This Side of Freedom

"This Side of Freedom: Life After Clemency" is a riveting, compelling tale about the life of activist, writer and artist Anthony Papa. He tells firsthand of his experience of returning home after serving 12 years of a 15-to-life sentence for a non-violent drug crime sentenced under the mandatory provisions of the Rockefeller Drug Laws of New York State. In 1997 he was granted executive clemency by New York Governor George Pataki. Papa says that the freedom he fought so hard to get, smacked him swiftly in the face, overpowering him. He struggles with his freedom while fighting to free those he left behind. Papa goes through heart-wrenching trials and tribulations as he seeks to end the war on drugs and save those he left behind. Along the way he meets an array of individuals from famous movie stars to politicians and the very rich, enlisting their help in doing away with mass incarceration and draconian sentencing laws that have destroyed America's criminal justice system."Anthony Papa's work, beginning with his incredible paintings, continuing with his ground-breaking memoir, 15 to Life, and now this new offering, This Side of Freedom, is almost single-handedly documenting one of the greatest civil and human rights disruptions in our nation's history: the human destruction caused by the war on drugs policies. Papa brings us, in living color and painful authenticity, what these gross violations of human rights do to the spirit, but more, how the spirit can still soar despite mountains of adversity. His is truly a hero's journey and one we should all take with him". -- asha bandele, author of The Prisoner's Wife