By Joseph Williams, New Republic, October 24, 2019
Betty Riddle was 17 when she was first convicted of a felony, for clubbing another woman in the face during a fight. “Assault with a deadly weapon,” she told me recently. “I was adjudicated as an adult.”
Riddle spent most of her life in and out of prison, mostly for drug possession and passing bad checks. A judge eventually declared her a danger to society as a repeat offender. “The last time I went in was 2000,” she said. “They habitualized me and gave me 10 years.”
When she got out, Riddle was determined to stay away from drugs. She got a low-paying but gratifying job in the Tampa public defender’s office as a communications assistant, occasional paralegal, and unofficial liaison between the office and the community. She wanted to have a positive impact on society.
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