“My name is Ray and I’m at your service. With no personal importance, with no attachments. I’m just a vehicle doing some work based on my experience from what I’ve seen in the community.”
This is how Ray Robinson describes his approach to helping people in his community who are justice-involved: a servant to the greater good and a resource to those navigating a complex and often cruel system.
Ray knows firsthand how difficult it can be. He grew up on the south side of Chicago, where he was first detained by police at just 8 years old. He has been arrested and detained multiple times and spent years of his life behind bars.
Now approaching 50, Ray uses those experiences to benefit people entangled in the criminal legal system and to advocate for policies that treat people humanely and are responsive to their needs.
Ray is a community liaison with the Cook County Safety and Justice Challenge, a trainer of trainers for First Defense Legal Aid, and involved in efforts to implement the Pretrial Fairness Act, state legislation passed in 2021 to improve pretrial justice in Illinois. Ray is also a senior member of the Alumni Association, a peer support group for people who are formerly incarcerated; he credits the group for getting him involved in this work.
Ray’s descriptions of being arrested and detained mirror those of millions of others each year: impersonal, violent, and confusing.
“It’s really aggressive, especially if you’re gang-related. Shakedown. Strip search. All kinds of people in there, most involved in drugs and violence. You’re treated harshly. Escorted, talked to, and addressed aggressively by both other inmates and correctional officers. It’s shut up or get beat up.”
Uncertainty and confusion add to the traumatic environment. Ray believes the failure of well-intentioned system actors to recognize the humanity of people accused of crime results in poor treatment and communication. The hearing process is a key example.
“You’ll be in front of the judge for less than about four minutes. They do a bunch of talking and everyone, when they come back to the bullpen, they say, ‘What’d they say?’ You can’t really grasp everything that’s being said in that time between the state and defense and the judge.”
After experiencing the arrest, detention, and court hearing process repeatedly, Ray says he knew what to expect but never learned how to advocate for himself. Ray recommends educating people who are detained on the legal process to increase their chances of making themselves heard.
Ray realizes this won’t be easy. In many ways, he says, it’s our human nature to expect people we interact with to think and act like us.
“When we communicate with somebody, it’s almost as if we’re communicating with a replica of ourselves. We expect them to hear it the way we do, but they can hear the same thing totally differently.”
Ray wants people who work in criminal legal systems and the people who are impacted by those systems to become patient, noncombative listeners; to be in the moment; and to see each other’s humanity.
In addition to reducing their confusion and uncertainty, listening to people involved in the criminal legal system creates an opportunity to identify their needs which, if addressed, can improve their chances of success before, during, and after trial.
Ray recommends conducting “an honest intake assessment” of people booked into custody, followed by accessible, relevant services. His suggestion is to make services voluntary except for people who are chronically system-involved. Currently, people who are detained have few opportunities to participate in treatment or behavioral therapy to help them reevaluate their actions.
Based on his experience, Ray says, “They may have some programs available that address substance abuse, but they don’t deal with mental health or other underlying factors in depth. It’s nothing like that. Especially if you’re waiting [for trial].”
Ray feels that the system’s failure to address people’s underlying treatment or service needs is a main reason they are arrested and detained repeatedly.
People who have been arrested—whether released or detained before trial—benefit from the assistance of people with lived experience who help them navigate the court system and access treatment and other supportive services. Learn more about:
Can we make the necessary changes to improve the system?
Ray says, “We’ll make some progress—we may even make some headway—but we’re never going to achieve the greater good as long as the human element isn’t involved in the equation.”
Ray adds, “If we want to make a difference and a change in the lives of people who come in contact with the criminal legal system, we need to be willing to see things through their perspectives and lenses. To do that, we need to recognize and support their humanity. Right now, humanity is not present in the system.”