Episode 44: Justice Movement with Guest Lisa “L.A.” Jones

Episode 44: Justice Movement with Guest Lisa “L.A.” Jones

We welcome another one of our Voices of Passion panelists to the show this week - Lisa “L.A.” Jones - to discuss her experience as a Black female prison warden, what she thinks is sending Black and Brown people into the justice system, and her current work with Hayti Reborn - Justice Movement, an organization she founded with retired Durham Police Chief Steven Chalmers with the intention of bridging the gap between community and law enforcement to create a system that supports justice-served individuals.

After detailing her past - including the poverty and trauma that impacted her life - L.A. explains how she got into working in the prison system and the challenges she faced as a Black female warden. She knew the best way to learn was from inside the system - to find out why the law is enforced so differently for Black and Brown vs. white people, as well as why the same people keep coming back to prison, specifically focusing on the lack of re-entry programs that are available. L.A. believes getting to the root cause of “why” something is happening is essential in understanding each issue and healing the community. She explains that it’s not just the incarcerated person that’s impacted - it’s the entire family that ends up being justice involved, especially the kids. BJ and L.A. discuss how Black and Brown communities blame each other (and kill each other) for these kinds of issues, rather than address them and the system that created them directly. This comes back to the importance of education and voting - now is the time for Black and Brown folks to make a change, and BJ and L.A. discuss what they believe is possible.

 

More about Hayti Reborn - Justice Movement: Justice Movement | Haytireborn

More about Lisa “L.A.” Jones
Lisa A. “L.A.” Jones (a native of Fayetteville, North Carolina) is a retired corrections administrator in the federal corrections system. L.A. spent her 30-year career in a variety of correctional positions and environments, becoming among the highest ranking African-American women in the federal prison. Her education consists of attendance at Southern Nazarene University, in Bethany, Oklahoma where she received a BS in Family Studies & Gerontology (Counseling Psychology specialization) and Saint Leo University, where she received a MS in Criminal Justice (dual specialization of Corrections & Behavioral Studies). She is currently a seminary student at Meadville Lombard Seminary School in Chicago, IL.

At the height of her career, L.A. decided to take her education, experience, and understanding of systems of incarceration and reassign those talents to the area of holistic re-entry programs and practices that create systemic change for justice-involved individuals, their families, and the communities in which they live. Her passion lies at the intersection of Criminal and Social Justice, where she works hard to bridge the two. All her work is done through a spiritually holistic lens. As a retiree, L.A. returned to Durham, NC where she is the Co-Founder and Executive Director of Movement Operations for the Hayti Reborn – Justice Movement. She serves as a member of the Durham Sheriff’s Community Advisory Board and Chairperson of the Board of Directors for the Southern Coalition of Social Justice. She is a poet, genealogist, and member of the William C Friday Fellowship for Human Relations in North Carolina.