Looking Inside Women with Life Sentences

Former public defender Sara Bennett spent over a decade photographing women convicted of homicide and sentenced to life in prison in New York State. Her long-term project traces the women's lives across time and space: inside prison walls, in their post-incarceration bedrooms, and as they re-enter the outside world after decades behind bars. Through intimate portraits and personal ephemera-Polaroids, letters, drawings, and handwritten notes-Bennett creates a layered narrative that offers a rare perspective, resisting stereotype. Looking Inside: Women with Life Sentences is a striking reminder of the complexity and humanity of women who are, and have always been, far more than the single act that sent them to prison for life. The publication is complemented by a powerful afterword by Judith Clark, who served 38 years in prison and is now Director of the Survivors Justice Project, alongside additional pictorial endnotes by Bennett that further expand the project's context.