The Crime Report (https://thecrimereport.org/category/viewpoints/)
If we want a safer criminal justice system, the habit of reducing “accountability” to punishment of individual bad actors will turn out to be a crippling mistake, writes TCR’s legal affairs columnist.
The mistaken belief that crime in general is up will fuel public support for policies of the past that filled the prisons, worsened economic and racial inequalities, and did little to reduce crime, warn four of the nation’s leading criminologists.
When Baltimore City and Prince George’s County recently released their lists of police officers who would no longer be called to testify in court, it raised more than a few eyebrows. But the real issue is that far too few prosecutors track police misconduct at all, writes the deputy director of John Jay’s Institute for Innovation in Prosecution.
A Colorado decision last week to scrap the “sex offender” label is an important first step, but it remains an uphill battle to change a mindset that stigmatizes people convicted of different levels of sex offenses with a one-size-fits-all description, says a justice reform advocate.
It’s been over four decades since President Ronald Reagan called for respect for the men and women who work in the nation’s prison systems. We still haven’t backed that up with the investment it requires, says a justice reform advocate.
Federal offenders on probation are less likely to commit new offenses. But this finding—with significant implications for federal courts—was concealed in a recent US Sentencing Commission report which misread the data, writes a Penn State law professor.
Years after entering prison, Leo Cardez is still grappling with the childhood traumas and resentments that destroyed his life.
Texas police seized $42,000 from Ameal Woods’ car in 2019 when his car was stopped and searched. Texas authorities say they have the right to keep it under civil forfeiture statutes, but a class-action lawsuit argues that such searches erode Fourth Amendment rights ― and produce loss of respect for law enforcement.
The self-appointed citizen watchdogs who shot Ahmaud Arbery claimed to be defending law and order, but they embodied the racialist attitudes of U.S. society. Would a nationwide training program that empowers Black and Latinx citizens to protect their communities make a difference?
Despite three years of aggressive enforcement-based attempts to target traffickers, opioids continue to dominate illicit markets across the country. It’s time for a different response, write two reform advocates.