OP-ED

Why Black People Held in Solitary More Often and For Longer Periods

The Angola Three, and a pattern of racially disparate treatment

Robert King stands in wooden replica of his 6x9x12 cell by artist, Jackie Summell | Photo by Landov 2011

Wherever there is injustice against a group of people, there's a movement that seeks to justify their mistreatment. This is how cruelty toward Black people and other marginalized groups — whether racial, ethnic, or otherwise — becomes a normalized part of society. As Ta-Nehisi Coates wrote in his memoir, The Message, "It may seem strange that people who have already attained a position of power through violence invest so much time in justifying their plunder with words. But even plunderers are human beings whose violent ambitions must contend with the guilt that gnaws at them when they meet the eyes of their victims. And so a story must be told, one that raises a wall between themselves and those they seek to throttle and rob." Reflecting on these words during Black August, a month when our community honors Black political prisoners, it's only fitting that we should try to chisel through this barrier.

Black people have faced disproportionate punishment in our nation's criminal justice system. It's a social problem that began during chattel slavery, as maintaining a race-based system of oppression meant giving patrols the authority to use violence to capture runaways…