A network dedicated to working in the Hudson Valley to fight the racist criminal justice system.
Description
The End the New Jim Crow Action Network! (ENJAN, pronounced “engine”) is a group of Hudson Valley residents working locally to end the era of mass incarceration in this country. With more than 2 million people currently in prisons and jails, and over 5 million people on probation and parole, the United States has steadily imprisoned or detained more of its citizens than any other country in the world. This expansion of the criminal justice system disproportionately targets African Americans and Hispanics, transforming the policy of mass incarceration into a racial caste system that robs our fellow citizens of their basic dignity and humanity by treating them as disposable beings. In Dutchess County alone, African Americans account for more than half of all those sentenced each year, despite constituting merely 10% of our population.
What We Stand For
-An end to the wasteful and failed “War on Drugs,” which has filled prisons with non-violent offenders.
-An end to unaccountable private “for-profit” prisons nationwide.
-An end to jail expansion in Dutchess County and all new prisons nationwide.
-An end to discriminatory sentencing.
-An end to Stop-and-Frisk and other forms of racial profiling.
-An end to the excessive use of force and other forms of police brutality.
-Full restoration of all civil rights, including voting rights, regardless of a person’s prior convictions.
-Full funding for programs that assist those being released from incarceration.
-A shift from forms of punishment that breed a cycle of poverty and delinquency to more restorative and rehabilitative approaches to crime, including a massive reinvestment in education and job creation.
