Petition for Sedrick V. Robinson

The "Distorted Priorities: Drug Offenders in State Prisons" study, conducted by the Sentencing Project, found that an estimated 251,000 drug offenders are in state prisons. Of that number, 58 percent are nonviolent offenders, and four out of five imprisoned are minorities. (Report: Most Drug Offenders in Prison are Nonviolent)

More than 60\% of the people in prison are now racial and ethnic minorities. For Black males in their twenties, 1 in every 8 is in prison or jail on any given day. These trends have been intensified by the disproportionate impact of the "war on drugs," in which three-fourths of all persons in prison for drug offenses are people of color.
(The Sentencing Project: Racial Disparity)

On September 5, 2007, Sedrick Robinson was found guilty of an alleged crime committed on November 21, 2004. During these past 2 years, 9 months and 16 days of freedom, Sedrick has made tremendous contributions to this community and to the welfare of at-risk youth in the Cedar Valley. Sedrick has also earned a masters degree from the University of Northern Iowa and donated countless hours of his time volunteering on boards, youth programs and committees, namely, the Juneteenth Planning Committee. Sedrick was also employed by various agencies oriented towards youth programming such as Boys and Girls Club, Young Parents Together, Wise Guys, PASSPORT and the Family & Childrens Council. If the maximum sentence is received for this alleged crime, Sedrick is facing 30 years of incarceration. 30 years of valued service, selfless commitment and effectiveness in the lives of many wayward youth in this community will be stolen and locked away.

While we are not necessarily negating that an offence may have been committed on one or more occasions, we are however challenging the idea of lengthy incarceration for this non-violent offence. We are asking the presiding Judge over the case of Sedrick Robinson for leniency in sentencing.

We, the undersigned, believe that Sedrick Robinson has contributed a great deal to this community and that Sedrick has done for himself what not many prisons have been able to do; Sedrick has rehabilitated and redeemed him self from all of the crimes of his past. Placing him in prison is counterproductive and a waste of tax dollars.

We, the undersigned, are asking this court to consider these facts before sentencing Sedrick Robinson to an extended amount of time in the prison system.