For Shafiq, inside Sheridan Correctional Heart, being a superb dad whereas incarcerated means numerous emails and cellphone calls.
“By no means underestimate the worth of your presence within the lives of your off-spring,” he writes. “We’re bodily absent, however that does NOT preclude our being current in all the opposite ways in which matter.”
Alexia Pitter, whose father has been locked up since she was 3, says “loving somebody who’s incarcerated means loving past the bodily obstacles of jail partitions.
“It’s a type of love that stretches throughout concrete and wire, reaching locations untouched by the fabric world.”
Of the greater than 29,000 individuals locked up within the Illinois Division of Corrections, about two-thirds of them report having kids. This Sunday, June fifteenth, from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. on WBEZ 91.5, the particular Father’s Day episode of Prisoncast! explores the methods incarceration impacts kids, mother and father and households in Illinois.
Under are segments from the present. Hearken to the whole broadcast on June fifteenth at WBEZ 91.5, the WBEZ app or wbez.org.
Right here’s what’s on the Father’s Day episode
Within the first hour of the present, we hear from a father and son who rebuilt their relationship whereas they had been each incarcerated – collectively – at Hill Correctional Heart in Galesburg. We’ll additionally hear listener-submitted ideas from incarcerated mother and father about how they preserve relationships with their youngsters. We finish the primary hour with the story of Juan Hernandez, who fought the Illinois Division of Corrections for 18 years in an effort to earn his GED.
How a dad reconnected along with his son whereas they had been incarcerated — collectively
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Recommendation for parenting behind bars, from individuals locked up in Illinois
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One man’s 18-year combat to get his GED in Illinois’ jail system
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Within the second hour, we hear from the John Howard Affiliation about dangerously excessive temperatures inside some state prisons through the summer season, and what they are saying the state ought to do about it. We even have a listener-requested dialog about coping with grief and the demise of a guardian when you’re locked up, and go to the Mothers & Infants program at Decatur Correctional Heart – one of many nation’s few in-prison nurseries, the place incarcerated mothers get to stay with their infants contained in the minimum-security facility.
Harmful warmth in prisons and one mom’s first journey to go to her incarcerated son
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Dealing with grief and the demise of a guardian behind bars
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Visiting the state’s solely in-prison nursery, the place mothers and infants stay collectively
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Discover the most recent situation of the e-zine Two Roads talked about within the episode right here. The e-zine is revealed by a gaggle at Kewanee Life Abilities Re-Entry Heart who chronicle the tales incarcerated women and men within the Illinois Division of Corrections.
What’s Prisoncast!?
From WBEZ and Illinois Public Radio, Prisoncast!, is a statewide present and engaged journalism venture that shines a light-weight on Illinois’ jail system, and the individuals affected by it. All the things on the present comes instantly from a query, thought or request from somebody at present or previously incarcerated in Illinois, or their family members. We report on jail situations, take music requests, and broadcast sounds from the world past jail partitions that incarcerated Illinoisans say they miss listening to essentially the most. It airs on public radio stations throughout the state, so individuals behind bars and their family members on the surface can hear collectively, even whereas they’re aside.
Study extra in regards to the venture right here.
Do you have got an thought for phase or need to write to us in regards to the present? E mail us at prisoncast@wbez.org.
Alex Keefe is WBEZ’s engagement editor and the lead editor of Prisoncast!. He oversees engaged journalism initiatives in Chicago Public Media’s newsroom.
