Blog
Emancipate NC and Allies Rally Against Corruption
Protesters gathered in downtown Raleigh, starting at 3 p.m. on Saturday, September 26. The rally was organized by Emancipate NC alongside coalition partners Raleigh Demands Justice, Save our Sons, and PACT Fayetteville. The rally, Uncover North Carolina: An...
Why Qualified Immunity for Cops Must Be Stopped: The Story of Malaika Brooks
The 2004 story of Malaika Brooks is a powerful look at exactly why we need to get rid of qualified immunity for police officers.
Tilmon Golphin’s Life Matters: NC Supreme Court Ruling Gives Him and Others Reprieve from Death Row
by Dawn Blagrove, Executive Director In 1997, Tilmon Golphin was a 19-year-old child. (Above, Tilmon Golphin’s uncle holds a childhood photo of Tilmon and his family). No different from the ones parents cry over as they leave for college. Friends and family use words...
Exploring the Youth Justice Election Perspective
NJJN Membership Advisory Council Member Jorren Biggs talks with Emancipate NC's Justice Fellow Aneesha Tucker and California Youth Activist and Policy Organizer Ronaldo Villeda about the election, innovation, and imagining safer spaces for youth....
Community Members Demand Cooper Release Incarcerated People at Risk of COVID-19
COVID-19 has spread rampantly through North Carolina’s state prisons, leaving thousands of incarcerated people infected and 12 dead. Still, NC Governor Roy Cooper has not commuted a single sentence during his 4-year term, and more than 2,000 who’ve completed their...
WUNC Profiles Emancipate NC Community Organizer Kerwin Pittman
In their series "Calling for Change," WUNC has been talking with North Carolinians who are advocating for major changes in policing. On September 10, they interviewed Emancipate NC's Kerwin Pittman about his life and what drives him in the fight for change. At 19,...
As Protests (and Arrests) Continue Across State, Volunteer Attorneys Protect First Amendment
It has been three months since George Floyd protests began in North Carolina, and Emancipate NC has worked tirelessly to connect anti-racist protestors arrested to volunteer attorneys across the state. North Carolina has seen protests in almost 100 communities across...
My First Protest Experience
by Kyla Holton, Emancipate NC Justice League Fellow and senior at Garner Magnet High School I can so vividly remember the first protest that truly caught my eye while I experienced watching it on T.V. It was 2016, right after Donald Trump was elected as the U.S...
Emancipate NC Staff Bail Out Raleigh Protestors
On August 28, close to 1,000 people marched through downtown Raleigh, up Fayetteville Street from the Wake County Justice Center to the State Capitol. The protest comes days after Jacob Blake, a Black man in Wisconsin, was left paralyzed after a police officer shot...
Emancipate NC and Co-Counsel Team File Motion to Ensure Protections for Incarcerated People During Pandemic
In June, Emancipate NC joined with ACLU of North Carolina, Disability Rights North Carolina, Forward Justice, and the National Juvenile Justice Network, filed a lawsuit demanding better protection for incarcerated people from COVID-19. The lawsuit asserted that the...
Poetic Justice 2020 to be Held Virtually on September 11
Please register and join us Friday, September 11, 2020 at 7:00 pm for Poetic Justice 2020, to be held virtually via Zoom due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Emancipate NC Poet-in-Residence Hausson Byrd will curate multiple young artists to share stories and spoken...
Emancipate NC Joins Panel of Intergenerational Activists to Discuss “The Struggle Then and Now”
On August 15, WRAL’s Lena Tillett hosted a powerful segment connecting the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s to today’s Black Lives Matter activism and protests. Tillett brought together a Zoom panel of experienced activists across different generations: Judy...
Emancipate NC Raises Another Billboard for Black Lives
Above, Executive Director Dawn Blagrove and Community Organizer Kerwin Pittman stand in front of the newly-erected billboard that will stay up until at least September 6. On August 10, Emancipate NC’s Kerwin Pittman helped organize funds and logistics to have another...
What Qualified Immunity Is and Why It Must be Ended for Police
Qualified immunity is one of the critical reasons so many police are never successfully held accountable for misconduct. And even in the rare occurrence that police are held accountable, qualified immunity means they almost never personally have to pay for violating...
The Problem with Criminalizing Childhood Trauma
by Tessa Hale, Emancipate NC Board Member Years ago, I worked as a mitigation specialist on death penalty cases. In that role, I constructed humanizing social histories for defendants in cases that would be presented at the sentencing phases of their...