Blog
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...
Deadly Discretion: How Police Departments are Failing to Protect Basic and Fundamental Human Rights
by Noah Mlyn “Deadly Discretion: The Failure of Police Use of Force Policies to Meet Fundamental International Human Rights Law and Standards,” published this week by the University of Chicago’s International Human Rights Clinic, evaluates the use of force policies in...
The Night Police Officers Almost Killed Me
by Dawn Blagrove, Executive Director I was 16 years old, living in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. I was in the car with my mother, on a dark road, picking my father up from his second shift job. Two police officers pulled us over for a trumped up traffic violation. We were...
Protecting the Right to Protest
Today, Emancipate NC joined with our partners at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and the ACLU of North Carolina to protect the rights of protesters in North Carolina. First, on behalf of community groups including, Raleigh Police Accountability...
Why I Believe Change is Actually Gonna Come This Time
by Dawn Blagrove, Executive Director As Sam Cooke sang — a change is gonna come. Never have these words been more true in my lifetime. Never have I been more sure that a radical reimagining and rebuilding of the American criminal justice system is...
A Vision for Schools Without Cops
by Aneesha Tucker, EmancipateNC Intern Dignity in Schools is launching a vision called “Counselors Not Cops: Ending the Regular Presence of Law Enforcement” that imagines an alternative to the regular occupation of law enforcement in schools. The data on arrests and...
Court Rules that North Carolina State Officials Must Protect Incarcerated People from COVID-19
A North Carolina Superior Court judge announced a ruling in favor of plaintiffs today, finding that plaintiffs were likely to win their claim that people incarcerated in North Carolina prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic are being held under unconstitutional...
Ask Your Local City Council Members to Reduce Police Violence in Your Community
No matter where you live in North Carolina, we encourage you to use this moment to contact your local city council members to demand change. City Council members have the power to make lasting policy changes that will reduce police violence. You can use and adapt our...
#RaleighDemandsJustice Coalition Issues Response to Raleigh City Council Meeting
On June 2, the Raleigh City Council held a special meeting, one in which they failed to make any significant progress towards preventing police violence and holding officers accountable for civil rights violations or excessive force. Emancipate NC, along with other...
The State of Things: How Do We Hold Police Officers Accountable In NC?
On June 2, Emancipate NC Executive Director Dawn Blagrove spoke with host Frank Stasio on the State of Things. They discussed the ongoing protests in downtown Raleigh, how to hold police accountable, and what policies activists are pushing for. Blagrove also provided...