Book Review: Behind Crimmigration: ICE, Law Enforcement, and Resistance in America by Felicia Arriaga
| Published date | 01 August 2024 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/13624806241232287 |
| Author | Mirian G Martinez-Aranda |
| Date | 01 August 2024 |
conversationsat the reentry center, whichdetail the group’s organic orientat ion toward abo-
lition in the aftermath of Trayvon Martin’s death at the hands of George Zimmerman, the
exposition of the racist logics of criminal justice, and the failure of these systems of pun-
ishment at offering protection to the Black and brown people victimized by them.
Smiley’s deeply humanizing portraits from his years spent at this reentry service center
in Newark provide complexities and richness that can only be afforded by forming such
close relationships with community members. This allows readers to gain access to a
mural of lived experiences, including the humor people are able to find in their situations,
the ways people are able to carve out small spaces for themselves by bending rules and
hiding cellphonesat the reentry center, or creating secret Facebook profiles for the neces-
sarily secret but innocent purposes of reconnecting with lost family. These human por-
trayals also exposethe lunacy of the draconian restrictions placed upon people doing
reentry, suchas banning the phones and social mediathat facilitated these momentsof con-
nection. “Abolition”,thefinal chapter, iswhere this approach truly shines, as Smileyis able
to provide us with anabolitionist orientation throughthe perspective of those most directly
harmed by the prison system. Thinking through the necessary tensions of abolition, as a
praxis of world-building, takes us into the conversations of group members at this
reentry center, who weigh the promise of freedom imbued in a world withoutprison
with their own notions of justice, revenge, and trauma. As they weigh the nuances of an
abolitionistfuture in the aftermath of yet anothertargeted racialized killing, Smiley master-
fully weaves the abolitionist writings of Mariama Kaba, Angela Davis, Ruth Wilson
Gilmore, Dylan Rodriguez, and Dorothy Roberts into the conversations present at the
reentry center and the negotiations made by people through lived experience. The delicate
balance carved outbetween theories of abolition andtheir practice, in ways that compelus
to examine the stakes of abolition for those who have been dealt the worst of the carceral
state’s injustices, is nothing short of illuminating. One of the final stories in the book is a
touching encounter, in which Darren,one of the men from the reentry center,meets a long-
lost acquaintance at a festival and shares a brief but meaningful interaction with him. He
fills the reader in afterward, that the man he met was someone he had robbed decades
before, but afterlearning about the death of this man’s brother, he felt the needto reconcile,
take accountability, and move toward reconciliation. Knowing that the apology was
accepted, the story serves as an anchor of the new forms of relationality that abolitionist
praxis can produce. This is also a reminder of the humanity at the center of Smiley’s
book, which argues compellingly to abolish the structures and logics that focus on profit
over these and all humans—their futures and their flourishing.
Felicia Arriaga, Behind Crimmigration: ICE, Law Enforcement, and Resistance in America, The University
of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 2023; 173 pp.: 978-1-4696-7323-3, $27.95 (pbk)
Reviewed by: Mirian G Martinez-Aranda, University of California-Irvine, USA
Felicia Arriaga’s book Behind Crimmigration: ICE, Law Enforcement, and Resistance in
America offers an incisive look into the complexities of local immigration enforcement
practices in North Carolina. The central argument of the book highlights the significant
Book Reviews409
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