Category Archives: crime

Participatory Research: A How‑To Blueprint

Posted on September 2, 2025 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

A practical guide to co‑designing, conducting, and deploying participatory research in criminal legal system advocacy—grounded in the 2025 white paper on incorporating lived expertise. Continue reading →

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Research as Resistance: Building Knowledge Together in the Fight for Parole Justice

Posted on August 31, 2025 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

A personal teaser for our participatory research installment—from early John Jay studies to peer‑reviewed scholarship and today’s lived‑expertise framework. Continue reading →

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The Anatomy of Advocacy, Part 3: Strategy in Action – How They Won the Fight

Posted on August 27, 2025 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

Inside the research, coalitions, and bipartisan sponsorship that led to Chapter 310 of the Laws of 2008 and discharges from lifetime parole. Continue reading →

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The Anatomy of Advocacy, Part 2: Birth of the Ad Hoc Committee on Lifetime Parole

Posted on August 20, 2025 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

How directly impacted New Yorkers formed the Ad Hoc Committee on Lifetime Parole and chose a winning strategy to change the law. Continue reading →

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The Anatomy of Advocacy, Part 1: How “Tough on Crime” Politics Reshaped Justice in New York

Posted on August 13, 2025 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

How Governor Pataki’s ‘tough on crime’ agenda and Jenna’s Law reshaped parole and sentencing in New York—and set the stage for grassroots reform. Continue reading →

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The Anatomy of Advocacy: Transforming Criminal “Justice” in New York

Posted on August 11, 2025 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

Starting July 13, 2025, a Four-Part Series titled “The Anatomy of Advocacy” will explore a criminal legal system advocacy movement led by formerly incarcerated individuals. It highlights New York’s “tough on crime” era, the formation of the Ad Hoc Committee on Lifetime Parole, strategic campaigning, and lessons learned for successful advocacy efforts. Continue reading →

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Rereading Richard Wright’s Black Boy

Posted on July 12, 2024 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

When I first read Richard Wright’s Black Boy more than 40 years ago when I was a teenager, little that I knew about literature,  I thought the writing was superb.  I was doing a little writing then and thought Wright … Continue reading →

Posted in being a teenager, Black patriotism, crime, Family, Fatherhood, Fathers, Growing Up, raising black boys, Relationships, Slavery | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

A Fourth of July Day Lynching

Posted on July 5, 2024 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

For Norris Dendy 07.04.1933 (Clinton, South Carolina) To the Negro, what is the Fourth of July? A picnic celebration with family and friends Not a day to be beaten, not a day to die! On this celebration of Independence,  still … Continue reading →

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You’re Once, Twice, 34 Times a “Felon”

Posted on June 12, 2024 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

Recently, in “The President’s Brief” from The Marshall Project, Carroll Bogert penned an op-ed piece in The Washington Post.  She wrote: Since Donald Trump was convicted of 34 felonies last week, gleeful headlines have sprouted across the media, with a … Continue reading →

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A Red Record Redux

Posted on May 30, 2024 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

Ida B. Wells-Barnett, in A Red Record (1895), about the bloody murders of Black people at the hands of white people, lists three “excuses” white people gave for the wholesale murder of Black people by whites. The excuses are: …the … Continue reading →

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