April is Second Chance Month
Second Chance Month recognizes the importance of supporting the safe and successful reentry of millions of people returning from incarceration each year.
An Introduction to Real-Life Skills
Written by Precious Bonner, Director of The Bonner FoundationDuring one of my daily phone calls with my brother while he was serving a 180-year sentence, I asked him “what do people do that don’t have the family support that you have”? In short, the answer is go back to prison or jail. The national average recidivism rate or tendency of currently incarcerated individuals to go back to prison, is 44% and costs $150,000 per instance. This means that for every 100 of you reading this, statistically speaking, 44 of you will return to prison.
I say “NO” No more releasing people back into a society that continues to condemn them after their sentence has been served. No more releasing people unsupported into a crazy new world and expecting them to just figure it out The Bonner Foundation (TBF) fights against this system of neglect by supporting the entire individual throughout the reentry process.
On a mission to improve our country through recidivism reduction and community stabilization, TBF began with the development of Real-Life Skills, our reintegration study guide With topics such as Forms of Payment, Identity Theft & Consumer Awareness, Insurance, & Employee Benefits it is my intention that in the time leading up to your release, Real-Life Skills will serve as an additional aide for you
Do you know what Cashapp is? What about Tap to pay? What about a 401K vs 401A and which is better for you? Should you buy a car outright, lease it or finance it? These are all questions Real-Life Skills will help you ponder for yourself.
Currently TBF is providing quarterly workshops to CTJC survivors and working with prisons in Indiana and Illinois to offer classes inside different institutions within each state
As the work continues to progress, TBF will begin to implement our long term program across the Great Lakes area that will aid each client from education while incarcerated completely through to homeownership after release
Contact The Bonner Foundation thebonnerfoundationnfp@gmail com
Purchase the Real-Life Skills Study Guide
https://amzn.to/3Ula9bZ
Sean Tyler and Reginald Henderson have been granted Certificates of Innocence
Brothers Sean Tyler and Reginald Henderson were finally granted Certificates of Innocence on April 2, 2024, thirty years after they were first tortured by Chicago police. This was a long awaited victory after justice was delayed by the state again and again. Sean and Reginald were just teenagers when they were framed and tortured by Chicago police in 1994 Both brothers were wrongfully incarcerated for over two decades, and in 2021 were finally exonerated.
Every win is worth celebrating, yet we know that there is nothing that can ever make up for the years that are stolen by the carceral system. We will continue to fight for the liberation of all of us, and to hold these systems of oppression accountable.
We hope to welcome more and more of you home.
What to expect when your loved one gets out of prison, from someone who lived itWritten by La Tanya Jenifor-Sublett, Director of Holistic and Liberatory Peer Reentry Originally published by WBEZ Chicago on September 15, 2023.
I was released from prison Oct. 4, 2013 after 21 years inside. Many people say the prison system is broken. Others say it isn’t broken, it does exactly what it was designed to do Either way, those of us who leave prison leave shattered And we return to loved ones who are just as shattered as we are. I spent 21 years educating myself and preparing for my release, but I could never have prepared myself for what I experienced when I got out
After 10 years of freedom these are just a few of the lessons I’ve learned, to help people returning from prison, and the loved ones welcoming them home
Loved ones need to be patient with us
It doesn’t matter how much time the returning family member has served; prison is traumatizing, and freedom can be overwhelming
I thought I knew what my freedom would be like. I had plans and I thought that society would support these plans, but freedom is different after incarceration After my return to society, I was restricted from resources and programming that provided me with a true opportunity for a second chance.
I was devastated and discouraged I can remember my mom asking me, “What are you going to do?” I didn’t have an answer. The last thing I wanted to do was to disappoint my mother again I could see her concern and uncertainty wrapped in love She didn’t have the answer either; expect to be overwhelmed with us being overwhelmed.
We need to be patient with our loved ones
Shortly after my release, my mom and I had a disagreement about my clothes being in the dryer too long. She was so upset that I didn’t understand what the problem was. I was thinking, “Wow, shouldn’t she be happy that I am home to wash and dry my clothes? I am ”
She began to cry and yell. I was confused, until she said, “You don’t know what it has been like to live, to work, to go to family functions, without you!”
When I thought about what she said, I cried I realized that not only had my incarceration broken her heart, it caused her a great deal of humiliation, isolation and embarrassment.
After my conviction on October 30, 1992, my mother left the courthouse at 26th and California without me. For 21 years her only child was in prison. It didn’t matter if I was innocent or guilty. What mattered is that she felt like she had been convicted of being a bad mother
Returning community members, leave room for that hurt, humiliation, and embarrassment to rise up upon your release They have carried it while loving and supporting you
Leave room for grief on both sides.
I only knew one level of grief until my release: the death of a loved one. During my incarceration, the death of my grandmother and my favorite uncle almost caused me to stop fighting for my release.
Two of my strongest supporters were gone
It took me some time, but I realized they had poured into me everything I needed to succeed, and I owed it to them to be the success they believed I could be
After my release, the pain of grief hit me again – this time it was different and heavier than I could explain Some of it was that I had returned home to a world without my granny and uncle, and knowing they died without seeing me free. I was also grieving the life I had missed, the life that I could have had. My mother was 21 years older –she was retired
I was free and heartbroken. How could I put the pieces together with this grief?
I tried to explain it, but everyone kept telling me that I should be happy to be free. I didn’t understand why they didn’t get it. I was happy to be free again, but I also had so much to mourn. My mom grieved the grandchildren that I never had and the time she missed with me.
Embrace the T-word
I was sent to prison for 21 years That means I spent more than two decades in a place that is broken, and that tried to break me without any real rehabilitation.
I was released into a society that continues to put policies in place that limit and impede my access to successful reentry and I am supposed to be a positive contributing member in society? Um, ok! The truth is freedom, family support, a safe place to live, food, shelter, clothing and a job isn’t the cure for all that I had experienced I needed therapy. My mom needed therapy. My immediate family needed therapy.
Families who are system- and justice impacted need a space to exhale, cry, and clear the air. Therapy is a seven-letter bad word in black and brown communities. We have to change this.
Often, these communities are already facing intersecting oppressions. A family member being incarcerated creates another level of oppression. Therapy isn’t a bad word, and all re-entry services should include individual and family therapy
Chicago in Crisis
by Abdul-Malik Muhammad
Chicago, the breathtakingly beautiful monster of a city that wears two masks With its small-town culture aesthetic, storied history, rich traditions and attractions. The beautiful landmark of the sinister grin of the magnificent mile, smiles. But just a few miles down, another smash and grab and someone bleeding out from multiple gunshot wounds Damn! Again! Our screams are completely exhausted as our pain is woven together with different ethnic groups, race and customs which is woven inside of our skin from way back when, since like way back–before the windy city took her first breath and became a part of our identity, or when we first took our first steps off our grandmama’s front porch
Chicago's delusional dream to welcome all immigrants, displays its vulnerabilities, paralyzed its citizens and muffle its cries out of foolish civic pride Have you ever played in the waves of Lake Michigan’s bipolar shores, with its sandy hair beaches, and realized its true intentions and still had to make conscious decisions on which asphalt landmines to avoid
Have you ever coursed through the veins of a wounded beast, paying tribute to its Soldier Fields and being overcome with emotions at its United Center? Don’t be deceived by the feeling of safety, when you stare at my unfamiliar skeletal structure, skyscrapers reach for the heavens, and shatter glass, of ancient relics and bones. Don’t be deceived, because all passages through hell are still passages in hell.
I know you heard it, or even felt the verdict, many felt that he deserves it, but the echoes of our political demonstrations and trials, it’s really based on how you worded it These are the type of emotions that make us cry sometimes. To see protestors, block the main entrance where hot air blares from bullhorns like strong winds from a distant storm, tears, will still form–as you read the signs–”We need police reform”
But, swing by the Lyric Opera House, walk the halls of city hall, and listen to the people who never complained at all, complained because from their perspective, the Chicago City Police–are very well trained Chicago in Crisis, ask any witness, visit the Chicago court building, that’s built like a prison, it would put you in the mind of a project building A building where Conviction and Conviction gets tossed, whenever another crooked cop has been caught–many innocent lives have been lost.
Who can hear my screams, when, when they are easily drowned out by the cult waves gently caressing these bipolar shores–you don’t know my city–she’s tricky The waves are known to produce “amnesia”--or at least some form of anesthesia to help you forget my city’s aches and pains, with her absent father.
We wash away our bottled-up memories of death and funerals, with the concoction of loud music and a Bull’s game
But, who can forget the jagged procession lives of old automobiles coasting the veins of a war-torn city. Peek through the veil behind shadows of finely decorated tourist attractions, dirty handshakes, and fists full of translucent Irish Blood money Chicago in Crisis, but, isn’t she pretty, as Politicians wipe tears away from her face, and kiss that shiny bean in her park that smothers the cries of that loud ass water.
Chicago is definitely in Crisis!
Mirror Room
by Darrion BensonSquinting beneath the lights, I saw at each wall myself.
Lover boy's crooked smile.
Thug's fearful eyes. Insecure's sky-high chin.
A teen with a disappointed brow. They rush me at once, rip skin from bone.
The smell of copper is thick. I bleed petals onto the floor while they place parts of me onto them where they had taken it from me.
Thanks to our friends at The Bonner Foundation, we are giving away free White Sox tickets to our community!
Please feel free to invite your loved ones. We would love to connect with them.
RSVP & RESERVE TICKETS HERE: