Usually, it’s the other way around, but this time, the convict became the politician. For the first time in history, a former prisoner in New York’s prison system was elected to serve in its legislature, Reuters reports.
Fifty-three-year-old Eddie Gibbs was sworn in as a representative in the state legislature, about thirty years after he was released from prison after serving about three years on a manslaughter conviction.
When Gibbs was 17, he was attacked by a man in an elevator in the apartment building where he and his family lived. The man forced Gibbs to open a safe in the family’s apartment, but the only item in the safe was a gun, which Gibbs used to shoot and kill the man. Gibbs immediately turned himself in to police; he was later tried and convicted.
Gibbs won a special election in January to represent his East Harlem district in Albany. His goal in the state capitol: to help people transitioning out of incarceration.