Panel discussion with local activists and impacted individuals responding to: "What do you see as the path toward decarceration, abolition, and beyond? And how do you think we get there?"

This is a part of our Week Against Mass Incarceration series, which is an annual event hosted by the National Lawyers Guild. This year the theme is “Prison Abolition and Beyond” and is meant to include all locations and instances in which people are held against their will, including jails, immigration detention, juvenile detention facilities, psychiatric wards, and more. We also intend the “beyond” to include consideration of the abolition of policing as part of the larger mass incarceration system.

Speakers:

• Bree Anderson, Daughters Beyond Incarceration | Bree Anderson is a native New Orleanian that graduated from Warren Easton Sr. High School. Bree is an advocate, social entrepreneur and trauma expert, in view of parental incarceration and her story has been featured on talk shows, panels, podcasts, and news articles about how mass incarceration affects children. Her social experience led her to become a community leader by helping to eliminate race-based discrimination as a former committee member of the NAACP and actively serve as a member of Innocence Project New Orleans Young Professional Committee to defy society’s stereotype of children with incarcerated parents. Bree has been nominated for several awards in 2019 including Champion of Change and Forbes 30 under 30, Forbes Next 1000, Jason Williams DA Transition Team, Community Advisory Group Safety & Justice committee. As well as, the Co-Founder of Daughters Beyond Incarceration, a non-profit geared towards enhancing the overall life of girls with incarcerated fathers.
• Dominque Jones-Johnson, Daughters Beyond Incarceration | Dominque Jones-Johnson is a native New Orleanian and a graduate of Warren Easton Sr. High School. As an adult child with an incarcerated parent, Ms. Jones advocates for kids with incarcerated parents by leading an organization geared toward the overall well-being of young black girls with an incarcerated father. In addition, she also speaks on panels as an expert in the field of trauma due to parental incarceration. In December of 2017, Ms. Jones became a published author with her article in Loyola's Law Review, titled: "When are you coming home: AN EXPLORATORY ESSAY CONFRONTING THE ISSUES INVOLVING CHILDREN WITH INCARCERATED PARENTS AND HOW TO BREAK THE CYCLE". She received her undergraduate degree from Alabama State University on a full track and field scholarship and, her Master's in Human Resource Education with a specialization in Organizational Leadership from LSU.
• Robert Jones, Director of Community Outreach with the Orleans Public Defenders Office | Robert Jones is a published author, Community Activist, Entrepreneur and Executive Director/founder of Free-Dem Foundations, Inc., Director of Community Outreach with the Orleans Public Defenders Office. Mr. Jones sits on the Board of Directors of Innocence project New Orleans, the City of New Orleans Safety & Justice Challenge Community Advisory Group Committee, The New Orleans City council Criminal Justice Advisory Committee, and the Dillard University Center For Racial Justice Advisory Board. On January 26, 2017, Robert Jones was exonerated after serving 23 years, 7 months, 3 days at Angola for crimes he did not commit.
• Nziki Wiltz, Participatory Defense Movement NOLA (PDM-NOLA), VOTE-NOLA, Teacher | Nziki Wiltz is a Nola native and has been an educator for the last 20 years. She is a member of PDM NOLA and recently fought charges against her, and won. Her first-hand experience with the criminal legal system almost took everything she built for her family. With the help of advocates and community organizing, she is still free and is dedicated to restoring the full human rights of those most impacted by mass incarceration. She works with VOTE and continues to work effortlessly to provide people with resources and support who are directly impacted. She knows that when we fight, we can win. #pdmnola
• Al Page, Immigration Services and Legal Advocacy (ISLA) | Al Page is a co-founder and staff attorney at ISLA. She is a graduate of McGill University and Tulane Law School. After law school, she received an Equal Justice Works Fellowship to represent unaccompanied immigrant minors, and at the completion of the project, she was hired by Catholic Charities of New Orleans where she continued her work as a Senior Staff Attorney, in addition to running a city-wide immigration self-help program. Recently, she founded ISLA to address the egregious deprivation of due process for immigrants in detention.