On Monday, August 6th, 2018, Prison Public Memory Project (PPMP) and Hudson Area Library are sponsoring a talk at the Library by Dr. Alexandra Cox, author of a new book, Trapped in A Vice: The Consequences of Confinement for Young People (Rutgers University Press, 2018).

Dr. Cox spent many months inside New York’s juvenile justice system interviewing detention center staff and confined youth and examining the history of this system which began with the first juvenile reformatory in the United States in 1842, the House of Refuge located in Manhattan.  The discussion builds on her book and explores the consequences of a juvenile justice system that is aimed at promoting change in the lives of young people, yet ultimately relies upon tools and strategies that enmesh them in a system that they struggle to move beyond. 

Dr. Alexandra Cox

She is currently a Lecturer in the Department of Sociology at the University of Essex (in England). She previously served as an Assistant Professor of Sociology at SUNY New Paltz, where she ran the department’s concentration in criminology and was a Research Scholar in Law at Yale University Law School’s Justice Collaboratory.  She received her Ph.D. in Criminology from the University of Cambridge and her undergraduate degree from Yale University. Prior to receiving her Ph.D., she worked at the Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem as a sentencing mitigation specialist on their youth law team and at the Drug Policy Alliance’s Office of Legal Affairs. She continues to work regularly as a sentencing mitigation specialist in cases across New York State, particularly those involving teenagers charged as adults. She is a former Gates Cambridge scholar and a Soros Justice Advocacy fellow. She was on the board of the New York State Defenders Association and was the board chair of Drama Club (which conducts theater workshops inside of juvenile facilities).

Dr. Frankie Bailey

Dr. Frankie Bailey, a PPMP scholar collaborator, will be on hand at the event as a discussant. Bailey is a professor at the School of Criminal Justice at University at Albany (SUNY) and directs the Justice and Multiculturalism in the 21st Century project there.