Shari Silberstein | Executive Director, Equal Justice USA
Today, so many people are exhaling with relief for the thousands who cannot: George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Duante Wright, Adam Toledo, and so many more. A legal system that has been over-applied to Black and Brown people and dramatically under-applied to law enforcement has now convicted one police officer.
The verdict is deeply meaningful for being so rare. But we cannot mistake this for a transformative moment. We still pour billions of more dollars into policing than into proven health-based violence prevention.
Black people are still not safe when they’re pulled over, jogging, even surrendering. And our nation has not been accountable to the harm of centuries of racist policies embedded in our justice system and far beyond it.
Equal Justice USA (EJUSA) is a national organization that works to transform the justice system by promoting responses to violence that break cycles of trauma. We work at the intersection of criminal justice, public health, and racial justice to elevate healing over retribution, meet the needs of survivors, advance racial equity, and build community safety.