Ep. 40 – 14 Years Inside, A Lifetime of Latinx Advocacy

[00:00:00] Steven Humble Mangual: You know, the sensory deprivation the inability to really control the lighting, the inability to have regular sleep patterns. there was a lot of noise there as well at upstate, there was a lot of abuse taking place because folks are mentally ill and they will just be abused by some of the correction officers.
I was next door to a guy that got beat up badly and taken out, you know, by the COs. After a while, you’re just sitting there staring at the walls and, they just start moving, and I was blessed. I was lucky because I, like I said, I was in a point in my life where I felt justified, I was like, man, finally, I’m being punished for something good, you know, I felt like in the spirit of, you know, all of the former, political prisoners and revolutionaries of the past that I studied up until that time and was like, you know, I’m going to get through this.
[00:01:25] Michael Hames-Garcia: In today’s podcast, we’ll be hearing from someone who spent 14 years in prison and has gone on to become a national civil rights leader. I’m Michael Hames-Garcia with the LatinXperts Podcast, coming to you from Latino Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. My guest today is Stephen “Humble” Mangual.
He is a Southeast Justice Advocate Coordinator for Latino Justice He’s a Boricua from the Bronx, but currently based in Orlando, Florida, a former health justice advocate, a former American sign language interpreter, a former producer and cohost of On the Count, the Prison and Criminal Justice Report, a 60 minute talk news and interview program featuring criminal justice and social justice subjects on radio station WBAI 99. 5 FM in New York. And for the next hour or so, we will be hearing about some of Stephen’s experiences within the criminal legal system. First, as a 20 year old facing a 24 year prison sentence in New York, serving 14 years of that sentence, including a significant amount of time in solitary confinement.
We will also talk about his amazing journey since getting out, a journey that has made him an effective advocate on some of the most important challenges of our day, from healthcare access to criminal legal reform. I plan to ask him about Eddie Ellis’s nontraditional approach to criminal justice, which is a touchstone for many of us concerned with how our society responds to violence and harm.
And we’ll learn what it’s like to do restorative justice work, both inside and outside of prisons. I teach here at the, University of Texas in Austin, and my teaching as well as my research has focused on inequalities in the criminal legal system from policing to incarceration to criminal courts to reentry.
I’ve tried to do some, , community work as well on that, but I’ve mostly stayed in the ivory tower. And I think it’s important to hear from people who are making a difference in the world on issues that have directly impacted them. And most academic criminologists, myself included, lack the kind of first hand experience with the very systems that we study that Stephen has.
So, I want to tell you, a little bit about how I met Stephen. it was the summer of 2023, I believe, or 2022, in Atlanta, and I had been invited to speak on a plenary panel, that was hosted by Latino Justice, which is a national civil rights organization that, among other things, focuses on, criminal legal reform.
This symposium, this one day convening was doubling as a graduation ceremony for some amazing students who were formerly incarcerated individuals who had received some training on community organizing and policy work. It was beautiful. But Stephen was the moderator for my panel, and I have spoken on a lot of panels over the years.
There have been a lot of, moderators for those panels. No one has ever stepped up and done the kind of work that Stephen did just to introduce me and moderate the panel. He read, an article that I had published, my most recent article. For those of us in academia, we pretty much consider it a win just to get published and don’t really expect anyone to ever read our work.
But Steven, made the effort and, and read the whole thing, had interesting thoughts on it. And,that just impressed me a lot. So, I appreciate anyone who will read my work and not hate it. So, um,Yeah, that’s my introduction for how I met Steven. But Steven, welcome to the show.
I wonder if you might, would mind introducing yourself to our audience.
[00:05:19] Steven Humble Mangual: First of all thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you so much for joining us for our convening on those two and a half years ago. And thank you so much for your work. I definitely enjoyed reading your work and I have to tell you that since then it played into even my own education and how I view you know this this thing that folks have been calling mass incarceration, quote unquote, and now I always, thanks to you, and I know you, you told me you didn’t invent it, but thanks to you, I always put the term racialized mass incarceration in front of it because mass incarceration is not something that affects everyone.
And so thank you. Thank you so much for the invitation and for your work. I’m really humbled to be on the podcast. So, like you mentioned, Steven Mangual, Justice Advocate Coordinator at Latino Justice PRLDEF. The PRLDEF stands for the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, which is the original name of the organization.
The organization is the latinx led civil rights organization that has been around for 52 years, and I’m just grateful and humbled that they’ve decided to invest in folks who are non attorney advocates because our bread and butter is still litigation and You know, most of my co workers are attorneys, what we call movement lawyers, and so it’s been a real blessing to see and be a part of an organization that has decided to invest in non attorney advocates, invest in those directly impacted by, policing and mass incarceration, racialized mass incarceration and everything from the front end to conviction to reentry in the back end of reintegration.
And so,like you said, born and raised in the Bronx. New York. Raised by a single Puerto Rican mom who came from Puerto Rico when she was nine years old. And by the time she was 19, she had me, her first boy, and then she had two more kids by the time she was 27 years old. And so, for most of my life, that’s really been, who has raised me and who has been a major, part of my life.
But yeah, that’s a little bit about me. Little intro.
[00:07:16] Michael Hames-Garcia: Yeah. What was it like growing up as you, as Steven?
[00:07:19] Steven Humble Mangual: Oh my God. Growing up. So like I said, I grew up in the Bronx, New York. I was born in 1971. And so I grew up poor, Puerto Rican, in a traditional household. I wind up having two stepfathers by the time I turned 11 years old. I never grew up with my father and my mom. You know, did the best she could with her three children.
It was interesting growing up poor, going to school, learning, about everything except, Puerto Rican Atlantic’s history. And and so, it was really interesting because I didn’t really do well. I suffered from peer pressure. I had a lot of childhood trauma, you know, my mom suffered from drug and alcohol addiction her whole life and, I know today that, she also suffered from undiagnosed and untreated, mental illness.
And so these are things that I grew up, you know, as a child and, and so, all of that played into. a lot of the choices that I made, growing up and getting involved in, you know, some unhealthy stuff like smoking marijuana as a young kid in the early eighties and other things. But yeah, it was difficult because I always searched for a father figure that wasn’t there.
I had two stepfathers that were really abusive and so. It was, an interesting way to grow up. I’m so grateful that my mom did the best she could to keep us together. You know, She, she suffered a lot though. And that is one of the reasons why I’m here today, honestly, but yeah,
[00:08:37] Michael Hames-Garcia: Mhm.
[00:08:38] Steven Humble Mangual: Wasn’t easy growing up in the Bronx back in them days.
[00:08:40] Michael Hames-Garcia: Yeah, I can imagine.
What was your first interaction with law enforcement? How did that come about?
[00:08:45] Steven Humble Mangual: So, and, and folks could, could find this in other areas. And it has taken me a long time to realize that direct relationship that I had with watching my mother get arrested when I was 10 years old.It was just a horrible incident. She had gotten into an altercation. The police came in and just really stripped her away from my household.
I was ten years old. I remember my two little sisters and I, we were just sitting there, powerless, crying and yelling. And it was all this commotion, police running in and out. My stepfather just being held in his place. Not much he can do as well. And then they just, I remember they just, took my mother away and yeah, and that really, I didn’t, you know, it took me a long time, through therapy, trauma and healing and you know, my own journey and realizing those direct relationships.
And that, that event changed my whole life because it broke apart the relationship my mother had with my stepfather at the time. We wind up moving out of there, but we were in the Bronx. That was a pretty stable household and from that point on, my mom really became a single parent and she was living on her own with the three of us.
And so I moved to Gerrard Avenue in the Bronx, near the Yankee Stadium. I was, close to 11 years old. And I remember when I turned 11 years old, I met all of my friends. And by the time, we were 12, we were already involved in, dealing and stealing and trying to just survive.
Because we were all broke and poor. And, it was, right before the beginning of the height of the crack era. And it was just no illogical leap that I wind up making some very poor decisions and wind up getting my first arrest when I was 14.I was still in, I think I was a freshman in high school if I remember. And, and I was 14 when I was first arrested. I was 16, 17, 19. I was arrested about six times, I want to say, before I turned 21. And my last arrest was when I was 20. Yeah, I grew up, like many of us in our neighborhoods, with a very antagonistic and violent relationship with law enforcement. And it started for me as a child when I was 10.
[00:10:46] Michael Hames-Garcia: Wow. That’s, that, that’s, that’s such an impactful story. When I think about all these single mothers, raising multiple kids and under difficult circumstances and poverty, like, I always just think Job should have been, a woman like to really understand like what it’s like to be tried that way.
Oh my gosh. Well, I’m glad that you’re here and that that, she was able to be, a positive influence on you to the extent that she was able. So, you talked a little bit about some of those early encounters. I know you, you ended up serving time , in upstate New York.

[00:11:14] Michael Hames-Garcia: And something I didn’t, know about you until I was, reading, some other interviews with you.is that you spend a significant amount of time in solitary confinement.
I was, recently, I think actually the same summer that I met you, I had, I was an expert witness in a case, a civil suit in Oregon, against Columbia County Jail. The case involved, a young man who had been diagnosed schizophrenia. He was in jail. They kept him in, solitary for a total of, about 90 days.
He was without meds during that time. Did really poorly as you might imagine.
We won the case, but I had nightmares for, for weeks after, Just, just doing the research for that trial, It was traumatic for me just to read all of those accounts of what solitary confinement does to people, and how it’s used. I was wondering if you could talk, say something about your own opinion on solitary confinement.
I know that you’ve, had some experiences with it. and I just hope you don’t mind talking a little bit about that.
[00:12:15] Steven Humble Mangual: No, for sure. It’s, it’s, it’s a major part of , my work, my life, my, my career, my, my trauma and healing and therapy is directly related to, my, my experience with solitary confinement. So for some backdrop, I actually was in, in solitary confinement, starting at Rikers Island. So when I was first incarcerated in November of 1992, I went to the Bronx house of detention, which doesn’t exist anymore.
Thank goodness. I was there for about 35 days, a little, a little shorter, a month and a half. And then I was transferred from the Bronx house to the main Rikers Island, Maine. And as soon as I got to Rikers Island, Maine, it was like, I’m, I’m 21 years old, 22 years old. And facing a life bid because I was offered 15 to life for the whole time.
I was in Rikers Island for the 17 months that I was there, almost a year and a half. And it was just dealing with that trauma, dealing with all the violence, dealing with, being young, all the drugs that was there, all the violence, the gang stuff that was happening there that I was also involved with, it was just a logical thing to be getting in trouble because of those choices and wind up, in the box or in the bing, because in Rikers Island they call it the bing.
And so in Rikers Island, I spent about, I want to say, maybe 30 days at one point, about 40 days at another point. And then right before I got sentenced, I was sentenced to 75 days in, in the bing. And so I was, yeah, I was like, man, please let me, when I went to court right after that, I told my attorney, please just give me any cop out right now so I could get out of this mess and start going up and go upstate.
It definitely played a role in, in my . You know, eventually, copping out and, and taking the, the offer that they took me, which was 8 to 24 years. That’s the first time, violent felony offender. I was in the box. I was in the bing. the experience of, of that bing, I want to say I’m, I’m, this is 1994.
I’m 22 years old still. And it was just so traumatic, like there was no sleep. Sensory deprivation, there was no human contact. One of the differences between Rikers Island Box and The Bing, and I think one of the reasons why they call it The Bing, is because that’s the sound that eventually, you wind up hearing inside of your head because of all of the noise.
Yeah, it just, it’s never ending. It is 24 hours a day, seven days a week. People are screaming, people are yelling, people are getting beat up. And some of us are just, trying to have human contact and singing songs. I remember singing songs with my homies and trying to, get through this time.
And so by the time I got upstate, which was in 1994, the summer of 1994, it was a little better and a little calmer for me, and I, and I wind up, getting involved in the college system and, still trying to like play defense, I was still, during that initial time, I was still with the Latin Kings, I was still you know, getting into some trouble kind of stuff with my, organizing and that group.
And then at the same time I was in the college program, I was educating, I was going to school. And so eventually in 1995, we wind up taking a stance against the double bunking and wind up, getting locked up for that. And so they, they, they targeted all the leaders who were, trying to put together and organize this, sell stoppage and work stoppage that we were doing.
And I wind up going to a downstate correctional facility, being transferred and going through the box at downstate for about almost 40 days. And then, so fast forward, what you’re talking about is upstate correctional facilities. So, I had, at this point, been incarcerated 12 years. I had, been, through an educational system, through non traditional, education.
I was doing a lot of organizing, a lot of reading, writing, a lot of self reflecting. a lot of taking accountability, a lot of therapy, I did a lot of cognitive behavioral therapy while I was incarcerated, both as a person who needed therapy and as a peer educator and in therapy, so by the time I got to the box at upstate, I had all of this behind me.
I had a lot of support community support. I was part of a class action lawsuit. I went to the box justified because I didn’t go to the box for anything that I did wrong. I was in Greenhaven annex. Which was, outside clearance at the time. This was in 2004. And I had, I was working outside.
We were walking outside the main. It was great. I was like, getting ready to go home. This was 12 years. And I said, either way, I’ll do 16 in my condition of release. I got four years to go. hopefully I’ll get released at this parole board because I went there. I got, I went to a parole board and I got denied parole while I was outside clearance there for the same thing I was denied for.
Four years prior and so I just said I couldn’t stay here. I couldn’t stay there I didn’t I felt like I you know, I felt like a slave like literally a slave It was just a horrible cap to be in the way the officers were treating folks the way You know some of the people that were there treated each other It was just something I went there because I figured if I’m get outside clearance, I could go home I could make my parole board, it It’s a great thing that, what else is there after outside clearance in the classification?
I thought after that it’s the streets and I got denied parole. I started writing up some of the officers there that were super abusive. I started this big investigation because I have some contacts of central office in Albany. And they set me up. They wrote me up. They, they got one of their people to put a wooden shank in my cube while I was working outside and they handcuffed me and took me right into the main and I stayed in the shoe there for a couple of weeks until they sentenced me and they gave me 124 days, four months and transferred me to upstate correctional facility, which was like you said, a super max.
And I was there for 127 days and it was, it was quite the, experience to say the least. I was mostly by myself, even though we were in double bunk cells, you’re locked in 24 hours because they give you the shower inside, they open the door in the back, and you have your think one to two hours of, of rec time, quote unquote, where you walk around a little box that’s connected to the outside of your cell, and you’re caged in, so you the only time you’re able to come out is if you’re going to sick call or you have a legal call or there’s some kind of emergency or something.
And I was blessed because, like I said before, I was part of a class action lawsuit. So I had a team of attorneys that were with me and backing me up and kept you know, in contact with me and really protected me, and I got to give a shout out to, at that time, it was the Community Service Society of New York.
It was the Center for Law and Social Justice out of Albany, and then it was the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund. And I tell you, I’m here today because of a lot of that history, and maybe we’ll get into that. But I was able to get out of the box. I was able to get out of solitary through legal forms.
And so I was able to get out and it was, but I tell you, it was like no experience ever after a while, you know, you know, the sensory deprivation the inability to really control the lighting, the inability to have regular sleep patterns. there was a lot of noise there as well at upstate, there was a lot of abuse taking place because folks are mentally ill and they will just be abused by some of the correction officers.
I was next door to a guy that got beat up badly and taken out, you know, by the COsAfter a while, you’re just sitting there staring at the walls and, they just start moving, and I was blessed. I was lucky because I, like I said, I was in a point in my life where I felt justified, I was like, man, finally, I’m being punished for something good, you know, I felt like in the spirit of, you know, all of the.
Former, political prisoners and revolutionaries of the past that I studied up until that time and was like, I’m going to get through this , and I did, I, I got through it and, and, and funny, I got through it because I was communicating with some of the folks that would next door to me, I, we build some kind of, communication system and we’re able to talk to each other through the walls and under the floor and it was, but yeah, it’s something that I, I still live with today, today, I’ve been home 18 plus years, I’ve been out of the box 19 plus years.
Yeah. It’s still a part of my life, still part of the trauma.
[00:19:38] Michael Hames-Garcia: Wow. Yeah. I can’t imagine, but it’s, it’s beautiful in a strange way that you had, you were able to create community under these circumstances.
[00:19:46] Steven Humble Mangual: It was quite the four months, I tell you. It seemed like when you’re in it, like it’s never gonna end. because of the isolation, it’s non stop. And no matter the redundancy, 24 hours seems like a long time. When you’re in that 9 by 12 cell. And, I developed the routine, I learned to fish, for those that don’t know, do some googling and find out what it is, fishing, sell to sell, and, that’s how we communicated, how we shared newspapers and magazines and things, of course, other people were sharing other stuff, but I wasn’t part of that,And yeah, I did not want to stay there because that’s one of the things about solitary. they, they figure a way to keep you in there with any little thing. They keep writing you up, writing you up, writing you up. And, and six months of like me and four months could turn into four years real easily.
[00:20:34] Michael Hames-Garcia: Yeah. Backing up, you mentioned, some non traditional education that you had.
[00:20:38] Steven Humble Mangual: Yes.
[00:20:39] Michael Hames-Garcia: And so I have I have this book with me. You can’t see it because we’re you’re not in the studio, but it’s by the Network of Black Organizers, um, is a book that they published in 1995 called Black Prison Movements USA.
And I, I bought this at some, at some independent bookstore in upstate New York, in 1995 and came across on page 92, this chapter by Eddie Ellis called the non traditional approach to criminals and social justice. And I read that as a graduate student and it, completely changed the direction that, that I was going with my studies, it just, it really, Eddie Ellis, he, so he was a survivor of the Attica uprising, he was an organizer after that, helped with, with some other folks to put together a, a think tank, in, in New York prisons, And so over the years, like, he has stayed in my head, but I’ve never come across this book again.
I’ve never come across that article by him again. Occasionally I’ll hear someone mention him. And then, like, I think last spring, or maybe even earlier this fall, I’m, I’m on a Zoom call with Latino Justice and your, your, You’re facilitating the call and you start talking about Eddie Ellis, a non traditional approach.
I was like, what?so it was, I love hearing that other people, other people know about his work and, and lift him up as well. And it was when, just tell us a little bit, for, for our, listeners, who is he? How, how did you learn, learn about him?
[00:22:09] Steven Humble Mangual: First and foremost, Eddie Ellis, Eddie, may he rest in peace. He died in 2014, July 24th. So it’s now a little over 10 years. so may he rest in peace, rest in power. I would not be here had it not been for the work that Eddie Ellis did that Larry Lukeman white did that blood did that. All of the folks that were part of the Greenhaven think tank that would transfer from Attica to Greenhaven at that time, post 1971, and created the think tank in 1975.
Mind you, I’m four years old when this is happening.and these guys were in there, surviving the worst massacre that had taken place in the history of this country, which is, the Attica Rebellion, the Bloody Monday, which was, September 13th, 1971. And 49 people were killed. were massacred and killed and, and over 100 wounded in that B yard, which they had taken over the yard four days prior, September 9th.
And so I bumped, I learned about this history when I got to Woodburn Correctional Facility. I’m there in 1996. And I’m already involved in the sign language class. So I get involved in American Sign Language, that’s what you mentioned earlier. That was my first facilitation gig. I got, I, I fell in love with, with ASL.
I fell in love with Deaf culture. I fell in love with the American Disability Act. And as soon as I got into the program, within six months, I was already a Facilitator Peer Educator and Sign Language Interpreter. And I did that for, almost the five years that I was in Woodburn. It was, just something that, I, I, I fell in love with, with doing, and what happened was, so now I’m in these circles, with these other peer educators and, and, and, living a different type of lifestyle now, making all these choices based on, community organizing, education, and, in the law library, and I wind up coming past and learning and meeting folks that were a part of it.
Old timers. I came down from the max and got to Woodburn and a few of them were students of Eddie Ellis. A few of them were there in Greenhaven, not just 1975, but fast forward around 1986, where they created, well, you have mentioned the non traditional process, criminal social justice, which is the package that has been a part of me ever since this is the package right here. And, yeah, this is the 1997 edition revised edition, which I wind up. Coming across with there was a class taking place at night that was called Community Empowerment and they were recruiting folks canvassing Hey, we’re gonna do a class at night called Community Empowerment what we’re gonna teach folks about Advocacy and and and I was like, okay.
I want to learn about this, and they said no We’re gonna learn it’s gonna be more than just advocacy. It’s a it’s it’s an empowerment course that comes directly from the history. You know, they have to be careful with some of the language because for a long time this was contraband and you couldn’t talk about the Attica, the Attica rebellion until this day is still not looked upon in a favorable way by law enforcement and the Department of Corrections and so they, they did it like a clandestine class and when we come into our classroom, the classroom is all about teaching the non traditional approach, teaching about, that history Starting with Attica and then, and going through the think tank and all of the programming that came out of that movement, including the college programs, the grievance programs, all of the, the Latino organization programs and all of the different organizations, the NAACPs and the.
And the,the Caribbean African unity, which, the, AVP, which the alternative to violence project, which Eddie Ellis was one of the first, trainees and facilitators,and so I wind up taking this course and it was just,life changing, when I learned about not just, not just, that history, but it opened up the doors to politics, to economics, to sociology, to, we have, we started off with a basic question, and the basic question, after they realized that When they were meeting each other in these different New York State prisons that were throughout the that that time frame that most of the folks were coming from the same neighborhoods, they, they started with a basic question and they researched it and they were like, how was it that although, blacks and Latinos only comprised of 28 percent of the general New York State population at the very same time comprised of over 86 percent of the New York State prison population.
And of that 86 percent of that 86 percent 75 percent came from the New York City areas and not just specifically New York City areas, but broken down by district. And the ending of that basic question was what happened? this disproportionate representation? And what are the future implications and that just set off, a movement that I have been a part of ever since, the resurrection study group came out of that where the group of folks was studying black history and understanding the relationship between, plantation to prison, which is where Eddie, Eddie did a lot of that writing and research.
And then I became a part of the conciencia study group sometime around 1998. Which is where some of the other leaders that came down and were a part of that facilitation group, taught me the conciencia study group, which was what we got into what we call the Latino historical perspective and understanding the relationship between our history and how we got to where we be, and of course, what the future implications.
And it just, from 1997, when I met Abdullah Salahuddin, who was teaching that community empowerment class, to 1997, 98, when Kush was my mentor, Kenny Kirkland Kush, who was my mentor, who was a first resurrection, where Eddie Ellis taught me, resurrection, and he was part of the Nation of Islam, which was a huge part of my life as well during that time, and I became a member of the Nation of Islam, which So it was a funny thing.
I was a Puerto Rican reading and studying and teaching Black history
[00:27:39] Michael Hames-Garcia: mhm,
[00:27:40] Steven Humble Mangual: mhm.
And I love it and to this day. But, when I met and, and bumped into the folks that were doing the Consciencas study group, I realized that this was me. I learned about.the Spanish American War of 1898 and all the colonization that was taking place.
And I learned about, what was taking place in Puerto Rico with the independence movement. And I became an independentista. I became a student of, of, of, Don Emeterio Betances and, and Lolita Lebron and, Don Pedro Albizu Campos. And to this day, that, that has been a part of me.
And it was because of the non traditional approach that taught me, taught me about the Young Lords and that movement. And, I just ate it up, and, and I didn’t even meet Eddie like this is 97 98 99, and I’m writing to him, he’s outside in the community because Eddie was released earlier, early Eddie was released sometime around 1992 93 after doing 25 years.
and so, by the time I came to be his student, I was a student of his student. This is the kind of visionary that he was and still is as far as I’m concerned. So I didn’t meet him in person until 2001. Him and, yeah, Dr. Divine Pryor, they came in for a festival that we were putting together by the Quakers.
It was a retreat, a religious retreat. And I seen Eddie Ellis coming through for the first time, in that church in Woodburn Correctional Facility. And I was like, him and Divine, I was like, yeah, that’s what I want to do. he came in proud and tall and wearing his suit, tie and, speaking a language that, was one of a kind.
That’s another thing, the package, the non traditional approach, it gave us a language, it gave us a sense of identity, it held us accountable through the five R’s of responsibility and reconciliation and atonement. it, it, it taught us that we were the experts, those who were inside, we were the experts in this because we lived it and not just lived it, but we’re authentically transforming our lives and looking to help transform our communities and, and, and rebuild those places that we destroyed when we went back.
It was Eddie that gave me that kind of sense of self empowerment.
[00:29:36] Michael Hames-Garcia: Wow. Wow. That’s that’s a beautiful story. I’m, I’m, did you, were you, were you able to meet him again after 2001 or was that the only time you met him?
[00:29:44] Steven Humble Mangual: We wrote constantly. And then I was transferred to Otisville in 2001 and 2002. He started the show, the radio show, On the Count, the prison and criminal justice report and because I was already, someone that was tuned in to WBAI and 99. 5 and always listening to alternative and non traditional radio, that was something that I just became a lefty while I was inside, And so, so I’m listening to the radio show, right after Grandpa Al Lewis, may he rest in peace, show came on. Saturday morning, and all of a sudden I hear this beat coming on. Dun, dun, dun, dun. Oh, my people up in Attica, where you at? I was like, what the hell is happening? I’m calling all of my friends.
I was in the network support services, which is a therapeutic community that still exists, that we were living in the dorm and we were practicing that. And I started calling all my leaders and all my facilitators. I was like, listen, you guys gotta tune in. and, and, in 2002, I, I wind up just loving the, it was like the religious to me, I listened to the radio show, I took notes, we did classes, and I just became, I knew that this was something I wanted to do, Eddie, Eddie and I continue to correspond for the next four years, and when I was released in 2006, Eddie was like this thing, come to the radio show as soon as you can, and October I was releasing 2006, I was in the radio by November of 2006, and I was learning, I was learning, I was sitting with him, and, and Joseph Jazz Hayden, may he rest in peace, who is another mentor of mine.
Jazz started the felony disenfranchisement lawsuit in New York state, the historic one that changed the way, the way, voting rights was practiced, which is hugely important still being with Latino justice. And so, yeah, it was just incredible. And he gave me the title, he says, Stephen, you’re going to be my Latino affairs producer.
And I produced my first show in 2008, and it was about the then two. Puerto Rican political prisoners will be in hell, Oscar López Rivera and Carlos Alberto Torres and, never look back. It’s
[00:31:45] Michael Hames-Garcia: about this, about having you on this, because this is my first time ever, ever guest hosting a podcast. And I knew you had all this experience in radio and I thought, I’m, I’m going to be like an, a fool interviewing him.
[00:31:59] Steven Humble Mangual: No, no, I, when I, when I was,communicating with you and even communicating with my, with my co, with my director of comms, I told her, I said, listen, I, I know his work, super impressive. he understands and, and, and, and, like, like you mentioned earlier when the tables were turning, you were a panelist for me, seeing all the research I was doing, and so it’s not as if this is Tracy, you’re used to researching and doing all that kind of stuff, and so, yeah, I’m really grateful, it is a kind of like a twist and a turn for me, but I think it’s been that way, really, since I left, so I haven’t been a part of the show since I’ve been in Florida now, in the southeast for, four and a half years now.
Hmm.So you, you transitioned to Florida, so let me, let me transition with you. Heh heh heh heh heh.
[00:32:42] Michael Hames-Garcia: But first, as a reminder you’re listening to LatinXperts, a podcast from Latino Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. And I’m Michael Hames Garcia, and my guest today is Steven Mangual.We talked a little bit about, some of Stephen’s earlier life and we’re gonna focus now, transition toward his, life and advocacy, after his release , from incarceration.
So I was watching an interview, that you did with Craig Walid for his YouTube show, Prison to Promise. It was a great interview, by the way. I love it. Listeners should go look that up and listen to that one as well. and you said something in it that struck me. And it struck me partly because.
One of the things I did in Oregon, when I was living there I volunteered for this organization called Sponsors, Inc., and I was a mentor for people who were, getting released from prison and, we’d meet weekly and just, work on like, “What’s Starbucks and how do you order coffee there?”
Because people, some people would have been, Starbucks didn’t exist when they went in. So I have some sense just from working with, different people in this capacity of how difficult it is to, to make that transition. and, in, in Oregon, this, this is statistics are that 50 percent of people released from prison are.
homeless on day one, which, makes it hard to keep appointments with parole officers, makes it hard to like, there’s so many things you have to do to get a driver’s license. So, You said in your interview with Craig Waleed that you’ve been unhoused and unemployed four or five times Since you were released from prison And we know that you didn’t unhoused.
Yes unhoused
[00:34:21] Steven Humble Mangual: Unemployed probably twice.
[00:34:22] Michael Hames-Garcia: Okay, okay So, given that, like, it’s, and the fact that it’s so easy to get sent back on something as small as a parole violation, like missing an appointment, or, looking at your parole officer the wrong way, I’m sure listeners would be interested in knowing, how a person manages to stay out and succeed the way you have in that situation.
[00:34:43] Steven Humble Mangual: Mhm.
First of all, thank you for that question because it’s been something that has been reoccurring and folks always asking like where, where, where the epiphany happen, where, how, how did you go from this to that, and so first of all, there was no one epiphany, you know that that’s nonsense.
I don’t think any human being goes through one specific experience and epiphany and says, oh, yeah, think it’s a combination of experiences I think big traumatic experiences do play a role in that and so not to diminish, you know that And that actually played a role in my life as well And so I was ready for reentry and reintegration as soon as I became a student of the nontraditional approach.
We were already working on, transforming a lot of the behaviors, going through a lot of therapy. educating ourselves,and, and, and really going through a lot of pain, a lot of crying, a lot of, cleansing, and, and really experiencing recidivism, even from within inside, because I was, I remember I was part of a group of folks that we were the folks that everyone else went to, we were the ones that would, working in a law library, we were the one that were working in the grievance, we were the one that were working in, in, in the different organizations, the brand by prisoners, we were the one that were doing all of these different programs, and so, folks will come to us.
And so we knew when folks were going out because we were helping folks with their parole package. We were doing mock interviews. We were helping people. I was helping people get ready for parole before I went to my first parole board, like maybe four years prior before me because I knew that that was how I was going to prepare.
I had to be able to know that language. I was in the law library. I knew executive law that guided parole and the New York City Code of Ruling Regulations that guided parole. Brought him back almost verbatim, at one point in my life, and so when I was released,like I said, I had a community of folks that I was already connected to, including those three legal.
Organizations that would, that, that, embrace me as soon as I came home, they took me to dinner, because in 2006, the class action lawsuit was still going on, and so I wind up, being a part of that and it just was different for me, it wasn’t where, even though I did struggle, I was not going to make choices that I made back 14, plus years prior.
First of all, I’m no longer 19. I’m no longer 20 years old. I’m now 35 years old plus. And so there’s, there’s been this whole, evolution with regards to how I’ve evolved in my thinking and my being, now older and being more responsible, but yeah, I came home in 2006 and I didn’t have nowhere to go.
Prior to my incarceration in 1992, I had lost my mom and my sister to a horrible car accident in 1991. And which play to play the role, and and I told you already some of, what I went through with, being raised by my mom and how she struggled. She died at 39 still struggling with with her drug and alcohol addiction.
Actually, she ran and was in the Dominican Republic with my little sister hoping to get clean and change her life around and that kind of stuff and only lasted seven days. And so that, that, that was something that, I still carry to this day, obviously it’s life changing losing your mom and your sister in that kind of way.
So I was incarcerated the following year. I didn’t last not even a year and a half after that. I just really gave up on myself. So,it wasn’t an illogical, growing up how I grew up, it wasn’t illogical for me to end up how I ended up, I committed, I committed the crime and I wind up in prison,because of all of these factors, it was all of this abuse, all of this experience that I had with violence and trauma and death, and so I would just happen to be that, I hate to use the term product of your environment because I don’t believe in that because everyone has that.
opportunity and not everyone who was in my environment made the choices that I made, and that’s that’s a reality. But the same thing in prison when I was in prison, all of my peers didn’t make the same choices that I made. I stayed away from certain circles. I stayed away from certain negative things because I knew that this was not gonna help me with my release.
I needed skills, I needed tools, I needed a community of positive people, I needed to really transform that. And so, when I was released, I didn’t have my mom, I didn’t have no one. my sister, who was my only living sibling, was in a shelter herself. And so, I was trying to get into this drug program, residential program, that was what I was paroled to.
I get in there, this is 2006, and they did, they asked me two questions in the intake regarding my drug and alcohol abuse, and they were like, Stephen, this is not for you. This is for people who are actively using and need it. You haven’t used drugs in over 12 years. I was in Rikers Island the last time I smoked weed and drank a little alcohol without the COs burning.
And so here I am standing outside. In the Bronx, after doing 14 years panicking, trying to figure out where am I going to go,
[00:39:21] Michael Hames-Garcia: So you didn’t need it enough, so they weren’t going to give you any, any support.
[00:39:26] Steven Humble Mangual: None, none, they just kicked me out, not even a referral, which I would have done, fast forward, I became a case manager myself, but yeah, I was homeless. I was unhoused. I was unhoused. And if it wasn’t for a friend of mine who let me sleep in her living room floor, shout out to my little Myra and my friend Vic, who facilitated that for me.
And I had to call my parole. Listen, I finally have an address that I told them what happened. and it took us a couple of hours to get that done. And so I stayed in that living room for three weeks until I rented my own room, met my wife, got married, was married 12 years, had two children.
Fast forward, the marriage fell apart, separation, upcoming divorce. I was unhoused again in 2018. and I was working. So I’m back in the Bronx, living in the basement apartment with a friend of mine, and I’m still running these programs. I’m still looking for apartments being denied because of my felony conviction and struggling with that.
Even in New York, I finally found an apartment. But I couldn’t stay after 12 months in the Bronx. It was just too much for me. It was too much for me emotionally. It was too much for me physically. I just couldn’t do it anymore. And I wind up resigning from my job. I was an assistant director of an alternative to incarceration program.
And I’m in the house. And I just, I packed, I resigned. I packed all my stuff, And COVID hit. And I decided I’m gonna leave. I can’t stay here. And I moved, I packed all my stuff and drove nonstop to North Carolina and was there unhoused in a friend’s house for like two weeks. And then I moved to Kissimmee in 2020 of June 6, 2020.
And I was living in hotels, unhoused, unemployed, living off of some savings and unemployment. And every housing application I filled out, I was still looking to stabilize myself in housing.
They wouldn’t give me it. Once they did a background check. Especially here in the state of Florida. It is. It is horrible regards to the kind of restrictions and barriers that we have for folks with felony convictions. Now, mind you, I was 14 and a half years post incarceration when I moved there. I was off parole since I’ve been off parole since 2009.
My felony conviction is from 1994. The only time I went back into the prison system was as a civilian doing trainings on the volunteer services.
[00:41:32] Michael Hames-Garcia: Wow.
[00:41:32] Steven Humble Mangual: And as soon as I got here, I was just denied, denied, denied, went through all of my savings. Luckily, I met my landlady here and her husband, and I’ve been here living with them for, I have my own little one bedroom in their private house for, for a little, about four years now, a little over, August, May, four years.
But yeah, it has been difficult. And throughout all of that, it was my community. It was my community. It was my, my, my family, who I call family, the folks that I met with while I was incarcerated that I’m still connected to. It was, all of those folks who were there for me and it was my training and my realizing and understanding that there was just no way I was going to do anything to risk my freedom again.
There was just no, because it wasn’t just about my freedom. I’m responsible and accountable to my community. I’m responsible, accountable to my mentors, to my mom.and there was just no way there was just, I, it was just something that I had gotten out of my system a long time ago. it’s about, it’s about creating a new set of values, and, and really living by those, convictions, pun intended.
[00:42:36] Michael Hames-Garcia: Yeah. Yeah. So, I want to give you your props for, for, your choices, your dedication and all of that. You also like landed on some good luck, right? Likeyou know, I think there’s so many people who,they try, they, I, I’ve seen people try and, and it’s the, the system doesn’t, doesn’t make it easy. There’s everything stacked against people.
[00:42:57] Steven Humble Mangual: My biggest support is folks like me, folks who are formerly incarcerated, folks who are going through it like me, folks who are directly impacted, family members of formerly incarcerated, advocates, who understand, what it is to go through this kind of reentry, reintegration,from a traumatic experience and carrying this felony conviction.
And so, it, it, I’m not, it wasn’t easy. I, I suffered a lot from, from PTSD, anxiety, depression, there were moments in my life where, where, where I felt, that I wanted to give up and, a couple of moments there where I, I even had a, a couple of, suicidal, thoughts.
and, and, nothing to carry out because of course I have, I understand that clearly it wasn’t an ideation. It wasn’t a plan. It wasn’t anything like that. It was just, I felt so defeated and the grief, it was just so much for me. That, yeah, I, I would drink a lot sometimes, and, and, and be like, no, I can’t do that, but I, I tell you, I lean on my community.
I lean on, on, on, most of my friends, that I, that I love most of my family are people who understand trauma and healing. I have folks that are social workers and counselors and coaches, and so, and I, all I have to do is pick up the phone. My co workers, I have, I have a strong support system from, from, our co workers and working in Latino justice has been really, really unique, because it is, it is a, a, a nontraditional place, my position is a nontraditional position, as a non attorney advocate working for a civil rights organization doing criminal punishment work, but yeah, hasn’t been easy and I’ve seen people go back to back and forth, back and forth during my time.
I’ve seen it. Mm hmm. Mm
[00:44:36] Michael Hames-Garcia: I wanna I wanna be sure to, to touch on something else in your history that, is, is, it’s related to the things we’ve been talking about, but it’s also, separate in some ways. And you spent a a long time, doing health advocacy or health justice work. it looks like mostly in New York.
and in an interview you said, many of us grow up poor and don’t have medical insurance or healthcare. So our first doctor is when we get incarcerated. Our first dental care, our first counselors, our first everything is when we get
[00:45:05] Steven Humble Mangual: incarcerated
Mm hmm.
[00:45:07] Michael Hames-Garcia: Mm
What is, what is, how did you get involved with health advocacy and what does it mean to you?
[00:45:12] Steven Humble Mangual: Hmm. That’s a great question because it was actually my first career when I, when I was released in 2006. So, the, when I, when I got involved in the ASL program, when we was teaching sign language, that this was, this was in 1996. This was in, A time in the world of HIV AIDS that was just horrific, not just in the prison system, but throughout the world, and we were, we were experiencing it.
We had fellow peers who were HIV positive, who were going through treatment. We had folks that, that wanted to learn about, health education, and so around that time, which was 1996, I got involved teaching sign language, but one of the parts that we implemented was, it was also a program called the Prisoners for AIDS Counseling and Education Program, the PACE program, and this was the program where folks went to learn about sex education where folks, folks went to, get pamphlets and, and, and ask questions and we had, they had community based organizations that were connected to them and they would come in and do trainings and counseling and testing and that kind of stuff, and so we decided that We wanted to make anyone who went through our sign language course learn some kind of portion of HIV so that we could teach HIV education and prevention and treatment through our American Sign Language class.
And I started learning, we started learning how to do signs for HIV and AIDS, HIV and AIDS, and, we learned,safer sex practices and, and, and learned about, the different, ways that it could be transmitted. And then we all, a lot of us got into medication and antiretrovirals. And in 2001, I got to Otisville, and they had, they had a great PACE program running by this guy named Fletcher, may he rest in peace. Fletcher was positive, and he was going through his own treatment, and I took the course with him, and I got my first HIV, even though I was already doing it before, but I got my first HIV, certificate as a peer educator with Fletcher, and shortly after that, Fletcher died.
Fletch, I struggled. Yeah, Fletch, I wind up, having some issues with, with the prison, medical staff, and they were denying him medical treatment, he was struggling, they wanted to force him on some treatment, he wasn’t having it, and he wind up getting really, really sick, and, eventually, because he was in a coma, they wind up releasing him and giving him a compassionate release, and he died in the hospital, like, two weeks after that.
And it was just, life changing for all of us that were there. And that just made me want to be more, more involved in health education. And I, and I just took every training that there was, I became a, a counselor, a tester. I know how to do HIV testing from inside the prison, even without having all the material.
I had all these certificates in every aspect that you could think of, and I was really connected with the community. And so upon my release, My very first job in 2006 was with an organization at that point that was called, Health PSI. And they, they were providing, comprehensive HIV, AIDS case management services under a Medicaid billable program.
And that was my, my very first real job. I, I had, I was already working for a couple of weeks in this, in this old crap job where this, these folks were hiring formerly incarcerated people because they were getting federal grants. And they would give us 10 an hour to do phone surveys. And that was the first, first job I did upon release.
But I only did that for a couple of weeks. And as soon as I got into case management, that was my, my, my career. I just, didn’t want to do anything else. Of course, I was doing a lot of the criminal justice work and advocacy work and the radio work, but all of that, most of that was volunteering. My nine to five was a case manager, counselor and tester.
I did outreach. I worked the homeless population in Yonkers for a while. and, and I did that all the way for about 11, about 11, 11 and a half years. Until I wind up going into the prisons doing work, and then I wind up going into the prisons with the same contract that I wind up learning from back then.
And so now I came back on the volunteer services, working with this organization and, and we will put, we, I was the civilian now providing those trainings that I used to get back in the days. And it’s, it’s just, been such a blessing that I was able to do that in about five years. Of the six facilities that I was in, in the downstate area, coming, coming back as a civilian, it was just talk about success.
I remember walking, I remember walking past. The civilian telling me explaining where everything is. I’m like, bro, if you only knew I’ve been here, but he didn’t know So I remember walking past the offices and some of the offices that were there when I was there and just looking at the there I’m looking at me in my face knowing that they didn’t want me there and I just smiled in them and every time I thought I’ll say hi.
Good morning. How are you? And that was my my my revenge my success and they would never respond back never they’d be like God
[00:49:45] Michael Hames-Garcia: It’s you were just like Ellie Eddie Ellis coming back with your suit
[00:49:48] Steven Humble Mangual: I did. It was Eddie who I got that from. Those, I would not have been able to do that if it wasn’t for them. I would have never even known that was possible. If it wasn’t for Eddie.
Oh, for sure. For sure. And it was the same thing because I would share the story with the folks that I was there with and tell them the same thing I went through with Eddie going back when. And it was a different connection that we made. When I would do the trainings with the men there at those facilities,it was real.
It was real. It was, it was, it was, it was accountability. It was community building. they, they, they couldn’t, they couldn’t BS me. They knew that, and if they did, those would fall short. But most of the facilitators that were there, they were really wanted to transform their lives as well and live the life that I was living post incarceration.
And a lot of them are actually a lot of them are, I’ve been in touch with a lot of those folks that I trained during that time frame. And they are doing very well right now throughout the country, not just in New York. Yeah, but yeah, that has been a love of mine, a passion of mine. And, and it’s something that even here, I’m still connected to.
I’m not doing the work directly, but I am connected to some organizations that are providing healthcare services, specifically through, some orgs that are, doing LGBTQAI plus work here. And, and I’ve been connected and volunteering with them and doing workshops and trying to figure a way to see if maybe one day we could duplicate those kind of services here in the state of florida and throughout the south because it doesn’t exist today.
It does not exist. And it’s and it’s horrible for someone to be HIV positive and in a prison system and not get the care that they need during incarceration and even worse post incarceration to be released with a diagnosis and not be connected to care is just a death sentence, especially with those kind of chronic conditions.
Yeah, I known people in Oregon who were released not even with HIV, but you know diabetes Diabetes type one.
High blood pressure, like there’s so many things people have been on chronic medications while incarcerated, well locked up on for, and then they get out and they don’t have access to those medications anymore, which are not medications you can just go off of.
Yeah. No, I, I, I love that work. I dedicate a lot of my, my initial learning on community advocacy and organizing to that, because I, I, I was, I was on parole for the first three years of that career. And, it was interesting where, my parole officers used to come to the office, and my clients used to be like, hey, because there was a few that I wound up developing great relationships with that were on parole, and I would tell them.
I didn’t, I didn’t disclose to everyone because it wasn’t necessary because I wasn’t in that kind of field, but I did disclose to my, to my people, and just, that’s the kind of connection that I would make, and, and I knew what they needed for the most part, because I needed it too, when I was going through my reentry reintegration, right, even though I wasn’t dealing with, the chronic condition, but I knew the services that they needed, and then once I got all of that in place, the healthcare was, it just came easy because, I knew I learned that system with them.
Right. They taught me what it was to go to a primary care provider and have a case conference and advocate for the needs that they knew they deserved. they taught me what it was to go to the Human Resources Administration and fight for their benefits and resources and, and housing. and that kind of stuff, folks, I wanted to go and get counseling and therapy and education, you know, I learned through them and, and I, I, I carry that to today to today.
I’m, I’m justice advocate coordinated with Latino justice today because I was an advocate for all of them folks, for those years in New York or, chronically even with that condition.
[00:53:13] Michael Hames-Garcia: It’s such important work. So you are a justice advocate coordinator with Latino Justice, PRLDEF, in Florida. Latino Justice is a legal advocacy organization. They specialize in litigation primarily, trying to change laws in order to better life chances for Latinos in the U. S., that’s how I understand them.
but what does it mean to be a justice advocate coordinator for them? And how did you end up in Florida?
[00:53:35] Steven Humble Mangual: Hmm. Wow. It, yeah. Right. . Well, I had been in Florida before, I traveled before my first time here in Kissimmee actually. I, I was a kid, it was before incarceration. I was, 18, 19 years old when I, when I came and visited. I had some friends that were coming back and forth, so I was familiar.
and I never lived anywhere else, but New York, never lived anywhere else but New York. So.when I first learned about Latino justice, I was still in New York. It was because I was already connected to the then, the former president and general counsel, Juan Cartagena. Don Juan Cartagena. Big shout out to Juan Cartagena, who I met.
He was one of the team of attorneys who used to call me out of the box. He was one of the team of attorneys in that famous felony disenfranchisement class action lawsuit. Hayden v. Pataki. after Joseph Jazz Hayden, by the way, who started the lawsuit, and then all of those team of attorneys took it up as a class action.
I met Juan Cartagena in the visiting room at Woodburn Correctional Facility, and I had already gone to my first parole board. It was around 2000, and I had gave him a parole package. I said, hey, this is who I am, and they picked me as a plaintiff. I was one of the six incarcerated plaintiffs in this class action lawsuit.
And so when I, when I, found out that he went from the community service society and then it wind up working and taking the role as the president and general counsel of Latino justice. He already came with a background of doing criminal justice work. He was an attorney. He was,he is an attorney.
Still, he was a circuit court judge in New Jersey. He was someone that worked for the Puerto Rican legal defense fund going back in 1972 in the beginning of his career, right? Going to the community service society as a general. So, you I already knew him. No, obviously, as you can tell, I know his history, right? Huge fan. And so as soon as he took over Latino justice, they created a way to provide, a consulting and, and, and,just advocacy opportunities for folks like me. they invested in us. This is way before they even had, our criminal justice work and, and being, a position, a paid position and, and, a department within, Latino justice.
He was already investing in us and he would reach out. I was on the radio already, at this point when he became president, general counsel, and it was just an easy thing where I could be, I used to invite him to the show. I would interview him on the things that Latino justice was doing. We did a lot of work around advocacy together, especially specifically for the Latinx population.
We did stuff in Spanish. We did webinars in Spanish completely. On a pretrial and that kind of struggle of movement that was taking place in New York State at the time, and it was really unique, and so I wind up becoming a plaintiff in another lawsuit that Latino justice was a part of around a prison based gerrymandering,and, and so, yeah, man, it was just wow, I’m just remembering this stuff now, it’s been quite the journey, and so when they started the open up the Southeast office region, which is they opened up the office around 10 years ago, And then they, they, they hired a, a community liaison to work with the attorneys and he had the position for a while.
He did some great connections and then did a lot of, a lot of great work around felony disenfranchisement, which of course is something that Juan would take on. And we were a part of the, Amendment 4 movement, and, and, and that kind of thing. Latino justice, there’s some advocacy, Latino justice translated the, the Amendment 4 into Spanish so it could be on the ballot.
For and so we were, we were busy with that. So by the time, I came to learn that the position was opening up around 2020, I had already resigned from, from my work with. the alternative incarceration program in the Bronx, Common Justice, I had, I was already in a place where I needed to start over somewhere else.
I was already someone who traveled throughout the state. I have worked with, Just Leadership USA, doing some leadership training courses and was able to travel throughout the country with them. Yeah. And, and I don’t know, I think we traveled to maybe like 15 different states. And so it’s, it wasn’t something that I was afraid of.
It was something I was looking forward to. And so I’m unhoused. I’m unemployed. It’s, COVID,the Latino justice job was opening up. I came and what I didn’t realize was that they were going through a transition and we’re creating now the justice advocate coordinated position. They got some grant money.
They got this position. And it’s a two year grant and I was like, okay, a two year grant. I could work with that and we’ll figure something out, but I’m starting over. I’m coming from a horrible separation and divorce and I needed to start all over. I knew that had I stayed in New York, it would have just got worse for me.
I needed a fresh start. And I came to Kissimmee because I had already connections to Kissimmee. I knew the office was in Orlando already. I had my oldest and dearest friend, Vic, who lives in Kissimmee, who is here. I had another old friend, childhood friend who was here. And I knew that I would at least be in somewhere familiar.
It’s a little Puerto Rico, a lot of Puerto Ricans here in Kissimmee. And so, so the Justice Advocate Coordinated position opened up. And I was all in my interviews, didn’t realize it was some competition there, but I’m grateful, and I made it, I got the position and fast forward, the position not only turned into a permanent position, but the, the, the work grew so much that we wind up.
making my position permanent in the southeast region in florida, creating a position in new york and hiring someone in new york as a justice advocate coordinator in new york in the northeast region and then hiring a position in texas, which you are familiar with as well, which is why we were in texas.
And we have now three justice advocate coordinators in three different regions. And so it has been a blessing. I feel like the position was created just for me. Not just because of what I was going through in my time and in my life, but because the work was something that I wanted to look forward to doing, it was challenging, it was new, it was advocacy at a whole other level, it was at a national level, even though we were in Florida, it was specifically geared and catered to my community, our committee, my Latinx community, and how, invisibilized we still are with regards to the racialized mass incarceration, policing, and criminal punishment system, it is a Latinx thing.
it ain’t just a black thing, African American thing, it is a Latinx thing, it wouldn’t be a disproportionate representation if it were only a black thing in certain states, you know what I’m saying? It would not be only a disproportionate representation if it were just a Latinx thing either.
It is a black and Latinx and indigenous and queer thing. And a woman because of women have been just, exploding with regards to, incarceration in the last number of years. But yeah, the position was made for me and, and I just, it’s been, it was scary because I’m, I was now doing a lot of legislative advocacy stuff, which I wasn’t used to doing at a leadership level.
And I still feel as if,this is where I was meant to be in my career, in my life. And I love it. I love, I love the work. I love the organization. I love being in Florida and in the Southeast because it’s not just Florida. I’m able to go to Georgia. I’m able to go to Virginia and be in contact with folks from Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, the Carolinas, Louisiana, it has just been, and that’s with the work with my position, but through the work with other campaigns, I have been blessed to do trainings and do direct work with people throughout the country because of Latino justice.
[01:01:08] Michael Hames-Garcia: That’s awesome. That’s awesome. and it was, it was great to see you at that convening in Atlanta and just, in your element.
[01:01:14] Steven Humble Mangual: I love that. I love that. I love that. I, and, and that was, so the criminal justice convenings that we, we, we did every year, is something that I have been a part of for a long time. Before I was working with Latino justice, they had one of the very first ones going back. So I think 2015 I was 16 here in Orlando and, and Juan said, Steven, I want you to come and be on, be on a, be a panelist.
And, and I came and I flew down here and that was, I sat on a panel for Latino justice way before. I did the same thing. Fast forward, I think it was, a year after in DC, we had a great convening. And so to, to, to be. a non staff consultant to come and speak and be a part of that way. And then fast forward to actually be organizing that same convening and being one of the moderators.
It is just, full circle and really humbling, humbling, humbling experience.
[01:02:07] Michael Hames-Garcia: That’s beautiful. That’s beautiful. so I, I want to, I think we’re just about out of time, but I want to,
[01:02:13] Steven Humble Mangual: Oh, wow.
[01:02:14] Michael Hames-Garcia: I know, I know I want to circle around though. When I teach classes about, criminal legal system and everything going on there and, justice reform, I always try toward the end of class, steer my students toward a conversation about restorative justice because, um, otherwise they leave bummed out.
Ha ha ha! Um, and I, I know that you have done a lot of work with, with restorative justice. and I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about, what it’s been like for you to, to facilitate restorative justice circles for folks.
So I took part in my first circle while I was in Rikers Island. And I remember we were just a bunch of young knuckleheads acting up. And, the sergeant would come through our captain. I think she was a captain, but she had a lot of respect. And she was a beautiful, tall African woman, African American woman.
[01:03:05] Steven Humble Mangual: She was this black sister from around the neighborhood who just went up the ranks. And she would come in, and as soon as she would come in, everybody would stand at attention, because she demanded that kind of thing. And she would tell us, man, turn the TV off, get up in this day room, we’re gonna have a circle, and we’re gonna talk. And,
It was a circle, we did therapy, we did the healing, we did community building, we did education, we had fun, all in this circle. And so I didn’t realize what was going on, and how this, this, this thing that I really felt a part of goes back,millennia, since the beginning of time, probably it’s the way we, it’s the way we dealt with everything in our community, in our African and indigenous communities, we dealt in it in a circle, we, we, whenever there was conflict, we, we did our best to do it in a, in a healing way, in a restorative, and healing way.
Sometime around, I want to say, oh my God, I don’t remember the exact date, but it was, it was right after I stopped working in a prisons, I wind up getting offered a job with Common Justice, which is a restorative justice, alternative incarceration program for youth, started in Brooklyn and in the Bronx, and if I’m not mistaken now, I hear that they’re in Manhattan as well.
So I was there during a time where they had just opened up their Bronx office and they were looking for someone, to run the program, the first, the first title was intervention manager and it was a program where we work with the DA’s office. And we got referrals directly from that interaction between the attorney for the young person, the DA, and the judge, and our program, and we did the intake, we met with the harmed party, and, and, and offered services to the harmed party, and explained to them that now we have this other portion of a program for the responsible party who committed this harm to you, where you could play a role as the harmed party in helping them be held responsible and accountable in this program for 18 months, approximately 18 months.
And I, I did that. I did that for three years. I ran restorative justice circles. I don’t know how many, and it was just such a great experience to be, in the community. In the courthouse, my office was in the courthouse where I was indicted, where I was indicted, back when, so here I am sitting next to, all of the probation offices in the, in the family court building. And my office was right there, you know, and, and it was just, the greatest experience. I learned so much. We started with two clients. I had two young kids that were with me in that Bronx house and it went from two to 15. We went from that little hole in the wall in that office to our own space where we.
had our circles and our meetings and our interventions and I graduated a good number. I want to say I graduated over 10 kids in the time that I was there and I took part in a whole lot more graduations between Brooklyn and the Bronx and I facilitated circles for those three years. I worked with, the district attorney.
I protected, a bunch of our young folks from going into the prisons and the jails. And it was just, was, it was, it was difficult. It was difficult. I’m not going to lie. It was difficult because I, I had a lot of,transference and counter transference going on. And it’s difficult for me to, to, to, to,the, the, the, the lines, became drawn because I, this is my community.
This is, these are my, like, it became like, these are my children, these are my kids. And so, I would do anything. And eventually, it just became, too heavy for me to carry. with everything that I was going through and still I leaned on circle keeping you know, and learn on lean on folks who still do circle keeping even when I was going through my own thing.
So when I resigned and I came here to florida, it was just easy for me to get involved in in that campaign to bring about restorative practice, restorative justice, restorative healing in the campaign and eventually wind up joining the florida restorative justice association. And I’ve been on their board for about a year now.
And, restorative justice and restorative practices has been one of my campaigns and one of my priorities here in the Southeast region in Florida and throughout the Southeast region. Yeah.
[01:07:12] Michael Hames-Garcia: Ah, that’s, that’s, that’s great. What are your goals, as you, move into the next year? It’s December now, so about to head into a new year. It’s time to think about goals.
[01:07:22] Steven Humble Mangual: Yeah. My main goal is to continue in the campaigns, ending solitary confinement here in the state of Florida and throughout the South and throughout the whole country, because we have over 122, 000 people held in extreme isolation, held in torturous conditions,and so that’s a main goal of mine, continuing doing restorative practices and restorative justice work.
be it through, direct trainings, workshops, panels, community education, and also legislative advocacy. And, we’re in a state where, juvenile justice is super duper important for me. We’re in a, we’re in a direct filed state where they send children into the adult system. we have every aspect of racialized mass incarceration that you could think of exists in this state.
I’m working to bridge the gaps between traditional criminal punishment system and the immigration and deportation pipeline system and what we call crimmigration. And so we’re involved in the Shut Down Baker campaign here, Baker ICE detention facility, which is where they’re holding our folks and planning on deporting a lot of them.
Even attempted to deport some Haitians, you know, this year and making sure that that folks throughout the country understand that part of the narrative is the Latinx narrative. Part of the narrative is that we are, suffering in the system and, and, and we are the ones to look forward to, to end the suffering as well.
to, to quote, Glenn Martin, those closest to the problem are closest to the solution. that’s the reality. We are the closest to the solution. we are, in many ways, the solution to those specific problems that we’ve been a part of because we lived it.
[01:08:50] Michael Hames-Garcia: Yeah.thank you. Thank you, for joining me today.
[01:08:54] Steven Humble Mangual: didn’t mention, I didn’t mention any personal goals. I didn’t
[01:08:56] Michael Hames-Garcia: Oh, yeah. What are your personal
[01:08:57] Steven Humble Mangual: is so tied into my career, but yeah,
[01:09:01] Michael Hames-Garcia: That’s not healthy. You got to have personal goals too.
[01:09:03] Steven Humble Mangual: Oh no, I take care of myself. I have a self-care routine. I do meditation. I, I, I, I do have, I lean on my community very well, but no, my, my personal goals are, are, I am planning on doing some writing.
I wanna go back to school, ’cause I, I, I stopped at my bachelor’s, with a, a concentration in social work and never went back to my, for my master’s degree. And so I’m thinking about doing that. I wanna do some publishing, maybe even some poetry. ’cause I did a lot of poetry writing while I was inside.
And, definitely, getting closer to my, my children, it’s been a blessing, I’ve got, I got two little ones that have been traveling from New York here and being a dad has been, the greatest title, cause I didn’t have a dad, I didn’t have a dad, and so.
They teaching me how to be a dad, but yeah, it is tied into my career. I’m always, I’m, I’m gonna, to quote how we used to do say in the nation of Islam, I’m going to die on my posts and my part of my posts is those campaigns that I told you, as long as it’s going to, there’s, there’s a Latinx young person, whatever kind of young person.
Being targeted for, mass incarceration and getting ready to go through this, this, system from a traumatic system. as long as I’m alive, I’m going to fight to end that, and, and I’m in a great place because our work is abolition guided, abolition minded. this is one of the unique things about our work and, and, and with Latino justice is that.
Everything we’re looking at it, we’re looking at it through an abolitionist lens. Let’s talk about that. Let’s, let’s, let’s start with the, that premise and then we’ll work from there. No human being in a cage. That’s our thing. No human being in a cage. Mm hmm.
[01:10:31] Michael Hames-Garcia: humans. Oh,
[01:10:33] Steven Humble Mangual: Yes.
[01:10:35] Michael Hames-Garcia: Thank you. Thank you so much. for those listening, I’m Michael Hames Garcia with UT Austin’s Latino Studies Department. Thank you for joining me today and learning from our guest, Stephen Mangual from Latino Justice PRLDF. I never know when to say PRLDF or P R L D F. PRLDF He, he shared with us, some of his thoughts on, solitary confinement, restorative justice, juvenile justice, healthcare access, probably the, the thing that I’m going to take away from our conversation, today is, just the reminder that these are systems that affect the Latinx community, disproportionately, but that, Latinos can be a part of the solution, and we are active, participants in, trying to achieve a better and more just future.
if you would like to learn more, you can visit latinojustice. org. also, I believe, Stephen mentioned Common Justice, which has a website as well, commonjustice. org. Locally here in Travis County, Texas, an organization that you might want to look up is, called Life Anew. Their, their website is elifeanew, that’s e l i f e a n e w.
com. But thank you again, Steven. I’m sure that we all wish you the best in your future endeavors.
[01:11:51] Steven Humble Mangual: Thank you so much for having me.