Amber Crowder spoke with rolling out about her experience with the criminal justice system that led to her creating The Been Down Project, which provides a supportive space and guidance to Black women who may have to navigate a system historically biased against Black people. Crowder shared how being sentenced to jail despite not having a criminal record took a toll on her as she had to leave her young child behind when she was incarcerated.
How did you get caught up in the criminal justice system?
I can’t get into the details of it just because I signed a plea, and I have to take responsibility for that, but my charge was mail fraud because I responded to an email on my government account. I used to work for the D.C. government, which got their funding from the federal government, and that is why they found it to be a federal crime. It was my first offense; I had never had any priors, but the judge looked me in my eyes, and he said, “Well, I think you deserve to go to prison.” [The government] investigated me from 2012 until 2019, and I had an attorney for all that time. It was financially, mentally and emotionally draining. When it was all said and done, it was like a weight lifted off my shoulders. But, it was replaced by another one because [then] I [had] to go to prison and leave my 3-year-old.
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