The Crime Report (https://thecrimereport.org/category/reforming-the-system/)
Under a proposal by the Vera Institute of Justice, the city will be the first in the country to replace money bail and conviction fees— “the twin pillars on which money injustice stands”— with a fair system aimed at reducing the number of individuals held in pretrial detention.
Two co-founders of the “Young Men Emerging” program at the Washington DC jail say their innovative community-building approach helps individuals aged 18-25 escape becoming ensnared in the justice system.
Our criminal justice system’s treatment of those who have committed violent acts needs to change, said panelists Thursday at a presentation of two new papers by the Square One Project and the Emerging Adult Justice Learning Community.
The office is the first in the state of California to make information about arrests, prosecutions and procedural information available to the public. ACLU counsel Nicole Fortier called it a ‘bold’ step towards transparency.
While the majority of deaths in state prisons are the result of natural causes among an aging prison population, there have been significant rises in mortality rates due to suicides, homicides, accidents, drug and alcohol-related events, and untreated medical issues, a Guardian investigation found.
The state, county and municipal systems in charge of administering justice for millions of Americans are not as separate as they think they are. Agreeing on shared ‘transformational values’ might help fix the problems they have in common, an American University symposium concluded.
Research shows how easy it is for people to be pressured into admitting crimes they didn’t commit. But, unless DNA proves them wrong, most people in the justice system won’t “consider the likelihood that a confession is false,” writes the director of the Miami Law Innocence Clinic in a new paper.
A state crackdown on driving without a license is making criminals out of tens of thousands of New Yorkers, and straining court systems—with no discernible benefit to public safety, say lawyers and researchers.
A new report by the Pew Research Center showed 87 percent of black Americans believe the criminal justice system is racially biased and a national problem, whereas only 61 percent of white Americans agree.
Under a package of bills approved by the legislature, the state could see a top-to-bottom institutional transformation. Measures include pretrial reform and a citizens committee to monitor jails and prisons.