the hashtag " "free cyntoia" became viral.r sentence was commuted by governor bill has some of tennessee on august of last year after 15 years behind bars cyntoia was released from prison. since then cyntoia has become a powerful advocate for criminal justice reform, especially for women and children in american prisons. she published a memoir "free cyntoia" my search for redemption in the american prison system " which she wrote when she was incarcerated. she had her husband jamie founded the foundation for justice freedom and mercy and in january of this year the vera institute of justice recognized cyntoia as one of the best of justice reform arteries. she was also in 2020 nominee for the naacp literary image award. joining our guests on stage tonight is professor hilary bender, a tisch college senior fellow in the founding director of the tufts university prison initiative at tisch college. i mentioned earlier that tisch college has expanded the scope of its educational programs and top it is one of our newer initiatives s

tisch college distinguished speaker series featuring a conversation with cyntoia brown-long, an authorivist for criminal justice reform. i want to thank molly goal, we just heard from. it was her suggestion that we bring some toyota campus. she was also instrumental in developing the program for said toy isc-span2 11's

advocates have pointed to the striking similarities between kizer's case and that of cyntoia brown's, who was freed from prison last year after being granted clemency while serving a life sentence for killing a man who bought her for sex when she was just 16 years old. in georgia, a grand jury has indicted three white men on murder charges for killing ahmaud arbery, a 25-year-old black man who was chased down and shot to death february 23. retired police officer greg mcmichael and his son travis, along with their friend william bryan, walked free for months after arbery's killing and were only arrested after a video of the killing filmed by bryan went viral on social media. the three men remain in a glynn county jail and have not yet been arraigned. also in georgia, a republican-controlled committee of state lawmakers has advanced a bill that would bar election officials from mailing absentee ballot applications to millions of active registered voters ahead of november's election. under senate bill 463, voters who want to cast ballots by mail would have to initiate the process themsel