Photo by UncleVinny (CC BY 3.0) To read more of Hollie Garrett's article, please click here. In 2011, a 20-year prison sentence turned my life completely upside down. This was not my first time being incarcerated, but it was the longest sentence I had ever received. This new reality was hard to accept. Twenty years was enough time to lose the people I cared about and damage the relationships I hoped to maintain. My biggest fear centered around my relationship with my three sons. I worried we...

The Prison Journalism Project trains incarcerated writes to be journalists and publishes their stories to empower a marginalized community to be a vital voice in criminal justice reform. To read stories and learn more about this organization, visit their website at prisonjournalismproject.org.

The Marshall Project is a nonpartisan, nonprofit news organization that seeks to create and sustain a sense of national urgency about the U.S. criminal justice system. Read more about this organization by visiting their website at themarshallproject.org.