July 5, 2022
What Chesa Boudin’s Recall Means for Children With Incarcerated Parents
By Lisa Herforth-Hebbert
If we want to seriously reform our criminal justice system, we need to listen to those who have felt the human costs of incarceration.
By Owen Mortner
On June 7, voters in San Francisco recalled District Attorney Chesa Boudin after less than two years in office. Like many advocates for criminal justice system reform, I was devastated. The commitment Boudin made to bringing an end to classist and racist prosecutorial practices inspired me, but his personal story touched me on a deeper level.
In 1981, Boudin’s parents—members of Weather Underground—took part in a botched bank robbery that turned violent when he was 14 months old. Each received a multi-decade prison sentence.
Like Boudin, I was impacted by parental incarceration during my childhood. When my father failed to show up for our monthly visitation sessions at the local community center, we assumed something was wrong. A year later, we learned he had been convicted of transporting more than 400 kilograms of cocaine into Florida, a state I had never visited. My father had begun serving a 15-year prison sentence by the time I turned 4, leaving my mom to raise me without support.
