My feed
Premium

Please
or
to access all these features

Petitions and activism

Free #CyntoiaBrown

33 replies

stumbledin · 13/12/2018 00:11

The contrast between Cyntoia Brown's sentence of 51 years compared to any number of men who have not been sentenced for acts of violence is truely horrifying.

Petition asking Tennessee Governor to grant clemency to Cyntoia Brown petitions.moveon.org/sign/free-cyntoia-brown

#CyntoiaBrown was not a sex worker, she was not a prostitute. She was a child who was a victim of sex trafficking. She feared for her life so she defended herself by killing the man who bought her for sex as a 16-year old. She’s already served 13 years. The Tennessee Supreme Court says she must spend 51 years behind bars before she can be released.

This is our so-called justice system discarding another black woman.
We must demand the Governor of Tennessee, Bill Haslam, issue executive clemency before he leaves office.
Email him here: //[email protected]
Phone: (615) 741-2001

If you want to send Cyntoia a message of support you can write or send a card (advice is only use white envelopes?) to:
Cyntoia Brown
#410593
Tennessee Prison for Women
2 North, B49
3881 Stewarts Lane
Nashville, TN 37218-3302

(sorry I have lost some of the links I got this info from but a quick google or search of twitter will bring up lots of info.
twitter.com/hashtag/cyntoiabrown?lang=en
twitter.com/hashtag/freecyntoiabrown?lang=en )

OP posts:
Report
SlowlyShrinking · 13/12/2018 01:51

Place marking to email and send a card tomorrow. Have heard of this appalling injustice before. Thanks for suggesting these practical steps op.

Report
MrsTerryPratcett · 13/12/2018 01:59

Also place marking.

There aren't words to describe how dreadful this is.

Report
reallymate · 13/12/2018 02:12

placemarking

Report
MrsTerryPratcett · 13/12/2018 13:19

Just looking in google and I can't see what Amnesty International are doing about this. Or has their pro prostitution lobby forced out actual activism?

Report
reallymate · 13/12/2018 20:55

Bump

Report
reallymate · 13/12/2018 22:30

Double bumb please do something mn's imagine if this was your child.

Report
MrsTerryPratcett · 13/12/2018 23:55

Signed.

I'm a bit sad more of us aren't on this thread.

Report
stumbledin · 14/12/2018 00:04

I dont know what's happen, if I have breached some sort of mumsnetiquette but I cant seen this thread on the home page.

Why is that? Does anyone know.

In the meantime this is a second petition, asking for a retrial rather than a pardon.

www.change.org/p/tennessee-re-trial-for-cyntoia-brown

OP posts:
Report
ForeverFaithless · 14/12/2018 00:25

I only found out about this when Tom Meagher tweeted about it.
Sentencing a child to 51 years is obscene in comparison to what jail time rapists get.

Report
BirdseyeFrozen · 14/12/2018 00:30

Bumping also.
Signing and will send her a card.
I did not know this story

Report
reallymate · 14/12/2018 00:31

Please sign both petitions in the comments and bump by writing signed when done

Report
reallymate · 14/12/2018 00:32

Yes @ForeverFaithless that's because she's not white.

Report
Frequency · 14/12/2018 00:37

I read into this case a few days ago. It's not quite as clear cut as it seems. The victim was shot in the back of his head, in bed, suggesting he was sleeping at the time. Cyntoia robbed him after the shooting and ran back to her pimp/trafficker.

I'm not denying the poor woman had a terrible childhood and I fully understand why an abused 16yo would run back to her abuser. I also think sentencing a child to 51 years is inhumane but I think the facts should be known so people can make their own minds up.

Report
reallymate · 14/12/2018 00:46

@Frequency really mate?!
She's shot her paedaphile abuser in the head whether he was sleeping or not it was completely justified. And what's happened to this poor abused child who is now a woman was certainly not justified. If anyone on here thinks what she did wasn't justified and what happened to her was then they are horrible people.

Report
Frequency · 14/12/2018 00:59

Yes, really. I happen to think shooting a sleeping man in the head is never justifiable.

The way the free Cyntoia Brown stories are written make it seem like the man she shot was her trafficker. He wasn't. He was a punter. She was also 16 so he wasn't a paedophile. He wasn't a stand-up guy either but the sentence for using underage prostitutes should never be death.

I don't believe she should have been sentenced to 51 years but I also don't think she should be pardoned. Paroled, yes, excused of her guilt, no.

Report
TwistedStitch · 14/12/2018 01:02

'Using underage prostitutes', otherwise known as rape. No the state certainly shouldn't sentence him to death but I don't think we can hold a frightened, trafficked, abused child who has just been penetrated by him to the same standard as the legal system.

Report
reallymate · 14/12/2018 01:15

@Frequency "I don't believe she should have been sentenced to 51 years but I also don't think she should be pardoned. Paroled, yes, excused of her guilt, no." She was a child who looked like a child. She had a horrible abusive life and was raped multiple times including by the man she shot. Of course it was justified. She was a traumatised and abused CHILD. She was not it the wrong. He was and you are for sympathising with him. Would you say the same thing if your child or hypothetical child got kidnapped and forced into child sex trafficking and ended up doing something like this? No you would not. How dare you say she shouldn't be excused of her guilt. She has been punished enough and she didn't deserve that in the first place. How dare you victim blame a traumatised child for acting out in a totally understandable way. And fine he wasn't a paedophile he was an Ephebophile. Still 100% wrongAngry And whether or not you believe his fate was unjust- she was not to blame.

Report
reallymate · 14/12/2018 01:16

@TwistedStitch yes. RAPE. It was CHILD RAPE. And this child had been raped over and over and over again.

Report
TwistedStitch · 14/12/2018 01:25

Yes. She was abused, pimped out to be raped repeatedly by men who bought her. Horrific enough in any case let alone when you are a CHILD. She didn't have the luxury of sitting safely in her home pontificating about the correct technical term for this abuser or whether her traumatized reaction was proportionate, she was living in hell.

Report
reallymate · 14/12/2018 01:35

@Frequency you sound like a monster.

Report
MrsTerryPratcett · 14/12/2018 01:47

I happen to think shooting a sleeping man in the head is never justifiable.

Not if it was me shooting, no. I don't believe in the death sentence. But if my child was trafficked, pimped out, multiply abused, all at 16, would I understand? I hope I would.

I think the legal issues are difficult. But I think if you empathize and try to think what it must be think for a child, trafficked, raped, alone, abused... would you pick up a gun? I might.

Courts should sentence based on capacity as well as crime. The capacity of an abused child? 51 years? Not for any reason.

Report
MrsTerryPratcett · 14/12/2018 01:51

I've recently worked with a pimped teenager. There's no way to express how much I wish this never happened. These sweet, kind, funny girls.

I just can't fit why people can't see it. Is it just racism?

Report
MrsTerryPratcett · 14/12/2018 01:57

This is the child an adult man thought he could pay to abuse.

Free #CyntoiaBrown
Report
reallymate · 14/12/2018 02:18

@MrsTerryPratcett I'm afraid it is just plain racism and possibly classism but mainly racism.

Report
Please create an account

To comment on this thread you need to create a Mumsnet account.