everyone left with an overwhelming sense that the history many of us were presented in school was not only one-sided but false. Many had to reconcile with this reality and then wrestle with how to live in light of this.

Jiva Manske, Director of National Organizing and Narrative Shifting

The Legacy Museum is a beautiful, heartbreaking, and sacred place that weaves a powerful and clear narrative: the institution of slavery is not gone, it has only evolved. The experience of the museum is a catharsis. Big, cathartic experience can open people’s hearts and minds, and it did on this trip. People who thought the criminal legal system needs reforms walked shared that now they understand that the whole thing needs to be transformed, or even razed to the ground. People who previously thought contemporary struggles for racial justice were misguided said now they want to join those struggles. A big, cathartic experience is not enough to change people’s perspectives. The process of healing collective trauma mirrors the process of healing individual trauma, and vice versa. Both take deep accompaniment rooted in positive social engagement. While this experience was certainly a benchmark for us, the change that happened for people is neither big nor sustainable, without significant follow up. I left with more certainty that the next phase of work needs to be even more rooted in racial justice, including understanding history and legacy, historical trauma, explicitly racist laws still on the books today, and institutions and impact today.

Will Simpson, Director of Violence Reduction Initiatives

The journey to Montgomery proved to be deeply impactful on a personal level, while also shedding light on the potential for growth within our evangelical and conservative networks. The museum effectively conveyed the evolution of white supremacy in our nation, from the abduction, enslavement, and torture of millions of African people to the current systemic violence present in our criminal legal system. Rarely has a space so vividly illustrated this narrative, touching on all senses and eliciting a range of emotions. Establishing a baseline understanding of white supremacy and state violence is crucial for our networks to expand their work on community safety. Overall, the trip to Montgomery was essential in setting the stage for our networks to better comprehend the consequences of white supremacy and state violence, and to work towards bridging the gap between the death penalty and community safety. With ongoing dialogue and collaboration, both networks can contribute to working to build a world where we reimagine true safety and build the systems that sustain it.

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The Next Frontier

In 2016, we launched a groundbreaking program in Newark, NJ, that brought community members and police officers into the same room to explore trauma — especially as it is connected to encounters with policing. And we wanted to explore the trauma of both groups. Since then hundreds of community members and police officers have gone through the two-day workshop. The police department saw a dramatic decline in citizen complaints from those who had been in the program, and Trauma to Trust has become a critical component of the community-centered public safety model that is thriving in the city. 

Representatives from Baton Rouge visited Newark several times over the years to see Trauma to Trust and other key components of the public safety model. In March, we had the official launch of the program and we’re excited to keep building in that city. 

EJUSA: When did Baton Rouge get off the ground? 

Lionel Latouche: We had been working there before as part of a program called Collective Healing, and EJUSA provided assistance to grassroots organizations in a handful of cities. Our partnership with our Baton Rouge partners had gone really well. Right before the pandemic, we started talking about how we might bring Trauma to Trust to Baton Rouge. Then the pandemic happened, and I actually didn’t get to go down there until December 2021. We talked about the history of T2T and the impact it was having in Newark. 

Automatically, a lot of stories came up and there was a clear need to talk about trauma. What was clear was that Baton Rouge needed language about recognizing and expressing the impact of trauma. They knew that they were experiencing trauma, and there was some language, but it was scattered depending on who you were talking to. That was a big step. I also made some important relationships with folks and shared the vision of T2T as well as my experience with trauma. In March 2022 we did our first listening sessions and those continued until January 2023. 

We really needed to capture the voice of community. And the beauty was we really began to understand the experience of Baton Rouge, and they informed the direction we went. 

EJ: How were police involved in the planning? 

LL: Absolutely, from early on. The training division was involved in the primer session we had (an introduction to T2T). You heard the perspective of law enforcement in the south. This was a year removed from the public execution of George Floyd and the national uprisings. There was a little bit of defensiveness, some “Hey, understand me.” But there was also true willingness to get messy and learn. It was important that they were there sitting with community. 

We also had a listening session with only cops, about 15. They shared their own opinion and it was interesting. You get in those spaces and the group says, “Everything is fine.” And then one person opens up and then everyone jumps in and it’s not as fine as it appeared. It was important for that to happen because we needed their perspective. 

EJ: Any other listening sessions stand out? 

LL: Well, we had one for white folks. I had to point that out, that white folks had their own category, acknowledging that the Black community asked if white people are going to be in the room. In Newark, it didn’t matter, we were going to do what we needed to do. But because of the racist legacy of the South, the Baton Rouge community stressed the importance of white community members being a part of the conversation. This is a city where Black people live on the other side of the tracks as white people, and they’re not interfacing unless something big is happening in the community. 

EJ: What struck you as the biggest differences between T2T in Baton Rouge and in Newark?

LL: The clearest thing is the legacy of racism and oppression in the South. The impact of slavery and segregation is still really clear. We had to be prepared for that. It showed up in how we created the experience and curate conversation. In Newark, you have the 1967 rebellion, a clear stance by the community that this is not right. It’s part of the ethos in Newark. It’s different down in Baton Rouge. The nicety of southern culture is different. But when you get to a place of ruffling feathers, there’s a volcanic explosion of emotion and frustration and straight-up racism. We needed to be cognizant of how that showed up. Events had happened in the city in the lead-up to T2T that were clear to us that the waters of racism settle but only for a short time until something happens and there’s a huge flood.

And to be real, we had to show up in our northern culture and know how to present things that met the cultural dynamics of Baton Rouge to make the experience palpable for folks. We’re a little more in your face coming from Newark. And there’s an advantage to that. We had to navigate through the Baton Rouge culture to get to the same emotional points while respecting the dynamic. 

EJ: You’ll go back in the fall for a full slate of sessions. How will your learnings from the spring affect the next chapter in Baton Rouge? 

LL: We really saw the desire of the people down there to tell stories. In BR, being able rub shoulders, to sit in groups and hear each other’s voices, that feels really important. We want to make sure that the folks have the space and the comfort to share those stories and experience one another.

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Baton Rouge Explores Trauma

Baton Rouge Trauma to Trust cohort posed for a picture

Lionel Latouche, our director of Trauma to Trust (T2T), turned the lights back on as the video of Baton Rouge Police Chief Murphy Paul apologizing for the killing of Alton Sterling came to a close. My chest was tight, feeling the tension of the room as Baton Rouge community members and police officers waited for the facilitators to re-engage. Dr. Monique Swift, a former EJUSA staff member who continues to lead T2T, addressed the room: “What is one word that you think of when you see this apology?”

Baton Rouge has a long history of police violence and oppression, but it also has a strong foundation of grassroots leaders and city officials determined to chart a new path and embrace community-centered public safety. Chief Paul’s apology was as historic as it was needed. 

We’ve been honored to partner with leaders in Baton Rouge over the past few years to reimagine justice for their community. And we hit a major milestone in mid-March when Baton Rouge became the second city with a program, officially making T2T national. 

This was EJUSA’s first Trauma to Trust workshop in Baton Rouge. It marks both the years of trust and relationship building with the community and police department, as well as the beginning of years of work to come.

The feeling of tension in that room that I described above is common in a T2T session no matter where it happens. These two-day workshops bring together community members and local police officers for guided conversations about the role of trauma and violence in their interactions. The goal of T2T is to illuminate the systems that everyone in the room has been subject to by creating a vulnerable space of sharing and truth to build empathy and reduce future harm.

Reflecting on the police chief’s apology, these words came pouring into the room: peace, understanding, pandering, risk, manipulate, vulnerability, compassion, exhaustion, prepared, fake.

This tangle of honest words led to the most powerful moment of the day for me. The participants began having a more honest and direct conversation, one in which they were allowing themselves the vulnerability of honesty and gaining confidence in finding common ground. All the participants shared the desire for a thriving Baton Rouge, and began to look at the systems around them, rather than the clothes and uniforms they wore. 

We discussed economic inequality that has deep roots in Baton Rouge. We talked about some of the roots of that inequality: redlining home loans, underfunded schools, and employment discrimination.. We confronted the exhaustive list of roles that police are expected to fill — from writing tickets to breaching doors with bullet proof vests to providing crisis support for victims. All of these tasks and the primary toolkit they’re given is a ticket book, handcuffs, and weapons. 

One officer asked, “Then what can we do about it?” He began to acknowledge the systemic problems, but he couldn’t see what his role would be other than continuing to be the best he could imagine at his job. The answer, the facilitators directed, is to use a trauma-informed lens. That means that officers should understand that harm most often comes from a person who has already experienced harm. And that the system around us can’t be removed from people’s personal actions and that police officers need to show up with deep empathy even while acting in it.

Gerald, a community member, closed with words about systemic racism that sunk in for the room: “The conversation still needs to happen because America as a collective hasn’t acknowledged it. And so I’m going to keep crying. Keep protesting. Keep acting out. Until you see me. Until you acknowledge me.”

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The Momentum is Real

Jami Hodge and EJUSA Staff

I recently got a text message from one of the most prominent district attorneys in the country. He thanked me for writing this op-ed on what survivors of violence need — and why meeting those needs, especially in the communities most impacted, builds community safety. He told me that his attorneys were talking about it. 

That text came just days before the Safe and Just Communities Summit in New York. I presented there with some amazing allies on the racial disparities in the legal system and what we need to do to solve them. 

We all want to be safe. But safety means so much more than the absence of violence. That’s especially true in communities experiencing the brunt of violence. The folks that live there know what they need to thrive — good jobs, affordable housing, great schools for their kids, and so much more. And they’re advocating for and building solutions that will secure them. These solutions aren’t new. They’ve been saving and improving lives for a while.

That was the foundation of my piece that ran in The Nation about the collective community-driven effort in Newark, our flagship city, to build public safety. Just days ago, President Obama named Newark a model community for its effectiveness in violence prevention, a testament to all the work being done there.

I look back on all of that (plus another op-ed, in February, in Essence on why Black history is essential to addressing systemic racism) and think, “Wow!” Each moment is exciting on its own. Take them all together, though, and I believe it’s clear that our work — that you make possible — is resonating deeply across the nation. People are interested in effective alternatives to the policing, prosecutions, and prisons that inflict so much harm, especially on Black and Brown communities. 

I find the momentum we’re seeing exhilarating and powerful. I hope you do too! If you’re moved by this progress, I invite you to become a member of our Visionary Circle by committing to a monthly donation. Whether it’s $5 or $50, your investment ensures that the movement to build community safety will have a generational impact.

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Stop the Cycle of Trauma

Thirty years ago, my father was the victim of a brutal assault that had a lasting impact that no one in my family could appreciate in that moment. We all struggled in different ways. A big part of that struggle stemmed from not seeing ourselves as survivors of violence, and not having access to the kinds of support that everyone impacted by violence needs to repair harm (including the person who caused the harm). Elevating the needs and voices of survivors from marginalized communities is a cornerstone of EJUSA’s mission thanks to Shari Silberstein’s vision and work as our founder, and it will always be a north star for us. I wrote about the importance of identifying as survivors and much more. Please give it a read and share. And for those in NY, please go to https://oneclickpolitics.global.ssl.fastly.net/messages/edit?promo_id=18883 to support the efforts to expand victims’ compensation.

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