Justice Reform Content Creators: We Need Your Help!
Do you have a working knowledge of Virginia criminal law, police reform, or criminal justice reform and are you interested in writing about it?
Do you have graphic design skills to help attract attention to our important cause?
Justice Forward needs your help!
As you may have heard, the Virginia General Assembly has announced an emergency legislative session for August, and the focus will be police reform and criminal justice reform.
In order for reform to work, it is imperative that it address the unique problems found in Virginia's justice system. And addressing our unique problems requires advocates to be informed. That represents a challenge in and of itself. With only two months before session, and so many proposals on the table, we have a tough task ahead of us to ensure that advocates understand what works and what doesn't.
For that reason we're calling on you, our community of volunteer advocates, to help us with the process of creating this important content. Here's what we need:
1) "Issue explainers" -- brief articles to be posted on our Blog and Issues page, explaining nuanced criminal justice and police reform topics in terms laypeople can understand. Blog posts will be published under your name, and where appropriate may be pitched to media outlets.
2) Graphic design assistance -- images, social media banners and the like, to accompany the content described above.
If you are able and willing to help, please email us at info@justiceforwardva.com. We're open to all ideas, but some of the subjects and proposals we've considered "explaining" are as follows:
Why we must prohibit stops and searches based on odor or presence of marijuana (even after decriminalization).
How ridiculous vehicle equipment violations enable pretextual, racially-disparate policing, and why we must eliminate many "primary offenses" from the Code.
How overcriminalization of minor misdemeanor conduct increases unnecessary police contacts, and therefore opportunities for the use of excessive force.
How has the War on Drugs destroyed communities of color, aggrandized law enforcement, and diminished important constitutional rights? How has it defined modern police operations? What can lawmakers do to undo the harm caused by the War on Drugs?
Can and should Virginia decriminalize illicit substances other than marijuana, or reduce punishment for possession them?
Civilian Review Boards: what are they? Do they work?
Do body-worn cameras reduce racial disparities or instances of excessive force?
Assault on law enforcement: why its status as a felony, and the 6-month mandatory minimum, facilitates bad police conduct, and why the law must be modified or repealed.
How eliminating mandatory minimums is a matter of racial justice, not just procedural justice.
Jury sentencing: what is it, why it matters, why it needs to change.
What is a deferred disposition? How does current Virginia law on deferred dispositions inhibit the exercise of discretion in the interest of compassion and fairness