Criminal justice reform student contest: Second place, middle school

Editor's note: Last year, the Minnesota Urban Debate League and Star Tribune Opinion put out a contest call to students between the ages 10 and 18: The task was to create an original written essay, video or audio file that described one or two specific changes our community, state or nation should make to reduce racial inequities and injustices in the criminal justice system. The following is one of the finalists. Click here for more information and a full list of winners.

When they read about crime in the newspaper, most people don't think about how it relates to the Eighth Amendment, which bans cruel and unusual punishment. But the truth is, the punishment for a crime often extends beyond the justice system. Even after they are released, felons are treated as second-class citizens, with their applications for jobs or housing complicated and their rights to vote sometimes lost. This type of treatment is, I believe, cruel and unusual. It is racially biased and often contributes to recidivism.

Let's look at the facts. African Americans are five times more likely to be incarcerated than white people, and African Americans and Hispanics make up 56% of the U.S. prison population, though only 32% of the country's population. Furthermore, violent crime rates have fallen by about 20% since 1991, whereas imprisonment rates have grown by 50% in the same time frame.

While all of that is useful information, it doesn't explain why life after prison can be punishment itself. Think about it this way: After being released from prison, most individuals want to enroll in school, apply for a job and find a place to live. However, such simple ambitions are complicated for felons. Studies show that many employers, landlords and admissions officials turn away felons at a higher rate, not to mention the effect of race. According to the NAACP, joblessness is "the single most important predictor of recidivism," so the refusal to rent or offer a job, and a lack of higher education, creates a cycle of incarceration, poverty and racial disparities.

Earlier I mentioned how the right to vote is often lost (temporarily, or even permanently) for current and former felons. The Sentencing Project — an organization dedicated to ending mass incarceration — reports that while Minnesota ranks 46th in the country for incarceration rates, our numbers reveal racial disparities. Per every 100,000 people, 111 white people are in prison, while 1,219 Black people are in prison, and our Black-to-white ratio of imprisonment is 11:1. More than 7% of Minnesota's Black population is disenfranchised, compared to 1.5% of the total Minnesota population. In other words, 7% of our Black population cannot use their constitutional right to vote, meaning that the legislators who represent them are not elected by and for the communities they serve.

So what do we, as a state and as a nation, do to dismantle the obvious racial disparities in the criminal justice system? When it comes to the corrections pillar, a few crucial reforms would help felons obtain a job, housing or a higher education. One idea to dismantle the cycle of inequalities would be to include job training in prisons and jails, so as to prepare inmates for getting a job once they've been released. Others suggest incentivizing companies, schools and real estate agencies to stop immediately disqualifying felons. I believe a combination of both would be the best way to ready ex-inmates for the outside world, and to ready the outside world for them.

Another important change would be to allow current and former inmates to vote, and to create clear guidelines so every individual knows their rights. Some say that the most violent criminals — serial killers or sexual offenders — should be denied this right as a part of their sentence. I believe otherwise: No person, no matter who, should be denied a basic constitutional right that allows them a voice.

Furthermore, if the loss of the right to vote is a consequence of incarceration, and Black individuals are incarcerated at a higher rate than white individuals, this suppresses the Black vote and marginalizes issues that are important to the Black community.

While I believe that criminals should be punished for their actions, the punishment needs to fit the crime. In today's world, felons — particularly Black felons — are treated as less than while trying to restart their lives, and this motivates more crime. In order to break the cycle of mass incarceration and disenfranchisement in Black communities, we need real, substantial change that goes beyond a black square on Instagram or a trendy T-shirt. It's now in our hands, the generation of the future, to make this change a reality.

Sonia Kharbanda is a student in Minneapolis.