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  • The Marshall Project

    Want to Escape a Criminal Past? Move to Alaska (Like I Did)

    After I left prison, nobody would hire me. So I threw a dart at a map.
    by J.T. Perkins Iii as told to Maurice Chammah May 04, 2018 4 minutes

    Alaska is full of people who moved here to get away from their criminal pasts. Maybe it’s the laws, maybe it’s the culture, or maybe it’s just the way you grow up hearing about how wild and free this place is. I came to Alaska to escape what Kansas was putting me through after I got out of prison.

    I’d been arrested in February 2009 for possession with “intent to sell” cocaine, within 1,000 feet of a school. I was in my mid-20’s, and it wasn’t my first trouble with the law—I’d been locked up for much of my teenage years

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