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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 27, 2025
Barnstable County Sheriff’s Office Held First Session of
the Frederick Douglass Project for Justice
BOURNE — On March 25, community members and incarcerated individuals came together at the Barnstable County Sheriff’s Office for the first of many Frederick Douglass Project for Justice events.
The Project, currently offered free at 22 jails and prisons in 15 states, uses human connection to ignite criminal justice reform.
“I want everyone to care about people in prison as they would about their brothers and sisters,” said Marc Howard, founder and president of the Frederick Douglass Project for Justice. “That’s how we will create change.”
Howard is a professor of Government and Law at Georgetown University, founding director of the Prisons and Justice Initiative, and the author of 3 books, including “Unusually Cruel: Prisons, Punishment, and the Real American Exceptionalism.”
Howard learned the power of connecting prisoners with the public when he visited his childhood friend, Marty Tankleff, in jail. Tankleff was eventually exonerated after spending almost 18 years in prison for murder. Through these visits and subsequent years visiting institutions nationwide, Howard witnessed tremendous human suffering created by a justice system that fails to rehabilitate prisoners.
Barnstable County Sheriff Donna D. Buckley is only the second sheriff in Massachusetts, after Middlesex County, to bring this Project to her facility. The Frederick Douglass Project’s mission aligns with Sheriff Buckley’s goal, which is to improve public safety by providing meaningful programming.
“The overall goal is, we don’t want you to come back here,” Sheriff Buckley told 20 inside participants who volunteered to speak with the public during the three-hour program.
She also addressed outside participants before they entered the jail. “We want to provide ways for people to succeed when they are released,” she said. “Making that community connection so that you understand their challenges is key to that success.”
Howard said he agreed with every word the Sheriff said.
"Locking people up in cages is not helping them," Howard told the outside participants. "When you treat them with humanity and give them programs, they won’t come back."
The outside participants received a tour of the facility. Then they went into the jail library, where they met up with the inside participants. Each person went around the room introducing themselves and answering the ice breaker question, “What language would you like to learn?”
An hour-long dinner came next, at tables arranged with a mix of inside and outside participants. The group came back together at the end to reflect.
“I’m so amazed by these two young women I met,” said one outside participant. “They are so focused on their opportunities.”
“It just felt so good to be normal and not have to play tough,” said an inside participant. “I think this was great for everybody.”
“It’s a misconception that people (in jail) are different than us,” said an outside participant. “We all have made a million mistakes and some of them could have put us in here.”
For future sessions, sign up here: https://bit.ly/4hKG8vB