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Who We Are

GINA’s Team, named for Gina Panetta who died while serving time in an Arizona prison, actively promotes education and self-sufficiency for incarcerated women and men in Arizona and the United States at no cost to the prisons. We bring volunteer community leaders, speakers and educators into our prisons to teach Life Skills subjects. Our volunteer programs provide inmates with much needed tools for re-entry, provide community members as roll models, and allow volunteers to see inmates as human beings. Our organization was co-founded by Gina's parents, Chris and Diane Panetta, and her prison roommate, Sue Ellen Allen.

Mission Statement:

GINA’s Team gets inmates needs addressed by contributing to inmate education, programming, and re-entry, thus creating better citizens, smoother re-entry and more peaceful communities both inside and out.

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The Slumber Party from Hell is a compelling memoir by our co-founder Sue Ellen Allen.
It is a bird’s eye view of her journey through prison and how she turned her pain into power.

Gina was her roommate.

Chapter 1

GINA

I was supposed to die, not Gina. She was only twenty-five. I was fifty-seven. She had her whole life in front of her. I thought mine was over. Why did she have to die? Why did I live to tell about it?

Early on the morning of December 12, 2002 I arrived at Perryville prison in a cold, white MCSO (Maricopa County Sheriff's Office) van with several other women. Besides my battle with breast cancer, I'd been up all night in the jail in a freezing cold concrete holding cell, and I was tired, anxious, and numb. I had no idea what was in store for me. It turned out to be an unforgettable journey, one that filled me with fear, sorrow, and joy. I met people I would in my previous life and experienced things I would not have believed possible. Some were horrific, demanding, and inhumane; some were wonderful. Gina was part of the wonderful...

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