Trust is more important now than ever before. This spring 2019, WITNESS is changing the story. We will highlight the people and communities that fuel our movement, and show that without trust, in our partnerships and for human rights content, there can be no justice.

Cheryl Morris, Community Team @ VIMEO and WITNESS volunteer, reflected on “who can we trust?” As noted in Cheryl’s blog post:

“I am a young, black, first generation American woman from New York City. Following the indictment of George Zimmerman and the murders of Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, Eric Garner, and Akai Gurley by the police, I began to feel extremely weary of authority figures and fearful of any potential interactions between my family and friends with the police. When walking through the city, I found myself anxiously crossing the street whenever I saw an officer, my heart racing and palms sweating. It seemed as if anything people of color did could be construed by the police as dangerous…

My growing anxiety over the documented cases of police violence however, led me to become more involved with the community of grassroots activists here in New York. I found local rallies and demonstrations through the Black Lives Matter movement to take part in, in hopes of effecting some change within our country. I began to speak candidly with friends and acquaintances about the fears that myself and many people who look like me feel on a regular basis. I wanted to make sure that future generations of black and brown people would not have to worry about their safety in the way that my generation and generations before me had. Through these activities, I learned that I had people around me that I could lean on when I felt overwhelmed. Through my community I learned that I didn’t have to live in fear every day. Over the past few years, I’ve grown to learn that I could trust the community that I had built around myself — friends, progressive-thinking people of color, and allies.”

For Mother’s Day 2019, we also created a fundraising campaign to encourage individuals to donate $25 in their mother’s name. With a small donation of $25, WITNESS can help many more activists, human rights defenders, and vulnerable people to defend their human rights online and on the ground. 

WITNESS is building a movement based on trust, truth, and transparency – will you join us? Learn more about and donate to the campaign here.

Our Program Director Sam Gregory was recently interviewed by VICE News about why is it so hard to care about humanitarian causes.

Click here to see what Sam, and other human rights leaders had to say about what it takes to care for justice in the world.

While some cities have attempted to craft protective policies to minimize ICE interference, these agents are relentlessly finding loopholes to exploit these communities. In New York City, where local officials have declared that the city would resist the White House’s crackdown, ICE raids are still happening. A new battlefront for these officers has become the courthouses of the city.

In an effort to educate and inform people that they have the right to film and document ICE officials, WITNESS along with Immigrant Defense Project (IDP), and New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) created a new resource informing people of their rights to film at courthouses.

The information in this resource is specific to a New York City-based audience, but many aspects can be applicable to communities in other spaces. It offers important information about your rights and best practices for documenting an incident. Remember: Always use your best judgment and assess risks to yourself and those you are filming before hitting “record”.

For more on our work to combat ICE abuses, check out our series, “Eyes on ICE.”

Photo: Leandro Justen

Just over a week ago, Marielle and her driver Anderson, were murdered following an impassioned speech Marielle had just given at Rio de Janeiro’s city council where she served as the only black female member.

WITNESS joins the global outpouring of grief and solidarity in the pursuit of justice for Marielle, Anderson and our allies in communities that live with and work to expose impunity of state violence daily. Just days after Marielle was assassinated, we heard from our partners at Coletivo Papo Reto that a 2-year-old boy named Benjamin, along with a woman and a man, had been killed by police bullets during an operation in Complexo do Alemão, a network of favelas in north Rio.  

Photo: Leandro Justen

Marielle and voices from the favelas such as Coletivo Papo Reto actively work to counter harmful narratives about their communities as places that are plagued by drug trafficking and violence. As we heard from Raull Santiago, a founding member of Papo Reto, in September, “the reality in Brazil is that a person is killed several times. First, they are killed by the actual bullet. Then, they are killed by the media narrative, which parrots the police version of events by describing that person as criminals and assassinating their reputation. And finally, they are killed by the legal systems that fail to hold perpetrators accountable.” Video is one of the most powerful tools to fight this impunity– as evidenced by the impact that Papo Reto has accomplished.

A black, lesbian single mother, born and raised in a favela, Franco was a rare face of representation in an overwhelming white and male political landscape. And with two degrees from one of Brazil’s most elite universities and over a decade of experience in politics, she was an undeniably powerful charismatic force in the growing movement to confront the epidemic of violence perpetrated or perpetuated by the state. – The Intercept

Marielle denounced the thousands of police killings that take place in Brazil each year (the last official count for 2016 in Rio de Janeiro alone was 920 people killed by police, but human rights groups say the number is likely higher) and whose victims are a majority black and poor. She was killed, but her voice has not been silenced as the #MariellePresente (Marielle is here) movement continues to grow.

[All photos by Leandro Justen]