Photograph from the Humanize the Numbers project, photographed in Michigan prisons

Marlen Dwayne, 2017
Even when you’re in the system, you still feel constantly under arrest. When a person is under arrest, it says you’re innocent until proven guilty, but from my experience, you’re guilty until proven innocent. It’s like you have to prove you’re a changed person. You can’t judge me by what I did in the past, only by the person I am today.