 This is Think Tech Hawaii. Community matters here. Happy Aloha Friday and welcome to Perspectives on Global Justice Think Tech Hawaii program. This is your host, Beatrice Cantelmo. Today, we'll be conversing with a new national director for black and pink organization based in Boston. Her name is Trey Johns. I first met Trey Honolulu back in January of this year, doing the Women's March at the State Capitol. I have hoped that Trey would stay in the State of Aloha for many years, but we should need her wisdom and spunk here. I also have hoped that Trey would be able to give continuity to her social justice and advocacy work in our state. But, Destiny had bigger plans for her. Trey is now focusing her energy and sharing her expertise to support LGBTQIA prisoners and their families at the national level, while addressing criminal justice reform issues as well. As a fast road nation, we know that reducing prison population, finding alternatives to incarceration and accounting for the human and fiscal toll of mass incarceration needs to happen in the United States. This is a bipartisan issue and restorative justice is as much more humane, cost efficient and effective way to address and repair harms and violence and crimes. Some states are ahead of the curve and walking towards moving in such direction. This conversation could not be more timing for the State of Hawaii, but we need effective incarceration policies now to improve Hawaii's current correctional system. On November 8, Governor Iggy announced a preferred location for the new building of O'ahu Community Correctional Center, otherwise known as OCCC. It seems to be quite a rushed decision, especially given that the community at large does not wish to see the building of a new OCCC, and HCR 85 Task Force must finish their work, which is not projected to happen until 2019, before any plans for OCCC move forward. Instead of spending billions of dollars building a larger OCCC, our state ought to consider repairing its current criminal justice system and spend money to adopt restorative justice models that focuses on rehabilitation and reintegration instead. The disproportionate overrepresentation of Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders in the Hawaiian criminal justice system is quite problematic and deserves special attention as well. Data from the Hawaii Department of Public Safety indicated that as of 2016, 38.4% of the prison population in the state of Hawaii were Native Hawaiians. That means that one out of four Native Hawaiians are in prison or jail. One out of three incarcerated people at OCCC were homeless, and more than 50% of the people detained at OCCC are pre-trial detainees. And as of July 2016, 999 people, or 72% of the people in prison at OCCC, were classified at community or minimal custody level. From 1978 to 2014, the Hawaiian prison has increased 654%. Such increase is largely driven by heavier penalties from nonviolent offenses. On that note, let's welcome Trey to our program. Hey, how are you doing? Hi, Trey. How are you doing? Wonderful. Thank you so much for being with us here at Think Tech Hawaii. So, do you mind giving our viewers a little background about yourself? I know that you were raised in Chicago. So, what was life like growing up by Darling? Well, life was growing up in Chicago in the late 80s, early 90s. It was different. I mean, we was poor, but I didn't realize how poor we was until I was an adult. So, it was growing up, family first. I left Chicago when I was 17. I joined the Navy after I was discharged from the Navy. I went to college. I studied pre-law. I was raising my sister's kids and my brother's kids. And then after I graduated from college five days later, I was sentenced to 13 years in federal prison for less than $500 worth of drugs. I spent nine years in federal prison becoming a very good jailhouse lawyer, assisting a lot of women with their cases, with custody battles and things like that. And then upon my release, at first I was an engineer and then I started doing advocacy work and just doing what I love because even though I was a certified welder, every job I had never worked out for me. So, it was destined for me to do this advocacy work because no matter what the job was, I mean, I could be getting paid $25 an hour and I wanted to just help somebody get out of prison. So, your call really comes from the heart, from past hand experience, not only having to deal with an unjust criminal justice system, but also finding niches and ways to ameliorate the system and to empower all the individuals to fight for their own rights. And so, Trey, tell me a little bit about what is life now for you in Boston since you took your new position as the National Director for Black and Pink? Like, what are you up to? Well, the prospect of life here in Boston as the National Director is amazing. You know, there's amazing opportunities and there's amazing work that can be done here. I've worked not only with Black and Pink, but I'm familiar with a couple of different organizations here starting up like the Women's Justice Circle, you know, but Black and Pink is now getting into the reentry. So, instead of just supporting the PENPOW program, we have reentry programs. We're trying to start up now to support LGBTQ and HIV-positive prisoners when they're released. So, they have the resources like healthcare providers, safe neighborhoods to live in LGBTQ-friendly mental health counseling and things like that. So, just basically try to build a community. That's wonderful. So, do you mind sharing with our viewers when did Black and Pink started, you know, in the United States and how many chapters you have? And you kind of touched a little bit on the vision and mission of the organization, which is to serve LGBT and HIV prisoners and their families, not only when they are reintegrated into society after they complete their term, but also while they are serving their sentence. So, can you elaborate a little bit on that? Well, Black and Pink started in 2005. The founder was Jason Leiden. He was released from federal prison and he decided to keep in contact with his friends that he left behind. That turned into one of the largest PENPOW programs in the country. We also have a newspaper that goes out to 15,000 prisoners every single month. We do court support. And basically, you know, we advocate for trans prisoners and LGBTQ prisoners to end solitary confinement because sexual violence, sexual assault is most prevalent among LGBTQ and trans prisoners. They're brutalized in men's prisons by guards and inmates alike. And so we take, you know, we hold prisons and jails accountable when we have our members complain to us and basically just advocate for human rights. But our vision and our mission is the end of prison-industrial conflicts itself because it is a failed entity and it has been shown historically over and over again that prison and the concept, the concept that it is used in today is failed. Exactly. So let's elaborate a little bit more on this failed system that you have just mentioned and the trend that we have in our nation to support more of their privatization, federal money to support a punitive criminal justice system as opposed to restorative one. How is Black and Pink engaged to educate people, you know, about the issues, but also to advocate for that change? We do a lot of workshops. We do workshops that we train professionals like public defenders. We train doctors, healthcare providers and how to treat formerly incarcerated LGBTQ. We also were instrumental in doing policy and research. We had a study called Coming Out of Concrete Closet. It was the largest LGBTQ study of active prisoners done. And I mean, that study itself gave so much information because it was over 1200 respondents all over the country, state and federal prisons. And we just got a wealth of information. And what Black and Pink is dedicated to doing is ensuring that the laws and policy that we work so hard to put in place are implemented. Right now in Massachusetts, we're working on solitary confinement bill and it states, you know, if a LGBTQ person is in or trans person is in solitary confinement for their safety, there is not only a time limit, but they have to be afforded with the same privileges. And at this present time, Black and Pink is, you know, making a case for being on that oversight committee as opposed to having someone from the governor's office or the sheriff's office dictating how long a person that they really don't care about has to sit in solitary confinement. So we've just been instrumental as while we tear down the prison industrial complex that we, in the interim, we do the necessary work to make sure people are treated the way that they should be treated. Absolutely. And do you as an organization have a hard time having access to prisoners, you know, who feel safe enough to share what the reality is? Because like one of the concerns that I think a lot of our social justice organizations have when doing this level of advocacy work is the fear of retaliation, you know, for inmates who are currently serving their time. And as they speak out, things not happening for them and not in a good way. So what is the experience of Black and Pink in Massachusetts and in older states where you have chapters? Well, for the most part, our LGBTQ people and trans people know that they're already being brutalized. They're already being beaten and they're already being raped. And beating them and raping them and brutalizing them more is not going to change anything. So almost every piece of prison, every piece of litigation that has gone through our Supreme Court has been brought on by a prisoner. It has been brought on by somebody sitting in a cell willing to take that backlash, willing to take that solitary confinement, willing to take those beatings and those rapes or sexual assaults to put their name on that lawsuit to fight the injustices of the prison system. So when our trans and LGBTQ people come to us, they already know the violence that they're going to face because they're facing it anyway. So we have that level to where we understand the retaliation. And our people come ready because they're being hurt and beaten anyway. So they're going to hurt and beat us anyway. So we might as well fight. Well, what a fresh way of air to be able to have an organization that can be a safe point for people that are being abused and their human rights are being violated to say no more. And I'm going to speak out against it and provide my testimony because that's a big part I think of systemic changes is that the people who are directly impacted by current policy, the good and better ugly of policies, never have that space on the table or stake in terms of having their voices and their experiences heard. It's our own organization. It's always experts speaking on behalf of a certain group, an interest group, and I really command and value the structure of the organization that it is grassroots driven, but also driven by and for the people who are directly impacted by the injustices that they're currently faced with. So that's a big, big, big thing happening right there. So tell us a little bit more about the older programs of Black and Pink, the art piece of it and the advocacy piece of it because I understand you also provide the advocacy to individuals when they go to court for their hearings or their parole reviews. How does that look like and how does Black and Pink? We have volunteers and they do court support. We identify LGBTQ people that need to be bonded out of jail and we go bond them out of jail and we find out when their court dates are and we go to court and support them. We make sure that they have transportation to court, make sure that they have a safe haven. We make sure that they eat, that they have the basic things necessary to make it to court and we stand there with them in place of their family if they don't have a family. And right now, Black and Pink, we're trying to get into participatory defense to where we can be more active and we can help them become more active and also reach out to their families so that they can become more active in their own defense because, I mean, if studies have shown that defendants with family and knowledge of their case and that actually took the time to help themselves, they get lesser sentences. Oh, absolutely. And so much of the clients that you see are people who have court-appointed attorneys like a public defender. How is that looking like in terms of efficiency, in terms of how that's translated into fair representation, at least in Massachusetts? I mean, I've only been in Massachusetts a couple of months, so I can't really speak to the record of the public defenders with a lot of intelligence. But I do know that we have been, we have a workshop training set up for the public defender's office here in Boston. They have been receptive to our volunteers and they're also receptive to the participatory defense. So we're fortunate enough to have some public defenders that are willing to allow people to come in to assist them with their caseloads that's impossible for them to even treat half of their cases with any sort of attention. Yes, so much of law has to do with that preparation, you know, like looking at the discovery, being able to do additional investigative work if necessary. And as you have pointed out, I think it's a national trend that most of our public defense system, any state you look at it, are overlooked and that the resources are not there to be able to provide that level of justice and equity. So perhaps a lot of the outcome of our sentence is determined because that work needed to be a little bit more expanded. So that's really wonderful that the public defenders in Boston are receptive to look at that and working partnership with Black and White. Are you guys working with the universities also and with legal law centers to be able to perhaps address this as a coalition? Well, we have a group, we have a couple of groups here in Boston. I'm trying to familiarize myself as I navigate through the non-profit quagmire that they have here. You know, they have a lot of amazing organizations, but it's like a lot of amazing people are doing amazing work, but they're not doing the work together. So like I team up with the Massachusetts Bill Fund. We work together and we're trying to incorporate diversion programs. So if we can manage to get people out of their court situations, we can keep them. Instead of trying to focus on making sure people go to court and prepare themselves to go to prison, we need to start focusing on keeping people out of prison when they get out from the house or stay out. Exactly. And that's that part of restorative justice call that I think we have all over instead of having people deeper into the system that we really work to rehabilitate and to reintegrate and keep them out of jail. So what is that looking like for Boston in terms of, for example, a current legislative book that would look fair reform or alternative to incarceration, for example, for people who pose low or no risk to society for the crime they might have committed? Well, Boston literally is kicking down doors because we have the primary caretakers act that we've been, and it's more like a diversion program. Whereas if you're the primary caretaker of a minor child, they need to offer something else instead of incarceration. So we've been trying to put that forward. Massachusetts Boston is also coming up with the women's justice circle and its pattern after the women's court in India. And basically, it's give us our women and girls and we'll take care of them. You don't have to put them in a cage. So we're determining the dynamics of that and try to see how we can fit that into the criminal justice system here in Boston. And we have a lot with the criminal justice bail reform or with the reform bill itself, we have a lot of new policies going through that we're hoping are adopted with this new bail fund. So right now, Boston is, they kicking butt over here trying to pave the way because we got some sisters over here that they're not playing no game, taking no prisoners. It's the women led organizations over here that are taking the lead making it more about that women led movement that's mobilizing and shifting the way criminal justice is being done in Boston. What have you noticed, you know, from women leadership and that call for change? Well, a struggle. I have, I have personally firsthand witnessed the, I'm trying to find the perfect work that terrified white male that they're going to lose their place to these women. I mean, I've literally watched them become afraid of their position in these organizations and in the world. I mean, it's like white privilege feels untaught and threatened because these women led organizations have done everything that should have been done in the last few years. I was asked the question at Simmons College via middle-aged white lady. She said that she has unrealistic sense of being a progressive liberal white woman, but there are no black people in her town. So she doesn't know. So she asked me what could she do to support, you know, the movement and the fight to end white supremacy. And my answer has become this and it's simply this and it's pay black women pay black women for the plight that we have put and the time and the blood and the sweat and the tears that we have put into America. We have put our sons down from the trees. We are the first ones at the jail where the first ones to protest. If you shoot our kids in the street, black women are the first ones to show up. We were the only ones nursing white babies from our breast. We have nursed and cared for this country and we owe it. And this country owes it to black women because after we put our kids on the bus, we go protests. We take care of this country. We have been taking care of this country since they brought us over here. And the way to support ending white supremacy is support black women because we have a reason to be doing this work and we're not doing it for the fame and the fortune. That's for sure. I can't. I can add anything to this statement that you made and I can't believe how quickly I have an hour have passed. And I hope that this is the faster or many dialogues that we'll be able to have moving forward for months, years to come. I have told you many times in your short stay here in Hawaii how much you have inspired me as a servant leader and as a sister, you know, to continue to walk in this field and to learn and to listen more importantly to listen and to build the sisterhood as it should be. And I can't believe how lucky and how timing it is that you went to Boston to exercise, you know, your new role and I'm so excited to not only follow your blossoming as a professional and as an advocate, but also to figure out ways in which we can tie your work at a national level here in Hawaii. You have so much to teach us and to share and this exchange needs to happen. So I really want to thank you from the heart, you know, for your inner fire, for your energy and for your perseverance and for giving so much of yourself. I'm happy that the older jobs did not work because this is exactly where you need to be. And you know that you always have a sister here and the Hawaii will always welcome you with open hearts. At least I think that Hawaii and I will keep the door open for all the other places, you know, to have, you know, your voice and your organization's presence strong also here. Thank you so much, Trey. Thank you, Beatrice, and we'll be back to see you. We got to see you much. Ola, Pikao is waiting for you and your wife. Aloha, my darling. Aloha. And this concludes our episode of Perspectives on Global Justice Think Tech Hawaii and I hope to see you next Friday and I wish you all a wonderful thanksgiving. A hui hou.