Excerpts and video from an article by Allison Dikanovic in the Milwaukee Neighborhood News.
Bridget Davis eagerly waved one hand in the air and wiped a tear from her eye with the other one as a yellow school bus pulled up in front of Taycheedah Correctional Institution. Her son Lawson was on the bus, and the last time she saw him was more than a year ago, when she dropped him off at school.
“I can’t wait to see him,” she said.
Davis was sentenced to nine years in prison for “selling a small amount of drugs.” Her son hadn’t been able to visit her since she’d been incarcerated, but she said she has written him letters every Sunday, updating him on things like her success in cosmetology classes. Now, he was getting to visit her at the prison along with 49 other children whose mothers also are incarcerated as part of a program called Camp Reunite.
More than 5.1 million kids have had a parent in jail or prison in the United States, including 88,000 in Wisconsin, according to research published by the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Parent incarceration can have short and long-term effects on a child, and it disproportionately affects children of color.
For more of this article by Allison Dikanovic see the Milwaukee Neighborhood News
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