Tamra Oman, the recipient of the Ramiah Whiteside Changemaker Award at the EXPOnentially Correcting the Narrative 2026 gala in the  Madison Concourse Hotel ballroom on Saturday night, recalled her first meeting with Jerome Dillard, the former executive director of Ex-incarcerated People Organization (EXPO) in 2003. They met in a basement with 30 people and raised $35 for a group called Voices Beyond Bars.

She contrasted that small start with the large gathering Saturday of criminal justice advocates and those they represent, along with Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, Wisconsin Secretary of the Department of Corrections Jared Hoy and Evers’s chief legal counsel and chair of the newly created Commutation Advisory Board, Mel Barnes.

“We have formerly incarcerated leaders,” she said of those in attendance. “We have Department of Corrections leaders. We have the governor of the state of Wisconsin. We have family members,” Oman said, adding, “30 people in a room to a 450 count.”

The Saturday event was a collaborative effort between EXPO, an organization of formerly incarcerated people working for a better future for those impacted by incarceration, and The Community, a statewide organization assisting people inside prisons and after their release.

Both EXPO and The Community, each founded in 2014 and launching gala celebrations in 2020, were celebrating the sixth anniversary of their annual events, so the two organizations decided to hold a joint event.

“Bringing two organizations together for anything can be difficult, especially something that is much of our identity as an annual celebration,” said Shannon Ross, the executive director and founder of The Community. “We all have our own practices and our own traditions and our own ideas, but if we can’t come together on things that are large and difficult like this, how can we ask the system and ask society for criminal legal system change?”

The event included  a phone tree where attendees could  listen to recorded conversations between people in prison and their family members. There was also artwork by artists who had been incarcerated, and a large display of framed posters of people who had served their time in prison but, after years of supervision and being responsible members of society, were still facing more years of parole or extended supervision. The exhibit questioned supervision over five years.

Ross said crime survivors are not helped in the criminal justice system because it is built to be adversarial and doesn’t lean toward healing but “fear-based mannerisms.”

“Tonight we are going to hear from someone who is very familiar with both sides of a criminal collision,” said Ross, introducing crime survivor  Melissa Ludin. 

“Today I come into this conversation as someone who has caused harm, and someone who has lost a loved one to violence,” said Ludin.

She told how at age 19 she attempted suicide because of the grief of losing her father. She drove her car into an intersection and, she said, “caused devastating harm to other people and many families.”

She received a 25-year sentence and said in six months she would finish 20 years of supervision.

“Over those years, I’ve made amends, including with the person I harmed,” she said, “and I’ve worked to become someone that my children can look up to and depend on. Then I found myself on the other side of violence.”

She recounted the death of Chad Wilson, a criminal justice advocate who worked with Ludin and with whom she had a child. He was killed on Dec. 21, 2021, intentionally run over by a woman he had only known for 24 hours.

Ludin described how she struggled with wanting the woman to receive justice but also suffer.

“Justice meant she needed to answer for what she had done,” she said. “Vengeance was part of me that wanted her to hurt because we were hurting, and I felt both.”

She remembered speaking at the Wisconsin Resource Center, and knowing that the woman who had killed Wilson was in the audience. She questioned whether she wanted to be there, but then finally asked to shake the hand of every woman in attendance, including Wilson’s killer.

“I don’t know her full story, but people who cause harm can also have been victims themselves, and I know what it is to carry pain without knowing what to do with it,” Ludin said. “Understanding that matters if we want to prevent harm and accountability matters, too.”

Marriane Oleson, co-executive director of EXPO, thanked Gov. Evers for bringing back commutations, a reduction or modification of a criminal sentence under the state’s constitutional authority, using his authority to issue executive orders.

“Thank you for the hope of being seen for who a person has become,” she said. “Shannon and I, with others in this room, hear every day from people holding that hope very carefully, people who have spent years understanding the harm they cause, who are preparing to come home. They are trying to imagine where they could belong. We also recognize the people who have been harmed. Their healing deserves support, and every decision about someone’s future carries real responsibility. I know something about rebuilding a life. I began as an EXPO fellow less than two years after coming home from prison, and today I stand here as the co-executive director. It’s given my life purpose.”

Ross noted the special exhibit for those on supervision who are hanging by a thread, and their photo spinning represents the tenuous nature of being associated with anyone who violates their supervision and also being vulnerable to having their freedom revoked and being sent back to prison just on an allegation.

“Many people on paper (supervision) try to stay out of getting involved and participating in a lot of things in the public and civic space because they don’t feel they’ll be given the benefit of the doubt if something happens when we’re trying to just help people,” he said.

The family of Alejandro Silva, an incarcerated man, was given an award for supporting him while he is still incarcerated.

“I’m just, so you know, grateful and thankful and appreciative for everything that they do for me,”  Silva said on a recorded phone call.

Delilah Franklin, wife of Dennis Franklin, the co-executive director of EXPO, and a member of the Silva family, spoke of her admiration for the family.

“When someone is sentenced, their family serves a sentence, too,” she said. “They may not be behind those walls, but they carry the heartache, the worry, the sleepless nights, and the silent pain comes, to see someone they love in prison. And somehow they still have to get up every morning, go to work, take care of their families, and carry on with a life while a piece of their heart is somewhere else. That is exactly what the Silva family does. They travel for visits, sometimes multiple times a week. They make the video calls, answer the phone, include Alejandro in family decisions, and make sure even the youngest nieces and nephews know him, love him, and build memories with him. They refuse to let incarceration erase Alejandro’s place in their family.”

Former Assembly representatives Michael Schraa (R-Oshkosh) and Milwaukee City Attorney Evan Goyke, who previously served as a Democratic state representative, were honored for their bipartisan efforts to advance criminal justice legislation, including making vocational training part of the state’s earned release program.

Schraa and Goyke both said that, even though they were on opposite political sides, they became friends and found common ground on legislation.

Goyke celebrated the recent wave of midterm election victories by  Democrats, but cautioned that legislation passed without bipartisan support can be repealed. He offered the example of a “package of criminal justice reform bills called justice reinvestment” passed between 2006-10 by a Democratic Legislature and governor, only to be rescinded under the Republican administration of Gov. Scott Walker. 

Marty Dunmore, the founder of the Dunmore Project was honored for creating an organization that collaborates with other groups to promote safety and healing.

Dunmore lost a daughter to cancer in 2019 just before her 18th birthday, and then subsequently two other daughters were injured, one fatally, in an accident caused by a fifth-time drunk driver, and then a year later the daughter who survived the vehicle injury died by gun violence.

“And at the end of the day, I am just a mother who has lost three children, two of which were so preventable,” said Dunmore on video. “So we have to go back to the preventive measures, restorative justice, to meeting people, meeting the youth where they are.”

Marian Wasierski of the citizen’s group Enough is Enough, addressing reckless vehicle driving, said Dunmore was an inspiration.

“Marty refuses to remain frozen in the moment of shock to be seen only as that mother broken by cruel death and immobilized by profound grief,” said Wasierski.  “Marty refuses to allow her sorrow to undo her bottom line, her non-negotiable tenet that the goodness of her girls will never be lost or forgotten.”

Dunmore said she had experienced unimaginable grief, and the Dunmore Project was one place to focus her love for her daughters and share it with others, hoping it will make a difference.

Ronald Watson, another honoree, was nominated by Focused Interruption, a volunteer group that addresses gun violence in Dane County.

In his video presentation, Watson recounted his successful efforts to reintegrate into society after leaving prison in 1993, including working in the restaurant industry, making connections in the community, getting married, starting a family, and staying accountable to his support system.

“I just want to continue to do the work and help other people, no matter how small it be,” he said. “I just want to help others,”

Anthony Cooper, CEO and founder of Focused Interruption, said of Watson, “This brother here is a man of integrity. He continues to want to do the right thing for the right reason, and not just sometimes, but all the time. He wants to make sure he continues to honor his family, continues to honor the work that he’s doing, and continues to honor the community that he’s attached to.”

“Tamra has touched thousands of lives,” said Dillard, introducing Oman for her award. “That’s no exaggeration.”

Oman said she had met Ramiah Whiteside, the namesake of her award, while he was still in prison, and he impressed her because he advocated for others, not knowing if he would ever gain his freedom.

“When I think about what it means to be a change maker, I don’t think about grand gestures,” she said. “What I think about is someone who refuses to accept the world as it is because it can be better. Yes, a change maker sees the possibilities, but other people see just problems. A change maker sees people for who they are, not what they did, but what they can be. Most of all, change makers believe that every single person has value, and every life has the power to create something meaningful.”

Gov. Evers was the last to be honored for restoring the pardon advisory board and pardoning over 2,400, offering commutations and pursuing criminal justice reforms.

“We’ve also expanded the successful earned release program, and we provided the highest level of funding ever for the state’s treatment and diversion program to help reduce recidivism and get folks the resources they need to use,” said Evers. “We also expanded the popular Windows to Work program, enabling more folks to participate in programming that increases general work skills, financial literacy, and work search abilities that will help them to be successful after they’re released.”

He noted the recent opening of the Type One Southeast Regional Care System for Youth in Milwaukee, which he said, “represents nearly a decade of work to transform a failed juvenile correction system.”

He added, “last year I introduced a corrections reform plan to modernize our deteriorating prisons, stabilize our population, and expand evidence-based programming to improve public safety and efficiency in the system. This includes expanding community-based options for alternatives to revocation. As well as providing meaningful supports for those facing housing instability, substance use recovery, reentry programs, and more.”

“Unfortunately, Republicans have rejected these common-sense proposals without offering any comprehensive alternatives of their own; my plan is still the safest, fastest, and cheapest option to overhaul the state’s dated correctional system. Every day of delay or inaction makes projects costlier and the goalposts that much harder to reach.”

He encouraged the audience to keep pressure on state leaders to pursue reforms that “keep our communities safe while giving folks the second chance that they deserve.”

Correction: An earlier version of this story misspelled the name of Melissa Ludin. We regret the error.

School districts often identify students they call “at-risk” who might have a learning disability or low reading or math scores in order to  provide them additional resources and attention to help them keep pace with their classmates and avoid dropping out.

In the Wisconsin Deflection Initiative, the “at-risk” people are in the community at large. They might have mental health or addiction issues, and the objective is to provide support to create stability and help them steer clear of the criminal justice system.

Eau Claire County is one of roughly 11 counties in the state that have a deflection program under the Wisconsin Deflection Initiative. The county started the program in 2024 under an opioid abatement efforts law enforcement grant that involves a partnership between the sheriff’s office, the public health department, human services, and criminal justice services.  

“Deflection, in its truest form, is really to try to be a preventative program that we can intervene when people are having difficulties in their lives before a major kind of event happens,” said Brianna Marsden, recovery and justice service manager for the Eau Claire County Department of Human Services

It’s a voluntary program for people who are at least 18 years of age, live in the county, have completed an assessment, have agreed to case management, and have no warrants or pending felony charges.

The Eau Claire County’s deflection program website states that the program “prioritizes connecting people experiencing substance use and/or mental health challenges with the care and resources they need—particularly in low-level, non-violent situations—while promoting healthier outcomes for individuals, families, and communities.”

With so many jails and prisons in Wisconsin filled with people who also have addiction and mental health problems, the deflection program offers a proactive, preventive alternative to incarceration.

“We’re really trying to look at where there are the gaps in our system and how can we help that? How can we prevent these bigger things from happening in people’s lives?” said Marsden.

Those “bigger things” could be accruing a large financial debt or having felony charges, spending time in jail, losing a job or acquiring a social stigma that shadows one’s life.

Currently, Marsden said, there are about 30 people in the deflection program in Eau Claire County, and a total of 50-60 have been served since the program began.

It’s often law enforcement personnel responding to a crisis who make a referral to the deflection program.

“Law enforcement gets sent to many different calls throughout their day, and the vast majority aren’t criminal in nature,” said Eau Claire County Sheriff Dave Reiewestahl. “Whether it’s mental health, substance use, there’s a variety of reasons why we get called, and the hope is that we can pair that person up with somebody in peer support and a case manager, you know, walks alongside that person, so they don’t get involved in the criminal justice system.”

People can also apply for the program or self-report online.

“We get some of our people already connected to some resources in our community, like sober living, who could use a little bit more support, or they’re already connected with peer support from our jail, and community members can send in referrals for other community members,” Marsden said.

To promote the deflection program, the county has also produced informational videos airing at Kwik Trip gas pumps and ads on city buses and social media.

“It’s low-barrier, free services for individuals,” said Marsden. “You don’t have to have Medicaid. You don’t have to have insurance. We’re not charging you for anything. It’s really trying to be in that space to help people when they’re ready for help.”

After applicants fill out an  online application, they receive a call within 72 hours to determine interest in the program. Then there is an  intake meeting where participants sign an informed consent form and are connected to  peer support specialists. The specialists often have struggled with the same kinds of problems facing  their clients, but have received training to become mentors. 

Marsden said the pillars of the deflection program are case management, helping to secure resources and peer support.

The concept of flagging “at-risk” students, she said, is very similar to the deflection program effort to help “at-risk” people in the community.

“We know something is going to likely happen if we don’t intervene,” she said, “so let’s just intervene so that nothing really big or significant happens.” 

The power of peer support

Emily Nichols is a certified recovery coach and operations manager for At the Roots LLC, which provides services through certified peer support specialists and certified recovery coaches.

“The provider often helps with practical things,” she said. “That might include rides. It might be setting up or getting to appointments. It might be completing paperwork or following up on leads for things like housing. Because we know those are the barriers that often derail somebody’s recovery, and once that recovery is derailed, they’re definitely at risk for becoming involved in the legal system.”

Nichols said it makes a huge difference that the peer support and recovery coaches working with clients know first hand what their  clients are going through.

“Even if somebody is maybe wary of the system, oftentimes peer support or recovery coaching is an easier way for them to kind of get the help and support that they need without feeling like they’ve kind of been sucked into the system,” she said. “I think it’s easier for people to talk to folks who have been where they are and have actually been successful, to kind of keep that hope alive.”

Her agency does a brief screening with potential clients and asks such basic questions as: “Are you going to answer the phone when we try and get hold of you?”

The agency matches the participant with someone who has a similar demographic and life experience, and they meet once a week.

“Oftentimes we’re meeting with individuals before they’ve done their intake into deflection because we’re trying to get them help as quickly as we can,” she said. “We do some goal setting with the person, kind of figure out if they have any basic needs they need met, and then kind of get talking about recovery capital and what they have going on in life.” 

Help can mean different things to different people, from processing past trauma to working on communication skills to getting their most basic needs for food and housing met, she said. 

The goal is to help clients manage their lives and not live in a constant state of crisis, but there are times when additional help is needed. Mentors have given clients rides to appointments, helped them deal with the social service bureaucracy and apply for benefits. 

“We have people who have said they truly have just never felt listened to before,” Nichols said. “So it was the first time they had somebody who would listen to them without judging or offering unsolicited advice. We’ve had individuals who came to us unemployed and with engagement from the cops, and after six months of the program, some of them have done things like enroll at the technical school. We’ve had people get jobs.”

Some clients, she added, worked on interview skills through the program and were successful in finding employment. Others began attending recovery meetings,  “which, while that sounds like a small thing, it’s helping them build a healthy community, which replaces some of the relationships that maybe they need to leave behind them.”

“I think the biggest thing from our perspective is if we can reduce the level of harm that people are facing, whether that’s with the legal system, or it’s by stopping or reducing drug use,”  Nichols said.  

“We’ve extended people’s opportunity to survive and exist … you cannot put a price on that,” she said.

Nichols thinks the most important thing  the deflection program offers clients is community connection,  helping them feel secure and participating and living in the community, and confidently exploring interests without falling back into destructive habits.

“Oftentimes, the people that end up in the deflection program just don’t have anyone else who is supportive of them in that way, and we do very little advice giving, and a lot of guided listening,” she said. 

‘This has helped me the most’

Mae is a young woman who has struggled with addiction. She had recently been released from jail when she learned about deflection. At first she was skeptical and asked, “What’s the catch?”

But then Mae, who meets with a therapist, sat down with her peer support specialist and liked the fact that the woman helping her had similar experiences.

“It was great because I was able to relate to her on different things during our meetings, like domestic violence things, recovery-related things, mental health and substance abuse,” she said. “It didn’t feel clinical. Out of everything that I’ve tried, that’s like recovery-related oriented stuff, this has helped me the most and I feel the most supported and the most seen and understood.”

Mae meets one hour a week with her peer specialist, and they talk about how her week has gone. They work on positive self-talk and learning coping skills to support Mae’s recovery and also address her anger.

The peer specialist doesn’t just find resources for Mae; she shows her how to research and look for resources herself.

 “She shows me, and we do it together so that I don’t feel like I don’t know how to look and find resources on my own when we are done meeting,” Mae said.

In two months, Mae will leave the deflection program and transfer to Comprehensive Community Support (CCS), a voluntary Medicaid-funded community-based psychosocial rehabilitation program, where she will keep her peer specialist and have a team to support her as she pursues recovery.

“I would not have known about it (CCS) if it wasn’t for being in the deflection program,” she said.

Mae knows another person in deflection, also struggling with addiction, who was referred to by a law enforcement officer, and she says that person is doing well.

“And I hear people talk about it (deflection) in support groups or recovery groups like NA (Narcotics Anonymous) or AA (Alcoholic Anonymous), and they also speak highly of it,” she said.

Just being able to talk about her pursuing recovery, she said, is growth because in the past she’s always pretended not to have a problem.

“I’m getting more comfortable talking about it,” Mae said. “I think that’s part of just accepting what I’m going through and being okay with it and coming out on the other side, because I haven’t been this far yet in my mental health and substance use recovery. It’s like coming through on the other side and being OK to talk about it and accepting myself and what I’m going through and giving myself grace.”

Mae has been so inspired by her growth and working with her peer support specialist that she envisions herself one day being a certified peer specialist herself.

Sheriff support

Sheriff Dave Riewestahl is very supportive of the deflection program.

“Historically, law enforcement has really three options when responding to the needs of the community,” he said. “We can leave that person there. We can arrest that person if they’ve committed a crime, or if they’re having a medical or mental health emergency, they get to go to the hospital,” he said.  

“Deflection gives our staff a fourth option. Yes, that person remains in the community, but we don’t just walk away. We’re able to get them linked up with DHS, with a case manager, and start working on that individual’s needs.” Peer support, he said, seems to be the  … “secret sauce”:  “They have a greater rapport, a greater ability to affect that person than somebody with a badge.”

Riewestahl said that when the case manager in his office talks with Marsden about people in the deflection program and he hears names he knows from previous interactions with law enforcement, it reassures him that those people have someone in their lives who can make a positive difference.

“Nobody wakes up and says, you know, I want to be homeless, or I want to be a criminal,” he said. “There are a multitude of reasons why somebody ends up in the criminal justice system — underlying traumas, historical trauma, family trauma, mental health, AODA, you name it. The hope is that we can work with that person sooner when the problems and the issues are maybe easier to fix. Because once somebody gets incarcerated and has a criminal record, the barriers just get bigger and harder to overcome.”

Louise K. Waakaa’igan, a poet and member of the Anishinaabe (Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Lake Superior Chippewa) tribe in Sawyer County, Wisconsin, spent 16 years at the Shakopee women’s prison on the outskirts of the Twin Cities. Waakaa’igan was one of the 19 writers featured at a program called Beyond Bars: Voices of Incarceration.

The event, held on Oct. 24 at Hamline University in St. Paul, was the 15th public reading organized by the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop, made possible by a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board.

Some of the writers, like Waakaa’igan, had been released and now have jobs on the  outside. Waakaa’igan is the event coordinator at Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe University in Wisconsin. Others are still incarcerated and their writings were read by other authors or by a writing mentor or instructor.

More than 500 people filled the large, open venue at Hamline University overlooking the campus. The mood was upbeat. Writers who had recently been released got standing ovations, and all who had spent time in prison received flowers.

Waakaa’igan, who has participated in several of the past events since 2020, said she started writing when she was young as a way to “survive early adolescence,” but had stopped writing as an adult until she was in prison and a volunteer group encouraged her to start writing again in 2004.

“That’s really where my voice solidified, where I had an actual writing community for the first time in my life,” she said.  “Just a circle of writers where we would give each other feedback, where we’d be able to share, learn different aspects and different pieces of the craft, which was really beneficial.”

In 2014 Jennifer Bowen, the founder of the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop, came to Shakopee, and helped expand the prison writing program with support from a large group of mentors who give feedback to incarcerated writers and instructors who teach in the prisons and provide a “creative community” to encourage writers.

“It’s just a creative, collaborative, supporting community that recognizes the writer, whether they’re incarcerated or not, recognizes the writer as an essential part of our creative life,” Waakaa’igan said of the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop.

Bowen spoke of her appreciation for the writers and those who came out to support them.

“The incarcerated writers you all have sent thousands, literally thousands, of notes of feedback to, have long written under pressure, under surveillance, and toward change,” she said. “They’ve told us stories about 600 days in segregation, about surviving the Khmer Rouge, about missing their daughter on her birthday every single year for 21 years. Many of those writers are home now, joining us as citizen artists on pages and stages and in the streets, showing up to offer change as artists and the art when it’s most needed, which is now. And they are building nonprofits that connect and organize and heal this community.”

The readings kicked off with a student introduction by an incarcerated writer named Andrew  (read by Tarik Dobbs) who described himself as serving more than one life sentence. He recounted not caring about writing when he joined a workshop in prison just to pass the time, but then found something more:

“Writing gave me my life back, or at least made my fate and future possible, tolerable. And more often than one might think, for someone serving multiple life sentences, enjoyable — the  kind of joy and serenity only possible when one finds a sense of purpose, a reason for being. For me, this meant, in some part, the self-expression, the catharsis that comes from any writing, as small as one word on a post note or a magnum opus on the meaning of the universe.”

Waakaa’igan read “East of Cicero,” a poem that recalls memories of abuse and struggles experienced after leaving the reservation:

“The year was 1999. They just buried half my identity. I refused to attend the ceremony after talking with Ni maama (Ojibwe word for mother). Instead, I sat in the dark, carving scars on my anemic body, dirtying my pale skin blending tears with Mad Dog 20/20, burning stale cigarettes in my nephew’s sandbox. I began driving alone back then, replacing reservation roads for out-of-state freeways…I met my first demon there on I-94 east of Cicero. He silenced me like those drunk hands did in Six Mile. I laughed as I flicked my Newport out the window. I’m not a little girl anymore. I bragged. I’ll fight back this time. It was his turn to laugh, and he did, mimicking that drunken slur that left boozy saliva on my five-year-old body? …It wasn’t until I slept in that cement cell block in Minnesota that he let my tears dry on their own. Those saltless tears pulled next to me on that cement floor pitied me, just as that demon den east of Cicero.”

Commenting on her poem, she said, “There are traumatic events in people’s lives, that I think, unfortunately, happen when we’re young that we learn how to recover and heal from, and I’m not exempt from that, and there have been things that have happened in my life that I’m still trying to recover and heal from, and my writing has definitely been a way to make sense of some of that and move on and heal in a way.”

She also read a poem written in prison about the place that shaped her:

“…I’m from Packer games on Sundays, Greyhound trips for Christmas, and Easter baskets with Karla. I’m from women with the same last name and a father none of us knew. I’m from the woods, northern, where pines and birch bark blanket both ends of tribal roads, paved and gravel. I’m from a single parent household. Michael Jackson cassette tapes, Purple Rain posters, and latchkey kids. Title V programs, commods (commodities, federal government issued food) on pantry shelves, cucumbers from Grandpa Jake’s garden and a mean ol’ dog named Turkey. I’m from ‘crying won’t change anything,’ and ‘you should have known better.’ I’m from punitive silence and where it’s normal, hugs are warm, forced Catholicism still weighs heavy on Imam’s shoulders. This is where I will always return.”

The poem, she said, was a kind of “sweet lamentation,” of the place she couldn’t return to because of incarceration.

Von Johnson, a writer recently released from prison and now on supervision, read his poem “Here Now!” describing the hardships in prison and then being released into society where he was adjusting to the freedom, figuring out who he spend his free time with,  learning new technology, enjoying his first savoy steak, but also the continued accountability to the criminal justice system living with an ankle monitor:

“I have to fill out a pass to go everywhere, even to come here tonight. Noting the time to leave, how long the drive will take, the moment I arrive, the purpose of being in each destination. My selfie game is out of control, except there’s always some address or giant logo next to my face to identify that I reached my destination, as if this ankle monitor wasn’t enough, right? How long I will stay, the minute I leave, my travel time, the next logo-slash-address field, you get the picture. I have to have permission to see my mother. Rules on how long I can hold my significant other, but I guess I’m here now. I need permission to drive a car, own a car. I’m not allowed to finance a car. Hell, get into a car. But I’m here now…”

Mark Altenhofen, called Red because he formerly had a red beard, read his  poem, “Do you remember,” written in prison upon learning a life-long friend outside was dying of leukemia:

“…Do you remember the feel of fist against flesh when we fought? The bitter tears on our lips with “I love you” and “I’m sorry” still foreign to us. Do you remember tumbling through the dust, our blood mixing with it until we fell side by side, too exhausted to do anything but laugh? Your mom compared us to Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer. We acted out the stories written until we nearly drowned…”

After his reading, Altenhofen talked about how  the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop helps remind people in prison that  “we’re still human beings.” That  is “huge,” he said, “because it’s really easy to lose your humanity in there, and to be reminded we’re still people. We still have people that care about us, and there’s a community out here we can come back to. … It gives us something to hold onto and to look forward to, and to make ourselves better men.”

He added, “I was one of those guys I didn’t know how to talk about emotions. I treated emotions like I was a diabetic and that was sugary cereal for kids.” Writing, he said, was “a way to get to deal with the stuff I never had a chance to deal with, I never had the courage to talk to anybody about.”

Peter Schilling has mentored seven writers through the  Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop.  He said writers in prison often are processing their experience in a way that helps them cope. He noted one of his mentees wrote a Western, with wide open spaces that speak of unrestricted freedom as a counterpoint to his confinement, and another wrote a horror, modeled on a Steven King novel, transposing real struggles into the stories of fictional characters.

Michael Kleber-Diggs, a writing instructor in prisons since 2015 and board president for Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop, said the evening event represented an effort to “transcend prison walls and reach the community,” and also to “tear down the distinction between incarcerated writers and community writers.”

One of the evening’s last offerings was an original song written by a man named Will, who had recently been released. He performed  “Among these voices,” an anthem to living courageously: “Justice, burn my lips come roaring off my tongue. Set me alight to set me free. This tide has risen to make many voices one. Among those voices you’ll find me.”

Frank Davis and Aaron Hicks, creators of ECHO: Every Choice Holds an Opportunity, contend that very little programming for people in prison is led by people of color or by those who have been incarcerated themselves.

Both Davis and Hicks have been to prison, served their time, and are now reaching out to  work with others who are still incarcerated and or have been recently released. 

Davis and Hicks say they see a recognition that they have something to offer from men who have spent years behind bars and are struggling to make the best of a situation they don’t want to be in.

Voices of Power is the organization Davis and Hicks created to offer their services. They are also founding members of EXPO (Ex-incarcerated People Organizing).

The two were asked to consult with Marquette University and the University of Wisconsin-Madison and to meet with staff at the Racine Correctional Institution: the warden, deputy warden, security director, a correctional officer with the rank of captain, and community members.

“Aaron and I were talking about different things we were doing out in the community, and how we feel that change, or we have seen how change happens,” said Davis, “and it happens when people who are impacted by the system come back to create programming for people in the system.”

At that initial meeting, the men were asked by Warden Robert Miller and Education Director Dan Durler to create programming to decrease the population in solitary confinement, also known as restrictive housing.

“There’s just certain kinds of messages you need the right messenger,” said Darren Wheelock, a professor at Marquette University and director of the prison education program, “and it doesn’t matter how many times someone like me may talk about, you know, the importance of having a reentry plan – ‘start thinking about how what you do affects your future chances’. I can say that until I’m blue in the face, but It’s not going to resonate in the same way that someone who spent years incarcerated, who spent a number of years of that time in the restricted housing unit. They bring all that lived experience with them.”

Wheelock was talking about the ECHO pilot program Davis and Hicks offered last spring at Racine Correctional, which he said amounted to much more than the content on accountability and being proactive.

“The goal of ECHO is to create a space where participants can discover their own strength, connect through shared experiences, and start building a path forward,” the ECHO curriculum states. “It’s about recognizing how many will define and limit them – and choosing instead to define themselves on their own terms.”

Davis said he and Hicks created a curriculum based on their years of experience of working in reentry and recovery.

After seeing the program, Warden Miller asked that in addition to those in restrictive housing, another session be offered for those in the general population who had just recently left restrictive housing

Marquette University funded the pilot project that ran from February to April. 

“The guys loved it,” said Davis. “The warden loved how it impacted the guys and how they interacted with staff. The staff inside was able to see changes in guys in just the short nine weeks that we were working with.”

Those who participated in ECHO had to volunteer. 

“Normally, what happens is when individuals are offered groups inside, there’s a little apprehension when it comes because it’s like okay, this is another group that’s created by DOC or somebody that doesn’t really understand us, and now suddenly we got to go in here, we got to act like we like it or act like we’re learning something, and there’s really no connection,” said Davis. “When we went up there in the listening session, it was an opportunity for them to see us and they wanted to hear that we’ve been impacted by the system. And once they heard that, their whole demeanor changed. They start listening. They start leaning in.”

After the first listening session, where participants asked questions, the second session addressed the history of incarceration in the United States, an open discussion followed about challenges, especially solitary confinement, along with a conversation about how those challenges do not define the people who endure them.

The third session focused on identity and how people in prison perceive themselves.

“All of the men have been labeled through the system, you know, as a convict, offender, all of those different things,” said Hicks, “and so we pose a question that’s a little bit different, and that question is, ‘who do you say that you are?’ Giving them the space and place to be able to define themselves, and how do you walk in that? And even if you don’t know who you are, we can also just talk about who you don’t want to be.”

There’s a session on mental health and what incarcerated people can do to take care of  their mental and emotional lives, what healthy relationships look like, including the one they have with themselves and how they talk about themselves.

Hicks said many reoffend and go back to prison because of unhealthy relationships that should be avoided.

“Once we get out of prison, the first thing we want to do is jump right into a relationship,” said Hicks. “So we talk about toxic relationships, and from that we build. We start talking about healthy relationships. We pose questions to them about what a healthy relationship looks like. We start to dissect it, talk about it.”

The ECHO curriculum asks the men to consider whether they are fostering healthy or unhealthy relationships in prison, even before they step outside into freedom. 

Then there is dialogue on post-release employability and housing. The program focuses on real-life skills, work and creating a resume, preparing for job interviews and understanding workplace culture.

Davis said a lot of people getting out want to live with someone they know but some of those people may be unhealthy, and Davis and Hicks challenge participants to not connect housing with toxic people. 

One of the last sessions is on vision, legacy and personal accountability. Questions explored, said Davis, include what is your vision, what is your legacy, what is your plan and how are you going to implement the plan?

The participants go through a graduation ceremony and receive a certificate of completion and are encouraged to practice what they learned in prison and start creating a healthy community in prison and make decisions that reflect their goals.

Davis said participants will be challenged and there may be justification for their outrage, for how the justice system may have meted out punishment disproportionate to  their offenses. But that has to be tempered by the longer-term goal of getting out and creating the life they desire, keeping the long game in mind.

“This is really about two men on a journey to really pay it forward and to open up eyes the way our eyes were opened,” said Hicks. 

Some of the men who participated in the program at RCI offered their feedback.

“They came at a time where I was going through a rough patch,” said Davonta Ballard. “They opened my eyes to living and making decisions; every decision you make should be beneficial to you, your goals, and your growth. It came from two individuals who’ve been in my shoes so it meant much more and they were a good example to how you can do your time and come back and be better for the world, your family and community.”

James Allen has been in and out of incarceration since 2006 and is just months away from release. He said the program made a big difference in his life.

“It was somewhat the way the guys can relate because they have been incarcerated,” said Allen. “They just didn’t talk, but also asked questions. They were different and straightforward.“

He said the session helped him think about the direction he wanted for his life and what he could do to make a difference. 

“The thing that stuck with me the most is the question of what did I care about the most,” he said. “I care most about my family.”

He added, “It was the only class I wanted to take to be a better person in life.”

David Greeno said what he learned the most is to pay attention to what he was thinking.

“I’m mostly controlling my bad ways of thinking and I am working on starting my own business when I get released from here in 11 months,” he said. “I am mostly grateful that I took the program. I am very appreciative of what Frank and Aaron are doing by coming into prison and teaching the younger generation.”

Kemondray Johnson said because both Davis and Hicks had been incarcerated Black men it gave him comfort with “opening up and being real.”

“They gave me pointers on how to be a survivor, survivor of the criminal system,” said Johnson.  “Coming where I come from, there aren’t many positive Black role models and sadly most men have to get incarcerated to learn to be a better man. Those two men are role models to me. They are people I look up to and look forward to meeting outside of these walls.”

He added, “Those guys are free Black men and make time to come here and help us and stepping into an environment they swore to never come to again! I commend them and have the utmost respect for them.”

Davis said during the sessions there was a new guard in one of the wings who reportedly was disrespectful to one of the participants, and another participant reminded the man being yelled at that, “Man, you better know your identity,” and both of the men laughed and walked away from the guard.

Warden Miller chose not to be interviewed for this article, but he did describe the pilot ECHO offering as an “awesome program we have worked hard on collaboratively.”

Wheelock said he heard glowing reports from the participants himself.

“That trial run is what has everyone really excited,” he said. “That worked way better than we had imagined. We had students that they worked with that gave glowing feedback. A number of them then transitioned from the restricted housing unit. Right, they wanted to then kind of expand their educational opportunities and start taking classes. So it was all these downstream really positive benefits from having guys that have lived experience go back inside and help guys.”

Future, fundraising

The goal now for Davis and Hicks is to provide a year of ECHO programming at RCI over five, nine-week sessions. They are looking at raising $75,000 to fund the programing. The DOC may find the funds in its budget, but the men are also holding an online fundraiser, which started Sept. 1 and will end Nov. 12. 

“This campaign is about more than sustaining a program,” the fundraising page states. “It is about closing the gap between what people inside need and what is often available to them. Many people are expected to heal, change, and prepare for reentry without consistent support. ECHO is working to change that.”

To learn more or donate, visit ECHO: Bridging the Gap

In 2009, Jennifer Olson was on parole, out of prison and under community supervision for a felony conviction, when she stopped at a friend’s house on the way to the mall. When Olson arrived, the friend was overdosing, and the friend’s brother was panicking, unsure what to do.

After attempting CPR and placing her friend in a cold shower to revive her, Olson called 911 to save her friend’s life.

The friend was placed in a medically induced coma for 37 days and lived, but during those 37 days, Olson was held in the Waukesha County Jail, incarcerated because, as a condition of her parole, she wasn’t supposed to be around criminal activity or drugs, and it didn’t matter that she had no drugs in her system, having been clean for two months after she went to rehab.

While in jail, Olson said, she lost custody of her children, and she lost her apartment and her job.

“Would I have gone to jail for calling 911 for someone having a heart attack? No.” she said. 

The Wisconsin Good Samaritan Coalition is advocating to change Wisconsin’s law to prioritize saving a life without fear of consequences for those seeking help.

Opioid overdose deaths in Wisconsin have dropped from a peak of 1459, or about four per day, in 2022, to 815 in 2024, according to state health department statistics.  “Many of those deaths could be prevented if people did not fear calling 911 to save a life,” the coalition says in a statement advocating for strengthening the state’s Good Samaritan law to offer protection from prosecution for people who survive an overdose and the people who help save their lives by calling for help on the scene. 

On Monday night, Sept. 28, the coalition met in Eau Claire at Hope United Methodist Church. A large contingent of University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire nursing students attended.

The Good Samaritan Coalition was the main organizer of the event, with support from ProSay, an advocacy organization for formerly incarcerated people  on community supervision, and WISDOM, a faith-based organization with 12 affiliates addressing systemic injustice, and WISDOM affiliates Free and Jonah, with Jonah hosting the event.

“Currently, Wisconsin law deters people from calling 911 in an overdose emergency and Good Samaritan Coalition feels everyone should feel safe to call 911,” said Lynn Buske, a representative of the coalition. Wisconsin has a Good Samaritan law, “but it offers very few protections, leaving people nervous,” she added.

Juli Bliefnick of ProSay said the issue was “deeply personal” to her because she had her supervision revoked and was sent to jail, losing her job and housing after she called 911 to save a life.

“People should not be forced to choose between their freedom and someone else’s life,” she said.

Bliefnick recounted the history of  Wisconsin’s  Good Samaritan law.

The current law, passed in 2013, grants immunity from prosecution for possession of a controlled substance to a person who summons or provides emergency medical assistance to another person suffering from an overdose. A 2017 update of the law, which is no longer in effect, also granted immunity from having parole, probation, or extended supervision revoked. The protections for people on parole, probation or supervision expired under a sunset clause in 2020.

The No. 1 reason people cite for not calling 911 in overdose cases is fear of arrest.

“I’ve experienced the grief of losing someone that I care about due to an overdose, an overdose death that could have been prevented if help had arrived in time,” said Mark Rice, the Transformational Justice Campaign Coordinator for WISDOM.

Rice said WISDOM’s goals of reducing the prison population and changing the culture and laws that result in “permanent punishment of people who have conviction records” align with the Coalition’s efforts.

“So many people fear calling 911 because of fear of arrest,” he said.  “…  the Good Samaritan Coalition is aiming to strip that fear away and to replace fear with health-centered care, and so definitely this is something that WISDOM strongly supports.”

Sarah Ferber, a regional organizer for Free, said she had several friends die of an overdose, and she had also been in situations where she had to call 911 to save a life, but she had not faced any repercussions for seeking help; however, she knew others who had called 911 and did face consequences.

Kelly Green said that when her partner overdosed, she applied six vials of Narcan to save his life, but she never called 911 out of fear of what might happen after first responders arrived.

“Calling 911 meant bringing police and emergency services to my house, and once they were there, I couldn’t control what happened next,” she said. “What would they see? What would they ask? What would Child Protective Services see or if they would get involved? What would happen to my kids? Could I lose them? Those thoughts were going through my head while someone I loved was overdosing in front of me, and I know how that sounds after the fact. Of course you call 911. Someone might die, but that’s not what fear looks like when you’re actually living it.”

Andrew Garr, executive director of Wisconsin Milkweed Alliance (a non-profit using the lived experience of members with mental health and substance abuse to “uplift and empower”) recounted his experiences of administering naloxone (Narcan is the brand name) to revive someone he knew who was overdosing and explained how to administer it. Following that, there were discussions about advocating for an update of Wisconsin’s Good Samaritan law.

Buske encouraged participants to sign a petition, talk to others about the subject and press legislators to change the law.

Bliefnick noted that other states, even some that are more conservative than Wisconsin, including Iowa, have broader, more protective Good Samaritan laws.

She also recounted recent attempts to change the law that stalled in the state Assembly, where Speaker Robin Vos didn’t allow it to come up for a vote.

More information on the Wisconsin Good Samaritan Coalition and its effort to change the law is available on the group’s website. 

 

 

On Friday the Commutation Advisory Board met for the second month in a row to hear from another 12 incarcerated people applying for a commutation, a shortening or modification of a criminal sentence allowed by Wisconsin Constitution under the governor’s executive clemency authority.

Gov. Tony Evers issued two executive orders on April 4 establishing the Commutation Advisory Board and application process 25 years after the last commutations  were offered by Gov. Tommy Thompson.

On Aug. 21, the board heard from the first 12 applicants.

The second round of the applicants also appeared in open session via livestreaming. The board then convened in closed session to make recommendations to the governor. Board chair Mel Barnes said that only those receiving a majority vote of the members are forwarded to the governor for consideration.

Touissant Harley

In 1992, Touissant Harley was sentenced to life imprisonment for first-degree murder and first-degree reckless injury. A board member said he became eligible for parole in July 2025. Harley, now 53, was convicted at 18. 

Harley told the board that it was impossible for him to “fully grasp the impact that my abhorrent actions had upon Mrs. Sallis, mentally, emotionally and otherwise,” referring to Mavis Sallis, the mother of the victim of the homicide. 

“In me accepting responsibility and apologizing, I’m also expressing the fact that I fully recognize that reality that I am not by no means worthy of the slightest acknowledgement from neither Mr. Evans or Mrs. Sallis,” Harley said. “I did not awake Aug. 15, 1991 with the intent to harm anyone. Nonetheless, me shooting and killing Chris, and injuring Mr. Evans, not only disgusted me, I felt like I was the worst of the worst… My disregard for life generated fear in the community and contributed to the eroding trust society affords each individual.”

In a December 2024 hearing in Harley’s case, then-Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm presented Sallis’s thoughts, using a statement from Sallis prepared by Harley’s attorney. 

Chisholm said that immediately after the homicide, Harley wrote a letter to Sallis, apologizing and asking for forgiveness for the death of her son. He said Sallis is an active supporter of his early release and his pleading to a lesser charge. 

“The relationship has been a testament to the power of forgiveness and restoration,” he said. “During his sentencing and trial phase, the voice of Christopher Sallis’s mother was neither heard nor considered.” 

Mistye Doughty

Mistye Doughty, 66, incarcerated at Taycheedah Correctional Institution, was sentenced on Oct. 11, 2002, in Brown County to 35 years followed by 25 years of extended supervision for felony murder and armed robbery. She has completed 25 years of her sentence.

In 2004, Doughty’s appeal was denied. She claimed she was not a party to a crime involving the robbery of a jeweler, Douglas Tappa, who was killed by her husband, Matthew Doughty, during a robbery.

Doughty recounted her husband attacking Tappa, and then later receiving $100 from him after selling the jewels in Chicago, although the court found she had taken “half the proceeds,” which she contested was incorrect. 

“I accept all responsibility and accountability for my action of not rendering aid and calling 911,” she said. “A good man lost his life. I live with the remorse and regret every day for what I did and didn’t do by not taking the proper action. This shattered many lives. I hurt and violated the sanctity of the home of Mr. Tampa, deeply hurting his children, grandchildren.” 

She recounted receiving therapy and becoming a certified peer specialist  to work and mentor others.

If released, Doughty said, she would live at Safe House in Madison managed by the advocacy group EXPO and continue with therapy and working as a peer mentor.

“Working as a certified peer specialist is my way of giving back to the community,” she said.

During victim statements, Mel Tappa, Douglas’s daughter, recounted how her mother and siblings suffered from the death of her father, and she asked the board to not grant a commutation.

Efrain Campos

In 1999, Efrain Campos was sentenced to 70 years of confinement. He was convicted of being party to armed robbery and first-degree recklessly endangering safety. 

According to a criminal complaint, he was charged with conducting robberies with threat of force between Jan. 18 and 19, 1999, and was charged with attempted homicide for shooting at two responding police officers. He said he’s been incarcerated for about 27 years for crimes committed when he had just turned 18. 

“I am grateful that no one lost their life, but I recognize that the outcome could have been very different,” Campos told the board. “At the time, I was immature, and I wanted to fit in and feel accepted. Growing up without a father in my life contributed to my desire to find acceptance from others. But that is no excuse. I had choices, and I made terrible and selfish ones.”

 

Wazir El-Amin

Wazir El-Amin, formerly Wade A. Curtis, 55, incarcerated at Fox Lake Correctional Institution, was given a life sentence on Nov. 21, 1990 for first degree intentional homicide with a dangerous weapon in Racine County, and has served 37 years in prison.

He applied for juvenile commutation because he was 18 at the time of his conviction; anyone 19 or younger at the time of conviction can apply through the juvenile application.

El-Amin is eligible for a parole hearing in 2028.

At the hearing, he took responsibility for the death of Christopher Rolle,18, and the pain it caused Rolle’s family and community.

“I understand now what I didn’t then – that my actions caused both mental, physical, emotional trauma,” he said.

He said the one way he had made amends was  by turning his life around, including pursuing his  education, getting two degrees, participating in several programs and becoming a tutor and respite care worker.

If released, he said he would live in the duplex he owns with his wife and he would continue in a program helping other people  who have been to prison.

Casey Fisher

In 1994, Casey Fisher was sentenced to life imprisonment and a consecutive 20 years of confinement. He was convicted of first-degree intentional homicide while armed and armed robbery with threat of force. 

Fisher, 54, said he has and still is maintaining his innocence of the crime, but that he isn’t trying to challenge his conviction through the commutation process. 

“I also want to acknowledge that me maintaining my innocence in this matter does not mean that I was some kind of good guy back then,” Fisher said. “I really wasn’t. I made a lot of poor choices, I often associated with the wrong people and acted without thinking about the impact that my actions had on others.”

Fisher said that during his incarceration, he’s taken advantage of some of the programs and classes in the prison system. Board member Cindy O’Donnell, former deputy secretary of the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, said that he hadn’t received a prison conduct report since 2018. She said that this was a hard thing to achieve, and asked how he’d done it. 

“Stayed in my own lane and just stayed focused on trying to do better,” Fisher said. “(I’ve) got a 2year-old granddaughter.”

Richard Sulla

Richard Sulla, 39, incarcerated at  Oregon Correctional Center, was convicted in May 15, 2012 for burglary using a dangerous weapon prison and required to make restitution of $101,070 to Joseph and Laurie Dudley. He was also charged with multiple other offenses in Waukesha, Milwaukee, Walworth and Washington counties that cumulatively, with the Jefferson County offenses, resulted in 25 years of incarceration and 25 years extended supervision. He has served 16 years in prison.

Sulla said he began his crime spree after he was medically discharged from the Marine Corp. while struggling with the effects of childhood abuse.

“I violated their sense of security and trust in society,” he said of his victims. “I took family memories and ultimately destroyed the Dudleys’ home. And today I stand here humbled, apologetic, and truly sorry for my actions. The destruction I caused to the Dudleys’ home was the first time in this 18-month crime spree I laid awake at night asking myself, ‘What are you doing, Richard?’”

He said in prison he began to focus on changing and taking responsibility for his actions. Through restorative justice programs, he realized the ripple effect of the harm his actions had caused.

He described  investing his time in getting an education and volunteering for Paws Patrols, working with service dogs and earning an associate’s degree, and starting a certified peer support program.

The Dudleys submitted a letter asking that Sulla not be given a commutation due to the damage he caused the family.

Robert Patterson

Robert Patterson was convicted of killing a man found dead from gunshot wounds in a van where he was a passenger on Sept. 3, 2002.

According to the criminal complaint, Patterson said he was riding in the back of the van when one of the men, Kristopher Beason, suddenly turned around in the front seat. His co-defendant, Kionta Crockett, began shooting after he saw Beason was holding a gun. 

Patterson said “the whole van was lighting up like a strobe light.” Patterson pointed his own gun toward the front of the van and fired at least two shots as he moved to exit the vehicle and ran away. 

Patterson told the board that he feared for his life. 

 “Looking back on the situation, I know that I didn’t have to shoot Kris,” he told the commutations board. “I had options…I also should not have gotten into a vehicle with people I didn’t trust.”

Ballistics results linked Beason’s bullet wounds to Patterson’s gun, according to court records. Patterson pled guilty to an amended charge of party to second-degree intentional homicide in Beason’s death. The prosecution agreed to recommend “in the area of 20 years” for initial confinement. 

Patterson was sentenced in 2003 to 27 years behind bars and 18 years on community supervision. 

Board chair Mel Barnes read a statement opposing Patterson’s application for commutation  from the sister of the victim. She said that the pain of losing her brother, especially knowing the perpetrator was a neighbor of more than 10 years whom she considered a friend, “shattered my sense of safety and trust.” She said Patterson pretended to help look for the people behind the crime despite being responsible. 

“It is deeply painful to know that if Robert Patterson is released, he will move forward with his life, while my family continues to live with the daily anguish of his actions,” Barnes read from the statement.

Dequelvin Douglas

Dequelvin Douglas, 47, a resident of Oshkosh Correctional Institution, was convicted of first degree intentional homicide and attempted first degree intentional homicide in Kenosha County at age 15 and sentenced to life in prison when he was 16. He has been incarcerated for 31 years.

“I take full responsibility for my actions,” he said. “This is not a crime of circumstance or peer pressure, but rather the result of a deliberate and selfish choice that terrorized my community. The actions I display, specifically in regards to my victims and their families, are both inexcusable and unrepairable. I know that there are no words that can be said to heal their pain or change how I destroyed their lives.”

When he went to prison at age 16, Douglas said, he thought he was a “monster,” but, he said, over the years he became a member of a men’ s accountability group and began to change his perspective and mature.

He talked about becoming a peer specialist and a mentor and helping others, especially young men. 

A restorative justice program, he said, helped him understand the perspective of his victims and develop empathy.

Harlan Schwartz 

In 2001, Harlan Schwartz was sentenced to 37 years behind bars and 18 years of supervision in the community. He had been convicted of two counts of arson for setting fire to a building and a count of selling, possessing or manufacturing a Molotov cocktail. 

Schwartz was charged in two instances of arson against then-Douglas County District Attorney Daniel Blank’s home, according to the criminal complaint in the case.

The first incident caused soot discoloration and minor charring on part of the siding on the garage. Over a month later, Blank’s family woke to the sound of breaking glass. Blank, his wife Suzanne and their three year-old daughter had been sleeping on the second floor of their home. Suzanne Blank said that she saw fire and smoke in their living room on the lower level, and the family called 911 and exited the home.  

Schwartz and his co-defendent claimed that they committed the crime under duress because they were in fear of their lives and the lives of their families based on threats by gang leader Alejandro Rivera, Fox 21 News reported. At the time of the firebombing, Rivera was awaiting trial for murder, with Blank as prosecutor. 

“Between (my co-defendant) and I, it was fear for me to participate in this because at that point in time, I didn’t believe I had any other choice,” Schwartz said. “As I’ve gotten older, I’ve realized I had a lot of different choices.”

Board member Cindy O’Donnell said that the Blanks wrote a letter in support of Schwartz’s commutation.

“That means so much to me,” Schwartz said. “I’m so sorry for everything I did to them, and for them to support and have forgiveness is just so overwhelming.”

In a notice to the court, Douglas County Circuit Court Judge George Glonek took no position on whether Schwartz should receive a commutation, noting that he was not the judge who handed down the original sentence, and that Judge Joseph McDonald is now deceased. But he stated that the incident “did more than just affect the victims, the city of Superior, or the County of Douglas.” 

Glonek wrote that during the sentencing hearing, McDonald said that the incident “‘was an attack on the criminal justice system’ (including elected officials) which shook the entire State of Wisconsin and beyond.”

Glonek wrote that at the sentencing hearing, McDonald said that the jury appropriately found there was no coercion, and called the conduct an “act of cowardice.”

“He says fear,” McDonald stated, according to Glonek. “The State says money. I say money. Fear wasn’t there…Fear wasn’t there when he was calling, trying to make arrangements after the fire bombing to Rivera to get the money, according to the testimony of other witnesses. He was waiting for the delivery of the money.”

In 2022, Schwartz sought a lighter sentence, with his attorney arguing that he provided information to law enforcement regarding a prison stabbing at risk of his own safety, according to a hearing transcript. His attorney contended that because of this new factor, Schwartz had met the standard for a sentence modification, and that his overall changed character merited a lighter sentence. 

“There are few things more telling about a person’s character than their (willingness) to risk their own safety to do the right thing,” Schwartz’s attorney said. “Mr. Schwartz did not do that 22 years ago when he committed the crime. He has shown today that he can and he is willing to do that.”

He said that the perpetrator of the prison stabbing, David Schroeder, admitted that he intended to kill the victim because he thought he was a snitch. 

“(Schwartz) found out later that David Schroeder had found out who he was, that he had provided information to the State, that he had made threats to Mr. Schwartz based on that,” Schwartz’s attorney said. 

At the hearing, the district attorney argued that Schwartz hadn’t met the legal standard to be considered for a lighter sentence. He said that Schwartz wasn’t the only witness to the stabbing and that Schroeder took a plea deal instead of going to trial. Judge George Glonek declined to change Schwartz’s sentence. 

Dawn Dobbs

Dawn Dobbs, 59, incarcerated at Taycheedah Correctional Institution, was convicted of first degree intentional homicide (party to a crime) in Milwaukee County and sentenced July 1, 1994, to life imprisonment for killing her life partner, the father of her two sons. She has been in prison for over 32 years.

At 26 years of age, she said, she obtained a gun that a younger co-defendant used to shoot  her partner. She said it had taken her 20 years to be fully accountable for her actions instead of blaming others. She said she now took responsibility for enticing her younger co-defendants to commit the crime.

“As pathetic as these words are, I am so very sorry for the trauma, the pain and heartache that I’ve caused for each and every one of you,” she said to her victims.

Dobbs recounted various jobs she had in prison and the numerous programs she has participated in, including counseling in anger management and coping skills.

She noted one of her crowning achievements was making a suicide prevention video that is viewed in prisons and had reportedly helped to save lives.

If released, she said she would live with her sister in Jefferson, where other family members live, and said she would like to work with animals and volunteer with numerous agencies, including animal and homeless shelters.

Richard Perekovich

On Nov. 9, 2001, police found Victor Ransom dead in the parking lot outside a tavern, alongside Antonio Young, who had gunshot wounds to his right arm and right leg after gunfire  broke out while the two men were leaving the bar at closing time.. 

According to a criminal complaint, Young said he and Ransom were walking out of the tavern when he saw a man he later identified as Richard Perekovich in front of the bar. Perekovich appeared to be showing off a handgun. Young was looking away and talking with Ransom when he heard a scream.

He looked up and saw Perekovich, firing the gun. Young ran and was hit in the arm and leg, and saw Ransom lying on the ground. Perekovich was sentenced to 30 years behind bars and 10 years of supervision in the community for the shootings. 

“Although the circumstances have never been fully resolved, the fact remains that my choice to arm myself and return fire resulted in the loss of a precious life, deprived children of their father, caused the mother to suffer the loss of her son, and a young man challenged with a severe injury to his arm,” Perekovich said. 

A board member asked Perekovich to clarify what happened and who fired first. He said that he fired first out of fear as a person who approached him at his car moved for a gun. Asked whether he saw a weapon, he said he did not, but that the person had previously threatened to “put a hole” in him.  

At sentencing, Perekovich said he pleaded no-contest because he didn’t think he could persuade a jury he acted in self-defense because of how many shots he fired, according to court records. His defense counsel argued that an investigator had found independent witnesses who said that people at the crime scene were armed and firing guns. Perekovich said he believed he was defending himself and did not intend to hit anyone when he fired his gun. 

The circuit court didn’t adopt the state or Perekovich’s version of events presented at sentencing, but said that “although you tell this court that you were not intending to shoot directly at anyone, it appears that an innocent person, someone who is doing nothing more than probably saying goodnight to his friends after an evening of socializing, he, too, was probably doing nothing more than trying to go home and be with his family.”

Yatau Her

Yatau Her, 43, incarcerated at  McNaughton Correctional Center, was convicted of attempted first degree intentional homicide in Eau Claire County, and sentenced on Nov. 18, 2005 to 24 years of confinement and 15 years of extended supervision.

Prior to his attempted robbery of the grocery store, Her said, his life had been unstable after he escaped  from the California Youth Authority to Minnesota and then joined a gang. He recounted the robbery and how he panicked and shot at the store owner.

At his sentencing, he said, the victim asked why a hardworking woman who had done nothing to others would be threatened with harm.

“To answer that question, life pushed me around, and I didn’t have the confidence in my ability, nor the capability to understand how to push life back, so I took it out on people,” he said and added,  “I am ashamed of my actions.”

In 2011, while living in segregation, Her said, he had a revelation about how destructive his life had become and how he had harmed others, and he began to reflect, tried to surround himself with “productive individuals,” and invested in himself by reading self-help books and participating in programs.

He said he gained work experience and education and skills and, over the years, was allowed to move from maximum to medium to unsecured minimum housing and take part in work release.

He said he is no longer a threat to society, and is “ready for the final step of rehabilitation.”

If released, he said he would live with family in California, Oklahoma or Wisconsin.