Meet the Board
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Harry Critchley (he/him) was, until his tragic passing on February 21, 2025, Co-Chair of ECPJS. We are heartbroken at the loss of our friend and colleague.
Please visit Harry 's memorial page. |
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Renford Farrier (he/him) became Co-Chair of ECPJS in 2025 following former co-chair Harry Critchley's passing. He is a Transition Support Worker with the John Howard Society of Nova Scotia, providing direct support and guidance to those who are transitioning back into the community from incarceration. In December 2023, with the help of PATH Legal, Renford was granted parole and released from Springhill Institution after more than three decades of incarceration- most of which was served in maximum security. He is dedicated to promoting awareness of and institutional accountability for racism, discrimination, and human rights abuses in the prison system, and to supporting others on their pathways to wellness and recovery. "Moving forward, I hope that I can put a dent in this steel wall that they have up.”
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Sheila Wildeman (she/her) is Co-Chair of ECPJS, a Professor of Law at the Schulich School of Law and Associate Director of the Dalhousie Health Justice Institute. Her research engages disability and prison justice. In 2023 she received a Nova Scotia Human Rights Award for her work connecting university-based research and resources with community justice movements, including through arts-based action research. Sheila has also served on the boards of Inclusion Nova Scotia and the Canadian Mental Health Association - Nova Scotia Division.
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El Jones is a poet, professor and activist. She is a two time National Spoken Word champion and was Halifax's Poet Laureate from 2013 to 2015. Her work focuses on social justice issues including feminism, prison abolition, anti-racism, and decolonization. She is an Assistant Professor at Mount Saint Vincent University and has also taught at Dalhousie University, Acadia University, Nova Scotia Community College, and Saint Mary's University. In 2017, she was named the 15th Nancy's Chair in Women's Studies at Mount Saint Vincent University.
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Randolph (Randy) Riley is a prison activist and writer from Cherry Brook, Nova Scotia. He is a co-founder of the Black Power Hour radio show collective on CKDU 88.1FM and is a research assistant with Dr OmiSoore Dryden, James R Johnston Chair of Black Canadian Studies, Faculty of Medicine at Dalhousie University.
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Tari Ajadi (he/him) is a PhD candidate in Political Science at Dalhousie University. His dissertation research compares how Black activists in municipalities in Nova Scotia and Ontario strategize to prompt change in policing and in health policy. A British-Nigerian immigrant to Canada, Tari aims to produce research that supports and engages with Black communities across the country. He has published articles in The Globe and Mail, The Chronicle-Herald, University Affairs, Canadian Government Executive, Canadian Diversity and The Tyee. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the Health Association of African Canadians. He is a Junior Fellow at the MacEachen Institute for Public Policy and Governance. He holds a MA in Political Science from Dalhousie University.
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Laura Beach (they/them) is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Law & Legal Studies at Carleton University. Dr. Beach is a broadly trained medical anthropologist with expertise in the areas of incarceration, mental health/illness, relations of care/caretaking, settler-colonialism, Indigenous – settler-state relations, critical legal studies, historiography, and ethnographic research methods. Dr. Beach’s doctoral research (based out of the University of Toronto) focused on relations of care within Saskatchewan’s carceral-corrections industry, drawing on twenty-two months of fieldwork, including participant observation, interviews with formerly incarcerated individuals and correctional staff, archival research, and personal insight as a volunteer guitar teacher and creative writing facilitator in federal and provincial prisons. Before joining the ECPJS Board of Directors, Dr. Beach was the Coordinator of the ECPJS Visiting Committee (2022-2024), supervising the toll-free phone line for incarcerated persons in Nova Scotia’s jails and undertaking individual and systemic advocacy toward improving conditions of confinement.
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Paniz Ghafari (she/her) is the Treasurer for East Coast Prison Justice Society. Paniz has an accounting background and works as a bookkeeper for a local law firm. Her prior volunteer experience includes service as an International Student Ambassador at the Nova Scotia Community College, assisting international students to access community resources and supports, and activities promoting the Sustainable Development Goals at NSCC.
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Shawnee Gregory is a staff lawyer at Nova Scotia Legal Aid. Her practice areas include criminal law, prison law and family law. She is a member of the Nova Scotia Criminal Lawyers Association, the South Shore Community Justice Society Board and the NSBS Provincial Court Liaison Committee. She was proud to be involved with ECPJS’s first monitoring group as her prisoner advocacy has been shaped by those with lived experience.
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Kylee Nunn has a professional background in frontline support work, restorative justice, and with research and advocacy on the subjects of exploitation, criminalization, IPV, GBV, and coercive control. She works with the Elizabeth Fry Society of Mainland Nova Scotia as the Abundance Program Manager to further their mission of reducing barriers for criminalized women and gender diverse people. Kylee is passionate about transforming the conditions of society which perpetuate violence and pushing for systemic change.
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Asaf Rashid practices criminal, immigration and prison law under Asaf Rashid Law in Halifax / k’jipuktuk. He is a member of the Canadian Prison Lawyers Association and Nova Scotia Criminal Lawyers Association. He is also a former union organizer and author of Solidarity Beyond Bars: unionizing prison labour, published in 2022 by Fernwood publishing.
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Laura Conrod is the Communications Director for ECPJS. Laura started volunteering with ECPJS in 2021 and was voted in as a member of the Board in 2024. Laura was called to get involved in social justice when she read about the violent assault by Halifax Regional Police officers upon Santina Rao in front of her children at a Walmart in her community. Laura is passionate about amplifying the work and voices of ECPJS, and dreams of a world where there are no prisons, but where love and healing reign instead.
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Sarah Joynt-Bowe (she/they) is a communications and narrative strategist supporting movements for social and climate justice across the US, Canada, UK and Europe. She is currently Director of Communication Strategy at Healing Justice Ldn and works as a consulting director of communications and narrative change for grassroots groups and organizations supporting them to deepen their impact and transform how we make meaning in the world. She brings 20 years of communications strategy experience alongside her experience as an organizer in migrant justice, abolitionist, and anti-racist social movements.
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Suzanne Patels is a Mi'kmaw rights advocate, legal scholar, and community leader whose journey from frontline activism to legal reform embodies the spirit of justice and resistance. A proud Mi'kmaw woman from Eskasoni First Nation, who has long been a powerful voice for Indigenous sovereignty, environmental protection, and prison justice. Her activism gained national attention during the 2013 anti-fracking protests near Elsipogtog First Nation in New Brunswick, facing arrest on several occasions. Her actions - rooted in ceremony and resistance - led to her inclusion on the RCMP's controversial "Protect Sitka" watch list of Indigenous activists. Rather than being deterred, Suzanne transformed this experience into fuel for systemic change. She pursued legal studies at the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University, graduating in 2025 and specializing in Criminal Justice and Aboriginal and Indigenous Law; also receiving the Donald Marshall Jr. Memorial Award; an honour named after the Mi'kmaw man whose wrongful conviction catalyzed major reforms in the Canadian justice system.
Suzanne's work bridges grassroots advocacy and institutional reform. She is committed to dismantling colonial structures within the legal system and amplifying the voices of criminalized and incarcerated peoples. Her lived experience as a land defender and legal training uniquely position her to challenge injustices from both outside and within the system. |
