[See image gallery at www.equalvoiceforfamilies.org]
We traveled to a small city in St. Louis to do a video to stop a young man from being executed. When asked about his life he said, “You grow into the shape of the container you were raised in.”
To tell his story, we needed to tell the story of the city and era he grew up in. The city was war-torn from what many called a “storm,” a plague of violence, poverty, drugs and incarceration. The height of that war was the 1990s. We asked the community members who survived to describe their city during that period.
The first person we asked, while showing his bullet wounds, said, “Do or Die.”
Editor’s note: Long before Ferguson became another Ground Zero for race relations in the country, a team from the San Jose, Calif.-based Albert Cobarrubias Justice Project (ACJP) visited the St. Louis area. Member Jean Melesaine posted this photo essay on July 28, about two weeks before Aug. 9. ACJP, which is hosted by Silicon Valley De-Bug, is an organizing and training model for families and community members to participate in their local criminal court system. Equal Voice News is publishing her photo essay a day after the “Ferguson October” rallies ended to give a better sense of a place before it changed forever and large numbers of people shouted the words, “Black Lives Matter.” Melesaine, who has an interest in the Pacific Islander community, has her own blog.