The Redemption Ventures Story
November 2014
Glenn E. Martin founds JustLeadershipUSA
Glenn founded JustLeadershipUSA, an organization dedicated to empowering justice-system-impacted individuals by providing rigorous training for leadership positions, raising the bar, and equipping them with the support they need to succeed.
Through this work, Glenn helped shape the national conversation around justice reform with a focus on advocacy and policy.
2022
Divine founds Solvent
Victor “Divine” Lombard founds Solvent, a fintech company focused on improving financial access, credit, and financial literacy for system-impacted individuals. Solvent addresses a clear issue: many returning citizens are excluded from financial institutions, creating a deprivation that underpins reentry rates.
Through this work, Divine gains a clear perspective: entrepreneurship can provide independence, but access to it remains limited.
Fall 2022
Ron Bauer begins mentoring Divine through Village Capital
While developing Solvent, Divine is mentored by Ron through the program Village Capital. This mentorship provides industry guidance and support.
Around the same time, Ron connects with Glenn through shared work in criminal justice reform.
Across these relationships, a pattern becomes clear. The system supports reentry, but entrepreneurship on a serious level is rare.
May 2025
The idea
Through their combined experience in justice reform, entrepreneurship, and mentorship, Glenn, Divine, and Ron come up with an idea to change the conversation around reentry and entrepreneurship in order to combat recidivism.
They realized that most non-profit efforts around reentry focus on short-term training and education, but few take action or risks by giving grants to formerly incarcerated founders, and that most incubators, accelerators, or non-profit educational organizations match founders with mentors who do not understand what it means to be formerly incarcerated.
They begin to develop a mission:
What if some formerly incarcerated people were supported as entrepreneurs rather than retrained to enter a workforce that second-guesses them at every juncture?
2025
Building Redemption Ventures
The Redemption Ventures model is created. A system that supports recently incarcerated entrepreneurs from conception to success, combining grants of up to $30,000 and structured mentorship to push the conversation around reentry to new heights.
Unlike traditional programs, Redemption Ventures focuses on business creation and economic participation, not just preparation.
© Redemption Ventures