California’s Justice System is a Debt Trap
Erica Smith was making a fresh start. After being forced out of her home by domestic violence, she had spent the last three years cycling between homelessness and jail for petty offenses.
The ACLU of San Diego & Imperial Counties works with local partners to advance public policy issues in our priority focus areas of policing, police accountability, immigrants’ rights and equity in our region. At the state level, we work with the ACLU of California Center for Advocacy and Policy as well as statewide coalitions to lobby the legislature, analyze proposed legislation, and engage grassroots supporters in the legislative process.
Erica Smith was making a fresh start. After being forced out of her home by domestic violence, she had spent the last three years cycling between homelessness and jail for petty offenses.
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Living in California is already expensive enough: for many working families, it’s almost impossible to afford to live here because of astronomically high housing prices and equally expensive childcare and...
Body cameras were promised as a way to hold police accountable not as surveillance systems to be used against the public. Unfortunately, body cameras are now at risk of being paired with face surveillance...