As a writer/researcher at PJI, I manage PJI’s situational awareness of the rapidly-changing state of pretrial across the country, curate our institutional library, and share PJI’s vision for an equitable and just pretrial system. I'm driven by my passion for justice and the power of clear, thoughtful communication to evoke compassion, insight, and urgency in others.
Over the past seven years, I have watched PJI shift to be heavily steeped in and committed to racial justice. This ongoing transformation is the result of deep work—looking at the racialized history of the criminal legal system, learning to recognize how white supremacy culture works between and within us, and looking at my own journey as a Chinese American woman—and it has changed me as a human being.
I split my time between PJI and my career as a children’s book author; while some people see these careers as incongruous, both endeavors are concerned with our shared humanness and creating justice. I am on the Megaphone Board of Shout Mouse Press, a nonprofit dedicated to encouraging and raising up the voices of marginalized youth. I earned my undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Virginia, and previously worked for the ABA Juvenile Justice Center on access to counsel issues.
What would your colleagues say is your superpower?
My knack for finding pretrial stats and studies. The deeper I get into a research rabbit hole, the happier I am!