Over the past five years, Google and YouTube have worked hard to improve the criminal justice system. The duo has provided more than $40M in grants to criminal justice reform organizations, supported work by non-profits promoting reform and by police departments working to improve interactions with their communities. They also promoted the use of data to increase the transparency of the US’s criminal justice system. One of their programs was the LoveLetters initiative, which supported children with imprisoned parents, allowing the little ones to send a video message to their parents in time for Mother’s Day and Father’s Day.

Now, Google and YouTube have partnered with Campaign for Fair Sentencing of Youth (CFSY) NGO and launched “Project Witness,” a campaign in which the main focus is on kids. More specifically, incarcerated children. According to Prison Policy, nearly 48,000 youths under age 18 are incarcerated in juvenile jails and prisons in the United States daily. The same report states that two out of every three confined youths end up in one of the US’s most restrictive facilities. Nearly one in ten children are incarcerated in adult jails and prisons, environments where safety is at risk and age-appropriate services are out of the question.

To build awareness around these incarcerated kids and also to trigger people’s empathy, Google is using YouTube‘s VR platform to depict the extreme forms of punishment children have to endure while being imprisoned in adult facilities. The VR adventure starts by placing you, the viewer, in the back of a van which carries you to a prison facility. Basically, the experience puts you in the shoes of a young person who is sentenced to prison. Nothing compares with 23 hours a day of incarceration, yet YouTube tried to reflect this as realistic as possible. So, it gave users a couple of minutes to virtually experience what it is like to be inside of four walls, all by yourself, without having any human contact.

The seven-minute-long video is the campaign’s centerpiece film, which is narrated by people who have experienced imprisonment in an adult facility. Still, if you access the NGO’s webpage, you can virtually meet the victims and listen to their stories. Alyssa Beck, Laura Berry, Hernán Carvente Martinez, Jarrett Harper, Xavier McElrath-Bey, and Johnny Perez, were brave enough to come forward and share their stories so that others would not have to face similar experiences. The stories featured in Project Witness are real, but the experiences are depicted by actors, claims YouTube.

“As Senior Counsel on Civil and Human Rights, I wanted to wield technology for the greater humanitarian good. YouTube and Google have always been a tool for people to change their own narratives,” said Malika Saada Saar, YouTube Social Impact.

“For those watching, we ask: Who were you at 13 years of age? How would you feel if you were exposed to the conditions depicted in this film?” the NGO asks its audience on YouTube. Let us know what kind of effect this experience had upon your spirit!

Credits:

Google, YouTube, Campaign for Fair Sentencing of Youth (CFSY)