It is a corrective to that silence. As the inaugural publication of the FreeHer Institute, the think tank of The National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women and Girls, this report compiles two decades of data, analysis, and lived experience to illuminate how incarceration harms individuals, destabilizes communities, and corrodes public health and local economies. It traces the enduring role of race and gender in sentencing and punishment, and documents how these traumas echo across generations. Most importantly, it centers the voices of women—those who have survived incarceration and who now demand that their truths shape the path forward.

The National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women and Girls challenges new prison and jail construction through campaigns led by people directly impacted by incarceration. Our work in Vermont and Massachusetts has exposed how architects sustain and profit from incarceration while using the language of humane design to obscure its harms. From the outset, we have rejected prisons branded as “feminist,” “trauma-informed,” or “gender-responsive.” Our experience has only strengthened that position. There is no such thing as a “trauma-informed” prison.