Reform Alliance

It’s been about five months since Meek Mill was released from prison, in what many called an unfair and ridiculous use of our justice system. After popping wheelies on a city street, Meek was arrested for a probation violation. The judge, who was accused of having a personal vendetta against Meek, sentence him to two-four years, for a 10-year-old drug/gun violation. After fans, celebrities, and politicians starting speaking out against the extreme sentencing for a “wheely”, Meek was finally released. Since then, Meek Mill has vowed to fight against a system that has unfairly and systematically imprisoned citizens, especially young black men, for centuries. To aid in his fight, Meek Mill, along with help from his mentor Jay Z, have created an organization called Reform Alliance.

31-year-old Meek, rap legend Jay Z, Philadelphia 76ers co-owner Michael Rubin, New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft alongside other activists joined Meek this week for the launch of Reform Alliance. The organization has one simple, yet big goal; to take its $50 million budget, and reduce the number of incarcerated Americans by 1 million within 5 years.

According to the Alliance Twitter feed, the mission is clear:

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At REFORM, we #FightDifferent. Our collective disgust with the current state of the American criminal justice system is creating a powerful, growing alliance that spans different backgrounds, industries and political beliefs. We are bringing together leaders in business, government, entertainment, sports, technology, art, and culture to give voice to the voiceless. We won’t stop until we’ve changed the laws, policies, and practices that perpetuate the horrific injustice we’re seeing in America. The Alliance started with the unjust re-imprisonment of recording artist @MeekMill due to minor technical probation violations. The shocking two-to-four year sentence Meek received in November 2017 spurred the international #FreeMeek movement, which led to his release on bail in April 2018. Although Meek had the resources and public platform to fight his case, he and the other founders recognized Meek’s case is only one of millions – and that the vast majority of people trapped in the system don’t have the resources to fight back. After Meek’s release, we joined forces and committed to changing mass supervision laws (probation and parole policies) that will have the greatest impact on the largest number of people. The mission of the REFORM Alliance is to dramatically reduce the number of people who are unjustly under the control of the criminal justice system – starting with probation and parole. To win, we will leverage our considerable resources to change laws, policies, hearts and minds.

A post shared by REFORM Alliance (@reform) on Jan 23, 2019 at 10:13am PST

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