On January 11th, The NY Times reported, there was another violent physical and sexual attack on transgender and cis gender women incarcerated at Edna Mahan. This systemic violence has been happening at EMCF since it opened in 1913.
All of Us or None Northern NJ has created a petition to hold not only the officers and administrators involved in this violence, but to change the criminal justice. The Meta Theatre Company are members of All of Us Or None Northern NJ and asks that you sign this petition.
We Demand:
YWCA of Northern NJ hosted a press conference with community partners Senator Loretta Weinberg, Senator Linda Greenstein, Assemblywoman Valerie Vainieri Huttle, Assemblywoman Yvonne Lopez, Tia Ryans, Survivor and Founder NJ Forte House, Bonnie Kerness, Program Director, American Friends Service Committee: Prison Watch Program, Maggie D’Aversa, Independent Researcher and Monitoring Committee, NJ Prison Justice Watch, and Christian Fuscarino, Executive Director, Garden State Equality to send a message that more needs to be done to address the atrocities that have taken place at the Edna Mahan Correctional Facility and it needs to happen now. Here is the recording of conference
For the last 7 years, we have rehearsed inside/outside the prison walls at a women's prison in New Jersey. In March 2020, we could no longer rehearse inside due to the pandemic. We continue to write and create with our inside castmates through the mail. Even though part of our cast is incarcerated, we work together and create work that will educate, raise critical consciousness, and promote social action with our audiences. Before the pandemic, our cast produced and created their shows inside the prison walls for their community. Outside the prison walls, we produce and create shows for the community to create liberating change.