➤ IMPRISONED ELDERS,, from p.20
on the couch.
SUSIE DAY: Why are you —
and RAPP — throwing everything
you’ve got into getting elders out
of prison — and driving us both
crazy?
LAURIE WHITEHORN: I started
RAPP with two other, formerly
incarcerated people, all in our late
60s, early 70s. Two of us had spent
years in New York State prisons; I
was in the federal system. We were
all inside in the 1980s and ‘90s,
during the AIDS epidemic. And
we were horrifi ed, seeing friends
around us suffering, dying, ostracized.
There was no treatment, no
care. So, from our different prisons
— we weren’t in touch with each
other — we all started peer education
programs. We understood the
connection between public health
and the incarceration of people
who are growing older and older,
who the system will not release.
I live — you know this — with
grief for the people I watched die in
prison. There wasn’t even an HIV
test then. Women would be taken
out to the hospital, come back.
They’d say, “I have a new kind of
pneumonia, I’m gonna die, and I
have AIDS – I don’t know what that
is.” No one on the street was saying
that women get AIDS then, we
were just seen as vectors for men
to acquire it.
In our kitchen, by the coffee
canister, as you know, there’s a
photo of Joyce, who died in prison
with AIDS. She was my best friend
inside; she didn’t tell anybody she
was sick, I guess because being
Black was already hard enough.
All of us who’ve done time are
haunted by those beloved friends,
who died inside because there was
no care — the system just wasn’t
capable of it.
This time, it’s not a sexually-
and blood-transmitted pathogen;
it’s one you can get from just being
in the same room with someone
who’s shedding virus droplets, or
it’s on exposed surfaces.
DAY: How many elders are there
now in New York State prisons?
WHITEHORN: About ten thousand;
10,239. That’s people in the
state system over 50 — not counting
younger people at risk with underlying
conditions.
We started RAPP in 2013 because
we saw that the proportion
of older people in New York prisons
had doubled, while the overall
prison population fell by almost 30
percent. This was because most
reforms apply only to people with
so-called low-level, nonviolent offenses.
But years of “lock-’em-up”
media and politicians making their
careers off convincing the public
that crime is America’s number
one problem have given us thousands
more people in prison with
impossible sentences like life without
parole.
These are people — mostly Black
and Brown — who are growing old,
who will become ill, as the virus
infi ltrates the prisons, which it’s
beginning to do. They’re usually
convicted of violent crimes. We’re
all trying to minimize violence,
but people with those sentences
have the lowest risk of recidivism,
once they reach about the age of
50. They’re the people who are being
denied release over and over
again.
If you give someone at age 19 a
25-to-life sentence, and then hold
them way past their 25-year minimum,
they’ll likely die in prison.
They can’t change what they did
when they were 19; all they can do
is transform themselves into a new
person. But that person becomes
invisible if you permanently brand
them with their original crime.
These are people in danger – that’s
why you see how nuts I am. There’s
an urgent need to get people out —
it’s an emergency.
DAY: What about people like me
who’ve never been to prison? Why
should I care who gets out when
I’ve got my own coronavirus worries?
WHITEHORN:’Because we can’t
let social distancing become moral
distancing. We can’t live in a society
that kills people, where people
only care about themselves.
I’m 74 and — you know, you live
with me — I’m nervous. I have underlying
conditions.
But what keeps me up at night is,
“What does shelter in place mean
if you’re homeless? Or if you’re in
prison, where you’re almost sure to
be infected?”
We’re getting chilling messages
from people inside: no cleaning
supplies, no TP, no soap, no attempt
to screen corrections offi -
cers, who bring in COVID-19. We
have to understand that the social
distancing strategy implemented
outside is utterly impossible inside
overcrowded prisons. I remember
when I lived in a cell built for one
person — it actually housed four.
The death penalty was outlawed
in New York State because people
here are against inhumane punishment.
But thisis a new death
penalty.
DAY: Are you having any success?
WHITEHORN: You see me run
to my computer every fi ve minutes
to put another article on the RAPP
website. Even Fox News is arguing
people should be released, as
are former prosecutors, current
prosecutors. The heads of the Corrections
Committees in the State
Senate and the Assembly have a
proposal for letting out people a
couple of years within their release
date, or anyone who’s parole-eligible
and has already hit their minimum
sentence.
The reason I think we’re not seeing
action by the governor of New
York is that he’s getting pressure
from the police. The police and
the guards union wield enormous
clout, so this is becoming a political
issue. Governor Cuomo: do
you really want to get your public
health and human rights agenda
from the police?
Cuomo puts himself forward as a
progressive — on some issues, he’s
pretty good — but on the criminal
legal system, he’s afraid of blowback
from the people who created
this incarceration crisis in the fi rst
place by pushing a law-and-order
agenda. He’s on TV, talking about
risk factors. He issued Matilda’s
Law, basically grounding his own
mother and others like me over
70 — we can’t go out of the house.
Cuomo sees his mother — and by
extension, others of us — as human
beings.
But he’s forcing people in prison
to shelter in place, exactly where
they’re most endangered. So can
you imagine, if Cuomo doesn’t act
and people inside are left to die,
how he will be remembered? We
can’t call this inaction: he’s actingby
not letting them out.
DAY: Is releasing people only up
to Cuomo?
WHITEHORN: No, but he’s
number one. He has the power to
cut through red tape on a dime, issue
an executive order: Clemency
to every person over 55, or with an
underlying condition. The Parole
Board could also immediately release
people. The Legislature could
craft something. But the people
who have the most power, who
could do the most good, are silent.
And if Cuomo doesn’t do this, then
really, he’s on a par with Trump,
who believes there are two kinds
of people: his people, and those he
calls animals, criminals.
DAY: Can people on the outside
help?
WHITEHORN: Everyone can do
something, use whatever position
they have in society to demand
Cuomo and the Parole Board release
people in the New York State
system. They can go on RAPPcampaign.
com and look at the petitions,
the letters, join the Twitter
campaigns. We have virtual forums
about this. RAPP supports
two legislative bills with a lot of cosponsors,
which look even more rational
and important in light of this
virus. To help release immigrants
in detention centers, they can go
to JusticeRoadmapny.org. People
should educate themselves, write
letters to local papers, organize
their social circles. Everyone has
some power — Oh Jesus, I’m getting
a migraine stands up, holds
forehead. I can’t believe this…
DAY: Just tell me why do you
keep doing this when it’s making
your head throb and turning our
home into Nerve Central?
WHITEHORN: Long pause
How could I not? If I was in prison
now, I would want someone to fi ght
for me. It hurts my heart to imagine
sitting here at home, watching
TV — doing more cooking than I’ve
done in a year because we can’t go
out — and looking at that picture
of Joyce.
The thing is, this is such an easy
fi x. Prisons don’t stop violence, but
even if you think they do, there’s
no reason for people with zero risk
of committing another crime to be
held there, waiting to get sick.
The fact that quote progressive
institutions in this state are enacting
inhumane policies — which are
racist in the deepest way — when
they could do something different,
that’s something I cannot sit with.
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