Lifers Inc.
Parole Eligibility Education Initiative
Photo Credit: Harvey Finkle
Lifers Incorporated at SCI-Graterford (Lifers Inc.) is an inmate organization comprised of life-sentenced inmates (lifers). The primary mission of the organization is to secure legislative action to retroactively offer parole review to any inmate sentenced to a term of life imprisonment in a Pennsylvania Department of Corrections (PDOC) facility.
Photo Credit: Harvey Finkle
The intended purpose of the Parole Eligibility Education Initiative is not to put the state criminal justice system on trial. Similarly, this educational campaign does not seek to challenge the need for, or the propriety of, a life sentence without the opportunity for parole. We recognize that in a civil society public safety is imperative and a life-term of incarceration for some convicted felons serves a legitimate purpose.
The Pennsylvania Prison Society (Prison Society) is legally recognized as an Official Visitor to prisoners confined in PDOC facilities throughout the state. Lifers Inc. and the Prison Society, in conjunction with The Penn Law Program on Documentaries and the Law, seek to educate the taxpayers of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania about the enormous economic and social costs associated with indefinitely confining what is referred to as the stock population of lifers in PDOC facilities.
This collaborative effort offers two independent but interrelated solutions to solve the problem of an ever increasing lifer population in Pennsylvania:
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Either the expanded use of the existing state commutation system to release lifers on lifetime parole, or
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The legislative enactment of a bill that would provide for a parole review for lifers.
Photo Credit: Theodore A. Harris
They are not forgotten
Honoring of the memory of passed Lifers
To submit a memory or memorial of a lifer, please contribute through our contact form, or email info@lifersincpa.org
Community Partners
