Tag Archives: prison industrial complex

Members of the Ypsilanti community talk with city officials about living in fear of the police and how we can work together to make things better

By Mark | July 12, 2016

Following are my extremely rough, admittedly incomplete notes on tonight’s meeting of the Ypsilanti Police-Community Relations / Black Lives Matter Joint Task Force. If you were also in the audience, and have something to add, please leave a comment. And, of course, feel free to weigh in on whatever you read below. As you’ll soon […]

Posted in Civil Liberties, Uncategorized, Ypsilanti | Also tagged anger, Anne Brown, Anthony Morgan, black lives matter, body cameras, cell phones, Citizen Review Board, Crisis Intervention Team, cultural awareness, Dan Vogt, de-escalation, Eastern Washtenaw Safety Alliance, Emmett Till, Heritage Fest, implicit bias, Jerry Clayton, mental health, mental illness, Nicole Brown, over policing, police violence, racism, sentencing disparities, subject control, Tony DeGiusti, use of force, Water Street, Water Street debt reduction millage, Ypsilanti police department | 91 Comments

Bestselling author Shaka Senghor on redemption and atonement, the making of the Commie High documentary, and civil rights attorney Dick Soble… on this weekend’s edition of the Saturday Six Pack

By Mark | March 31, 2016

On this Saturday’s show, we’ll be joined by Shaka Senghor, the author of the New York Times bestseller Writing My Wrongs: Life, Death, and Redemption in an American Prison. A recent Detroit-based fellow at MIT’s Media Lab, Senghor was released from prison in 2010, after serving 19 years for second-degree murder, a crime which he […]

Posted in Civil Liberties, Detroit, The Saturday Six Pack, Uncategorized, Ypsilanti | Also tagged arbitration, atonement, authors, Calvin Evans, Commie High, Community High, Dick Soble, dispute resolution, Donald Harrison, drug dealing, drugs, ex-prisoners, gun violence, MIT, MIT Media Lab, murder, Oprah, prison, prison reform, redemption, Shaka Senghor, solitary confinement, The Daily Show, Writing My Wrongs: Life Death and Redemption in an American Prison | 19 Comments

Will Potter on the existence of secret prisons in America

By Mark | December 3, 2015

On episode 26 of the Saturday Six Pack, I spoke at length with journalist Will Potter, formerly of the Chicago Tribune, about his work to bring the criminalization of free speech to light in post-9/11 America. Well, as you may recall, Potter, who is now a Knight-Wallace Fellow at the University of Michigan, mentioned during […]

Posted in Civil Liberties, The Saturday Six Pack, Uncategorized | Also tagged 9/11, Eco-terrorism, prison, prison reform, prisoner rights, secret prisons, TED, TED conference, terrorism, Will Potter | 1 Comment

Disturbing video surfaces of Davontae Sanford being forcefully subdued by prison guards at the age of 16

By Mark | July 3, 2015

Yesterday the folks at the Huffington Post released a gut-wrenching expose on the treatment of kids sentenced to adult prison in Michigan. The report, titled Cruel and All-Too-Usual, begins with a graphic video accompanied by the following warning. Warning: The following video, obtained by The Huffington Post, shows the rough treatment of a minor by […]

Posted in Civil Liberties, Detroit | Also tagged Davontae Sanford, prison, Taminko Sanford | 9 Comments

Noam Chomsky on Ferguson: “This is a very racist society”

By Mark | December 13, 2014

It’s been a several years since it happened last, but someone just used the n-word in a comment on this site. I don’t know that the context really matters, but it was said in relation to the recent events in Ferguson, Missouri. As I’m not in the practice of editing or removing comments, I’m going […]