DUNKED ON

Advocates Pressure NBA Owners Over Tom Gores’ Prison-Industry Company

A full-page ad in The New York Times aims to get him to divest from Securus Technologies—or be forced to sell the Detroit Pistons.

The pressure is on for billionaire Tom Gores to divest from prison-industry company Securus Technologies—or for the NBA to force him to sell the Detroit Pistons. As Bloomberg reports, criminal justice advocates took out a full-page ad in Sunday’s New York Times addressed to the other owners of NBA teams. “If Black Lives Matter, what are you doing about Detroit Pistons owner Tom Gores?” it reads. Securus provides communications technology to prisons and has been accused of gouging inmates and their families and profiting off mass incarceration. Gores, who bought the company in 2017, has said he is committed to reforming its practices, but he has already had to resign from the board of the L.A. County Museum of Art over the controversy.