Victims of Injustice Inc dba Life Support Alliance

Programs

1. Correspondence Courses:Correspondence courses have been offered since March 2020, covering interactive courses and self-directed workbooks to assist incarcerated students in achieving rehabilitation, and in preparing for parole hearings and meeting the criteria established by the Board of Parole Hearings. Correspondence courses require written interaction with reviewers at LSA, trained in the various curriculum content and are recognized by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Each student receives a workbook of 5 to 117 pages, depending on subject and correspondence course contain self-addressed stamped envelopes to ensure indigent students can maintain their coursework. Currently there are over 1,000 students enrolled in one or more courses. All courses and materials are created and produced in house and mailed directly to incarcerated students. To date over 2,300 students have enrolled in one or more of the correspondence courses and we have sent several hundred non-interactive informational workbooks to incarcerated individuals and their family members.

   $3,201 spent
   8% of program spending

2. Prison Presentations:Workshops and classes for incarcerated students to assist in achieving rehabilitation and understanding and achieving parole suitability for those individuals who must obtain their freedom via grants of parole. The workshops and classes teach the tenets of restorative justice, anger management, cognitive behavior therapy, eliminating domestic violence, victim impact and relapse prevention. Many of the classes are recognized by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. These workshops and classes began in 2012 and are held within various California state prisons, conducted by Victims of Injustice dba Life Support Alliance members and volunteers. These activities, including preparing workbooks for attendees, travel to the prisons, volunteer training and presenting the workshops and classes historically account for approximately 50% of volunteers and members time. Due to an increase in interest and participation as well as need within the incarcerated population, creating new courses as well as processing the work from those enrolled in the courses now accounts for 25% of time.

   $26,218 spent
   64% of program spending

3. Newsletters:Since 2010 Lifer*Line, a free monthly publication, has been sent via email to now over 3,200 email addresses of prisoner family members and friends, attorneys, prison librarians, parole board members and corrections personnel, providing educational updates on new policies and laws. Nearly 900 indigent inmates are also provided with the newsletter via a volunteer mail tree. Many institutional counselors have requested inclusion on the distribution list; they also reprint the newsletter and distribute it to their incarcerated clients. The second newsletter, California Lifer Newsletter, first published in 2008, is a quarterly publication which members can subscribe to for a fee, and includes court cases, providing legal information to those incarcerated individuals interested in possible changes in their sentences. CLN is professionally published and mailed directly to subscribers in all California state prisons by a professional publishing/mailing service. All aspects of the newsletter, absent the printing and mailing, are done in house by volunteers, accounting for approximately 15% of staff time. Several institutional libraries now subscribe to CLN, as well as numerous…

   $9,806 spent
   24% of program spending

4. Seminars:We offer a series of seminars for families, held monthly online, to reach the maximum number of families, friends, and supporters. These are hour long events to provide families with information, interaction, and support, letting them know they are part of a community and can contribute to that community. In 2023 our first virtual seminar included participants from 7 states outside California as well as individuals from the UK, Germany, and Australia.

   $2,030 spent
   5% of program spending

The 4 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990-EZ. Program spending in total: $41,255.