RUTH ROLLINS

South End

​

Co-founder of Operation LIPSTICK (Ladies Involved in Putting a Stop to Inner-City Killing) and a nationally recognized leader in addressing gun and community violence, Ruth Rollins brings healing and hope to women traumatized by the loss of a child or the incarceration of one. She believes that "What we do to one side we must do to another." She was also impacted on both ends having lost her son Warren Daniel “Danny” Hairston to murder in 2007 and having suffered in silence over another son’s incarceration.

 

Through We Are Better Together Warren Daniel Hairston Project (WAB2G), Ruth connects and uplifts women and girls who have endured such losses in an effort to stop the cycles of violence and victimization. She worked for years as a supervisor at Elizabeth Stone House, directing her expertise and energies to survivors of domestic violence and people in recovery. Her son’s unsolved murder launched her in a new direction. “I wanted to get involved in the prevention work. I wanted to know where these guns were coming from,” she said.

 

From trauma counseling and restorative justice workshops to its signature healing retreat, the work that WAB2G does “is spiritual and transformational,” she said. “When you have a mother of a loved one who has taken someone’s life asking forgiveness of a mother whose child was killed, just to see that! We are building community. These women begin their healing journeys with forgiveness and compassion."