The Creativity, Innovation and Ingenuity Languishing in US Prisons | Brittany K. Barnett | TED

TED

Chris Young's Story and Package

Attorney Brittany Barnett received large box from client Chris Young 2 years ago
Chris transferred from Kentucky federal prison to Texas facility hundreds of miles away
Handwritten note: "Please take care of these for me, Brittany. I don't want them messed up in the move. They're all I've got."
Chris serving life without parole sentence, nearly 10 years in at time of package
- Arrested for drug dealing at age 22
- Sentenced to life due to two drug priors
- Combined drug quantity weighed less than three pennies
Background similarities between Chris and Barnett:
- Both have big dreams
- Both have mothers who suffer from drug addiction leading to incarceration
- Result of war on drugs
Chris's childhood circumstances:
- Handcuffed by suffocating poverty
- Selling drugs on corner by age 12 to help put food on table for him and brother Robert
- No kingpin, unjustly sentenced

Package contained favorite books covering quantum physics, philosophy, history, computer programming
Self-taught coding in prison without access to single computer
Young mind stimulated by artificial intelligence and economics
Cell small but dreams huge
Margin notes covered almost every page
Designs outlined for biggest dream: groundbreaking mental health app
- Purpose: prevent suicides like brother Robert's
- Robert took own life at 21 when Chris was 18
Barnett's reaction: genius laid out on page took her breath away
Started thinking how to help bring entrepreneurial spirit to life
Society deemed Chris's gifted mind worthless

One of Barnett's first clients
Single mother, talented chef, budding entrepreneur
Early 90s circumstances:
- Caring for quadriplegic mother
- Growing needs of daughter
- Made poor decision: transported drugs for childhood friend on few occasions
Years later caught in federal drug conspiracy
Sentenced to life (fundamental death sentence) for first conviction
Prison culinary innovations:
- Ground corn chips into meal for famous tamales
- Melted Oreos insides to frost cakes
- Whipped cranberry sauce from assorted jelly packets
- Red hot chicken meatballs made with Doritos
- Women at Carswell Federal Prison lined up around corner for taste
- Guards recipes with her life
2015: President Barack Obama granted clemency
Served 16 years and 9 months in federal prison

Common quality among clients: unjust sentences interrupted/destroyed plans to bring great things to world
True liberation must include vision for restoring, investing in, nurturing those plans
Cannot keep rescuing people from prison and restoring them to poverty
True freedom is multidimensional
Systemic change doesn't only come from Congress or state legislators who move with no urgency
Can come from directly impacted people like Chris and Sharanda
Sustainable liberation requires:
- Economic freedom
- Equity
- Access to resources and capital for justice-impacted people to flourish
- Create positive ripple effects in communities

Barnett was corporate mergers and acquisitions lawyer, recognized good business plan
Invested in Sharanda, left rest entirely up to her
Summer launch: Sharanda's company "Fed Up"
- Name meaning: "Fed up with racially biased criminal legal system that steals lives and cages futures"
- Also: "Come through to Sharanda Jones's food truck where bellies will be fed up with amazing food"
- 100% staffed and run by formerly incarcerated people
- Portion of revenue invested in Buried Alive Project
Buried Alive Project:
- Nonprofit cofounded by Barnett with client Corey Jacobs
- Helps free people buried alive under outdated federal drug laws
- To date: helped win freedom of dozens of men and women
Manifest Freedom Fund launched after Sharanda investment:
- Deployed $300,000 in non-dilutive capital to justice-impacted entrepreneurs
- Invested in Trustworthy Trucking (run by former client)
  - Fully employed by justice-impacted people
  - Lease to purchase option: each driver eventually owns truck
  - Maximizes economic impact and independence
- Entered tech startup world from trucking experience
- Developing app to improve truckers' day-to-day life
- Immediate beneficial impact on transportation industry and supply chain crisis
- Goal: help build smart cities, improving life for everyone

Building ecosystem, partnering with investors who share passion for cultivating entrepreneurial spirits
Supported businesses include:
- Corey's fintech and merchandising company partnering with HBCUs
- Alfred's food truck in North Carolina
- Corvain Cooper's cannabis brand "40 Tons"
- Naz's pink tea company (both in Los Angeles)
Combined total: 75 years served in prison by these entrepreneurs
Must not let those years be defining decades of their lives
Freedom journey begins when stepping out of prison gates

Businesses like Fed Up protect against recidivism
Without employment or entrepreneurship support: formerly incarcerated people 3-5 times more likely to commit crime than those with jobs
Not focused on just keeping partners out of prison (incredibly low bar)
Focused on attaining economic liberation
Providing infrastructural support for achievement of dreams and visions
Want to live fulfilling, meaningful lives of purpose
Investing in their potential isn't charity - investment in all futures

Refused to stop fighting for Chris
September 2020: won reduction of life sentence through court
Earlier this year: executive clemency further reduced sentence to time served
Chris walked out of prison free man
Immediately launched tech startup he dreamed would stop suicides plaguing young Black men like brother Robert
Born from devastating loss, created with vision and purpose
Profoundly innovative idea deserving highest level of investment
With capital investment and support: helps redeem tremendous loss to society Chris's incarceration represents
Positions society to benefit from his distinct gifts

Should look upon release of unjustly incarcerated as gift and tremendous opportunity for societal renewal, not burden
To transform criminal legal system: must transform beliefs about formerly incarcerated people and their futures
Creativity, innovation, ingenuity languishing in America's prisons is key to transformation
Better tomorrow for all through investing in ideas and initiatives of justice-impacted people
Manifesting freedom through investment

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