The first week of March, I visited my daughter in the Florida Women’s Reception Center in Ocala. Our birthdays were coming up; she was turning 20 and I was turning 50. We shared ice cream sandwiches made into a sundae, topped with crushed Oreos bought from the prison concession, and celebrated our birthdays together. Little did we know there was a novel coronavirus insidiously emerging in our prisons and across the country. This virus has since changed our lives.

Covid in the Prisons

As of today, 2,591 incarcerated individuals in the state of Florida have tested positive for COVID, along with 827 staff. There have been 29 deaths of incarcerated individuals. Some of our loved ones are sick and others have passed away. Nationally, more than 50,000 prisoners have tested positive for the virus, with Florida being recognized as one of the hot spots.

For those who aren’t sick, they have been cut off from society whether infected or not, with no end date in sight. It is understandable that visitation is suspended due to the likelihood of visitors carrying the virus into prisons. Combine that with the risk already presented by staff, who go in and out every day, and the constant transfers into prisons from local jails, visitations would almost certainly result in many more positive tests.

As in the case of nursing homes, the virus can spread like wildfire in a prison. This is why loved ones of those incarcerated are begging the state, when possible, to set them free. You might ask, “Why is it better for them to be at home if  the virus is spreading like wildfire outside too?” There are crucial reasons why.

The substandard healthcare system in prisons does not have the capacity or the financial resources to care for our loved ones falling ill from the virus. Prisons already struggle to treat ongoing health and mental health  issues, such as the ongoing  prisonwide Hepatitis C epidemic.

Let’s also mention the lack of a nutritious diet in prisons to fight off any ailments. Plus, incarcerated individuals can not social distance; they sleep two feet apart, as well as eat, live, use the bathroom, and work together in close proximity every day.

Do I blame the Department of Corrections for these conditions? No, I think they are working with prisons that are overcrowded due to draconian sentences levied in Florida. Corrections officials must also deal with budget limitations.

By the way, that money comes from you, the taxpayers. It would be used much better if, instead of warehousing prisoners, more of it were spent on rehabilitation. That leaves us in our current situation, where prisoners who don’t need to be incarcerated are in danger of succumbing to COVID-19. Some of our legislators continue to fail to acknowledge this.

The Toll on the Prisoners and Their Families/Loved Ones

The virus is taking an emotional toll on incarcerated individuals and the people who love them. Yes, they too, have families and loved ones. I have experienced nightmares and anxiety and many sleepless nights. My daughter is only 20. She needs her mom. She has had conversations with her bunkmates about taking care of each other should they fall ill, and now she is in a quarantined dorm.  

Her mind is in a secluded place and gets into depressive states; she recently made a short visit to the psych unit. Memories of home have become a blur,  a natural coping mechanism for those in prison. The longer the incarceration, the more society will become a distant memory.

She said to me recently, “Mom, it seems like I’m not going to see you until my end of sentence date.” That date is 4/21/24. I certainly hope that is not the case, but this virus is certainly not under control, at least not in Florida and some other states. Am I saying open visitation? No, not until this virus comes under control. Their chances of dying are much greater than that of society as a whole and they shouldn’t be given a death sentence.

Where do we go from here?

The need to decarcerate is apparent. End the imprisonment of low-level, non-violent imprisonment. The definition of violent needs to be revised as well. Did you know you can be convicted of a crime that labels you violent when no one was hurt and you didn’t
carry a weapon?

Also, we need to stop sending children to adult prisons! To be clear, NOT ALL prisoners are violent and some are serving 20, 30, 40 years to life for non-violent crimes. That is simply outrageous! Let’s free up the scarce resources for prisons so they can treat those inside and get a better handle on the virus and all infectious diseases and ailments.

We must also end the use of draconian mandatory minimum sentences, and end the revolving door of incarceration by incentivizing rehabilitation. The housing and the healthcare of prisoners with unnecessary and excessive sentences is costing you, the taxpayers, many millions of dollars every year. Incarcerated individuals are left without hope of earning credit for good behavior or engaging in self-improvement programs and vocational training.

Now, due to the coronavirus, their families are left to worry that their loved ones will die in prison from the virus--a death sentence they didn’t deserve.

Subsequently, the spread of the COVID-19 virus in prisons is taking its toll on all of us. Directly or indirectly, everyone is affected, including you.

Kim Lawrance is a mom of a daughter who was direct filed at the age of 15, and is inside living through the criminal justice system. Kim is a criminal justice advocate and also has her dual Master’s in criminal justice specializing in corrections and rehabilitation and criminal analysis and is a Criminal Justice PhD student.

In 2013, I founded Mothers Against Police Brutality (MAPB) after my only son Clinton Allen was extra-judicially murdered by a Dallas police officer. Clinton was unarmed. He was just 25-years-old, and had grown from being a delightful and curious child into an avid reader who dreamed of becoming the fifth generation of our family to be a rancher. His dreams were extinguished with his life. He should be alive today.
 
The officer shot my son seven times, once at close range in the back. Clinton’s death at the hands of police is far from uncommon. Rather, it is something almost commonplace in communities of color, and the public outcry against police violence makes it clear that the nation is waking up to that tragic reality more and more.
 
Each year, thousands of people are killed by U.S. law enforcement. For the most part, no one says their names except for their own family and friends. Every so often a handful of these thousands who have been murdered are cherry-picked as being worthy of attention for a variety of reasons: the killing was caught on compelling video; it’s particularly vicious; or because the victim is especially sympathetic.

The reality is that all people killed by law enforcement should have their names heard, and their stories told. Outside of the handful of cases that the public is aware of, the consistent loss of life at the hands of police is almost invisible. The lack of extensive media coverage of all police killings spreads the illusion worldwide that police brutality in the U.S. is an anomaly. We know that instead, it is the rule, and a source of fear, death, and anguish for communities of color in general and Black people in particular.
 
A common retort is that we are dealing with “a few bad apples” who happen to be spoiling the good name of the bunch. We are not. We are dealing with a police culture that is an orchard of poisoned trees, diseased at the root, bearing a relentless, deadly fruit which tears apart Black families like my own. 
 
For each one of us who fights for our rights and lives, there is a law enforcement organization pushing back. Unjust laws and powerful police unions protect U.S. police officers. The number of police officers who kill Black people who actually face a jury is statistically insignificant. Furthermore, district attorneys are generally unwilling to prosecute; they are often too cozy with police institutions they count on to win convictions; and when campaigning for office, they seek the endorsement and funds of the local police union.
 
Finally, police killings are not always independently investigated — more often than not, it is police departments that investigate themselves. In the first hours after an officer kills one of us, they set the narrative and tone, which is typically picked up by the county prosecutor. The fact remains that in the U.S., a police officer can violate your human rights, even kill you, and 99 times out of 100, nothing will happen. No charges, no indictment, no trial, no conviction and often not even dismissal from the police force. Put simply, the problem of police brutality in America is systemic, racist, and must be addressed as such.
 
These factors have coalesced and worsened over time to enshrine a very dangerous police culture in the U.S. It is dangerous for people of color, particularly Black men and boys. But it is also a great danger to the future of democracy in the U.S. When police abuse their power and use their authority unjustly — which, after all, is the authority given to them by the public, by us — they break the social contract and leave it bleeding in the street.
 
They leave us bleeding in the street.
 
The people of every nation on this earth must summon the courage to resist police brutality, not only in the U.S., but in every country where the fatal results of an original betrayal of public trust exists. We need many specific policy changes, starting with ending qualified immunity, and proceed from there to setting a national standard for the use of deadly force that complies with international law.
 
Reducing funding to police departments and reinvesting those funds into Black and Brown communities are necessary steps to prevent further harm and to ensure that all people can live without fear of police violence.
 
Incredibly, today in America every law enforcement agency can claim its own standard for when they can kill a person as long as the officer says that he felt that “his life was in danger.” Unarmed suspect, shot in the back, driving away, running away? “Fearing for his life, the officer fired seven shots, killing the suspect.” No charges, no indictment, no trial, no conviction. It could only be more unbelievable if it weren’t true, but this is the reality of police brutality in the U.S.
 
On June 19, the United Nations Human Rights Council adopted by consensus a watered-down resolution calling on the high commissioner to prepare a report on systemic racism and violations of international human rights law against Black people, to contribute to accountability and redress for victims. I very much hope that the report will be the first step in a series of meaningful international accountability measures to fully and independently investigate police killings in the U.S., and to provide effective remedy and compensation to victims and their families.
 
But beyond any specific policy change, we need people worldwide to demand an end to the routine extra-judicial killing of Black people by the police in America. In the name of my son, Clinton, and for all of our families: this must stop.

" data-domain="www.youtube.com" data-whitelisted="false">

This article is based on Collette Flanagan’s statement to the United Nations Human Rights Council.

Collette Flanagan, Founder, Mothers Against Police Brutality

Donald Trump, who often behaves as though he has never read the Constitution, received an important civics lesson from the Supreme Court yesterday when it ruled in two cases involving his personal financial records, including tax returns that he has long sought to conceal, that there is an important difference between being president and king. As the Supreme Court emphatically – and on this point, unanimously – reminded us all, the president may occupy the highest office in the land, but he is not above the law.
 
Chief Justice Roberts wrote the Court’s opinion in both cases. The first case, Trump v. Vance, arose when a New York State grand jury investigating possible financial crimes issued a subpoena to the President’s long-time accountants, requiring production of the President’s own tax returns as well as tax returns filed on behalf of various of his business entities. Grand jury proceedings are secret, and the Manhattan District Attorney has refused to say whether the President himself is a target of the investigation. He has said, however, that the grand jury is looking into the conduct of “multiple individuals.”
 
The second case, Trump v. Mazars, began when three congressional committees issued subpoenas seeking tax and other financial records from two banks with which Trump has done business in addition to his accounting firm. The congressional subpoenas were issued as part of ongoing inquiries into foreign interference with the 2016 presidential election and the possible need to strengthen federal laws addressing money laundering, terrorism, and conflicts of interest.
 
Donald Trump’s response was to file federal lawsuits in both New York and D.C. insisting that each of the subpoenas was invalid and therefore none of them could be enforced. He lost that argument in the lower courts and he has now lost it in the Supreme Court. The two cases nonetheless presented different claims and the Supreme Court approached them differently. The ACLU filed amicus briefs in both cases.
 
Trump’s position in the grand jury case was that he is absolutely immune from state judicial process (meaning a subpoena) while in office even if, as here, the subpoena solely concerns his conduct as a private individual unrelated to the performance of any presidential duties and even if, as here, the subpoenaed documents are relevant to the grand jury’s investigation of other individuals and organizations.
 
No one on the Supreme Court accepted that position, and with good reason. Since the early days of the Republic, as Chief Justice Roberts put it, presidents have been required to produce evidence in federal criminal proceedings. It was true for Thomas Jefferson when Aaron Burr was on trial for treason. It was true for Richard Nixon when a grand jury sought the Watergate tapes. And it was true for Bill Clinton during the Whitewater investigation. Donald Trump’s tweeted complaint following the Supreme Court’s decisions that other presidents in similar situations have received judicial deference, “BUT NOT ME,” is not only self-pitying, but wrong.
 
Indeed, as the Supreme Court recognized, Trump’s claim to absolute immunity was considerably weaker than in the Watergate case, where President Nixon had claimed executive privilege over conversations that took place in the Oval Office. Trump did not and could not claim executive privilege over his private business affairs. For that reason, the Supreme Court also rejected Trump’s plea to apply the same heightened standard of need that it had applied to the Watergate subpoena. But, like every other recipient of a grand jury subpoena, Trump remains free to argue that the subpoena is unduly burdensome or was issued in bad faith.
 
The congressional subpoena case involved a different set of concerns and a different balancing of interests by the Supreme Court. In contrast to a 200-year history of presidential compliance with criminal subpoenas, Chief Justice Roberts began his opinion in Mazars by pointing out that the Court had never previously addressed a congressional subpoena for information concerning the president. Rather, he noted, such disputes have historically been resolved by negotiation between the political branches.
 
Writing on a clean slate, the Chief Justice articulated two important principles at the outset. First, Congress’s power to obtain information through subpoena is a necessary and important adjunct to its power to legislate and conduct oversight of the executive branch. Second, the power to investigate is subject to limits to prevent a recurrence of the abuses that occurred most notably during the McCarthy era. The most important of those limits is the requirement that a congressional subpoena be pertinent to a valid legislative purpose.
 
Citing Watergate again, Trump argued that something more should be required when the president is involved. Again, the Court disagreed, reiterating the distinction between an inquiry into the president’s conduct in office and his conduct as a private citizen. The standard proposed by the President, the Court noted, “would risk seriously impeding Congress in carrying out its responsibilities.”
 
The ACLU accordingly argued in its amicus brief that the congressional subpoenas were proper and should be upheld. The Supreme Court took a different course, sending the case back to the lower courts for a closer look at whether the information Congress was seeking could be obtained elsewhere and whether the subpoenas could be narrowed.
 
As a practical matter, that means that Congress is unlikely to obtain any documents before the upcoming election unless the parties can settle the dispute, which would undoubtedly be the Court’s preferred resolution but seems even less likely given the current toxic political environment.
 
That outcome has led some to describe the congressional case as a political victory for Trump, even if his legal position did not prevail. But it would be a mistake to underestimate the significance of the fundamental principle that underlies both of yesterday’s decisions, or the fact that a Court that is so frequently fractured was unified in recognizing that Trump’s broad claim to presidential immunity is incompatible with our constitutional democracy and the system of checks and balances that was designed to preserve it.

Steven R. Shapiro, Former ACLU Legal Director
Sam Shapiro, Partner, Emery Celli Brinckerhoff & Abady LLP