Tevin discussed the impacts of incarceration on the community and how detrimental the carceral system is to community health. Particularly, Tevin shared his insight into the ways in which the carceral system takes mothers and fathers out of the community. Children grow up with limited guidance and lack structure. In turn, the criminal justice system attempts to fill the void created by incarcerated parents. He also discussed the lack of healthcare in prison. He emphasized Covid-19 and how prisons don’t take proper precautions to prevent the spread of the disease. Tevin felt that the prison system does not value the life of people in prison.

Ayoola works in a jail and does criminal justice advocacy. She spoke of working “on the front lines” of mass incarceration and “in the trenches.” Her interview addressed the lack of health care and the poor quality of existing health care within prisons. Ayoola spoke to the lack of visibility for those experiencing mental and physical illness due to incarceration. Many people both in and out of prison do not receive proper treatment. Those in prison are denied or made to wait for treatment because prison staff believes the individual is malingering. Those formerly incarcerated individuals have deteriorated health upon release and receive inadequate health care. Ayoola mentioned how working in prisons has an impact on the mental health of her family. Additionally, her interview touched on the effects that working in incarceration has on her health. She spoke of migraine headaches that she believes have to do with the constant exposure to stress in the prison environment. Ayoola wished that the country would acknowledge the parallels between incarceration and slavery.

The interviewee discussed how the carceral system and income impact their vision of health. Folks in their community need health care, but a lack of money prevents them from receiving care. Health to the participant comprises a variety of components. Although health care providers do not discriminate against formerly incarcerated individuals due to their association with the legal system, formerly incarcerated individuals experience economic discrimination. The interview also touched on prejudices that take place. People who have been incarcerated experience stigma associated with their incarceration. This stigma also impacts communities intergenerationally. The impacts of the carceral system impact generations of families in the communities. They concluded by discussing the impact of policing in the community and made parallels between incarceration and slavery. Mass incarceration includes policing. These aggressive policing conditions normalize the community to police discrimination and impact relationships between different people in the community. This policing changes how people interact with their geography. They navigated their community and life in order to avoid policing.

In this interview, the interviewee discusses her contact with the criminal justice system as a young adult who had an incarcerated parent and worked at a public defender’s office, to now as a full-time lawyer and volunteer with Prisoner Visitation and Support. She often visited her father in prison and believes it is important for people experiencing incarceration to have outside connections. She also shares how difficult it is for family members to visit their loved ones in prison right now, compared to her familial visits in the 1980s. The conversations that occur when she visits include politics, concerns about life after release, and personal troubles within the prison. While it is challenging to keep certain thoughts to oneself, she states that the role of a prison visitor is to listen and be supportive rather than transforming people’s principles. Unfortunately, since the pandemic, prison visitors have had little to no communication with people they once regularly visited.