Christopher Blackwell, forty-one, is an incarcerated writer in Washington State who previously worked in prison as a chicken farmer. Jamie Beth Cohen, forty-six, is a writer who is not incarcerated. She lives in the suburbs of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania; although she doesn’t identify as a “soccer mom,” her kids do play soccer. The two were paired in 2020 by a program called Empowerment Avenue (EA), which supports incarcerated artists and writers.
Since their pairing, which was EA’s pilot match, Chris has placed more than fifty pieces of writing, ranging from extensively reported articles to intensely personal essays, in large and small outlets including The New York Times, The Washington Post, HuffPost, The Boston Globe, The Progressive, and others.
The following is an email exchange between Chris and Jamie about their partnership. It has been edited for length and clarity.
JAMIE: I can’t believe we’ve been working together for more than two years. Because you’re on the inside and I’m on the outside, time moves differently for us.
Sometimes I feel weird about that. Like when we talk and I ask how your week was, and I’m thinking, “How do you think his week was? He’s in prison, during a deadly pandemic, separated from all of his loved ones.”
CHRIS: I don’t know if others feel weird when folks in the free world ask about their week, but I love it when you do. When you share the drama of your kids’ lives. When you open up about these things, it reminds me of just how close we’ve become. Yes, we work together, but we’re also close friends.
On a recent call, I told you that when I’m released, [my wife] Chelsea and I are going to pay for a trip for you and your family to somewhere cool like Disneyland. You laughed and said, “Oh, the kids will really love Uncle Chris then.” I didn’t tell you at the time, but I started to tear up. That moment allowed me to see how close we really are. You are an incredible parent, and very protective of your children, so hearing you say that—including me as a member of your family—did more for me then you may ever know.
Chris Blackwell
I’m in prison for taking someone’s life, and sometimes I wonder if people will ever see the real me, or if I’ll be forever condemned to a life of judgment. Yet in moments like these, I’m reminded that I’m more than the harm I’ve caused. And that doesn’t absolve me of that horrible act, but it does let me breathe freely and know I have support in doing the work I do, which will hopefully stop others from causing the same kind of harm that I have.
Some pieces we’ve published were hard to process. Like when you shared the “Letter To My Teen Self” that you wrote when your first book came out. You encouraged me to write a similar piece. I thought why not? It should be easy. I had no clue what the piece would open within me, and it was anything but easy. It forced me to open doors I had sealed off decades ago. When I finished, I read it to my wife over the phone with tears pouring down my face.
I had been carrying around some really traumatic stuff, but without your guidance and encouragement, I never would have written what was probably one of the most rewarding pieces of my career—not because I won an award, but because I grew, learned more about myself, and received dozens of messages on Twitter from others who could relate to my traumatic childhood. This was one of the defining moments in my writing career; a light turned on, and I realized my stories could help others process their trauma.
But being paired with me, someone in prison for such a violent crime, couldn’t have been easy to overcome.
JAMIE: I don’t know that it was hard for me to let you in, but that may say more about my porous boundaries than anything else. One reason we were EA’s first pairing is because you had writing experience already, and I had experience with jails, prisoners, and crime.
What I don’t think EA knew, but what I remember telling you, is that my dad was a criminal who never got caught. Among his many crimes was identity theft, and I was one of his victims. Working with you is a continuation of my relationship with my father, who died in 2005. I strongly believe there are not good and bad people, but rather good and bad choices. Both of you made choices I would deem bad, but I don’t think that makes either of you bad people.
Jamie Beth Cohen
Another thing I remember talking to you about are the ways my privilege has protected me from the ramifications of some of my bad choices. And how, despite the fact that you are white, growing up in an underserved neighborhood with a high crime rate really impacted the way you were treated by the system and affected the choices you had.
On that first call, I told you I’ve been pulled over for speeding three times, once with weed in the car in my early twenties, and I’ve never gotten a speeding ticket. As a white girl driving a Jetta with a college decal, the police assumed I was a “good person.”
My friends had concerns about my burgeoning friendship with someone who is in prison for taking a human life. The way I look at it, you’re not a threat to me or anyone else because you are not the same person who chose to carry a gun to a robbery all those years ago. I’ve explained this to my friends, and they’ve read your really moving pieces. Now, they’re more interested in the mechanics of our work.
For example, my friends know it is expensive to talk on the phone with someone in prison, but they didn’t know we have to pay to email each other, or that some people in prison don’t even have access to email or the Internet. There’s a lot about having a friendship with someone who is incarcerated that many people don’t understand or even consider. If more people did, there might be a stronger movement to alleviate the kinds of conditions in prison that you and others deal with all the time.
The same holds true for prison writers. A lot of my friends are fiction writers and write personal essays like me. We’re not used to being fact-checked. I know you’re working on more heavily reported pieces these days, but most major outlets even fact-check your personal essays to make sure the Department of Corrections (DOC) gets to weigh in with their version of events. How does that make you feel?
CHRIS: It isn’t easy knowing your oppressor has the ability to claim the harms they do to you are lies, as they actively paint you in a bad light. It’s ludicrous. If you were to ask an abusive parent if they hit their child—after the child had accused them of doing so—would we as a society believe the parent when they said the child was lying? Or would we be skeptical and make them prove the child was lying and that they, an accused abuser, were not just protecting their own self-interest?
A light turned on, and I realized my stories could help others process their trauma.
With incarcerated people, many on the outside seem to expect that everything we say or do must be taken with a grain of salt. “Of course they lie about everything. Only seems right, since they’ve made a mistake that led them to prison in the first place.” However, in reality, like all humans, prisoners grow, mature, and develop. Everyone makes mistakes in their lives, some get caught, and some don’t. At the end of the day, our mistakes shouldn’t condemn us forever.
What’s important is that our voices are not oppressed or overlooked and met with false accusations by the very people who continue to abuse us. If I am fact-checked rigorously by publishers and made to prove each part of my claims against the DOC, then the DOC should be held to the same standard. In the end, it’s about reporting the truth, making sure that all who experience abuse are supported, and that those who cause harm are held accountable. If not, the cycle will continue.
This is how we get to a place where incarcerated voices are heard and respected—a place where we are not treated as if we are lucky that publishers are letting us speak our truths, but instead recognizing our right to do so. Because that is what journalism is about—investigating and reporting the truth to better educate society about the dysfunctional systems that operate in the shadows.