For Immediate Release

Media Contacts:

Caroline Isaacs, American Friends Service Committee | cisaacs@afsc.org | 520.256.4146

Eshe Cole, Grassroots Leadership | ecole@grassrootsleadership.org | 512.971.0487

Kathryn Hamoudah, Southern Center for Human Rights | khamoudah@schr.org | 404.688.1202

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(Tucson, AZ; Austin, TX; Atlanta, GA) – American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Grassroots Leadership, and the Southern Center for Human Rights (SCHR) will hold a teleconference to answer questions about a groundbreaking report that exposes the ways in which for-profit prison corporations are adapting to historic reductions in prison populations by seeking out new markets previously served by non-profit behavioral health and treatment-oriented agencies.

“The Treatment Industrial Complex: How For-Profit Prison Corporations are Undermining Efforts to Treat and Rehabilitate Prisoners for Corporate Gain,” highlights the expansion of the incarceration industry away from warehousing people and into areas that traditionally were focused on treatment and care of individuals involved in the criminal justice system–prison medical care, forensic mental hospitals, civil commitment centers, and ‘community corrections’ programs such as halfway houses and home arrest.

Detailing key findings and recommendations, report author Caroline Isaacs, Program Director, American Friends Service Committee, Arizona, will be joined by Eshe Cole, Mental Health and Criminal Justice Program Coordinator with Grassroots Leadership and Kathryn Hamoudah, Public Policy and Communications Manager with the Southern Center for Human Rights. Cole will discuss recent attempts by private prison companies in Texas to take control of mental health facilities. Hamoudah will provide an overview of how private contractors operating probation services in Georgia have lobbied for laws that allow them to shield public information and expand their reach.

WHO:             

Caroline Isaacs, Program Director, American Friends Service Committee, Arizona 

Kathryn Hamoudah, Public Policy and Communications Mgr, Southern Center for Human Rights

Eshe Cole, Mental Health and Criminal Justice Program Coordinator, Grassroots Leadership

WHEN:                       

Tuesday, November 18, 2014

10:00 AM PST/12:00 PM CST/1:00 PM EST

WHERE:

Participant Dial In Number(s): 866.952.1907

Program ID: TREATMENT

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The American Friends Service Committee is a non-profit organization that works for justice and human rights both nationally and internationally. The Arizona office, based in Tucson, advocates for criminal justice reform.

Grassroots Leadership fights to end for-profit incarceration and reduce reliance on criminalization and detention through direct action, organizing, research, and public education. Grassroots Leadership builds bridges between communities to increase the capacity of local leaders and coalitions, mobilize opposition to privatization, and transform the immigration and justice systems.

The Southern Center for Human Rights is a nonprofit, public interest law firm based in Atlanta, Georgia, and provides legal representation to people facing the death penalty, challenges human rights violations in prisons and jails, seeks through litigation and advocacy to improve legal representation for poor people accused of crimes, and advocates for criminal justice system reforms on behalf of those affected by the system in the Southern United States.