Keith Wattley Letter to the Editor - New York Times
Re “What Do You Do When a Family Member Commits a Terrible Crime?” (The Opinions, nytimes.com, April 2):
Harriet Clark, in her conversation with M. Gessen, observes that accountability is a long process, not an ultimatum. She is right. I know because I’ve spent more than 20 years watching hundreds of people take accountability and transform their lives.
I represent people serving life sentences at parole hearings. Many have been incarcerated for 30 to 40 years. They have done decades of the work Ms. Clark describes. They’ve rebuilt family bonds from behind glass, mentored younger people inside and confronted the harm they caused with painful honesty.
But they too often sit before parole boards that treat this kind of transformation as irrelevant. Ms. Clark names something I see frequently: The boards conclude that a person is dangerous because of the fears and outrage survivors express, not because the person is an actual current threat. Letting the person come home would cost something politically.
The people I work with have something to offer the communities waiting for them. They mentor young people, counsel others struggling with addiction and trauma, and show up for their families in ways most people would never expect from people who have spent most of their youth in prison.
We can keep choosing punishment long after it has stopped serving anyone. Or we can build a system that recognizes what people are capable of becoming.
Keith Wattley
Oakland, Calif.
The writer is the founder and executive director of UnCommon Law.