Ed Martin may no longer be serving as D.C.’s top federal prosecutor, but, if he has his way, then his successor, Jeannette Pirro, will take his prosecution of undocumented immigrants and alleged violent offenders to the next level.
In his final remarks as interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, Martin blasted D.C. officials for, as he described it, standing in opposition to President Donald J. Trump’s efforts to “beautify” the nation’s capital.
“The president was gracious recently to remind people we reduced crime 25% in the president’s first 100 Days—but it was not easy. It took attention and resources— law enforcement and our prosecutors had to focus on getting bad actors off the streets,” Martin said during a May 13 press conference at the Patrick Henry building in Northwest.
Not long after Martin made his comments, Pirro carried out her first criminal indictments and sentencing as the new interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia. As reported by The D.C. Examiner, she announced: the sentencing of two men to seven years imprisonment for a daytime drive-by shooting near a D.C. public school; and the indictment of a young man alleged to have assaulted an elder before a Nationals game last summer.
For Martin, such outcomes could happen with the cooperation of elected officials in D.C.
“Congress gave the District of Columbia Home Rule, but with that comes the responsibility to the city’s residents, businesses and workers—and a responsibility to the rest of the country to cherish our nation’s capital,” Martin said as he lambasted the courts for, as he described it, releasing “too many bad guys.” “When our justice system thinks justice is a revolving door when bad actors like the ones with guns and Fentanyl get back on the streets, we have a problem.”
A Revolving Door that Many Returning Citizens are Trying to Avoid
As the Trump administration wields its power to federalize the prosecution of D.C.-based gun crimes, there are 67,000 D.C. residents— nearly 10% of the city’s population— who are living a life of physical freedom after similar experiences in the D.C. courts and federal prison system.
According to the Criminal Justice Coordinating Council, anywhere between an additional 2,000 and 2,500 District residents are making a similar return to society this year. As D.C. Policy Center concluded in 2018, a significant portion of returning citizens will come home in need of credentials beyond a GED.
Despite the District’s reputation as one of the better jurisdictions for returning citizens, statistics indicate that fewer than half of returning citizens are employed or are known as participants in second chance hiring. That’s why the D.C. government, over the last few years, have made investments to help returning citizens make a smooth transition to society, while equipped with the knowledge and confidence needed to overcome the stigma of a criminal record.
For instance, the Congress Heights Community Training & Development Corporation (CHCTDC) helps returning citizens gain and sharpen the skills needed for industry-specific careers in the D.C. metropolitan area. As one of 10 institutions supported by the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) as an integrated education and training provider, CHCTDC exclusively serves returning citizens, 70% of whom experienced gains in math and reading, according to data compiled by OSSE.
No CHCTDC students experienced recidivism during the last fiscal year, OSSE said.
For some students like Terrance Moore, CHCTDC provides an opportunity to change the tide.
“I know if I put in the effort, I can better myself [with] trying to get employment,” said Moore, a 43-year-old Ward 8 resident who will soon enter his third year as a free man. “Nothing’s just going to fall in your lap [but] if you apply yourself and you do, results will come. It might not be as quick as you want, but you will see your progression.”
Moore, who spent more than a decade behind bars, said he’s found it difficult to secure employment since coming home. While at CHCTDC, he practiced using a desktop computer, explored a bevy of industry-recognized certifications and established rapport with other participants with similar aspirations.
Earlier this month, Moore familiarized himself with the latest word processing software under the direction of Stephanie Foo, CHCTDC data manager and instructor. Foo guided Moore and his peers through several minutes of typing and formatting text in a word processor — but not before telling a story that ended with a lesson about accountability.
The experience, Moore said, is helping him grow in more ways than one.
“This class gives you a sense of peace,” he told The Informer. “Honestly. It’s a place where you can relax. At the same time, you’re learning.”
CHCTDC, in existence since 1988, operates along Martin Luther King, Jr. Avenue in Congress Heights. Offerings include literacy, math, and workforce development. Those who enroll often do so as a condition of their parole of their own volition. Throughout the calendar year, cohorts of up to 30 students spend 13 weeks navigating specialized instruction that prepares them for employment, either in maintenance, security or other fields.
As Troy J. Shockley explained to The Informer, students come to depend on CHCTDC as a hub of professional development long after they complete the program.
“They are always coming back because we have an open door policy,” said Shockley, CHCTDC’s director of human capital development. “They need to come back [for] help with their resume, so they always come back. The whole objective is that you get the certification so we can help get you employed. We don’t promise jobs because that’s just not how it works with society and with the job market, but we really work hard with some people to try to get the folk employed.”
Since 2018, Shockley has helped an untold number of returning citizens acquire the skills and develop the confidence needed to navigate the job market. He spoke to what he called his students’ development into human beings who are able to advocate for themselves and tap into the resources for their betterment and that of their families.
“We look at things like critical thinking [and] putting them in positions for personal management,” Shockley told The Informer. “We don’t necessarily teach a toastmaster class, but we also let them know that in order to get a job, you’re going to be at an interview…with that 30-second elevator speech.”
The goal, Shockley said, centers on raising the consciousness and quality of life in the surrounding community.
“ This program…keeps people who are vulnerable…doing some positive things,” he told The Informer. “The hope is…they can take it out in the community and share it with somebody else.”
Cortez Davis, a Southeast resident and returning citizen, said he learned about CHCTDC from a friend.
Years ago, while incarcerated, Davis acquired his GED, but with several weeks of CHCTDC training under his belt, Davis said he feels ready to go to the next level in his professional development.
“I’m getting what I was missing,” Davis said. “I’m really learning something with this computer thing, man. The people [are] down to earth [and] they want you to learn. Back in school, the teachers weren’t really hands-on [like] that.”
Davis, who doesn’t consider himself a “school person,” expressed his appreciation for the attention that he’s been receiving while under the tutelage of Shockley, Foo, and other staff members at CHCTDC.
“You got to do your work, but they’ll help you figure it out,” Davis said. “That’s what it’s about, man.”
Returning Citizens Demand a “Second Chance”
Monday, May 17 marked the 100th birth anniversary of Malcolm X, a Sunni Muslim Pan-Africanist who stands as one of the world’s most well known and widely revered returning citizens.
In the weeks leading up to celebrations in Malcolm X’s honor, District residents who are walking in the footsteps of the human rights organizer reflected on their spiritual and sociopolitical transformation while behind prison walls. Such was the case at Lamond-Riggs/Lillian J. Huff Neighborhood Library in Northeast, where the D.C. Mayor’s Office of Returning Citizens Affairs (MORCA) an author’s talk in observance of Second Chance Month.
The April 10 event featured: Tanisha L. Murden; Maurice Tyree; and Richard Morris, Ph.D. — all of whom published books, either during their incarceration or upon the completion of their sentence. For several minutes, each of these authors spoke to an audience of more than 40 people about the inspiration behind their written work.
Tyree said he made his commitment to the pen after reading “Soledad Brothers” and “Blood in My Eye,” two books written by George Jackson of the Black Guerilla Family. Those books, he said, highlighted the societal conditions that set the stage for his incarceration at the age of 27.
“They let me know that I had a social position, I had a national or global position, and it was one that was, or still is, constructive,” Tyree, author of The Darkest Parts of My Blackness: A Journey of Remorse, Reform, Reconciliation, and (R)evolution, told audience members at Lamond-Riggs/Lillian J. Huff Neighborhood Library on the evening of April 10.
“I used to have pyramids to see where I was on the pyramid of the social scheme,” he continued. “Once I began to do that, then I began to understand that I was bigger than I imagined, that I’m supposed to be, my brain, my thoughts, everything matters.”
Though he eventually came to understand how poverty and systemic racism shaped his world, Tyree said that writing helped him acknowledge how his actions affected him and his family.
“Soledad Brothers…made me hold, first and foremost, myself accountable then that’s when I began to hold even my parents’ accountable, and after that, I began to hold the government and whoever else’s accounts for their role in all that’s going on here,” Tyree said. “So I say we’ll do a 50-50 thing… I take 50, then 50 I’m gonna have to split with the rest.”
During Second Chance Month, MORCA also hosted a clothing drive, a returning citizens roundtable, a welcome home expo for returning citizens at the D.C. Armory in Southeast, and an anti-drug event at Our Lady of Perpetual Health on Morris Road, also in Southeast. Each event highlighted a different aspect of the returning citizen experience, with the common thread being, as MORCA Director Lamont Carey described it, the returning citizen’s struggle to acclimate to society and gain acceptance by those skeptical about their rehabilitation.
“It’s a whole new world,” Carey told The Informer. “Right now this morning, somebody is being released and they’re going into a bathroom and [they don’t realize] all they got to do is move away and the toilet [is] gonna flush itself and then you move over to the sink [with] the same experience.”
Carey, a native Washingtonian and returning citizen, assumed the helm of MORCA as part of a nearly two-decade career in reentry that’s placed him in the same rooms as lawmakers, nonprofit executives, philanthropists, and others working in the re-entry space. He told The Informer that the goal of Second Chance Month centered on ensuring that returning citizens have the tools that are needed to avoid the criminal justice system.
“We’re helping individuals build their skill set so…they can afford to have their own place, take care of their kids, travel, [and] have some new experiences that their past criminal lifestyle may have afforded them,” Carey said. “It is about how we create an environment for them to thrive and feel successful, feel wanted. That helps in decreasing recidivism.”
A Matter of Saving the Local Economy
During the latter part of April, at the culmination of Second Chance Month, the Second Chance Hiring Alliance, the Greater Washington DC Black Chamber of Commerce (GWBCC) and RBIJ co-hosted a forum at the True Reformer Building in Northwest intended to help District employers hire those who’ve been in contact with the criminal justice system.
The event, titled “Talent Beyond Barriers: A Business Exchange on Second Chance Hiring,” featured a panel of experts, including Colin Fraser, a returning citizen and local entrepreneur who employs returning citizens Upling, a cannabis delivery app and tech company.
At a time when, according to GWBCC President Aisha Bond, 55 out 100 D.C.-based jobs are vacant, it’s imperative for local employers to embrace the returning citizen population as an employee base.
“Job seekers with criminal records are a skilled, motivated, and often-overlooked talent pool that stand ready and willing to fill these workforce gaps,” Bond said. “Research consistently shows that second-chance employees perform just as well — if not better — than their peers without past contact with the justice system. They’re also more likely to stay in their jobs longer, reducing turnover costs for companies willing to hire them.”
