Funder Briefing: Organizing Against Governor Newsoms “California Model” of Incarceration at San Quentin State Prison

In her role, Emily oversees state and local campaigns, develops a statewide membership structure, and builds and coordinates relationships with other state organizations, community leaders, allies, and key local and state officials.

Emily has served as the Statewide Coordinator for Californians United for a Responsible Budget (CURB), a coalition of 65 anti-prison organizations (including the Ella Baker Center), for four years. Her prior work experience includes working with women in prison through roles at Free Battered Women, California Coalition for Women Prisoners, and the Prison Creative Arts Project.

She serves on the National Advisory Board for the Prison Creative Arts Project and is the mentor for the Criminal Justice Cohort of the Women’s Policy Institute, a program of the Women’s Foundation of California.

Her policy interests and experience include working to reduce prison and jail populations, stopping prison expansion, reproductive justice for people inside, and redirecting resources out of the corrections budget.

Brian is a founding chapter member of California Coalition for Women Prisoners (CCWP) Los Angeles. He has spent the past decade monitoring, challenging and exposing the abusive conditions inside women’s prisons and advocating for the rights of incarcerated people. A tireless fundraiser for prison abolition with an extensive background in both business and media, Brian became CURB staff in January of 2019 and was selected to join the 2019-2021 SVP Systems Change Accelerator cohort of emerging Los Angeles leaders. In 2020, he joined the steering committee of Re-imagine LA County. Brian became CURB’s Deputy Director in 2021 and was elected community co-chair of LA County’s Measure J subcommittee on Mental Health, Behavioral Health & Diversion. Brian represents CURB on the Executive Team of JusticeLA

James King is the Co Director of Programs for the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights. Prior to joining the organization, James worked to build recognition of the value of people who are being held in carceral spaces. In 2016, he organized a symposium at San Quentin, where he and other incarcerated students made specific policy recommendations concerning the implementation of Prop 57. In attendance were the Secretary of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, various officials from the California Governor’s office, numerous social justice advocates, and many of his incarcerated peers.

James is also a writer and organizer, having written numerous op-eds, and a weekly blog that gave a first person perspective of the true impact of mass criminalization and living within the prison industrial complex. As an organizer, he founded a think tank of incarcerated people who were passionate about criminal justice policy and built relationships with multiple California criminal justice reform organizations.

Upon returning to society in December, 2019, James co-wrote and presented a TEDx Talk called “From Proximity to Power,” at California Polytechnic State University that advocated for recognizing the value and expertise of people who come from marginalized communities. His current policy interests include decarceration and improving the living conditions for incarcerated people, with the ultimate goal of creating alternatives to incarceration based upon investing in under-resourced communities.

Gina Peralta is a program officer with the Human Rights program at the Heising- Simons Foundation. Prior to joining the Foundation in 2019, Gina served as the director of site management at The W. Haywood Burns Institute (the Burns Institute), a national nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing racial and ethnic equity in the justice system by creating community-based alternatives to system involvement. During her tenure, Gina provided strategic direction to system and community stakeholders working to improve local and state policies contributing to racial and ethnic disparities, and also raised awareness about the impact of the justice system on Native American and Latino communities. Prior to working at the Burns Institute, Gina was an education advocate at Public Counsel Law Center for youth involved in the delinquency and dependency systems in Los Angeles County. Gina is also a former probation officer who has worked with youth, adults, and families involved in the justice system. Gina earned a bachelor’s degree in sociology and women’s studies from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and a master’s degree in social welfare from the University of California, Los Angeles.