The Real Cost of Prisons Weblog

June 27, 2009

Ruling could aid Pennsylvania prison lifers seeking release

The big word in the headline is COULD.
Lois

Posted on Fri, Jun. 26, 2009
Ruling could aid Pa. prison lifers seeking release
PETER JACKSON
The Associated Press

HARRISBURG, Pa. - A federal judge has reaffirmed a ruling that could make it easier for inmates serving life sentences in Pennsylvania prisons to get commutation requests considered by the governor.

The ruling by U.S. District Judge A. Richard Caputo in Scranton could affect hundreds of lifers who committed their crimes before voters amended the state constitution in November 1997 to toughen the standards for clemency requests from lifers.

The amendment, part of an anti-crime package advocated by then-Gov. Tom Ridge, requires the unanimous approval of the state Pardons Board before a commutation is recommended to the governor , allowing a single board member to block a commutation. Before that, only a majority vote by the five-member board was needed.

In the latest ruling on a lawsuit filed by the Pennsylvania Prison Society, Caputo reiterated that applying the stricter rules to inmates convicted of crimes committed before the 1997 referendum amounted to unconstitutional, ex post facto punishment.

Caputo initially decided the case in 2006. The state appealed, and the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals remanded the case to Caputo in 2007 to determine whether several inmates, citizens and groups that had joined the case as plaintiffs had sustained a legal injury that entitled them to participate.

In his June 11 ruling, Caputo dismissed all plaintiffs except for the prison society.

He also reaffirmed his conclusion about the disparate treatment of lifers seeking commutations, although lawyers in the case said the circuit court has not scrutinized that issue.

Only three life sentences have been commuted in the 12 years since the referendum, according to Bill DiMascio, executive director of the prison society, the nation's oldest prisoner advocacy group. In the three preceding decades, he said, such commutations were granted, on average, 10 times a year.

Members of the prison board "are hearing very few cases and very few of them are getting a majority vote," so complying with the ruling would not result in the "wholesale release" of murderers, he said.

Gov. Ed Rendell and state Attorney General Tom Corbett are among the state officials discussing whether to appeal Caputo's decision, their spokesmen said.

DiMascio said he was disappointed that Caputo did not order the pardons board to forward commutation requests from two lifers whose crimes were committed before 1997 , Jackie Lee Thompson and Keith O. Smith , and whose requests were denied even though they were approved by 4-1 votes of the board several years ago.

John Heaton, secretary of the pardons board, said any action on the requests would be premature because the 30-day appeal period is pending.

Members of the board are Corbett, Lt. Gov. Joe Scarnati, psychologist Russell A. Walsh, victim representative Louise B. Williams and corrections expert John E. Wetzel.
http://www.philly.com/philly/wires/ap/news/state/pennsylvania/20090626_ap_rulingcouldaidpaprisonlifersseekingrelease.html

Posted by lois at 11:24 AM | Comments (0)

June 25, 2009

FL: Powerful business lobby calls for a halt to prison construction & change in sentencing policies

Change sought in Florida prison system
A movement among powerful Florida leaders to overhaul the state's prison system is gaining steam as lawmakers grapple with shrinking resources.

BY CAROL MARBIN MILLER
Miami Herald
06.24.09

A call by Florida's most powerful business lobby to halt prison construction and reform the criminal justice system is gaining surprising traction among policymakers in the wake of a deepening budget crisis and growing evidence that building new prison beds will not reduce crime.

Four months after the head of Associated Industries of Florida stunned lawmakers with his plea to slow prison growth, a who's-who of business, religious and political leaders are asking Gov. Charlie Crist to consider alternatives to incarceration for non-violent offenders, particularly drug addicts.

Crist and state lawmakers this week received an ''open letter'' from opinion-makers calling for a ``bold and serious conversation about justice reform.''

The statement was signed by three former Florida attorneys general -- Jim Smith, Bob Butterworth and Richard Doran -- along with retired Department of Corrections secretary James McDonough and the heads of the Florida Association of Counties and the Florida Catholic Conference.

''At a time when Florida is in serious recession and facing a deep state budget crisis, the $2 billion-plus budget of the Florida Department of Corrections has grown larger; and without reform, that budget will continue to grow at a pace that crowds out other mission-critical state services such as education, human service needs, and environmental protection,'' the group wrote.

Calling itself the Coalition for Smart Justice, the group is asking state leaders to bolster education, drug and alcohol treatment and faith-based and character-building programs both within the state prison system and in community settings as an alternative to prison.

Coalition members also want Crist to ''immediately implement'' a bill passed by the Legislature in 2008 that created ''the much needed'' Correctional Policy Advisory Council to offer new directions for criminal justice administration.

Staying the course, coalition members wrote, will lead to ``too many non-violent individuals being incarcerated, too many prisons needing to be built at astounding public cost [and] too many young people moving from the juvenile justice system into the adult justice system.''

BREAKING CYCLE

At the root of the state's failures, the group says, is the unwillingness of lawmakers to invest in programs -- such as job training, education and substance-abuse treatment -- that can break the cycle of crime and reduce recidivism.

McDonough, the state's former drug czar and prisons chief, said Florida can avoid the need to build a new $100 million prison each year by spending one-fifth that amount on drug treatment. ''The math is irrefutable,'' McDonough said. ``That's $100 million right there that you don't have to spend immediately.''

Gretl Plessinger, DOC's spokeswoman, said the equation is far more complicated. Since the prison system runs on a five-year cycle based on ''strategic projections,'' the corrections agency cannot simply ``stop construction on a dime.''

''Several projects are nearing completion,'' Plessinger said. ``We've already spent money, and to stop construction now would cost taxpayers quite a lot of money.''

DOC Secretary Walter McNeil does not favor the early release of inmates, Plessinger said, but does agree with the coalition's goal of increased spending on drug treatment and other programs designed to aid offenders' safe return to their communities. Close to 90 percent of state inmates eventually are released, she said.

''Secretary McNeil knows inmates who receive basic education, job skills training and substance abuse treatment are less likely to commit another crime and return to prison,'' Plessinger said. ``Through re-entry [programs], we can reduce our recidivism rate which will increase public safety and lower our inmate population.''

Sterling Ivey, a Crist spokesman, declined to discuss the letter in depth. ''We have received the letter and we are currently reviewing the information,'' he said.

A driving force in the coalition is J. Allison DeFoor II, an admittedly unlikely prison reform activist as a former Monroe County sheriff, prosecutor, judge and reelection running mate for former Gov. Bob Martinez. Now an ordained Episcopal priest, the colorful politician tends a ministry at Wakulla Correctional Institution near Tallahassee.

Among DeFoor's gripes: though faith-based programs at Wakulla have reduced recidivism among inmates from 33 percent to just 7 percent, Florida's waiting list for such programs has grown to 10,000-strong. ''I've seen everything that doesn't work,'' he says. ``And I've seen what does work.''

''I can flatly tell you that 75 percent of the people in the system -- probably more than that -- have substance abuse and psychological problems,'' and treatment, education and counseling can help many of those men and women stay out of prison, he said.

PREVENTION

Butterworth, a former Broward sheriff, prosecutor and 20-year attorney general, said his two-year stint as secretary of the Department of Children & Families reinforced his belief in the value of prevention dollars -- which are typically the first to be cut during lean years.

''Sometimes the worst dollar we spend,'' Butterworth said, ``pays for bricks and mortar.''

Florida still will need prisons for violent felons, Butterworth said. But spending $1 billion over the next decade to build new prisons for drug addicts and people with mental illness, he added, is ``nuts. There's just got to be a better way.''

Steve Seibert, a former Pinellas County commissioner and secretary of the Deparment of Community Affairs under Gov. Jeb Bush, said he discovered another reason for reform while touring an Overtown community center: Leaders told him 70 percent of the neighborhood's men were ex-felons.

'That was an `Aha' moment for me,'' said Seibert, who as director of policy for the Collins Center for Public Policy is a coalition leader.

``All the affordable housing, economic development, parks, water and infrastructure-type stuff doesn't mean squat when 70 percent of the men in a community are ex-felons.''

And most Americans appear to agree with him. A just-released poll by the National Council on Crime and Delinquency showed that nearly eight in 10 Americans favor probation, restitution and community service over prison for ''nonserious, nonviolent, nonsexual'' offenders.

McDonough, who calls himself a pragmatist, said that ultimately the most powerful winds steering reform are financial.

''I think the recession probably will bring the pendulum swing to its highest point and it will start to swing the other way,'' he said. ``Legislators don't want to spend that much money.''

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/florida/v-fullstory/story/1111002.html

Posted by lois at 08:40 PM | Comments (0)

June 22, 2009

CO: Independent Ideas: Prison spending still shackles state budget Until sentencing laws change, not much can be done

Independent Ideas: Prison spending still shackles state budget
Until sentencing laws change, not much can be done

By By Mike Krause, For the Colorado Daily

Sunday, June 21, 2009

On June 3, Gov. Bill Ritter signed Senate Bill 228, repealing the statutory spending limitation (the Bird-Arveschoug Act) that held the annual increase in general fund spending in Colorado to 6 percent.

But before anyone gets all teary-eyed -- whether from joy or sorrow -- because the majority Democrats in the Legislature finally will have the budgetary flexibility to spend as they see fit, take a breath.

Recent history shows that prison spending in Colorado, and the sentencing polices that drive that spending, has been constraining state spending for decades, and will continue to do so into the near future.

In 1985, the Legislature doubled the maximum penalties in Colorado's presumptive sentencing range for all levels of felony crimes. The average sentence length quickly increased by two-thirds, and Colorado's inmate population more than doubled in the next five years.

It has more than doubled again since.

In an effort to keep pace with the capacity demands of such unprecedented growth in the prison population, successive legislatures and governors have taken Colorado taxpayers on an extreme prison spending spree that has pushed corrections spending from less than 3 percent to nearly 9 percent of general fund spending.

It is a simple formula, but a dramatic increase in spending for one item as a percentage of the state's general fund (prisons) necessarily means that other spending items (such as health care and higher education) have had to decrease as a percentage of general fund appropriation.

This year's Joint Budget Committee budget briefing notes that in the 16 years since Colorado lawmakers implemented the 6 percent spending limit, prison spending has grown "at a compound annual rate of 9.5 percent." If prison spending had actually been held to the 6 percent growth, then last year's Department of Corrections operating budget would have been around $430 million; instead it was nearly $677 million.

So the current opportunity cost of Colorado's extreme prison spending spree is a quarter billion dollars that could have been spent on health care and higher education.

This year's budget increased prison spending by around 3 percent, and while this is considerably less than the more than 9 percent increase originally requested by, it is likely not nearly enough to allow the Department of Corrections to keep pace with the ever growing prison population. Despite a recent slowing trend, projections still estimate thousands more inmates by 2012, which in turn demands many more millions in new prison spending.

Spending doesn't drive the prison population, rather the prison population drives state spending. So regardless of what lawmakers do with the prison budget next session, inmates will keep showing up at the door. The Legislature's ability to affect prison spending lies in its prerogative to write sentencing law and policy

The fact that the Democrat majority had to take the axe to general fund spending items such as higher education and health care this year had little to do with the 6-percent spending limitation and everything to do with fiscally irresponsible prison spending.

And until such time as Colorado lawmakers find the will to make meaningful sentencing law reforms, this will continue to be the case.

Mike Krause directs the Justice Policy Initiative at the Independence Institute.
http://www.coloradodaily.com/news/2009/jun/21/prison-spending-still-shackles-state-budget/

Posted by lois at 09:36 AM | Comments (0)

June 19, 2009

MA Bar Association Drug Policy Task Force report on The Failure of the War on Drugs"

Massachusetts Bar Association's Drug Policy Task Force issued a major report, "The Failure of the War on Drugs: Charting a New Course for the Commonwealth." The report urges the Legislature to reform the state's approach to drug prevention, treatment and punishment. "Changing policies from emphasis on incarceration to more encouragement for treatment would allow us to save money, reduce crime, and rebuild families and communities."
Recommendations for reform. The Task Force's recommendations to reform mandatory minimum sentences are the same ones that FAMM supports: allowing drug offenders to apply for parole, work release and earned "good time" deductions, reducing "school zones" to 100 feet, eliminating mandatory sentences for school zone offenders (who will still be punished for the underlying offense) and allowing school zone sentences to be served concurrently with another sentence.
http://www.massbar.org/media/520275/drug%20policy%20task%20force%20final%20report.pdf

Posted by lois at 05:52 PM | Comments (0)

June 14, 2009

Testimony at Senate Hearing on national prison reform Commission introduced by Jim Webb

Testimony at Senate Hearing on national prison reform
June 13,2009

The U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs convened a hearing on proposed national prison reform legislation. Virginia Senator Jim Webb introduced bill S.714 in March to create a commission to thoroughly review the entire criminal justice system and make recommendations for reform in several areas of significant concern.

Since being introduced, the bill already has widespread support with 29 cosponsors in the Senate including Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Chairman of the Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs Senator Arlen Specter (D-PA) and Ranking Member Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC), and Judiciary Committee member Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT). Numerous organizations, currently numbering 42, now endorse the legislative endeavor with interest continuing to expand as public awareness increases.

Other than Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Senator Kay Hagan (D-NC), Senator Mary L. Landrieu (D-LA), and Senator Mark R. Warner (D-VA), no other senators from the southeastern states, including Georgia and Florida, have as yet expressed their support for this bill as cosponsors.

Speaking at the June 11 hearing, entitled “Exploring the National Criminal Justice Act of 2009,” Senator Webb compared the condition of the criminal justice system to be no less critical than have been the 9/11 attacks in New York and Washington, D.C. and the economic crisis the country faces. The senator asserts, “…the disintegration of this system, day by day and year by year, and the movement toward mass incarceration, with very little attention being paid to clear standards of prison administration or meaningful avenues of re-entry for those who have served their time, is dramatically affecting millions of lives, draining billions of dollars from our economy, destroying notions of neighborhood and family in hundreds of communities across the country….” The proposed legislation is the first major effort to examine and reform the United States criminal justice system in more than forty years.

“We need to take a comprehensive look at our criminal justice system…. As a nation, we can spend our money more effectively, reduce crime and violence, reduce the prison population, and create a fairer system. It is time to take stock of what is broken and what works and modify our criminal justice policies accordingly.” (See related article: ‘Pew “1 in 31” report on corrections: Challenges and opportunities.’)

Collaboration between Senator Webb’s office and more than 100 organizations that represent prosecutors, judges, defense lawyers, former offenders, advocacy groups, think tanks, victims’ rights organizations, academics, prisoners, law enforcement, and numerous church organizations has generated significant interest and support for advancing this legislation.

Several experts in the legal, law enforcement, and volunteer services communities testified at the hearing, including Chief William Bratton of the Los Angeles Police Department, Professor Charles J. Ogletree of Harvard Law School, Pat Nolan, Vice President of the Prison Fellowship, and Brian W. Walsh, Senior Legal Research Fellow at the Center for Legal and Judicial Studies of The Heritage Foundation.

Serving as vice president of the volunteer service organization the Prison Fellowship, Pat Nolan testified, “My work has given me a close up view of our criminal justice system across the country; and I must tell you our prisons are in crisis. Corrections budgets are literally eating up state budgets, siphoning off money that could be going to schools, roads and hospitals. The crisis in our criminal justice system is national in scope; and only a national commission can conduct the type of review that will help guide us into better policies and safer communities.”

Brian W. Walsh with The Heritage Foundation encouraged support in saying, “Reform experts who are serious about criminal-justice reform should draw encouragement from Senator Webb’s efforts to date to reach out to elected officials on both sides of the aisle and to criminal-justice reform advocates across the conservative-to-liberal spectrum.”
http://www.examiner.com/x-7357-Atlanta-Criminal-Rehabilitation-Examiner~y2009m6d13-Testimony-at-Senate-Hearing-on-national-prison-reform

Posted by lois at 10:16 AM | Comments (0)

June 04, 2009

Foes of Rockefeller Drug Law Reform Attack Recent Changes By False Charges of Threats to Public Safety by Judges Sealing Records

From the Center for Community Alternatives (NY)
Those opposed to the recently enacted Rockefeller Drug Law Reform have seized upon a small, but important aspect of the legislation - conditional sealing - as a way to attack the recent reforms and create the misperception that drug law reform will diminish public safety. Their criticism overlooks the fact that the conditional sealing legislation is an important tool for fostering New York's commitment to promoting public safety by ensuring the successful and productive reentry of people with criminal history records into our communities - a commitment best demonstrated by the 2006 amendment to the Penal Law establishing reentry and reintegration as a sentencing goal. Ultimately, conditional sealing is a well-considered mechanism for ensuring that people who have demonstrated a commitment to their rehabilitation (by completing substance abuse treatment and a court-imposed sentence) will have a fair opportunity at employment, housing, education, and other aspects of full community membership. For a reasoned response to the misperceptions created by opponents to drug law reform and an explanation of how conditional sealing can enhance public safety, click here.
http://www.communityalternatives.org/pdf/conditionalSealingResponse.pdf

Posted by lois at 05:44 PM | Comments (0)

June 02, 2009

New Poll Shows the Public Largely in Favor of Alternatives to Prison and Jail as a Response to Nonserious Offenses

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE- The National Council on Crime and Delinquency (NCCD)
Oakland, CA, June 2, 2009
New Poll Shows the Public Largely in Favor of Alternatives to Prison and Jail as a Response to Nonserious Offenses

The National Council on Crime and Delinquency (NCCD) has just released the results of a public opinion poll on attitudes toward nonserious, nonviolent, nonsexual crime and the appropriate sanctions in such cases. Across most demographic groups, the public feels that alternatives to prison and jail benefit society rather than hurt it.

Some of the key poll results are as follows:

* Eight in ten (77%) adults believe the most appropriate sentence for nonviolent, nonserious offenders is supervised probation, restitution, community service, and/or rehabilitative services; if an offender fails in these alternatives, then prison or jail may be appropriate.
* Over three-quarters (77%) believe alternatives to incarceration do not decrease public safety.
* More than half (55%) believe alternatives to prison or jail decrease costs to state and local governments.
* US adults more often think alternatives to incarceration are more effective than prison or jail time at reducing recidivism (45% vs. 38%).
* Respondents cited a variety of reasons they believe justify sending fewer people to prison or jail, including expense, overcrowding (danger to guards, danger to inmates), the ability of proven alternatives to reduce crime, and the fairness of the punishment relative to the crime.

The poll was conducted by Zogby International in April, 2009. The margin of error is +/- 3.1 percentage points.

This report is available on NCCD’s website at: http://www.nccd-crc.org/nccd/pubs/2009_focus_nonserious_offenders.pdf

Posted by lois at 07:16 PM | Comments (0)

May 29, 2009

Interfaith group seeks second chance for youths sentenced to life The coalition delivers a message of redemption in sermons at some 200 California churches, synagogues and mosques.

Interfaith group seeks second chance for youths sentenced to life
The coalition delivers a message of redemption in sermons at some 200 California churches, synagogues and mosques.
By Dana Parsons
May 25, 2009
The major faith traditions teach that the young are special in the eyes of the Almighty. So what does God do when one of them commits a horrible crime and is consigned to a life in prison?

He cries.

That was the message delivered over Memorial Day weekend at some 200 churches, synagogues and mosques around the state by an interfaith coalition trying to change people's attitudes about long sentences for juveniles -- especially those facing life without the possibility of parole.

"When children commit certain actions, we stop thinking of them as children," Javier Stauring, director of Faith Communities for Families and Children, told a group of about 90 people Sunday at All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena. "We start fearing them, we start demonizing them."

The Bible virtually sanctifies children. That doesn't change, Stauring suggested, when the legal system tries a young teenager as an adult. While not condoning their crimes, Stauring said a society with redemption in mind would not foreclose a second chance to someone so young.

"It's a lot easier to lock up a problem and throw away the key and not have to think about it, and to think that's going to make us safer," he said. What will make society safer from young criminals, Stauring said, is going after the "layers of woundedness" that often afflict them -- wounds that may stem from violence or abuse.

In an interview before he spoke Sunday, the 47-year-old Stauring said he met his first juvenile inmate 18 years ago while volunteering through his church. Now a lay chaplain, Stauring said he wasn't particularly religious when he volunteered.

"I now consider that a blessing," he said of the experience. "I formed my vision of God. We find him in the fringes. That's where, if we look at Jesus as a model, that's who he hung around with."

Stauring shared the microphone Sunday with Elias Elizondo, who took a plea bargain 16 years ago on a murder charge that got him a sentence of 15 years to life instead of life without parole. Now 32 and living in Sun Valley, Elizondo was paroled four months ago and said he's a different person than he was at 16.

"I don't justify my actions," he said, without explaining the details of the crime. He told the group that he not only deserved prison but that, at the time, he wasn't sure he ever should be released. Only when he matured, he said, did he realize that he could change course. Instead of blaming other people or his education, which stopped at sixth grade, he set out to improve himself.

"I started thinking, 'Is it possible I could turn my life around?' "

The answer, Elizondo said, was yes. "The parole board gave me a chance when it didn't have to," he said. "I was redeemable."

Elizondo is the kind of person Stauring's group wants to reach. The coalition is advocating for state Senate Bill 399, which would permit anyone under 18 sentenced to life without parole to ask for resentencing after serving 10 years. If the inmate met certain conditions, he or she could be eligible for a new sentence of 25 years to life.

Even that seemingly small window, Stauring said, would give hope to the still-young person.

The coalition's efforts are aligned with Human Rights Watch, an international organization that has called on Congress to end life-without-parole sentencing for young offenders. "Sentencing juveniles to die in prison is cruel, costly and unnecessary," the organization's U.S. program director said this month.

The group reported that at least 2,574 inmates in the United States were sentenced to life without parole for crimes committed before the age of 18. California has 250 of them. The United States is the only country that imposes such harsh sentences on juveniles.

Stauring knows the statistics but said the holy books of Christianity, Judaism and Islam are his references on the subject.

"This comes from our faith convictions," he said, "that we should never ever give up on a child -- children are always changing -- and that we should not look at them and declare that the worst thing they did as a child is how we're going to label them for the rest of their lives."
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-juvenile-justice25-2009may25,0,7391881.story

Posted by lois at 05:04 PM | Comments (0)

May 13, 2009

Congressional Black Caucus Justice and Civil Rights Taskforce and Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race & Justice at Harvard Law School presents Rethinking Federal Sentencing Policy: 25th Anniversary of the Sentencing Reform Act.

Congressional Black Caucus Justice and Civil Rights Taskforce and Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race & Justice at Harvard Law School presents Rethinking Federal Sentencing Policy: 25th Anniversary of the Sentencing Reform Act.
Start: 2009/06/24 - 4:00pm
End: 2009/06/24 - 7:00pm
Schedule:

Welcome and Opening remarks by
Rep. Danny Davis (5 minutes)
Rep. Charles Rangel (5 minutes)

Welcome and Introduction of A.G. by CBC Justice & Civil Rights Task Force, Rep. John Conyers (5-10 minutes)

Remarks by Eric Holder, Attorney General (15 minutes), U.S. Department of Justice

Introduction of Justice O’Connor by Sen. Patrick Leahy, Charles Hamilton Houston, Institute for Race & Justice (5 minutes)

Remarks by Hon. Sandra Day O’Connor (15 minutes), Supreme Court of the United States

Mandatory Minimums
Panel One: Rep Maxine Waters (CA) History of Mandatory Minimums

Hon. Terry Hatter, Judge, U.S. District Court for the Central District of California
Hon. J. Spencer Letts, Senior Judge, U.S. District Court for the Central District of California
Eric Sterling, President, Criminal Justice Policy Foundation
Charles E. Black, formerly Incarcerated

Panel Two: Rep. Bobby Scott (VA) the need for repeal and how to repeal, including legislative update

Hon. Ann Williams, Circuit Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals, 7th Circuit
A.J. Kramer, Federal Defender, Federal Public Defender of the District of Columbia
Julie Stewart, President, Families Against Mandatory Minimums

Disparity between Crack and Powder Cocaine
Panel Three: Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (TX)

Hon. Reggie B. Walton, Judge, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia
Hon. William Sessions, Vice Chairman, U.S. Sentencing Commission
Brace Nicholson, Legislative Counsel, American Bar Association
David Kirby, Former United States Attorney for the District of Vermont

Good Time

Panel Four: Rep. Danny K. Davis (IL)

Hon. Consuelo B. Marshall, Senior Judge, U.S. District Court for Central District of California
Nancy Gertner, Judge, U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts
Marc Mauer, Executive Director, Sentencing Project
Harley G. Lappin, Director, Federal Bureau of Prisons (Discuss overcrowding)
U.S. House of Representatives -- Committee on Ways and Means
1100 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC
United States

Posted by lois at 12:58 PM | Comments (0)

May 12, 2009

Life Sentence for Juveniles?

May 12, 2009
Letter to the Editor, NY Times
Life Sentence for Juveniles?

To the Editor:

Re “Justices Agree to Take Up Life-Without-Parole Sentences for Young Offenders” (news article, May 5):

There are currently almost 2,500 people serving sentences of life without parole for crimes committed before age 18. Fifty-nine percent received their sentences for their first-ever criminal conviction. Sixteen percent were between 13 and 15 when they committed their crimes, and 26 percent were sentenced under a felony murder charge where their offenses did not involve carrying a weapon or pulling a trigger.

Our society recognizes that juveniles differ from adults in their thinking, reasoning and decision-making capacities. Research also demonstrates that adolescents actually use their brains in fundamentally different ways from adults. As a result, they are more likely to act on impulse, without fully considering the consequences of their actions.

This fall, the Supreme Court will decide if juvenile offenders should be eligible for life without parole. One hopes they will concur with the growing public sentiment that it’s time to stop sentencing young people to die in jail.

David Fassler
Burlington, Vt., May 5, 2009

The writer is a clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of Vermont.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/12/opinio/l12juvenile.html?ref=opinion

Posted by lois at 08:52 PM | Comments (0)

NY: AFTER 'ROCK' REFORM: WHAT HAPPENS TO REHAB?

AFTER 'ROCK' REFORM: WHAT HAPPENS TO REHAB?
Expanded drug courts and holistic re-entry planning are under discussion, along with up to 3,000 more slots for addiction treatment.
By Casey Samulski
City Limits WEEKLY #686
May 11, 2009

Now that New York state's Rockefeller drug laws have been reformed, mandatory prison sentences no longer come with convictions for any but the highest level of non-violent offenders found guilty of drug possession. Now judges can send drug addicts who would have gone to prison to treatment programs instead. Viewing addiction more often as an affliction rather than a crime – better treated through rehabilitation than confinement – will mean a stream of new clients at drug rehab centers, which are planning for the influx.

Under the reforms, an additional 1,000 to 2,000 offenders per year could be diverted from prison to drug treatment, raising questions around the state about how to handle the increased caseload. Gov. Paterson recently announced the creation of a group called ACTION – the Addictions Collaborative to Improve Outcomes for New York – a council of commissioners from 20 state agencies as well as the nonprofit and private sectors. Its mandate is to identify “ways in which statutes, regulations, rules and policies may be revised in order to promote addiction prevention, treatment and recovery efforts.”

Accompanying the planning group is an additional $50 million appropriation for treatment to be disbursed through the state Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services (OASAS,) which regulates and certifies all operating drug treatment centers in the state. Over 1,500 certified treatment centers work with an estimated 110,000 New Yorkers every day. The state currently spends close to $2 billion annually – across a number of agencies – on substance abuse, treatment, and recovery, and the new funding is an addition to OASAS’ current $713 million budget. The $50 million will be distributed over the next three years to help build and improve residential and outpatient capacity, to help treatment networks to meet the increased demand that's anticipated.

OASAS Commissioner Karen Carpenter-Palumbo praised the changes to the Rockefeller laws, congratulating the governor in an interview for “leading the country,” calling the changes a “landmark reform.” Carpenter-Palumbo expressed confidence that the additional funding would cover increased use of the treatment system, saying, “I’m confident we have the resources we need to make it real.”

While recidivism for those who successfully finish a course of treatment is on average far lower than for those who have been imprisoned, the commissioner called addiction “a chronic illness.”

“There is no magic bullet,” she said. “Some people do relapse.”

It is organizations like Phoenix House that will be recipients of the additional funding. Phoenix House is a network of treatment centers spread across nine states, including New York. It runs more than 120 programs for drug and alcohol treatment and prevention and serves about 7,000 individuals every day, treating everyone from adolescents to the homeless; in New York alone it serves 2,400 individuals per day.

Norwig Debye-Saxinger, vice president and director of public policy and government relations at the New York office, said it's too early to tell what effect the changed policies will have on his organization. Of the increased funding, he said, "Percentage-wise it’s not a big increase, but it’s hard to tell how many additional people will be diverted.” Debye-Saxinger has heard estimates ranging from as few as 600 to as many as 3,000 additional offenders entering treatment.

As rehab facilities acclimate, OASAS may be urged to consider temporarily waiving space regulations to help increase capacity faster. “The only regulations that might need tweaking are the physical plant standards that require a certain square footage per client,” he said, suggesting that returning to the lower standard from before 2002 would help build additional treatment space faster.

Working in an advisory capacity to ACTION will be the National Association of Drug Court Professionals, who help in the training, startup, and organization of drug courts across the country. Judge John Schwartz, founder of New York’s first drug court in Rochester and former chairman of the drug court association's board, reached out to the governor to be a part of the council in helping with ACTION. Schwartz says that while New York has a drug court for every county – one of the largest systems in the country – he anticipated that his group would be advocating to improve and expand the drug court system. “Everyone who fits the criteria should be given the opportunity” to be assessed for treatment, he said.

Drug courts function as the intermediary between the criminal justice system and the drug treatment network, strategizing side by side with treatment professionals to determine the best course of action for those diverted from prison. “It’s not the normal courtroom that one thinks of,” Schwartz said. “It’s really a treatment court. Treatment services are provided right through the court system.”

Schwartz said increasing the capacity of the drug court system, making more courts, making them larger, and thus making them able to divert more people from prison would actually save the state money. “It costs about $6,000 for a drug court placement compared to $30,000 for staying in prison,” he explained.

Dr. David Deitch, senior vice president and chief clinical officer of Phoenix House, explained his concerns for those in need of treatment but already imprisoned. He called the Rockefeller reforms “enlightened legislation” but warned that the effort could be “tossed on its rear end if indeed people are released and commit crimes simply because they are returning to a lifestyle of drug-seeking and drug-taking behavior.”

Deitch was adamant that a part of preventing this sort of cycle would be treatment options for those nearing the end of their sentence. He said, “Providers like Phoenix ought to be given the opportunity to case manage those who are due for release" – thus helping an individual re-enter society and deal with issues like welfare, mental health, employment, housing, and family reunification.

This is the sort of cooperation with the prison system that Deitch and others would like to see expanded even further by the ACTION council, particularly for those individuals who may achieve retroactive release if their crimes fall under the guidelines for a diversionary treatment program. The transition of taking people out of prison and into treatment can be a difficult one, he said. “Most offenders after years in prison are not interested in being committed to a mental health program.”

Deitch is not the only one thinking long-term. When discussing aftercare and case management, Commissioner Carpenter-Palumbo made it clear that effective drug treatment was a long and involved process. “The science tells us that after any treatment involvement, the person has to maintain contact [with the program] for at least one year, many even longer. The reason they say 'one day at a time' is that it is truly one day at a time.”

- Casey Samulski

Posted by lois at 09:19 AM | Comments (0)

May 10, 2009

MA: Editorial: Reform sentencing to save money, reduce crime

Editorial: Reform sentencing to save money, reduce crime
GateHouse News Service
Posted May 08, 2009

The case for reforming criminal sentencing in Massachusetts has been evident for years. Mandatory minimum sentences handcuff judges, denying them the flexibility they need to ensure justice and protect public safety in light of the specific case at hand. They pack the prisons with people who come out more dangerous than they went in. And they deny courts and prosecutors the most effective tools for keeping released prisoners from offending again.

Those serving mandatory minimum sentences, most of them drug offenders, aren't eligible for work release programs, "good conduct" credits or parole. As a result, nearly a thousand inmates a year are released back into the community with none of the post-release supervision proven to keep ex-offenders from committing crimes again.

The state's Criminal Offender Record Information system suffers from similar unintended consequences. Designed to protect the innocent by giving prospective employers access to criminal records, CORI too often denies those who have served their sentences the jobs they need to keep away from crime.

But the case for reforming sentencing and CORI has been lost on the risk-averse state Legislature. Mandatory minimums aren't as politically popular as they were 20 years ago, but convicted criminals don't vote, and those who like policies that look "tough on crime" do - even if those policies don't actually work.

Gov. Deval Patrick is challenging legislators to choose effective crime-control strategies over outdated political assumptions. Patrick is introducing bills to modify mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent drug offenders, allowing them to apply for parole after serving two-thirds of their sentences and making post-release supervision mandatory. Drug offenders serving mandatory minimums would be eligible for work release and community corrections programs.

Patrick calls for CORI reforms that would tighten administration and give offenders the opportunity to contest CORI decisions and respond to those reviewing their records.

These reforms are a good first step, but only that. The state should be creating options for drug treatment instead of incarceration for some drug offenders. Community corrections and post-release supervision should be expanded, as should drug treatment programs in the prisons.

In the past, the Legislature has too often ignored the governor's reform initiatives. His response, in this and other areas, has been to offer more modest reforms, which the Legislature dilutes further, so that they hardly qualify as reforms at all.

In this case, the Legislature should make Patrick's reforms even stronger. If the research into preventing recidivism isn't convincing enough, lawmakers should consider the cost of "lock-em-up-and-forget-about-them" policies. It costs about $47,000 a year to house each inmate in Massachusetts' overcrowded prisons. With the state facing its worst ever fiscal crisis, taxpayers can no longer afford politically popular policies that do little to reduce crime.

The MetroWest Daily News
http://www.enterprisenews.com/opinions/x2133277840/Editorial-Reform-sentencing-to-save-money-reduce-crime?view=print

Posted by lois at 02:12 PM | Comments (0)

May 07, 2009

MA: Boston Globe Editorial: Better sense in sentencing

Better sense in sentencing
May 7, 2009
Boston Globe Editorial

MANDATORY MINIMUM sentences for nonviolent drug crimes don't prompt offenders to clean up their acts. But they do pick the pockets of taxpayers, who cover the $47,000 annual cost of holding an inmate in state prison. Today, the Patrick administration is taking a sensible step to address this imbalance in the criminal justice system.

Part of the governor's new crime prevention bill would allow parole for drug offenders after serving two-thirds of their mandatory minimum sentences. Parole eligibility would provide offenders with access to addiction treatment and work release programs, which are now foolishly barred to them. The offer of parole, however, would be decided case-by-case by the Parole Board. That check adds an important layer of protection for the public.

Legal experts ranging from the US Justice Department to the Massachusetts Bar Association have been pointing out flaws in drug sentencing structures that do little to reintegrate offenders and fall disproportionately on minorities in crowded cities. A prime example is the two-year mandatory minimum sentence for selling drugs within 1,000 feet of a school zone. It can apply to adults involved in drug deals regardless of whether school is in session.

The public needs to pay attention when Kevin Burke, the state secretary of public safety, says that "some people are doing too much time for nonviolent offenses." District attorneys, including Middlesex DA Gerry Leone, are also embracing the effort because it gets at the root of recidivism. The bill wisely requires that all offenders, not just drug offenders, remain under mandatory supervision by the Parole Board for a period equal to 25 percent of their sentence. That requirement, says Leone, makes the bill a sound approach to crime prevention. He warns, however, that lawmakers must be willing to fund prevention and reentry programs for offenders.

Mandatory minimum sentences were the reaction to a frightening outbreak of drug-fueled gang violence in the 1980s. More than 20 years later, the sentences are ensnaring low-level drug users who pose minimal safety risks. Patrick's bill reflects the best current thinking in criminal justice circles.
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2009/05/07/better_sense_in_sentencing/

Posted by lois at 10:06 AM | Comments (0)

May 05, 2009

Justices Agree to Take Up Life Without Parole for Youth

Justices Agree to Take Up Sentencing for Young Offenders
By ADAM LIPTAK
Published: May 4, 2009- NY Times

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court agreed on Monday to consider whether the reasoning that led it to strike down the death penalty for juvenile offenders four years ago should also apply to sentences of life without the possibility of parole.

The court accepted two cases on the issue, both from Florida and neither involving a killing. In one, Joe Sullivan was sentenced to life without the possibility of release for raping a 72-year-old woman in 1989, when he was 13. In the other, Terrance Graham received the same sentence for participating in a home invasion robbery in 2004, when he was 17 and on probation for other crimes.

In the majority opinion in the death penalty case, Roper v. Simmons, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote that teenagers were immature, unformed, irresponsible and susceptible to negative influences, including peer pressure.

“Even a heinous crime committed by a juvenile,” Justice Kennedy concluded, is not “evidence of irretrievably depraved character.”

Outside the context of the death penalty, however, the Supreme Court has not shown much interest in cases from prisoners claiming that the sentences they received were too harsh. But Douglas A. Berman, an authority on sentencing law at Ohio State University, said the factors cited by Justice Kennedy concerning juveniles might well apply in noncapital cases.

“The principles driving Roper,” Professor Berman said, “would seem to suggest that its impact does not stop at the execution chamber.”

The United States is alone in the world in making routine use of life-without-parole sentences for juvenile offenders. Human rights groups say more than 2,000 prisoners in the United States are serving such sentences for crimes they committed when they were 17 or younger. A vast majority of those crimes involved a killing by the defendant or an accomplice.

At the argument of the Roper case in 2004, Justice Antonin Scalia said the rationales offered against the juvenile death penalty applied just as forcefully to sentences of life without the possibility of parole.

“I don’t see where there’s a logical line,” said Justice Scalia, who voted in dissent to retain the juvenile death penalty.

But Justice Kennedy wrote that life sentences would continue to deter young criminals after the death penalty became unavailable.

“The punishment of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole,” Justice Kennedy wrote, “is itself a severe sanction, in particular for a young person.”

Lawyers for the two Florida inmates cited international law, including the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which prohibits sentences of life without parole for juveniles. Justice Kennedy’s invoking foreign and international law in the Roper decision was controversial, and the new cases will reopen the question of how much attention the Supreme Court should pay to international law.

Bryan S. Gowdy, a lawyer for Mr. Graham, said in an interview that his client had never been convicted of the robbery that sent him to prison for the rest of his life. Though evidence was presented concerning the robbery, the trial judge found only that Mr. Graham had violated the terms of his probation after an earlier conviction for armed burglary and attempted armed robbery when he was 16.

“When our children make mistakes, are we going to lock them up and throw away the key for life?” Mr. Gowdy said. “If you follow the rationale of Roper, that’s not appropriate.”

In rejecting a challenge to Mr. Graham’s sentence last year, a Florida appeals court acknowledged that “a true life sentence is typically reserved for juveniles guilty of more heinous crimes such as homicide.” But the court added that Mr. Graham “rejected his second chance” in violating the terms of his probation “and chose to continue committing crimes at an escalating pace.”

A ruling in favor of the prisoners in the two cases — Graham v. Florida, No. 08-7412, and Sullivan v. Florida, No. 08-7621 — could be quite narrow. The Supreme Court may leave for another day, for instance, the question of how murders committed by juveniles may be punished.

Last year, drawing a similar distinction, the court said in Kennedy v. Louisiana that crimes against individuals that do not involve killing, including the rape of a child by an adult, cannot be punished by death.
A version of this article appeared in print on May 5, 2009, on page A16 of the New York edition.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/05/us/05scotus.html?scp=1&sq=Justices%20Agree%20to%20Take%20Up%20Life-Without%20Parole&st=cse

Posted by lois at 06:54 PM | Comments (0)

April 29, 2009

Obama Administration Calls for End to Crack-Powder Sentencing Disparity

Obama Administration Calls for End to Crack-Powder Sentencing Disparity
by Jasmine Tyler, Anthony Papa
Huffington Post
April 29, 2009

On President Obama's 100th day in office the White House asked Congress to address the issue of disparity in penalties for the use of powder/crack cocaine. This historic request follows a national lobby day held yesterday that was co-sponsored by a dozen advocacy groups.

The day brought together voters from Utah, California, Oklahoma, New Jersey, South Carolina and other states to pressure key members of Congress to eliminate the disparity between crack and powder cocaine sentences.

The groups held a breakfast briefing with members of congress and victims of the federal disparity on Tuesday morning. Chocolate bars weighing fifty grams, the equivalent weight that would trigger a 10 year mandatory minimum sentence for crack cocaine, were on hand to demonstrate to members of Congress just how small that quantity is compared to the 5000 grams -- five kilos -- of powered cocaine that garners the same penalty.

The 1986 and 1988 Anti-Drug Abuse Acts created a disparity in sentencing between two forms of cocaine, crack cocaine and powder, at the federal level even though scientific evidence, including a major study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, has proven that crack and powder cocaine have similar physiological and psychoactive effects on the human body. It takes only five grams of crack cocaine (the equivalent of the contents of two sugar packets) to receive a five-year mandatory minimum sentence, while it takes 500 grams of powder cocaine to receive the same sentence.

As a presidential candidate, then-Senator Obama said the "war on drugs is an utter failure" and that he believes in "shifting the paradigm, shifting the model, so that we focus more on a public health approach." He also called for eliminating the crack/powder cocaine sentencing disparity, repealing the ban on federal funding for syringe exchange programs to reduce HIV/AIDS, and stopping the U.S. Justice Department from undermining state medical marijuana laws. Within 24 hours of taking office, the White House website made clear that Obama's campaign commitments to eliminate both the crack/powder disparity and the ban on syringe exchange funding were now official administration policy.

The Obama Administration has articulated the need to address this issue by completely eliminating the disparity. Current penalties for crack cocaine are excessively harsh and have little to do with an individual's actual culpability and more to do with the color of their skin. It's not fair and it's not working. While two-thirds of crack cocaine users are white or Latino according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, more than 80 percent of those convicted in federal court for crack cocaine offenses in 2006 were African American.

Last year, the U.S. Sentencing Commission moderately reduced sentences for crack cocaine offenses and the U.S. Supreme Court also ruled that judges have the right to sentence people below the guidelines in Kimbrough v. the United States. However, judicial discretion is still undermined by the statutory mandatory minimum sentences that Congress enacted over 20 years ago, and those mandatory minimums are the source of the crack/powder disparity.

Thus far, two legislative proposals have been re-introduced in the House -- one by Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee, D-TX, and one by Rep. Bobby Scott, D-VA. Both would end the disparity between powder and crack cocaine sentences. The Senate Crime and Drugs subcommittee will hold a hearing to discuss crack cocaine sentencing on Wednesday, April 29. The House Crime, Terror and Homeland Security committee also will hold a hearing on this issue on May 21.

The stars are aligning to ensure Americans will no longer be subjected to the same draconian policy set in the late 80s, which flies in the face of scientific and legal research. Congress and the administration have an obligation to fix this and show the country that our criminal justice practices will be fair and sentences proportional to the offense. We can no longer prioritize precious federal resources solely on the incarceration of individuals who are low-level, nonviolent drug users and sellers nor permit any racial group to continue to be unjustly targeted.

Jasmine L. Tyler is the Deputy Director of National Affairs for the Drug Policy Alliance. Anthony Papa is the author 15 to Life.

* http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jasmine-tyler/obama-administration-call_b_193028.html

And....
Justice Dept. Seeks Equity in Sentences for Cocaine

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By SOLOMON MOORE
Published: April 29, 2009

A senior Justice Department official urged Congress on Wednesday to lower the mandatory minimum prison sentence for the sale and possession of crack cocaine to match the punishment for powder cocaine, eliminating arbitrary sentencing disparities that have resulted in many more African-Americans’ being jailed for longer terms.

It was the first time such a high-level law enforcement official has endorsed legislation to eliminate inequities in cocaine sentencing. Barack Obama, while campaigning for the White House, had called for an end to the disparity.

“Most in the law enforcement community now recognize the need to re-evaluate current federal cocaine sentencing policy and the disparities the policy creates,” the official, Lanny A. Breuer, the chief of the Criminal Division in the Justice Department, testified before the Crime and Drugs Subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Under current federal laws, conviction for the sale and possession of 50 grams of crack cocaine is punishable by a mandatory minimum of 10 years in prison; it takes 5,000 grams of powder cocaine to trigger the same punishment under the guidelines.

Mr. Breuer said that as of 2006, 82 percent of people convicted of federal crack cocaine offenses were African-American, and 9 percent were white. In that same year, 14 percent of federal powder cocaine offenders were white, 27 percent were African-American and 58 percent were Hispanic.

Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois and the subcommittee chairman, said he was a proponent of the two-tiered sentencing structure when it was adopted in 1986 during an epidemic of crack cocaine use. But Mr. Durbin said that he and other early supporters, including Joseph R. Biden Jr., who is now vice president, changed their minds as they learned more about the drug.

“Each of the myths upon which we based the disparity has since been dispelled or altered,” Mr. Durbin said. “Crack-related violence has decreased significantly since the 1980s, and today 94 percent of crack cocaine cases don’t involve violence at all.”

Mr. Breuer and other witnesses testified that the sentencing disparities eroded trust in the justice system, overstressed the prison system, and diverted federal law enforcement resources from prosecutions of organized crime and other priorities.

In 2007, the United States Sentencing Commission, a panel that advises federal courts on appropriate prison terms based on legislation, reduced the average sentence for crack cocaine possession to 8 years, 10 months from 10 years, 1 month.

That change was expected to reduce the federal prison population by about 3,800 inmates over 15 years.

So far, 19,239 offenders who were sentenced under the earlier guidelines have applied to have their terms reduced. About 70 percent of those motions have been granted.

Further sentencing reductions would require Congress to pass new legislation. Mr. Breuer said he was leading a working group at the Justice Department that was looking at how to reduce the sentencing disparity while preserving public safety.

Although many law enforcement groups have generally sided with reducing disparities in cocaine sentences, they disagree with the administration about how that might be achieved.

James Pasco, a lobbyist for the Fraternal Order of Police, suggested that prison sentences for powder cocaine should be raised to the level of crack sentences.

“The Obama administration just says they want the disparity addressed,” Mr. Pasco said. “So somewhere between our position for raising sentences for powder, and their position for doing away with disparities there’s room for discussion.”

Jasmine Tyler, of the Drug Policy Alliance, a nonprofit advocacy group supporting the reduction of drug crime sentences, said increasing penalties for powder cocaine would further burden the Federal Bureau of Prisons, which is 140 percent beyond its capacity.

“I would be shocked if that were ever vetted as a real possibility,” Ms. Tyler said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/30/us/30cocaine.html?_r=1

Posted by lois at 04:52 PM | Comments (0)

April 25, 2009

CA: State prisons chief proposes $400 million in cuts

State prisons chief proposes $400 million in cuts
afurillo@sacbee.com
Published Friday, Apr. 24, 2009

California corrections officials today unveiled $400 million in cost-cutting proposals that would reduce the state prison population by 8,000 inmates by next summer.

Agency Secretary Matt Cate said a proposed change in parole policies would cut the prison population by 4,000.

He said it would result in fewer offenders being returned on technical violations while at the same time lowering parole agent caseloads so they can spend more time supervising more serious and violent parolees when they are released.

The other half of the population reductions would come through expanded good behavior credits for inmates who complete education or job programs and through changes in the dollar value of property crimes, which would turn some thefts now prosecuted as felonies into misdemeanors.

The proposed changes in parole policies, the time credits and the adjustment on property crimes each require approval from the Legislature. Cate said the agency plans to submit a package of bills to the Legislature next week.

Cate said the department also plays to cut 150 of the 2,000 position at its headquarters office in downtown Sacramento. He also said that corrections officials are planning to close down one Division of Juvenile Justice youth prison.

The cuts came in response to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's open-ended $400 million line-item veto earlier this year on Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation spending budget, issued as part of the state's recent resolution to close its $40 billion budget gap.
http://www.sacbee.com/topstories/v-print/story/1808030.html

Posted by lois at 01:57 PM | Comments (0)

April 23, 2009

Prison population, corrections budget spike during truth in sentencing

"If a crime policy is gauged by its ability to lower crime rates and rehabilitate inmates to prevent return trips to prison, then truth in sentencing has failed."

Prison population, corrections budget spike during truth in sentencing
Jessica VanEgeren
April 21, 2009
Capital Times- Madison, WI

When the tough-on-crime mantra was all the rage in the 1990s, Wisconsin, like the rest of the nation, got caught up in the movement.

Michael Lew got caught up in it, too. As one of eight assistant chiefs of probation and parole for the state Department of Corrections, Lew was tapped to research the financial impact of a new sentencing policy being debated at the Capitol.

Known as truth in sentencing, the policy -- which had the blessing of then-Attorney General Jim Doyle -- took effect Dec. 31, 1999. It replaced the possibility of early release for good behavior, or parole, with a system where a 10-year sentence meant 10 years served. Time behind bars was followed by years out of prison under extended state supervision.

Because inmates under the then-existing parole system were only serving, on average, about 50 percent of their sentences, Lew and about a dozen colleagues estimated the truth in sentencing program would contribute to a Department of Corrections budget increase of $50 million to $70 million a year. Their estimates hit the mark.

Between 1999 and 2009, the Wisconsin Department of Corrections' budget grew 71 percent, from $700 million to $1.2 billion, or an average of $50 million a year, according to information released earlier this month by the Council of State Governments Justice Center, a national organization funded in part through the U.S. Department of Justice.

"Truth in sentencing is one of the reasons we have so many people in prison right now," said Lew, a 36-year veteran of the state corrections system who retired in 2006. "We are bankrupting ourselves."

The national organization further found that statewide between 2000 and 2007, the number of reported violent crimes increased by 28 percent, from 12,700 incidents to 16,296, and the prison population grew 14 percent, from 20,508 to 23,476. A majority of inmates are incarcerated because they re-offend or violate the terms of their release. In 2007, 55 percent of prison inmates had violated terms of their parole, probation or extended supervision or were re-offenders who had committed a new crime.

If a crime policy is gauged by its ability to lower crime rates and rehabilitate inmates to prevent return trips to prison, then truth in sentencing has failed. Costs are also up, threatening to become even more of a burden on an already cash-strapped state. These facts are not lost on state policy makers, who reached out last year to a national organization for policy assistance. While that group is delivering its recommendations to the Legislature this week, Governor Doyle has already put forward changes in his 2009-2011 budget, which is attempting to close a $5.2 billion deficit. The governor's plan proposes new ways for inmates who exhibit good behavior to get out of prison early. Parole, though not referred to as such, would make a comeback. Under these guidelines, roughly 1,000 inmates immediately would be ready for early release. More would be eligible in the months and years ahead.

Not surprisingly, the plan has critics, including state Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen, victim's rights advocates and the Wisconsin Sheriffs and Deputy Sheriffs Association.

At a press conference earlier this month, Van Hollen argued that undoing truth in sentencing by "opening up prison doors is indefensible." He said the state should instead spend money on alternatives to incarceration in appropriate cases.

But Department of Corrections Secretary Rick Raemisch, who worked with Doyle on the proposals, says they are a step in the right direction.

"Inmates can go back one of two ways ... treated, with a positive attitude and a job skill, or they can go back angry," Raemisch said. "Under truth in sentencing there was no incentive for inmates to improve themselves behind bars. What's being proposed is the start of a major movement toward sentencing reform in Wisconsin."

Positive reinforcement

Joe Gunter, a 40-year-old Madison resident, has spent nine of the last 18 years behind bars. His offense: driving under the influence. His drinking problem began when his stint in the Army ended in 1990. Over the next two years, he was caught and sentenced four times. His drinking has cost him everything, he says, including his marriage and the ability to see his three children. On July 15 he was released from a minimum security prison after serving a two-year sentence for his ninth drunken driving offense.

Employed in the construction business, Gunter says he would have liked to have taken a vocational training course in prison, but the programs were full. He did attend a month-long alcohol treatment program during his most recent prison term, the first substance abuse help he received after multiple incarcerations. The help he received worked. He has been sober ever since.

"I don't disagree with the law for putting me in prison," Gunter said. "But I would have benefited from treatment sooner."

He said limited space in programs and general overcrowding is making the prison environment more hostile. "Guys were testy," he said. "There were more fights this time around."

The governor's budget policy recommendations, if approved by the Legislature, aim to ease some of the strain on the system due to swelling prison ranks. The objective is to entice inmates like Gunter to improve themselves by rewarding good behavior with a shot at early release.

Specifically, non-violent felons could get out of prison early through a beefed-up version of the "earned release program." The program began in 2004, but was only available to an extremely narrow subset of inmates that included non-violent felony offenders who needed alcohol or drug treatment. For a number of reasons, what now is being proposed is drastically different.

First, all but the most violent felons could earn release not only by participating in drug or alcohol treatment but by taking advantage of educational, employment readiness and vocational training opportunities while in prison. Upon completing a program, the inmate would need approval from the Earned Release Review Commission, the new name for the Parole Commission, before being released into the community and onto extended supervision.

The state estimates roughly 1,000 felons would be immediately eligible for early release. Sex offenders and the top two categories of the most violent felons would never be eligible for early release.

Second, the proposals would be retroactive to Dec. 31, 1999, the date truth in sentencing took effect, making sentences handed down during the past 10 years up for change.

The retroactive nature is the most troubling part of what is being proposed, said Karen Rengert, president of the Wisconsin Victim/Witness Professionals Association. Although violent offenders would not be eligible for release, non-violent offenders, such as burglars, thieves or embezzlers, can make a victim feel as violated as does a person who suffers a physical attack, she said.

"Since 1999, we've been able to say to victims, if somebody is sentenced for five years, five years means five years," Rengert said. "We feel we are breaking our promises to all the victims we told this to over the years."

She said she is also concerned that victims will learn of an assailant's early release by running into them in public.

"I can appreciate the fact that we have too many people in prisons," Rengert said. "But this isn't the answer."

The governor's recommendations follow several bipartisan moves designed to address the state's escalating prison population and associated costs.

Last year, Doyle, along with Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson, Sen. Fred Risser, D-Madison, and then-Assembly Speaker Mike Huebsch, R-West Salem, sought assistance from the Council of State Governments Justice Center to help develop a policy that would reduce spending on corrections and increase public safety.

In January, the Wisconsin Legislative Council established the Special Committee on Justice Reinvestment Oversight, a bipartisan advisory group, to assist the national organization in its data analyses and development of policy options.

The organization will present state officials with its policy recommendations at 11 a.m. Wednesday, April 22, in Room 412 East at the Capitol.

Criminally inclined?

In his final days as chancellor of UW-Madison, John Wiley let loose on a number of issues facing Wisconsin in a sharply worded piece in the September 2008 issue of Madison Magazine.

Wiley not only blasted some legislators for their hostile stance toward the University of Wisconsin System, he also asked why Minnesota, a state with a population similar to Wisconsin's, had roughly 14,000 fewer people behind bars, 8,757 compared to Wisconsin's 22,966 inmates.

"Are Wisconsin citizens that much more criminally inclined?" he asked.

Or is Minnesota more selective about who it sends to prison?

"Minnesota reserves its prison beds for the most violent offenders," said Shari Burt, communications director for the Minnesota Department of Corrections.

In 2007, the most recent year data was available, 16,168 Minnesota residents were convicted of felonies, according to Suzanne Alliegro, executive director of the Minnesota Sentencing Guidelines Commission. Of those, 3,760 went to prison. The remaining 12,408 offenders were punished through a three-tier system that includes time in a county jail, probation or a combination of jail and probation time.

Burt said the state pays a subsidy to counties for jail space and reimburses a percentage of the salaries of county-level probation officers.

This process, in contrast to Wisconsin's system, adds up to big savings. For the 2009 fiscal year, Minnesota's Department of Corrections' budget is $472 million. Wisconsin's is $1.2 billion.

Because sentencing guidelines were not changed in 1999 to accompany the new truth in sentencing policy, prison costs rose as the state's sentencing system skewed toward longer confinements.

Prior to truth in sentencing, someone convicted of a burglary, for example, could have been sentenced to 10 years in prison. After serving 25 percent of their time, they were eligible for parole. If denied parole, they had to be released for good behavior after serving 66 percent of their sentence, or just over six years in prison. Upon release, the burglar was put on parole. In other words, 10 years never meant 10 years behind bars. Ten years meant anywhere from two to six years behind bars.

Under truth in sentencing, if that same burglar was sentenced to 10 years in prison, there is no chance to get out early. The same crime now holds the offender in prison for four to eight years longer. At a price of $30,000 a year, the costs to incarcerate offenders for longer sentences compound quickly.

"The major failing of the truth-in-sentencing model is that by getting rid of parole you are asking judges to predict too far into the future on how suited someone will be for release," said Dane County District Attorney Brian Blanchard. "No matter how smart any given judge is, I don't think that's logical. If prison is about correction, then we should care how they are doing in prison. The parole system was able to capture that."

Lew, who now teaches online criminal justice classes for the University of Phoenix, said communities will be safer if inmates are no longer incarcerated without any incentives for self-improvement. Truth in sentencing, he says, has run its course.

"The policy failed," said Lew, "Besides costing a lot of money, I don't know what else it accomplished."
http://www.madison.com/tct/news/stories/447944

Posted by lois at 02:27 PM | Comments (0)

April 20, 2009

MN: Senate bill aims to cut prison sentences to save state funds

Senate bill aims to cut prison sentences to save state funds
by Tom Scheck, Minnesota Public Radio
April 16, 2009

A bill introduced in the Minnesota Senate this week would cut prison sentences across the board and lower penalties for specific crimes. The bill's author said she's proposing the changes to help balance the state's budget. But some public safety advocates say the changes go too far and the savings could be found elsewhere.

St. Paul, Minn. — The bill proposed by DFL Senator Linda Higgins would cut $78 million from the Department of Public Safety and the Department of Corrections. The bulk of the cuts, $66 million, would come from the Corrections Department.

Because most of the department's expenses come from housing inmates, Higgins said the only way to save money is by reducing the number of inmates walking into prisons and the amount of time they stay there. Her plan accomplishes that by eliminating mandatory minimum sentences for some offenses.

"In the last 10 or 15 years, legislators have imposed all of these mandatory minimums and taken away any discretion that judges have on certain things," Higgins said. "And all of the research that's been going around the country on prison systems have found that it has really been a driver in an explosion of costs in a prison system."

Higgins wants to repeal required minimum sentences for felony drunk drivers, for some drug offenses and for predatory offenders who fail to register with authorities. She said judges should decide the length of sentences.

"They're the ones who know the circumstances. They know the person," Higgins said. "They're more intimately involved in a case rather than the those of us who sit this building and decide that we should be deciding a certain person's sentences. It's really not an appropriate thing for us to be doing. I think it should be people in that other branch of government."

The bill also reduces the length of time all inmates would serve in prison. Currently, offenders have to serve at least two-thirds of their sentence in prison or jail. The bill would shorten it to 60 percent. In other words, a person with a thirty year sentence would see their length of time in prison reduced from twenty years to eighteen years. Higgins said lawmakers have to make changes in light of a tough budget deficit.

That doesn't appease county attorneys who say the bill takes a step backward.

"In my experience going back to the '80s, I've never seen a rush at the last moment to attempt to save lots of money by making radical changes to the criminal justice system," said Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman.

Freeman said eliminating mandatory minimum sentences and prison time is a mistake. Even though the bill would apply only to inmates who are sentenced after July 1, Freeman said nearly every inmate already in prison would apply for the reduction. He said courts would force the state to make the change retroactive, meaning further reductions for inmates.

"It doesn't save any money," he said. "By the time we're done in the next two or three years litigating everyone's sentence again, it's going to be very expensive and there's no money in this bill for it."

Freeman said there are other ways for the state to save money. Among his suggestions is a study commission to determine which sentences should be reduced or extended. An official with the Minnesota County Attorneys Association said his organization has long supported a hike in the liquor tax to pay for public safety and corrections programs.

The Senate bill has other critics. Officials with Mothers Against Drunk Driving said repealing the mandatory minimum for felony DWIs will make the roads less safe. Lynn Goughler, with MADD Minnesota, said the felony DWI laws are working.

"I think that the laws in Minnesota for DWI have to be looked at very carefully and we can't just be changing DWI laws for the convenience of a state budget," Goughler said.

Goughler said she believes the state could save money by passing a law that requires drunk drivers to install a system that checks their blood alcohol level before they can start their cars. The engine won't start if the driver has been drinking.

The Public Safety Finance Committee debated and approved the bill on a divided voice vote. A full Senate vote is expected early next week. A companion bill in the Minnesota House cuts less to Corrections and Public Safety. It would rely on a cut in the daily amount spent on prisoners, freeze nonessential hiring and reduce sentences for low level drug offenses.
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2009/04/15/prisonsentences_bill/

Posted by lois at 10:11 PM | Comments (0)

CO: Governor Runs From Issue He Ran On

Greene: Ritter runs from issue he ran on
By Susan Greene
Denver Post Columnist
04/19/2009

You should be scared, very scared.

That's what DAs hope as the legislature contemplates a bill to reform sentencing laws.

Notably silent, at least publicly, is Gov. Bill Ritter, who served 12 years as Denver's chief prosecutor yet ran on a promise to fix what's broken in a state that has built nearly a prison a year.

Behind the scenes, he's pushing lawmakers to abandon reform to one of his many commissions and urging his appointees to stall even further.

Ritter no doubt is trying, at least in his first term, to avoid a Willie Horton scenario or appearing soft on crime. But some say the man once credited as less of a demagogue than most DAs has hoodwinked voters into expecting reforms.

"For those of us who voted for Bill Ritter, it's disheartening that years into his term we've not begun to take a hard look at sentencing and the changes we need," says Maureen Cain of the Criminal Defense Bar.

"He's a problem identifier, not a problem solver," adds state Public Defender Doug Wilson.

If there was ever a time to reform our Reagan-era sentencing laws, this is it.

Facing the biggest shortfall in a generation, Colorado spends $755 million — 8.8 percent — of our budget on corrections, more than we fund for higher ed. Penal programs will get a $22 million increase while state workers face furloughs.

That money pays for the one in 29 adults here under correctional control, says the Pew Center. And for every dollar we spend on prisons, we pay only 15 cents helping parolees and probationers disentangle from the system.

Our policies aren't working. Reformers argue for investing in the community corrections system to reduce recidivism among lower-risk inmates and ultimately lower the budget.

"We cannot build our way to public safety," Pew reports.

Reform isn't partisan.

Faced with his own budget woes, Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is cutting prison terms in California. Red states like Texas are following suit. Even the Independence Institute, the free-market think tank led by Jon Caldara, embraces changes.

Ritter seemed on board as a candidate. And shortly after taking office, he created the Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice to tackle the issue.

But doubts set in when he failed to fund the board or hire a director. They grew when he nixed bills to give a modicum of mercy to kids behind bars.

This year, his public-safety chief told commissioners to hold off on sentencing reform. Frustrated, Sen. John Morse and Rep. Claire Levy nevertheless proposed a bill.

The DA's Council is fighting rabidly, warning that wife beaters and sex offenders would be let loose. They and Ritter want to deflect the issue to the commission despite Ritter's lack of funding, direction or urgency.

"The task is daunting and cannot be done quickly. . .," he wrote two commissioners. "Like any policymaker, I cannot responsibly promise uncritical endorsement of an entire set of recommendations without my own careful consideration."

That's political-speak for "You guys deal with this, s-l-o-w-l-y. And, by the way, don't count on my support."

Ritter has a rep for deferring tough policy calls to committees, then taking little action.

It's one thing for a DA with no background in natural resources to count on 19 months of work by oil and gas commissioners to rewrite drilling rules. But it's another for a man who spent his career in criminal justice to punt on his own issues.

Ritter understands sentencing and well knows the need for reform. In these lean times, we hardly need more fear-mongering and stall tactics to embrace its complexities.
http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_12174697

Posted by lois at 10:34 AM | Comments (0)

Three book reviews: Abolishing The Prison Industrial Complex and Freeing All Political Prisoners

Abolishing The Prison Industrial Complex and Freeing All Political Prisoners
Sunday, April 19 2009
By Hans Bennett
Prisons Above all, these three highly-recommended books (available online at www.akpress.org) argue that prison-related issues are inseparable from racism, classism, sexism, and all oppression, so the more we know about prisons, the better informed multi-issue activist strategies will be. They conclude that in working to abolish all oppression, we must also work to abolish the PIC and free all political prisoners.
Abolishing The Prison Industrial Complex and Freeing All Political Prisoners
A Book review of:

The Real Cost of Prisons Comix, edited by Lois Ahrens, PM Press, 2008.

Let Freedom Ring: A Collection of Documents from the Movements to Free US Political Prisoners, edited by Matt Meyer, PM Press, 2008.

Abolition Now! Ten Years of Strategy and Struggle Against The Prison Industrial Complex, edited by the CR10 Publications Collective, AK Press, 2008.

2008 marked the ten-year anniversaries of both the prison abolitionist Critical Resistance (CR) conference in Oakland, CA that coined the phrase "prison industrial complex" (PIC) and the National Jericho Movement’s march in Washington DC that demanded the release of all US political prisoners and prisoners of war. To commemorate the 1998 events, the CR10 conference was held in Oakland in September, and Jericho organized a march to the United Nations in October.

These two important events in 1998 successfully re-energized the prison-activist and political prisoner support movements rooted in the 1960s and 1970s. However, while recognizing this accomplishment, three new books document how the prison industrial complex has actually grown bigger and stronger since 1998, while the post-911 climate has further escalated political repression. While recognizing this frustrating reality, these new books look honestly at both the accomplishments and shortcomings of the last ten years.

The Real Cost of Prisons Comix

The new book The Real Cost of Prisons Comix, reprints three comic books published as part of the Real Costs of Prisons Project (RCPP), which began in 2000. So far, 125,000 comic books have been printed, with over 100,000 distributed for free to community groups and college classes alike. Featuring artwork by Kevin Pyle, Sabrina Jones and Susan Willmarth, all three comic books can be freely downloaded at www.realcostofprisons.org.

Prison abolitionists Ruth Wilson Gilmore and Craig Gilmore write in the book’s introduction that the RCPP’s value "has been to show us how the system of mass incarceration permeates our lives, who is paying the costs of that system and the many ways the system is vulnerable to people who put their thought and effort into organizing to shrink it." Significantly, the RCPP’s comics "demonstrate that the ideas we need to change the world can be explained simply enough and packaged attractively enough to be used by all kinds of readers." Prisoners and their families can "understand material usually circulated only among academics and those who focus on policy."

Editor Lois Ahrens writes that "a central goal of the comic books is to politicize, not pathologize." She argues that the "deregulation and globalization" of the last 30 years has "resulted in impoverishing urban economies, limiting opportunities for meaningful work and slashing funding for quality education, marginalizing the poor, and creating more inequality. The comic books place individual experience in this context and challenge a central message of neo-liberal ideology: the myth that people can pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. In this paradigm, racism, sexism, classism, and economic inequality are not part of the picture. Most people now believe that change happens through personal transformation rather than political struggle and change."

The recent growth of the PIC and mass incarceration is staggering. Ahrens writes that "every year from 1947 through the beginning of the 1970s, approximately 200,000 people were incarcerated in the US. Today, there are more than 2.3 million men and women incarcerated, with more than 5 million more on parole and probation."

The 'Prison Town' comic book debunks the myth that building a new prison actually helps to revitalize a town with an ailing economy, and instead illustrates the many negative costs that a new prison can impose. Importantly, Prison Town also documents how many towns learned by example and cited the prisons’ negative impact in successful campaigns to stop prison construction in their community.

'Prisoners of the War on Drugs' is a heart-wrenching look at the victims of the so-called "war on drugs." At least according to its official purpose, the "war on drugs" has been a total failure, resulting in the mass incarceration of non-violent drug offenders at a huge, inefficient expense to tax-payers. Prisoners emphasizes "harm reduction" and treatment as a better solution, stating that the "war on drugs locks up more users than dealers. Most want to quit, but can’t. A year of treatment costs much less than a year of incarceration, plus: the person can work, pay taxes & take part in family life." While drug laws may seem insane, they appear to have unofficial motives that are highly rational. For example, they have served to accelerate mass imprisonment, the criminalization of poverty, and the erosion of civil-liberties.

'Prisoners of a Hard Life: Women & Their Children' concludes the three-comic book series. The stories presented here are mostly fictional, but are based on the writers’ research and personal experience working with women prisoners. Therefore, Ahrens explains that the stories "represent the lives of hundreds of thousands of people suffering as a result of the war on drugs." Perhaps most outrageous is the true story of Regina McKnight, the first woman in the US to be convicted of murder because of behavior while pregnant. When McKnight’s baby was delivered stillborn and an autopsy found traces of cocaine in the fetus she was arrested and convicted of murder with a 20-year sentence. In 2008, following several appeals and eight years in prison, the South Carolina Supreme Court unanimously reversed her conviction, after concluding that there is no medical evidence of cocaine causing stillbirths.

Let Freedom Ring

Let Freedom Ring: A Collection of Documents from the Movements to Free US Political Prisoners, is an epic 877-page compilation of both pre-existing documents and original articles. Explaining the context of its release, editor Matt Meyer cites the recent persecution of the San Francisco Eight, who are former Black Panther Party (BPP) members being charged with a 30-year old crime. Beginning with the 2006 grand jury, "the state threw down a gauntlet. When it became clear that the investigations were reopening cases based on evidence obtained primarily through torture, the message was unmistakable: Be afraid, be very afraid, and don’t even think of fighting back. When these same men stood strong, firm on the principle that they would not take part in a new, government sponsored witch-hunt, they sent a counter-message on behalf of us all: we will not allow our communities, our struggles, our communities, our very lives to be criminalized by a corrupt and racist criminal justice system." This spirit of resistance to state repression flows throughout Let Freedom Ring.

The book’s many sections focus on a wide range of US political prisoners, featuring both facts about their case, and actual writing from the prisoners themselves. One particularly interesting section is titled Resisting Repression: Out and Proud, which includes the classic 1991 interview "Dykes and Fags Want to Know: Interview with Lesbian Political Prisoners," featuring Laura Whitehorn (released in 1999), a well as Linda Evans and Susan Rosenberg, who were both pardoned by President Clinton in 2001. Also notable is a 1991 speech given by former BPP political prisoner Dhoruba Bin-Wahad, who was released after 19 years. Considered a groundbreaking speech from a Black Muslim revolutionary, Bin-Wahad declared that "we can not build a new society if we premise that society on the oppression of other people." Continuing the legacy of BPP co-founder Huey P. Newton, he argued that fighting the oppression of women and GLBTs is inseparable from the fight against capitalism, racism, and all oppression. Also featured is a tribute to the late Kuwasi Balagoon, who died in prison of AIDS-related pneumonia in 1986. In the words of poet Walidah Imarisha, Balagoon "was an anarchist in a Black nationalist movement, he was queer in a straight dominated movement, he was a guerrilla fighter after it was ‘chic,’ and he...demanded to be seen not as a revolutionary icon, but as a person, beautiful and flawed."

Abolition Now!

Abolition Now! was published to coincide with the CR10 conference. The introduction explains that Critical Resistance (CR) is not only "struggling to tear down the cages" of the prison industrial complex (PIC), but "also to abolish the actions of policing, surveillance, and imprisonment that give the PIC its power. We are also reminded that abolition is the creation of possibilities for our dreams and demands for health and happiness—for what we want, not what we think we can get."

The book features reflections and constructive criticism from a variety of CR organizers and activists. For example, Mills College professor Julia Sudbury emphasizes the "need for healing as an abolitionist practice. Many of us come to this work with our own wounds," and while "many of us draw energy and inspiration from these wounds," we are "also drained by these traumas...As a result our movement can be very ‘head’ oriented—talking, planning, thinking, writing—and not body and emotion oriented." Sudbury concludes that a "movement against a violent and violating phenomenon like the PIC cannot hope to be successful if we don’t directly address and heal the effects of that violence."

Former political prisoner Bo Brown argues that the movement should have more "street awareness" and not be limited to "legislative" goals and actions. "You have to do both. I think you can get lost in that and you can stay there and consider yourself a good person and never really get your hands dirty in a human kind of way...I’d like to see us come up with some kind of support group for families with prisoners that’s real. We need to figure out how to support the prisoners when they’re coming home. We need to understand post-traumatic shock on an ongoing, day-to-day basis."

Andrea Smith, co-founder of INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence argues that "the criminalization approach proffered in the mainstream anti-violence movement doesn’t work. And, also, this criminalization approach obfuscates the role of the state in perpetrating gender violence. At the same time, we have to deal with the practical concerns for safety for survivors of domestic and sexual violence. Thus, we are working on developing community accountability strategies that do not rely on the state, and also do not depend on a romanticized version of ‘community’...This intersects with work in indigenous rights movements, which have concepts of indigenous nationhood that are not based on nation-state forms of governance that rule through violence, domination, and control."

Abolition Now! also spotlights examples of organizations putting abolitionist strategy into practice, like with the LEAD Project’s group of transition homes for women returning from imprisonment in the Watts District of Los Angeles, called "A New Way of Life." Also, the UBUNTU Coalition in Durham, NC, works at responding to violence without reinforcing the PIC.

Prisons Are Everywhere

Above all, these three highly-recommended books (available online at www.akpress.org) argue that prison-related issues are inseparable from racism, classism, sexism, and all oppression, so the more we know about prisons, the better informed multi-issue activist strategies will be. They conclude that in working to abolish all oppression, we must also work to abolish the PIC and free all political prisoners.

--Based out of the SF Bay Area, Hans Bennett is an independent multi-media journalist (www.insubordination.blogspot.com) and co-founder of Journalists for Mumia (www.abu-jamal-news.com).

Posted by lois at 10:29 AM | Comments (0)

April 18, 2009

Bryne Grants and another conscequence featured in new film: "American Violet"

Taking Drug Task Forces to Task
By: Lewis Beale
April 17, 2009

In November 2000, a drug task force arrested 28 residents of Hearne, Texas, almost all of them African-American, and charged them with distributing crack cocaine. Pressed to plead guilty to the charges by their public defenders, several of the accused did, but Regina Kelly, a single mother of four, refused. The American Civil Liberty Union's Drug Law Reform Project eventually took up the case and filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of 15 of the arrestees, accusing the local district attorney and the

South Central Texas Narcotics Task Force with conducting racially motivated drug sweeps for more than 15 years.
That case, which wound up with the charges against all the ACLU's clients being dropped due to insufficient evidence and the tainted testimony of an unreliable police informant, is now the basis of a movie, "American Violet", opening nationwide on April 17th. Starring newcomer Nicole Beharie as Kelly, as well as Alfre Woodard, Tim Blake Nelson and Charles S. Dutton, the film is practically a primer on drug-task-force abuses under what is known as the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Program.

Enacted in 1988, and recently refunded under President Obama's stimulus package, the Byrne grant program is designed to help states and local jurisdictions fight drugs and the violent crime associated with drug trafficking. The program provides federal money in 29 specific "purpose areas," including crime-victim assistance and alternatives to incarceration for nonviolent offenders, but most of the grants are intended for police activity. And a good deal of the money disbursed is predicated on the number, not the quality, of drug arrests.

"Throughout America, Byrne grants are consistently used to target very low-level drug dealers for arrest and long-term incarceration," said Graham Boyd, lawyer for the Hearne plaintiffs and director of the ACLU's Drug Law Reform Project. "You have a drug task force whose goal is to arrest as many people as they can, their funding stream is based on that, so they rely on confidential informants, and their racial profiling is staggering."

"The block grant is based on population and crime rate," added Bill Piper, director of national affairs for the Drug Policy Alliance Network. "Because it's based on arrests, the incentive is to focus on arrests, and the more the better. They have an incentive to go after low-level drug dealers, and it leads to civil rights offenses because they have quotas to fill, and that might entail cutting corners."

Hearne was not the first case, nor the most notorious, involving drug-task-force abuses. That honor belongs to Tulia, another small Texas town where, on July 23, 1999, and based on the word of a single informant, 46 people, 39 of them African-American, were accused of selling drugs. As recounted in Tulia, Texas, a documentary recently shown as part of PBS' Independent Lens series [available on DVD at www.newsreel.org], the informant, Tom Coleman — at one point named "Texas Lawman of the Year" - had a checkered law enforcement career, did not wear a recording device during any of his alleged drug buys, made numerous evidentiary errors and was accused of being a racist.

In 2003, a Texas court voided 38 of the Tulia arrests (several of the cases had already been dismissed), and in 2005, Coleman was convicted of perjury when a jury found he had lied about his own arrest for theft during a hearing on the drug cases.
As egregious as these cases were, Boyd says incidents like this are "still happening all over America." And they serve to point out several gaping holes in the well-intentioned, but flawed, Byrne grant program:

• The use of confidential informants, many of them criminals themselves, whose uncorroborated testimony is used to obtain drug convictions. The Hearne informant, for example, had a history of drug addiction and mental illness. "The way informants get used reflects a reality that there are few checks and balances on how law enforcement uses them," said Boyd. "It's easier for them to do this than send in an undercover officer."

• The lack of jurisdictional control. "There's a problem that goes with regional drug task forces," said Piper. "Because they are made up of people from different areas, there is a lack of oversight. There is no one entity you can blame, because they're multi-jurisdictional." Case in point: In both Hearn and Tulia, the cases were solved on the county, not town, level.

• The task forces are self-sustaining. "They use asset forfeiture, which only exists for drug crimes," said Piper, "so police tend to focus on that. Because they can keep what they seize [cash, cars, weapons, etc.] and they get the federal money, they are independent from state and local concerns, and they don't have to go to the city council and justify what they're doing."

• The impact on the black community. African-Americans, who make up about 13 percent of the total population, now account for more than 50 percent of all drug arrests. Piper refers to mass drug arrests in Hearne, Tulia and other places as being akin to "Vietnam War-like body count statistics," which are "used to measure success."

At least Texas got the message. The Lone Star State became the first in the country to require corroboration of informant information to make a drug arrest. Texas also stopped taking Byrne money for drug cases and made them the responsibility of the state police, the Texas Rangers.

And the state changed its drug-war measurement criteria. Officers used to be graded on how many arrests they made; now it's how many drug trafficking organizations they have identified, infiltrated and dismantled. "You actually lose points the more end users — drug offenders, people selling to feed their habits — you arrest," said Piper. "What they're trying to do is get people to stay undercover, work their way up, so they can take down a big trafficker, and that's revolutionary." Because of this, says Piper, drug arrests in Texas dropped by 40 percent last year, but drug seizures doubled.

Still, there are more than 600 drug task forces in the country, and at least a dozen Hearne-like scandals reported in the last 10 years. That might not seem like a lot, but it's more than enough for the people sent to jail on tainted evidence, perjured testimony or pressured into plea bargains in order to avoid jury trials and potential sentences of 30 years or more.
Even worse, says Boyd, is that in small, under-financed communities, the desperation for Byrne grant money is so great, "there's evidence of police being taken off Main Street and being put into these drug task forces."

The bottom line is what this all says about how the war on drugs is being waged, and according to Boyd, Hearne and Tulia "are Exhibit A on why the war is a failure. It's ineffective, expensive and generates a level of racial targeting that has no place in America today."

At least, added Piper, there's a little ray of hope emerging from the Obama administration. Naming Seattle police Chief Gil Kerlikowske — known for progressive and community-based approach to drug issues — to head the Office of National Drug Control Policy could mean that law enforcement will not be the drug czar's only emphasis.

"Both Obama and Kerlikowske have talked about dealing with this as a treatment issue, dealing with the demand side," says Piper. "Short of repealing drug prohibition, it's the most effective way of hurting the drug cartels — you're reducing their profits."
http://www.miller-mccune.com/legal_affairs/taking-drug-task-forces-to-task-1074

Posted by lois at 10:40 AM | Comments (0)

CT: Raise the Age supporters cheer Democrats' alternative budget

Raise the Age supporters cheer Democrats' alternative budget
Hour Staff Writer

Supporters of the Raise the Age campaign and other youth-focused legislation announced their support of the Democrats alternative proposed budget Monday, saying it preserves Connecticut's "commitments to children and families while being fiscally responsible."

The "Raise the Age" legislation, signed into law in 2007 by Gov. M. Jodi Rell, changes the default mechanism in Connecticut that automatically sends youthful offenders to adult court at the age of 16 and, instead, allow 16- and 17-year-olds to go through the juvenile court system.

Earlier this year as part of Gov. M. Jodi Rell's response to the budget crisis the governor said the state would delay the implementation of Raise the Age to 2012 -- the original implementation was supposed to be 2010.

Connecticut is only one of three states that allows 16- and 17-year-olds to be processed in adult court.

As part of their proposal, the Democrats are proposing allowing the 16-year-olds to system as intended in 2010, delaying only the 17-year-olds.

Abby Anderson, executive director of the Connecticut Juvenile Justice Alliance, said the Democrats' proposal showed that including 16-year-olds in the juvenile justice system can be done with minimal impact on the state's budget.

"We're thrilled the Democrats understand the importance of continuing these efforts instead of not doing anything and then having to do a more costly intervention down the line," Anderson said. "We'd love to have both the 16- and 17-year- olds out of the adult system because the longer we wait, the more kids we lose to the system, but at least we might get part of what we were promised, so we're thrilled for that."

In addition to Raise the Age, the Dems budget also supports Family Support Centers which deliver preventive services to struggling families. Anderson said the centers are very successful at helping youth before they need more costly interventions or become involved in the juvenile justice system.

Anderson said she thinks the Democrats' proposed legislation has a fair amount of support behind it.

"It does have a good amount of support because I feel that legislators feel it's important to do something to move forward in a positive way and do what was promised," she said.

State Sen. Bob Duff, D-25, a big supporter of the Raise the Age campaign, and said he continues to support its implementation.

"While I didn't vote for the spending plan, I do support Raise the Age as a long-term investment for our state to cut down on the rate of recidivism among our youth," Duff said.
http://www.thehour.com/story/467880

Posted by lois at 10:30 AM | Comments (0)

April 15, 2009

A Racial Shift in Drug-Crime Prisoners Fewer Blacks and More Whites, Says Sentencing Project

A Racial Shift in Drug-Crime Prisoners
Fewer Blacks and More Whites, Says Sentencing Project
By Darryl Fears
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, April 15, 2009; Page A04

For the first time since crack cocaine sparked a war on drugs 20 years ago, the number of black Americans in state prisons for drug offenses has fallen sharply, while the number of white prisoners convicted for drug crimes has increased, according to a report released yesterday.

The D.C.-based Sentencing Project reported that the number of black inmates in state prisons for drug offenses had fallen from 145,000 in 1999 to 113,500 in 2005, a 22 percent decline. In that period, the number of white drug offenders rose steadily, from about 50,000 to more than 72,000, a 43 percent increase. The number of Latino drug offenders was virtually unchanged at about 51,000.

The findings represent a significant shift in the racial makeup of those incarcerated for drug crimes and could signal a gradual change in the demographics of the nation's prison population of 2 million, which has been disproportionately black for decades. Drug offenders make up about a quarter of the prison population.

The Sentencing Project report and other experts said the numbers could reflect several factors, including an increased reliance by prosecutors and judges on prison alternatives such as drug courts and a shift in police focus to methamphetamines, which are used and distributed mostly by white Americans. In addition, the report said, crack use and arrests have declined steadily since the 1990s.

The report relied heavily on data compiled by the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics and covered six years, ending in 2005, the last year the bureau broke down the state prison population by race and drug offense.

Maryland and Virginia authorities said the racial breakdown of prisoners incarcerated in their states for drug offenses was not available. But the racial makeup of their overall prison populations had not changed significantly over that period, they said.

African American drug offenders, who have been convicted most often for dealing and possessing crack cocaine, still made up a disproportionate share of drug offenders in state prisons, 45 percent in 2005. That was down from nearly 58 percent in 1999. Black Americans make up about 12 percent of the U.S. population.
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The number of white drug offenders in state prisons rose from 20 percent to 29 percent, and Latino prisoners made up 20 percent of such inmates.

"I have no doubt that crystal meth explains some of the white increase, but I'm not ready to say it's the reason for all of the white increase," said Marc Mauer, executive director of the Sentencing Project, which opposes stiff penalties for nonviolent drug crimes. "It's also hard to imagine that [drug courts] are not having some effect. Most drug courts are in urban areas where African Americans live."

Twenty percent of white inmates used methamphetamines in the month before they were arrested, compared with 1 percent of black inmates, according to interviews conducted in the nation's 14,500 state prisons and 3,700 federal prisons.

Drug courts offer nonviolent offenders the option of undergoing rigorous substance-abuse treatment and criminal rehabilitation or going to jail. There are more than 2,000 such courts in operation, mostly in cities with large black communities ravaged by violence associated with crack cocaine. White offenders also are increasingly winding up in drug courts for abusing methamphetamines.

Mauer also hypothesized that drug dealers might have shifted from open-air crack cocaine markets to dealing indoors, making them harder for police to catch. And he speculated that because so many African American men have been incarcerated, there are fewer on the street to be arrested.

But James E. Felman, co-chairman of the Sentencing Committee for the American Bar Association, said that in Tampa, where he practices law, black suspects are still being regularly arrested on crack cocaine charges and being handed out long sentences.

"I can't second-guess their study, but I haven't seen a change," Felman said. "Maybe we're getting smarter on crime in some states. That could be part of it."

David B. Muhlhausen, a senior policy analyst for the conservative Heritage Foundation, said stronger police enforcement of methamphetamine trafficking and use, coupled with treatment options mostly for urban crack cocaine offenders, probably caused the shift. "There is some data out there that suggests that drug courts and drug treatments reduce recidivism," he said. "If you take the less serious offenders and put them into programs other than prison it would be a benefit to society."

The war on drugs began in 1986, when Congress passed the Anti-Drug Abuse Act to combat violence associated with the crack cocaine trade. Lawmakers were prompted by the death of University of Maryland basketball player Len Bias, who they mistakenly thought had died from ingesting crack. Bias overdosed on powder cocaine.

Last year, then-Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) joined several of his colleagues in saying that his support for the legislation was a mistake. The law contributed to the incarceration of more than a half-million people in state and federal prisons for drug offenses, compared with the 40,000 jailed for the same offenses in 1980.

According to a report by the Bureau of Justice Statistics last year, 7.2 million people are under prison supervision, as inmates, parolees and probationers, at a cost of about $45 billion per year.

California, which has one of the nation's largest prison populations, farmed out 170,000 inmates to private prisons in as far away as Tennessee in 2006 to relieve costs and has relaxed its penal code to relieve prison overcrowding.

Jeffrey L. Sedgwick, a former director of the Bureau of Justice Statistics, said the record incarceration might be worth the cost. "As the number of people under correctional supervision goes up, crime goes down," he said. Conservative estimates put the annual cost of violent crime at about $17 billion, Sedgwick said.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/14/AR2009041401775.html
Report on-line: http://sentencingproject.org/Admin%5CDocuments%5Cpublications%5Cdp_raceanddrugs.pdf

Posted by lois at 04:00 PM | Comments (0)

April 14, 2009

NV: "Centers" proposed for parole violaters and people with drug & alcohol convictions

Centers proposed for low-risk offenders
By RACHELLE GINES Associated Press Writer
04/13/2009

CARSON CITY, Nev.—The Nevada Senate's top Democrat told lawmakers Monday that a new program for low-risk parole violators and drug and alcohol offenders would reduce the state's prison population and save millions of dollars in taxpayer money.

Senate Majority Leader Steven Horsford, D-North Las Vegas, told Finance Committee members that SB398 would create a two-year pilot program of "intermediate sanction" centers for low-risk probation violators as well as people whose crimes are linked to alcohol or drug addictions.

Life skill and rehabilitative programs would be offered to about 400 participants a year, who would stay an average of six months.

Centers proposed for low-risk offenders
By RACHELLE GINES Associated Press Writer
04/13/2009

CARSON CITY, Nev.—The Nevada Senate's top Democrat told lawmakers Monday that a new program for low-risk parole violators and drug and alcohol offenders would reduce the state's prison population and save millions of dollars in taxpayer money.

Senate Majority Leader Steven Horsford, D-North Las Vegas, told Finance Committee members that SB398 would create a two-year pilot program of "intermediate sanction" centers for low-risk probation violators as well as people whose crimes are linked to alcohol or drug addictions.

Life skill and rehabilitative programs would be offered to about 400 participants a year, who would stay an average of six months.

Horsford said the program could save the state more than $34 million over the next five years. He noted that it costs the state about $22,000 a year to incarcerate a prisoner, and a quarter of the new arrivals at Nevada prisons every year are parole violators returning to custody.

"Clearly there is a new and more innovative approach we can take that would ensure public safety and require the offender to go through their sentence, but also do it in a way that doesn't cost the state what we're spending now," Horsford said.

The program would use existing facilities and wouldn't require new beds. Horsford added that program participants wouldn't mix with other inmates and that a little more than half of the beds would be concentrated in southern Nevada.

Drug and alcohol treatment programs for
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the centers would be provided through the Department of Health and Human Services, who would work with community service providers, DHH director Mike Willden said.

Willden told lawmakers an additional $2.2 million per year would be required to provide such programs, at a ratio of one staff person for every 27 inmates.

Bernie Curtis, chief of the Division of Parole and Probation, spoke in support of the bill, saying, "It's not going to cost us anything in parole and probation, frankly, to use these intermediate sanctions. We think it's a good start for a program that is needed in this state."

Maurice Lee, senior vice president of the WestCare Foundation, also favored the bill and said he has enjoyed success as an ex-offender who participated in a similar program. WestCare is a nonprofit organization that currently provides programs similar to those touted in SB398 both in Nevada and other states.

"I offer myself as an example personally. I have been incarcerated and went through a similar system of care that has helped me turn my life around," Lee said. "I now have 20 years outside of the system and I live in a state where I pay taxes, tithes in church and take care of six kids."

Lee told lawmakers, "Your investment goes a lot further than what is being stated here on paper." He said later that the prison population is expected to keep growing.

"Other states have learned quickly that they cannot build their way out of their criminal justice situation. There is no way to build enough prisons to continue housing people," Lee said.

Sen. Bill Raggio, R-Reno, praised the program, but said it's important to know all program costs before starting it.

"I question the cost. We don't want to find out in the haste to get it approved we haven't funded it properly," Raggio said.

http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_12133087

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April 12, 2009

Twenty Years of Drug Courts -- Results and Misgivings from Drug War Chronicle

Feature: Twenty Years of Drug Courts -- Results and Misgivings
from Drug War Chronicle, Issue #580, 4/10/09

The drug court phenomenon celebrates its 20th birthday this year. The first drug court, designed to find a more effective way for the criminal justice system to deal with drug offenders, was born in Miami in 1989 under the guidance of then local prosecutor Janet Reno. Since then, drug courts have expanded dramatically, with their number exceeding 2000 today, including at least one in every state.

According to Urban Institute estimates, some 55,000 people are currently in drug court programs. The group found that another 1.5 million arrestees would probably meet the criteria for drug dependence and would thus be good candidates for drug courts.

The notion behind drug courts is that providing drug treatment to some defendants would lead to better outcomes for them and their communities. Unlike typical criminal proceedings, drug courts are intended to be collaborative, with judges, prosecutors, social workers, and defense attorneys working together to decide what would be best for the defendant and the community.

Drug courts can operate either by diverting offenders into treatment before sentencing or by sentencing offenders to prison terms and suspending the sentences providing they comply with treatment demands. They also vary in their criteria for eligibility: Some may accept only nonviolent, first-time offenders considered to be addicted, while others may have broader criteria.

Such courts rely on sanctions and rewards for their clients, with continuing adherence to treatment demands met with a loosening of restrictions and relapsing into drug use subjected to ever harsher punishments, typically beginning with a weekend in jail and graduating from there. People who fail drug court completely are then either diverted back into the criminal justice system for prosecution or, if they have already been convicted, sent to prison.

Drug courts operate in a strange and contradictory realm that embraces the model of addiction as a disease needing treatment, yet punishes failure to respond as if it were a moral failing. No other disease is confronted in such a manner. There are no diabetes courts, for example, where one is placed under the control of the criminal justice system for being sick and subject to "flash incarceration" for eating forbidden foods.

Conceptual dilemmas notwithstanding, drug courts have been extensively studied, and the general conclusion is that, within the parameters of the therapeutic/criminal justice model, they are successful. A recently released report from the Sentencing Project is the latest addition to the literature, or, more accurately, review of the literature.

In the report, Drug Courts: A Review of the Evidence, the group concluded that:

* Drug courts have generally been demonstrated to have positive benefits in reducing recidivism.
* Evaluations of the cost-effectiveness of drug courts have generally found benefits through reduced costs of crime or incarceration.
* Concern remains regarding potential "net-widening" effects of drug courts by drawing in defendants who might not otherwise have been subject to arrest and prosecution.

"What you have with drug courts is a program that the research has shown time and time again works," said Chris Deutsch, associate director of communications for the National Association of Drug Court Professionals in suburban Washington, DC. "We all know the problems facing the criminal justice system with drug offenders and imprisonment. We have established incentives and sanctions as an important part of the drug court model because they work," he said. "One of the reasons drug courts are expanding so rapidly," said Deutsch, "is that we don't move away from what the research shows works. This is a scientifically validated model."

"There is evidence that in certain models there is success in reducing recidivism, but there is not a single model that works," said Ryan King, coauthor of the Sentencing Project report. "We wanted to highlight common factors in success, such as having judges with multiple turns in drug court and who understand addiction, and building on graduated sanctions, but also to get people to understand the weaknesses."

"Drug courts are definitely better than going to prison," said Theshia Naidoo, a staff attorney for the Drug Policy Alliance, which has championed a less coercive treatment-not-jail program in California's Proposition 36, "but they are not the be-all and end-all of addressing drug abuse. They may be a step forward in our current prohibitionist system, but when you look at their everyday operations, it's pretty much criminal justice as usual."

That was one of the nicest things said about drug courts by harm reductionists and drug policy reformers contacted this week by the Chronicle. While drug courts can claim success as measured by the metrics embraced by the therapeutic-criminal justice complex, they appear deeply perverse and wrongheaded to people who do not embrace that model.

Remarks by Kevin Zeese of Common Sense for Drug Policy hit many of the common themes. "If drug courts result in more people being caught up in the criminal justice system, I do not see them as a good thing," he said. "The US has one out of 31 people in prison on probation or on parole, and that's a national embarrassment more appropriate for a police state than the land of the free. If drug courts are adding to that problem, they are part of the national embarrassment, not the solution."

But Zeese was equally disturbed by the therapeutic-criminal justice model itself. "Forcing drug treatment on people who happen to get caught is a very strange way to offer health care," he observed. "We would see a greater impact if treatment on request were the national policy and sufficient funds were provided to treatment services so that people who wanted treatment could get it quickly. And, the treatment industry would be a stronger industry if they were not dependent on police and courts to be sending them 'clients' -- by force -- and if instead they had to offer services that people wanted."

For Zeese, the bottom line was: "The disease model has no place in the courts. Courts don't treat disease, doctors and health professionals do."

In addition to such conceptual and public policy concerns, others cited more specific problems with drug court operations. "In Connecticut, the success of drug courts depends on educated judges," said Robert Heimer of the Yale University School of Public Health. "For example, in some parts of the state, judges refused to send defendants with opioid addiction to methadone programs. This dramatically reduced the success of the drug courts in these parts of the state compared to parts of the state where judges referred people to the one proven medically effective form of treatment for their addiction."

Heimer's complaint about the rejection of methadone maintenance therapy was echoed on the other side of the Hudson River by upstate New York drug reformer Nicolas Eyle of Reconsider: Forum on Drug Policy. "Most, if not all, drug courts in New York abhor methadone and maintenance treatment in general," he noted. "This is troubling because the state's recent Rockefeller law reforms have a major focus on treatment in lieu of prison, suggesting that more and more hapless people will be forced to enter treatment they may not need or want. Then the judge decides what type of treatment they must have, and when they don't achieve the therapeutic goals set for them they'll be hauled off to serve their time."

Still, said Heimer, "Such courts can work if appropriate treatment options are available, but if the treatment programs are bad, then it is unlikely that courts will work. In such cases, if the only alternative is then incarceration, there is little reason for drug courts. If drug court personnel think their program is valuable, they should be consistently lobbying for better drug treatment in their community. If they are not doing this, then they are contributing to the circumstances of their own failure, and again, the drug user becomes the victim if the drug court personnel are not doing this."

Even within the coerced treatment model, there are more effective approaches than drug courts, said Naidoo. "Drug courts basically have a zero tolerance policy, and many judges just don't understand addiction as a chronic relapsing condition, so if there is a failed drug test, the court comes in with a hammer imposing a whole series of sanctions. A more effective model would be to look at the overall context," she argued. "If the guy has a dirty urine, but has found a job, has gotten housing, and is reunited with his family, maybe he shouldn't be punished for the relapse. The drug court would punish him."

Other harm reductionists were just plain cynical about drug courts. "I guess they work in reducing the drug-related harm of going to prison by keeping people out of prison -- except when they're sending people to prison," said Delaney Ellison, a veteran Michigan harm reductionist and activist. "And that's exactly what drug courts do if you're resistant to treatment or broke. Poor, minority people can't afford to complete a time-consuming drug court regime. If a participant finds he can't pay the fines, go to four hours a day of outpatient treatment, and pay rent and buy food while trapped in the system, he finds a way to prioritize and abandons the drug court."

An adequate health care system that provided treatment on demand is what is needed, Ellison said. "And most importantly, when are we going to stop letting cops and lawyers -- and this includes judges -- regulate drugs?" he asked. "These people don't know anything about pharmacology. When do we lobby to let doctors and pharmacists regulate drugs?"

Drug courts are also under attack on the grounds they deny due process rights to defendants. In Maryland, the state's public defender last week argued that drug courts were unconstitutional, complaining that judges should not be allowed to send someone to jail repeatedly without a full judicial hearing.

"There is no due process in drug treatment court," Public Defender Nancy Foster told the Maryland Court of Appeals in a case that is yet to be decided.

Foster's argument aroused some interest from the appeals court judges. One of them, Judge Joseph Murphy, noted that a judge talking to one party in a case without the other party being present, which sometimes happens in drug courts, has raised due process concerns in other criminal proceedings. "Can you do that without violating the defendant's rights?" he asked.

A leading advocate of the position that drug courts interfere with due process rights is Williams College sociologist James Nolan. In an interview last year, Nolan summarized his problem with drug courts. "My concern is that if we make the law so concerned with being therapeutic, you forget about notions of justice such as proportionality of punishment, due process and the protection of individual rights," Nolan said. "Even though problem-solving advocates wouldn't want to do away with these things, they tend to fade into the background in terms of importance."

In that interview, Nolan cited a Miami-Dade County drug court participant forced to remain in the program for seven years. "So here, the goal is not about justice," he said. "The goal is to make someone well, and the consequences can be unjust because they are getting more of a punishment than they deserve."

Deutsch said he was "hesitant" to comment on criticisms of the drug court model, "but the fact of the matter is that when it comes to keeping drug addicted offenders out of the criminal justice system and in treatment, drug courts are the best option available."

For the Sentencing Project's King, drug courts are a step up from the depths of the punitive prohibitionist approach, but not much of one. "With the drug courts, we're in a better place now than we were 20 years ago, but it's not the place we want to be 20 years from now," he said. "The idea that somebody needs to enter the criminal justice system to access public drug treatment is a real tragedy."
http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/580/drug_courts_at_20_years

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April 10, 2009

WA: Closing prisons, slashing sentences eyed to balance budget

Closing prisons, slashing sentences eyed to balance budget
By Jennifer Sullivan
Seattle Times staff reporter
April 9, 2009

OLYMPIA — Tough-on-crime legislation that has long filled courtrooms, prisons and parole offices across the country has apparently met its match — the economy.

In Washington and other states, lawmakers are considering budget cuts that would close prisons, loosen sentencing guidelines and slash probation terms.

With lawmakers in Olympia looking for nearly $4 billion in spending cuts, several high-ranking Democrats say the recession gives them an opportunity to add compassion to a criminal-justice system they believe has grown too large, too expensive and too harsh for some of the crimes.

"We need a massive re-look at what we're doing and what the focus is," said Senate Ways and Means Chairwoman Margarita Prentice, D-Renton.

Prentice is backing a plan in the Senate's proposed state budget to close the McNeil Island Correctional Complex, a 1,300-inmate, medium-security island prison in Pierce County.

The state has never closed a major prison before. The move would save about $16 million over the next two years, legislative budget staff said.

The Senate budget also would close Green Hill School, the state lockup for violent and gang-entrenched juveniles; downsize the state prison population by 1,900 inmates; and drop people convicted of low-level felonies and misdemeanors from probation.

The House, in its proposed budget, would cut probation time for violent felons and sex offenders; allow for home detention instead of incarceration in some cases; close the medium-security Naselle Youth Camp; and eliminate parole for nearly a third of all juvenile offenders.

6% of states' budgets

One in every 31 adults is incarcerated or on parole in the U.S. — a total of 7.3 million people, the Pew Center on the States reported last month.

Nationally, the prison inmate population has grown each year since 1972, said Jeremy Travis, president of John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City.

But due to the recession, nearly every state is scrambling to find ways to cut criminal-justice costs, which eat up nearly 6 percent of state budgets, said Alison Lawrence, a policy specialist with the National Conference of State Legislatures.

States are releasing inmates early and are letting offenders trade incarceration for treatment programs, she said. Some, like Washington, Michigan and New York, are considering prison closures.

In Olympia, the Senate would cut $152 million from corrections and criminal justice in the 2009-11 state budget, while the House would cut more than $160 million.

Last year, Washington spent nearly $1.1 billion on criminal justice, which includes the Department of Corrections, the State Patrol, the Criminal Justice Training Commission, the courts system and the Juvenile Rehabilitation Administration, according to the state Office of Financial Management.

Nearly 18,000 people are housed in the state's 15 prisons. Still, Washington is far from a leader in incarceration rates nationally. According to the Pew study, Washington ranks 44th for the number of people per capita in prison or jail.

King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg attributes Washington's lower prison population to a 2002 law that allows prosecutors to steer many drug offenders to state-funded treatment instead of incarceration.

Last year, drug offenders totaled about 13 percent of the prison population, down from 22 percent in 2005, Satterberg said.

Some urge caution

Crime-victim advocate Jenny Wieland Ward says the state should study how to reduce the cost of corrections before closing prisons.

"There's smarter ways of dealing with budget cuts than closing McNeil," said Ward, executive director of Everett-based Families & Friends of Missing Persons & Violent Crime Victims. "There has got to be a more thoughtful process."

State Corrections Chief Eldon Vail agrees the state shouldn't rush into closing institutions. He suggests cutting costs by placing fewer offenders on probation — a strategy both the House and Senate propose, along with closing institutions.

Currently, the state supervises about 27,000 offenders on probation, Vail said. The House proposal would remove about 11,000 people from supervision while the Senate would cut 7,100, Vail said.

Sen. Jim Hargrove, D-Hoquiam, worries the budget shortfall could cut into programs that provide drug, alcohol and mental-health treatment to adult and juvenile offenders. Hargrove, who chairs the Senate Human Services and Corrections Committee, said he would rather close expensive facilities like McNeil Island than put treatment programs on the chopping block.

Attorney General Rob McKenna, a Republican, said the state should look for new ways to pay for criminal justice.

"This state needs to have a serious conversation about public safety, how we're paying for it and how the public is suffering from inadequate law-enforcement resources," McKenna said.

When the economy is flush, lawmakers want to devote more money to public safety, he said. But when times are bad, criminal justice gets whacked.

"This is not the first time the state has balanced the budget by letting people out of prison early," McKenna added.

Sen. Mike Carrell, R-Lakewood, vehemently opposes any move to close prisons. He believes criminal-justice funding should be a higher priority this legislative session.

"Public safety has to be the first call," Carrell said. "What good does it do to have great schools if our children are raped, murdered and assaulted to and from school?"

"It's desperate times"

At Green Hill, news of the potential closure of the state's oldest and toughest juvenile-detention center was circulating though the population last week.

The facility in Chehalis holds about 200 medium- and maximum-security offenders ranging in age from 17 to 20.

Dan Robertson, deputy assistant secretary of the Juvenile Rehabilitation Administration, says closing Green Hill would be a mistake. Senate budget writers say the move would save nearly $14 million a year in operating costs.

But Robertson says it would cost more than $35 million to construct new facilities at Maple Lane School, a juvenile lockup near Centralia where Green Hill's offenders would be moved. Maple Lane primarily houses youth who have substance-abuse problems or mental illness or are incarcerated for sex offenses.

Instead of closing Green Hill, Robertson said his agency suggested closing Naselle Youth Camp, a medium-security facility that serves both boys and girls. That would save $10 million over the next two years.

Marybeth Queral, superintendent at Green Hill, doubts the state could re-create Green Hill's vocational programs for fiber-optic networking, welding, auto repair, embroidery and sign printing.

She's also concerned about the two offender populations mixing — many of Green Hill's offenders are known gang members serving time for violent felonies. Queral fears that Maple Lane's population could be preyed upon and manipulated by the older and more sophisticated offenders.

"I think it's desperate times. I think decisions are being made looking at the bottom-line dollar, not the potential impact," she said. "It could be very dangerous.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2009010460_criminaljusticecut
s09m.html

Copyright © 2009 The Seattle Times Company

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April 05, 2009

NY: Rockefeller Drug Laws: A Welcome Change But Not Far Enough Say NY Activists and Organizers

"The new law eliminates the mandatory minimum of a year in prison for first offenders charged with Class B felonies (sale of up to 1/2 ounce of cocaine or heroin, or possession with intent to sell) and first or second offenders charged with lesser felonies (such as possession of 1/2 gram of cocaine). It also expands drug treatment and other alternatives to incarceration. Second offenders charged with B felonies, who now face an automatic 4 1/2 to 9 years, might be able to get treatment instead of prison if they can prove they're drug-dependent.On the other hand, the bill retains the mandatory-minimum sentences for all other accused dealers, and only about one-eighth of the state's 13,400 drug prisoners will be able to apply for reduced sentences."

New York Lightens Up on Some of the Harshest Drug Laws in the Country
Steven Wishnia
AlterNet
Fri, 03 Apr 2009

New York State is about to enact major changes in its Rockefeller drug laws, which contain some of the harshest mandatory-minimum sentences in the nation. The activists who've been trying to repeal those laws for years say it's a very welcome move but doesn't go far enough.

"I think it's a really positive step forward. It is not the end of the Rockefeller drug laws, but hopefully, it's the beginning of the end," says Caitlin Dunklee of the Drop the Rock campaign, an umbrella group campaigning to repeal the laws.

The bill "breaches the mandatory-sentencing wall," adds Robert Gangi of the Correctional Association of New York, the prison-reform group behind Drop the Rock. It might divert half the state's convicted drug felons from prison, the group estimates.

The bill came about as part of a deal among the "three men in a room" who control New York's government: Gov. David Paterson, state Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith, and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, all Democrats. They agreed to include it in the state's budget, so it would not be voted on separately. After several days of delay, the state Senate approved the bill on a 32-30 party-line vote on Thursday, April 2. Paterson has promised to sign it.

The new law eliminates the mandatory minimum of a year in prison for first offenders charged with Class B felonies (sale of up to 1/2 ounce of cocaine or heroin, or possession with intent to sell) and first or second offenders charged with lesser felonies (such as possession of 1/2 gram of cocaine). It also expands drug treatment and other alternatives to incarceration. Second offenders charged with B felonies, who now face an automatic 4 1/2 to 9 years, might be able to get treatment instead of prison if they can prove they're drug-dependent.

On the other hand, the bill retains the mandatory-minimum sentences for all other accused dealers, and only about one-eighth of the state's 13,400 drug prisoners will be able to apply for reduced sentences.

The old law, Silver said in a statement, "has not impacted crime or reduced addiction, but, rather, has led to a massive increase in New York's prison population."

Drug offenders make up one-fifth of the state's male inmates and one-third of the female inmates. More than 90 percent of them are black or Latino, and about 40 percent are incarcerated for possession charges.

Paterson was arrested at a civil-disobedience protest against the Rockefeller laws in 2002, when he was a state senator representing Harlem, but he has taken a more cautious stance since he succeeded Eliot Spitzer as governor last year. He objected to several provisions in a drug-law bill passed by the Assembly in March.

Gangi credits activist pressure for getting him to compromise. The deal was reached on the night of March 25, a few hours after about 250 people demonstrated outside the governor's Manhattan offices.

"We heard that Paterson's staffers were asking, 'Can we make a deal before the rally?' " Gangi says.

According to Paterson spokeswoman Marissa Shorenstein, the governor agreed to end mandatory minimums for second offenders charged with felonies below Class B, and to allow drug prisoners to apply for resentencing.

But he insisted that accused drug offenders who wanted treatment instead of prison would have to plead guilty first, on the grounds that the threat of prison would make drug users more likely to stick with treatment. The governor's philosophy is "treat, don't punish, but treat to be effective," Shorenstein explains.

The bill also revives the Rockefeller law's original 15-years-to-life sentences, this time for "kingpins" convicted of selling more than $75,000 worth of drugs.

The state's prosecutors largely oppose easing the law. And the New York Daily News editorial page, long a loud voice for the "fry 'em" approach to crime, called the proposed changes the "Drug Dealer Protection Act" and said they would unleash a crime wave.

New York's current drug laws date from 1973, when Gov. Nelson Rockefeller was facing two problems. First, heroin-related crime was exploding, with dope fiends funding their habits with muggings and burglaries and dealers killing each other in business disputes.

Second, Rockefeller, the erstwhile standard-bearer of the Republicans' shrinking liberal wing, was contemplating another run for the party's presidential nomination, and he needed to prove that he was adequately "tough on crime."

The result was a law that mandated 15 years to life for sale of 2 ounces or more of heroin or cocaine or for possession of 4 ounces.

(Crime in New York continued to rise until the early 1990s, and New York City neighborhoods like Washington Heights and the Lower East Side -- low-income areas easily accessible to white buyers -- became open-air drug markets.)

Critics of the Rockefeller laws' harshness charge that they are "unjust and racially targeted," Linda Dechabert, head of Exponents, a harm-reduction group working with drug addicts, ex-prisoners and people with AIDS, said at the March 25 rally.

The racial disparities most likely stem from the ecology of the drug trade -- ghetto street dealers are more visible and violent than discreet white-collar dealers -- and the cumulative effects of racism in who gets stopped, who gets prosecuted and who gets imprisoned.

"It's easy to arrest blacks and Latinos, because they're in a confined area," notes Carl Dukes, 64, an ex-prisoner who attended the rally.

Another criticism is that penalties are determined by the weight of the drugs seized rather than by the defendant's role in the deal.

The most notorious case of that was Elaine Bartlett, a Harlem single mother who in 1983 was set up by an Albany cocaine dealer, who paid her $2,500 to deliver 4 ounces to him. Bartlett got 20 years to life, serving 16 years before she won clemency. Police allowed the dealer who hired her to continue operating in exchange for the information.

The state enacted mild reforms in 2004 and 2005. They reduced the 15-to-life sentences to 8 to 20 years, but did not affect the 90 percent of the state's drug prisoners convicted of lesser charges.

Activists developed four "pillars" for further-reaching reforms: restoring judicial discretion, expanding treatment and alternatives to prison, reducing sentences and retroactivity -- letting prisoners apply for the sentences they would have gotten under the revised laws.

By those standards, the proposed new law would do well on treatment. It's expected to provide an extra $50 million to $80 million for drug-treatment and alternatives-to-incarceration programs, such as the one run by the Brooklyn district attorney's office.

New York has a harm-reduction system well positioned to take advantage of this, notes Gabriel Sayegh of the Drug Policy Alliance, as there are well-established programs for drug rehab, needle exchange, methadone maintenance and overdose prevention.

Most activists agree, however, that the bill falls short on judicial discretion and retroactivity. For example, someone found guilty of selling drugs would still get an automatic 4 1/2-year minimum if they had been convicted of a violent felony in the past 10 years, says Gangi. Such a person might be dangerous -- or might have calmed down considerably since their previous crime.

"We're not saying people should not go to prison," he explains. "We're saying the judge should decide."

"It's unfair. You're caught with a little amount of drugs, and you serve a long, long term in prison," says Ashley O'Donoghue, a tall, thin man with "God's Son" tattooed on his neck. "It should be retroactive so the people who are still there can get a sentence that's more suitable for what they did."

O'Donoghue, 26, was arrested in 2003 when two white college students he'd been dealing cocaine to were nabbed and set him up for a 2 1/2-ounce sale, well above his usual range. Facing 15 to life, he pleaded guilty to a B felony and served five years of a 7-to-21-year sentence.

Comedian Randy Credico, a longtime drug-law activist who attended the March 25 rally dressed as Diogenes, "looking for an honest politician," says any changes in the law would be inadequate unless retroactive resentencing is "automatic." Less than half the 1,000 prisoners eligible to apply for shorter sentences under the 2004 law actually got them.

Nicholas Eyle of Reconsider, a Syracuse anti-prohibition group, is also not enthusiastic. "I don't want to sound like I don't support the change, but I'm not that excited," he says. "I'm not a fan of mandatory treatment."

Although rehab is preferable to prison, he says, most people arrested on drug charges are not addicts, and if they tell counselors that, they'll be told they're "in denial."

What the state really needs, he believes, is a "paradigm shift. If you want to save money and reduce crime, end prohibition. If you question the fundamentals, you have to conclude that prohibition doesn't work."

Many New Yorkers find it surprising that the state government could accomplish anything on such a controversial issue. The New York legislature is often called the most dysfunctional in the nation. Virtually all major legislation is crafted by secret negotiations among the "three men in a room": the governor, the state Senate majority leader and the Assembly speaker.

Democrats have long held a majority approaching 2-1 in the Assembly, the legislature's lower house. However, state Senate districts have been gerrymandered to aid the Republicans, who controlled it from 1965 to 2008.

Over the last 15 years of that era, the Senate's GOP leader, Joseph Bruno, was able to block all but token Rockefeller-law reform. He also gutted the state's rent-control laws and refused to let the Senate consider legalizing same-sex marriage.

Bruno resigned last summer, several months before he was indicted on federal corruption charges, and in November, the Democrats won a 32-30 majority in the Senate. That immediately revved up hopes among the state's progressive activists.

However, the ballots had scarcely been counted when three Senate Democrats threatened to ally with the Republicans unless they were given power and concessions.

Nicknamed the Gang of Three, they are Pedro Espada Jr. of the Bronx, a rent-control foe with a long history of campaign-finance violations; Carl Kruger, a Brooklyn death-penalty advocate; and the fiercely anti-gay Ruben Diaz Sr. of the Bronx.

The Democrats' majority was further threatened when Hiram Monserrate, a Queens liberal, was indicted for slashing his girlfriend. This has jeopardized Senate passage of several bills to strengthen rent control and is widely believed to have scotched any hope of it considering same-sex marriage.

Many activists also believe that upstate Republicans oppose reducing drug sentences because prisons are one of the few sources of steady jobs in the region, whose economy has been slumping since the 1970s. In 1973, when the Rockefeller laws passed, New York had 18 prisons. From 1973 to 1999, it built 51 new ones.

Nicholas Eyle disputes that notion, saying he doesn't believe that the dozen or so legislators from rural districts where prisons are prominent are a strong enough lobby to preserve the drug laws. Sayegh advocates replacing the 30,000 prison jobs with green jobs.

Still, economic issues may well have played a role. The state has been slammed with a $15 billion budget deficit. At $45,000 per inmate, the Silver statement emphasized, it costs New York more than $500 million a year to imprison drug offenders. The minimal changes enacted in 2004 have saved the state $100 million, it added.

"My Assembly colleagues and I continue in our pledge not to give up our fight for greater reform of New York state's ineffective and imprudent drug laws," Assembly Corrections Committee Chairman Jeffrion Aubry, D-Queens, a longtime advocate of repealing the Rockefeller laws, said in a statement after the deal was announced. "While today's agreement brings us closer to our goal, we recognize the need to do more."
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/180895-New-York-Lightens-Up-on-Some-of-the-Harshest-Drug-Laws-in-the-Country

Posted by lois at 10:59 AM | Comments (0)

April 03, 2009

Prisons, Drugs in America: A Turning Point?

Prisons, Drugs in America: A Turning Point?
Neal Peirce / Apr 02 2009
For Release Sunday, April 5, 2009
© 2009 Washington Post Writers Group

An historic turning point in criminal justice and drug policy in America?

The fourth week of March was arguably just that:

On the way to Mexico City, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton became the first senior U.S. official to accept co-responsibility for the cartel-driven drug violence now ravaging Mexico. Clinton acknowledged that “our insatiable demand for illegal drugs fuels the drug trade,” and that our three-decade long war on drugs has simply “not worked.”

In Albany, New York Gov. David Paterson and the Democratic legislative majority announced they’d reached agreement to roll back the punitive “Rockefeller drug laws” of the 1970s, starting with then-Gov. Nelson Rockefeller’s insistence on mandatory minimum prison sentences for first-time, non-violent drug offenders.

But the biggest breakthrough of all may have come in the U.S. Senate, where Virginia’s Jim Webb (D), joined by two Republican and 13 Democratic colleagues, sponsored legislation for a high-level “National Criminal Justice Commission.”

This could be the official eye-opener, the crucial reexamination of America’s penal and drug policies that the nation has so sorely needed for years.

Why?

First, its chair would be appointed by the president–and President Obama has called Webb twice to commend his effort. A commission-endorsed reform agenda would provide Obama cover for major changes in this politically charged area.

Second, the Senate Democratic leadership is enthusiastically in favor and there’s smaller but significant Republican cosponsorship–Pennsylvania’s Arlen Specter, ranking GOP member of the Judiciary Committee, and South Carolina’s Lindsay Graham, ranking member on the Crime and Drugs subcommittee.

A third positive: Jim Webb–highly decorated Marine combat veteran, Navy Secretary under President Reagan–can hardly be labeled a “softie” on crime. He and his staff have spent two years researching the prison and drug issues, hearing from prosecutors, judges, crime victims, former offenders, inmates and police. “It was like tapping a nerve,” Webb declares– “all are saying we have a real mess on our hands.”

Webb defines the base problem: with just 5 percent of world population, the U.S. has 2.3 million people behind bars–25 percent of all prisoners worldwide. “Either we have the most evil people on earth living in the United States, or we are doing something dramatically wrong.”

Webb contends that our prisons, many seriously overcrowded, have become “places of violence, physical abuse and hate,” costing federal, state and local governments a tough-to-justify $68 billion a year.

We’re “warehousing” the mentally ill in our prisons where, the senator notes, they get scant professional treatment. Then he focuses on “the elephant in the bedroom” –the rise in drug incarcerations. In 1980, the U.S. incarcerated 41,000 drug offenders; today the figure tops 500,000–a 1,200 percent increase.

The commission, says Webb, would have to wrestle with the fact that more than half of Americans age 12 and over have at some time used an illegal drug. “In talking of legality and illegality, what does that do to the fiber of our society? I saw more drug use at Georgetown Law School than anywhere else I’ve been. A lot of those people went on to be judges.”

Yet what’s the answer? Should we be arresting people for recreational drug use–or, Webb asks, for addiction?

Then there’s race: African-Americans, he observes, comprise 12 percent of our population, use drugs at close to the national average, but represent 37 percent of drug arrests and 74 percent of drug offenders sentenced to prison. How’s that to be explained?

Conversely, Webb underscores how seriously gangs are impacting American society. Some, though not all, ride on the back of the drug trade. Mexican drug cartels, the most violent and visible, are operating in 230 American cities, not simply along the border. MS-13 gangs, notorious for drug smuggling, gun running and hits for hire, have spread across the U.S., even recruiting 2,000, Webb notes, in Northern Virginia across the Potomac from Washington.

Then there’s the problem of rural towns, hard hit by globalization, actively seeking prisons as a source for jobs.

Many American guards receive only brief on-the-job training. Webb contrasts this with Japan, where guards have a year’s preparation and inmates legitimately regard them but “mentors, disciplinarians, and friends.”

Bottom line: Webb’s commission, if Congress approves it, will have a massive, complex agenda. Yet its findings could prove a vital turning point, not only for the federal government (which holds just 10 percent of prisoners) but state and local governments nationwide. Many might be inspired to create their own commissions.

Some say Webb, representing historically conservative Virginia, is threatening his own political future. But if Webb can get us off the dime, thinking and acting afresh on critical prison and drug issues, he’ll be serving America as vitally as the bravest of his erstwhile Marine colleagues.
http://citiwire.net/post/831/

Posted by lois at 12:04 AM | Comments (0)

April 01, 2009

Lock 'Em Up Jailing kids is a proud American tradition.

Lock 'Em Up
Jailing kids is a proud American tradition.
By THOMAS FRANK
Wall Street Journal On-line
April 1, 2009

At first glance, the news from Luzerne County, in northeastern Pennsylvania, is not good. In what is known locally as the "kids for cash" scandal, two judges have pleaded guilty to accepting $2.6 million in kickbacks from a for-profit juvenile correctional facility -- a privately owned jail for kids, essentially.

And here is what the judges delivered, according to the charges of the U.S. Attorney overseeing the case: In 2003 one of them, Judge Michael Conahan, who had authority over such expenses, defunded the county-owned detention center, channeling kids sentenced to detention to the private jail -- along with the public's money.

For good measure, the feds charge, Mr. Conahan also agreed to send the private facility $1.3 million per year in public funds. Over the succeeding years, the private jail, along with a second lockup-for-profit that had opened in another part of the state, won tens of millions of dollars in Luzerne County contracts, allegedly with the two judges' help.

What has drawn the media's attention, though, is the remarkable strictness of the judges' judging. Mr. Conahan's alleged partner in the scheme, Judge Mark Ciavarella Jr., reportedly sent kids to the private detention centers when probation officers didn't think it was a good idea; he sent kids there when their crimes were nonviolent; he sent kids there when their crimes were insignificant. It was as though he was determined to keep those private prisons filled with children at all times. According to news stories, offenses as small as swiping a jar of nutmeg or throwing a piece of steak at an adult were enough to merit a trip to the hoosegow.

Over the years Mr. Ciavarella racked up a truly awesome score: He sent kids to detention instead of other options at twice the state average, according to the New York Times. He tried a prodigious number of cases in which the accused child had no lawyer -- here, says the Times, the judge's numbers were fully 10 times the state average. And he did it fast, sometimes rendering a verdict "in the neighborhood of a minute-and-a-half to three minutes," according to the judge tasked with reconsidering Mr. Ciavarella's work.

My question is, what have the Luzerne County judges done that deviates in the least from our American political traditions? These jurists have merely taken to heart the unvarying message of 40 years' worth of election results -- that more people, many more, need to go to jail -- and have come up with an entrepreneurial solution to the problem.

We the people say it loud and clear every Election Day, in high-crime periods as well as peaceful stretches: More of our population needs to be behind bars. We love retribution so much we make hits of TV shows in which society's ne'er-do-wells come in for lectures not only by stern, righteous judges, but by tattooed, mulletted bounty hunters as well.

And over the years we have embraced all sorts of instruments ensuring that more people got locked up for longer and longer stretches: Three strikes laws, mandatory sentencing laws, zero-tolerance policies. Maybe they aren't "fair," but they've helped to make the U.S. number one in percentage of population in the clink -- in fact, as Virginia Democratic Sen. Jim Webb pointed out in Parade magazine on Sunday, America has an amazing 25% of the world's prisoners.

Taking this path has not always been easy. In the 1990s, when we started to realize that child crooks were "superpredators" who needed to go to prison along with everyone else, some were unwilling to act. Others stepped up. "We've got to quit coddling these violent kids like nothing is going on," said Sen. Orrin Hatch (R., Utah) in 1996. "Getting some of these do-gooder liberals to do what is right is real tough. We'd all like to rehabilitate these kids, but by gosh we are in a different age."

But taking law and order to the next level in this different age required money, by gosh. Privatizing bits of the prison industry was a step in the right direction, but what we didn't have -- until recently -- were proper instruments for incentivizing the judiciary. That's what the "kids for cash" judges were apparently experimenting with.

Today the do-gooders revile those efforts as "kickbacks," but before long we will see them as legitimate tools of justice. Our laws governing lobbying and campaign contributions have struck the right balance between the wishes of the people and those of private industry, so why are we so quick to doubt that the same great results can be achieved by putting the government's justice-dealing branch on the same market-based course?

The public will get to see their neighbors' kids go to jail, the judge who sends them there will be able to afford a nice condo in Florida, and the company that satisfies the public's desire for punishment will make a handsome profit. It will be a win-win result for everyone.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123854010220075533.html#

Posted by lois at 05:31 PM | Comments (0)

March 30, 2009

Real Cost of Prisons Comix wins National Council on Crime and Delinquency PASS Award

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
The National Council on Crime and Delinquency
Announces
The 2008 PASS Award Winners
Oakland, CA, March 20, 2009

The National Council on Crime and Delinquency is pleased to announce the 2008 Winners of its respected PASS Awards (Prevention for a Safer Society). NCCD honors the media’s success and vital role in illuminating the people and programs that uncover the root causes of crime and those that promise to protect our most precious resource—our youth—against involvement in crime.

A critical link in successful policies related to youth and justice is the education of the public. The media is uniquely positioned to be this link, and we gratefully acknowledge their efforts to fulfill that responsibility. Each year the PASS Awards honor media professionals in the fields of print, literature, broadcast media, television, and film in recognition of thoughtful and factual coverage of the issues. Special consideration is given to those stories that highlight solutions to criminal and juvenile justice and child welfare problems.

NCCD is the nation's oldest private organization working to attain responsive and effective criminal justice, juvenile justice, and child welfare systems. For over 100 years, NCCD has been committed to promoting criminal justice strategies that are fair, humane, cost-effective, and uncompromising in public safety. The issues that have defined NCCD since its inception are the need for a separate and humane justice system for children, alternatives to incarceration, and the fundamental connection between social justice and public safety.

For more information on NCCD, please visit our website at www.nccd-crc.org

FILM
Ice T Presents “25 to Life” Deloss Pickett, Michael Dallum
“At the Death House Door” Steve James, Peter Gilbert

LITERATURE
American Furies: Crime, Punishment, and Vengeance in the Age of Mass Imprisonment by Sasha Abramsky

Chasing Justice by Kerry Max Cook, Sandra Kaye Pressey, Kerry Justice Cook, Peter Hubbard

From the Bottom of the Heap: The Autobiography of Black Panther Robert Hillary King by Robert Hillary King and Andrea Gibbons

I’ll Fly Away: Further Testimonies from the Women of York Prison by Walley Lamb

Letters From the Dhamma Brothers by Jenny Phillips, Pariyatti Press, Ron Cavanaugh

Maximum Security: The True Meaning of Freedom by Alan Gompers

Prison Profiteers: Who Makes Money from Mass Incarceration by Paul Wright, Tara Herivel and Dianne Wachtel

Stanley Tookie Williams Street Peace Series by Stanley Tookie Williams and Barbara Becnel

The Real Cost of Prisons Comix by Lois Ahrens, Kevin Pyle, Sabrina Jones, Susan Willmarth, Ellen Miller-Mack and Craig Gilmore

MAGAZINE
San Jose Mercury News
“A Painful Choice for Moms in Prison” Edwin Garcia, Karen Borchers, Miller-McCune
“Is This the Future of the War on Drugs?” by Vince Beiser,John Mecklin

NEWSPAPER
East Valley Tribune “Reasonable Doubt” by Ryan Gabrielson, Paul Giblin, Patti Epler
Long Beach Press-Telegram “Lots of Answers, but No Easy Fixes” byWendy Thomas Russell andTracy Manzer
Seattle Weekly “Neverminded” by Laura Onstot and Mike Seely
The Daily Review “Educate to Break Cradle-to-Prison Pipeline” by Tammerlin Drummond
The Sacramento Bee “Unprotected” Marjie Lundstrom, Sam Stanton, Autumn Cruz, Mitchell Brooks
The Village Voice “Teen Murders at Rikers Jail” by Graham Rayman, Tony Ortega
The Washington Post “Rehabilitating Juvenile Offenders” by Robert Pierre, Carol Morello Westword
“Stand and Deliver” byAdam Cayton-Holland, Patricia Calhoun, Anthony Camera

RADIO
American Radioworks -“Gangster Confidential" Michael Montgomery and Catherine Winter
KALW Radio “Prisons in Crisis: A State of Emergency in California” JoAnn Mar, Alyne Ellis
KQED/Forum “Prisoner Health” by Scott Shafer, Nick Vidinsky andDan Zoll

TELEVISION/ VIDEO
HBO - “The Wire, Season 5” by David Simon, Nina Kostroff Noble, Ed Burns, Joe Chappelle.Karen L.Thorson
SoCal Connected/KCET -“Inside Locke High” Angela Shelley andAlexandria Gales, Brett Wood, Michael Bloecher,Bret Marcus
NBC/Wolf Films “Law and Order: SVU - Confession” Dick Wolf, Neal Baer, Ted Kotcheff, Peter Jankowski, Arthur Forney, Judith McCreary

WEB
AlterNet -“Meet Gus Puryear” by Silja J.A. Talvi and Jan Frel
City Limits -“A Ballot’s Breadth Away from Rejoining Society” by Karen Loew, Curtis Stephen, Rosie McCobb
City Limits “Debating How to Police a Challenging Population” Karen Loew, Tram Whitehurst

Posted by lois at 09:30 PM | Comments (0)

March 29, 2009

MA: Freedom watch: Jailhouse bloc The real reason law-and-order types love mandatory-minimum sentencing? It's money in their pockets.

News Features, The Boston Phoenix
Freedom watch: Jailhouse bloc
The real reason law-and-order types love mandatory-minimum sentencing? It's money in their pockets.
By HARVEY SILVERGLATE AND KYLE SMEALLIE | December 9, 2008

With aromatic puffs of change, Bay State stoners rejoiced on Election Day. But even the haziest of revelers may have missed the full significance of Question 2, a statewide ballot initiative to decriminalize marijuana possession in small amounts. Not only will this bring more humane and responsible marijuana laws, it will also suppress — however slightly — an insidious, contemporary offshoot of what President Dwight Eisenhower famously referred to as the "military-industrial complex": the idea that if private industry and government joined in promoting ever-increasing defense spending, war as well as national bankruptcy were more likely.

Almost a half-century later, that mindset has extended to both the local and federal law-and-order sectors, which have argued for, and experienced, virtually unabated growth. Today, law-enforcement groups regularly lobby against criminal-punishment reforms, and for the creation of new criminal statutes and overly harsh prison sentences. While these efforts are cloaked as calls for public safety, they are essentially creating more business for themselves.

The problem has become so widespread that some private correctional corporations — companies that subcontract services, and even privately owned jails and prisons, to all levels of government — have even lobbied the government to enact and maintain ever broader criminal laws and higher sentences. Those private prisons are now rolling in the profit, and taking on more prisoners every day as federal and state prisons run out of room to house their inmates.

But these lobbyists' success — and that of various law-enforcement groups — has given rise to a veritable "prison-industrial complex" that not only uses fear to suppress these groups' true intentions — it leaves taxpayers footing the bill.

Bleak house of detention
It was with these self-aggrandizing interests in mind that the Massachusetts Districts Attorneys' Association (MDAA) and other tough-on-crime groups fiercelyopposedthe marijuana-decriminalization referendum.

After all, if the penalties for minor marijuana possession were to remain on the statute books, more police, prosecutors, prison guards, and parole officers — and their lucrative overtime — would also be retained.

To their dismay, however, Question 2 passed by an overwhelming 65 to 35 percent voter margin, and will be implemented 30 days after election results are certified. As a result, many law-enforcement officials may soon be without an important source of job security and additional revenue — namely, the $30 million a year (as one study by a Harvard economics professor estimated) spent enforcing the soon-to-be-history current marijuana-possession laws.

Never mind that the forthcoming statutory reform is, from even a moderate law-and-order perspective, relatively benign. According to Question 2, anyone caught with less than one ounce will forfeit the substance and pay a $100 fine, while minors will additionally have to complete a drug-awareness program (including group sessions and community service). Current penalties for growing and trafficking in marijuana, as well as the prohibition against driving while high, will remain exactly as they are.

These facts were conveniently left out of the MDAA's efforts to "inform" voters.The group could not legally make direct contributions to ballot campaigns — publicly funded groups are unable to do so, thanks to a 1978 Supreme Judicial Court decision — yet in opposing Question 2, it still managed to fuel a whisper campaign and add misleading info to its Web site (hosted, by the way, on the state's ".gov" domain).

Thus, these law-enforcement officials were able to avoid any technical wrongdoing while lobbying for an increased legislative arsenal — feathering their own nests at the expense of liberty and sensible public policy.

Bear in mind, though, that our First Amendment protects not only speech, but also "the right of the people . . . to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." So state and local law-enforcement personnel, like other citizens, do have the right to lobby voters and even members of the legislature to promote more expansive criminal laws and stricter penalties. But self-serving lobbying and public-relations offensives, disguised as seeking protections for society, should be treated with exceptional scrutiny and skepticism.

Though disheartening, their actions are an age-old fact of life best described by Charles Dickens in his classic 1853 novel Bleak House: "The one great principle of the English law is to make business for itself."

Coke vs. crack
A similar battle waged in Massachusetts last summer, when law-enforcement groups sought once again to thwart criminal-justice reform. At the time, a legislative effort to help nonviolent offenders find employment opportunities by changing Criminal Offender Record Information (CORI) laws was brought before the State House of Representatives — and, thanks to the efforts of state Attorney General Martha Coakley and other law-enforcement officials, essentially squashed.

The proposed bill would have restricted the type of personal information that some employers receive, thereby assisting the many individuals saddled with CORI records who struggle to find employment and end up back behind bars.

Massachusetts's recidivism rates are nearly 40 percent, according to a study by the Urban Institute Justice Policy Center. And the CORI law's branding of even the most innocuous offender is, by all accounts, partly responsible for this dismal situation. So advocates of the bill asserted that changing CORI could ease the massive overcrowding at the state's prison system, which the Department of Corrections recently estimated to be operating at "144 percent of capacity." (Currently, there are 12,000 inmates imprisoned — a disgraceful state record.)

Another aspect of that same failed bill would have reduced mandatory-minimum sentences for certain drug offenses, which advocates said also contribute to overcrowding.

As the law stands, anyone convicted of selling drugs within 1000 feet of a school zone automatically receives a two-year prison term — leaving no room for judicial discretion. That means a first-time offender with no record could receive more prison time than, say, an armed robber. And the mandatory nature of these sentences eliminates the possibility of parole.

Because of the numerous schools in dense urban areas, poor, black, and Hispanic populations are at a greater risk of facing the mandatory-minimum measures, according to a recent Prison Policy Initiative study.

Yet despite the clear inequalities in the current law, as well as the benefits that reform holds out to both taxpayers and public safety — not to mention liberty — the legislative term ended in July with no action taken on the reform legislation.

This problem with drug sentencing is nothing new. For more than two decades, prison-reform supporters have condemned the federal sentencing disparities for the mostly middle and upper-class defendants caught using cocaine, and the mostly lower-class, inner-city habitants caught with cheaper crack cocaine.

Part of the now-infamous war on crime, a 100-to-1 ratio was implemented in sentencing for crack cocaine. So, a person caught selling five grams of crack received the same prison sentence as someone dealing 500 grams of powder cocaine.

The mandatory-minimums were harsh, too. That same person caught selling five grams of crack received a five-year minimum sentence; 50 grams or more and the minimum was 10 years.

Despite clear racial, economic, and cultural disparities, cries from constituents fell on deaf ears while law-enforcement lobbyists successfully cajoled and frightened congressional leaders.

US Attorney General Michael Mukasey, for one, strongly opposed reducing the crack-cocaine minimums. The Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), a 325,000 member national organization that bills itself as "the voice of our nations' law-enforcement officers," also spent $550,000 lobbying Congress over the past three years. Among their interests: stopping the Powder-Crack Cocaine Penalty Equalization Act, along with promoting a litany of other Draconian measures.

Prison business
To be fair, government employees weren't the only ones to lobby against crack-cocaine sentence equalization. A little-recognized subset of this vast prison-industrial complex lobbying community is composed of private correctional corporations, which sign lucrative contracts with governments to house inmates for profit, often shipping them to facilities out of state.

It is, of course, in these private prisons' economic interests to see more people in prison serving longer sentences. And with current facilities bursting at the seams, times for this burgeoning industry are good. The country's largest private prison provider, the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), spent more than $2.7 million from 2006 through September 2008 on lobbying for stricter laws. Last year alone, the company, listed on the New York Stock Exchange, generated $133 million in net income.

For the past 25 years, the CCA has built itself into a corrections powerhouse — it operates nearly 70 facilities housing more than 75,000 detainees. As it does for, say, contractors in Iraq, though, privatization comes with an inevitable lack of oversight. The CCA has been involved in numerous wrongful-death lawsuits, and it has been a constant target of prison-reform groups who claim the private facilities are understaffed and their detainees abused.

Yet another private prison provider, the GEO Group, which has annual revenue topping $1 billion, has come under intense scrutiny for dozens — if not hundreds — of inmate deaths in the past decade. One such prisoner death led to the recent indictment of Vice-President Dick Cheney on November 18, in which a rather ornery Texas state prosecutor claimed that Cheney's substantial investments in the GEO Group made him partly responsible for prisoner abuse — a dubious prosecutorial theory (in fact, it was dismissed this Monday), but with a grain of practical truth.

Nonetheless, states facing prison overcrowding turn to these corporations to outsource inmates. California, for example, has commissioned the CCA to ship convicts as far away as Tennessee (where financially strapped relatives and friends frequently cannot visit). The CCA has exported nearly 4000 California prisoners to states across the country under a $115 million contract with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Over the next three years, 8000 more are planned to be shipped out of the Golden State.

The societal costs — both human and financial — of these policies and practices are enormous, and growing. California — which carried a $15.2 billion deficit into this fiscal year — spends $10 billion per year on more than 170,000 inmates. Like the Bay State, California also faces high recidivism rates; state records show that more than two-thirds of released inmates return to prison within three years. In this context, a ballot battle — possibly more contentious than Massachusetts's Question 2 scuffle — raged this past election season. Two separate initiatives, each from vastly different perspectives, concerned the state's approach to criminal justice.

The first, Proposition 5, would have expanded treatment programs for those convicted of drug-related and nonviolent crimes. While the costs for more rehabilitation were estimated at $1 billion a year, analysts said $2.5 billion would have been saved from the reduction in prison costs. But, much like what transpired in Massachusetts, the California District Attorney's Association, along with other law-enforcement agencies, vehemently opposed the initiative. These agencies raised nearly $400,000 and, through the Web site of their umbrella group, People Against Proposition 5, issued "facts" such as "Proposition 5 creates an 'Express Lane' for drug dealers to get back on the streets and peddling dope to our kids."

Conversely, nearly $1 billion would have been added to the cops' coffers under Proposition 6, which proposed new laws for prosecutors to fight gang activity. Many of the same law-enforcement agencies that opposed Prop 5 supported Prop 6, joined by some "tough-on-crime" lawmakers who slashed $3 billion in education from the state's 2008 budget. Included among the Prop 6 supporters was — you guessed it — the CCA.

The CCA's lobbying efforts, as well as those of publicly funded law-enforcement agents, wasn't enough to convince Californians, as nearly 70 percent of voters opposed Prop 6. Yet similarly high numbers opted against Prop 5.

Maybe the cops' Prop 6 push for more crime-fighting money and power were too transparent for voters. Interestingly, though, their appeals to public safety in opposing Prop 5 seemed to work. California voters were quite possibly unaware that, by maintaining strict criminal laws and closing off alternatives to incarceration, law-enforcement agencies maintained their strength.

The 1 percent solution?
From Niccolò Machiavelli to Rudy Giuliani, fear has been the foundation of ever-expanding political power (and, for some, job status and security). And it continues to drive the prison-industrial complex.

Just as the United States Department of Justice was able to pressure Congress to enact the infamous USA-Patriot Act in the immediate aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, here in the Bay State, an appeal to fear ("protect the children") prevailed in stampeding the legislature. In late July, Governor Deval Patrick signed into law "An Act Further Protecting Children," a bill providing stricter mandatory-minimum sentences for sex offenders who target children.

The way this legislation was presented made opposition appear callous and irresponsible. Who, after all, wouldn't want to keep child predators off the streets?

Yet tucked away in this bill are provisions that do far more than simply protect the young. The proposal enables prosecutors to obtain private records from Internet and telephone providers by issuing an "administrative subpoena." Prosecutors, having only to assert that records are "relevant and material to an ongoing criminal investigation," were granted ever-expanding access into otherwise personal data. The telecoms, in turn, were granted blanket immunity from claims of privacy violation. There was no mass protest from the customers.

But at least one person did object. Newton's Democratic state senator Cynthia Creem voiced skepticism in a July 29 Newton TAB op-ed. Mindful that the most egregious provisions of the Patriot Act have been used to target not just terrorists but journalists, activists, and Muslim charities, she wrote: "I cannot support this attack on privacy rights when less-invasive and equally effective means are available. Our liberties should never be sacrificed in the name of prosecutorial convenience." A few other scattered voices in the State Senate echoed Creem. But perhaps Creem's reference to "convenience" missed the point — prosecutorial power appears to have been the more likely goal.

When the bill was passed by the Massachusetts House and presented to the Senate, Coakley, having learned that other politicians were questioning the bill's scope, lobbied hard so that no language would be changed (which would have required passage again through the House). With robust MDAA support, as well as the backing of key legislative leaders, 11 different role-call votes for amending provisions of the bill were voted down. Less than two weeks after this truncated debate, the bill became law. Experienced observers of the legislative process marveled at the ability of Coakley and her allies to forestall changes to the legislation.

The United States — "land of the free" — has five percent of the world's population, but it also, thanks to the lobbyists and officiants behind the prison-industrial complex, shamefully holds 25 percent of the world's incarcerated. It has a higher rate of imprisonment than the planet's most notorious despotisms. One in 100 Americans is in jail.

These citizens are not only unproductive, they cost the public $45 billion a year, according to a June report by the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics. And yet they also keep a small army of officers and other law-enforcement support personnel on the job. The monumental taxpayer's tab that would be unnecessary with saner criminal-justice laws is virtually incalculable.

It is long past the time to re-think how much credence we should give to those who claim to be experts in law enforcement, but who, in reality, have simply discovered a steady and ever-increasing source of job security.

Their First Amendment right to lobby for endless new criminal laws and ever-tougher prison sentences is indeed constitutionally protected, but this does not mean that these law-enforcement officials' criminal "expertise" should endow them with a free pass from critical scrutiny. Legislators and the public need not sit by idly as their fellow citizens are unjustly arrested, prosecuted, and often incarcerated for increasingly lengthy periods of time as the law-enforcement industry's wallet grows fat. The next time prison-industrial-complex adherents tell us we need tougher laws and sentences for our own good, we should point out precisely whose good is being served.

Harvey Silverglate is a criminal defense and civil-liberties lawyer and writer. Kyle Smeallie, former associate editor of the Boston College Heights, is Silverglate's research assistant and paralegal. Silverglate's next book, Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent, is forthcoming next year from Encounter Books.
http://thephoenix.com/Boston/News/73092-Freedom-watch-Jailhouse-bloc/
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Posted by lois at 11:22 AM | Comments (0)

March 28, 2009

NY: Press Release from Gov. Paterson on Major Changes to Rockefeller Drug Laws!!

(Scroll down for specific reforms.)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
March 27, 2009

GOVERNOR PATERSON AND LEGISLATIVE LEADERS ANNOUNCE THREE-WAY AGREEMENT TO REFORM NEW YORK STATE’S ROCKEFELLER DRUG LAWS

Sweeping Reform Ends Harsh Sentences for Non-violent Addicts

Focuses on Treatment Rather than Punishment to End the Cycle of Addiction

Governor David A. Paterson, Senate Majority Leader Malcolm A. Smith and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver today announced a three-way agreement calling for sweeping reform of the State’s Rockefeller Drug Laws. The agreement eliminates the harsh sentences that the Rockefeller Drug Laws mandated by giving judges total authority to divert non-violent addicts to treatment and greatly expanding drug treatment programs. The agreement strikes a careful and appropriate balance to ensure that non-violent addicted offenders get the treatment they need while predatory kingpins get the punishment they deserve.

“I have been fighting to overhaul the drug laws and restore judicial discretion in narcotics cases since I began my career in public service as a State Senator nearly a quarter-century ago,” Governor Paterson said. “As a resident and representative of Harlem, I saw first-hand the devastating effect that drugs have on our communities, and the devastating effect that ill-considered drug laws and drug policies have had on individuals, families and neighborhoods.”

The Governor added: “I have seen too many lives destroyed by outrageously harsh and ineffective mandatory sentencing laws, and I have also seen too many lives ruined by despicable dealers who prey on the vulnerabilities and addictions of others. I believe this agreement strikes the right balance, and I urge the Legislature to enact it immediately, before more lives and communities are needlessly destroyed.”

Senate Majority Leader Smith said: “Today marks the beginning of a new era for New York’s sentencing laws. Rockefeller Drug Law reform will reverse years of ineffective criminal laws, protect communities and save taxpayers millions of dollars that were wasted on the current policy. With more money going toward treatment instead of costly imprisonment, our State will finally have a smarter policy, giving families a fighting chance in the war on drugs.”

Assembly Speaker Silver said: “Long before we had partners in either the Executive or in the Senate, the Assembly Majority was fighting for real reform of the Rockefeller Drug Laws. With this legislation, we have taken, at long last, a giant leap in establishing a more just, a more humane and a more effective drug policy in the State of New York. No longer will drug use and addiction be considered solely a criminal matter in this State, but a public health matter as well. This legislation recognizes that drug addiction is a disease which calls out for treatment rather than incarceration. I commend the tenacity and the dedication of my colleagues and the leadership of Assemblymembers Aubry, Lentol and Weinstein for their unyielding commitment to this issue.”

Senator Ruth Hassell-Thompson said: “Today, the Governor and the Legislature have agreed on a major change in public policy. We have created a balanced approach to drug addiction and crime. Our ability to reduce the flow of drugs in our communities is dependent on our ability to reduce the demand. We are now shifting resources to treat drug addiction as a medical problem. By diverting addicts to drug treatment courts, we believe we can get people off drugs and thereby reduce the demand for them. Study after study shows that our policies will make our communities safer and save the taxpayers millions of dollars. Today, we begin anew, offering offenders an opportunity to receive treatment, while maintaining that the safety and security of our neighborhoods, cities, and State remains paramount.”

Senator John L. Sampson said: “This is a promise made, and a promise kept. The Rockefeller Drug Laws have decimated communities and destroyed lives. Our Democratic conference said that once in the Majority we would be instrumental in making changes that positively impact all people across our State. Taking on this issue in our first year as the Majority shows the people that the Senate is serious and will not back down from the big issues. Reforms we made in 2004 were just a down payment, we’ve now paid off the mortgage. So I congratulate the Governor and members of the Assembly. I also congratulate my colleagues, Senators Schneiderman and Hassell-Thompson, who along with myself, were at the table and the forefront of the push to reform the Rockefeller Drug Laws.”

Senator Eric T. Schneiderman said: “This legislation delivers a big dose of sanity to our State’s sentencing practices. It will make our communities safer, save money and, most importantly, save lives. Thousands of people from every corner of this State will benefit from these reforms. Today NewYork chooses treatment over incarceration—30 years is enough.”

Assemblyman Jeffrion L. Aubry said: “My Assembly colleagues and I continue in our pledge not to give up our fight for greater reform of New York State’s ineffective and imprudent drug laws. While today’s agreement brings us closer to our goal, we recognize the need to do more. We will continue to work with our partners to completely reform the Rockefeller Drug Laws.”

Assemblyman Joseph R. Lentol said: “Thirty-six years ago I voted against the enactment of the Rockefeller Drug Laws. It was clear to me that simply locking drug offenders away without treatment would not be effective. I am pleased that we are finally towards turning this travesty around and judges will once again have more of the discretion they need.”

Assemblywoman Helene E. Weinstein said: “Judicial discretion has always been one of the core principles for which the Assembly has fought. With the expansion of drug courts and other options to treat addicts, we are moving toward dealing with the underlying problems of drug offenders – giving them the opportunity to get treatment and reduce recidivism in New York.”

The agreement will give judges the discretion to divert non-violent drug addicted individuals to treatment alternatives that are shown to be far more successful than prison in ending the cycle of addiction. Crucially, it also commits tens of millions of dollars to existing and new treatment programs.

“It makes no sense to give judges the authority to place non-violent addicted offenders into treatment if there is nowhere to treat them,” Governor Paterson said. “We must not only overhaul the drug laws, but also provide an infrastructure to ensure that we successfully rehabilitate those who are addicted.”

There are three significant pieces of the agreement. First, it creates a drug treatment program to be administered by drug court judges.

+ Under this program, judges will have discretion to place addicted first and second-time drug offenders into judicially-approved alcohol and substance abuse treatment – over the objectionsof prosecutors.

+ This agreement also recognizes that drug-addicted persons often commit other crimes, such as property and theft offenses. This agreement will make treatment available to these non-violent addicted offenders who commit these offenses.
+ The agreement maximizes an addicted offender’s chance of success in overcoming addiction, by relying on New York’s highly successful drug courts to administer the new treatment model. Drug courts use specially-trained judges who build relationships with offenders, closely monitor their progress and reward their successes. They are also staffed with case managers and vocational and employment specialists to assist offenders in obtaining education and jobs.

+ For the first time, the agreement gives judges the authority to dismiss all charges or seal the arrest and conviction records of offenders who successfully complete a judicially-sanctioned treatment program. It also gives judges complete discretion to determine an appropriate penalty for those offenders who are unable to succeed in the treatment program.
+ The agreement recognizes that relapses are often part of recovery from long-term drug addiction. It would require judges to consider whether a non-incarceratory remedy, such as heightened supervision or more frequent testing and treatment, could effectively be used if an offender under court supervision suffers a relapse.
+ The agreement vastly expands the availability of drug treatment programs and commits tens of millions of dollars to inpatient treatment programs, outpatient treatment programs and community residential facilities.

+ Recognizing that some offenders may require more supervision than can be provided through community-based drug treatment programs, the agreement expands the use of programs such as the “shock” incarceration program and the Willard drug treatment program, to give judges additional sentencing options for these offenders.
+ The agreement also permits the State Division of Parole to discharge early from continued parole supervision those drug offenders who have demonstrated success and rehabilitation while serving a term of post-release supervision.

Second, the agreement relieves new offenders from some of the old Rockefeller Drug Law’s mandatory sentencing provisions and provides additional relief to offenders who remain incarcerated under the old laws.

+ The agreement eliminates mandatory State prison sentences for first-time class B felony drug offenders and second-time non-violent class C, D and E drug offenders, making them eligible for a term of probation that could also include drug treatment, or a local jail sentence.

+ The agreement permits class B drug felons who meet eligibility criteria and who are currently serving Rockefeller Drug Law sentences to enter the six-month shock incarceration program when they are within three years of release. If successful, they would be entitled to early release from prison.
+ The agreement also requires the Board of Parole to consider current, lower sentencing ranges when deciding whether to release a class B drug offender to parole supervision.

Third, the agreement ensures that offenders who are not addicted, but who profit from the addictions of others, are appropriately sentenced to State prison.

+ The Governor believes that law enforcement should target drug kingpins instead of low-level drug users and his agreement creates a new drug “kingpin” offense that targets organized drug traffickers who profit from and prey on drug users.
+ The agreement also creates new crimes to ensure that adults who sell drugs to children are appropriately required to serve time in State prison.

+ Finally, the agreement retains mandatory prison sentences for class B predicate drug offenders, but allows judges to impose lower prison terms that are similar to those in other states.

Posted by lois at 09:54 PM | Comments (0)

March 27, 2009

FL:Woman joins sex-offender group living under Julia Tuttle Causeway

Mar. 23, 2009
Woman joins sex-offender group living under Julia Tuttle Causeway
By FRED GRIMM. Miami Herald
It's as if Voncel Johnson has been thrust into a bizarre social experiment.

Forcing so many men to live like post-apocalyptic trolls beneath a bridge in the middle of Biscayne Bay wasn't quite mad enough. Now they've added a woman.

For two years, a colony of convicted sex offenders under the Julia Tuttle Causeway has lived in a public health travesty, without water or toilets or electrical service. They sleep in tents, shacks, the back seats of cars in the last realistic address in metropolitan Miami unaffected by city and county sex-offender residency laws.

The numbers have been growing steadily as more convicted sex offenders emerge from prison and are consigned to finish out their wretched lives under a bridge.

The population was up to 52 men Monday. And Voncel Johnson.

GENDER EQUITY

In a peculiar nod to gender equity, the Florida Department of Corrections informed her last week that she too had only one residency option in Miami-Dade County -- the Tuttle. ''They just give me a blanket and a pillow and sent me . . . here?'' she asked, talking over the incessant thump-thump-thump of the freeway traffic overhead. ``I just broke down.''

A community backward enough to create a subterranean de-facto prison camp of male sex offenders thrusts a single woman into the mix -- just to see what happens.

It's an ironic setting for Voncel Johnson. The 43-year-old woman, who grew up in poverty and neglect in the Brownsville section of Miami, told me she was sexually molested at age 6 and gang-raped at 16. ''I have a hard time trusting men,'' she said.

In 2004, Johnson pleaded guilty to a charge of lewd and lascivious exhibition (without physical contact) with a minor. She claimed Monday the charge was unfounded but at the time a plea offer with one year probation and no prison time seemed prudent. Except she twice failed to meet sex-offender registration requirements. Her probation was revoked. She did 10 months at Broward Correctional Institute.

COMMON REFRAIN

She repeated a common refrain -- sometimes delusional -- among the bridge outcasts. ``I never would have done that plea deal if I'd known they'd send me here. I could've fought those charges.''

But offender laws leave the state Department of Corrections no options for a sex offender. Voncel Johnson's parole officer did find her a motel room for three days last week. And she was offered a slot in a residential offender program in another county. But Johnson refused to leave Miami. ``All my family lives here. I've never been any place but Miami.''

It was probably a foolish decision, but Johnson harbors some vague notion about gutting it out beneath the Tuttle until her parole ends May 5. ''Then I can find some place to live.'' She seems unable to grasp that residency restrictions are forever.

Meanwhile, the men beneath the Tuttle gave her a battered old camper trailer. ''We watch out for her,'' insisted Juan Carlos Martin, who has been under the bridge so long that the address on his driver's license reads ''Julia Tuttle Causeway Bridge.'' He said it was as if city, county and state officials purposely cram more and more men into an unliveable, hopeless, crowded space, knowing that eventually something awful might happen. And now they add a woman.

Martin said, ``They need to get her out of here.''
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/columnists/fred-grimm/story/964528.html

Posted by lois at 11:03 PM | Comments (0)

March 26, 2009

The National Criminal Justice Act of 2009- will undertake a top-to bottom review of our entire criminal justice system and offer recommendations for reform"

Senator Jim Webb of VA has introduced The National Criminal Justice Act of 2009 today.

I encourage you to take a few minutes and read the full-bill http://webb.senate.gov/email/incardocs/CriminalJusticeReform_Legislation.pdf

Here is a fact sheet on the Bill (http://webb.senate.gov/email/incardocs/FactSheeti.pdf), which according to Senator Webb will be "undertake a top-to-bottom review of our entire criminal justice system" and to offer recommendations for reform."

Please encourage your Senators and Congresspeople to support passage of the Act.

Here is part of Webb's statement:

The National Criminal Justice Act of 2009 that I introduced in the Senate on March 26, 2009 will create a blue-ribbon commission to look at every aspect of our criminal justice system with an eye toward reshaping the process from top to bottom. I believe that it is time to bring together the best minds in America to confer, report, and make concrete recommendations about how we can reform the process.

Why We Urgently Need this Legislation:
With 5% of the world's population, our country now houses 25% of the world's reported prisoners.
Incarcerated drug offenders have soared 1200% since 1980.
Four times as many mentally ill people are in prisons than in mental health hospitals.
Approximately 1 million gang members reside in the U.S., many of them foreign-based; and Mexican cartels operate in 230+ communities across the country.
Post-incarceration re-entry programs are haphazard and often nonexistent, undermining public safety and making it extremely difficult for ex-offenders to become full, contributing members of society.

America's criminal justice system has deteriorated to the point that it is a national disgrace. Its irregularities and inequities cut against the notion that we are a society founded on fundamental fairness. Our failure to address this problem has caused the nation's prisons to burst their seams with massive overcrowding, even as our neighborhoods have become more dangerous. We are wasting billions of dollars and diminishing millions of lives.

We need to fix the system. Doing so will require a major nationwide recalculation of who goes to prison and for how long and of how we address the long-term consequences of incarceration.

Posted by lois at 05:31 PM | Comments (0)

March 25, 2009

"Resistance Behind Bars- The Struggles of Incercerated Women" by Vikki Law

I just finished reading "Resistance Behind Bars" written by Vikki Law. In case you don't know about it or haven't had the chance to I recommend you buy a copy and read it.
I will quote a little from the introduction in which Vikki writes about her response to the comment: "Women (in prison) don't organize."
"I began to search for stories---and women--who would disprove this assertion. I found mentions of lawsuits, and using various state department of corrections' websites looked up their address addresses and wrote them letters asking if they would share their experiences with me." And "To ensure that I was representing their struggles accurately and to give them the opportunity to add, update or delete any of the tales they do not want to share with the public, I sent each woman draft after draft of the chapters her voice and experience(s) appeared in. "
The voices of women form form the majority of the book which took 8 years to complete. The chapters reflect the concerns of the women with whom Vikki corresponded and include Barriers to Basic Care, Mothers and Children, Sexual Abuse,Education, Women's Work, Grievances, lawsuits and the Power of the Media. Other chapters focus on Breaking the Silence, Resistance Among Women in Immigrant Detention and an Historical Background.
The book is written in plain English. It frames resistance by women very differently than the kinds of resistance by men prisoners which has come to define "resistance."
The book is published by PM Press and you can order a copy on-line (https://secure.pmpress.org/index.php?l=product_detail&p=91) or I am sure your local bookstore can order it for you.

Posted by lois at 04:03 PM | Comments (0)

KS: Johnson County’s prison avoidance operation could lose more than $868,500 from the state

Johnson County’s prison avoidance operation could lose more than $868,500 from the state
Posted:03/21/2009

Mark Winton’s handshake was firm and his voice strong when he said he was a former drug addict on his last chance to stay out of prison.

“I know I can make it,” the Olathe man pledged.

Supporting him is one of the largest prison avoidance operations in Kansas. He’s among about 245 residents at a sprawling site at New Century AirCenter — a $12.8 million-a-year operation funded by Johnson County, the state, grants and user fees.

Most offenders there leave to work and make money. Governments save money.

These kinds of community alternatives are far cheaper than prisons. A recent Pew Center on the States report urged states to use them more and praised Kansas for helping fund the programs.

But when budgets are stressed, money for alternatives tends to shrink. The proposed state budget in Kansas now calls for cutting about $2 million that helps pay for the residential offender programs in Johnson and Sedgwick counties.

Johnson County stands to lose more than $868,500 from the state, and with its own tight budget, the county might have to reduce the $6.1 million it pays, said Betsy Gillespie, director of county corrections.

All that would boost other costs, Gillespie said, when offenders go to jail or prison instead.

It also would be a step back for a Johnson County operation that began with one building and 33 beds in the 1980s and gradually grew to four buildings, hundreds of beds and many operations.

Drunken drivers

Society and governments struggle with what to do with a constant flow of repeat drunken drivers, and the New Century complex provides one option.

Under Kansas law, a felony drunken driver can go to a county jail for up to one year but not to prison. This saves the state money on prisons but throws the cost onto the counties.

Two years ago, Johnson County started a work-release program for those with four drunken-driving convictions or more. The 60-bed unit generally runs near capacity, and 134 people were admitted last year. More than eight in 10 successfully served their time.

Repeat drunken drivers actually have more going for them than many other criminals, said Antonio Booker, a director at the county corrections center.

They tend to be older and have stable jobs, he said.

Michael Sesto, 47, of Shawnee, said last week that he was due for release in two days.

“This was a needed program for me,” the carpenter said, and it allowed him to keep working and keep his house. He got in trouble because he kept trying to meet the right woman in nightclubs, he said, and now he’s part of a church singles group.

For the DUI offenders, he said, alcohol treatment begins when they leave the program and start parole.

“That’s where the rubber meets the pavement,” he said, and more challenges are ahead.

‘Legal side of the law’

Don Womack, 34, breezed down a hallway waving a certificate of completion, which he got after serving 96 days for possessing cocaine.

He was among 155 criminals in another program, which allows them to work while attending self-improvement programs. They stay two to four months.

More than 500 people were admitted to that operation last year. More than three of four graduate successfully, according to past studies.

Here, as in the rest of the complex, residents can be seen by a nurse or mental health worker. Throughout the New Century complex, about 65 percent of residents get medicine for mental illnesses.

Womack, who came to the center from prison, stopped at the credit union on site, where people can deposit or cash checks and save money. Many can’t get a bank account on the outside or have never had one.

Womack found a good job at a Lenexa manufacturing company while serving time at New Century program and saved money toward a car.

“It gave me a chance to live on the legal side of the law,” he said. “I was at a point in my life when I was ready.”

Another building in the complex houses the therapeutic community, which is six months of substance abuse treatment and self-improvement work. It holds 40. Addicted clients can’t leave until they finish the six months. Many then move to work release.

Winton, 37, recently graduated from the treatment community into work release, where he hopes to learn to be an electrician.

He’s a cocaine addict who has been in and out of the system for more than 15 years, he said, including three stints in prison. He said the long drug treatment and improvement work got him past personal problems that fed anger, resentment and bad behavior.

“I came here with low self-esteem,” he said.

Winton said he intended to go straight and be a better father to his nine children by six women. He’ll really do it this time, he said.

He said he got to this point after using drugs while on probation. A judge sent him to New Century as a last chance to avoid prison.

Winton said he would make good on that chance.

So far, Booker said, “he’s done an excellent job.”

If Winton finally stops breaking the law, he’ll save the state the cost of locking him up. The Pew Center study puts the national average at $29,000 a year.

Every little bit helps.

In fiscal year 2008, the study reported, Kansas spent $341 million on corrections, or 5.6 percent of its general fund.
http://m.kansascity.com/kcstar/db_10893/contentdetail.htm;jsessionid=A7A42481212D882B1F56AE46E8669453?contentguid=XKtKydiX&storycount=19&detailindex=1&full=true#display

Posted by lois at 02:12 PM | Comments (0)

March 21, 2009

MA Bar Association: MBA-backed criminal reform legislation returns for 2009-10 session

Lawyers Journal
MBA-backed criminal reform legislation returns for 2009-10 session
By Kelsey Sadoff
March 20, 2009

Criminal reform bills that failed to make it through last year’s legislative session are being reintroduced for the 2009-10 session with high expectations for their passage, which would usher in significant changes to the state’s criminal policies.

Last year, the Massachusetts Bar Association championed reforms to both sentencing guidelines and the Criminal Offender Record Information (CORI) law, but the legislation was released from committee too late to advance before the end of the 2008-09 session. Immediate Past President David W. White Jr. made sentencing and CORI reform a priority for his term, and 2008-09 President Edward W. McIntyre has continued the push for reform.

The MBA is supporting a CORI bill that the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute and a coalition of groups, under the name of Massachusetts Alliance to Reform CORI (MARC), are focused on having addressed by the Legislature. The MBA has proposed recommendations for the CORI bill, which includes addressing access (law enforcement access versus non-law enforcement entities), accuracy and sealing old records.

The MBA’s Drug Policy Task Force is also set to issue a report this year that will include comprehensive data and facts that will strongly support arguments for sentencing reform in Massachusetts.

“This new legislative session holds much promise in the advancement of criminal sentencing and CORI reform legislative measures,” said MBA General Counsel and Acting Executive Director Martin W. Healy. “Criminal justice reforms have been identified as a priority area of interest by a number of legislators. We are in the second half of the (Gov. Deval) Patrick administration and the governor is considered a veteran on the Hill. We are hopeful that Patrick will push hard on these greatly needed reforms.”

More than 20 years ago, mandatory minimum sentencing reforms for drug offenders were enacted in Massachusetts to deal with crimes including trafficking, possession with intent to distribute, distribution in a school zone and distribution to a minor. The mandatory minimum sentences effectively ended an offender’s opportunity for parole if incarcerated.

Speaking against the current mandatory minimum sentencing policy at the Jan. 15 MBA House of Delegates meeting, the Drug Policy Task Force received HOD endorsement on two pieces of drug and treatment legislation that the MBA will support during the 2009-10 legislative session.

HOD unanimously voted in favor of the proposed legislation, which would revise the drug sentencing structure by eliminating mandatory minimums for most drug dealing crimes and expand parole and work release opportunities for incarcerated drug offenders, while also enhancing the existing system of diversion of drug offenders to drug treatment programs as an alternative to incarceration.

“The MBA is taking a position because current drug policies have failed; because they are expensive (Department of Correction’s inmate cost is more than $47,000; county jail is $39,000) and growing exponentially,” said MBA President Edward W. McIntyre.

According to the Massachusetts Department of Correction, the state prison population increased by 384 percent from 1980 to 2008 and the number of drug offenders increased 2,394 percent, from 109 in 1980 to 2,610 in 2008. Since the enactment of mandatory minimum sentencing reforms, drug offenders have made up more than 25 percent of the state prison population, as opposed to the 4 percent of drug offenders making up the state prison population in 1980.

“Essentially, the MBA’s position is about deploying a public health approach rather than a failed criminal justices paradigm to drug offenders,” said McIntyre. “It’s about treatment rather than incarceration; about accelerated reintegration into the family unit, the community’s social structure and workforce. Studies from across the country and around the world demonstrate that intelligent policies that move away from the incarceration model to a treatment, accelerated assimilation program, reduce the rate of crime and the staggering cost of incarceration — which is the second most rapidly growing budget item next to health care.”

“Parole is really a function of getting a person in a productive relationship with society and their community,” said MBA immediate Past President David W. White Jr. and founding member of the Drug Policy Task Force. “Offering parole allows prisons to make room for more dangerous criminals, reducing the rate of crime overall by restoring families, neighborhoods and communities by making ex-offenders better citizens, and saves the taxpayers money.”

In the November 2008 general election, Massachusetts citizens voted to decriminalize marijuana. Legislators, who for years have been focused on discussion revolving around the belief that constituents want stronger punishments for low-level drug offenders, now have proof that the public actually wants to reduce the resources designated to punishment of low-level drug offenses. White believes the “commonwealth, now in severe economic crisis, can handle the drug sentencing issues in a way to save millions and millions of dollars.”

Furthermore, current mandatory minimum drug sentences have disproportionately impacted cities and their minority populations. Current school zone laws, which increase punishment drug offenses within 1,000 feet of a school with mandatory sentences — regardless of prior knowledge if school is in session, intent to distribute, time of day or awareness of proximity to a school — have created a situation where almost an entire city can be considered a school zone.

“The result is an impact on minorities,” said White. “The bill didn’t have that intent when it was enacted, but it has discriminatory consequences. We would like the statute changed to 100 feet.” White pointed out that approximately 300 people are sentenced for school zone offenses each year.

“In the commonwealth, we spend more money on jails and prisons then on higher education,” White said. “It is time for more sensible priorities.”
ttp://www.massbar.org/for-attorneys/publications/lawyers-journal/2009/march/mba-backed-criminal-reform-legislation

Posted by lois at 10:07 AM | Comments (0)

March 20, 2009

MI: Juvenile lifer bills in Senate “The greatest hope I have had in 33 years.”

Juvenile lifer bills in Senate
“The greatest hope I have had in 33 years.”

By Diane Bukowski
The Michigan Citizen

DETROIT — Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy charged a 17-year-old with assault with intent to commit murder, felonious assault, assault with a dangerous weapon on school grounds, carrying a concealed weapon and felony firearm after he wounded another 17-year-old in the stomach inside Central High School Feb. 18.

The two were gambling in the halls, a practice that has being going on since at least the 70s, according to one Central High alumni. The 17-year-old faces up to life in prison. Days later, police raided CHS and carried away teens as young as 14 on police buses to face loitering charges, whether or not they were students.

“Until they improve the conditions in our schools, there will be more trouble,” said Steve Conn, a high school teacher for 22 years with the Detroit Public Schools. “Despair runs so deep among our young people, who are treated like their lives don’t matter.”

A 16-year-old Detroiter was ordered to stand trial on first-degree murder charges Feb. 5 in connection with the shooting death of an Oak Park police officer, under unclear circumstances. Numerous suburbanites wrote in to daily news message boards calling for his execution, or at least life without parole, although he has not yet been tried or convicted.

These children, and numerous others in Detroit and communities across Michigan, have 400 counterparts already in the system, children who were sentenced at the age of 17 or below to life in prison without parole, and at least 1,000 others serving lengthy jail terms. The number of juvenile non-parolable lifers is up substantially from slightly over 300 a year ago, indicating that more juveniles are newly entering the system, condemned to death behind bars.

But there is hope on the horizon.

“The Juvenile Life Without Parole bills that were passed last year in the House of Representatives represent the greatest hope I have had in 33 years,” wrote Edward Sanders. “These bills must be voted on in the Senate now, to give the second chance we pray for.”

Sanders, who is currently incarcerated at the Earnest C. Brooks Correctional Facility in Muskegon, was 17 when he was convicted in a drive-by shooting in 1976, although he was not the shooter.

He is awaiting word from the Michigan parole board regarding his request for commutation. Before Michigan prisons ceased providing college courses, he obtained his bachelor’s degree and now helps other prisoners as a “jail-house” lawyer and spiritual advisor.

Sanders was referring to Senate Bills 0171 through 0176, sponsored by State Sens. Liz Brater (D-Ann Arbor), Martha Scott (D-Highland Park) and Michael Switalski (D-Roseville). Co-sponsors include Glenn Anderson, (D-Westland), Michael Prusi (D-Ishpeming), Samuel “Buzz” Thomas (D-Detroit), Hansen Clarke (D-Detroit), and Gilda Jackson (D-Huntington Woods).

House versions were passed Dec. 4 by an overwhelming margin of 83-22. The current Senate bills, however, will have to go back to the House again for approval before they can be forwarded to Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm.

“The idea of sending a person whose brain is not fully developed to prison for life has been determined to be inhumane,” said Brater. “The U.S. is one of only two countries in the world, and Michigan is one of few states in the U.S. with this practice. Many of these youth were sentenced along with an adult defendant who got a lesser sentence and many were victims of abuse or neglect or are people with a mental illness or disability.”

The series of bills therefore addresses alternatives to incarceration for mentally ill individuals and diversion from jail under other circumstances as well as the central life without parole question.

S.B. 0173 says, “An individual who was less than 18 years of age when he or she committed a crime for which he or she was sentenced to serve a minimum term of imprisonment of 10 years or more, or who was sentenced to imprisonment for life, including imprisonment for life without parole eligibility, who has served 10 years of his or her sentence is subject to the jurisdiction of the parole board and may be released on parole.”

The bill specifies several aspects of the prisoner’s individual situation for the parole board to consider.

All six bills, introduced Jan. 29, are now in the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is chaired by State Sen. Alan Cropsey (R-Dewitt). Cropsey has expressed reluctance to let the bills out of committee.

Brater said that although the Senate is predominantly Republican, efforts are constantly being made to reach out to that side of the aisle. A particular consideration is the huge cost of such incarcerations. Both the Greater Detroit and Michigan Chambers of Commerce have passed resolutions calling for a reduction in Michigan’s prison population, along with numerous other organizations and even major media.

Felicia Tyson, part of a group of family members of juvenile lifers, said that they are continuing to organize and lobby Senators as well as Representatives, in the same fashion that won passage of the House bills last year.

“We are asking people to write, phone and email their legislators, and are planning a mass visit to the House in April,” said Tyson. Over 200 family members and even victims turned out for a lobbying effort last year.

The website for the group can be found at www.secondchanceforyouth.com.

The group’s address is P.O. Box 251941, West Bloomfield, MI 48325-1941 and phone 248-738-2111. An online petition to legislators is available at petition@secondchanceforyouth.com.

http://www.michigancitizen.com/default.asp?sourceid=&smenu=1&twindow=&mad=&sdetail=7116&wpage=1&skeyword=&sidate=&ccat=&ccatm=&restate=&restatus=&reoption=&retype=&repmin=&repmax=&rebed=&rebath=&subname=&pform=&sc=1070&hn=michigancitizen&he=.com

Posted by lois at 05:11 PM | Comments (0)

March 14, 2009

Real Cost of Prisons Comix (the book)

The Real Cost of Prisons Comix
edited by Lois Ahrens
PM Press
Reviews: http://www.pmpress.org/content/article.php?story=loisahrens#reviews
Ordering info:
https://secure.pmpress.org/index.php?l=product_detail&p=48

One out of every hundred adults in the U.S. is in prison. This book provides a crash course in what drives mass incarceration, the human and community costs, and how to stop the numbers from going even higher. This volume collects the three comic books published by the Real Cost of Prisons Project. The stories and statistical information in each comic book is thoroughly researched and documented.

Prison Town: Paying the Price tells the story of how the financing and site locations of prisons affects the people of rural communities in which prison are built. It also tells the story of how mass incarceration affects people of urban communities where the majority of incarcerated people come from.

Prisoners of the War on Drugs includes the history of the war on drugs, mandatory minimums, how racism creates harsher sentences for people of color, stories on how the war on drugs works against women, three strikes laws, obstacles to coming home after incarceration, and how mass incarceration destabilizes neighborhoods.

Prisoners of a Hard Life: Women and Their Children includes stories about women trapped by mandatory sentencing and the "costs" of incarceration for women and their families. Also included are alternatives to the present system, a glossary and footnotes.

Over 125,000 copies of the comic books have been printed and more than 100,000 have been sent to families of people who are incarcerated, people who are incarcerated, and to organizers and activists throughout the country. The book includes a chapter with descriptions about how the comix have been put to use in the work of organizers and activists in prison and in the "free world" by ESL teachers, high school teachers, college professors, students, and health care providers throughout the country. The demand for them is constant and the ways in which they are being used is inspiring.

The Buzz:

"I cannot think of a better way to arouse the public to the cruelties of the prison system than to make this book widely available."
--Howard Zinn

"The Real Cost of Prisons comics are among the most transformative pieces of information that the youth get to read. We take it with us to detention centers, group homes, youth shelters and social justice organizing projects. Everywhere we go we see youth nodding with agreement and getting excited to see their reality validated in print. The Real Cost of Prisons helps youth know what's up and gives them the push they need to get active in the struggle to make interpersonal and community-wide change."
--Shira Hassan, Co-Director Young Women's Empowerment Project, Chicago, IL

Posted by lois at 09:14 AM | Comments (0)

March 10, 2009

New look at sentencing guidelines for cocaine

"The U.S. Sentencing Commission tallied all 4,262 crack cases for 2006. It calculated a median drug quantity of 1.8 ounces."

New look at sentencing guidelines for cocaine
Claire Cooper
Sunday, March 8, 2009
SF Chronicle

Willie Mays Aikens has returned to Kansas City, where he's still a star. He's worked in construction and hopes to land a job with Major League Baseball, maybe as a counselor, he says, "talking to people about what drugs can do to a person."

People in Kansas City still talk about Aikens' four home runs for the Royals in the 1980 World Series. They seem ready to forgive the crack cocaine bust that earned him a 16-year prison term.

"It takes a big man to step back into the limelight after such a dark path," wrote one blogger.

Aikens' path was dark indeed, but not because his crime was large. The drug sale that sent him to prison was 64 grams, about a quarter cup. The federal cocaine sentencing statutes treat that much crack the same as a bucket of cocaine powder, the material from which crack is produced.

Aikens' case exemplifies all that's gone wrong because of these federal sentencing laws: The focus on petty crimes. The distortion of priorities in the war on drugs. The lopsided impact on African Americans - the 83 percent of federal crack defendants who are black, though a federal health survey found most crack users are white.

The problems have been documented for years. Now it's time for a change.

Finally, key congressional members seem to be in a negotiating mood, and the Obama administration wants the crack/powder disparity eliminated. In the last session of Congress, then-Sen. Barack Obama co-sponsored a bill introduced by then-Sen. Joe Biden to do just that.

The same bill is on the table again. HR 265, introduced in the House by Texas Democrat Sheila Jackson Lee, would increase federal penalties for big-time trafficking while reducing them for possession or dealing in trivial quantities of crack - offenses that should be left to state prosecutors or public health officials.

Cracking down on kingpins was the idea all along. When Congress established the crack sentences in 1986 and 1988, it expected to lock away major drug traffickers who were rumored to be preying on African American neighborhoods and creating an epidemic of crack-fed violence.

Support for the legislation crossed every line - left, right, black, white. In signing the 1986 bill, President Reagan named Rep. Charles Rangel of Harlem as one of its "real champions," along with Strom Thurmond and the president's wife, Nancy.

But Congress got it wrong in every way. As the U.S. Sentencing Commission reported in 1995, "the stereotype of a drug-crazed addict committing heinous crimes" was simply fiction. And the crack laws shifted the focus to drug quantities that a neighborhood pusher might carry, not a national or international trafficker.

Commission records show that more than half of all crack offenders in the federal courts are street-level distributors, with crack weighing less than an ounce. The average crack case is less than 2 ounces. In the San Francisco-based judicial district, it's even smaller, according to the latest 2006 statistics.

So irrational are these laws that a crack retailer like Aikens could be punished more severely than his powder cocaine wholesaler, as the commission has pointed out.

The undercover agent who busted Aikens understood that. Aikens had offered her cocaine powder, not crack. According to the court's pre-sentence report, she told him "she thought he was going to get crack cocaine." So he made some for her. Crack is produced at the neighborhood level by cooking cocaine powder with baking soda and water.

Federal law enforcement has focused on neighborhood dealers, says Eric Sterling, president of the Criminal Justice Police Foundation, because "it's easy for U.S. attorneys to try cases against low-level offenders" but hard to find informants to testify against "genuine high-level traffickers."

Sterling, who was counsel to the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime when the crack/powder sentencing formula was established, says Congress "blundered completely." It failed to understand how much crack would signify major trafficking.

The mistake has been widely acknowledged in Washington, but reform has been stymied by congressional disagreements over the best way to correct it. Recently, the U.S. Sentencing Commission took matters into its own hands.

For two decades, the commission's guidelines reflected a decision by Congress that a crack sentence should equal a sentence for 100 times as much powder cocaine. But then in November 2007, the commission ratcheted down its crack guidelines by 20 percent. It made the change retroactive, allowing judges to review the sentences of many defendants already serving time.

As of six weeks ago, 12,723 inmates had been re-sentenced - and many of those have been released.

But the reforms by the Sentencing Commission are restricted by mandatory minimum terms set by Congress - five years for possession or sale of five grams of crack and 10 years for sale of 50 grams. Eighty-two percent of federal crack defendants are serving those mandatory minimum terms, which only Congress can change.

It's time to do so. As Clyde Cahill, a St. Louis federal judge, said in a 1994 crack case, "If young white males were being incarcerated at the same rate as young black males, the statutes would have been amended long ago."

Or, from the more personal perspective of Stacey Candler: "We're talking about somebody's life here. It doesn't take 10 years for you to teach that person a lesson."

Candler served more than 10 years for the crack that her boyfriend kept in their Fresno home. She was released from the federal women's prison in Victorville (San Bernardino County) a year ago, in the first wave of inmates to have their sentences re-evaluated under the Sentencing Commission's revised guidelines.

Originally, Candler was sentenced to almost 16 years for 2 kilograms of crack. She knew the crack was in the house, she says. She didn't expect to be held criminally responsible for it. Her boyfriend got 25 years to life.

She was 22, a nursing student and hospital aide living a modest lifestyle. She had no criminal record.

"I was just a young girl looking for love," she says. She hoped that her boyfriend, six years older, would follow her good example, "but, of course, it didn't turn out that way."

Candler is back in Fresno. She's working and going to college, now majoring in social work. She's confident about her future. "I have the family support and I have friends," she says. "I don't have kids, thank God."

The inmates who do have kids are Candler's saddest prison memory. She recalls the Children's Days that she would help organize once a year, how the kids would get to see their mothers' prison cubicles: "This is where Mommy eats and sleeps now."

As for Aikens, he got out of prison last June, five years early. At 54, he's getting his feet on the ground, he says.

He visited with his older daughter for the first time in eight years - she was 5 when he went to prison for selling a couple of ounces of crack cocaine. His younger daughter, 4, when he went away, won't see him yet. He's trying to build a relationship with her.

He blames only himself for getting in trouble. "All of us make a decision," he says. But he also knows that the stiff crack sentencing laws make no sense. As he puts it, "The ones who have control of this have it wrong."

Busts by the numbers

Median drug weights for federal crack cocaine cases

Nationwide 51 grams (1.8 oz.) 4,262 cases
Los Angeles 120 grams 27 cases
Sacramento 86.5 grams 35 cases
Chicago 76.3 grams 79 cases
New York 56.3 grams 78 cases
Seattle 45.7 grams 30 cases
San Francisco 30.2 grams 18 cases
Miami 30.2 grams 104 cases

Note: San Diego was not included because there was only one case (33 grams)

Source: U.S. Sentencing Commission, based on 2006 data
Local districts strict on crack quantities

Federal prosecutions target petty crack cocaine cases throughout the nation, destroying the lives of many small-time offenders and squandering resources in the war on drugs.

The U.S. Sentencing Commission tallied all 4,262 crack cases for 2006. It calculated a median drug quantity of 1.8 ounces.

Surprisingly, among the strictest jurisdictions was the Northern California district based in San Francisco. A single ounce of crack was involved in the median case here, enough to cover the bottom of a teacup.

In fact, crack quantities in Northern California prosecutions were the lowest in the state - and 17th lowest among the 94 federal judicial districts in the country.

The smallest cases were in Idaho and the largest in Wyoming.

Claire Cooper is an East Bay freelance writer. Her reporting was supported by the Justice and Journalism Fund, established by USC Annenberg's Institute for Justice and Journalism with Ford Foundation funding.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/03/08/INM5165QMP.DTL

Posted by lois at 09:51 AM | Comments (0)

March 09, 2009

New book: Resistance Behind Bars: The Struggles of Incarcerated Women

Resistance Behind Bars: The Struggles of Incarcerated Women
By Vikki Law
PM Press
Now available

In 1974, women imprisoned at New York’s maximum-security prison at
Bedford Hills staged what is known as the August Rebellion. Protesting the brutal beating of a fellow prisoner, the women fought off guards, holding seven of them hostage, and took over sections of the prison.

Why do activists know about Attica but not the August Rebellion?
Resistance Behind Bars documents collective organizing and individual
resistance among women incarcerated in the U.S. and challenges the reader to question why these instances and efforts have been ignored and why many assume that women do not organize to demand change. It fills the gap in the existing literature, which has focused mostly on the causes, conditions and effects of female imprisonment.

Women have significantly disrupted the daily operations of their prison to protest injustices and demand change. More often, however, they have employed less visible means such as forming peer education groups, clandestinely organizing ways for children to visit mothers in distant prisons and raising public awareness about their conditions.

By emphasizing women's agency in resisting individually as well as organizing collectively against their conditions of confinement, Resistance will spark further discussion and research on
incarcerated women's actions and also galvanize much-needed outside support for their struggle.

About the Author:
Victoria Law is a writer, mother, and photographer. She is also the co-founder of Books Through Bars—NYC and publisher of the zine Tenacious: Art and Writings from Women in Prison. Her new book, Resistance Behind Bars: The Struggles of Incarcerated Women (PM Press, 2009), is the culmination of 8 years of research, writing and listening to the stories of incarcerated women.

Product Details:
Published by PM Press
ISBN: 978-1-60486-018-4
Pub Date: February 2009
Format: Paperback
Page count: 260
Size: 6 by 9
Subjects: Women’s Studies, Penology, Prisons, Prison Abolition
Ordering information: https://secure.pmpress.org/index.php?l=product_detail&p=91/

For more about the book and upcoming events: http://resistancebehindbars.org

"Written in regular English, rather than academese, yet full of fire, this is an impressive work of research and reportage. I hope you're able to get this to a greater audience, and that it sparks
awareness and resistance. Well done!" –Mumia Abu-Jamal

"There are too few books written about womyn in prison. Many focus on these womyn as victims only. But this book is different. Its focus is on the herstorical resistance of womyn prisoners! This is necessary information for all of us to have in our consciousness, especially our abolitionist consciousness." --Bo (r.d.brown), former political prisoner, founding mother of Out of Control: Lesbian Committee to Support Women Political Prisoners and volunteer with the
Prison Activist Resource Center

“Excellently researched and well documented, Resistance Behind Bars is a long needed and much awaited look at the struggles, protests and resistance waged by women prisoners. Highly
recommended for anyone interested in the modern American gulag.” --Paul Wright, former
prisoner, founder/publisher of Prison Legal News and editor of Prison Nation: The Warehousing of America’s Poor and Prison Profiteers: Who Makes Money from Mass Incarceration

“Victoria Law's eight years of research and writing, inspired by her unflinching commitment to listen to and support women prisoners, have resulted in an illuminating effort to document the
dynamic resistance of incarcerated women in the United States.” --Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz,
historian, feminist, indigenous rights activist, author, most recently of Roots of Resistance: History of Land Tenure in New Mexico

Posted by lois at 08:47 PM | Comments (0)

Tennessee: State eyes cost-effective alternatives to prison

Commissioner George Little: “We can figure out how to better manage those populations,” he said. “What I think it opens up is a discussion of who we are locking up, how long they are being locked up and do we have the right people in our prisons and jails.”

Tennessee: State eyes cost-effective alternatives to prison
Monday, March 9, 2009
By: Lauren Gregory
Chattanooga Times Free Press

Housing a prisoner costs about $60 a day in Tennessee, so locking someone up for not paying $45 a month in probation fees doesn’t make sense, according to Tennessee’s corrections commissioner.

Allowing nonviolent inmates approved for parole to sit behind bars for days or weeks, racking up costs the state could cut in half if they immediately were placed in halfway houses also is counterproductive, Commissioner George Little said.

“We can figure out how to better manage those populations,” he said. “What I think it opens up is a discussion of who we are locking up, how long they are being locked up and do we have the right people in our prisons and jails.”

With the state’s budget crisis forcing $42 million in cuts to a corrections program that will receive almost no federal stimulus money, Mr. Little is championing an increased emphasis on community corrections programs such as halfway houses.

He asked Gov. Phil Bredesen to include money for the facilities, which help paroled offenders transition into society by providing housing, structure and assistance finding employment, in his 2010 budget.

The governor’s budget should be complete later this month, spokeswoman Lydia Lenker said.

State Rep. G.A. Hardaway, D-Memphis, introduced legislation that would establish a pilot halfway house program for the state with that money.

The pilot program would increase state expenditures by $410,900, according to documents, and for that reason faces an uphill battle, said Rep. Gerald McCormick, R-Chattanooga.

PAY NOW OR PAY LATER

Rep. McCormick is a member of the House’s State and Local Government Committee, which has the bill. He said he doesn’t anticipate the legislation surviving if Gov. Bredesen doesn’t approve money for it.

“If it’s not already included in the governor’s budget, there is a very, very, very little chance it will pass,” Rep. McCormick said. “I’d have to vote against it. It’s not that it’s not a good cause, but there are a lot of good causes out there and, in this environment, it would be unfair to put that one at the top.”

Committee Chairman Rep. Curry Todd, R-Collierville, agreed.

“I don’t think it’s going anywhere,” he said.

Rep. Hardaway did not return calls or an e-mail seeking comment.

State Sen. Andy Berke, D-Chattanooga, said he will be disappointed if his colleagues focus on a program’s upfront costs without considering ultimate savings.

“In state government, we need to continue to look for ways to save money in the long run, and that means ensuring that money we spend today will save us money in the future,” Sen. Berke said.

Supporters of halfway houses say there is good reason to view community corrections that way. A small initial investment in halfway houses will save billions of dollars in prison construction costs down the road, said Tim Dempsey, chief executive officer of Chattanooga Endeavors, a nonprofit organization that helps ex-prisoners find employment.

“On the one hand, you say, ‘How can we afford to take on anything new?’” Mr. Dempsey said. “But on the other hand, this is an extremely cost-effective way to keep people out of prison and keep them from returning in the long term.”

The Washington, D.C.-based Pew Center on the States released a report last week that concluded Tennessee, along with all other states, would benefit from that type of thinking.

“New community supervision strategies and technologies need to be strengthened and expanded, not scaled back,” said Adam Gelb, director of the Pew Center on the States’ Public Safety Performance Project, which generated the report.

“Cutting them may appear to save a few dollars, but it doesn’t,” Mr. Gelb said. “It will fuel the cycle of more crime, more victims, more arrests, more prosecutions and still more imprisonment.”

potential impact

Calvin Figgures, director of prison ministry at Shady Grove Baptist Church in Chickamauga, Ga., has recognized a local need and doesn’t want to wait for state funding. He hopes to be able to secure a grant through the federal Second Chance Act, which former President George W. Bush signed into law last year to provide support services to ex-prisoners, to open several halfway houses in Chattanooga.

An ex-offender himself, Mr. Figgures spent eight years in prison on drug charges. He says a halfway house was behind his successful turnaround.

“It’s like a family,” he said. “It’s loving, and it gives a person a sense of self. And not only that, it helps give you a solid foundation. In prison, they tell you what to do, when to shower, when to go to bed. In a halfway house setting, they give you a sense of responsibility again but with monitoring.”

Mr. Little said that ultimately makes the entire community safer.

“The argument (for creating more halfway houses) is fiscal, but the long-term benefit is going to be quality of life and public safety,” he said.
BY THE NUMBERS

* $645 million: Department of Correction budget last year

* $60: Cost to house an inmate for a day

* $25: Cost to keep someone in a halfway house for a day

* 40: Percentage of all inmates incarcerated for technical violations of probation or parole

* $100,000: Prison building cost, per bed

* $50 million: Annual operating cost for recently expanded Morgan County Correctional Complex

* $1 billion: Cost to operate the 2,400-bed Morgan County facility over the next 20 years

HALFWAY HOUSES

* Nashville — 55

* Knoxville — 10

* Memphis — 9

* Chattanooga — 1

Source: Tennessee Board of Probation and Parole

Source: Tennessee Department of Correction Commissioner George Little
http://timesfreepress.com/news/2009/mar/09/tennessee-state-eyes-cost-effective-alternatives-p/?local

Posted by lois at 09:38 AM | Comments (0)

March 05, 2009

Video and 2 articles on today's (3-5-09) developments on the Rockefeller Drugs Laws

Tony Papa interview in today's video section of the NY Times......
http://video.nytimes.com/video/playlist/ny-region/1194811622241/index.html#1194838345272

http://www.gothamgazette.com/blogs/wonkster/2009/03/04/assembly-to-pass-drug-reform/

Gotham Gazette
The Wonkster Blog
Assembly to Pass Drug Reform
March 4th, 2009

Today the Assembly is expected to pass drug law reform.

The bill would eliminate most mandatory minimum sentencing while giving judges more sentencing options.

Sponsored by Assemblyman Jeffrion Aubry, the bill represents a new fervor shown by Assembly Majority Leader Sheldon Silver for drug law reform.

Earlier this year, Silver released a position paper calling for an overhaul of the drug laws and for New York to address drug addiction as a health problem instead of a criminal matter.

Law makers say the reforms will restore justice to the legal system and save the state money by committing fewer offenders to prison.

“More than 35 years after the Rockefeller Drug Laws were enacted, it is clear that these laws mandating imprisonment for even lower-level offenders have failed to effectively combat drug abuse or reduce the incidence of violent crime,” said Silver in a prepared statement.

“This legislation restores humanity to drug policy here in New York. It expands the sentencing options available to judges, without endangering the public. Judges are in the best position to know who is deserving of prison and who is not. State prison and mandatory prison sentences are not the magic bullets to address drug abuse and its attendant problems; restoring judicial discretion is the solution.”

The Assembly has passed similar legislation in the past only to see it die in the Republican controlled Senate. Now that the Democrats are in control of the Senate it is not clear if they have a large enough majority to get the legislation passed.

However, the sponsor of drug law reform in the Senate, Sen. Eric Schneiderman, is reportedly trying to access whether he has enough votes to move the bill. The Senate will at least discuss their version of the bill today.

Advocates fear that if action is not taken in both houses in the next few weeks their issue will be put aside during heated budget discussions.

Here is an overview of the Assembly bill provided by Silver’s office:

Amends the Penal Law to make all non-violent first and second felony drug offenders (other than class A felony offenders) eligible for probation (5 years), a local jail sentence (up to one year) or a split sentence (jail plus probation) upon a plea of guilty or upon conviction —- the judge could always sentence the offender to the existing terms of state imprisonment.

Excepts from the benefits of this sentencing reform the following exclusion crimes, some of which are newly created, as well as other crimes arising out of the sale of drugs on school grounds and day care facilities:

Drug sale while in physical possession of a loaded gun;

Adult (age 21 or older) sale to a minor (under age 18);

Kingpin (multiple class B felony and above transactions).

Judges continue to have discretion to sentence offenders to the maximum terms available under current law, i.e., judges will still be able to sentence first time class B felony offenders to up to 9 years in prison and second time class B felony offenders without a violent predicate felony offense to up to 12 years in prison.

CREATES new sentencing options for judges without disrupting those options available under current law.

Judges can continue to divert offenders away from prison with district attorney consent (e.g., DTAP, STEPS); current law requires the same judicial consent which this reform continues.

Judges can order, upon application of defendant or district attorney alcohol or substance abuse assessment of defendant.

Subject to appropriation, requires that one court in each county be designated as a drug court with appropriate training provided for all participants.

Judges may specify candidates to be enrolled in DOCS shock incarceration programs (subject to DOCS safety considerations), including second-time, class B felony offenders (subject to exclusions).

Judges may order early entry to ASAT and CASAT (substance abuse treatment programs designed for offenders in DOCS custody).

Judges can directly sentence offenders to “parole supervision” (90 days incarcerated at the DOCS Willard drug treatment program followed by supervision and treatment in the community: CPL 410.91) by:

eliminating DA veto on class D felony crimes; and restoring to judges the discretion to order such a “parole supervision” sentence for specified class C and B drug felony crimes.

REFORMS technical aspects of the drug laws to make them more responsive and fairer.

Eliminates a plea restriction so that certain drug offenders may plead guilty to a reduced charge with DA consent (class A felony to a class B felony). Clarifies procedure for making motions to dismiss “in the furtherance of justice” by adding a new subdivision to CPL 170.40 and 210.40 to authorize dismissal, where a defendant charged with a non-exclusionary, drug crime has successfully complied with the terms of a judicial diversion order.

Increases the weight thresholds for certain class A felony level offenses following up the reforms made in 2004.

Revises the so-called “automobile/room” presumptions by converting the “presumption” into a “permissible inference” and ensures that the inference does not apply when the defendant was neither the owner nor the operator of the vehicle and the controlled substance was outside the area in which the defendant could readily grab it.

EXTENDS the benefits of drug law reform to those under sentence.

Permits class B felony drug offenders in prison (previously excluded from taking advantage of the 2004 drug law reforms) to seek courtresentencing to a determinate term under the new sentences;

Allows defendant appeals from denial of re-sentence and re-sentence orders.

INCREASES chances for drug offenders under sentence and after completing sentence to successfully reintegrate into society.

Mandates that DOCS assess drug treatment need for every inmate admitted to custody.

Requires that youths placed in or committed to OCFS facilities be assessed for alcohol and substance abuse.

Mandates substance abuse treatment as part of probation where appropriate.

Allows DOCS to enroll class B drug felons (on entry to DOCS or thereafter) into the Shock Incarceration Program, consistent with the Governor’s Article VII bill.

Requires OASAS certification for all persons performing drug abuse assessment and treatment and all programs providing such services for the Department of Correctional Services.

Enacts a sealing law authorizing judges, on motion so that the district attorney can respond, to conditionally seal a limited category of first-time, drug felony and misdemeanor convictions, upon application, if the defendant has remained crime-free for a specified period or has completed a court-ordered treatment program; existing statutory requirements barring individuals convicted of such crimes from being licensed for certain purposes would not be amended.

Provides transitional services to offenders leaving DOCS custody to better help them find housing, employment and apply for government benefits so that they do not relapse and continue moving through the revolving door.

QUANTIFIES the savings of reforming the drug laws.

Requires the State Comptroller to certify each year the number of days and number of persons diverted from state prison as a result of the bill and, to the greatest extent possible, quantify the savings generated as a result.

Requires that such amount certified by the Comptroller be segregated annually in a dedicated fund to be used exclusively for drug and alcohol treatment and related alternative to incarceration programs.

PLACES a premium on knowledge and information to effectuate reform.

Requires use of a community justice crime information mapping system to target efforts to further provide drug abuse treatment and reduce drug-related crime in different communities around the state.

Syracuse Post-Standard
No Rockefeller drug law reform in New York would be a real crime

By Anthony Papa and Gabriel Sayegh
March 05, 2009

New York's draconian Rockefeller drug laws represent a misguided and ineffective regime for addressing drug use and addiction -- health issues, not criminal issues. With legislation passing this week by the state Assembly, New York may be ready to shift toward a more reasonable -- and affordable -- approach guided by public health and safety.

Enacted in 1973, the Rockefeller laws mandate extremely harsh prison terms for the possession or sale of relatively small amounts of drugs. Supposedly intended to target major dealers, most of the people incarcerated under these laws are convicted of low-level, nonviolent offenses; many have no prior criminal record.

Approximately 12,000 people are locked up for drug offenses in New York state prisons -- nearly 21 percent of the prison population. Over 4,000 are serving long terms for simple possession. Nearly 90 percent of the people incarcerated are black or Latino, though whites use and sell illegal drugs at equal or higher rates.

As New York reels from the most severe economic crisis since the Great Depression, Gov. David Paterson and the Legislature are scrambling to close ever-expanding deficits. It costs New Yorkers $45,000 a year to keep someone locked up, while treatment costs a fraction of that.

Does it make sense to spend over $500 million every year on laws we know don't work? These laws did not stop the crack epidemic of the 1980s. They are completely incapable of stemming the accidental drug overdose epidemic hitting New York City and Long Island today. And they have turned the Department of Corrections into the state's largest, most costly and ineffective treatment provider.

The Assembly's bill would finally reform the failed Rockefeller laws. Sponsored by Corrections Committee Chairman -- and drug treatment counselor -- Jeffrion Aubry, D-Queens, Speaker Sheldon Silver and a host of others, the bill contains the four key elements: restoration of judicial discretion in drug cases, so judges can place appropriate people in treatment; expansion of alternative-to-incarceration programs and community-based drug treatment; fair sentencing reform; and retroactive sentencing relief for eligible people serving unjust sentences under the Rockefeller laws.

The Assembly's proposal would not allow people who commit violence to be resentenced.

The Assembly could have done even more, such as including full repeal of the second felony offender law. Even so, the bill represents a significant step forward. Modest reforms of 2004 and 2005 continue to deny people the right to apply for shorter terms, and do not increase judicial discretion. After 2004, more people went to prison under Rockefeller drug laws than before.

The need for reform is no longer in debate. The question is, what kind of reform will we see in New York? The Assembly has proposed real reform, advancing a public health and safety approach to drug use and addiction. This is the direction we need to go. Drug addiction shouldn't be a crime -- the real crime would be if reform was stymied yet again.

Anthony Papa, author of "15 to Life," served 12 years in prison under the Rockefeller drug laws.
Gabriel Sayegh is project director for the New York City-based Drug Policy Alliance.

Proposed drug law reforms

Assembly Bill A6085, introduced last week and expected to pass this week, includes the following provisions which balance safety and justice:

Ö Return discretion to sentencing judges to tailor the penalty to the facts and circumstances of each drug offense.

Ö Allow a sentence of probation and treatment where appropriate.

Ö Strengthen in-prison treatment and re-entry services.

Ö Expand the use of alternatives to incarceration, including community-based treatment, where appropriate.

Ö Allow certain eligible individuals incarcerated for low-level drug offenses to apply for resentencing; individuals convicted of violent crimes are not eligible.

Ö Expand use of drug courts throughout New York.

Ö Increase penalties for sale of a controlled substance to a child.

Ö Establish a new "kingpin" crime for organized drug-trafficking.

Posted by lois at 05:39 PM | Comments (0)

March 02, 2009

MA: From Cell Block to City Block Hearing Report 11-18-08

From Cell Block to City Block Hearing Report
Summary of Testimony for 11/18/08 Public Hearing: “From Cell Block to City Block: Strategies for a Successful Re-entry”
Synopsis

The purpose of this report is to capture the themes and recommendations from oral testimony and to give voice to prisoners’ written testimony that was not read at the hearing because of time constraints. A full transcript of oral testimony is available at www.endtheodds.org. Copies of written testimony not read at the hearing are available upon request.

The report briefly summarizes what is--or was--working, with respect to preparation for a successful reentry and what is impeding successful reentry now. The remainder of the report outlines wide ranging recommendations for successful reentry outcomes. At the heart of the recommendations you will hear a cry for dignity, meaningful activity, civic engagement, and hope. Not programs alone, but policies, practices, and the very culture and structure of the prisons are critical to successful reentry and reintegration.

1. Background

The End the Odds Coalition is a small group of Boston area people—formerly incarcerated and not yet incarcerated—who came together in January 2008 to brainstorm strategies for “ending the odds” against those in prison and those coming back out into the community. After holding two meetings with the Commissioner of Correction and his staff we decided to hold a public hearing. “From Cell Block to City Block: Strategies for a Successful Re-entry” became the theme of the hearing as we believe that what happens inside prison directly impacts the health and safety of our community. We wanted legislators and the DOC authorities to hear not only concerns, but also solutions from the experts—people inside prison, people who have returned to the community, and people who provide direct services to prisoners returning to the community.

We invited people inside to provide written testimony and we invited formerly incarcerated people and agency representatives to speak. We targeted specific legislators who chaired judiciary, public safety, mental health, and health care committees. We invited the Governor, the DOC Commissioner and any staff he chose to accompany him. We sent invitational emails to a broad range of people we knew had an interest in these issues. While we anticipated that time would not allow everyone to speak, we expected those who did speak would represent a wide range of sentiments, issues, and solutions.

Well over 100 people attended the two hour hearing, including formerly incarcerated people and family members. The Commissioner and several staff were present. One Senator-elect attended, but no incumbent legislators. Aides from two legislators’ office attended. Approximately 25 people spoke or had their written testimony read. The Commissioner spoke twice during the hearing, once to rebut some of the testimony and the other time to broadly outline his reentry plan.

2. What is, or was, working?

Although most people spoke to the lack of adequate programming for reentry, prisoners cited a few programs and policies that are currently working to help prepare for reintegration. They credited volunteer programs, religious groups, and recovery groups with providing tools for successful reintegration by building self-respect through interaction with members of society.

Others identified a number of programs and policies that worked in the past to prepare people for reentry. Broadly speaking the valued programs included furloughs, college education, work release, substance abuse treatment, mental health treatment, employment and coping skills, help with family dynamics, and community building. Opportunities to earn and save money while in prison eased the transition to the community.

3. What is impeding successful reentry now?

The impediments to reentry seem to far outweigh any positive measures. Not only are programs in short supply, but philosophy, policies, and practices stand in the way of a successful reentry. For example, the “breaking rocks” attitude of the 1980’s is still deeply rooted in much of the current leadership and staff. Retribution and punishment seem more operative than rehabilitation and treatment.

The new classification system was supposed to address the problem of arbitrary assignments and “over” classification. Despite some improvements in the process, far too many people are overclassified, necessitating higher security beds. Subjectivity still pervades. The classification system has few incentives for “good” behavior, but many negative consequences for alleged disciplinary problems. Even if the overclassification problem were addressed, opportunities for “step-down” would be limited. Between 1990 and 2005 approximately 1500 minimum and pre-release beds were eliminated, resulting in reduced capacity for step-down opportunities. Too many people are being released from walled facilities.

Violation of basic human rights impedes physical, mental, and emotional readiness for reentry. Many people provided testimony citing the lack of accessible, adequate, and empathic medical and mental health. Others spoke of being subjected to verbal and physical abuse from staff and to disrespect of their personal property. The resultant anger and resentment stand in the way of successful reintegration. In particular, use of solitary confinement, where prisoners are kept hungry, cold, and miserable, risks making people angry and dangerous upon release.

Resources for programs and reentry preparation are grossly inadequate. They are only a small percentage of the DOC budget. The lack of meaningful programs was cited over and over--especially skills training programs. There is also a lack of opportunities for meaningful avocations, such as lack of art supplies for arts and crafts. Some people testified that some programs are offered just for show. When inspections are over, the program disappears. Instead of spending time in programs, prisoners spend time in lockdown. A large percentage of prisoners are prescribed mood altering pills.

Assignment to programs is also problematic. Sentencing for certain types of crimes restricts eligibility for programs and work opportunities. Fairness in assignment to programs was also raised. For example, confidential informants are purportedly given preferential assignment to programs and jobs. And while there are regulations on the books outlining procedures for preparing prisoners for reentry, they are not consistently enforced.

Work opportunities are sorely lacking relative to the number of people who want jobs. Wages for prisoners are not commensurate with the cost of daily toiletries, other canteen items, and other fees and charges, such as telephone service.

The commutation process should be another avenue to reentry for those sentenced to life without parole. However, Massachusetts has not commuted the sentence of a single prisoner for over 12 years. The lack of possibility of reentry for a significant number of the prison population contributes to an atmosphere of hopelessness and despair.

4. Recommendations for change

The concrete and positive recommendations for change that came out of the testimony are far reaching and numerous. However, at the core of all these recommendations is a cry for dignity, meaningful activity, civic engagement, and hope.

There is a need for structural and personnel changes:

* Return the Department of Corrections to the Executive Office of Health and Human Services.
* Change the entrenched personnel in top leadership positions and bring in those with a rehabilitative philosophy
* Hire and train staff to have attitudes and behaviors that respect the dignity of prisoners and promote rehabilitation by modeling appropriate behavior
* Promote collaboration between the DOC and the Parole Board so that the DOC will act upon downward movement decisions of the Parole Board.
* Promote collaboration between the DOC and the Massachusetts business community to include additional job site locations within medium and minimum security facilities
* Develop collaboration between the DOC and Parole Board to establish a “volunteer” Offender Relocation Program

Guarantee basic human rights; change the culture from retribution to transformative justice

* Provide health care that meets the standards of health care in the community
* Make the grievance procedure more objective and fair

Modify policy and practices

* Re-allocate funding within the DOC budget to programs and re-entry
* Revamp the classification system to reduce the number of people held in high security; build in more positive incentives
* Increase the total number of available minimum security and pre-release beds and close one maximum security facility (abandon the double celling proposal at the maximum security facility; allow some choice of cellmate where double celling is the norm)
* Suspend the classification and policy restrictions that prohibit the placement of 1st and 2nd degree “lifers” from placements at minimum security facilities
* Adhere to the current regulatory guidelines for reentry preparation for health care coverage, housing, and other benefits as needed; start the reentry process at the beginning of the sentence
* Provide more opportunities for earning “good time”

Provide opportunities for meaningful activities and fair allocation of programs:

* Provide more job training, with certificates, for jobs in demand;
* Provide more educational opportunities, including computer literacy, more GED programs; expand the Inside-Out (Amherst College) initiative
* Provide more opportunities for gainful employment while incarcerated, including avocation shops e.g. woodworking; consideration of programs like the Prison Industries
* Enhancement Certification Program (PIE), which allows prisoners to work for private employers while earning prevailing wages
* Pay at least minimum wage for prison jobs
* Provide parenting programs to help prisoners maintain their role as parents
* Provide more opportunities for prisoners to provide peer teaching, tutoring, and mentoring
* Provide more opportunities for civic engagement, including reinstatement of Lifers programs, e.g. Reading for the Blind, Toys for Tots
* End restrictions on programming for people in maximum security facilities
* Consider offering a Certificate of Rehabilitation

Re-define relations with the community

* Enable program volunteers and program employees to submit testimony and attend commutation and parole hearings
* Expand the number and kinds of volunteer-run programs; bring more people from the community into the prisons
* Provide help for grieving family loss
* Establish visitor-friendly policies and procedures to promote more and better quality visitation
* Provide information on service providers in the community who can help with medical needs, housing, jobs, food stamps, financial aid, religious affiliation, AA and NA groups; offer this information in a timely fashion and in different languages
* Place community members and survivors on the Prison Rape Elimination Act committee; these people can compile and create resources for prisoners as they reenter the community
* Offer mediation program to prevent animosities formed inside from traveling into the community upon reentry
* Develop programs on the outside for men and women who have successfully returned to the community to go back inside to help prepare others for reentry

Make changes outside the DOC domain (requiring legislation in most cases)

* Reform mandatory minimum legislation (thus ending restrictions on access to programs and other reentry activities, and providing eligibility for parole)
* Reform CORI to enable people with CORI’s to obtain jobs, housing, and other services
* Create an independent commission to have oversight over all aspects of DOC functions; the panel must include representatives of the impacted communities
* Amend the life without parole law, with measures such as a 25/50 option (the possibility of parole for those 50 and over who have served 25 years) and the possibility of parole for Youth Offenders who currently are sentenced with life without parole; revisit the joint venture (felony murder) law
* Implement a compassionate medical release policy for chronically ill or terminally ill prisoners (e.g. hospice care, release to families)
* Provide special reentry programs, such as, COSA (Circles of Support and Accountability) for people designated as sex offenders to enable re-integration without harassment and isolation
* Amend restrictions on media access for prisoners
* Bring back Pell Grants for prisoners

5. Next steps

The following next steps are suggested:

* Distribute and use the report, inside and outside, to expand the dialogue and to create a constituency and the political will to change the odds
* Request a written copy of the Commissioner’s reentry proposal for review
* Create mechanisms for holding the DOC accountable for its responsibility to provide a humane environment and to prepare people for reentry into the community
* Support/modify current legislative bills on Beacon Hill and in Congress that address Cell Block to City Block concerns and increase the odds of successful reentry
* Formulate and submit new legislation where there are gaps
copies of the full report contact: info@endtheodds.org).

Posted by lois at 10:23 AM | Comments (0)

February 28, 2009

WI: News Republic Editorial: Time to cut state prison population?

Baraboo News Republic (WI)
Sauk County's Daily Newspaper
Saturday, February 28, 2009

News Republic Editorial: Time to cut state prison population?

With our national, state and local economies circling the bowl, legislators at all levels of government are looking to repair the damage and put us back on the road to prosperity.

Nationally, of course, there is President Barack Obama's much-scrutinized $787 billion stimulus plan.

Obama and his Democratic majority in Congress believe their venture is a bold, brilliant, can-do, must-do vehicle that will move people back to work and drive us out of the recession before it morphs into The Great Depression, Part II.

In our state of Wisconsin we have a man with his own budget and some novel ideas tucked between the numbers.

And one of Gov. Jim Doyle's proposals — targeting Wisconsin's prison system — has the big dogs in the state's GOP barking that our state leader is soft on crime. Here's why:

Felons could earn earlier extended supervision, probation for minor crimes would be eliminated and real-time tracking for some sex offenders could end under Doyle's broad-brush changes to Wisconsin's prison policy.

Heard over the roar of Republican carping, Rick Raemisch, the state's corrections secretary, said these moves should ease the crowding in our prisons and better prepare convicts for life after incarceration.

Raemisch said the moves should generate substantial savings for the state, which faces a $5.7 billion shortfall by mid-2011.

States have been pondering alternatives to incarceration for 10 years. At least a half dozen, including California and New York, are considering early release to lessen costs.

Raemisch, of course, was appointed by Doyle so no one should be surprised that he supports the boss's agenda.

"We have a saying — never waste a crisis," Raemisch said. "Some things people wouldn't look at before, they'll take a hard look at now. ... The days of locking people up and forgetting they're in prison are over."

Republicans, the loyal opposition, called Doyle's deal soft on crime.

"It's a let 'em loose early plan," said state Rep. Scott Suder, R-Abbotsford. "To sacrifice public safety to save a few bucks, I find appalling."

Suder has a point if, indeed, early release of inmates puts the public in peril.

But when you compare our inmate numbers to the State of Minnesota, you have to wonder if we have too many people behind bars.

Wisconsin's prison population stands at more than 22,000. Minnesota has about 7,000 inmates. Is it because the Gopher State produces a better class of people? Of course not. (After all, let's not forget most of them are Vikings fans).

Or could it be, simply, that Minnesota's prison policy reflects the model Doyle is trying to duplicate.

Certainly, there is money to be saved. Our state prison system has more than 18 institutions and costs more than $1 billion per year. And we've been struggling with overcrowding for years.

According to Raemisch, each inmate costs the state about $29,000 a year to keep caged.

A report released in January found Wisconsin's facilities are in decay. It recommended more than $1.2 billion in upgrades over the next decade, including nearly 9,000 new beds to cope with the crowd of convicts.

But Doyle's budget would reduce the inmate population and also the need for upgrades.

Under the Doyle deal:

* Prisoners could earn "positive adjustment" days for good behavior, and become eligible for extended supervision earlier. Inmates convicted of serious felonies, such as homicide and child sexual assault, wouldn't be eligible for the program.

* Inmates on extended supervision would be able to earn good behavior days, allowing them to finish their sentences sooner. That could mean an estimated 3,000 inmates, according to Raemisch.

* Probation for nonviolent offenders convicted of misdemeanors would be eliminated. Raemisch said about 7,000 offenders could qualify.

* Corrections would decide whether serious sex offenders need real-time GPS tracking after a year or if checking their movements once a day would be appropriate. State law requires real-time monitoring for the worst sex offenders.He said the plan would make work safer for guards by giving them fewer inmates to supervise, allowing them to focus on the most dangerous.

Raemisch said the initiatives would help offenders readjust to society by teaching them how to behave and follow the rules.

"This shouldn't, by any means, be considered opening up the back doors to the institutions or letting people that are violent back out on the streets," Raemisch said. "If I didn't think we could do this safely, I wouldn't be talking to the governor about it."

To be sure, saving money is not a valid reason to release dangerous criminals back into our communities. But if done carefully, as Raemisch promises, this might be a smarter option than long-term incarceration, which some believe fails to rehabilitate and often refines and refocuses the criminal inclination.

After all, if Minnesota can do this without putting its citizens in jeopardy, why can't we?
http://www.wiscnews.com/bnr/opinion/440872

Posted by lois at 10:37 AM | Comments (0)

February 26, 2009

MA: Mandatory Minimums in Action: A Berkshire County case highlights the controversies in school-zone sentencing.

Mandatory Minimums in Action: A Berkshire County case highlights the controversies in school-zone sentencing.
February 26, 2009
By Maureen Turner, Valley Advocate (Northampton, MA)

On a June morning in 2004, 17-year-old Mitchell Lawrence rode his bicycle from his home in Otis to Great Barrington, where he met up with friends in a parking lot outside a movie theater. Lawrence, who would start his senior year in high school that fall, went to the parking lot several times a week, where a group of teens regularly met up to pass the time, playing hackey sack and smoking pot.

A few weeks earlier, a new person had begun joining the group. Mitchell knew the new guy as “José”; what he didn’t know was that José was an undercover detective, working as part of a wide-scale Berkshire County drug task force operation that eventually would yield 19 drug-related arrests—and generate a considerable amount of controversy. Among the controversial issues: whether prosecutors were too eager to apply the school drug zone law, under which some defendants, including Lawrence, faced much more stringent penalties than they would have received had they simply been convicted for the underlying offense.

That day in the parking lot, Lawrence got high with some friends, then chatted with José for about an hour, according to court records. José asked Lawrence “if [he] had any smoke,” which the teenager later said he interpreted as an invitation to smoke together.

Lawrence agreed, although he was confused, he later said in court, when José led him not to the area behind the theater where the kids typically smoked, but in the opposite direction, near a Congregational church. He was also confused, he said, when José handed him a $20 bill, since he thought the two were simply going to share his pot.

Lawrence took the money and went off to buy a burrito. Two and a half months later, he was arrested. In 2006, Lawrence was convicted by a jury of possession and distribution of a class D substance. A first-time offender with a relatively small amount of pot, Lawrence did not face lengthy jail time for those convictions; Judge John A. Agostini sentenced the teen to just one day for the distribution charge, and 10 days for possession.

Unfortunately for Lawrence, however, he was also convicted of committing a drug offense within a “school zone” (triggered by the fact that a preschool was located within the Congregational church), which earned him an automatic minimum sentence of two years in the Berkshire House of Correction.

Lawrence appealed his conviction but did not prevail. But while the appeals court upheld the conviction, at least one justice took the opportunity to question the logic behind the “school-zone” law that landed Lawrence, a first-time offender arrested for a $20 pot sale, behind bars for two years.
In an opinion attached to the case, Justice Frederick Brown wrote that Detective Felix Aguirre—the real name of the man known as “José” to Lawrence and his friends in the parking lot—had known from his weeks of observation where the kids typically went to smoke, and had deliberately led Lawrence to another site, within a designated school zone.

“I believe that an enlightened prosecutor should not have sought a conviction for the school zone offense,” Brown wrote. “A government official (i.e., police officer) induced the defendant to enter a danger zone that exposed him to an enhanced penalty. This conduct is particularly outrageous because the young man went along with an experienced police officer, who undoubtedly was aware of the consequences of drug activities in a school zone.”

Brown continued: “This case is made all the more troubling by the fact that because of the government’s actions, a teenage defendant with no known involvement in drug sales other than this isolated incident, and for whom there is no indication of drug use other than marijuana, was subjected to a greatly enhanced penalty, including incarceration for two years, due to his conviction under [the school-zone law].”

The Great Barrington drug busts set off a furor of controversy in Berkshire County, in part because of the prosecutors’ use of the school-zone law. Of the 19 people arrested as part of the operation, seven, including Lawrence, had no prior records and were arrested for selling small amounts of drugs, according to reporting in the Berkshire Eagle at the time.

Berkshire District Attorney David Capeless, who has built a reputation as a tough-on-drugs prosecutor, has maintained the investigation was a valid response to public concerns about drug dealing in the area, including specific complaints about the Great Barrington parking lot where Lawrence was arrested.

During the trial, Capeless maintained that Lawrence was not arrested over a single cigarette, but, in fact, had more than a gram of marijuana prepackaged for sale. Lawrence went to jail “due to some poor decisions on his part,” Capeless told the Eagle.

Posted by lois at 10:14 AM | Comments (0)

February 25, 2009

Missouri senator proposes bill to lengthen prison stays

Missouri senator proposes bill to lengthen prison stays
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Missourian
BY Michael Bushnell

JEFFERSON CITY – Before he even was sworn in as a state senator for his first term, Kurt Schaefer, R-Columbia, filed a bill to require criminals to serve prison terms closer to their actual sentences than is current practice.

Currently, the average convicted felon serves less than one half of the actual sentence before release, according to the Missouri Corrections Department.

But Sen. Schaefer proposes requiring a minimum of 85 percent of a sentence be served before release. He acknowledged he has found it difficult to promote a bill perceived as increasing prison populations and the costs associated with them, while the state grapples with a more than $250 million budget shortfall.

Schaefer said his main goal is not to incarcerate large numbers of people for a much longer time, but to create more truthful sentencing. He said judges are currently sentencing felons to exorbitant prison terms, knowing they will only serve a fraction of the time.

"Right now judges are getting pre-sentencing reports for what length prison terms they can give," Schaefer said. "So you'll get a judge giving a twenty-year sentence because they believe the person needs to spend at least four years in prison. If the judge knew, and the victim knew for certain that the defendant would serve 85 percent of whatever sentence was given, you would see sentences reflecting that."

The state Corrections Department reports there are 30,377 felons serving time in state prison at a daily cost of $45.02 per inmate. That amounts to a taxpayer cost of $1.37 million every day to house Missouri inmates. According to the department, felons currently in state are projected to serve 47.5 percent of their sentence before release. Legislative staff report the average sentence of those released in 2008 was slightly greater than 38 percent of the original sentence.

Schaefer said he is trying to get Missouri in line with the federal government and a majority of the states, many of which enacted truth in sentencing bills in the mid-1990s. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, the federal government requires those convicted of federal crimes to serve a "substantial portion" of their sentences, which in the vast majority of cases is at least 85 percent.

A federal "truth-in-sentencing" law passed in 1994 committed federal funds to states that require felons to serve at least 85 percent of their sentences. The Department of Justice reports that 27 states plus the District of Columbia meet that requirement.

Democrats have expressed concern about the bill, in no small part because of the estimated cost. The analysis of the bill estimated a minimum cost of nearly $40 million in the 2011 fiscal year, something that Sen. Jeff Smith, D-St. Louis, said makes the legislation unpalatable.

"In a time of such lean budgets, when we're facing the crisis we face, the last thing we need is a bill with a huge fiscal note that's going to cost corrections millions of dollars," said Smith, who, like Schaefer, serves on the Senate Judiciary Committee where the bill is assigned.

Smith also said it is inaccurate to think judges will immediately start issuing shorter sentences to reflect the mandatory sentencing.

"It takes years for changes to run through a system," he said. "It would take years for judges to start issuing shorter sentences that were 'true.' That would be millions of dollars in increased costs to prisons, and that's where we don't need to be budget-wise."

Schaefer countered by saying that the Corrections Department took the worst-case scenario in determining the cost and that judges would immediately change their sentencing formulas.

"I will tell you that the Department of Corrections will do anything to not lose the discretion to allow people to serve as little as five percent of a sentence," he said. "You could take a sky-is-falling amount for every dollar. What corrections is assuming is that judges will keep giving these long sentences, and I've talked to a lot of judges and I don't think that's a reasonable statement."

At a recent committee hearing on the legislation, three witnesses testified against the bill, saying it would remove a major incentive for felons to stay out of trouble and improve their lives following incarceration. Defense lawyer Dan Dodson, representing the Missouri Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, said early release dates act as an incentive for felons to remain out of trouble.

Dodson said the legislation would either lengthen prison terms or shorten the time that convicted felons spent on probation, because they would be spending more of the sentence incarcerated. He said that, under that second option, convicts spending less time under the eye of the government could increase the likelihood of criminal recidivism.

"Let's say judges recalibrate it to where they really wanted someone to go (to prison) for four years, and they would normally give them a ten-year sentence to serve four," Dodson said. "Now what you'd get, they're going to get a five-year sentence and serve four or so, but instead of that person going back out on the street with probation as the carrot and the stick and we can say 'we're going to still watch you for a while,' you can't do that anymore."

More than two dozen states have laws that comply with the federal "truth-in-sentencing" standards. Various studies of those states have found mixed results.

A 2001 study published by the U.S. Justice Department that analyzed the first five years of Virginia's truth-in-sentencing law found a decrease in recidivism. But the study also reported a nearly one-third increase in the length of prison terms and an expansion in the state's prison budget.

The Judiciary Committee's vice chairman said he worries about the cost and that the state may have to build a new prison or two. He said the bill might have been easier to get through in the days of budget surpluses.

"I will say, philosophically, I support what Sen. Schaefer is trying to do," said Sen. Jack Goodman, R-Mt. Vernon. "The problem is that our taxpayers fund that bill. While we do have an obligation to keep our streets safe, this year any bill that costs a lot of money is going to be difficult to pass."

Nonetheless, Schaefer told the committee that a law like this could be implemented at a much lower cost than estimated, because it doesn't mandate longer prison terms or incarcerating people who wouldn't be without this legislation.

"This doesn't affect anyone's ability to be sentenced to mental health treatment or drug treatment," he said. "All it does is, when a sentence is handed down, it requires that a sentence actually be served."
http://www.columbiamissourian.com/stories/2009/02/24/felon-bill/

Posted by lois at 11:25 AM | Comments (0)

February 19, 2009

MA: School Zone Laws Fail to Keep Children Safe from Drug Sales and Disproportionately Send More African Americans and Latinos to Prison & Jail

Go to the full report and excellent graph:
http://www.prisonpolicy.org/toofar/report.html

Report: Mass. sentencing laws not doing the job
Feb. 19, 2009
Bay State Banner
St. John Barned-Smith

Calls for reform of mandatory minimum sentencing laws received some added support recently from a report by a Massachusetts incarceration think tank that claims current policies are failing to keep children safe from the dangers of drugs.

At issue are so-called “sentencing enhancement zones,” according to the report unveiled last month by the Northampton-based Prison Policy Initiative.

The zones were originally designed “to serve as a geographic deterrent in order to protect children from drug activity [by] identifying specific areas where children gather and driving drug offenders away from them with the threat of an enhanced penalty,” according to the report.

But Massachusetts’ mandatory minimum laws have largely missed the mark, says initiative executive director Peter Wagner. Under the current law, certain drug offenses carry a mandatory minimum sentence of two years in jail if they are committed within an “enhancement zone,” defined as the 1,000-foot area surrounding a school.

According to Wagner, the abundance of Head Start centers, accredited day care centers and other schools leave few areas in cities and towns that are not considered special enforcement zones.

“If you make everywhere special, nowhere is special,” Wagner said.

The result, he argues, is legislation that not only fails to specifically deter the sale of drugs near schools, but also unfairly targets drug users caught possessing narcotics in these zones who are not intent on selling to schoolchildren.

“The legislature made the assumption that within 1,000 feet” of a school, people “were intending to sell to children,” Wagner said. “But only 1 percent of those cases involve children. Ninety-nine percent of the time, the law punishes people who weren’t trying to sell to children.”

The Prison Policy Initiative’s report recommends reducing the scope of the boundary to 100 feet, which Wagner said will create zones that would more effectively stop drug use near schools.

“One hundred feet wouldn’t cover an entire populated area,” Wagner said. “It would make certain areas special.”

The report also underlines other problems with Massachusetts’ mandatory minimum laws. One highly contentious issue is the claim that the sentencing requirements disproportionately affect minorities.

According to the report, blacks and Latinos account for 80 percent of the state’s special enforcement zone convictions, and are between 26 and 30 times more likely to receive a mandatory enhanced sentence.

Opponents of mandatory minimum laws also say the requirements unfairly handcuff judges by eliminating alternative options during sentencing. On top of that, Wagner said, by giving prosecutors more leverage to encourage defendants to plead guilty to lesser charges so that they can avoid the minimum sentences, the laws can actually result in people receiving longer periods of imprisonment.

The laws have practical downfalls for the state as well, said Wagner. Chief among them: They’re bleeding state coffers dry.

“With the state facing a $3.1 billion [budget] shortfall and incarceration costing the taxpayer $47,679 for each prisoner each year, the state can ill-afford this kind of inefficiency,” Wagner wrote in the report.

Mandatory minimum opponents have been trying to bring more attention to the matter by making their presence felt at a series of civil rights hearings being held throughout the state.

Barbara Dougan, executive director of the Massachusetts branch of Families Against Mandatory Minimums, recently e-mailed her members to encourage them to attend the last of the meetings (to be held on March 10 in New Bedford) to voice their opposition to the laws.

“People who live in urban areas get punished more severely than people who live in suburban areas,” Dougan said, even though “statewide, the data shows drug use is roughly equivalent.”
http://www.baystatebanner.com/Print?page=local14-2009-02-19

Posted by lois at 09:26 AM | Comments (0)

February 11, 2009

CA: The Prison Overcrowding Fix

News Analysis
The Prison Overcrowding Fix
By SOLOMON MOORE
Published: February 10, 2009

In San Francisco last week, a federal court was hearing final arguments in the prison overcrowding lawsuit that led Monday to an unprecedented decision to reduce the nation’s largest prison system by one-third. Just a few blocks away, a state appellate court was affirming a life sentence for Ali Foroutan, convicted of possession of 0.03 gram of methamphetamine.

Critics of California’s justice system say Mr. Foroutan’s sentence under the “three-strikes law,” which mandates 25 years to life in prison for three-time felons, is the kind of punishment that has made the state’s prisons the most overcrowded in the nation.

Federal judges tentatively ruled Monday that packed facilities were the chief impediment to adequate health care in prisons — a system so flawed it was tantamount to a violation of the Eighth Amendment.

Monday’s ruling signaled the court’s intention to cap the number of prisoners at about 101,000, a reduction of 55,000. It came after more than a decade of federal court orders from exasperated judges who demanded that the state improve its facilities and personnel, after the appointment of the most powerful federal receivership since the days of forced racial integration in the South, and after the death of scores of prisoners who committed suicide or died of preventable illnesses.

The judges encouraged the state to negotiate with inmates’ lawyers to cut the prison population from 156,000, which is about double the system’s capacity, within three years. If the state refuses to negotiate such a plan, the judges could order specific actions, including shortened prison sentences, diversion of nonviolent felons to county programs, and parole reforms that would cut down recidivism.

Few releases of prisoners would be necessary to reduce the prison population if the state carried out sentencing and parole reforms, which could save $903 million a year, according to the federal judges. They also argued that such reforms could be achieved without jeopardizing public safety.

Attorney General Jerry Brown of California vowed to appeal the judges’ final order to the United States Supreme Court, a prospect that could delay the carrying out of the prison population cap or overturn it.

The case is significant because of the scale of the proposed prisoner reduction, and also because it shines a harsh light on the failures of state government to address the problem for years.

Decades of tough-on-crime laws coupled with a failure to finance prison programs have left prisoners stacked three bunks high in prison gymnasiums and hallways throughout the state. With few probation and parole programs available, about two-thirds of all ex-convicts return to prison within three years.

California’s 13-year-old three-strikes law, which doubles sentences for second-time felons, and reserves life sentences for even nonviolent third-felony offenders like Mr. Foroutan, has also increased the prison population by thousands. As of March 2008, there were 41,284 prisoners serving time under the three-strikes law. In 2005, the California Legislative Analyst’s Office estimated that the law cost the state $500 million annually.

California is the only state in the nation that paroles 98 percent of released inmates, even if they have completed their sentences. About 70,000 parolees return to prison every year. Nationally, states parole an average of 40 percent of their released inmates.

“That is a major reason for the overcrowding problem,” said Joan Petersilia, a parole expert at the RAND Corporation. “Everybody goes on parole in California,” she said. “Everybody serves at least one year” on parole. Many parolees go back to prison for violations, including failed drug tests.

But Stuart Drown, executive director of the Little Hoover Commission, a state-financed watchdog organization, said sentencing reform was the key to reducing prison population.

The Legislature, Mr. Drown says, has added thousands of new penalties for new and old crimes. “We don’t track how judges are sentencing people on a statewide basis,” he said. “We don’t have a sentencing policy.”

In other states, sentencing commissions monitor penalties to help policy makers anticipate how many prisoners will be coming and for how long.

California has no such data, Mr. Drown said. Proposed sentencing commissions have been defeated in the Legislature at least 10 times, according to Ms. Petersilia.

This case began not as an overcrowding lawsuit but as an effort to address inadequate health care. After the state failed to improve its care, Judge Thelton E. Henderson appointed a federal receiver to take over the medical system, and the receiver has demanded billions of state dollars to build health care facilities.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has responded with a mix of conciliatory gestures — supporting an as-yet underfinanced initiative to build space for 53,000 prisoners — and defiance, as when he called for the dissolution of the receivership.

Eventually the receiver concluded that new prison facilities could not be added quickly enough to stem the deaths and injuries to prisoners or to outpace the rising prison population.

Lawyers for the state have argued that the federal courts lack the authority to order prison reforms costing billions of dollars, especially at a time when California is facing a $40 billion deficit.

Counties in California say they cannot afford to serve parolees’ rehabilitation needs without additional financing, as many other states do.

Kara P. Dansky, a lecturer at Stanford Law School, believes that the judges may have the authority to push through sweeping reforms, including more financing for counties, under the Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1995.

The state disagrees that the court has such authority and plans to appeal to the Supreme Court, which could delay any outcome. Ms. Dansky said policy makers would be watching the case closely. “This is one of the areas that the law is unclear on because we’ve never seen a case like this,” she said.
A version of this article appeared in print on February 11, 2009, on page A17 of the New York edition.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/11/us/11prisons.html?ref=todayspaper

Posted by lois at 10:16 PM | Comments (0)

February 10, 2009

CA: Panel of Judges Rule State must release up to 57,000 prisoners---3 articles

From the Los Angeles Times
Judges back a one-third reduction in state prison population
Jurists issue tentative ruling in lawsuit brought by inmates, who say overcrowding in state prisons violates their right to adequate healthcare.
By Michael Rothfeld

February 10, 2009

Reporting from Sacramento — A panel of three federal judges, saying overcrowding in state prisons has deprived inmates of their right to adequate healthcare, tentatively ruled Monday that the state must reduce the population in those lockups by as many as 57,000 people.

The judges issued the decisionafter a trial in two long-running cases brought by inmates to protest the state of medical and mental healthcare in the prisons.

Although their order is not final, U.S. District Court Judges Thelton Henderson and Lawrence Karlton and 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Stephen Reinhardt effectively told the state that it had lost the trial and would have to make dramatic changes in its prisons unless it could reach a settlement with inmates' lawyers.

State officials immediately said they would appeal.

If the state is ordered to reduce the prison population, it would likely be able to do so over two or three years, so it would not have to release large numbers of inmates at once. Some methods of cutting the population include limiting new admissions, changing policies so parole violators return to prison less frequently, and giving prisoners more time off of their sentences for good behavior and rehabilitation efforts.

The judges said these types of measures could save the state more than $900 million a year in prison costs, money that could be used by cities and counties to put those who otherwise would have gone to prison into local jails or treatment programs.

The state's 33 prisons were designed for 84,000 inmates, and they now hold 158,000, nearly double their designed capacity. The rest of the 170,000 in the correctional system are in out-of-state prisons and other facilities. The judges found that with inmates crammed into institutions, they could not receive the care to which they are entitled under the U.S. Constitution.

"There is . . . uncontroverted evidence that, because of overcrowding, there are not enough clinical facilities or resources to accommodate inmates with medical or mental health needs at the level of care they require," the judges wrote in a 10-page decision.

They said that triple-bunking of inmates in prison gymnasiums has increased the risk of infectious disease and that a shortage of doctors, nurses and correctional officers has denied inmates access to treatment and a decent system to keep their medical records in order.

In the ruling, the judges said they believe the state's prisons can safely operate at 120% to 145% of their designed capacity. Based on the current prison population, that would mean a potential reduction of 36,000 to 57,000 inmates. They reserved the right to change their numbers and did not say when their final order might come.

"It's a pretty comprehensive victory for us," said Michael Bien, a lawyer in San Francisco who has fought for mentally ill prisoners. "It was a message -- a very loud, clear message -- that it's time that the public officials in California took responsibility for their own criminal justice system."

Under federal law, judges cannot order the state to lock up fewer prisoners if such a move would endanger the public, and the panel said that would not be the case if reductions were done gradually.

But Matt Cate, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's corrections secretary, said the ruling "poses a significant threat to public safety" because it could prevent the state from incarcerating as many criminals as it now keeps in seven to 10 prisons.

"If this panel issues a final decision, we will appeal this matter to the United States Supreme Court," Cate said tersely during a news conference in Sacramento.

State Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown called the ruling "the latest intrusion" on California's prison system by the federal courts. In a statement, he labeled the order "a blunt instrument that does not recognize the imperatives of public safety, nor the challenges of incarcerating criminals, many of whom are deeply disturbed."

The judges oversaw the trial starting in November and completed it last week. In their decision, they referred to the testimony of Jeanne Woodford, a former corrections secretary under Schwarzenegger, who told them overcrowding made it impossible for prisoners to get mental health treatment and medical exams. They also cited experts from Texas, Pennsylvania, Maine and Washington.

And the judges used Schwarzenegger's words and actions against him, citing the state of emergency the governor declared for the prisons in 2006 -- still in effect -- and quoting him as saying overcrowding had caused "substantial risk to the health and safety" of prison inmates and staff. They noted that Schwarzenegger has made budget-related proposals to reduce the prison population by 40,000 inmates, and that lawmakers have backed similar ideas.

"We cannot believe that such support would exist if the adoption of such measures would adversely affect public safety," the judges wrote, although the proposals they referred to have not garnered enough support to go into effect.

The state nearly reached a settlement with the inmates last year that would have reduced the prison population by tens of thousands, largely by shifting low-level offenders to local jails and rehabilitation programs. But that deal fell apart when Republican state lawmakers and county prosecutors objected.

Since then, the state has hardened its stance. Schwarzenegger and Brown are now demanding that Henderson terminate court oversight of prison medical care, which he seized from the state in 2006. They say the situation has improved with the hiring of new medical and correctional personnel.

http://www.latimes.com/news/la me-prisons10-2009feb10,0,4380330.story?track=ntothtml

Judges tell state to free thousands of inmates

Bob Egelko,Wyatt Buchanan, Chronicle Staff Writers
Tuesday, February 10, 2009

(02-09) 18:48 PST SAN FRANCISCO -- California needs to release tens of thousands of California inmates over the next two to three years to relieve overcrowding that has ravaged prison medical and mental health care, a panel of federal judges said Monday.

In what it labeled a tentative ruling, the three-judge panel said prison populations must be reduced so health care for inmates can be brought up to constitutional standards.

Crowding at prisons can be eased by measures that will not flood the streets with dangerous inmates, such as changing parole policies and sending some low-risk inmates to county custody, the panel said.

"The evidence is compelling that there is no relief other than a prisoner release order that will remedy the unconstitutional prison conditions," said the judges, who held a trial on prison overcrowding in San Francisco last fall.

California's 33 prisons hold nearly 160,000 inmates, about twice their designed capacity. The judges said they were prepared to impose a limit of between 120 and 145 percent of capacity, which would require 37,000 to 58,000 prisoners to be released.

The Schwarzenegger administration immediately announced plans to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court once the ruling becomes final.

Matthew Cate, secretary of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said at a Sacramento news conference that the judges' order would put thousands of inmates back on the streets, posing "a significant threat to public safety."

Attorney General Jerry Brown, who represented the state, said the court "does not recognize the imperatives of public safety, nor the challenges of incarcerating criminals, many of whom are deeply disturbed."

But Donald Specter of the nonprofit Prison Law Office, a lawyer for inmates who sued the state, said the ruling validates the group's position that overcrowding is creating dangerous conditions that can be eased only by reducing the prison population.

"Much of the evidence showed that it's been done in other states without having any impact on public safety," Specter said. "It's safe, it's reasonable, it's necessary. It's too bad that it's taken a court to recognize this."

The case arose from past rulings by two of the panel members, U.S. District Judges Thelton Henderson of San Francisco and Lawrence Karlton of Sacramento, that concluded the quality of medical care and mental health treatment in California prisons violated the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Karlton first ordered improvements in mental health treatment in 1995, and Henderson found that prison health care had been substandard since at least 2002.
Unnecessary deaths

In a 2006 ruling, Henderson said the $1.1 billion medical care system was causing the unnecessary death of one inmate per week. He said the state was incapable of repairing the system and appointed a manager to run it under his supervision.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger called for a return to state control last month. He also has appealed Henderson's order that the state pay the first $250 million of the manager's $8 billion plan to rebuild prison hospitals.

In Monday's decision, the panel, which also includes Judge Stephen Reinhardt of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, agreed with lawyers for the inmates that "crowding is the primary cause" of the constitutional violations.

Because prisons are jammed beyond capacity, there aren't enough doctors and nurses to help all the inmates who need care, or enough staff to make sure they're taking medications, the panel said. Crowding at some prisons is so severe, with inmates being triple-bunked in gyms, that it has increased the risk of diseases spreading among prisoners and staff, the judges said.

They noted that Schwarzenegger declared a state of emergency for the prisons in 2006, citing overcrowding that endangered inmates and staff. That order remains in effect.

Prison crowding could be eased through a combination of increasing sentence reductions for good behavior, turning over low-risk prisoners to counties for incarceration or treatment, and changing parole policies that now return large numbers of inmates to prison for minor violations, the judges said.

They said the state would save nearly $1 billion a year, money that could be used for local prisoner housing and rehabilitation.
No help in sight

Although prison health conditions are improving under the direction of court appointees, the panel said, inmates are still suffering, with no immediate help in sight. Construction plans will take years to implement, even if the deficit-plagued state can find a way to pay for them, the panel said.

The judges ordered state officials to consult with the prisoners' lawyers and other parties in the case, including prison guards and county prosecutors, on any steps that might be taken to lower the prison population.

Specter, the inmates' lawyer, said he was prepared to resume negotiations, but added that "there's no point in talking" if Schwarzenegger maintains his refusal to consider any such measures.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/02/10/MNGS15QM8V.DTL
This article appeared on page A - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle
© 2009 Hearst Communications Inc.

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Judges tentatively approve prison inmate reduction
dwalsh@sacbee.com
Published Tuesday, Feb. 10, 2009

A panel of three federal judges tentatively ruled Monday that California must reduce its prison population by up to 58,000 inmates in two to three years, saying that "the present state of overcrowding" makes it impossible for the state to deliver health care at a constitutional level.

The judges clearly said there are many avenues available to the state and counties other than an early-release program - like parole reform, increased good time credits and programs to reduce recidivism. They all fall under the federal Prison Litigation Reform Act's definition of a "prisoner release order."

They will review the evidence presented at a 14-day non-jury trial and issue a final opinion, but the tentative ruling is meant "to give the parties notice of the likely nature of that opinion, and to allow them to plan accordingly," the judges said.

Inmates' attorneys expressed hope that, in the wake of the ruling, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and his administration, legislative leaders, county representatives and all other affected parties will work out a settlement.

Reaction by Corrections and Rehabilitation Secretary Matthew Cate made that seem unlikely. Cate correctly said the 10-page tentative ruling calls for 37,000 to 58,000 fewer inmates within two to three years.

Speaking for himself and Schwarzenegger, the secretary said they "disagree with the panel's ruling," and with the release of that many convicts "onto California streets," which he called "a significant threat to public safety."

Attorney General Jerry Brown labeled the tentative ruling "a blunt instrument that does not recognize the imperatives of public safety, nor the challenges of incarcerating criminals."

If the ruling becomes permanent, Cate declared, it will be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. An appeal from the specially-convened panel bypasses the federal appellate level and goes directly to the high court, which could accept the matter for review, or let the ruling stand without review.

"This is not about overcrowding," Cate said. "We are providing a constitutional level of care now; so we have the right to keep these inmates in prison."

By contrast, the three judges said inmates' attorneys "have presented overwhelming evidence that crowding is the primary cause of the underlying constitutional violations."

They said conditions have "substantially increased the risk of the transmission of infectious illnesses among inmates and prison staff."

"It is our present intention," the panel said, "to adopt an order requiring the state to develop a plan to reduce the prison population to 120 percent or 145 percent of the prison's design capacity (or somewhere in between) within a period of two or three years." The judges noted the 33 adult prisons, with nearly 160,000 inmates, are operating at close to 200 percent design capacity.

The judges are Lawrence K. Karlton of Sacramento, who has presided for 19 years over an ongoing class-action lawsuit on behalf of mentally ill inmates; Thelton E. Henderson of San Francisco, who has presided for eight years over an ongoing class-action lawsuit on behalf of physically ill inmates and who put prison health care into receivership in 2006; and Stephen Reinhardt of Los Angeles, a judge of the 9th U. S. Circuit Court of Appeals. They are considered three of the most liberal judges in the nine-state appellate circuit.

"The state has a number of options Š that would serve to reduce the population of the prison Š without adversely affecting public safety," the judges said. "It could also use the savings that will result from the implementation of a population cap to provide for any increased burdens on the counties."

The judges acknowledged the state's $42 billion budget deficit and the fiscal implications of their final decision "are of the most serious order. There are simply no additional funds Š being made available by the state to deal with the critical problem created by prison overcrowding."

California legislators expressed mixed views Monday about releasing inmates, but declined to specifically address the tentative ruling because they had not read it.

"I don't think we should be releasing prisoners early," said Assemblyman Ted Gaines, R-Roseville. "I think they're in prison because they created a threat to society. And I think we should do everything we can to keep them behind bars."

But Assemblywoman Fiona Ma, D-San Francisco, who sits on the Assembly Public Safety Committee, said that some prison inmates can be rehabilitated and released, thus relieving prison overcrowding without impairing public safety.

"I know there is a percentage of inmates who are in for less serious offenses who would not endanger the public directly, but there are always exceptions, and that's where we get in trouble," Ma said, adding that early release deserves scrutiny.

Inmate lawyer Michael Bien said the ruling "sends a message to the state to Š work out a solution that is win, win, win - that is good for public safety, good for sick prisoners and helps solve the budget deficit.

Steven Fama, an inmate attorney, pointed to proposals by Schwarzenegger in the past two years - "parole reform," "release of about 20,000 inmates over about 20 months."

He said of the 140,000 inmates released each year, most served only a few months.

"It's just a matter of finding the ones that would create the least risk if released a couple of months early," Fama added.
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Call The Bee's Denny Walsh, (916) 321-1189. The Bee's Jim Sanders also contributed to this report.
==================

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February 09, 2009

Singing the prison blues Incarceration rate has direct impact on Florida's finances

The News-Journal
February 08, 2009

Singing the prison blues

Incarceration rate has direct impact on Florida's finances

Everyone in Florida government is singing the Budget Blues. But underlying the melody is a drumbeat many state leaders profess not to hear: The sound of countless prison doors slamming shut. Like it or not, the state's incarceration policies have a direct and growing impact on the current budget crisis.

AN EXPENSIVE HABIT

Florida's prison system is growing faster than that of any other state. According to a report by the Pew Charitable Trust, corrections (which includes state prisons and probation) consumed 9.3 percent of the state budget in 2007. The only states to allocate a greater portion of their budget were Oregon and Michigan.

And that only accounts for direct prison and probation spending -- it doesn't encompass increased public support for the families prisoners leave behind, or the burden on city and county governments that have to build additional jail space and employ more public-safety workers. Meanwhile, the state -- whose daily average prison population is projected to top 100,000 this year -- will need to build new facilities this year or face overcrowding. Department of Corrections Secretary Walter McNeil has requested $439.2 million in the coming budget year to add capacity.

Few people are pushing for dangerous murderers and rapists to be released. But neither can they dispute that Florida's incarceration spree occurred at a time when crime rates were actually trending downward. Florida hasn't become a more dangerous place to live, it's just become one that has become politically addicted to the idea of increasingly harsh punishments.

HANDCUFFING JUDGES

One of the more important checks against legislative excess has been hobbled. Lawmakers have significantly eroded the ability of judges to determine fair, justifiable sentences for a wide range of crimes.

Florida, like many states, adopted sentencing guidelines as a way to keep sentences relatively fair across geographic and racial lines. After sentencing guidelines passed in 1983, courts used a "score sheet" that added points for the particulars of an offense, the criminal background of an offender and other relevant considerations. The resulting score was then matched to a "guideline" range of prison and/or probation time -- but judges could depart from the guidelines if they found good reason to do so. That approach used fairness as a base line, giving judges the ability to tailor sentences to circumstances.

That changed in the mid-1990s, when the Legislature passed a series of laws aimed at stripping discretion from judges. There were "minimum mandatory" laws that demanded specific sentences for specific crimes, regardless of circumstances. Habitual offender statutes added more prison time, again taking away judges' discretion and resulting in cases like that of a burglar who received a life sentence for stealing a handful of children's videotapes.

In 1997, the Legislature erased the "ceiling" for guideline sentences; judges were not allowed to sentence a defendant to a sentence lower than the guidelines called for, but were permitted (even encouraged) to levy the statutory maximum sentence even if the guidelines called for a much lower penalty. As a result, the state could see a dramatic growth in sentencing disparity, with more politically minded judges levying unnecessarily harsh sentences in an attempt to appear tougher.

A final change -- setting zero-tolerance policies for many prisoners on probation -- has pushed thousands more people back behind bars, often for relatively minor offenses.

FINDING A SOLUTION

Restoring the intent of Florida's sentencing guidelines, and returning discretion to judges, would be a good start. The state also can ease the burden on prisons by matching offenders with programs that reduce the chances that they will commit more crimes. Specialized courts -- such as drug or mental health courts -- generally operate outside sentencing guideline requirements. And these programs work, significantly reducing the number of offenders who are rearrested.

Last month, the state Senate Criminal Justice Committee heard about other measures that could reduce prison population -- such as a controlled release program or prison diversion measures. These are worth exploring, but they would be no replacement for a careful, analytical approach to each case that a judge could offer.

Undoing these dubious reforms would restore equity to sentencing in Florida, and help restore the emphasis of the state's correctional mission -- to reform prisoners and turn them away from a life of crime -- and reducing the burden on Florida's taxpayers, who are feeding ever-increasing sums of money into a prison system that doesn't make them any safer.

By The Numbers

· 9.3 percent -- portion of Florida budget (2007) spent for corrections (prison and probation)

· 100,000 -- state's projected daily average prison population for 2009

· $439.2 million -- requested in coming budget year to add capacity
http://www.news-journalonline.com/NewsJournalOnline/Opinion/Editorials/opnOPN86020809.htm

Posted by lois at 05:45 PM | Comments (0)

February 06, 2009

CT: Gov. delays sending 16 & 17 year old youth to juvenile system

Criminal justice initiative clipped in Rell budget
By Keith M. Phaneuf
Journal Inquirer
Published: Thursday, February 5, 2009
HARTFORD — Though criminal justice initiatives traditionally are one area both political parties insist are immune to budget cuts, even they may not be safe in this economic climate.

The budget proposal Gov. M. Jodi Rell unveiled Wednesday would delay for two years an initiative to transfer most 16- and 17-year-offenders from the adult courts to the juvenile system.

That switch, which was supposed to occur in January 2010, would be delayed until January 2012.

Municipal leaders urged Rell to order this delay, noting that the switch would place an added financial burden on their police departments and other forms of support services. Juvenile cases, in general, carry a much higher price tag than other cases.

Connecticut is one of just three states that treats offenders in this age group as adults. An estimated 10,000 16- and 17-year-olds are prosecuted as adults each year, with about 60 percent becoming repeat offenders.

Advocates of the switch have argued that rehabilitation programs for 16- and 17-year-olds would be much more effective if these offenders are treated outside of the adult system.

The change is expected to cost the state close to $100 million in the first two years, not only to expand support programs, but also to expand courts and staff at the juvenile level.

The governor’s budget proposal for the next two fiscal years also would make several other changes, including:

• Canceling the planned Juvenile Justice Urban Cities Pilot Program.

• Closing courthouses in Meriden and Bristol, and realigning four towns amid judicial districts based in Middlesex and Waterbury counties.

• Leaving vacant five judge positions over the next two years. An additional 65 posts within the Judicial Department that have been vacant since the state’s 2003 early retirement program would be eliminated permanently.

• And canceling 60 community based, residential program beds for offender re-entry programs.

“Although each of the initiatives is very important, the state’s dire economic circumstances requires review of the initiatives that are not currently operating,” the governor’s budget message reads.

The recession has lowered projected collections for all state taxes. The current $18.4 billion state budget is $922 million in deficit, according to Rell.

Even more important, both the Rell administration and the legislature’s nonpartisan Office of Fiscal Analysis have projected that under current spending and tax policies, the next two fiscal years face huge, built-in deficits.

Rell’s budget office places the two-year shortfall at a combined $6 billion, while OFA pegs the deficit at $8.7 billion.

http://www.journalinquirer.com/articles/2009/02/05/connecticut/doc498af5918966c985809856.txt

Posted by lois at 03:35 PM | Comments (0)

NY: Sentencing Commission Calls for Drug Law Reform and Critical Response from NY Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver

Sentencing Commission Calls for Drug Law Reform
February 3, 2009

Panel also recommends determinate sentencing, graduated sanctions for parole violators

A bi-partisan panel that spent nearly two years studying New York State’s sentencing statutes today called for further reforms to the state’s drug laws and provided the Governor, Legislature and Judiciary with several different options for historic reform.

The Commission on Sentencing Reform agreed on five major principles of drug law reform:

* Community-based drug treatment, especially when required in a criminal justice setting where the offender faces clearly defined sanctions for program failure, works and should be an available option in every region of the state.

* The state’s network of existing diversion programs and drug courts has been effective for thousands of drug-addicted offenders, and any new diversion model must be structured so as not to undermine these programs.

* New York should adopt a comprehensive plan to provide statewide access to substance abuse treatment programs.

* New York must continue to reserve costly prison resources for high-risk offenders and make greater use of alternatives to incarceration for non-violent offenders while not jeopardizing the state’s significant gains in public safety.

* While New York has a large network of successful drug treatment courts and prosecutor-based diversion programs (such as DTAP – “Drug Treatment Alternative-to-Prison), these programs are not always made available to deserving offenders in need of treatment. The result is a “hit-or-miss” system that leaves many non-violent, drug-addicted offenders ─ and particularly persons of color – without access to this potentially life-changing alternative. To help close this gap, the Commission supports the adoption in statute of a uniform statewide drug diversion model.

The Commission considered several different alternatives for achieving those objectives and included five different options for reform.

Under one of the proposals, the “judicial diversion” model, judges would have discretion to divert certain addicted, non-violent first- and second-felony drug offenders into treatment programs rather than prison. The Commission noted that if this model had been in place in 2006, approximately 3,000 offenders – 89 percent of them African American or Hispanic – might have been diverted from prison and instead steered toward treatment.

Other options are: the Court Approved Drug Abuse Treatment (CADAT) model that is part of a comprehensive drug reform bill pending in both houses of the Legislature; judicial diversion, but only with the consent of the prosecutor; and two variations of a proposal that would allow first-time Class B drug felons to receive a probation or local jail sentence in lieu of a one-year state prison term.

Denise E. O’Donnell, chair of the Commission and Deputy Secretary for Public Safety, said all of the five proposals have benefits and drawbacks that the Legislature should take into account before implementing drug law reform.

“The Commission has heard from the prosecution, the defense, and the judiciary,” Deputy Secretary O’Donnell said. “We have solicited advice from advocates and renowned experts from around the nation. We held public hearings in New York City, Albany and Buffalo. We formed focus groups. We studied drug courts and drug diversion programs around the state and visited drug treatment facilities and New York State’s prisons in an effort to determine which approaches are most successful at ending the cycle of addiction and incarceration.

“I believe our report provides Governor Paterson and the Legislature with the balanced, objective and evidence-based information they need to make informed decisions about the future of New York’s drug laws,” Deputy Secretary O’Donnell added.

The 11-member Sentencing Commission, which was established by Executive Order in March 2007 to perform a comprehensive review of New York’s sentencing statutes, also recommended:

* Adopting a largely “determinate” sentencing system to promote greater uniformity, fairness and truth-in-sentencing. Currently, New York utilizes a hybrid of “determinate” sentences where the court imposes a fixed sentence, and “indeterminate” sentences where the court imposes a minimum and maximum term and the Parole Board decides when the offender is actually released. Under a determinate sentencing system, defendants, crime victims, judges and the public have a clear understanding of how long an offender will actually spend behind bars. The Commission reviewed more than two decades of sentences that had been imposed through the indeterminate system and used that data to construct a proposed range of sentences for particular offenses.

* A comprehensive system of graduated responses, which would allow parole officers throughout the state to respond quickly and proportionately to technical parole violations. Since incarceration is an expensive and, often, unnecessary response to parole violations, the Commission recommends expanded use of “graduated sanctions” – such as curfews, electronic monitoring, increased reporting – coupled with use of evidence-based risk assessments to identify parolees who pose the greatest risk to public safety.

* Expanding effective and cost-efficient “shock incarceration” and “merit time” initiatives that reduce recidivism and reserve costly prison space for the most dangerous offenders.

* Enhancing the rights of crime victims. The Commission recommends moving all of the various victim’s rights statutes into a single article of law, or cross-referencing to a single article, so that victims, judges and practitioners can readily ascertain the rights and benefits that may be available. Additionally, the Commission recommends enhancing victim’s rights training requirements for prosecutors and judges, as well as new laws to enhance the ability of victims to collect restitution.

* Establishing a permanent sentencing commission. Over the past 40 years, portions of New York’s sentencing statutes have been amended and altered countless times, resulting in an overly complex, Byzantine structure replete with the potential for injustice. The Commission recommends the establishment of a permanent body of experts to advise the Executive and Legislative branches on proposed legislation.

Jeremy Travis, president of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, said the “Sentencing Commission has performed a valuable service, at a critical time in the state’s history.”

“By focusing squarely on the connection between public safety and sentencing policy, the Commission has provided a roadmap that will guide the state during difficult fiscal times,” President Travis said. “The Commission’s recommendations, if followed, will bring clarity to our patchwork quilt of accumulated sentencing reforms, improve reentry outcomes, and support more rational uses of our prisons and our parole system.”

Deputy Secretary O’Donnell said the report is “the product of an extraordinary effort by an extraordinary group of professionals.”

“This comprehensive report reflects the wide diversity of experience represented on the Commission, and the seriousness with which every member approached this very difficult and time-consuming mission,” Deputy Secretary O’Donnell said. “Although we come from different areas, different professions and different backgrounds, our overarching goals were identical – justice, fairness and public safety. I believe that, with this report, we have met that goal.”

Also on the Commission were: Anthony Bergamo, Chairman, Federal Law Enforcement Foundation, Inc.; Brian Fischer, Commissioner, New York State Department of Correctional Services; Michael C. Green, Monroe County District Attorney; Joseph R. Lentol, member of the New York State Assembly; Michael P. McDermott, O’Connell and Aronowitz in Albany; Judge Juanita Bing Newton, Deputy Chief Administrative Judge for Justice Initiatives; Felix Rosa; Executive Director, New York State Division of Parole; Eric T. Schneiderman, member of the New York State Senate; Tina Marie Stanford, Chair, New York State Crime Victims Board; and Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., of Morvillo, Abramowitz, Grand, Iason, Anello & Bohrer in Manhattan

“A lot of talented people put a lot of work into this report, which I believe will serve as a positive stepping stone for the legislature as we consider reforms to our state’s costly ─ and at times overly-punitive ─ criminal justice system,” said Senator Schneiderman, the new chair of the Senate Codes Committee. “I am especially heartened by the fact that the Commission is recommending by nearly unanimous agreement that judges be given the power to divert drug-addicted offenders to treatment, even without prosecutorial consent.”

Added Karen Carpenter-Palumbo, Commissioner of the New York State Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services: “I applaud the Governor and the Sentencing Commission for recognizing addiction is a chronic illness that is better to treat than to incarcerate. We know that 72 percent of state parolees have a substance abuse problem and effective treatment is the best way to help them return to their communities, not to prison.

“OASAS is proud to partner with the Governor and Legislature on insuring that appropriate treatment is available to those individuals who can be diverted from State prison to our not-for-profit system of care,” she added. “New York State is a national leader in diversion programs, such as drug courts, and the action of this Commission once again puts New York in the forefront.”

Commissioner Fischer said the “shock incarceration” and “merit time proposals would build upon effective and cost efficient programs already being utilized by the Department of Correctional Services.

“Expanding eligibility for shock incarceration and creating limited credit time for good behavior and enhanced program participation during prison are sound, common-sense ideas based upon many years of practical experience in what works best,” Commissioner Fischer said.

“Shock has saved state taxpayers nearly $1.3 billion directly over two decades through reduced need for prison space, in addition to lowering recidivism by better preparing its participants to return to society,” he added. “Credit time would build on our very successful merit time program by providing incentives that have been shown not only to help in the rehabilitative process for offenders but also to make our correctional facilities safer and to enhance public safety.”

Added Ms. Stanford, Chair of the Crime Victims Board: “I am pleased to note that victims’ rights and concerns were studied and considered as part of the extensive process of reviewing sentencing in New York. The final product reflects fairness and forward thinking in an effort to share practical suggestions and best practices to achieve just results.”

Mr. Vance said that the “Commission’s report provides sound and bold recommendations to reform New York’s complex, sometimes unfair and often incomprehensible sentencing laws. We hope our work will be a roadmap to a more fair and effective criminal justice system for all of us.”

http://criminaljustice.state.ny.us/pio/press_releases/2009-02-03_pressrelease.html
Critical Response to Report from Sheldon Silver, Speaker of the NY Assembly
http://blogs.timesunion.com/capitol/archives/11304/silver-thumbs-down-on-dru g-law-reform-report

Silver: Thumbs down on drug law reform report
February 3, 2009 at 12:51 pm by Casey Seiler

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has wasted no time in calling the drug law reform commission’s report a “missed opportunity.” Here’s his letter to commission Chairwoman Denise O’Donnell:

Dear Commissioner O’Donnell:

I write to express my deep disappointment with the final report of the Commission on Sentencing Reform. Unfortunately, the Commission’s report represents a historic missed opportunity to advance meaningful reform of New York’s antiquated “Rockefeller-era Drug Laws”. The Commission held in its hands a unique opportunity to help undo thirty-five years of failed drug policy and set New York on the path to establishing a more just, more humane and more effective approach to combat drug crime and drug abuse.

I am saddened that it failed to do so.

More than 35 years after they were enacted, it is clear that the Rockefeller laws have failed to combat drug abuse or effectively impact the incidence of violent crime across New York State. Rather, they have succeeded in imprisoning tens of thousands of low-level non-violent offenders, who are predominantly African-American and Latino, with no history of committing violent crimes at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars to taxpayers. By restoring to judges their discretion not to mandate a prison sentence when they deem it inappropriate, non-violent drug offenders and taxpayers will be
better served by driving resources toward strategies that have been proven far more effective at combating substance abuse and the street level crime associated with it.

Fore nearly a decade, the New York State Assembly, led by Assemblymember Jeffrion Aubry, has passed legislation to reform these laws, with an emphasis on restoring discretion to judges and providing alternatives to incarceration where appropriate and drug treatment for offenders where needed. Policy reforms encapsulated in that legislation were proposed to this Commission by Assemblymember Joseph Lentol. I was very sorry to learn
that the Commission rejected them.

I am troubled that the Commission’s report fails to address a system that has ignored, and still ignores, the health and societal implications of drug abuse, and has ignored the failed laws that have led to African- Americans and Latinos constituting 90% of those incarcerated in our state prisons for drug offenses. This profound discriminatory impact is even more shocking when the rates of illicit drug use are 8.1 percent for Whites, 7.2 percent
for Latinos and 8.7 percent for African-Americans.

In 2004, under the leadership of the New York State Assembly and drug law reform advocates, New York undertook an important first step in correcting failed policies by lowering maximum prison sentences through converting indeterminate to determinate sentences, eliminating life sentences, doubling weights for the top 2 classes of drug offenses and providing other sentencing relief. Further amendments have enabled some of those who were previously sentenced under the laws to seek limited reconsideration of their sentences.

But still, more than 35 years after enactment of the Rockefeller Drug Laws, individuals convicted of a class B felony drug offense must go to state prison, often regardless of the quantity, quality or type of drugs involved and regardless of other options that combat drug crime and drug abuse.

While I believe the Commission missed a historic opportunity to address these issues, the Assembly is committed to ensuring that in 2009, New York finally enacts real reform of the Rockefeller-era Drug Laws. We believe the following principles should guide any efforts at enacting reform:

Mandatory minimum sentences for low-level non-violent offenders must go. Judges must have the discretion to impose sentences that make sense. Mandating that judges sentence drug users and very low level street sellers to state prison has not appreciably impacted crime or
reduced addiction but, rather, has led to a massive increase in New York’s prison population with a disproportionate number of Latinos and African-Americans being incarcerated. Thus, real reform means untying the hands of our judiciary by ending mandatory minimum
prison sentences for Class B felony drug offenses and second time,
non-violent drug offenders, and placing an emphasis on probation,
alternatives to incarceration, and treatment. Except for the most serious and violent crimes, judges in New York already have had and continue to have the discretion to fashion appropriate sentences for criminal acts. Judges should have the ability to make an informed decision whether circumstances warrant imposing a state prison sentence in drug crimes just as they do in cases of many assault, larceny, property damage and any number of other crimes.

Illegal drugs should remain illegal. Adults who sell drugs to children, individuals who use guns in drug deals, and drug kingpins deserve harsh punishment. In addition, existing maximum
determinate sentences for first and second class B level felony and below offenders should also be maintained so that if a judge decided circumstances warrant, those who commit the crime will do serious time.

District Attorneys should continue to play a key role in the process, but they should not be able to veto a judge’s discretion. Indeed, to the extent there are district attorney-sponsored initiatives, such as Drug Treatment Alternative to Prison (DTAP) programs that have proven success rates with the limited populations they serve, judges will have the discretion to continue them.

This approach is fair, sensible and cost effective. We spend almost $45,000 per year incarcerating each drug offender in state prison, many of whom are non-violent individuals suffering from substance abuse. This is money that could be spent on breaking the cycle that has driven New York’s apparent addiction to sending people to prison rather than ending the drug abuse and recidivism.

I reiterate my disappointment at this missed opportunity. I remain
committed to eliminating the most ineffective and inhumane aspects of the Rockefeller-era Drug Laws. I am hopeful that this year my colleagues in the Legislature can create a partnership with the Governor to complete this work.

Sincerely,
Sheldon Silver
Speaker
New York State Assembly

Posted by lois at 12:06 AM | Comments (0)

February 05, 2009

MI: State should expand Parole Board to cut prison stays and costs

State should expand Parole Board to cut prison stays and costs
February 4, 2009

Michigan's $2-billion-a-year prison system holds thousands of inmates who have served their minimum sentence and are eligible for release. Not all of them merit paroles, of course, but many do, costing taxpayers millions of dollars that could be better spent on higher education and other state services. To give these cases a thorough and timely review, Gov. Jennifer Granholm ought to expand the 10-member Parole Board.

Longer prison stays, dictated by past Parole Board practices, are largely responsible for Michigan spending hundreds of millions of dollars more on prisons than surrounding states -- states with crime rates no higher than Michigan's.

At least 12,000 inmates who are eligible for parole remain in Michigan's 41 prisons, even though parole rates have increased over the last year. If even half of them could be safely released, it would save the state nearly $200 million a year.

With 49,000 inmates, Michigan has one of the nation's highest incarceration rates. The Parole Board must determine, as soon as possible, who should stay in prison and who can go home. To do the job, the Parole Board needs to expand by two, four or even six members.

Delaying the review of worthy cases is immoral and expensive. Even under normal circumstances, the board grants about 12,000 paroles a year and reviews twice that number of cases. But over the last 18 months, board members have gotten hundreds of additional cases from the governor's new Executive Clemency Advisory Council, which recommends medical and other commutations that require public hearings. The Parole Board is also personally reviewing hundreds of parolable lifers, after a federal judge ruled that the Department of Corrections had violated their constitutional rights.

Parole Board members serve rotating four-year terms and earn $89,000 a year. To make their decisions more impartial and accurate, they are learning how to use new validated assessment tools that predict risk based on a variety of information, including crime history, release plan, institutional record and age. But the Parole Board must have enough members to ensure that every eligible inmate gets a thorough, and safe, review.

Michigan cannot afford a prison system that is much larger than necessary to protect its citizens.
http://www.freep.com/article/20090204/OPINION01/902040356

Posted by lois at 09:00 AM | Comments (0)

February 03, 2009

Defining ‘Cruel and Unusual’ When Offender Is 13

Sidebar
Defining ‘Cruel and Unusual’ When Offender Is 13

By ADAM LIPTAK
Published: February 2, 2009

In 1989, someone raped a 72-year-old woman in Pensacola, Fla. Joe Sullivan was 13 at the time, and he admitted that he and two older friends had burglarized the woman’s home earlier that day. But he denied that he had returned to commit the rape.

The victim testified that her assailant was “a colored boy” who “had kinky hair and he was quite black and he was small.” She said she “did not see him full in the face” and so would not recognize him by sight. But she recalled her attacker saying something like, “If you can’t identify me, I may not have to kill you.”

At his trial, Mr. Sullivan was made to say those words several times.

“It’s been six months,” the woman said on the witness stand. “It’s hard, but it does sound similar.”

The trial lasted a day and ended in conviction. Then Judge Nicholas Geeker, of the circuit court in Escambia County, sentenced Mr. Sullivan to life without the possibility of parole.

“I’m going to send him away for as long as I can,” Judge Geeker said.

Mr. Sullivan is 33 now, and his lawyers have asked the United States Supreme Court to consider the question of whether the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment extends to sentencing someone who was barely a teenager to die in prison for a crime that did not involve a killing.

People can argue about whether the punishment in Mr. Sullivan’s case is cruel. There is no question that it is unusual.

According to court papers and a report from the Equal Justice Initiative, which now represents Mr. Sullivan, only eight people in the world are serving sentences of life without parole for crimes they committed when they were 13. All are in the United States.

And there are only two people in that group whose crimes did not involve a killing. Both are in Florida, and both are black.

Joe Sullivan is one; Ian Manuel, who is in prison for a 1990 robbery and attempted murder, is the other.

About 1,000 people under 15 are arrested on rape charges every year, according to Justice Department data. But none of them have been sentenced to life without parole since Mr. Sullivan was. Indeed, no 13-year-old has been sentenced to life without parole for any crime that did not involve a killing in more than 15 years.

Florida’s attorney general, Bill McCollum, waived his right to file a response to Mr. Sullivan’s petition to the Supreme Court, a sign suggesting that he considers the case insubstantial if not frivolous. Sandi Copes, a spokeswoman for Mr. McCollum’s office, declined to discuss the case.

Last month, the court indicated that it found the case more interesting than Florida does, requesting a response from the state. That probably means that at least one justice considered the case significant or difficult. But it is nothing like a guarantee that the court will agree to hear it.

On the other hand, the question of whether life without parole for juveniles is constitutional is the logical next step following the court’s 2005 decision in Roper v. Simmons, which struck down the death penalty for crimes committed by 16- and 17-year-olds. Writing for the majority in that case, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy said that even older teenagers are different from adults. They are less mature, more impulsive, more susceptible to peer pressure and more likely to change for the better over time.

Last year, in Kennedy v. Louisiana, the court issued another ruling that helps frame Mr. Sullivan’s case. That decision said crimes against individuals that did not involve killing, including the rape of a child by an adult, may not be punished by death.

In 2007, after Mr. Sullivan had served almost two decades in prison, a Florida appeals court declined to have another look at his case. The Roper decision, the appeals court said, “established only one new constitutional right, the right for a juvenile not to be given the death penalty.”

Douglas A. Berman, an authority on sentencing law at Ohio State, said it was time for the Supreme Court and the legal system to widen its relentless focus on capital cases and to look at other severe sentences as well. Cases involving the death penalty receive careful review at multiple levels, he said. Life sentences can receive almost none.

Mr. Sullivan’s trial, for instance, lasted a day. He was represented by a lawyer who made no opening statement and whose closing argument occupies about three double-spaced pages of the trial transcript. The lawyer was later suspended, and the Florida Bar’s Web site says he is “not eligible to practice in Florida.”

There was biological evidence from the rape, but it was not presented at the trial. When Mr. Sullivan’s new lawyers recently sought to conduct DNA testing on it, they were told that the state had destroyed it in 1993.

“I absolutely believe he is innocent,” Bryan A. Stevenson, the executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative, said of Mr. Sullivan. Mr. Stevenson said he believed that one of the older youths who committed the burglary with Mr. Sullivan and who testified against him was probably the actual assailant.

But the point made by Mr. Sullivan’s brief to the Supreme Court is not that he is innocent. It is not even that he should be released after 20 years in prison. It is only that he should someday be allowed to make his case to the Florida Parole Commission.

“I don’t think it’s possible to say that a 13-year-old will never change and that life without parole is an appropriate punishment,” Mr. Stevenson said.

Aside from Mr. Sullivan’s case, it seems there is only one other appeals court decision about whether young teenagers may be locked away forever for rape. It was issued 40 years ago in Kentucky, and it involved two 14-year-olds. The court struck down the part of the sentences precluding the possibility of parole.

Juveniles “are not permitted to vote, to contract, to purchase alcoholic beverages or to marry without the consent of their parents,” the court said. “It seems inconsistent that one be denied the fruits of the tree of the law, yet subjected to all of its thorns.”

» A version of this article appeared in print on February 3, 2009, on page A12 of the New York edition.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/03/us/03bar.html?ref=us

Posted by lois at 05:48 PM | Comments (0)

January 30, 2009

MI: Sacred Cows Block Real Prison Reform

Wednesday, January 28,2009
Sacred cows block real prison reform
by Kyle Melinn
Don't claim to be a Korean War veteran if you're not. In Michigan, it's a three-year felony.

Sodomy is still a crime in Michigan, as is dueling, adultery and compelling a woman to marry.

Yet, trying to get Republicans to strip these arcane crimes from the books or to be a bit more sensible on sentencing for real crimes like low-level drug offenses, forgery and counterfeiting is like trying to make real reform in the state's prison system.

It’s next to impossible.

Gov. Jennifer Granholm's administration told legislative Republicans 18 months ago that if it was serious about cutting corrections costs, there's really only one way to do it: Lower the state's comparably enormous prison population with realistic sentences that aren't driven by political opportunism.

But in order to do it, the Democrats have to give too, and that means lessening labor costs in the union-driven prison system.

Everybody wants to cut the Department of Corrections these days, but for different reasons.
During last May’s swank Detroit Chamber of Commerce shindig on Mackinac Island, Granholm pledged that if the business community got the Legislature to cut prison costs, she’d roll back the new Michigan Business Tax surcharge.

So off to work they went. The Detroit Chamber and other business groups spent the next several months tearing apart the state’s prison budget, trying to find a way to imprison our bad guys for less money.

If you haven’t heard yet, Michigan’s prison system is huge, like $2 billion huge. The biggest in the Midwest by far and by any measuring stick you want to use. We lock up more prisoners than any of our neighbors and at a higher cost.

During the economically flush 1990s, then-Gov. John Engler made prison construction a cottage industry. Get-tough-on-crime Republican lawmakers were more than happy to fill these new facilities by jacking up prison sentences and installing more mandatory minimums.

Ah, but public safety comes at a price. In the fear-driven culture in which we live, where any middle-class child abduction or spousal murder has the potential to make national headline news for weeks on end, no amount of money is too much to lock up the crooks.

Until, the piggybank is empty, that is.

And in Michigan, the state piggy bank has been collecting dust bunnies since 2001. We’ve shifted money here and there. Cut money to cities, townships, universities, and certain parts of state government. Taxes were raised in 2007, and the business community was ticked.

That returns us to the Detroit Chamber, which came back last October with $800 million in prison reform, more than enough to cover a business tax surcharge. Their plan was to cut sentences and cut labor costs.

The governor and the Legislature stared at each other. The stand-off began.

The Republican-led Senate is all about privatization and slashing the union-driven labor costs within the state’s prison system, but not giving up their "bad-guys-are-going-to-kill-you-in-your-bed-in-the-middle-of-the-night” fear card.

The Democrats are OK letting out non-violent offenders as long as they’ve served their minimum sentences. They’re also fine with giving judges more sentencing discretion, but not if they have to throw their union buddies under the bus by cutting labor costs.

The Council of State Governments’ Justice Center was called in to help. It called in the Republicans, Democrats and DOC officials and went to work.

Last week, amid much bipartisan fanfare, the report was released. What did Republicans and Democrats come up with?

Squat.

Not only did the Council only find $16 million in savings for next year (less than 1 percent of the entire DOC budget), but it suggested that the money saved go toward local police and DNA crime labs. So much for rolling back the business tax.

Faced with the charge of fixing state government, the Republicans and Democrats came back with a tin can and square tires.

Now the state has a $1.4 billion budget hole, the little sister to a $1.8 billion hole of two years ago that required major tax increases to fill.

Prison cuts must happen this year. The “Obama-bucks” won’t balance the state budget in the long term.

The sacred cows need to be led to the slaughterhouse. Republicans need to pitch the "lock-'em-up-and-throw-away-the-key" mentality, but Democrats will need to give a little, too, even if it means less overtime or fewer union workers in prisons.

To not meet halfway can't be an option.
http://www.lansingcitypulse.com/lansing/article-2562-sacred-cows-block-real-
prison-reform.html

Posted by lois at 11:54 PM | Comments (0)

January 28, 2009

MA: FAMM instroduces reform bills on mandatory minimum sentencing and school zones

Families Against Mandatory Minimums has just introduced two sentencing reform bills. They are comprehensive sentencing reform bills that go beyond similar bills that were filed in previous sessions. One would repeal mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses while the other would reform the school zone drug sentencing law. As of this moment they do not have Bill numbers. FAMM is seeking sponsors of these Bills from our legislators in the Senate and the House.

Please call or please email your Senator and Rep. If you do not have their email address or phone # you can go to this site.....
http://www.mass.gov/legis/memmenu.htm
Please remember to ask them to get back to you on their actions. All of this will take not more than 5 minutes.
Thank you!
Lois
After you have contacted your senator and rep....please forward to others!!

This message is from FAMM...
Please ask your legislators to sign on as co-sponsors! The deadline is February 4. Use FAMM's action center to help you make your calls to your representative and senator (you'll make two calls total). After each call, be sure to give us feedback on the response and click the "submit" button at the end of both calls. Call by going to this URL: http://capwiz.com/famm/callalert/index.tt?alertid=12519506

Mandatory minimum repeal bill. The repeal bill is called, "An Act to Repeal Mandatory Minimum Sentencing Laws for Drug Offenses." It would do away with one-size-fits-all sentencing for drug offenses. Instead, courts would be allowed to once again base sentences on the facts of the case and the offender's circumstances. It would also allow drug offenders to apply for parole, work release and earned "good conduct" credits. Identical versions of the bill were filed in the House of Representatives by Rep. Benjamin Swan and in the Senate by Sen. Thomas McGee. For more information, see our summary of the bill (
http://www.famm.org/Repository/Files/Mass_repeal_summary_for_members___1-23-09_%5B1%5D.pdf )
and fact sheet. (http://www.famm.org/Repository/Files/Mass_general_repeal_fact_sheet__1-21-09_%5B1%5D.pdf)

School zone drug sentencing bill. The school zone bill is called, "An Act to Reform the School Zone Law for Drug Offenses." It was filed in the House by Rep. Benjamin Swan (there is no Senate sponsor). This bill would reduce the size of drug-free school zones to 100 feet and get rid of the mandatory prison sentence for school zone violations. In addition, school zone penalties would no longer apply to drug sales that take place in private residences. (The drug offense would still be illegal, but there would no longer be an additional penalty due to the location of the home.) Finally, school zone sentences could be served at the same time as the sentence for the drug offense itself. For more information, see our summary of the bill (http://www.famm.org/Repository/Files/Mass_repeal_summary_for_members___1-23-09_%5B1%5D.pdf)
and fact sheet. (http://www.famm.org/Repository/Files/Mass_school_zone_fact_sheet__1-21-09_%5B1%5D.pdf)

Posted by lois at 01:59 PM | Comments (0)

January 23, 2009

MI: Getting smart on crime — and prison time

Getting smart on crime — and prison time
Jeff Gerritt
January 22, 2009

A study by a far more credible source than me — the Justice Center at the Council of State Governments — backs what I’ve been saying the last eight years: We’re locking too many people up. Michigan’s way high incarceration rates are bankrupting the state while failing to make us safer. The Justice Center reports are available here.)

The policies of the Michigan State Parole Board — which denies releases for often inexplicable reasons, even when people are old and sick — have caused much of the problem. The Parole Board has loosened up in the past year, but there are still 12,000 prisoners in Michigan past their earliest release date. Those 12,000 people, together, cost taxpayers $420 million a year.

One of the council’s recommendations — and it’s a good one — is to direct the parole board, through legislation, to release most inmates before they serve more than 120% of their sentences. This is not, as a Freep.com headline indicates, an early release.

These prisoners have served more than the minimum time dictated by their sentences, and they are parole-eligible.

Right now, the average parolee in Michigan has served 127% of his or her sentence. Just reducing time served to 120% would cut the overall prison population by more than 4,300 by 2015. That’s four fewer prisons.

Studies show that length of sentence has little to do with how likely a person is to commit another crime. The parole board now has too much discretion. Legally requiring releases after a certain period would take some of the heat off them.

Money saved with fewer prisons could put more cops on the street and increase intervention work with young men. Males 17-24 now commit 26% of the violent crimes. Intervention programs, like Flip the Script in Detroit, would reduce that number. In other words, spend more money on preventing crime and less after the damage is done.

Other states have made similar changes. They save hundreds of millions of dollars and still report lower crime rates than Michigan. We’ve tried tough on crime. Now let’s get smart on crime.
http://www.freep.com/article/20090122/BLOG2505/90122088/1068/opinion/Getting+smart+on+crime+%E2%80%94+and+prison+time

Posted by lois at 11:21 PM | Comments (0)

January 22, 2009

Michigan can save millions on prison costs, group says

Thursday, January 22, 2009
Detroit News
Michigan can save millions on prison costs, group says
Gary Heinlein and Charlie Cain / Detroit News Lansing Bureau

LANSING --Michigan can save $262 million in five years on prison spending with new policies that include targeted crime fighting and expanded job services for probationers and parolees, a national study group said today. The Council of State Governments also recommends the state reduce its crime lab backlogs and respond to probation violations with "swift, certain and proportional sanctions."

Corrections Director Patricia Caruso said the policy options presented today are "a critical step toward an affordable and effective corrections system that helps us go beyond what we have achieved in cost savings since 2003." Council findings included:

• Violent crime arrests dropped 22 percent between 2000 and 2007, while such crime dropped only 2 percent.

Advertisement

• 50 percent of people on probation and 50-70 percent of those on parole lack jobs.

• People released from prison have served, on average, 127 percent of their original minimum sentences.

The recommendations come from the council's Justice Center, which is involved in a 2- to 3-year study to help Michigan trim its $2-billion corrections budget.

The recommendations are a first step toward trimming Michigan's $2 billion prison budget.

Michigan runs the nation's sixth-largest prison system at a cost of $5.48 million a day or about $200 a year for each resident. The state also is one of just four that spends more on prisons than on state universities -- $1.19 on prisons for each $1 spent on schools.

There's a growing sense that the prison system, at its current size, no longer is sustainable, given the state's longstanding fiscal problems.

The state's corrections budget is under closer than usual scrutiny as lawmakers and Gov. Jennifer Granholm look for ways to resolve a projected $1.6 billion revenue shortfall in the state budget year that starts Oct. 1.

The Legislature has resisted making any major changes in sentencing and parole policies, expressing worries the result would be more crimes by inmates set free before they were rehabilitated. But the study by the prestigious council could provide justification for significant overhauls in the prison system.

In a two-day special series last April, The Detroit News reported:

• The prison population has grown four-fold in the last quarter-century and now numbers nearly 50,000.

• The $31,325 it costs to house a Michigan inmate for a year could pay three years worth of tuition for a student at a state university.

• Michigan incarcerates inmates at a higher rate than any other Midwest state and estimates are that the state could save $500 million annually if it locked-up criminals at a rate more like its neighboring states.

• Mushrooming prison spending has not stopped the state from ranking 10th among the states in the rate of violent crimes -- the only Midwestern state in the top 10.

• Today's prison population equals the combined populations of Ferndale, Mount Clemens and Harper Woods.

• Because of Michigan's stringent parole practices, about 12,000 inmates who've served their minimum sentences remain locked up.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090122/METRO/901220434/1
409/METRO

Posted by lois at 07:01 PM | Comments (0)

January 19, 2009

OK: Report: Rethink corrections policies or risk federal oversight

Report: Rethink corrections policies or risk federal bout

by Marie Price, The Journal Record
January 14, 2009
http://www.journalrecord.com/article.cfm?recid=95123

OKLAHOMA CITY – Oklahoma’s swelling inmate population shows the
need to rethink corrections policies to avoid another bout with
federal-court oversight of the prison system or a state budget
where corrections needs crowd out funding for others, members
of the Oklahoma Academy were told Tuesday.

In the organization’s report “Oklahoma’s Criminal Justice
System: Can We be Just as Tough but Twice as Smart?” a key
recommendation is a hard look at a state law that requires
those convicted of certain serious crimes to serve at least 85
percent of their sentence before being considered for parole.

Report Co-Chairman Marc Edwards, an Oklahoma City attorney,
said the “85-percent rule” was initially adopted in 1996 along
with a new sentencing matrix, which was jettisoned while the
85-percent requirement remains in place.

Neville Massie, executive assistant to the corrections
director, said a recent audit showed that most of the growth in
the state’s prison population is attributable to the longer
sentences required under laws such as the 85-percent rule.

Other recommendations include reducing incarceration of women
and preventing people from entering the prison system through
increased use of alternatives such as drug courts, more
regional and community alternatives and addressing addiction
and mental health issues.

Academy Chairman Howard Barnett said the report is the result
of work that began at a three-day town-hall conference in
Ardmore last October.

Secretary of State Susan Savage said the academy took on a
tough issue, one that is always at the forefront of legislative
and budgetary matters.

Savage said addressing some issues can only be accomplished
over the long term.

“It is not a quick fix,” she said.

Former state Rep. David Braddock said improving the state’s
criminal justice system is the right thing to do, but a
difficult task from which some lawmakers shrink for political
considerations.

Braddock said Oklahoma’s “tough on crime” stance has been used
by opponents to defeat some more reform-minded legislators.

“Our job, if anything, is to point out that the system is not
working,” he said.

Braddock said statistics such as being number one in the
incarceration of women are unacceptable.

“We need some common-sense, intelligent reforms that will serve
us better for the future,” he said. “We can change Oklahoma’s
criminal justice system, but it has to be ‘we.’”

Braddock said the state is in for a “huge train wreck,” with
the possibility of a $1.5 billion corrections budget in 10
years, if nothing is done.

Former state Sen. Cal Hobson said the state has pulled back on
laws that provided for some relief on the prison population by
releasing some inmates early, as well as adopting the
85-percent rule, which originally targeted only severe crimes
deemed the “seven deadly sins.” He said it now covers about 19
offenses.

“There’ll be more by May,” Hobson said, referring to the end of
the legislative session.

Hobson said Oklahoma’s corrections budget is “number three and
battling to be number two.”

He pointed out that the cap law was enacted in the early 1980s,
when the state faced a fiscal problem due to plummeting oil
prices.

“This problem will only be solved in a time of crisis,” Hobson
said.

Lawmakers were recently told they will have much less to
appropriate this session than last.

Commissioner Terri White, of the Oklahoma Department of Mental
Health and Substance Abuse Services, outlined her agency’s
“Smart on Crime” proposal, which calls for addressing addiction
and mental illness as the diseases science has proven them to
be, to stem the flow into the prison system of individuals who
suffer from them.

“If we locked up people for having diabetes, there would be a
public outcry,” White said.

The proposal also calls for screening, prevention and
intervention strategies to identify these issues early on, as
well as treatment of those incarcerated.

The agency estimates that the plan will cost about $30 million
per year.

White also said that 76 percent of women in Oklahoma prisons
have some form of mental illness, compared with about 40
percent of men.

Massie said meeting the needs of women in prison involves
addressing issues such as trauma and abuse, which many female
inmates have experienced in their private lives, as well as
their responsibilities regarding children.
Bruce DeMuth, chief of staff with the Oklahoma Department of
Career Technology and Education, stressed the need to improve
Oklahoma’s educational statistics, as a way to reduce the
prison population.

He said that in Oklahoma about 62 percent of inmates are high
school dropouts.

Improving the state’s graduation rate by just 6.4 percent would
increase overall income by $830 million, the gross state
product by $2 billion and state revenues by $76 million, DeMuth
said.

The Rev. Stan Basler, director of Criminal Justice and Mercy
Ministries at Oklahoma Conference United Methodist Church, said
the best policy is to keep people from going to prison in the
first place. However, he said the state needs to do more to
assist those just-released from prison, who face hurdles in
securing housing, jobs and other support, as well as basic
items such as driver’s licenses.

Posted by lois at 11:18 PM | Comments (0)

January 15, 2009

LA: Did Mothers Against Drunk Drivers and Others Push Up Mandatory Sentences

"Why, then, is the country just now getting around to talking about cutting criminal justice costs by reducing the prison population?
As Mauer said, the states have finally reached a point fiscally where leaders must choose between costly prisons and less expensive alternatives. Was the delay about fear of politically powerful groups such as Mothers Against Drunk Drivers?That group and others successfully pushed for mandatory sentences for selected crimes, driving the number of prison inmates higher."

Will La. reduce prison population to save money?
By Robert Morgan January 14, 2009

*
Some states reportedly are considering cutting expenses by letting some convicts out of prison and relieving others of supervised parole as a means of cutting expenses.

According to the Associated Press, Kentucky is implementing a temporary cost-cutting plan that has seen murderers and other violent offenders benefit.

Early-release programs are being considered in California, Virginia and New York to avoid budget shortfalls.

The AP stated, "Collectively, the pending and proposed initiatives could add up to one of (the) biggest shifts ever in corrections policy, putting into place cost-saving reforms that have struggled to win political support in the tough-on-crime climate of recent decades."

Marc Mauer, executive director of the Sentencing Project, which advocates alternatives to incarceration, said hard financial times are doing what politics could not.

"Many political leaders who weren't comfortable enough, politically, to do it before can now -- under the guise of fiscal responsibility -- implement programs and policies that would be win-win situations, saving money and improving corrections," Mauer said.

This story comes on the heels of an earlier AP article about proposed layoffs in the Louisiana Department of Corrections.

Corrections Secretary Jimmy LeBlanc did not mention anything about cutting costs by reducing the number of inmates but that would have to be legislative decision.

Perhaps it was always inevitable that cuts in housing prisoners would have to be made.

Several years ago, in a Town Talk article, local sheriffs and Corrections officials said about 85 percent of the state's incarcerated population had drug or mental problems. There has been nothing reported since to alter that assessment.

Why, then, is the country just now getting around to talking about cutting criminal justice costs by reducing the prison population?

As Mauer said, the states have finally reached a point fiscally where leaders must choose between costly prisons and less expensive alternatives.

Was the delay about fear of politically powerful groups such as Mothers Against Drunk Drivers?

That group and others successfully pushed for mandatory sentences for selected crimes, driving the number of prison inmates higher.

When The Town Talk story was published, it was noted that the cost of keeping one prisoner locked up was $18,000 per year, and the cost went to more than $30,000 annually when expenses for prison construction were added.

Will Louisiana join the other states in considering ways to reduce the prison population, possibly providing less expensive drug and psychiatric treatment rather than incarceration?

Gov. Bobby Jindal has said Louisiana is not facing the economic crisis to the extent that the rest of the nation is suffering.

Will he wait until the state is in a worse fiscal crisis before considering a practical means for cutting expenses?

http://www.thetowntalk.com/article/20090114/NEWS01/901140326

Posted by lois at 02:42 PM | Comments (0)

January 05, 2009

PA: Rendell Wants No Parole for People Convicted of Repeated Violent Crimes

Rendell Wants No Parole For Repeat Violent Offenders
Last Edited: Sunday, 04 Jan 2009
Governor Ed Rendell

PHILADELPHIA -- Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell has put forth his first order of business for 2009. He wants to get rid of parole for repeat violent offenders.

"In 2008, four Pennsylvanians were brutally murdered by men who had served state time for violent crimes and were out on parole at the time," said Governor Rendell. "These murders cry out for changes in how we sentence our violent repeat offenders."

Currently, in the state of Pennsylvania, offenders are given indeterminate sentences, requiring a minimum and maximum time to be served. Gov. Rendell proposes that any adult or juvenile convicted of a violent crime with a deadly weapon would be unable to get out on parole. He has told the General Assembly to start working on this legislation.

He cited the case of Daniel Giddings, accused of shooting and killing Philadelphia Police Sgt. Patrick McDonald. Giddings had been out on parole.

"Howard Cain, Levon Warner, and Eric Floyd, all on parole...shot and killed Sgt. Steven Liczbinski," said Gov. Rendell.

The sentencing guidelines for crimes wouldn't change but judges would give offenders a sentence that would be served fully, no time off for good behavior. He says most repeat violent offenders have learned "to game the system," entering programs in prison to help them get out at the earliest possible time.

The prison system, already overcrowded, may see an increase due to the legislation, but Rendell says non-violent offenders would be fast tracked out of the state prison system. He says he believes the state prisons are for violent offenders. He says the state is also working on building additional prisons.

"Nobody, myself included, will tell you that just locking people up solves the problem, but it does buy us some valuable time. Instead of one of these offenders being in prison for four years, if they can be in prison for nine years, that's five years more of safety for the citizens of Pennsylvania," said Rendell.

The legislature is scheduled to reconvene in a week and Rendell hopes they will take up the matter immediately.
http://www.myfoxphilly.com/myfox/pages/News/Detail?contentId=8190722&version=10&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=TSTY&pageId=3.2.1

Posted by lois at 09:27 AM | Comments (0)

December 19, 2008

OH: State could invest in half-way houses rather than more prisons

Ohio bill seeks to ease prison crowding
By JULIE CARR SMYTH AP Statehouse Correspondent
Thursday Dec 18, 2008
Akron Beacon Journal
Non-violent drug offenders could spend more time in halfway houses instead of in prison. Well-behaved inmates who earn their GEDs could get out early. Others could serve the final months of their sentences outside prison while wearing GPS devices.

These are just some of the options Gov. Ted Strickland's administration is considering to contend with crowded prisons amid forecasts of plummeting state revenues.

"To me, it comes down to a simple formula," said state prisons director Terry Collins. "Either we spend a whole lot more money on building a whole lot more prisons to lock up everybody in Ohio, or we can figure out some other solutions so that all those other programs _ like social services, education, Medicaid _ have the money they need."

In a document recently shared with state lawmakers, Collins outlined 15 options for reducing the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction's 51,000-prisoner population _ and its hefty annual budget of about $1.8 billion.

The document's final page included a subtle reminder to lawmakers: Collins has the ability to declare a prison overcrowding emergency that could result, with legislative or gubernatorial approval, in the reduction of sentences in 30-, 60- and 90-day increments to alleviate the problem. Collins said it's a matter of state spending priorities.

"I'm just saying why don't we look at something different, so my grandkids and other people's grandkids in this state can get some education?" Collins said in an interview. "I'm not looking to empty the prisons. I'm looking to be smart about it."

Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O'Brien said care would have to be taken if prison housing guidelines were rewritten. He said some low-level felons, such as first time drunken drivers or people who have assaulted a domestic partner, are susceptible to repeat offenses.

"Those powder keg kind of people are low-level offenders today that tomorrow could be a homicide," he said.

In Ohio, prisons are at 133 percent capacity. He said the lack of personal space leads to more violence and more dangerous conditions for both prisoners and staff.

He said he'd be happy if capacity were narrowed back to 100 percent again.

"That's like Santa Claus would bring me everything I wanted for Christmas," he said.

Some of Collins' recommendations were included in a sweeping law enforcement bill passed late Wednesday and sent to Gov. Strickland's desk. The bill gives judges broader discretion in sentencing 3rd-, 4th- and 5th-degree felons to community-based facilities instead of prison, particularly those with drug addictions.

The proposal passed the Senate 28-3 and received its final sign-off from the House.

The U.S. prison population is the largest in the world, largely due to tougher sentences states have imposed in recent years on drunken drivers, drug offenders, sex offenders and others.

Collins said he views the bill as a foundation to build on. Among other scenarios his department is exploring are:

_Allowing low-level, non-sex offenders serving 12 months or less to spend a third of their sentence in prison, a third in a halfway house, and a third with a GPS monitor. Savings: 3,083 prison beds, $19 million over the biennium.

_Increasing prison diversion programs paid through the Community Corrections Act. Savings: Up to 2,804 prison beds, and, for a $5 million expenditure, $14.8 million in unneeded construction costs.

_Allowing offenders serving the shortest sentences, less than 30 days, to serve their time in local custody, with the state paying counties incentives for the service. Savings: 160 prison beds, $725,849.

_Stepping down low-level, non-violent, non-sex offenders directly to GPS supervision, rather than to community programs, for their final 90 days. Savings: 700 prison beds, $1.3 million.

_Trimming sentences by up to 15 percent for those who complete classes or recovery programs behind bars. Savings: 800 prison beds, $1.7 million.

_Diverting those serving time for child support violations to community-based facilities. Savings: 438 prison beds, $3.4 million.

_Equalizing powder and crack cocaine offenses, in a manner the federal government recently recommended. Savings: 1,450 beds, $10.4 million.

Collins cautioned that all the scenarios are in the brainstorming stages. None is a formal budget proposal.

O'Brien said such creative solutions may be needed to free up the cash to avoid closing prisons, which he sees as a far worse option. But he said halfway houses also require cash.

"The money has to there to build, operate, maintain and staff those community-based corrections facilities," he said. "You can't just say more people need to be sent there and not fund them."

___

On The Net:

Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections: http://www.drc.ohio.gov
http://www.ohio.com/news/ap?articleID=1301917

Posted by lois at 02:43 PM | Comments (0)

December 18, 2008

MA: Marijuana Law Comes With Challenges

December 18, 2008
Marijuana Law Comes With Challenges
By ABBY GOODNOUGH
NY Times
BOSTON — Last month, voters approved a statewide measure decriminalizing the possession of small amounts of marijuana. Now, wary authorities say, comes the hard part. They are scrambling to set up a new system of civil penalties before Jan. 2, when the change becomes law. From then on, anyone caught with an ounce or less of marijuana will owe a $100 civil fine instead of ending up with an arrest record and possibly facing jail time.

It sounds simple, but David Capeless, president of the Massachusetts District Attorneys Association, said the new policy presented a thicket of questions and complications.

One of the most basic, Mr. Capeless said, is who will collect the fines and enforce other provisions of the law. For example, violators under 18 will be required to attend a drug awareness class within a year, but it is unclear who will make sure that they do so. The fine increases to $1,000 for those who skip the class.

A complicating factor, said Mr. Capeless, the district attorney in Berkshire County, is that state law bans the police from demanding identification for civil infractions.

“Not only do you not have to identify yourself,” he said, “but it would appear from a strict reading that people can get a citation, walk away, never pay a fine and have no repercussion.”

Wayne Sampson, executive director of the Massachusetts Chiefs of Police Association, says he anticipates that many violators will lie about their identities.

“You can tell us that you’re Mickey Mouse of One Disneyland Way,” Mr. Sampson said, “and we have to assume that’s true.”

The authorities, he said, will also have to be sure that the substance they hand out citations for is marijuana, which will involve sending it to the State Police crime laboratory.

“You’re going to appeal it and go to the clerk’s hearing,” Mr. Sampson said, “and if we don’t have an analysis from the drug lab, the clerk is going to throw the case out.”

Mr. Sampson predicted that the law would result in de facto legalization of marijuana because it would prove too difficult to enforce.

“I would argue that the proponents knew these complications right from the beginning,” he said.

About 65 percent of state voters supported the decriminalization measure, which was promoted by a group that spent more than $1.5 million on the effort.

The group, the Committee for Sensible Marijuana Policy, said that in addition to ensuring that people caught with marijuana no longer have a criminal record, the change would save about $29.5 million a year that it estimates law enforcement currently spends to enforce existing drug laws.

A spokesman for the Marijuana Policy Project in Washington, which supports the drug’s legalization and created the Committee for Sensible Marijuana Policy to get the ballot question passed here, said that judging from the experience of other states with civil penalties for marijuana possession, Massachusetts officials were exaggerating the challenges.

“I can’t help but think that the real difficulty in implementing it,” said the spokesman, Dan Bernath, “is they don’t want to do it.”

Eleven states have decriminalized first-time possession of marijuana, though in most it is technically a misdemeanor instead of a civil offense.

In Nebraska, where possession of an ounce or less of marijuana is punishable by a $300 civil fine, the process has worked smoothly for three decades, said Michael Behm, executive director of the Nebraska Crime Commission.

In New York, possession of an ounce or less of marijuana is a noncriminal violation but is still processed through the criminal system, said Robert M. Carney, the district attorney in Schenectady County.

“They are brought down to the police station so their identity is established,” Mr. Carney said of violators, “but they are not fingerprinted because it’s not an arrest.”

In Massachusetts, the Executive Office of Public Safety is working with state and local law enforcement and court officials to determine how to apply the changes. Mr. Capeless said education officials were also in on the discussions because it was unclear whether public schools and universities could forbid marijuana possession under the new law.

A spokesman for the public safety office said its legal counsel was considering “a lot of questions” as the deadline drew near. But the spokesman, Terrel Harris, would not elaborate.

“We are just trying to make sure we have all the answers,” Mr. Harris said.

Mr. Capeless said that in particular the department needed to address a clause in the new law that said neither the state nor its “political subdivisions or their respective agencies” could impose “any form of penalty, sanction or disqualification” on anyone found with an ounce or less of marijuana.

“It appears to say that you get a $100 fine and they can’t do anything else to you,” he said. “Can a police officer caught with marijuana several times get to keep his job and not be disciplined in any fashion? Can public high schools punish kids for smoking cigarettes but not for having pot?”

Mr. Bernath agreed that the law was “not completely clear” on how to handle such situations, but predicted that they would be rare.

“I think the resistance has to do with dealing with something new,” he said. “We’re pretty confident that once this gets going and the newness of it wears off, a lot of the apprehension will go away.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/18/us/18marijuana.html?scp=2&sq=marijuana&st=cse

Posted by lois at 09:46 PM | Comments (0)

December 12, 2008

LAC Releases New Drug Law Reform Costs Savings Report (Very good study whether or not you are in NY)

■ LAC Releases New Drug Law Reform Costs Savings Report (Very good study whether or not you are in NY)

The Legal Action Center has just completed a new study, Drug Law Reform 2008 - Dramatic Costs Savings For New York State, which finds that New York would save over a quarter billion dollars a year by reforming the Rockefeller-Era Drug Laws. When drug law reform is fully operational, it is estimated that New York would save $267,660,000 a year. Even in the first year, estimates show that New York would realize tens of millions of dollars in savings. The study calculated the cost savings that would accrue to New York State by diverting addicted individuals charged with second, non-violent, non-sex felony offenses from prison to community-based treatment, as they comprise the vast majority of individuals who are mandated into prison under current law. LAC believes such individuals should be diverted into mandated treatment if the laws are reformed. The study excludes people charged with Class A felonies. The findings take into account savings generated by the elimination of costs associated with incarceration; savings related to reduced foster care, health care and welfare costs; and increased tax contributions. To see the full study,
http://www.lac.org/pdf/RDL08_Cost%20Savings%20Report%2012_08.pdf

Posted by lois at 01:13 PM | Comments (0)

December 08, 2008

WA: Policy that lets prisoners serve half their sentences reduces money and doesn't increase crime

Tacoma, WA - Monday, December 8, 2008
News Tribune
Policy that lets inmates get out early might stay
JOSEPH TURNER

A policy that has allowed many Washington inmates to get out of prison after serving only half of their sentences may be extended by a cash-strapped Legislature because the program saves money and doesn’t increase crime.

Since mid-2003, many inmates who are sent to prison for nonviolent crimes such as burglary, theft and drugs have been allowed to accrue “good time” equal to 50 percent of their sentences. Then-Gov. Gary Locke and the Legislature approved that change to the “time off for good behavior” policy that previously had been limited to no more than one-third of an inmate’s sentence.

Then, as now, the governor and Legislature were facing a multibillion-dollar budget deficit, and were looking for ways to cut state spending.

A recent study by the Washington State Institute for Public Policy concludes the state saves more than $10,000 for every inmate who is let out early, partly because they spend fewer days in prison and partly because they are even less likely to commit more crimes when they do get out.

Sens. Jim Hargrove, D-Hoquiam, and Adam Kline, D-Seattle, say they are heartened by the study’s conclusion and plan to introduce a bill to extend the 50 percent good time policy. The 2003 law that increased the amount of time off for good behavior also set an expiration date of mid-2010. Some lawmakers were afraid that letting inmates out of prison might just give them more opportunities to commit more crimes. Their new bill would get rid of the expiration date, also called a sunset provision.

Hargrove is chairman of the Senate Human Services and Corrections Committee. Kline is chairman of the Judiciary Committee.

“It’s cheaper and it has a positive effect on recidivism,” Kline said. That should make keeping the policy more attractive to a Legislature that is facing a projected $5 billion deficit for the 2009-11 budget cycle, he said.

“I expect there’s going to be some opposition from the tough-on-crime folks,” he added.

Indeed, there will be.

Tom McBride, executive secretary for the Washington Association of Prosecuting Attorneys, said prosecutors objected to the 2003 change because it further misleads the public about how much time offenders actually spend in prison.

“It’s a truth-in-sentencing issue,” McBride said. If a judge sentences someone to prison for two years, the public thinks that’s what happens, he said. But in actuality, that inmate probably will serve only half of that sentence, and there’s a good chance that only six months of it will be in prison and the other six months would be in a work-release center, he said.

Prosecutors will continue to oppose the longer good time policy, McBride said. If the Legislature wants to save money, they should use a more “honest” approach and just shorten prison sentences for crimes, he said. But lawmakers should be concerned about more than just saving money, he said. Part of the reason for sentences is punishment, he said.

It costs an average of $98 a day to house an inmate in a Washington prison.

Elizabeth Drake, the analyst who studied the effect of the 2003 law, said inmates who were released under the new good time provision spent an average of 63 fewer days in prison. That accounted for nearly $6,300 in cost savings per inmate. In addition, those offenders were less likely than other inmates to commit crimes when they got out.

Of the 2,614 inmates who were released during the first 14 months of the new good time policy, 49 percent were convicted of another crime within three years of their release, compared to 53 percent of a comparison group of offenders.

Because they committed fewer crimes resulted in additional savings to taxpayers and victims, which boosted the overall savings to $10,743 per inmate, Drake said.

Washington has released 40,820 inmates over the past 51/2 years, since the larger good time policy took effect. Only 21 percent of them – 8,440 – were eligible to have prison sentences reduced by as much as 50 percent.

Inmates convicted of violent sex crimes, domestic violence or other crimes against people are not eligible for any time off greater than one-third of their sentence. In fact, the same 2003 law reduced the amount of good time that sex offenders could earn to 10 percent from 15 percent.

Dick Van Wagenen, who was Locke’s criminal justice adviser in 2003, said the governor’s original proposal gave more good time to nonviolent offenders who committed property crimes like commercial burglary and theft. The Legislature expanded that group to include drug offenders to save even more money, he said.

The state Department of Corrections recently was on a pace to spend $30 million more than it was budgeted for 2007-09, largely because of overtime expenses. Although Gov. Chris Gregoire has ordered state agencies to find up to 20 percent in cuts, the prison system is largely exempt from that exercise because it deals with public safety.

The Legislature is likely to look at other sentencing provisions, too, since those are the main ways it can control costs.

“We’re always looking at sentencing laws,” Kline said.
http://www.thenewstribune.com/news/local/v-printerfriendly/story/560995.html

Posted by lois at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)

Calif.'s Prop 5 Battle Exposes Fault Lines Between Treatment Groups, Drug Courts

Calif.'s Prop 5 Battle Exposes Fault Lines Between Treatment Groups, Drug Courts
December 5, 2008
News Feature
By Bob Curley

The battle over California's recently defeated Proposition 5 has led to a schism between drug courts and addiction treatment providers -- putative allies in the drive to shunt drug offenders into treatment rather than prisons -- with advocates on both sides lamenting a lost opportunity to reform a justice system that most agree places too much emphasis on punishment and not enough on rehabilitation.

When the Nonviolent Offenders Rehabilitation Act (NORA) was shot down by about a 60-40 margin in November, it was partly due to the advocacy efforts of drug-court judges, who allied themselves with law enforcement, prison guards, and some prevention groups in opposing the measure. NORA backers, who undertook a low-key campaign to build on and improve the Proposition 36 reforms approved by state voters in 2000, instead suffered a unexpected and crushing defeat.

NORA opponents cast Prop 5 as the work of drug-legalization groups like the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA), saying it diluted drug-court judges' power to hold offenders accountable if they failed in treatment. In announcing its opposition to NORA, the National Association of Drug Court Professionals (NADCP) cited concern that the measure would "extend DPA's influence at the expense of public safety, proven judicial interventions, and DPA's political and philosophical adversaries; [and] endorse treatments and practices associated with the harm-reduction and legalization movements that are unproven and objectionable."

The pro-NORA forces were indeed led by the DPA (which does not officially endorse drug legalization but has championed medical marijuana and marijuana decriminalization laws nationally). Supporters and opponents of the measure described the drafting of the measure as a closed process, with those outside DPA learning details of the plan only when it was certified for the state ballot.

"We did discuss the contents with experts in academia, judges, some in law enforcement," said Margaret Dooley-Sammuli, DPA's deputy Prop 5 campaign manager and deputy state director in California, "but it's absolutely correct that we did not seek the consensus of the addiction field or law enforcement."

Regardless, the ranks of Proposition 5 supporters included the bulk of the "mainstream" addiction groups in California, including the California Society of Addiction Medicine, the California Association of Alcoholism and Drug Abuse Counselors, the Coalition of Alcohol and Drug Associations, the California Association for Alcohol and Drug Educators, and prominent individual groups like Phoenix House and a pair of NCADD chapters.

A review of the No on Proposition 5 website shows that NADCP was joined by law enforcement groups, some state lawmakers and civic groups, and prevention organizations such as D.A.R.E. America, Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), Californians for Drug Free Schools, and a variety of conservative antidrug groups, including the Drug Free America Foundation.

'Locking Horns'

Doug Marlowe, chief of science, policy and law at NADCP, was dismissive of the state treatment community's support for NORA. "There were some California providers in favor of NORA because they would have benefitted [financially] from it," said Marlowe.

Marlowe expressed concern, however, that the battle over NORA had driven a wedge between drug courts and treatment providers. "There is no drug court without treatment," Marlowe said. "To say that we are locking horns may be true, unfortunately, but it's not what we want."

"We are very clear that we are in favor of treatment and that drug courts are an alternative to incarceration," he added. "We're not a law-enforcement group, we're not a punishment group -- we are a treatment-support group."

NORA supporter John DeMiranda, executive director of the National Association on Alcohol, Drugs and Disability and Pacific Southwest regional representative for Faces and Voices of Recovery, said that the treatment community in California "jumped on the bandwagon and talked about NORA as a treatment initiative," even though DPA mainly cast Prop 5 as a drug-policy reform effort. Some California treatment providers were reluctant to back NORA, but DeMiranda contended that this had less to do with DPA's involvement than fear of bucking the criminal-justice programs that control their funding.

"If we were to do our own initiative it would be very different, and the politics would be very different," said DeMiranda. However, he scorned the state's drug courts for failing to embrace the reforms embodied in NORA. "We need wholesale decriminalization, not retail decriminalization," said DeMiranda, noting the relatively small number of clients currently served by drug courts.

For DPA, Tried-and-True Meant Go-it-Alone

Both DeMiranda and Marlowe said that DPA erred in not allowing the addiction field and drug courts greater involvement in drafting NORA, although DeMiranda said that the compromises that likely would have resulted -- such as allowing for more sanctions or removing language related to marijuana decriminalization -- probably would have cost DPA the financial backing needed to forward the measure.

"George Soros doesn't want to expand treatment -- he wants progressive reform," DeMiranda said.

Marlowe said that the "all or nothing" approach taken by DPA forced drug courts and others to choose sides rather than compromising. "As a result, groups that have shared interests couldn't come together," he said.

NADCP has a long list of concerns with NORA, but Marlowe said there were a number of areas of agreement, including the initiative's general philosophy of providing treatment rather than incarceration, greater emphasis on needs assessment, and added accountability for offenders compared to California's earlier attempt at shunting more offenders to treatment, Prop 36.

"Drug courts could have had common ground with [DPA], but it was too late," said Marlowe.

Building a broader coalition might have helped neutralize opposition to NORA, but Dooley-Sammuli pinned blame for NORA's overwhelming defeat largely on ballot language that emphasized the cost of Prop 5, combined with the economic collapse in October.

She said DPA based its go-alone strategy on a string of previous successes with ballot initiatives in other states, and added that while "we're not afraid to try to talk to folks," the group had felt burned by the experience of working with drug-court judges on a bill that modified Prop 36 -- and ultimately included jail sanctions opposed by DPA. "We made a good-faith effort, but in the end it was a case where consensus meant wanting us to agree with them," she said.

Post-NORA: Confronting California's Looming Budget Crisis

The defeat of NORA may have been seen as a victory by some in the prevention and drug court community, but few are celebrating the loss of potentially hundreds of millions of dollars in new state spending on treatment that would have been mandated by Prop 5.

Moreover, the treatment community is facing potentially catastrophic budget cuts as California grapples with a $28-billion budget shortfall, with continued treatment funding possibly hanging on legislative approval of an alcohol tax increase proposed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

DPA officials, members of the California treatment communities, and other NORA backers met on Dec. 3 to discuss the future of drug-policy reform efforts in the state.

"We are definitely open to compromise going forward," said NADCP's Marlowe, who said he was unaware of the meeting. "NORA did take some steps forward in terms of accountability and sanctions, but in our opinion erected too many barriers to applying them ... We are absolutely open to a conversation about shared interests and values with DPA."

"We'd love to have an amazing coming together of NORA opponents and supporters, but time is running out," responded Dooley-Sammuli. "I don't know how it's going to play out when we're looking at dramatic budget cuts in the next few months."

DeMiranda expressed a similar hope for cooperation around the state budget issue but also said that California's treatment and recovery movement needs to find it own voice on drug-policy reform issues, such as by pushing forward its own "people-powered" treatment-funding ballot initiative in 2010.

In the wake of the NORA defeat, "It's no longer possible for [the treatment and recovery community] to piggyback on public sentiment," said DeMiranda. "We have to get our people to the ballot box so it's not so easy ... to demonize this kind of initiative."
http://www.jointogether.org/news/features/2008/califs-prop-5-battle.html?print=t

Posted by lois at 01:54 PM | Comments (0)

December 06, 2008

Fiscal Cost Forcasting for Criminal Sentencing

Sentencing laws needn’t drain us
By Rachel E. Barkow and Joshua J. Libling |
Saturday, December 6, 2008 Op-Ed

Massachusetts, like most states around the country, is in fiscal crisis. Gov. Deval Patrick announced more than $1 billion in midyear spending reductions last month. At the same time, the prison system is bursting at its seams: Almost 12,000 state prisoners are living in space built for fewer than 8,000, and the prison commissioner has announced that prisoners in maximum-security facilities may have to double-bunk.

Studies show that putting inmates in such close quarters increases violence. But this policy is flawed for an even more fundamental reason: A patchwork solution like double-bunking fails to offer a long-term, fiscally responsible approach to criminal justice. Despite stable crime rates, the prison population is rising, and unless some sentencing laws are reconsidered, overcrowding is not going away.

Simply building more prisons isn’t a feasible solution. An across-the-board release of prisoners or lowering of sentences is obviously unappealing. But the combination of the state budgetary and prison overcrowding crises offers Massachusetts an opportunity to become smarter in its sentencing policy and to adopt the best solution: using fiscal-cost forecasting for criminal sentencing.

Fiscal cost forecasting makes sentencing policy more rational in the real world of limited resources. Minnesota’s sentencing commission has developed computer models to predict the impact in terms of dollars and prison population of all changes to the state’s laws affecting criminal sentences. This early-warning system has empowered - indeed, forced - officials there to consider the costs of sentencing proposals prior to enacting them, which has allowed that state to avoid the prison overcrowding that has plagued Massachusetts.

Minnesota’s system is so successful that virtually every state with a sentencing commission has followed suit, including Washington, North Carolina, Virginia and Alabama. Washington alone has saved $45 million per year as a result. Indeed, these cost projections are so successful that the American Bar Association has included cost forecasts as an integral part of its proposed model law of sentencing.

Massachusetts has a sentencing commission, but the Legislature hasn’t adopted the guidelines the commission suggested years ago. Nor has the Legislature paid any attention to cost estimates produced by the commission or any other group. But ignoring these costs leads to a situation like the one Massachusetts is in right now: Too many prisoners, not enough beds and not enough money. No aspect of state policymaking should be immune from a rational consideration of costs and benefits, and that includes criminal justice.

Significantly, fiscal cost forecasting doesn’t dictate higher or lower sentences. Sometimes states raise sentences in light of cost data, knowing that they have the resources to afford the financial outlay. Other times, states lower sentences for some crimes (particularly nonviolent crimes) in order to reserve space for violent crimes and achieve the same overall reduction in crime, but at a lesser cost.

Cost data allow more informed, more efficient and more rational use of resources. When $1 billion is being cut from the Bay State budget and violent felons are sharing bunk space, getting more bang for the prison buck makes common sense.

Rachel E. Barkow is Beneficial Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, and director of the Center on the Administration of Criminal Law at New York University School of Law. Joshua J. Libling is a fellow at the center.
Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/opinion/op_ed/view.bg?articleid=1137094

Posted by lois at 09:18 PM | Comments (0)

December 04, 2008

MA: Want to know the real reason the law-and-order set backs mandatory-minimum sentencing? They get their pockets lined by the 'prison-industrial complex.'

Freedom watch: Jailhouse bloc
Want to know the real reason the law-and-order set backs mandatory-minimum sentencing? They get their pockets lined by the 'prison-industrial complex.'
By HARVEY SILVERGLATE AND KYLE SMEALLIE | December 3, 2008

With aromatic puffs of change, Bay State stoners rejoiced on Election Day. But even the haziest of revelers may have missed the full significance of Question 2, a statewide ballot initiative to decriminalize marijuana possession in small amounts. Not only will this bring more humane and responsible marijuana laws, it will also suppress — however slightly — an insidious, contemporary offshoot of what President Dwight Eisenhower famously referred to as the "military-industrial complex": the idea that if private industry and government joined in promoting ever-increasing defense spending, war as well as national bankruptcy were more likely.

Almost a half-century later, that mindset has extended to both the local and federal law-and-order sectors, which have argued for, and experienced, virtually unabated growth. Today, law-enforcement groups regularly lobby against criminal-punishment reforms, and for the creation of new criminal statutes and overly harsh prison sentences. While these efforts are cloaked as calls for public safety, they are essentially creating more business for themselves.

The problem has become so widespread that some private correctional corporations — companies that subcontract services, and even privately owned jails and prisons, to all levels of government — have even lobbied the government to enact and maintain ever broader criminal laws and higher sentences. Those private prisons are now rolling in the profit, and taking on more prisoners every day as federal and state prisons run out of room to house their inmates.

But these lobbyists' success — and that of various law-enforcement groups — has given rise to a veritable "prison-industrial complex" that not only uses fear to suppress these groups' true intentions — it leaves taxpayers footing the bill.

Bleak house of detention
It was with these self-aggrandizing interests in mind that the Massachusetts Districts Attorneys' Association (MDAA) and other tough-on-crime groups fiercelyopposedthe marijuana-decriminalization referendum.

After all, if the penalties for minor marijuana possession were to remain on the statute books, more police, prosecutors, prison guards, and parole officers — and their lucrative overtime — would also be retained.

To their dismay, however, Question 2 passed by an overwhelming 65 to 35 percent voter margin, and will be implemented 30 days after election results are certified. As a result, many law-enforcement officials may soon be without an important source of job security and additional revenue — namely, the $30 million a year (as one study by a Harvard economics professor estimated) spent enforcing the soon-to-be-history current marijuana-possession laws.

Never mind that the forthcoming statutory reform is, from even a moderate law-and-order perspective, relatively benign. According to Question 2, anyone caught with less than one ounce will forfeit the substance and pay a $100 fine, while minors will additionally have to complete a drug-awareness program (including group sessions and community service). Current penalties for growing and trafficking in marijuana, as well as the prohibition against driving while high, will remain exactly as they are.

These facts were conveniently left out of the MDAA's efforts to "inform" voters.The group could not legally make direct contributions to ballot campaigns — publicly funded groups are unable to do so, thanks to a 1978 Supreme Judicial Court decision — yet in opposing Question 2, it still managed to fuel a whisper campaign and add misleading info to its Web site (hosted, by the way, on the state's ".gov" domain).

Thus, these law-enforcement officials were able to avoid any technical wrongdoing while lobbying for an increased legislative arsenal — feathering their own nests at the expense of liberty and sensible public policy.

Bear in mind, though, that our First Amendment protects not only speech, but also "the right of the people . . . to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." So state and local law-enforcement personnel, like other citizens, do have the right to lobby voters and even members of the legislature to promote more expansive criminal laws and stricter penalties. But self-serving lobbying and public-relations offensives, disguised as seeking protections for society, should be treated with exceptional scrutiny and skepticism.

Though disheartening, their actions are an age-old fact of life best described by Charles Dickens in his classic 1853 novel Bleak House: "The one great principle of the English law is to make business for itself."

Coke vs. crack
A similar battle waged in Massachusetts last summer, when law-enforcement groups sought once again to thwart criminal-justice reform. At the time, a legislative effort to help nonviolent offenders find employment opportunities by changing Criminal Offender Record Information (CORI) laws was brought before the State House of Representatives — and, thanks to the efforts of state Attorney General Martha Coakley and other law-enforcement officials, essentially squashed.

The proposed bill would have restricted the type of personal information that some employers receive, thereby assisting the many individuals saddled with CORI records who struggle to find employment and end up back behind bars.

Massachusetts's recidivism rates are nearly 40 percent, according to a study by the Urban Institute Justice Policy Center. And the CORI law's branding of even the most innocuous offender is, by all accounts, partly responsible for this dismal situation. So advocates of the bill asserted that changing CORI could ease the massive overcrowding at the state's prison system, which the Department of Corrections recently estimated to be operating at "144 percent of capacity." (Currently, there are 12,000 inmates imprisoned — a disgraceful state record.)

Another aspect of that same failed bill would have reduced mandatory-minimum sentences for certain drug offenses, which advocates said also contribute to overcrowding.

As the law stands, anyone convicted of selling drugs within 1000 feet of a school zone automatically receives a two-year prison term — leaving no room for judicial discretion. That means a first-time offender with no record could receive more prison time than, say, an armed robber. And the mandatory nature of these sentences eliminates the possibility of parole.

Because of the numerous schools in dense urban areas, poor, black, and Hispanic populations are at a greater risk of facing the mandatory-minimum measures, according to a recent Prison Policy Initiative study.

Yet despite the clear inequalities in the current law, as well as the benefits that reform holds out to both taxpayers and public safety — not to mention liberty — the legislative term ended in July with no action taken on the reform legislation.

This problem with drug sentencing is nothing new. For more than two decades, prison-reform supporters have condemned the federal sentencing disparities for the mostly middle and upper-class defendants caught using cocaine, and the mostly lower-class, inner-city habitants caught with cheaper crack cocaine.

Part of the now-infamous war on crime, a 100-to-1 ratio was implemented in sentencing for crack cocaine. So, a person caught selling five grams of crack received the same prison sentence as someone dealing 500 grams of powder cocaine.

The mandatory-minimums were harsh, too. That same person caught selling five grams of crack received a five-year minimum sentence; 50 grams or more and the minimum was 10 years.

Despite clear racial, economic, and cultural disparities, cries from constituents fell on deaf ears while law-enforcement lobbyists successfully cajoled and frightened congressional leaders.

US Attorney General Michael Mukasey, for one, strongly opposed reducing the crack-cocaine minimums. The Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), a 325,000 member national organization that bills itself as "the voice of our nations' law-enforcement officers," also spent $550,000 lobbying Congress over the past three years. Among their interests: stopping the Powder-Crack Cocaine Penalty Equalization Act, along with promoting a litany of other Draconian measures.

Prison business
To be fair, government employees weren't the only ones to lobby against crack-cocaine sentence equalization. A little-recognized subset of this vast prison-industrial complex lobbying community is composed of private correctional corporations, which sign lucrative contracts with governments to house inmates for profit, often shipping them to facilities out of state.

It is, of course, in these private prisons' economic interests to see more people in prison serving longer sentences. And with current facilities bursting at the seams, times for this burgeoning industry are good. The country's largest private prison provider, the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), spent more than $2.7 million from 2006 through September 2008 on lobbying for stricter laws. Last year alone, the company, listed on the New York Stock Exchange, generated $133 million in net income.

For the past 25 years, the CCA has built itself into a corrections powerhouse — it operates nearly 70 facilities housing more than 75,000 detainees. As it does for, say, contractors in Iraq, though, privatization comes with an inevitable lack of oversight. The CCA has been involved in numerous wrongful-death lawsuits, and it has been a constant target of prison-reform groups who claim the private facilities are understaffed and their detainees abused.

Yet another private prison provider, the GEO Group, which has annual revenue topping $1 billion, has come under intense scrutiny for dozens — if not hundreds — of inmate deaths in the past decade. One such prisoner death led to the recent indictment of Vice-President Dick Cheney on November 18, in which a rather ornery Texas state prosecutor claimed that Cheney's substantial investments in the GEO Group made him partly responsible for prisoner abuse — a dubious prosecutorial theory (in fact, it was dismissed this Monday), but with a grain of practical truth.

Nonetheless, states facing prison overcrowding turn to these corporations to outsource inmates. California, for example, has commissioned the CCA to ship convicts as far away as Tennessee (where financially strapped relatives and friends frequently cannot visit). The CCA has exported nearly 4000 California prisoners to states across the country under a $115 million contract with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Over the next three years, 8000 more are planned to be shipped out of the Golden State.

The societal costs — both human and financial — of these policies and practices are enormous, and growing. California — which carried a $15.2 billion deficit into this fiscal year — spends $10 billion per year on more than 170,000 inmates. Like the Bay State, California also faces high recidivism rates; state records show that more than two-thirds of released inmates return to prison within three years. In this context, a ballot battle — possibly more contentious than Massachusetts's Question 2 scuffle — raged this past election season. Two separate initiatives, each from vastly different perspectives, concerned the state's approach to criminal justice.

The first, Proposition 5, would have expanded treatment programs for those convicted of drug-related and nonviolent crimes. While the costs for more rehabilitation were estimated at $1 billion a year, analysts said $2.5 billion would have been saved from the reduction in prison costs. But, much like what transpired in Massachusetts, the California District Attorney's Association, along with other law-enforcement agencies, vehemently opposed the initiative. These agencies raised nearly $400,000 and, through the Web site of their umbrella group, People Against Proposition 5, issued "facts" such as "Proposition 5 creates an 'Express Lane' for drug dealers to get back on the streets and peddling dope to our kids."

Conversely, nearly $1 billion would have been added to the cops' coffers under Proposition 6, which proposed new laws for prosecutors to fight gang activity. Many of the same law-enforcement agencies that opposed Prop 5 supported Prop 6, joined by some "tough-on-crime" lawmakers who slashed $3 billion in education from the state's 2008 budget. Included among the Prop 6 supporters was — you guessed it — the CCA.

The CCA's lobbying efforts, as well as those of publicly funded law-enforcement agents, wasn't enough to convince Californians, as nearly 70 percent of voters opposed Prop 6. Yet similarly high numbers opted against Prop 5.

Maybe the cops' Prop 6 push for more crime-fighting money and power were too transparent for voters. Interestingly, though, their appeals to public safety in opposing Prop 5 seemed to work. California voters were quite possibly unaware that, by maintaining strict criminal laws and closing off alternatives to incarceration, law-enforcement agencies maintained their strength.

The 1 percent solution?
From Niccolò Machiavelli to Rudy Giuliani, fear has been the foundation of ever-expanding political power (and, for some, job status and security). And it continues to drive the prison-industrial complex.

Just as the United States Department of Justice was able to pressure Congress to enact the infamous USA-Patriot Act in the immediate aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, here in the Bay State, an appeal to fear ("protect the children") prevailed in stampeding the legislature. In late July, Governor Deval Patrick signed into law "An Act Further Protecting Children," a bill providing stricter mandatory-minimum sentences for sex offenders who target children.

The way this legislation was presented made opposition appear callous and irresponsible. Who, after all, wouldn't want to keep child predators off the streets?

Yet tucked away in this bill are provisions that do far more than simply protect the young. The proposal enables prosecutors to obtain private records from Internet and telephone providers by issuing an "administrative subpoena." Prosecutors, having only to assert that records are "relevant and material to an ongoing criminal investigation," were granted ever-expanding access into otherwise personal data. The telecoms, in turn, were granted blanket immunity from claims of privacy violation. There was no mass protest from the customers.

But at least one person did object. Newton's Democratic state senator Cynthia Creem voiced skepticism in a July 29 Newton TAB op-ed. Mindful that the most egregious provisions of the Patriot Act have been used to target not just terrorists but journalists, activists, and Muslim charities, she wrote: "I cannot support this attack on privacy rights when less-invasive and equally effective means are available. Our liberties should never be sacrificed in the name of prosecutorial convenience." A few other scattered voices in the State Senate echoed Creem. But perhaps Creem's reference to "convenience" missed the point — prosecutorial power appears to have been the more likely goal.

When the bill was passed by the Massachusetts House and presented to the Senate, Coakley, having learned that other politicians were questioning the bill's scope, lobbied hard so that no language would be changed (which would have required passage again through the House). With robust MDAA support, as well as the backing of key legislative leaders, 11 different role-call votes for amending provisions of the bill were voted down. Less than two weeks after this truncated debate, the bill became law. Experienced observers of the legislative process marveled at the ability of Coakley and her allies to forestall changes to the legislation.

The United States — "land of the free" — has five percent of the world's population, but it also, thanks to the lobbyists and officiants behind the prison-industrial complex, shamefully holds 25 percent of the world's incarcerated. It has a higher rate of imprisonment than the planet's most notorious despotisms. One in 100 Americans is in jail.

These citizens are not only unproductive, they cost the public $45 billion a year, according to a June report by the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics. And yet they also keep a small army of officers and other law-enforcement support personnel on the job. The monumental taxpayer's tab that would be unnecessary with saner criminal-justice laws is virtually incalculable.

It is long past the time to re-think how much credence we should give to those who claim to be experts in law enforcement, but who, in reality, have simply discovered a steady and ever-increasing source of job security.
Topics

Their First Amendment right to lobby for endless new criminal laws and ever-tougher prison sentences is indeed constitutionally protected, but this does not mean that these law-enforcement officials' criminal "expertise" should endow them with a free pass from critical scrutiny. Legislators and the public need not sit by idly as their fellow citizens are unjustly arrested, prosecuted, and often incarcerated for increasingly lengthy periods of time as the law-enforcement industry's wallet grows fat. The next time prison-industrial-complex adherents tell us we need tougher laws and sentences for our own good, we should point out precisely whose good is being served.

Harvey Silverglate is a criminal defense and civil-liberties lawyer and writer. Kyle Smeallie, former associate editor of the Boston College Heights, is Silverglate's research assistant and paralegal. Silverglate's next book, Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent, is forthcoming next year from Encounter Books.
http://thephoenix.com/Boston/News/73092-Freedom-watch-Jailhouse-bloc/

Posted by lois at 09:46 AM | Comments (0)

December 02, 2008

NY: A new tack on drug policy could save the state billions

A new tack on drug policy could save the state billions
Posted by The Readers' Page
November 30, 2008 5:00AM

By Gabriel Sayegh

While New York reels from the most severe budget crisis since the Great Depression, Gov. David Paterson and the Legislature are scrambling to close ever-expanding deficits. So let's stop spending over $500 million every year on ineffective, wasteful policies like the Rockefeller Drug Laws.

These laws represent a misguided and ineffective regime for addressing drug use and addiction -- health issues, not criminal issues. Imagine if we incarcerated people for being addicted to cigarettes, or for having diabetes.

Passed in 1973, the laws mandate harsh, mandatory-minimum prison terms for even low-level drug offenses; people convicted of first- and second-time drug offenses often receive eight to 20 years. There are shocking, inexcusable racial disparities -- more than 90 percent of the people incarcerated are black or Latino, though whites use and sell illegal drugs at equal or higher rates.

These laws did not stop the crack epidemic of the 1980s. They are completely incapable of stemming the accidental drug overdose epidemic hitting New York City and Long Island today. And they have turned the Department of Corrections into the state's largest, most costly and ineffective treatment provider.

The state spends hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars every year on policies that both criminal justice and public health experts -- as well as the majority of New Yorkers, according to the polls -- say don't work. It costs over $35,000 a year to keep someone in prison. Factor in policing and court costs, and that number rises to nearly $50,000.

Lawmakers, do the math: There are nearly 14,000 people incarcerated under these laws. Meanwhile, spending on community-based drug treatment is pitifully low, and is facing cuts in this economic crisis.

Recent DOC figures show the slight reforms made to the Rockefeller Drug Laws in 2004 and 2005 saved the state at least $90 million. That doesn't include additional savings from related parole reforms. Meanwhile, crime in the state has gone down.

Conservative estimates of savings from Rockefeller Drug Law repeal are around half-a-billion dollars -- much higher once court and policing costs are factored in.

With crisis comes opportunity. A governor who as Senate minority leader engaged in civil disobedience to protest the failed Rockefeller Drug Laws could promote a smarter, more effective, cost-efficient approach: Re-invest a portion of the savings from repeal in prevention, community treatment, harm reduction, alternative-to-incarceration programs and related services. The state would still save hundreds of millions in the short term, billions over the long term, and we could finally stop trying to incarcerate our way out of this problem.

This process is already under way. Earlier this year, the six Assembly committees held historic joint hearings to begin outlining a public health approach to drug policy. Experts explained New York had the required programs and services largely in place -- only appropriate funding is needed.

The governor should follow President-elect Barack Obama's fiscal advice: Cut what doesn't work, keep what does. Given the abysmal failure of the "war on drugs," a public-health approach is both long overdue and fiscally prudent.

Gabriel Sayegh is a policy director at the Drug Policy Alliance, based in Washington, D.C.
http://blog.syracuse.com/opinion/2008/11/a_new_tack_on_drug_policy_coul.
html

Posted by lois at 04:29 PM | Comments (0)

November 23, 2008

OK: Audit: State’s prisons crowded, underfunded

Audit: State’s prisons crowded, underfunded
November 23, 2008
Muskogee Phoeniz
— TAFT — Velita Nash says she does not have a drug or alcohol problem.
“I have a problem shoplifting clothing,” she said. “I steal clothes from a retailer.”
Nash, 40, of Lawton, is serving five years in prison and “five years on paper” — five years suspended. Nash has been a “Level 4,” the highest possible rating, at Dr. Eddie Warrior Correctional Center since April. She has completed available programs and education. Her conduct has remained good, supervisors said.
The Pardon and Parole Board issued her a parole certificate last month and recommended she be paroled Dec. 1, after one-third of her five-year prison sentence has been served.

“Parole is a slow progress,” Nash said. “I’m a nonviolent offender — there are so many nonviolent offenders incarcerated.”
Nonviolent inmates accounted for 51.8 percent of the inmates incarcerated in Oklahoma on Aug. 29, 2008, DOC spokesman Jerry Massie said.
Oklahoma prison facilities are overcrowded, underfunded and undermanned, according to the latest Department of Corrections Performance Audit.
The state’s prison population has been estimated to go from 25,416 to 26,316 in fiscal year 2008. By fiscal year 2016, that total is estimated to be 28,872, according to the Oklahoma Criminal Justice Research Center.
Overcrowding is one of the biggest problems facing the state prison system, Massie said.
“Our incarceration rate is fourth in the country,” he said.
And more prisoners are on the way, according to a DOC performance audit for fiscal year 2007.
State prisoners awaiting transfer to DOC can be 1,300 on any day, the audit states. Muskogee County/City Detention Facility usually has between 45 to 50 inmates awaiting transport to DOC, said Ida Thompson, jail administrator.
The audit also states Oklahoma’s rate of female incarceration is the highest in the nation.
Nonviolent inmates are one of several concerns facing the state’s prison system, including undermanned facilities.
At Jess Dunn Correctional Center, 10 miles from Muskogee, there was one officer on duty recently for every 81 inmates, said spokeswoman Cheryl Bryant.
The facility has 84 employees but is funded to fill 106 positions. DOC has established a budgetary policy of filling 82 percent of authorized staffing levels, according to its latest performance audit report.
“We (Oklahoma prisons) are at 98.21 percent capacity,” Massie said. “Ninety-five percent or below is what you should be for management flexibility. Some people can’t be in the same cell together.”
Prison facilities that weren’t built to be prisons and how well they are retrofitted as correctional centers is of concern to the state legislature, Massie said.
Whether DOC should build some new facilities or look toward more private prisons — “that will be the debate,” Massie said.
There are at least six private prisons in the state, three of which DOC contracts with, he said. The other private prisons contract for out-of-state prisoners because they can get more revenue from other states, Massie said.
Massie said the state lost access to one private prison for that reason.
The audit shows in 2006, private prisons in the state had exactly twice the percentage of serious incidents per 1,000 inmates as that of public prisons.
Sentencing guidelines also have an impact on overcrowding prisons.
DOC statistics also show that in December 2000, 53 inmates were serving sentences for which they had to serve 85 percent of that sentence. Regardless of their progress, the law does not allow for an early parole for those inmates.
In April 2007, 3,671 state inmates were serving sentences for 85 percent crimes. The longer sentences are part of the reason for the overcrowding, experts agree. There are now 19 crimes that carry a penalty of serving 85 percent of a sentence, officials said.
The MGT performance audit found “virtually all” of the projected growth in the number of inmates “is a consequence of longer periods of imprisonment associated with the 85 percent sentence laws, accompanied by a very low parole grant rate.”
The percentage of inmates eligible for parole or commutation who were released from prison in 1991 was 40.8 percent. In 2006, the number was 18.9 percent. There has been a 39 percent drop since 2003 and a 54 percent drop since 1991, according to DOC.

Parole decision doesn’t mean immediate release
A Pardon and Parole Board recommendation for parole doesn’t necessarily mean an inmate will be paroled.
The number of paroles or commutations signed by the governor has fallen from 2,868 in 2001 to 846 in 2006, a 71 percent drop, according to DOC records.
There is a backlog because of overcrowding throughout the system.
But because of overcrowding, Nash can’t move to a halfway house and prepare further for re-entry into society.
Nash completed a program at Eddie Warrior called “Boundaries” and says she’s learned to set boundaries for herself.
She plans to move to Oklahoma City if she can get paroled, instead of returning to Lawton, where she said it would be harder for her to stay in boundaries she sets “and make the right decisions.”
She’s a good cook and hopes to take training in culinary arts and get a job as a cook.
It’s hard for her to understand if the DOC budget is so stretched why the governor doesn’t parole more people recommended for parole.
Nash said she knows he is a very busy man and has to study parole recommendations in addition to his other duties. But the delay is costing the state, she said.

Oklahoma Constitution impedes parole process
Paul Sund, spokesman for Gov. Brad Henry, agrees he’s the only governor in the nation who has to sign every parole.
The performance audit recommended removing the governor from the parole process. But, there’s a hitch.
The governor’s personally signing off on each parole “is in the Oklahoma Constitution,” Sund said. “Our Constitution says the governor has the final word on parole.”
Reading each probation file is very time consuming, so Sund says the governor can see both sides of the issue.
Victims of crime enjoy one more set of eyes before someone is released to the streets, Sund said.
“The bottom line — the people will decide this issue (in a statewide vote),” he said.
After the Pardon and Parole Board recommends a parole, all information on a parolee application has to be verified, including where they would live and where they would work, Then the governor assigns an attorney to review the file and make a recommendation. Then the governor goes through the file.
Sometimes its months and months before the review process is over and it’s in the governor’s office, he said.
“We get several hundred every month,” Sund said. “Some have expressed frustration how long it takes.”
But the governor wants to be right, he said.
“It’s a public safety issue,” Sund said.

Costly incarceration
Cost of incarceration in FY 2007 for state inmates according to the security ranking of each facility — per inmate:
• Maximum — $69.23 daily and $25,270 annually.
• Medium — $56.02 daily and $20,447 annually.
• Minimum — $51.99 daily and $18,976 annually (includes Jess Dunn and Eddie Warrior).
• Community — $53.79 daily and $19,634 annually (includes one facility in Muskogee).
• Work Centers — $40.64 daily and $14,835 annually.
DOC’s FY 2009 appropriated budget is $503,000,000.
Source: Oklahoma Department of Corrections.

On the web
An Oklahoma Department of Corrections performance audit for 2007, authorized by the Legislative Service Bureau of the Oklahoma Legislature, can be found on the DOC Web site.
http://www.muskogeephoenix.com/local/local_story_328001407.html/resources_printstory

Posted by lois at 02:55 PM | Comments (0)

MA: "Reform is Needed" letter by Barbara Dougan of FAMM

Letters to the Editor - The Boston Globe
Reform is needed
November 23, 2008

"PRISON TO double-bunk inmates" highlights the urgent need for sentencing reform in Massachusetts. Our prisons are bursting, due in large part to costly and inflexible mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses. Almost 17 percent of state prisoners are serving a mandatory sentence, a 32 percent increase over the past 10 years. Many are serving these harsh sentences for first-time, nonviolent offenses. These prisoners are also ineligible for parole or participation in work-release programs, which are key tools to relieve prison overcrowding.

Massachusetts currently spends, on average, about $48,000 per year on each state prisoner. Building new prisons is costly too - about $1 million for each new prison bed. Repealing mandatory minimums for drug offenders would lead to significant savings of taxpayer dollars.

Harold Clarke, commissioner of the Department of Correction, is correct to say that costly prison space should be for those who pose a public safety risk, not for those needing drug treatment or for low-level offenders. The coming legislative session offers the Commonwealth an opportunity to save money by adopting sensible sentencing reform.

Barbara J. Dougan
Newton
The writer is Massachusetts project director with Families Against Mandatory Minimums.

Posted by lois at 02:42 PM | Comments (0)

November 18, 2008

KY: Study Blames Repeat "Offender" Law for Overcrowded Prisons

Study blames Ky. law for overcrowded prisons
November 17, 2008 @ 07:30 PM
2008/The Herald-Dispatch

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Kentucky’s repeat offender law shoulders much of the blame for overcrowded prisons, according to a new study by the man who wrote the state’s penal code.

The report by University of Kentucky professor Robert Lawson called the state’s repeat offender law “draconian” because, unlike in most other states, it is not limited to violent or serious crimes.

He said the law originally was reserved for the worst criminals, but legislators have extended it so much over the years that it has “pushed the state’s corrections budget off the charts.”

Earlier this year, lawmakers authorized releasing some prison inmates early as a cost-saving measure aimed at relieving some of the mounting financial pressure Kentucky’s prison system is putting on an already cash-strapped budget.

The study comes as a state panel on sentencing reform is considering the issue and will make recommendations to the Kentucky Criminal Justice Council, which will report to Gov. Steve Beshear.

The panel’s chairman, Deputy Justice Secretary Charles Geveden, said it will vote to recommend eliminating the part of the law that provides enhanced sentences for offenders with only one previous felony conviction.

Panel member and public defender Ed Monahan said he would propose limiting the law to violent offenders.

The president of the Kentucky Association of Commonwealth’s Attorneys, prosecutor Chris Cohron, told The Courier-Journal for a story published Monday that his group is opposed to limiting the law to serious or violent offenders. Cohron says offenders who repeat crimes should have additional penalties.

Geveden said it will be difficult to get lawmakers to change the law because they “don’t want to be perceived as soft on crime.”

State Rep. Kathy Stein, D-Lexington, who has been chairwoman of the House Judiciary Committee, said she expects a “full frontal assault” from prosecutors.

In a rebuttal to Lawson’s report, Fayette County prosecutor Ray Larson said 20 persistent felons cited in the study had been convicted of more than 300 felonies and misdemeanors. He said the 3,200 persistent felons his office prosecuted in the 12 years ending in 2007 were convicted of 45,000 felonies and misdemeanors.

“The average citizen wants to be protected from these predatory repeat criminals,” Larson said.

Attorney General Jack Conway said he is willing to “listen and to talk about what offenses ought to trigger the PFO laws.”

But he says a more effective way to slow the growing prison population is to refer nonviolent drug offenders for treatment and to set a sliding scale of sentences for theft offenses.

“You shouldn’t be punished the same for stealing $500 as embezzling a half-million,” he said.
http://www.herald-dispatch.com/news/briefs/x2077109477/Study-blames-Ky-law-for-overcrowded-prisons

Posted by lois at 10:14 AM | Comments (0)

November 16, 2008

MA: Prisoners to be double bunked due to sentencing/war on drugs

Prison to double-bunk inmates
Sentencing changes urged to ease overcrowding in system
Boston Globe
By Jonathan Saltzman, Globe Staff | November 16, 2008

MILFORD - The number of inmates in Massachusetts prisons is projected to reach about 12,000 next year for the first time, prompting the head of the prison system to call for sentencing changes that ease overcrowding and to proceed with a controversial plan to double-bunk inmates at a maximum-security facility.

About two weeks short of his one-year anniversary as commissioner of the Department of Correction, Harold W. Clarke said last week that he hopes Governor Deval Patrick reintroduces legislation to reform "mandatory minimum" sentences, which Clarke said have led to a surge in inmates, many with no history of violence.

"We've been really concerned with mandatory sentencing laws," Clarke, 57, said at the department's headquarters here. "We don't want people backed up in prison that are not posing a risk to the community at large."

On Nov. 3, the state's 18 prisons held 11,380 inmates, putting them at 44 percent above capacity, Clarke said. The number is projected to grow by 5 to 7 percent next year, which would put the population at between 11,949 and 12,176.

The prison population declined steadily from 10,990 in 1999 to 9,825 in 2005, but it has surged since then, according to department statistics. The totals include convicted offenders, people awaiting trial, and individuals committed involuntarily - even though they have finished their sentences - because they still pose a danger, such as some sex offenders.

With crime rates remaining relatively stable, Clarke said, the main reason for the surge is mandatory-minimum sentences passed by Massachusetts since the 1980s. Many of the laws were approved as part of a harsh nationwide crackdown on drug offenses, but a growing number of judges, defense lawyers, prison administrators, and advocates for prisoners say they often do more harm than good.

As of Sept. 22, about 1,917 inmates were serving a mandatory minimum sentence for a drug offense, said Diane Wiffin, a prison system spokeswoman. Those inmates are ineligible for parole and are forbidden from participating in work-release programs or halfway houses that could ease overcrowding.

Patrick filed legislation last year that would have let drug offenders serving mandatory minimum sentences participate in work-release programs, but the bill did not win passage. He has refiled it for the new legislative session. The Patrick administration is also scheduled to complete a master plan in December that will discuss construction projects that could relieve overcrowding, said a spokesman for the governor.

In the meantime, Clarke is moving forward with a plan to double-bunk some inmates at a maximum-security prison. As early as year's end, he said, he plans to move 400 inmates from maximum-security MCI-Cedar Junction at Walpole to Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center in Shirley.

Each of the 400 inmates would share a cell with another prisoner at Souza-Baranowski, which has 1,028 inmates. Cedar Junction would become a medium-security prison that takes in new inmates until they are classified, a role currently played by MCI-Concord. And Old Colony Correctional Center, a medium- and minimum-security prison in Bridgewater, would mostly house inmates with diagnoses of mental illness.

The plan to put two inmates in a cell at the 10-year-old Souza-Baranowski has drawn fire from prisoner rights activists and the union that represents correction officers.

Leslie Walker, executive director of Massachusetts Correctional Legal Services, said that double-bunking at Souza-Baranowski - where prisoners spend scant time outside their cells - would probably lead to violence.

"You're taking two prisoners that the department has deemed of maximum-security dangerousness and you're locking them together in a cell for over 20 hours a day," she said. "I think it's a very risky measure that should be taken only in desperation."

Her comments reflect a rare agreement with Steve Kenneway, the president of the Massachusetts Correction Officers Federated Union. He told the Globe last month that putting two inmates in the same cell would provoke fights, stabbings, and killings.

"There are some inmates out there who are going to make a choice whether to accept a roommate or kill their roommate," he said. "That's not an exaggeration."

But Clarke, who headed the prison systems of Nebraska and then Washington State before Patrick appointed him last November, said prisoners already share cells or dorms in the state's 16 medium- and minimum-security prisons. He said many other states double-bunk prisoners, as does the federal Bureau of Prisons. And Souza-Baranowski cells were originally designed to house two inmates, he said.

"We don't have many options - one, releasing offenders, and two, building more capacity - and I'm not sure that either of those are now palatable," he said.

In another matter, Clarke and Walker said in separate interviews that they hoped a federal suit filed last year by the Disability Law Center against the Department of Correction over treatment of mentally ill inmates will be settled soon.

The center, a nonprofit advocacy group that provides legal help for the disabled, alleged in a March 2007 suit that hundreds of seriously mentally ill prisoners were held in cells 23 hours a day in inhumane conditions, leading to self-mutilation, the swallowing of razor blades, and at least seven suicides since November 2004. The group, which has been assisted by Walker's organization, urged the creation of special treatment units similar to those in at least six other states.

Clarke said last week that settlement talks have been under way for a year and that soon "we're hoping to be able to say, 'We don't have to go to court, we can avoid litigation,' which I'm certain will serve all parties best," he said.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2008/11/16/prison_to_double_bunk_inmates?mode=PF

Posted by lois at 10:30 AM | Comments (0)

November 10, 2008

California Youth Defeat ‘Lock ‘em Up’ Politics -Prop 6

New America Media, Commentary, Raj Jayadev //
Posted: Nov 08, 2008 Review it on NewsTrust

Eclipsed by the enormity of a nation voting in a black President, and a statewide cultural war over gay marriage, is that fact that California registered one the most dramatic and significant shifts in attitude over incarceration policies in state history this past election.

The quintessential “tough on crime” initiative, Proposition 6, was overwhelmingly rejected by voters across the state, a count of 70 percent to 30 percent, and did not win a majority in a single county. With little news coverage, and no commercials on either side leading up to the election, the trouncing of Prop. 6 was a near unadulterated reflection of California's new mind-set on criminal justice policies. The numbers point to a repudiation of “lock 'em all up” politics that has dominated the state for decades.

Prop. 6 was an ambitious, catch-all initiative that targeted youth, immigrants, and even families of those who had been involved in the criminal justice system. The proposition would have created more than 30 changes in the law. It would have turned some nonviolent misdemeanors into felonies, dramatically increased prison sentences for "gang-related" crimes, put 14-year-olds in the adult system, mandated regular criminal background checks on families in public housing with aims of removal, and denied bail to undocumented immigrants facing certain felony charges. It would have cost an estimated $965 million to fund annually.

But as far-reaching, perhaps even arrogant, of an attempt Prop. 6 was to balloon incarceration rates, proponents knew they were facing good odds given the track record of previous tough on crime proposals. The three strikes law, that doubles sentences for second offenses, and gives life on their third, was passed by voters in 1994 with numbers inversely mirroring the Prop. 6 results (72 percent in favor), and has withstood repeated legal and legislative attempts to be removed. Prop. 21 passed in 2000 despite the birth of a California youth movement that fought tooth and nail to defeat it. That proposition further cemented anti-gang laws and lowered the age for minors to be convicted and sentenced as adults. It won with the approval of more than 60 percent of voters.

Ironically, though, it may have been the consequences of these tough on crime laws that caused voters to depart from their previous voting pattern.

California, upon the governor's orders, is in a Prison Overcrowding State of Emergency. The legislature was forced to authorize $7.7 billion to create more beds at state prisons over the next 10 years. According to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, the state's prison population is more than 170,000 inmates housed in facilities designed for 100,000.

Proponents of tough crime laws typically extol their proposals by arguing that they would "take more criminals off the street," but, more accurately, they just put more people in prison – to a point well beyond the state’s infrastructure capacity and budget.

Any policy that would increase prison rates, given the current crisis, would seem irrational. And with the financial crisis facing California, plus the $8 billion for prisons we still need to come up with, any proposition with a billion dollar price tag was going to be a hard sell -- whether it was beds for prisons, or even books for kids.

But outside of the fiscal argument against Prop. 6, California has been witness to the devastating impact of tough on crime laws on communities of color. Statewide, roughly 75 percent of those serving second and third-strike sentences are minorities. In Santa Clara County, black youths are arrested at a rate of seven times their proportion in the general population. Any new law that would increase incarceration would simultaneously increase the conscience-shocking racial disproportionality as well.

And of course we knew who was at the polls this time around: youth and people of color – those more likely to know firsthand how prison destroys families, those more likely to know personally the man given his third strike for stealing a candy bar, or the juvenile who is deemed a gang member just because he liked a certain sport team or was from a certain neighborhood. Indeed, the contradiction would be too large for an electorate to overwhelmingly vote for a black man to be president, yet at the same time seal the fate of thousands of black men to a life behind bars.

Many families who were victims of three strikes and Prop. 21 – having learned how quickly a public policy can become a personal nightmare – also became the most vocal advocates against Prop. 6.

Without the gloss of a campaign public relations firm, their efforts took on the dynamism and energy of a movement rather than a campaign. Immigrant youth, the same group that in 2006 sparked the largest protest marches in this country's history, already knew what tactics worked. Young people from East Palo Alto sent weekly fact texts like, "Did you know Prop. 6 would lock up youth as adults? Pass it on." In San Jose, they held rallies in front of the jails, calling out their relatives’ names, and getting inmates to flash their lights on and off to signal their support. Across the state, youth posted YouTube videos, made rap songs and MySpace pages.

While Californians battle among themselves over gay marriage, and collectively rejoice and marvel at their new president, the biggest change in history ushered in by voters may be the one that didn't make the news.

The impact may be felt across the country in coming years. We know from three strikes, Prop. 21, and anti-gang laws that originate from California that such proposals become the template laws for other states and even federal legislation if they make the grade in California. Currently, more than half of all the states in the country now have anti-gang laws that are based on the language of California legislation, and there are eight similar proposals pending in Congress.

Stopping Prop. 6 may be have the biggest "change" that never made headlines.
http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=f046d9d7c84cbc1724f01206edaf4749

Posted by lois at 11:20 AM | Comments (0)

CA: Prop. 5 and 6 defeated in election

2 of 3 CA crime measures fail at polls
Tuesday, November 04, 2008
AP

LOS ANGELES -- Two of three crime initiatives on California's ballot were rejected Tuesday by voters who may have been deterred by the hefty cost to taxpayers in hard economic times.

In a one-two punch, voters defeated two competing measures that appeared consecutively: Proposition 5, which would have increased drug rehabilitation programs, and Proposition 6, which would have cracked down on gang crimes.

They were narrowly favoring a third measure that would write crime victims' rights into the state Constitution.

Proposition 5 failed with 62 percent voting in opposition and 38 percent in favor with 28 percent of precincts reporting. The measure would have diverted an estimated 84,000 drug offenders - including those able to convince judges that their serious crimes are drug-related - into treatment programs each year.

Proposition 6 failed with 69 percent opposed and 31 percent in favor, also with 28 percent of precincts in. The initiative would have stiffened penalties for many gang crimes, including allowing gang members as young as 14 to be tried as adults. It would have made methamphetamine possession a felony.

A majority of voters were favoring Proposition 9, however. The measure was leading with 54 percent in favor and 46 percent opposed with 28 percent of precincts tallied. The measure would expand on the "Victims' Bill of Rights" approved by voters in 1982 while making it more difficult for criminals to be paroled.

Both of the failed measures carried hefty price tags at a time when California faces a growing state budget deficit.

"I think they both signify more money and I think people are tightening their belts," said Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca, who opposed Proposition 5 and favored 6 and 9.

Proposition 5 would have eventually cost $1 billion a year for expanded rehabilitation programs for 84,000 drug offenders annually, projected the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office.

However, incarcerating fewer offenders would cut the number of inmates in California's crowded prisons by 17 percent, the analyst estimated. That could have eventually saved the state $1 billion in annual prison costs and $2.5 billion for new prisons.

The initiative was backed by billionaire investor and liberal activist George Soros, who also sponsored a less sweeping drug diversion measure approved by California voters in 2000.

Critics - including Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and all four of his living predecessors - say the measure is one step in a nationwide drive to decriminalize drugs.

"I think people saw through that initiative," Baca said. "Those who perpetuate the crimes, because they're drug users, are almost given an incredible free ride."

They likely rejected get-tough Proposition 6 after opponents highlighted its cost to taxpayers, Baca said.

Proposition 6 would have cost the already stressed state budget $500 million a year in increased payments to local police, prosecutors, probation and rehabilitation services, plus $500 million for new prisons, the state analyst projected. It also includes $15 million to monitor the movements of sex offenders through global positioning systems.

Costs were tougher to project for Proposition 9, the crime victims' rights measure.

The initiative would require state and local officials to spend whatever it takes to avoid releasing inmates early to ease crowding in prisons or jails. That sets up potential legal conflicts with federal court orders capping the number of inmates who can be housed in 20 jails throughout the state.

"I think the empathy is on the side of the victims," Baca said, though he expects the crime initiative to face court challenges.

Both 6 and 9 were backed by billionaire Broadcom co-founder Henry T. Nicholas III, who was indicted in June on federal securities fraud and drug charges. He has pleaded not guilty.

http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=news/politics&id=6489380

Posted by lois at 10:58 AM | Comments (0)

OR: Measure 57 goes into effect

Mannix-sponsored anti-crime measure won't go into effect
Posted by The Oregonian November 04, 2008 21:28PM

Voters were narrowly approving Measure 61, an anti-crime initiative, but it won't go into effect because a competing measure received more votes.

Measure 61 would have set three-year mandatory minimum prison sentences for first-time drug dealers, burglars and identity thieves.

It would have sent an estimated 6,000 non-violent offenders to prison -- a 44 percent increase in the state's prison population -- and cost an estimated $797 million over the next five years. It also would have required the state to borrow as much as $1.3 billion for prison construction.

Measure 61 was sponsored by former Republican lawmaker Kevin Mannix. Measure57, a competing anti-crime proposal, received more votes so only it will go into effect.

Measure 57 will also send career criminals to prison, but it provides drug treatment to first-time non-violent offenders. Written by the Legislature,it includes a provision that says if voters approve both measures only the one with the most votes takes effect.
http://blog.oregonlive.com/elections/2008/11/m61.html

Posted by lois at 10:37 AM | Comments (0)

November 05, 2008

MA: Voters approve marijuana law change

The Boston Globe
QUESTION 2
Voters approve marijuana law change
By David Abel, Globe Staff | November 5, 2008

Voters yesterday overwhelmingly approved a ballot initiative to decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana, making getting caught with less than an ounce of pot punishable by a civil fine of $100. The change in the law means someone found carrying dozens of joints will no longer be reported to the state's criminal history board.

With about 90 percent of the state's precincts reporting last night, voters favored the Question 2 proposition 65 percent to 35 percent. (from Lois: MA presidential tally: Winner Obama- 1,838,746 or 62% McCain,075,007 or 36%)

"The people were ahead of the politicians on this issue; they recognize and want a more sensible approach to our marijuana policy," said Whitney Taylor, chairwoman of the Committee for Sensible Marijuana Policy, which campaigned for the ballot initiative. "They want to focus our limited law enforcement resources on serious and violent crimes. They recognize under the new law that the punishment will fit the offense."

The proposition will become law 30 days after it is reported to the Governor's Council, which usually meets in late November or early December. But the Legislature could amend or repeal the new law, as they have done with prior initiatives passed by the voters, said Emily LaGrassa, a spokeswoman for Attorney General Martha Coakley.

Opponents of the proposition said they are concerned about the potential consequences of the vote. "The administration is clear in its opposition to the decriminalization of marijuana, and we are concerned about the effects of ballot Question 2's passage," Kevin Burke, secretary of the state's Executive Office of Public Safety and Security, said in a statement.

He would not comment on whether the administration will try to repeal the law, which will require violators younger than 18 to complete a drug awareness program and community service. The fine would increase to as much as $1,000 for those who fail to complete the program.

Proponents of the initiative, who spent about $1 million promoting it, argued the change in the law would maintain the state's existing penalties for growing, trafficking, or driving under the influence of marijuana, while ensuring that those caught with less than an ounce of pot would avoid the taint of a criminal record.

The opponents, who include the governor, attorney general, and district attorneys around the state, argued that decriminalizing marijuana possession would promote drug use and benefit drug dealers at a time when they say marijuana has become more potent. They warned it would increase violence on the streets and safety hazards in the workplace, and cause the number of car crashes to rise as more youths drive under the influence.

In a statement, the Coalition for Safe Streets, which opposed the initiative, blamed the loss on being outspent by supporters of Question 2, which included the billionaire financier George Soros, who spent more than $400,000 in favor of decriminalizing marijuana.

"Now these pro-drug special interests will move on to another state as part of their plan to inflict a radical drug-legalization agenda on as many communities as possible," said the statement.

The Rev. Bruce Wall, pastor of Global Ministries Christian Church in Dorchester, was among several prominent black ministers in Boston who called on fellow clergy to oppose the initiative.

"I guess there are a lot of people smoking the stuff, and they don't see what we see," Wall said.

The initiative's success last night sparked loud cheers from supporters gathered at the Silvertone Bar & Grill in downtown.

"I think this points to how our Legislature is unwilling to represent their constituents on these issues," said Bill Downing, president of the Massachusetts Cannabis Reform Coalition.

Globe correspondent Matt Negrin contributed to this report.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2008/11/05/voters_approve_marijuana_law_change/

Posted by lois at 12:03 PM | Comments (0)

October 25, 2008

NY Times Editorial: The California Prison Disaster

October 25, 2008
The California Prison Disaster
Editorial NY Times

The mass imprisonment philosophy that has packed prisons and sent corrections costs through the roof around the country has hit especially hard in California, which has the largest prison population, the highest recidivism rate and a prison budget raging out of control.

According to a new federally backed study conducted at the University of California, Irvine, the state’s corrections costs have grown by about 50 percent in less than a decade and now account for about 10 percent of state spending — nearly the same amount as higher education. The costs could rise substantially given that a federal lawsuit may require the state to spend $8 billion to bring the prison system’s woefully inadequate medical services up to constitutional standards.

The solution for California is to shrink its vastly overcrowded prison system. To do so, it would need to move away from mandatory sentencing laws that have proved to be disastrous across the country — locking up more people than protecting public safety requires.

In addition, the state also has perhaps the most counterproductive and ill-conceived parole system in the United States. More people are sent to prison in California by parole officers than by the courts. In addition, about 66 percent of California’s parolees land back in prison after three years, compared with about 40 percent nationally. Four in 10 are sent back for technical violations like missed appointments or failed drug tests.

Later this year, the state is expected to begin testing a new system that redirects the lowest-risk drug addicts to treatment. But that will only work if the state and the counties dramatically expand treatment slots.

The heart of the problem is that California’s parole system is simply too big. Most states keep dangerous people behind bars or reserve parole supervision for the most serious offenders. California puts virtually everyone on parole, typically for three years.

Under this setup, about 80 percent of the parolees have fewer than two 15-minute meetings with a parole officer per month. That might be adequate for low-risk offenders, but it’s clearly too little time for serious offenders who present a risk to public safety.

A good first step would be to place fewer people on parole. The second step would be to reserve the most intensive supervision for offenders who present the greatest risk.

State lawmakers, some of whom are fearful of being seen as soft on crime, have failed to make perfectly reasonable sentencing modifications and other changes that the prisons desperately need. Unless they muster some courage soon, Californians will find themselves swamped by prison costs and unable to afford just about anything else.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/25/opinion/25sat1.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

Posted by lois at 03:27 PM | Comments (0)

October 20, 2008

MS: Assistant DA hleps to reduce jail overcrowding

ADA helps Rankin jail reduce crowding
Clarion-Ledger
October 20, 2008
BRANDON — The number of inmates at Rankin County's jail last week hit 380 - 71 inmates above the jail's suggested 309 capacity.

But that number could have been higher if not for the county's new assistant district attorney, Dan Duggan, who so far this year has shifted 125 of the county's oldest cases into plea bargains or verdicts. That's 125 fewer people filling the jail at taxpayers' expense.

And it's good news to county officials who worry the jail's $7 million, 96-bed expansion - which will be completed early next year - won't be empty long.

"It'll probably be full the first 10 minutes it opens," quipped District 2 Supervisor Wood Brown.

The criminal histories of the 125 inmates run the gamut, but what they have in common is their lengthy stays - 400 days, 600 days, 800 days and even 1,300 days - in what should be short-term lockup.

One is sex offender Devin Groover, who, after nearly four years of delays, pleaded guilty in April. A requested mental evaluation took two years to come through.

Groover was sentenced to 15 years in prison with 10 years suspended and five to serve. Since the 21-year-old had been in the county jail so long, he is serving only one year inside the Walnut Grove Youth Correctional Facility. He will be released in June 2009.

Groover's case was one of the first Duggan addressed. He is now a poster child of sorts in Duggan's mind, representing the kind of inmate that shouldn't be taking up space in the county jail.

"We've moved these guys through the system by speeding up mental evaluations, reducing bonds and IDing those we can plea bargain with," said Duggan, a 54-year-old former public defender and Houston police officer.

Added Duggan: "We've also prioritized who we want in jail."

The jail should not be for first-time offenders or those caught using drugs, he said. It's meant as a temporary holding space for hardened, violent offenders before they are turned over to the Mississippi Department of Corrections.

In recent years, however, the jail has morphed into an extended-stay facility, which puts pressure on jail personnel to find space to squeeze in an ever-growing inmate population that waits on backlogged courts.

"You get inmates in here who are stressed and wondering about their situation, and the longer they are here the bolder they get," Jail Administrator Capt. Eddie Thompson said. "It's a safety issue more than anything else."

One of the things Rankin-Madison District Attorney Michael Guest first saw bogging down the system was the waiting list for Mississippi State Hospital at Whitfield, which performs all of the state's mental evaluations.

"What we discovered is that there was an 18-month waiting period," Guest said. "So, we met with the judges and told them the current system wasn't working."

Guest brokered a deal to have a Flowood psychologist - already contracted by the state to perform mental evaluations - to take on Madison and Rankin counties' evaluations. Now, mental evaluations take two weeks at most.

Rankin County Circuit Court judges William Chapman and Samac Richardson could not be reached for comment.

Besides problems with crowding, too many inmates at the jail also drive up the county's medical costs.

"When you house some of these guys in excess of 400 days, some of them are going to get sick," Rankin County Sheriff Ronnie Pennington said. "And that means we have to drive them to the hospital. Sometimes it can last three to four days. It costs money, and there is nothing we can do about it."

Pennington said some inmates face serious illnesses like cancer, hepatitis C and diabetes.

"To house a healthy inmate is costly enough, but to take care of an inmate's cancer treatments, for example, is very costly," Duggan said. "The county has to take on those payments until we move them over to MDOC, for example. Then it becomes the state's problem. That's our goal."

Duggan is paid $80,000 and is one of nine ADAs in the district attorney's office.

Rankin County public defender Aafram Sellers said he appreciates what the DA's office is doing.

"I've had cases low on the docket, and they've called to see if we could work it out with a plea or a bond reduction," he said. "It's great for both sides. There's no point holding some of these guys for months on end when we can reduce a bond or work out a plea agreement and let them rehabilitate on the outside."

In Hinds County, the district attorney's office constantly battles inmate populations at the county's 594-capacity jail. But District Attorney Robert Schuler Smith does not have an attorney assigned to do what Duggan does.

"I think all assistant district attorneys should do what he does and mine do," Smith said. He points out that his office in the last year has shifted exponentially more inmates than Rankin's 125.

The latest U.S. Bureau statistics put Hinds County's population at about 250,000. Rankin County is hovering around 138,000 people - and growing.

The growing population is why Rankin will never be able to fully eradicate the situation. Duggan and Guest can only tamp it down, but Brown said he has a long-term solution for convicted criminals.

"Why not start a penal farm like the one in Hinds County?" Brown said. "There's plenty of work to be done in the county with painting and litter. We have the land available to do it too. Let's put these inmates to work."

Although Pennington has said he is on board with the farm, the idea has gained little traction. In the meantime, inmates awaiting sentencing have become admirers of Duggan's work.

"I get letters from them now asking for us to look at their case," he said. "The ones that are eligible we review, but there are plenty of serious offenders we have to ignore. But it's really something. These guys don't want to be in there any longer than they have to. Neither do we."
http://www.clarionledger.com/article/20081020/NEWS/810200339/1001/news

Posted by lois at 03:14 PM | Comments (0)

October 18, 2008

VA: Editorial: A sensible call for sentencing reform

"The cost to build and operate the prisons needed to hold all of these people is enormous: States spent about $2 billion on construction alone in 2006."

Editorial: A sensible call for sentencing reform
Virginia's junior senator insists on taking an honest look at the high cost of the war on drugs.

Sen. Jim Webb will be moderating a symposium Wednesday on illegal drug trafficking and the nation's hugely expensive fight against it.

The symposium at George Mason University could not be more timely for Virginians and their policymakers, who last week heard Gov. Tim Kaine's latest -- but by no means last -- budget cuts to match steep shortfalls in state revenues.

Webb's interest, of course, is at the federal rather than state level, but the concerns he has been raising -- during two earlier Senate hearings and now at the upcoming symposium -- apply equally in both spheres.

Webb is gathering law enforcement and criminal justice experts, along with advocates of sentencing reform, both to collect facts and to educate the public about a policy failure most politicians consider too politically dangerous to broach:

The so-called war on drugs has produced the highest incarceration rate of any nation in the world -- 750 inmates for every 100,000 people. Most criminal justice experts attribute a leap in imprisonments since 1991 to tougher sentencing laws, particularly for drug offenses, that have ensnared a whole lot of low-level, nonviolent offenders.

Webb cites statistics that show four out of five drug arrests in 2005 were for possession, one out of five for drug sales.

The cost to build and operate the prisons needed to hold all of these people is enormous: States spent about $2 billion on construction alone in 2006. And the cost to society is compounded by the loss at an early age of lives that might have been productive, but end up in a cycle of sharply limited opportunities, recidivism and reimprisonment.

In a phone interview last week, Webb was careful to state, "I'm all for incarcerating violent offenders and people involved in gang activities." Given the electorate's enthusiasm for tough-on-crime rhetoric, he knows his congressional colleagues will be loath to take up sentencing reform: "People running and in office get nervous.

"But we have to be able to address the dynamic in some way because it's all so skewed."

Webb has no legislative fix in his back pocket, but insists on having the conversation to get the country working toward one. That's necessary and brave.

In the midst of painful budget cuts, Virginia lawmakers should ponder the problem and heed Kaine's pointed suggestion to look for policy changes that would yield long-term savings, such as prison reform.
http://www.roanoke.com/editorials/wb/180264

Posted by lois at 10:53 AM | Comments (0)

October 12, 2008

U.S. Sentencing Commission is considering endorsing options including treatment programs for nonviolent users of drugs such as crack.

Sentencing Panel Mulls Alternatives to Prison
The U.S. Sentencing Commission is considering endorsing options including treatment programs for nonviolent users of drugs such as crack.
By Darryl Fears
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, October 12, 2008; Page A02

As the nation's inmate population climbs toward 2.5 million, the U.S. Sentencing Commission is considering alternatives to prison for some offenders, including treatment programs for nonviolent drug users and employment training for minor parole violators.

The commission's consideration of alternatives to incarceration reflects its determination to persuade Congress to ease federal mandatory minimum sentencing laws that contributed to explosive growth in the prison population. The laws were enacted in the mid-1980s, principally to address a crime epidemic related to crack cocaine. But in recent years, federal judges, public defenders and probation officials have argued that mandatory sentences imprison first-time offenders unnecessarily and disproportionately affect minorities.

If the commission moves ahead with recommending alternatives to Congress, it would send a strong signal to state sentencing commissions and legislatures, and could pave the way for a major expansion of drug courts and adult developmental programs for parolees, advocates said.

"We are leading the world in incarcerating adults, and that's something Americans need to understand," said Beryl Howell, one of six members of the commission, which drafts federal sentencing guidelines and advises the House and Senate on prison policy. "People should be aware that every tough-on-crime act comes with a price. The average cost [of incarceration] across the country is $24,000 a year per inmate. . . . It's going up far faster than state budgets can keep up."

About 2,000 drug courts nationwide spend between $1,500 and $11,000 per offender, according to the National Drug Court Institute. Those scattered courts handle only a small fraction of the 1.5 million nonviolent drug offenders who are arrested and charged with a crime, said C. West Huddleston, chief executive of the National Association of Drug Court Professionals.

The courts operate under similar principles: At sentencing, a judge gives a nonviolent offender the option of going to prison or committing to a rigorous treatment program, where he or she submits to frequent tests and supervision. The aim is to reduce the 67 percent recidivism rate of addicted offenders.

The government has established a discretionary grant program, operated by the Bureau of Justice Assistance, which is distributing $13 million to drug court programs this year.

"Drug courts are the most successful strategy in terms of reducing crime, but they're tremendously underutilized," Huddleston said. "I think a Sentencing Commission recommendation to U.S. courts would create momentum. It'll wake up state legislatures. It's a conversation that should have been had years ago."

The commission held a symposium to discuss alternatives to incarceration in July after a study this year by the nonpartisan Pew Center on the States revealed that more than one in 100 American adults are in jail or prison. That study was followed by a Bureau of Justice Statistics report in June that showed that a record 7.2 million people are under supervision in the criminal justice system. The cost, about $45 billion a year, has forced states such as California to export inmates to private prisons as far away as Tennessee.

Jeffrey L. Sedgwick, assistant attorney general for the Justice Department's office of justice programs, said the burgeoning prison population might be worth the cost. Research has shown that crime rates decline as the incarceration rate rises, he said. "In other words, as the number of people under correctional supervision goes up, crime goes down."

Sedgwick said the cost of housing prisoners should be weighed against other factors, such as the cost for victims of violent crimes to piece their lives back together. He said conservative estimates put the cost of violent crime at about $17 billion.

But the Justice Department is open to discussing options that might reduce prison overcrowding and costs, and is waiting to see what the commission recommends, Sedgwick said. "We're not necessarily going to oppose it out of hand, but we say be real careful, we recommend more study," he said.

Sentencing Panel Mulls Alternatives to Prison

Howell said maintaining a prison population equal to the size of a major U.S. city "is inconsistent with what Congress had in mind with the Sentencing Reform Act" of 1984, which created the commission.

"Our purpose is not just to issue guidelines setting forth the severity of punishment, but to provide guidelines to judges for the form of that punishment," Howell said. "The commission has spent most of its time on the severity. It is somewhat new for us to look at the form of the punishment, and that's where alternatives come in."

The commission's consideration of alternatives comes the year after it defied the Bush administration by relaxing tough sentencing guidelines for crack cocaine offenders and making its decision retroactive, so that thousands already in prison could seek release before the end of their terms. About 4,000 mostly nonviolent offenders have taken advantage of the policy so far, according to members of the commission and the federal Bureau of Prisons.

The Justice Department, U.S. attorneys and the National District Attorneys Association strongly opposed easing the guidelines for crack cocaine offenders and making them retroactive. But the reaction to possible prison alternatives has not been as pronounced.

"My experience tells me that if the drug court is properly constituted and has the buy-in of judges, prosecutors and parole officials, they are very effective," said Tom Sneddon, interim executive director of the district attorneys group and a former Santa Barbara, Calif., prosecutor who helped establish a drug court there.
"But there are some courts that are shadow programs that they use to cycle people back into society and not send them to prison, and have no real substance at all," Sneddon said.

Another program under consideration would allow judges to develop rehabilitation programs for parolees based on their needs -- such as employment, education or drug treatment. Parolees could join the program upon their release from prison or after committing a minor parole violation, such as failing to update an address or a telephone number.

Texas criminal district court Judge John Creuzot said drug courts have worked in his state. He said he established a program after Texas got tough on minor drug offenders, jailing them for two years.

"Well, that thing started to break down by the late 1990s," he said, ". . . because then we had so many people in penitentiaries that we were actually letting murderers and rapists out to make room for these small violators, low-risk violators. And so we started rethinking what we were doing."

The 18-month program accepts low-level drug offenders with no felony records or histories of violence. "We did a study of that program, and we have a 68 percent reduction of recidivism in that program," Creuzot said. "It's a phenomenally successful program."

For parolees, job training is seen as the chief remedy to repeated incarceration, said Judge Robert Holmes Bell, chief U.S. district judge for the Western District of Michigan. "In the old days, the warden of the prison used to give the person a bus ticket and $20 and say, 'Godspeed to you,' and away they went."

The Sentencing Commission's staff is drafting a proposal amending its guidelines that the panel could submit for public comment in late December. The commission could make a final decision by May 1. Congress would then have 180 days to reverse the decision.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/11/AR2008101102051_2.html?sub=AR

Posted by lois at 06:13 PM | Comments (0)

October 06, 2008

CA: Justice issues collide on ballot

Justice issues collide on ballot
By Andy Furillo
Monday, October 6, 2008
Sacramento Bee

Law and order activists, critics of California's drug laws and victims rights groups independently have loaded three separate crime measures onto the Nov. 4 ballot, and they're not making it easy for state voters to sort them out.

Together, Propositions 5, 6 and 9 cover 115 pages, would change scores of laws and would affect billions of dollars in state spending.

"My mom asked me if I have positions on all of them, and I told her I'm still working on it," said Assembly Public Safety Committee chairman Jose Solorio, D-Santa Ana, who presided over nine hours of hearings on the measures. "There's a lot to digest."

On Nov. 4, voters will decide whether to drastically change the way the state prosecutes drug addicts and the lower-level property crimes they commit, to the tune of diverting an estimated 18,000 offenders from prison into treatment programs. That's the basic thrust of Proposition 5.

They're also being asked to give local law enforcement more money, protect what funds they already get, and toughen laws aimed at street gang members, methamphetamine cookers and serious ex-cons who possess guns in public. Those are the basics of Proposition 6.

The third measure seeks to put victims at or near the center of the entire criminal justice process and give them a constitutional right to participate in plea bargaining and parole decisions. It also wants to make life-term inmates wait 15 years between parole hearings, stop early inmate releases and have counties build tent jails to handle inmate overflow. That's Proposition 9.

"The skies are getting crowded," UC Berkeley law professor Franklin Zimring said of the air traffic over the criminal justice system. "It's become a two-sided process, with the left using it as well as the right."

Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley, whose office opposes Propositions 5 and 9 and has deep reservations about Proposition 6, said the ballot campaigns represent criminal justice policy-making at its worst.

"It only takes $2 million or $3 million to put any nice-sounding piece of junk into the constitution," Cooley said.<