CHLP Joins Mississippi Center for Justice for Webinar Observing Inaugural HIV Criminalization Awareness Day
On Monday, February 28, CHLP co-sponsors a webinar entitled, Confronting HIV Criminalization: Promoting Criminal Justice Reform to Protect Marginalized Communities and End Mass Incarceration. Hosted by the Mississippi Center for Justice, this two-part webinar marks the inaugural HIV Criminalization Awareness Day. The webinar will draw connections between HIV criminalization and other forms of criminalization and over-policing, and point to coalitions and partnerships that offer new pathways for broader criminal justice reform. Sponsoring organizations include Association of Prosecuting Attorneys, CHLP, Fair Trials, Prevention Access Campaign, Mississippi Center for Justice, SUNY-Downstate/HEAT, Williams Institute/UCLA. Watch now on You Tube:
HIV Criminalization Awareness Day (HCAD) was developed by Sero Project in collaboration with The Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation, community activists, and organizations in the U.S. and around the world. This date honors the birthday of Elizabeth Taylor with advocates nationwide gathering to continue her legacy of compassion in shifting HIV stigma narratives from ignorance to informed. The day is intended to raise awareness of communities affected by the policing of health status, the laws that further disenfranchise people living with HIV and other health conditions, and the advocacy underway in the U.S. and around the world to end HIV criminalization.
Confronting HIV Criminalization: Promoting Criminal Justice Reform to Protect Marginalized Communities and End Mass Incarceration
Monday, February 28, 2022
12:00 noon – 2:00 p.m. PT / 1:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. MT / 2:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m. CT / 3:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m. ET
Host: Mississippi Center for Justice
Sponsors: Association of Prosecuting Attorneys, CHLP, Fair Trials, Prevention Access Campaign, Mississippi Center for Justice, SUNY-Downstate/HEAT, Williams Institute/UCLA
The first National HIV Criminalization Awareness Day will be observed this year on February 28. It is an opportunity to shine a spotlight on HIV criminalization as part of a broader pattern of criminalizing people based on disfavored identities, health status, and disabilities. This two-part event will draw connections between HIV criminalization and other forms of criminalization and over-policing, and point to coalitions and partnerships that offer new pathways for broader criminal justice reform.
SCHEDULE
OPENING REMARKS: Linda Dixon, Health Law Director, Mississippi Center for Justice
12:00 noon PT / 1:00 p.m. MT / 2:00 p.m. CT / 3:00 p.m. ET
PANEL 1: Understanding Criminalization of HIV and Viral Hepatitis as Part of the Mass Incarceration Problem
12:05 p.m. PT / 1:05 p.m. MT / 2:05 p.m. CT / 3:05 p.m. ET
This talk will address the question of who is criminalized and how. Panelists will discuss the criminalization of “disfavored identity”: HIV/Viral Hepatitis status, sexual orientation and gender identity, sex worker. The moderator will first give a thumbnail overview of HIV criminalization as an example of disfavored identity or status criminalization. Each panelist will then take five minutes to describe what HIV criminalization looks like from their perspective (as a person with lived experience, as a professional or advocate, etc.). The moderator will then lead a 30-minute discussion with Q&A.
Panelists will address:
- Being Black in America
- Sex work
- Injection drug use and harm reduction
- HIV, infectious disease, and the real targets of HIV criminal law enforcement
- Immigration status
- Poverty
Moderator: Amir Sadeghi, CHLP
Speakers:
- Mandisa Moore-O’Neal, J.D., New Orleans, LA
- Alecia Reed-Owens, J.D., Mississippi Center for Justice
- Eric Reece, HRC-Arkansas
- Kiara St. James, NY Transgender Advocacy Group (program note: this speaker was unable to attend)
- Norma Esquivel, CHLP
- Nathan Cisneros, Williams Institute, UCLA
PANEL 2: Building an Effective Movement for Systemic Change: Collaborative Responses to Criminalization of Health Status and Identity
1:00 p.m. PT / 2:00 p.m. MT / 3:00 p.m. CT / 4:00 p.m. ET
The patchwork and limits of HIV criminal law reforms to date underscore the need for broader, perhaps unusual, collaborations that extend outside of the HIV silo. Collaborative, multidisciplinary strategies that center those with lived experience in criminal justice and immigration systems are essential for a truly transformative movement. The moderator will provide a snapshot of HIV-related criminal laws in the U.S. The panelists–all stakeholders with different perspectives and focus–will take five minutes to describe new, surprising, or interesting coalitions they have built across disciplines to reduce criminalization, and successes and obstacles they have experienced along the way. The moderator will then lead a 15-minute discussion with Q&A.
Panelists will address:
- The roles and obligations of state and federal public health departments, and sexual health illiteracy as a catalyst for criminalization
- How prosecutors, law enforcement and defense attorneys can influence outcomes
- The role of research in reform advocacy
- Health care professionals as advocates for reform
- Building truly grassroots, inclusive coalitions for change
Moderator: Catherine Hanssens, CHLP
Speakers:
- Amy Killelea, Killelea Consulting
- David LaBahn, Executive Director, Association of Prosecuting Attorneys
- Norman Reimer, Executive Director, Fair Trials
- Dr. Jeffrey Birnbaum, SUNY-Downstate/HEAT (Health Education Alternative for Teens)
- Bryan Jones, Dirt Advocacy Movement, Ohio HIV Modernization Coalition
- Sarah Pilcher, Community Health Centers of Arkansas
CLOSING REMARKS: Linda Dixon, Health Law Director, Mississippi Center for Justice
1:55 p.m. PT / 2:55 p.m. MT / 3:55 p.m. CT / 4:55 p.m. ET