Harm Reduction as Social Justice: Prisons

Harm Reduction as Social Justice: Prisons

This lunch and learn event will engage students, faculty, activists, researchers, prison in-reach workers, and formerly incarcerated people in a discussion about harm reduction in Canadian prisons. Topics explored will include mass incarceration, drug policies, human rights, prison needle-exchange programs, drug use, discharge planning, and overdoses. A short video will be played of a current prisoner.

Lunch will be served before the panel discussion and there will be a resource table with harm reduction and safer sex supplies and information.

SPEAKERS:
• Sandra Ka Hon Chu, Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network
• Zachary Grant, Federal Hep C Coordinator, PASAN
• Kyle King, Prisoner Rights Activist
• Olson Crow, Former Inmate and Activist

VIDEO:
• Gregory McMaster, Award-Winning Writer & Producer, Current Prisoner

This event is free, open to the public, and wheelchair accessible. If you have questions or require other accessibility accommodations to ensure your inclusion in this event, please email Alannah Fricker at cssdp@torontomu.ca.

This event is hosted by Canadian Students for Sensible Drug Policy, CSSDP Ryerson, in collaboration with Emily van der Meulen, Criminology; Ken Moffatt, Jack Layton Chair; Kim Bailey, Director of Strategic Initiatives, Office of Social Innovation; and Corinne Hart, Nursing. 

Sponsored by Melanie Panitch, the John C. Eaton Chair in Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship; the Criminology Course Union; the Department of Criminology; the Office of the Dean, Faculty of Arts; and Faculty of Community Services, Ryerson University. 

BIOS:

Sandra Ka Hon Chu is the director of research and advocacy at the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network. She works on HIV-related human rights issues concerning prisons, harm reduction, sex work, women, and immigration. She has led the Legal Network’s involvement in lawsuits challenging the Canadian government’s failure to adopt prison-based needle and syringe programs and criminal laws governing sex work. Previously, she worked in The Hague for the Women’s Initiatives for Gender Justice. Her broad international experience has also included assignments for development, human rights and UN agencies in Libya, Timor-Leste, Hong Kong, and Vancouver. Sandra holds an LL.B. from the University of Toronto and an LL.M. from the Osgoode Hall Law School of York University. She was called to the bar of British Columbia in 2003.

Zachary Grant is the Federal Hep C Program Coordinator at PASAN (Prisoner’s HIV/AIDS Support Action Network) which is based in Tkaronto, the traditional territory of the Haudenosaunee, the Anishinaabek, and the Wendat Nations – as well as many peoples who are displaced by the ongoing legacy of colonization and community devastation on Turtle Island and around the world. His passion is supporting the work of prisoners in their efforts for a just and equitable society, which begins with deepening community and relationships inside prison as a transgressive act. He facilitates restorative health workshops, community facilitator training programs and leads ritual around grief and loss alongside prisoners who are federally incarcerated in the great lakes region.

Olson Crow is a crownward 2S Mohawk person who attends Ryerson University and studies Criminology. Olson is currently elected as the trans constituency rep for the Canadian Federation of Students - an organization that represents over 650,000 students nation wide. Most of Olsons work focuses around Reproductive Justice, Indigeneity, and gender. They hope one day to work on abolition activism.

Kyle King is a 27 year old man. He is currently a Peer Health Navigator with PASAN and sits on several committees relating to various prison and convict activism initiatives. He has spent 8 of the last 10 years incarcerated. Having been the BIFFA Chairman and the Grievance Clerk while at Millhaven, he has an in-depth grasp of the system. Seeing the holes and having pointed them out on numerous occasions has made him a target. Kyle advocated for programming and better health care resources within both provincial and federal institutions, and was segregated for allegations of inciting riots due to his institutional pro-inmate activism. His focus has not solely been on health and programming, but also on inmate and staff relations - working to bridge the gap where the most significant breakdowns in communication happen.

Gregory J McMaster has served more than 40 years of two concurrent life sentences, including 15 years in maximum security prison in the United States, before being extradited to Canada. He has won several writing awards including first place in Prison Life magazine (1995), he served as contributing editor to the Voices of Canadian Literacy textbook (2002), and is a regular contributor to the Journal of Prisoners on Prisons. Not restricting himself to the written word, he was the associate producer and American correspondent for the Canadian Prison television network (1993-1997), and he orchestrated several highly acclaimed television specials intended to educate the Canadian public about the realities of prison life. More recently he was a contributing author to the Marion Experiment, a criminal law textbook used by universities across the United States. He has been a volunteer and contributor to PASAN for the past 20 years.