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Alternatives and Organizing

Aspiring to the Impracticable: Alternatives to Incarceration in the Era Of Mass Incarceration
By Marsha Weissman, New York University Journal of Law and Social Change. May 2009. Weissman argues that in order for Alternative-to-Incarceration programs to reach their potential, they must be grounded in an understanding of the social, political and economic contexts of crime and punishment. She calls on ATI organizations to be proactive in identifying people who would otherwise be incarcerated, provide vigorous advocacy in support of alternatives to incarceration, forcefully confront the racial disparities that impact the use of incarceration, and forge alliances with communities most directly affected by the over reliance on prisons.
http://www.law.nyu.edu/ecm_dlv2/gro...uments/documents/ecm_pro_063446.pdf

Calling for Change
By Liv Gold and Chris Sturr. Dollars and Sense Magazine, May/June 2006. (Telephone justice campaigns.)
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Calling-for-change.pdf

Catholic Bishops of the South: "I have come to heal..." Restorative Justice
Part of a series of pastoral statements by Catholic Bishops of the South on the Criminal Justice process.
http://www.catholiclabor.org/church-doc/CBS-4.htm

Children of Incarcerated Parents: An Action Plan for Federal Policymakers
By The Council of State Governments (CSG) Justice Center (October 26,2009). The plan outlines promising practices and 70-plus recommendations for improving outcomes for the more than 1.7 million children of incarcerated parents. The publication reflects the work of an advisory board of criminal justice and child welfare experts, representatives of community-based organizations, and a bipartisan group of state and local government officials. Among the federal action plan's recommendations are those that urge policymakers to:
* create federal interagency task forces and develop cross-system collaborations that address the risk factors of children of incarcerated parents and better link them to services;
* support new policies and practices in the criminal justice system that address trauma associated with a parent's arrest and their incarceration, which is often many miles from where a child is living;
* encourage measures that facilitate visitation when in the best interests of the child and promote permanence that takes into account siblings and other important relationships;
* address federal and state measures that make it more difficult for caregivers to obtain benefits and support for these children.
http://www.reentrypolicy.org/jc_pub...hildren_Incarcerated_Parents_v8.pdf

Compact for Racial Justice: An Agenda for Fairness and Unity
Produced by the Applied Research Center as a proactive agenda for fairness and unity in communities, politics, and the law. November 2008.
http://sentencingproject.org/tmp/File/Racial%20Disparity/rd_compact_final.pdf

Criminal Justice and Health and Human Services: An Exploration of Overlapping Needs, Resources, and Interests in Brooklyn Neighborhoods
By Eric Cadora with Mannix Gordon and Charles Swartz, 2002. Posted on the Urban Institute's website.
http://www.urban.org/UploadedPDF/410633_CriminalJustice.pdf

Defending Justice
Defending Justice is an Activist Resource Kit that helps progressive activists understand and resist the Right, the State, and other forces that contribute to the growing system of courts, surveillance, policing, and incarceration. The easy-to-use chapters and factsheets are useful tools to draw upon in leading discussions and talking to the press. Through dialog and thinking together, we can create the best strategies for challenging the criminal justice system.
http://www.defendingjustice.org/index.html

The Diminishing Returns of Increased Incarceration: A Blueprint to Improve Public Safety and Reduce Costs
By James Austin and Tony Fabelo, 2004. Published by the JFA Institute.
http://www.jfa-associates.com/BlueprintFinal.pdf

Downscaling Prisons: Lessons from Four States
Justice Strategies and The Sentencing Project, March 2010. Four states - Kansas, Michigan, New Jersey, and New York - have reduced their prison populations by 5-20% since 1999 without any increases in crime. This came about at a time when the national prison population increased by 12%; and in six states it increased by more than 40%. The reductions were achieved through a mix of legislative reforms and changes in practice by corrections and parole agencies. The reforms included:
* Kansas - Changed sentencing guidelines to divert lower-level drug cases to treatment rather than incarceration; Expanded supportive services to people on parole supervision.
* Michigan - Eliminated most mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses; enacted statewide initiative to reduce parole revocations and enhance employment, housing, and treatment services for people leaving prison.
* New Jersey - Increased parole releases by adopting risk assessment instruments and utilizing day reporting centers and electronic monitoring.
* New York - Scaled back harsh drug penalties, established Drug Treatment Alternative to Prison programs, and applied "merit time" credits to speed up parole consideration.
http://sentencingproject.org/doc/pu...ons/inc_DownscalingPrisons2010.pdf

A Dynamic Economic Impact Analysis of Alternatives to Incarceration in Connecticut
A REMI Analysis 2001. Connecticut Center For Economic Analysis, University of Connecticut.
http://ccea.uconn.edu/studies/Incarceration%20Analysis.pdf

Ending the Culture of Street Crime
By The Lifers Public Safety Steering Committee of the State Correctional Institution at Graterford, PA. From Prison Journal, December 2004.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/streetculture.pdf

Estimates of the Savings of the Alternative Drug Court Program, Erie County, New York
http://www.jointogether.org/news/re...2004/drug-court-savings-extend.html

Evaluation of the Substance Abuse and Crime Prevention Act (Prop. 36)
SACPA Cost-Analysis Report. Prepared by: UCLA Integrated Substance Abuse Program. Proposition 36 Saves Taxpayers' Money: UCLA Study Finds Nearly $2.50 in Savings for Each $1 Spent on Drug Offenders Eligible for Treatment under the state's Substance Abuse and Crime Prevention Act of 2000 (SACPA), or Proposition 36. Over a 30-month follow-up period, this represented a savings to state and local government of $173.3 million for people entering SACPA during its first year. For people convicted of drug offenses who completed their required drug treatment, nearly $4 was saved for each dollar expended.
http://www.uclaisap.org/prop36/documents/SACPA_COSTANALYSIS.pdf

Evidence-Based Public Policy Options to Reduce Future Prison Construction, Criminal Justice Costs, and Crime Rates
The Washington State Institute for Public Policy (WSIPP). Findings include: a systematic review of all research evidence to identify what works, if anything, to reduce crime. WSIPP found and analyzed 571 rigorous comparison-group evaluations of adult corrections, juvenile corrections, and prevention programs, most of which were conducted in the United States. They then estimated the benefits and costs of many of these evidence-based options. Finally, they projected the degree to which alternative "portfolios" of these programs could affect future prison construction needs, criminal justice costs, and crime rates in Washington.. They found that if Washington successfully implements a moderate-to-aggressive portfolio of evidence-based options, a significant level of future prison construction can be avoided, taxpayers can save about two billion dollars, and crime rates can be reduced.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/WashingtonStateReport.pdf

From Prison to Home: The Effect of Incarceration and Reentry on Children, Families, and Communities Incarceration. Reentry, and Social Capital: Social Networks in the Balance
By Dina R. Rose and Todd R. Clear, John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/prison2home02/Rose.htm

Inalienable Rights: Applying International Human Rights Standards to the U.S. Criminal Justice System
AFSC
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/AFSC_Inalienable_Rights.pdf

Joining Forces: Prisons and Environmental Justice in Recent California Organizing
By Rose Braz and Craig Gilmore. Radical History Review. Issue 96, 2006. An excellent essay by Craig Gilmore, organizer and co-founder of the CA Prison Moratorium Project and Rose Braz, national campaign director of Critical Resistance. Their essay is a great combination of organizing experience, solid information, no rhetoric, inclusion/validation of the work people are doing and analysis. The article focuses on the complex organizing which took place to prevent the opening of Delano II in California.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Joining_Forces_Braz.pdf

Justice Reinvestment: To Invest in Public Safety by Reallocating Justice Dollars to Refinance Education, Housing, Healthcare and Jobs
A new set of important and concrete ideas in a paper by Susan B. Tucker and Eric Cadora, of the After Prison Initiative, Open Society Institute.
http://www.soros.org/resources/articles_publications/publications/ideas_20040106

Legal Primer
The Prison Book Program in Quincy, MA has developed this Legal Primer. Contact them at: Prison Book Program, c/o Lucy Parsons Bookstore, 1306 Hancock Street, #100, Quincy, MA 02169, or read online using the link below.
http://www.prisonbookprogram.org/wethepeople.pdf

Locked Up: Corrections Policy in New Hampshire/Paper 1: The Fiscal Consequences of Incarceration Policies, 1981-2001
September, 2001. New Hampshire Center for Public Policy's excellent analysis on state corrections policy and spending. Includes a focus on county jails as well as state prisons. Some really good graphics and charts as well.
http://www.unh.edu/nhcpps/lockedup1.pdf

Locked Up: Corrections Policy in New Hampshire/Paper 2: Options For Reducing The Prison Population and the Cost of Incarceration.
February, 2004. New Hampshire Center for Public Policy's excellent analysis on state corrections policy and spending. Includes a focus on county jails as well as state prisons. Some really good graphics and charts as well.
http://www.unh.edu/nhcpps/locked2.pdf

Minnesota's AB 1542: Alternatives to Incarceration for Veterans
Minnesota Council on Crime and Justice, June 2007. A Bill to provide alternative sentencing other than jail for first people who are combat veterans who convicted of first time non-violent offenses.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/ab_1542_bill_20050908_enrolled.pdf
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/vets-in-prison-or-jail-2000.pdf
http://realcostofprisons.org/materi...AlternativesToJailingVeterans2.pdf

Minor Crimes, Massive Waste: The Terrible Toll of America's Broken Misdemeanor Courts
By Robert C. Boruchowitz and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL). Nationwide, state and local governments are wasting millions of tax dollars to prosecute petty offenses, creating huge deficits in their budgets and violating the constitutional rights of citizens haled into court. The report comprehensively examines misdemeanor courts across the country. It recommends that states divert non-violent misdemeanor cases that do not impact public safety to programs that are less costly to taxpayers and repay society through community service or civil fines. (April 2009)
http://www.nacdl.org/public.nsf/defenseupdates/misdemeanor/$FILE/Report.pdf

The Montgomery Story
"The Montgomery Story", a 1956 MLK Jr. comic book, details some key events and spiritual underpinnings of the Civil Rights Era.
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/peek/46736/

Moving Target: A Decade of Resistance to the Prison Industrial Complex
The Justice Policy Institute (JPI). This new report examines the Prison Industrial Complex (PIC) -- the relationship between government and private interests that use imprisonment, policing, and surveillance as a solution to social, political, and economic problems. The report examines the progress of reform 10 years after Critical Resistance first launched its efforts to dismantle the PIC.
http://www.justicepolicy.org/images...09_REP_MovingTargetCR10_AC-PS.pdf

Prison Book Program Resource Directory
Prison Book Program Resource Directory (2-09)
http://realcostofprisons.org/materi...Book_Program_Resource_List_2-09.pdf

Prison Resource Project Directory
Prison Resource Project Directory (8-09)
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Prison_Resource_Project_Directory.pdf

Proposition 36: Five Years Later
Justice Policy Institute report documents huge taxpayer savings through doing away with prison sentences in favor of treatment. That report said the program, saved California $173 million in its first year and $2.50 for every dollar invested since then. www.justicepolicy.org. April 2006.
http://www.justicepolicy.org

Proven Pro-family Criminal Justice Policies that Save Families, Save Taxpayers' Money & Improve the Safety of Our Community
August 2004.Criminal Justice Policy Board, Texas LULAC
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/LULAC.pdf

Racial Impact Statements as a Means of Reducing Unwarranted Sentencing Disparities
An article by Marc Mauer in the Ohio State Journal of Criminal Law proposes the development of "Racial Impact Statements" as a means of assessing the impact of proposed sentencing policies. In Racial Impact Statements as a Means of Reducing Unwarranted Sentencing Disparities, he suggests that these statements have much in common with fiscal and environmental impact statements that have become commonplace at many levels of government. The goal of a racial impact statement would be to assess the projected impact of new sentencing legislation on racial and ethnic minorities prior to enactment of the policy. If the statement indicates that unwarranted sentencing disparities might be produced, legislators would have the opportunity of considering alternative means of achieving public safety goals that would not exacerbate existing disparities.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/A...tions/rd_racialimpactstatements.pdf

Racial Impact Statements: Changing Policies to Address Disparities
By Marc Mauer. Examines policy initiatives designed to make state and federal justice systems more fair and equitable. American Bar Assoc. Magazine, Criminal Justice. Winter 2009.
http://sentencingproject.org/Admin/Documents/publications/rd_abaarticle.pdf

Reconsidering Incarceration : New Directions for Reducing Crime
By Don Stemen. January 2007 Current research on the relationship between incarceration and crime provides confusing and even contradictory guidance for policymakers. The most sophisticated analyses generally agree that increased incarceration rates have some effect on reducing crime, but the scope of that impact is limited: a 10 percent increase in incarceration is associated with a 2 to 4 percent drop in crime. Moreover, analysts are nearly unanimous in their conclusion that continued growth in incarceration will prevent considerably fewer, if any, crimes than past increases did and will cost taxpayers substantially more to achieve. These outcomes raise the question of whether or not further increases in incarceration offer the most effective and efficient strategy for combating crime. Additional research examined in this report reveals several other variables that have also been shown to have a relationship with lower crime rates. An increase in the number of police per capita, a reduction in unemployment, and increases in real wage rates and education have all been shown to be associated with lower rates of crime.
http://www.vera.org/publication_pdf/379_727.pdf

Resisting Living Death at Marion Federal Penitentiary, 1972
By Alan Eladio Gomez, Radical History Review, 2006. The history and development of control units and SHUs, how politicized prisoners at Marion organized against "living death" and how this set the stage for Guantanamo now.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Resisting_Living_Death_Gomez.pdf

Restoration of Prisoners' Pell Grant Eligibility Overdue
By Jason Burford, June 2008. An article on the organizing work of Jon Marc Taylor, PhD, incarcerated in Missouri, Charlie Sullivan of CURE to secure a NAACP resolution restoring Pell Grants to prisoners.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/pellgrant.pdf

Smart on Crime: Recommendations for the Next Administration and Congress
The 2009 Criminal Justice Transition Coalition and 21 national organizations released a collaborative report identifying critical needs for federal policy reform. The report contains comprehensive policy recommendations at every stage of the justice system for the new Administration and Congress. Included among the recommendations to overcome these challenges are:
� Eliminate the crack cocaine sentencing disparity
� Expand alternatives to incarceration
� Fund prisoner reentry through the Second Chance Act
� Extend federal voting rights to people released from prison
� Restore welfare and food stamp eligibility to individuals with drug felony convictions
� Analyze and reduce unwarranted racial and ethnic disparity in the federal judicial system.
http://sentencingproject.org/Admin/...blications/inc_transition2009.pdf

Texas Criminal Justice Coalition (TCJC) Policy Guide
Promotes criminal justice solutions that embody the principles of effective management, accountability, public safety, and human and civil rights. January 2007
http://www.criminaljusticecoalition...s/tx_criminal_justice_solutions.pdf

Toxic Sentence: E Waste, Prisons and Economic and Environmental Justice.
June 2005. By the Computer Take Back Campaign.
http://svtc.igc.org/cleancc/pubs/prisonfactsheet_305.pdf

Vermont County Develops Cooperative Regional Re-Entry Housing Plan
Six municipalities in Chittenden County (VT) have endorsed a strategic and targeted response to address the housing needs of people returning to the county from jail and prison. The Housing Plan was developed by a Regional Advisory Group convened by the Burlington Housing Authority.
http://www.reentrypolicy.org/rp/main.aspx?dbName=DocumentViewer&DocumentID=902

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Crime and Crime Rates

Bureau of Justice Statistics: Prisoners in 2005
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/p05.pdf

Bureau of Justice Statistics: Probation and Parole in 2005
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/ppus05.pdf

Concerns Over Rising Crime in Context
Justice Policy Institute: March 15, 2007. In light of the recent Police Executive Research Forum report decrying an "alarming trend" of increasing violent crime, and the call for more money for law enforcement, JPI put together this factsheet to keep the numbers in context, and to show that while the increase in violent crime is cause for concern, it is not increasing at the alarming rates seen in the early 1990s.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Concerns_in_Context.pdf

The Impact of Capital on Crime: Does Access to Home Mortgage Money Reduce Crime Rates?
By Charis E. Kubrin and Gregory D. Squires
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/TTT_paper3.pdf

The Impending Crime Wave: Four Dangerous New Trends and How to Stop Them
A Third Way Report by Jim Kessler, Rachel Laser, Michael Earls, and Nikki Yamashiro. On February 26, 2008, Third Way, a "liberal" think-tank released a paper that warns of a coming wave of crime and offers more than 100 federal, state, and local policy options to handle the impending problem. The group also released the findings of a newn ational poll revealing that public concern over crime is high and growing. Pointing to the findings in the paper, the Governors announced a 21st-century crime-fighting agenda to combat this wave.

In The Impending Crime Wave, Third Way describes the convergence of four new and menacing sociological trends, which, together with the recent federal disengagement from crime-fighting, threaten a new and devastating wave of crime in America. These trends include:
• The Reentry Explosion: A massive group of prisoners are poised to reenter their communities over the next several years. In the 1980s, 2.5 million prisoners were released; in this decade, it will be nearly 7 million, with 700,000 in the next year alone.
• The Lengthening Shadow of Illegal Immigration: With more that 12 million illegal immigrants now in the country, a shadow economy that both serves and exploits illegal immigrants is large and growing, and a small but violent minority of illegal immigrants are themselves offenders.
• The Sprawling Parentless Neighborhood of the Internet: Technology, in particular the explosion of online social networking, is exposing increasing numbers of young children and teenagers to a surge in sexual predation on the Internet.
• The Surging Youth Population: Young people commit far more crimes than the general population, and the demographic bulge in young people, if not effectively addressed, will account for about 2.5 million more crimes by 2012.
http://www.thirdway.org/data/product/file/121/Third_Way_Crime_Report.pdf

Incarceration and Crime: A Complex Relationship
Provides a comprehensive analysis of research conducted on the relationship between incarceration and crime, and concludes that assertions of prison's impact on criminal offending have been overstated. As policymakers continue to struggle with the legacy of a prison population that has been growing steadily for more than three decades, this report suggests an urgent need for the reconsideration of the punitive sentencing and parole policies that currently dominate the criminal justice landscape. The Sentencing Project, November 2005.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/pdfs/incarceration-crime.pdf

Prison and Jail Inmates at Midyear 2005
Presents data on prison and jail inmates, collected from National Prisoner Statistics counts and the Census of Jail Inmates 2005. This annual report provides the number of inmates and the overall incarceration rate per 100,000 residents for each State and the Federal system. It offers trends since 1995 and percentage changes in prison populations since midyear and yearend 2004.
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/pjim05.pdf

Third Way Crime Poll Highlights
These are the highlights of a 1,139 person survey conducted by Cooper & Secrest Associates, December 15-19, 2007 on voter attitudes toward crime.
http://www.thirdway.org/data/produc...Crime_Poll_Toplines_wHighlights.pdf

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The Real Cost of Building and Financing Prisons and Jails

An American Seduction: Portrait of a Prison Town
By Joelle Fraser
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/TTT_paper2.pdf

Building a Prison Economy in Rural America
By Tracy Huling. From Invisible Punishment: The Collateral Consequences of Mass Imprisonment, Marc Mauer and Meda Chesney-Lind, Editors. The New Press. 2002.
http://www.prisonpolicy.org/scans/building.html

Catholic Bishops of the South: Wardens from Wall Street: Prison Privatization
Part of a series of pastoral statements by Catholic Bishops of the South on the Criminal Justice process.
http://www.catholiclabor.org/church-doc/CBS-2.htm

The Development of Last Resort: The Impact of New State Prisons on Small Town Economies
By Terry L. Besser and Margaret M. Hanson
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/TTT_paper1.pdf

Don't Build It Here Revisited (or "There is no Economic Salvation Through Incarceration") - Prisons Do Not Create Jobs
By Clayton Mosher and Gregory Hooks. Published in Prison Legal News, January 2010.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/dont_build_it_here.pdf

The Economic Impacts of the Prison Development Boom on Persistently Poor Rural Places
By T.L. Farrigan and A.K. Glasmeier.
http://www.onenation.psu.edu/produc..._development/prison_development.pdf

Fact Sheet on the Use of Lease Revenue Bonds to Build Prisons
By Californians United for a Responsible Budget.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Fact_Sheet_Lease_Rev_Bonds.pdf

Impacts of Jail Expansion in New York State: A Hidden Burden
By Dana Kaplan, Center for Constitutional Rights. May 2007. An excellent, comprehensive report on what is driving the building of jails in NYS includes important race-based analysis and recommendations to alternatives to jail building includes findings that that:

• Between 1999 and 2006, the New York state prison population had dropped from 71,000 to 62,928 people, a decrease of 8 percent in less than a decade. Despite the decrease in the prison population, the combined capacity of jails in upstate and suburban New York increased by 20.
• Jail construction has cost counties an estimated $1 billion, raising local property taxes in some instances as much as 40 percent and diverting money away from social services.
• The growth in the number of people incarcerated in jails has not been caused by an increase in crime or by an increase in population-rather, it has been caused by the expansion mandates issued by the SCOC and new arrest and detention policies, including arrest policies for low-level offenses and misdemeanors; a rising number of mentally ill people in jail; system inefficiencies; and the use of local jails to hold those detained by the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Jail Leaders Speak: Current & Future Challenges to Jail Administration and Operations
A Summary Report To The Bureau of Justice Assistance July 27, 2007 The Center for Innovative Public Policies, Inc. A few excerpts:

• "we have to stop looking at ourselves as just jailers, and look at ourselves as part of a social service provider system...let's embrace this problem, fight for the funding, and just do it"
• "participants suggested that jails need to explore nothing less than a fundamental mission change that expands their official role beyond just traditional incarceration functions toward becoming an acknowledged medical/mental health service provider for an un-served segment of the local population"
• "this will require the type of public attitude change and widespread commitment with funding, that can only be accomplished with a national initiative"
• "with regard to re-entry endeavors, a similar theme was observed in terms of expanding the traditionally recognized boundaries of the jail to encompass the transitional services that have heretofore remained relatively exclusively within the realm of state corrections systems"
• "again, jail representatives are looking not only to officially acknowledge and bring into the operational mainstream a role that has long been neglected, but also to employ it to enhance their value-added position in the community"

Prisons as Rural Development
Deborah M. Tootle
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Prisons_as_Rural_Development.pdf

Why Not in Our County? Cost-Effective Solutions to Jail Overcrowding (2004)
Factsheet. Compiled by Dana Kaplan, consultant, National Resource Center on Prisons and Communities.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/jail_reform_natl.pdf

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Mass Incarceration

Alabama Prison Crisis
An in-depth report on sentencing and correctional policy. Justice Strategies, October 31, 2005.
http://justicestrategies.net

At What Point is Justice Served?: Why Terminally Ill Patients Are Left to Die Behind the Walls of the Massachusetts Prison System
(Unknown author) 2008
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/MA-At_What_Point_Is_Justice_Served.pdf

Bureau of Justice Statistics: 2007 Prison statistics
Bureau of Justice Statistics 2007 Prison statistics.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/BJS_2007_Prison_Statistics.pdf

Buried Alive: Solitary Confinement in Arizona's Prisons and Jails
By Caroline Isaacs and Mathew Lowen. AFSC Arizona, May 2008. The report is the first attempt to catalog the use and impacts of solitary confinement for adults and juveniles in the Arizona Department of Corrections, the Arizona Department of Juvenile Corrections and the Maricopa County Fourth Avenue Jail. The report is part of the national AFSC StopMax Campaign.
http://www.afsc.org/az/documents/buried-alive.pdf

California Prison Reform: Inmates, I.T., and Health Care
What role computer technology, electronic medical records could or should play in the California's medical receivership's work. How can a system of 33 prisons run on shared typewriters and decomissioned printers hope to track inmate health care records? 3 articles written by Kim Nash, CIO magazine. April 2008
http://www.cio.com/special/california_prison_IT

Catholic Bishops of the South on the Criminal Justice:Challenges for the Criminal Justice Process in the South
Part of a series of pastoral statements by Catholic Bishops of the South on the Criminal Justice process.
http://www.catholiclabor.org/church-doc/CBS-1.htm

Changing Direction? State Sentencing Reforms 2004-2006
Finds that at least 22 states have enacted sentencing reforms in the past three years. The report further identifies that the most popular approach for reducing prison crowding -- implemented by 13 states -- was the diversion of low-level drug offenders from prison to drug treatment programs. The Sentencing Project, March 2007.
http://sentencingproject.org/Admin/...ications/sentencingreformforweb.pdf

Commission on Safety and Abuse in America's Prisons
A look at the problems from the perspective of corrections officers. Nov, 2005. Link to the Commission Website includes transcripts of all testimony.
http://www.prisoncommission.org/public_hearing_3.asp

Confronting Confinement
The Commission on Safety and Abuse in America's Prisons released Confronting Confinement, a report on violence and abuse in U.S. jails and prisons, the impact of those problems on public safety and public health, and how correctional facilities nationwide can become safer and more effective.
http://www.prisoncommission.org/report.asp

Correcting Course: Lessons from the 1970 Repeal of Mandatory Minimums
Describes how Congress repealed mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses in 1970 � and had no trouble getting reelected.
http://www.famm.org/Repository/Files/8189_FAMM_BoggsAct_final.pdf

Court Debt and Related Incarceration in Rhode Island from 2005 to 2007
By Nick Horton, Rhode Island Family Life Center. According to the report, "nearly 2,500 people were sent to the state prison last year because they failed to appear at hearings regarding court debts, such as fines and court costs."
http://riflc.org/pagetool/reports/CourtDebt.pdf

The Criminal and Juvenile Justice Policy Briefing Book
July 2006. The Criminal Justice Institute has created this "briefing book" and given it to Massachusetts political candidates and the press. The "briefing book" includes three sections - Snapshot, Questions and Answers, and Research in Brief - on these topics: Mandatory Minimum Sentences, Preventing Criminal Behavior, Offender Reentry and Juvenile Justice.

There are definitely problems with this "Briefing Book" including language (when will the ever get rid of calling someone who has been incarcerated an "offender"), no specific mention of the special concerns and issues women and girls face, unwarranted support of the Hampden County Jail (CJPC appears completely snowed by Ashe -- even inviting him to be their keynote speaker!), no mention real mention of how racism drives the incarceration of people of color -- especially African Americans, and on and on. Still, it has some good information and worth taking a look.
http://www.crjustice.org/cji/briefing_book_2006.pdf

Cruel and Degrading: The use of dogs for cell extractions in U.S. prisons
A report from Human Rights Watch. October 2006. Policies in Connecticut, Delaware, Iowa, South Dakota and Utah allow guards to use "aggressive, unmuzzled" dogs to compel uncooperative inmates to leave their cells. It said dogs may be ordered to bite prisoners if they resist.
http://www.hrw.org/reports/2006/us1006/index.htm

Custody and Control: Conditions of Confinement in New Yorks Juvenile Prisons for Girls
Human Rights Watch and the American Civil Liberties Union take the first in-depth look at New York's highest security juvenile prisons for girls. What the report uncovers is disturbing: Upon being found "delinquent," young girls from backgrounds of intergenerational poverty, many of whom have survived abuse and trauma, are locked up and again abused and neglected, this time at the hands of the state. This report documents the excessive use of a face-down "restraint" procedure in which girls are thrown to the floor, often causing injury, as well as incidents of sexual abuse, and inadequate educational and mental health services.
http://hrw.org/reports/2006/us0906/

Department of Justice 2010 Budget Likely to Increase Incarceration in U.S.
Overspending in law enforcement, prisons and under-spending in prevention, treatment and communities won’t yield long term improvements, will cause increased costs for states. May 2009. The President’s Department of Justice (DOJ) budget will likely lead to growing incarceration rates, according to an analysis by the Justice Policy Institute (JPI), a Washington, D.C.-based public policy organization. JPI’s analysis of the budgets released by the Administration late last week points to increases in spending for law enforcement and decreases in juvenile justice expenditures – what research says is the opposite of what is needed to have a long term impact on public safety and the number of people incarcerated in the United States.
http://www.justicepolicy.org/images..._FY2010%20Budget%20Factsheet_PS.pdf

Domestic Criminal Justice Issues and the ICCPR
A 2006 report by The Sentencing Project to the United Nations' Human Rights Committee regarding the United States' compliance with dictates specified in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). The Criminal Justice Policy Foundation, Open Society Policy Center, Penal Reform International, and The Sentencing Project contributed statements for the section, and other national organizations endorsed its recommendations. Key findings in this section include: The United States fails to adequately fund a viable public defense system, which jeopardizes the fairness of criminal court proceedings and increases the likelihood of erroneous conviction; Mandatory minimum sentences exacerbate racial inequality in the criminal justice system and have devastating consequences for the African American community; The American correctional system fails to protect basic human rights in prison, primarily through overcrowding, violence, inadequate programming, and confinement in “supermax” prison facilities; The practice of routinely prosecuting juveniles in adult criminal court, in some cases subjecting children to sentences of life without parole, continues in the U.S. despite guarantees in the ICCPR for its occurrence to be limited to “exceptional circumstances.”
http://www.sentencingproject.org/pdfs/ICCPRShadowreport.pdf

Education from the Inside, Out: The Multiple Benefits of College Programs in Prison
A report examining the multiple benefits of in-prison college programs. The Correctional Association of New York. In addition to conversations with formerly incarcerated people and program practitioners, the paper includes a survey of statistically-based studies supporting the significance of post-secondary correctional education in reducing recidivism and improving prison management. A look at programs in NY and other stages. The report includes a full examination of the tangible benefits of post-secondary correctional education. January 2009.
http://www.correctionalassociation....gher_Education_Full_Report_2009.pdf

Evaluating the Effectiveness of Supermax Prisons
Author: Daniel P. Mears. May 10, 2006, The Urban Institute. Executive Summary: Twenty years ago, super-maximum-security prisons were rare in America. As of 1996, over two-thirds of states had "supermax" facilities that collectively housed more than 20,000 inmates. Based on the present study, however, as of 2004, 44 states had supermax prisons. Designed to hold the putatively most violent and disruptive inmates in single-cell confinement for 23 hours per day, often for an indefinite period of time, these facilities have been lightning rods for controversy. Economic considerations are one reason- supermaxes typically cost two or three times more to build and operate than traditional maximum security prisons. A perhaps bigger reason lies in the criticism by some that supermax confinement is unconstitutional and inhumane. While proponents and opponents of supermax prisons debate such issues, a fundamental set of questions has gone largely unexamined: What exactly are the goals of supermax prisons? How, if at all, are these goals achieved? And what are their unintended impacts?
http://www.urban.org/publications/411326.html

Families Against Mandatory Minimums Omnibus Survey
A new poll released 9-25-08 shows widespread support for ending mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent offenses and that Americans will vote for candidates who feel the same way. Fully 78 percent of Americans (nearly eight in 10) agree that courts � not Congress � should determine an individual�s prison sentence. Six in 10 (59 percent) oppose mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent offenders. A majority of Americans (57 percent) polled said they would likely vote for a candidate for Congress who would eliminate all mandatory minimums for nonviolent crimes.
http://famm.org/Repository/Files/FAMM%20poll%20no%20embargo.pdf

Healthcare in Prison Thirty Years After Estelle v. Gamble
Wright. Journal of Correctional Health Care, 2008
http://realcostofprisons.org/materi...n_prison_30_years_after_estelle.pdf

Housing and Public Safety
"Housing and Public Safety" finds that increased availability of quality affordable or supportive housing is associated with public safety benefits. The release of this brief corresponds with concerns about the U.S. housing market and economic stability. Key findings include: Some studies found that substandard housing--particularly where exposure to lead hazards is more likely to occur--is associated with higher violent crime rates. Studies have shown that exposure to lead--associated with older, deteriorated, and lower-quality housing--can result in increased delinquency, violence, and crime. For populations who are the most at-risk for criminal justice involvement, supportive or affordable housing has been shown to be a cost effective public investment, lowering corrections and jail expenditures and freeing up funds for other public safety investments. Additionally, providing affordable or supportive housing to people leaving correctional facilities is an effective means of reducing the chance of future incarceration. States that spent more on housing experienced lower incarceration rates than those states that spent less. Of the 10 states that spent the larger proportion of their total expenditures on housing, all 10 had incarceration rates lower than the national average. Justice Policy Institute. November 2007
http://www.justicepolicy.org/images...1_REP_HousingPublicSafety_AC-PS.pdf

How New York Could Save Millions: The Potential Cost Savings and Public Safety Benefits of the Temporary Release Program
This paper discusses the incredible potential of the Temporary Release program to save the State millions of dollars while enhancing public safety. In fact, using DOCS' own figures, we calculate that if New York were to return to 1994 levels of participation in the Temporary Release program, the State would realize a savings of approximately $137 million a year. Center for Community Alternatives, NYS. January 2009.
http://www.communityalternatives.org/pdfs/TempReleasePolicy.pdf

Incarceration As Forced Migration: Effects on Selected Community Health Outcomes
September 2008. Conclusions: High rates of incarceration can have the unintended consequence of destabilizing communities and contributing to adverse health outcomes. (Am J Public Health. 2006;96:1762-1765. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2005.081760)
http://www.redorbit.com/news/health...elected_community_health_outcomes/#

Jail populations exploding; massive growth devastating local communities
Justice Policy Institute, April 2008. Communities are bearing the cost of a massive explosion in the jail population which has nearly doubled in less than two decades. The research found that jails are now warehousing more people--who have not been found guilty of any crime--for longer periods of time than ever before. The research shows that in part due to the rising costs of bail, people arrested today are much more likely to serve jail time before trial than they would have been twenty years ago, even though crime rates are nearly at the lowest levels in thirty years.
http://www.justicepolicy.org/content.php?hmID=1811&smID=1581&ssmID=73

Justice Expenditure and Employment in the United States, 2003
(04/06 NCJ 212260) Provides selected data from the U.S. Census Bureau's Annual General Finance and Employment Surveys. Data presented include police protection, judicial and legal services, and corrections expenditure and employment for Federal, State, and local governments in 2003 and national trend data for 1982 to 2003. Highlights include the following:

• The total number of justice employees grew 86% between 1982 and 2003 with the Federal Government having the largest percentage increase - 168%
• Total per capita expenditure for each justice function increased more than 300% between 1982 and 2003, with corrections having the largest per capita increase - 436%
• The total direct justice expenditure for all levels of governments grew from $3.6 billion in 1982 to $185 billion in 2003, a 418% increase

Life Without Parole, America's Other Death Penalty: Notes on Life Under Sentence of Death by Incarceration
Robert Johnson and Sandra McGunigall-Smith. Prison Journal, Vol. 88, Number 2, July 2008. Robert Johnson writes: "Life Without Parole is death by incarceration and should be used as our only death penalty and only with capital murderers."
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/americas_other_death_penalty.pdf

Literacy Behind Bars: Results From the 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy Prison Survey
This report from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) presents findings on the literacy skills of incarcerated adults and analyzes the changes in these skills since the 1992 National Adult Literacy Survey (NALS). May 2007
http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2007473

Lock Up USA
American History Magazine. October 2009. Info graphic based on the Prison Index of the Prison Policy Initiative.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Lock_Up_USA.pdf

Locked Up: Corrections Policy in New Hampshire/Paper 1: The Fiscal Consequences of Incarceration Policies, 1981-2001
September, 2001. New Hampshire Center for Public Policy's excellent analysis on state corrections policy and spending. Includes a focus on county jails as well as state prisons. Some really good graphics and charts as well.
http://www.unh.edu/nhcpps/lockedup1.pdf

Locked Up: Corrections Policy in New Hampshire/Paper 2: Options For Reducing The Prison Population and the Cost of Incarceration.
February, 2004. New Hampshire Center for Public Policy's excellent analysis on state corrections policy and spending. Includes a focus on county jails as well as state prisons. Some really good graphics and charts as well.
http://www.unh.edu/nhcpps/locked2.pdf

MA Department of Correction (DOC) Advisory Council's Preliminary Report
Released on June 17, 2005. The 39-page document reviews progress made on eighteen recommendations set forth in the Harshbarger Commission on Corrections Reform (GCCR) report of June, 30 2004. It also includes recommendations for next steps and for removing identified barriers to change.
http://www.mass.gov/Eeops/docs/doc/DOCAC_prelim_report.pdf

Mental Health Problems of Prison and Jail Inmates
Bureau of Justice Statistics, September 2006. Presents estimates of the prevalence of mental health problems among prison and jail inmates using self-reported data on recent history and symptoms of mental disorders. It presents measures of mental health problems by gender, race, Hispanic origin, and age. The report describes mental health problems and mental health treatment among people who are incarceratedsince admission to jail or prison. Highlights include the following:

• Nearly a quarter of both State prisoners and jail inmates who had a mental health problem, compared to a fifth of those without, had served 3 or more prior incarcerations.
• Female inmates had higher rates of mental health problems than male inmates (State prisons: 73% of females and 55% of males; Federal prisons: 61% of females and 44% of males; local jails: 75% of females and 63% of males).
• Over 1 in 3 State prisoners, 1 in 4 Federal prisoners, and 1 in 6 jail inmates who had a mental health problem had received treatment since admission.

Moving Target: A Decade of Resistance to the Prison Industrial Complex
Justice Policy Institute, September 2008. Examines the progress of reform 10 years after Critical Resistance first launched its efforts to dismantle the PIC. The report examines the Prison Industrial Complex and the relationship between government and private interests that use imprisonment, policing, and surveillance as a solution to social, political, and economic problems.
http://www.justicepolicy.org/images/upload/08-09_REP_MovingTargetCR10_AC-PS.pdf

Nationwide Survey of Control Units
An inventory of Control Units across the United States. (May 2009)
http://www.abolishcontrolunits.org/research

The Need for Establishing a Humanitarian Medical Parole Policy in Massachusetts
(Unknown author) 2008
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/MA_Medical_Parole_policy.pdf

No Easy Answers: Sex Offender Laws in the US
Human Right Watch. September, 2007. Laws aimed at people convicted of sex offenses may not protect children from sex crimes but do lead to harassment, ostracism and even violence against former offenders. Human Rights Watch urges the reform of state and federal registration and community notification laws, and the elimination of residency restrictions, because they violate basic rights of former offenders. The 146-page report, "No Easy Answers: Sex Offender Laws in the United States," is the first comprehensive study of US sex offender policies, their public safety impact, and the effect they have on former offenders and their families. During two years of investigation for this report, Human Rights Watch researchers conducted over 200 interviews with victims of sexual violence and their relatives, former offenders, law enforcement and government officials, treatment providers, researchers, and child safety advocates.
http://hrw.org/reports/2007/us0907/

No Exit: The Expanding Use of Life Sentences in America
A report from The Sentencing Project represents the first nationwide collection of life sentence data documenting race, ethnicity and gender. The report's findings reveal overwhelming racial and ethnic disparities in the allocation of life sentences: 66% of all persons sentenced to life are non-white, and 77% of juveniles serving life sentences are non-white. The Sentencing Project finds a record 140,610 individuals are now serving life sentences in state and federal prisons, 6,807 of whom were juveniles at the time of the crime. In addition, 29% of persons serving a life sentence (41,095) have no possibility of parole, and 1,755 were juveniles at the time of the crime. Other findings in the report include:
* In five states - Alabama, California, Massachusetts, Nevada, and New York -at least 1 in 6 prisoners is serving a life sentence.
* Five states - California, Florida, Louisiana, Michigan, and Pennsylvania - each have more than 3,000 people serving life without parole. Pennsylvania leads the nation with 345 juveniles serving sentences of life without parole.
* In six states - Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Maine, Pennsylvania, and South Dakota - and the federal government, all life sentences are imposed without the possibility of parole.
* The dramatic growth in life sentences is not primarily a result of higher crime rates, but of policy changes that have imposed harsher punishments and restricted parole consideration.
The Sentencing Project calls for the elimination of sentences of life without parole, and restoring discretion to parole boards to determine suitability for release. The report also recommends that individuals serving parole-eligible life sentences be properly prepared for reentry back into the community.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/doc/publications/inc_noexit.pdf

One in 100: Behind Bars in America 2008
Pew Center on the States. February 2008. For the first time in the nation�s history, more than one in 100 American adults is behind bars. The prison population grew by 25,000 last year, bringing it to almost 1.6 million. Another 723,000 people are in local jails. The number of American adults is about 230 million, meaning that one in every 99.1 adults is behind bars.

Incarceration rates are even higher for some groups. One in 36 Hispanic adults is behind bars, based on Justice Department figures for 2006. One in 15 black adults is, too, as is one in nine black men between the ages of 20 and 34. The report found that only one in 355 white women between the ages of 35 and 39 are behind bars but that one in 100 black women are
http://www.pewcenteronthestates.org/uploadedFiles/One%20in%20100.pdf

One in 31: The Long Reach of American Corrections
Pew Center on the States.States: March 2009. Counting people on probation and parole, one in 31 U.S. adults is under some form of correctional supervision, including incarceration, according to the study. In 1982, 1 in 77 adults was under correctional supervision. States spend seven times more money on prisons than on probation and parole, even though the vast majority of the 7.3 million adults now under correctional supervision are not behind bars, according to the first detailed survey of state corrections spending since 2002. The new report focuses on the more than 5 million adults under probation or parole supervision, either because their crimes did not warrant incarceration or because they have been released after serving time. States, the Pew study contends, devote a disproportionately small amount of funding to the management of these offenders, when compared with what they spend on criminals currently behind bars - even taking into consideration the far greater costs of operating prisons.
http://www.pewcenteronthestates.org..._1in31_report_FINAL_WEB_2-27-09.pdf

An Overview of Prisoners' First Amendment Rights
By Larry Dupuis, Wisconsin ACLU, March 29, 2007.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/prisoners_first_amendment_rights.pdf

Priorities and Public Safety: Reentry and the Rising Cost of Our Corrections System
The Crime and Justice Institute for the Boston Foundation. (Massachusetts) 2009.
http://www.cjinstitute.org/files/CorrectionsCosts.pdf

The Prison Industry: Carceral Expansion and Employment in US Counties, 1969-1994.
By Gregory Hooks et al.
http://www.on-the-map.com/ssq_0304.pdf

Prolonged Solitary Confinement and the Constitution
By Prof. Jules Lobel, University of Pittsburgh School of Law Published in: 11 University of Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law 115 (2008).
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Lobel_Prolonged_Solitary.pdf

Pruning Prisons: How Cutting Corrections Can Save Money and Protect Public Safety
States could save a combined $4.1 billion by increasing the availability of parole by shifting 10 percent of the prison population into the parole system, and improving parole support and services so that fewer people are returned to prison for technical (rule) violations. Additionally, the report finds that community-based drug treatment provides bigger crime reduction returns than prison--for every dollar spent on drug treatment in the community, the state receives $18 in benefits. Justice Policy Institute: May 2009
http://www.justicepolicy.org/images/upload/09_05_REP_PruningPrisons_AC_PS.pdf

Public Safety, Public Spending: Forecasting America's Prison Population 2007-2011
Prepared for the Pew Charitable Trusts by the JFA Institute. February 2007. By 2011 one in every 178 U.S. residents will live in prison. America will have more than 1.7 million men and women in prison, an increase of more than 192,000 from 2006. That increase could cost taxpayers as much as $27.5 billion over the next five years beyond what they currently spend on prisons. Among the report's projections for 2011:

• Without policy changes by the states, the nation's incarceration rate will reach 562 per 100,000, or one of every 178 Americans.
• The new inmates will cost states an additional $15 billion for prison operations over the five-year period. Construction of new prison beds will cost as much as $12.5 billion.
• Unless Montana, Arizona, Alaska, Idaho and Vermont change their sentencing or release practices, they can expect to see their prison systems grow by one third or more. Similarly, barring reforms, Colorado, Washington, Wyoming, Nevada, Utah and South Dakota can expect their inmate populations to grow by about 25 percent.
• Connecticut, Delaware and New York are projected to see no change in their prison populations. Maryland will see a 1 percent increase in prison population.
• The number of women prisoners is projected to grow by 16 percent, while the male population will increase 12 percent.
• Though the Northeast boasts the lowest incarceration rates, it has the highest costs per prisoner, led by Rhode Island ($44,860 per prisoner). Louisiana spends the least per prisoner ($13,009).
• State by state projections of the number of men and women incarcerated, crime rates, costs.

Reducing Racial Disparity in the Criminal Justice System
A comprehensive manual for practitioners and policymakers. The publication provides insight into how racial disparities develop in the criminal justice system, and workable solutions to address and reduce disparities. The manual provides strategies for addressing disparities at each stage of the system, as well as 17 "best practices" illustrating practitioner approaches for enhancing fairness. The Sentencing Project. September 2008.
http://sentencingproject.org/Admin/...ions/rd_reducingracialdisparity.pdf

A Rising Share: Hispanics and Federal Crime
By Mark Hugo Lopez, Associate Director, Pew Hispanic Center, and Michael T. Light, Pennsylvania State University. 2009. Sharp growth in illegal immigration and increased enforcement of immigration laws have altered the ethnic composition of prisoners sentenced in federal courts. In 2007, Latinos accounted for 40% of all sentenced federal prisoners-more than triple their share (13%) of the total U.S. adult population. Among sentenced immigrants, most were convicted of unlawfully entering or remaining in the U.S. Fully 75% of Latino prisoners sentenced for immigration crimes in 2007 were convicted of entering the U.S. unlawfully or residing in the country without authorization.
http://pewhispanic.org/files/reports/104.pdf

Solving California's Corrections Crisis: Time is Running Out
The long-awaited California Little Hoover Commission report on sentencing reform. "In a blistering 84-page report, the nonpartisan Little Hoover Commission linked the problems plaguing the correctional system to political cowardice among governors and lawmakers fearful of being labeled soft on crime." (LA Times)
http://www.lhc.ca.gov/lhcdir/report185.html

Spreading the Pain: The Social Cost of Incarcerating Parents
By Thomas E. Lengyel, MSW, Ph.D., Director of Research & Evaluation Services, Alliance for Children and Families. September 2006. An interesting paper including the social cost and dollar figure for incarcerating a parent convicted of a drug offense in NY State amounting to $776,698.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Spreading-the-Pain-Working-Draft.doc

State Rates of Incarceration by Race (2004)
The Sentencing Project
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/TSP_racial_dispartity_2004.pdf

Testimony by Frank Smith, November 11, 2005, St.Louis, MO
Commission on Safety and Abuse in America's Prisons. Written testimony and eight pages of synopses of 44 affidavits. These were from inmates who were allegedly assaulted in two separate "guards' riots" at CCA's CADC facility in Florence, Arizona, in 1998 and 2000. Most of the affidavits were written contemporaneous with the riot, when the inmates were on lockdown in different pods, unable to communicate with each other. You'll find their accounts are remarkably consistent.The inmates' statements really captured how out of control and unprofessional the guards were in each instance. It compares prison safety issues in public vs. for-profit prisons.
http://www.prisoncommission.org/statements/smith.pdf

The Resistable Rise and Predictable Fall of the U.S. Supermax
By Stephen F. Eisenman
http://www.monthlyreview.org/091116eisenman.php

Thinking About Prison and Its Impact on the Twenty-First Century
A talk by Marc Mauer of the Sentencing Project. April 2004.
http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/osjcl/issue2_articles/OSU-Reckless-PDF-3-17-05.pdf

Thirty Years After Estelle v. Gamble: A Legal Retrospective
By William J. Rold. Journal of Correctional Health Care, 2008
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/30_years_after_estelle.pdf

Timeline: Solitary Confinement in U.S. Prisons
NPR.org, July 26, 2006 An overview of key moments in the history of solitary confinement.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5579901

Treatment of Immigration Detainees Housed at ICE Facilities
Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General, December 2006
http://www.dhs.gov/xoig/assets/mgmtrpts/OIG_07-01_Dec06.pdf

Two-Tiered Justice: Race, Class, and Crime Policy
An essay by Marc Mauer in The Integration Debate, edited by Chester Hartman and Gregory Squires. Examines the intersection of policy changes in criminal justice with the dynamics of a society that is still segregated in large part has produced a crisis of mass incarceration with profound effects for communities of color. In the drug war and other areas, the "two-tiered" approach to public safety has emphasized treatment and public health strategies in communities with resources, while stressing punitive criminal justice initiatives in low-income neighborhoods. These policies have set in motion a vicious cycle whereby the failure to invest in communities leads to higher rates of incarceration, which in turn contribute to declining economic prospects.
http://sentencingproject.org/doc/publications/rd_integrationdebate.pdf

Understanding California Corrections
By Joan Petersilia, California Policy Research Center, May 2006. A detailed report of the growth of CA "corrections." Includes extensive graphs on CA in comparison to all other states.
http://www.ucop.edu/cprc/documents/understand_ca_corrections.pdf

Unlocking America: Why and How to Reduce America's Prison Population
The JFA Institute, November 2007. Includes "Crime Rates and Incarceration", "Three Key Myths About Crime and Incarceration", "Decarceration, Cost Savings and Public Safety."
http://www.jfa-associates.com/publications/srs/UnlockingAmerica.pdf

Who's in Prison? The Changing Demographics of Incarceration
The Public Policy Institute of California. California Counts: Population and Trends, Vol. 8, No. 1. August 2006. By Amanda Bailey and Joseph M. Hayes.
http://www.ppic.org/content/pubs/cacounts/CC_806ABCC.pdf

World Prison Population List (sixth edition)
By Roy Walmsley, International Centre for Prison Studies, Kings College, London. The World Prison Population List gives details of the number of prisoners held in 211 independent countries and dependent territories. It shows the differences in the level of imprisonment across the world and makes possible an estimate of the world prison population total. The information is the latest available at the end of February 2005.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/2006-world-prison-pop-list.pdf

Zogby Poll on Attitudes of U.S. Voters Reveals Strong Support for Prisoner Rehabilitation and Reentry Services
In February 2006, Zogby International was commissioned to conduct a national public opinion poll about American attitudes toward rehabilitation and reentry of prisoners into their home communities. Except where noted, the questions pertained to prisoners convicted of nonviolent crimes, such as drug or property offenses. The results of the poll showed that striking majorities favor rehabilitation as a major goal of incarceration, and appears to reflect a recognition that current correctional systems do not help the problem of crime; that prisoners face enormous barriers to successful reintegration to the community; and that rehabilitative services should be provided as a means of reducing crime.
http://www.njisj.org/pubdocs/2006/red_051206_zogby.pdf

[Return to top]

Obstacles to Coming Home

After Prison: Roadblocks to Reentry. A Report on State Legal Barriers Facing People with Criminal Records
From the Legal Action Center.
http://www.lac.org/lac/

Barriers to Employment: Prison Time
by John Pawasarat, Employment and Training Institute, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2007. Approximately 40% of African American men between 25 and 34 living in Milwaukee had been previously imprisoned as compared to 5% for the white and Hispanic population. The number of previously incarcerated men and women released to Milwaukee Co increased from 2,000 in 1983 to 8,000 in 2005. The report showed that possession of a driver’s license to be more important than education level in determining whether a person can attain and maintain employment. Specific recommendations are made for programs in prisons so prisoners can begin the process of regaining the license before release.
http://www.uwm.edu/Dept/ETI/barriers/MilwaukeePrisonStudy.pdf

California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation: The Intermediate Sanctions Programs Lacked Performance Benchmarks and Were Plagued with Implementation Problems
(#2005-11). A couple of years ago, the legislature passed a series of measures designed to reduce California's off-the-charts parole revocation rates -- parolees are returned to prison on technical violations at twice the national average. The state auditor has released a report on the failure of the parole reform. November 2005.
http://www.bsa.ca.gov/pdfs/reports/2005-111.pdf

California's Parole Experiment
By Jeremy Travis and Sarah Lawrence, Urban Institute, 2002. "California's policy is expensive, burdensome and with proof of being more effective." A look from 2002 at one important element driving extreme over-crowding in California's prisons.
http://www.urban.org/UploadedPDF/CA_parole_exp.pdf

The Collateral Effects of Incarceration on Fathers, Families, and Communities
By Council on Crime and Justice (March 2006). Focusing on racial disparities in the Minnesota criminal justice system, this report examines the effects of imprisonment on family relationships from the perspective of fathers, including a focus on their strengths and struggles behind bars and upon reentry into their communities. In addition, the report examines community dynamics and resources within neighborhoods experiencing high levels of reentry or exit due to incarceration.
http://www.advancementproject.org/cjrc/ColEff.pdf

Court Debt and Related Incarceration in Rhode Island
This report details the process of assessing and collecting court fees, including the related period of incarceration. It concludes that the most common reason for putting someone in jail in RI is for court debt, and that in many cases that process costs the state more than the individual owed. Rhode Island Family Life Center. May 2007.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materi...bt_and_Related_Incarceration_RI.pdf

Does it Pay to Invest In Jail Re-Entry Programs for Jail Inmates
John Roman and Aaron Chalfin, Urban Institute Re-Entry Roundtable. June 2006. Cost benefit analysis for "re-entry" program in jails focusing on low cost programs in the Hampden County Jail (MA), high cost programs in Montgomery County MD, and contracted programs in Chicago. The paper includes statistical information on the increasing costs of jails from 1983 to 2003 (an increase of 600%) and 3 times the number of cells during the same period. They find that even a modest re-entry program in jails yields considerable benefits. Non-contracted re-entry services might be expected to return between $4.40 to $9.00 in social benefits for each $1 invested. And, if over time, re-entry programs persist, greater benefits will accrue.
http://www.urban.org/projects/reentry-roundtable/upload/roman_chalfin.pdf

Does Prison Harden Inmates?: A Discontinuity-based Approach
By M. Keith Chen and Jesse M. Shapiro. December 2006
http://home.uchicago.edu/~jmshapir/prison120406.pdf

The Evolving Standard of Decency: Post Release Planning?
By Jeff Mellow and Robert Greifirgen. Journal of Correctional Health Care, 2008.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/evolving_standard_of_decency.pdf

Fact Sheet on Substance Abuse and Re-Entry
Re-Entry Policy Council, Feb. 2006.
http://www.reentrypolicy.org/rp/main.aspx?dbName=DocumentViewer&DocumentID=908

Financial Penalties Proposed in the NYS 2006 Executive Budget
From Justice Strategies, the research, policy and training division of the Center for Community Alternatives.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/nys-2006-penalties.pdf

From Prison to Home: The Effect of Incarceration and Reentry on Children, Families, and Communities Incarceration. Reentry, and Social Capital: Social Networks in the Balance
By Dina R. Rose and Todd R. Clear, John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/prison2home02/Rose.htm

From Prison To Work: A Proposal for a National Reentry Program
By Bruce Western. Bookings Institution. December 2008
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/12_prison_to_work_western.pdf

Improving Outcomes for People with Mental Illnesses under Community Corrections Supervision: A Guide to Research-Informed Policy and Practice
The Justice Center: March 2009. The Guide reviews the body of recent research on community corrections supervision for people with mental illnesses and translates the findings to help officials develop effective interventions. Based on other recent prevalence studies, the Guide indicates that an unprecedented number of these individuals have serious mental illnesses. These individuals are more likely than others to have their community sentences revoked, return to jail or prison, and become more deeply involved in the criminal justice system. This first-of-its-kind guide helps program planners and policymakers apply research on promising practices to improve outcomes for people with mental illnesses under community corrections supervision.

"More than 1.5 million people released from jail each year have serious mental illnesses and many will require special supervision strategies and treatments to safely and successfully rejoin their communities," said Nevada Assemblywoman Sheila Leslie, the specialty courts coordinator of the state's Second Judicial District and Justice Center board member. The Guide indicates that community corrections and mental health officials are increasingly aware that they are serving the same individuals without positive effect. It explores the extent to which people with mental illnesses become involved in the community corrections system, and why traditional supervision and treatment strategies are not generally effective for this population.
http://consensusproject.org/downloads/community.corrections.research.guide.pdf

Mapping Prisoner Reentry: An Action Research Guidebook
The Reentry Mapping Network (RMN) is a partnership among community-based organizations and the Urban Institute designed to create community change through the mapping and analysis of neighborhood- level data related to prisoner reentry. RMN partners collect and analyze local data related to incarceration, reentry, and community well-being; develop policy options based on the findings; and document their accomplishments and lessons learned. This guidebook provides information on how to understand and address prisoner reentry at the community level through mapping and analysis. It describes the concepts and methods underlying the RMN so that other jurisdictions can learn from these experiences in the interests of crafting more effective and successful reentry strategies in their communities. The key steps to doing so are highlighted below. (Sept. 2005)
http://www.urban.org/UploadedPDF/411250_RMNguidebook.pdf

The Mark of a Criminal Record
By Devah Pager, American Journal of Sociology, March 2003. A criminal record represents a major barrier to employment with important implications for racial disparities. The article focuses on the consequences of incarceration for the employment outcomes of black and white job seekers.
http://www.princeton.edu/~pager/pager_ajs.pdf

Maryland's Parole Supervision Fee: A Barrier to Reentry
By Rebekah Diller, Judith Greene, & Michelle Jacobs. Brennan Center for Justice (March 2009). Given the increasing use of economic sanctions by state governments, people entering the criminal justice system are unlikely to leave it without incurring new debt. For example, Maryland law authorizes charges for everything from an individual's initial arrest, to the costs of a constitutionally mandated public defender, to the costs of the individual's supervision on probation or parole. Most of these charges are unrelated to the criminal system's putative goals of punishment, deterrence, incapacitation, and rehabilitation. Instead, they are designed to subsidize state budgets. This growing category of debt created by fees levied to generate revenue is distinct from fines and restitution, the two more traditional categories of criminal justice-related "legal financial obligations," or "LFOs." Fines are the traditional monetary penalty, usually based on the severity of crime, imposed to punish an individual. Restitution, a court-ordered payment by the offender to compensate the victim for financial loss resulting from the crime, is rooted in a restorative justice approach that emphasizes repairing the harm of criminal behavior. Revenue-generating "fees," on the other hand, are assessed not for any criminal justice purpose, but rather to fund state budgets. They are imposed on a largely indigent population, rather than on the general tax-paying populace. And, they are imposed without regard to their impact on the ability of persons convicted of a crime to reenter society after completing court-mandated punishment. The parole supervision fee in Maryland - a monthly obligation of $40 that totals of hundreds of dollars over the course of the parole term - is just such a charge.
http://www.brennancenter.org/conten...pervision_fee_a_barrier_to_reentry/

People, Places, and Things: The Social Process of Reentry for Female Ex-Offenders
By Andrea M. Leverentz. August 2006. Source: National Institute of Justice. This study examined the social lives of female with felony convictions to determine the features of their relationships after their release from prison.
http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/215178.pdf

Priorities for the New Presidential Administration to Reduce Poverty through Transitional Jobs Programs
The National Transitional Jobs Network is requesting $1 billion dollars over five years in new dedicated sources of Transitional Jobs funding as well as alterations and clarifications of current law in various programs to facilitate use of current funding streams for Transitional Jobs programs.
http://transitionaljobs.net/Policy/NTJNFed%20Memo1215.pdf

Repaying Debts
The Council of State Governments Justice Center is a first-of-its-kind comprehensive guide, supported by the U.S. Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Assistance that details how policymakers can increase financial accountability among people leaving correctional facilities, improve rates of child support collection and victim restitution, and make individuals' transition from prisons and jails to the community safe and successful.

People released from prisons and jails typically must make payments to a host of agencies, including probation departments, courts, attorney generals' offices, and child support enforcement offices. While coordinated collections efforts among these agencies could increase rates of repayment to victims, families, and criminal justice agencies, there is rarely a single agency tracking all of an individual's court-ordered debts and facilitating payment.

The report recommends very specific strategies to improve how people released from prisons and jails meet their court-ordered financial obligations. It also provides examples from states that have successfully implemented some aspect of these strategies, including Arizona, California, Colorado, Iowa, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Texas, Utah, Rhode Island, Washington, and Wisconsin.
http://justicecenter.csg.org/media/press_releases/

Report of the Re-Entry Policy Council
This 600 page report issued in January 2005 presents recommendations and analysis developed by the Re-entry Policy Council (RPC), an organization consisting of over 100 policymakers representing diverse constituencies. The RPC is sponsored by the Council of State Governments, a nonpartisan organization that tracks all branches of state government, plus 11 additional nonprofit organizations.
http://www.reentrypolicy.org/rp/main.aspx?dbID=DB_TheREPORT409

Scarlet Letters and Recidivism: Does an Old Criminal Record Predict Future Offending?
By Megan C. Kurlycheck and Robert Brame, July 19, 2006. The study's bottom line? People with felony convictions with years-old rap sheets are less likely to commit new crimes then those recently released. Moreover, for policy related implications, there should be more legislative buy-in into giving the old records of people with felony convictions less weight in considering whether they should get the job.
Reaction Essays:
Evidence-Based Policy for Successful Prisoner Re-Entry (by Devah Prager),
Should Criminal History Records Be Universally Available? (by Steven Raphael)
Main article:
http://www.twincities.com/multimedia/twincities/archive/pdfs/scarlet.pdf

Smoothing the Path from Prison to Home: A Summary and a Roundtable Discussion on the Lessons of Project Greenlight
By James A. Wilson, Yury Cheryachukin, Robert C. Davis, Jean Dauphinee, Robert Hope, Kajal Gehi, and Timothy Ross. This publication combines two parts: A roundtable discussion (13 pages) and a summary report (15 pages). We are also publishing a technical report (155 pages) that supplements this publication, introduced by the roundtable discussion. This report presents research findings about Project Greenlight, reentry demonstration project that the Vera Institute of Justice conducted at the Queensboro Correctional Facility in Queens, New York, from February 2002 to February 2003.

Drawing upon research literature and demonstrated best practices, Greenlight sought to reduce recidivism among soon-to-be-released men by working with corrections and parole staff to address a spectrum of reentry issues during the last 60 days in prison. Despite these efforts, however, Vera researchers found that arrest rates among Greenlight's 348 participants were higher than those of two different comparison groups.While disappointing, these findings present the field of prison reentry with a valuable learning opportunity. The technical and summary reports now available on our web site are supplemented by an edited transcript of an April 2005 roundtable discussion about the project that was attended by prominent researchers, expert practitioners, and former Greenlight and select Vera staff. The edited transcript covers many issues that could have factored into the disappointing outcomes and present lessons for current and future programs that are designed to reduce recidivism and improve outcomes for men and women returning to the community from prison.
http://www.vera.org/publication_pdf/319_590.pdf?bulletin=55&token=1183

A Study of Parole Board Decisions for Lifers
Massachusetts: Phantom Prisoner, 2003-2006. Published May 2007. To contact the Phantom Prisoner and/or subscribe to the Phantom Prisoner Newsletter ($5 for prisoners in stamps or cash and $10 for free world subscribers), write to Phantom Prisoner, Ltd., P.O. Box 114379, Centerdale, RI 02911
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Phantom-Prisoner.pdf

A Study of Parole Board Decisions for Lifers 2008
Lifers Group, Norfolk Prison, Massachusetts. Lifers' Group, Inc. of MCI, Norfolk has obtained data from the MA Parole Board on the hearings given Lifers, most of whom were convicted of 2nd degree murder. (A very few were convicted of other crimes which the M.G.L. provides for a maximum sentence of life. Those crimes include rape, poisoning, armed assault within a dwelling, armed robbery, kidnapping with intent to extort, and assault of a child with intent to commit rape.) The very detailed analysis, with discussion, separates decisions by those who are before the Parole board for the first time and those who are applying a subsequent time. Also listed are the reasons that the Parole board gives the applicants, both for approved parole and parole denied, as is their frequency. Finally, the length of setbacks (time needing to elapse before an individual denied parole is allowed to reapply for parole.) is charted.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materi...ofParoleBoardDecisionsforLifers.pdf

When the Gates Open: Ready4Work - A National Response to the Prisoner Reentry Crisis
By Joshua Good and Pamela Sherrid. October 2005, 32 pages. When the Gates Open describes the emergence of Ready4Work, a 17-site, national ex-prisoner reentry initiative developed by P/PV. The report outlines the initiative's basic goals and design, and examines how it is directly confronting the nation's reentry crisis by drawing on local faith- and community-based organizations to provide job training, mentoring, case management and job placement services.The report documents a rare partnership among the business, government, community and faith sectors, as they come together to confront alarmingly high incarceration and recidivism rates. It describes key start-up and implementation challenges and, using early outcomes data, touches on a number of promising practices for future reentry efforts.
http://www.ppv.org/ppv/community_fa...blications.asp?section_id=3##pub189

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Related Issues

Annual Privatization Report
Annual Privatization Report by the Reason Foundation ("free minds and free markets") includes federal, state and local update, surface transportation, air transportation, education, emerging issues such as State Lottery privatization update, water & wastewater, telecommunications, land use and environment, and of course...prisons,
http://www.reason.org/apr2008/

Blacks See Growing Values Gap Between Poor and Middle Class; Optimism about Black Progress Declines
Pew Research Center. 91 pages. November 13, 2007. African Americans see a widening gulf between the values of middle class and poor blacks, and nearly four-in-ten say that because of the diversity within their community, blacks can no longer be thought of as a single race. The new nationwide Pew Research Center survey also finds blacks less upbeat about the state of black progress now than at any time since 1983. Looking backward, just one-in-five blacks say things are better for blacks now than they were five years ago. Looking ahead, fewer than half of all blacks (44%) say they think life for blacks will get better in the future, down from the 57% who said so in a 1986 survey. Blacks have much less confidence than whites in the fairness of the criminal justice system. Also, blacks say that anti-black discrimination is commonplace in everyday life; whites disagree.

A 53% majority of African Americans say that blacks who don't get ahead are mainly responsible for their situation, while just three-in-ten say discrimination is mainly to blame. As recently as the mid-1990s, black opinion on this question tilted in the opposite direction, with a majority of African Americans saying then that discrimination is the main reason for a lack of black progress.
http://pewsocialtrends.org/assets/pdf/Race.pdf

By the Numbers: The Public Costs of Teen Childbearing
Documents the public costs of teen childbearing at both the national and state level. Teen childbearing in the United States costs taxpayers (federal, state, and local) at least $9.1 billion, according to a new report by Saul Hoffman, Ph.D. and published by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy. Most of the costs of teen childbearing are associated with negative consequences for the children of teen mothers, including increased costs for health care, foster care, and incarceration. The study includes state by state fact sheets on cost of teen childbearing.
http://www.teenpregnancy.org/costs/default.asp

The Combat Veteran in Minnesota Criminal Court: A Proposal to Mitigate Sentences and Encourage Treatment of the Most Troubled of Our Returning Heroes
January 11, 2008. By Brockton D. Hunter, Legislative Chair, Minnesota Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. See also the accompanying Sentencing Mitigation Bill for Veterans, Minn. HF3670 (2008).
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/vets_sentencing.pdf

The Economic Costs of the War in Iraq: An Appraisal 3 Years After the Beginning of the Conflict.
By Linda Bilmes and Joseph E. Stiglitz. January 2006. A cost-benefit analysis of the war.
http://www2.gsb.columbia.edu/faculty/jstiglitz/cost_of_war_in_iraq.pdf

Follow The Money Flow Chart
"Federal hurricane relief has traveled a convoluted path from Congress to the Gulf Coast. More than 70 federal agencies have handled a portion of the approximately $87 billion that has been doled out."
http://nationaljournal.com/about/njweekly/stories/pdfs/0811katcash.pdf

Katrina Anniversary Report
Co-released by the Women's Funding Network and the Ms. Foundation for Women. "Women have become a critical force rebuilding the Gulf Coast after being disproportionately affected by Katrina. This report reveals that, while the lens of race and class were applied to the natural disaster early on, the gender dimensions of poverty and recovery on the Gulf Coast have largely been overlooked. The report includes amazing stories of women survivors, outlines post-disaster challenges they face, and the actions they've taken as leaders in the rebuilding process in partnership with women's organizations and women's foundations."
http://www.wfnet.org/documents/publications/katrina_report_082706.pdf

The Katrina Files
An archive of reports on the hurricane and the aftermath, is now available at C3 Online, the website of the UCLA-based Center for Communications and Community. The archive includes links to print, video and audio content in the following categories: Coverage Critiques, Community and Independent Media, Community Activism Research, Journalism and Research Archives
http://uclaccc.ucla.edu

Mixed Signals
A counter-recruitment comic book by artist Sabrina Jones. It is being emblazoned on paper bags, to be distributed to delis and bodegas in New York by a mysterious cadre of activist artists known as "Friends of William Blake." Check it out in this week's "Time Out NY", on the William Blake website, or at the comic book's web page:
http://www.brethren.org/oepa/CRMixedSignals.html

National Journal Special Report: After Katrina
http://nationaljournal.com/about/njweekly/stories/2006/0811nj3.htm

New Orleans by the Numbers
By Peter Wagner and Susan Edwards. This article is from the March/April 2006 issue of Dollars & Sense magazine. The city of New Orleans and the state of Louisiana were in trouble long before Hurricane Katrina flooded the city and long before the Federal Emergency Management Agency decided that the director's dinner engagements were more important than the plight of hurricane victims running out of food in the Superdome.
http://www.dollarsandsense.org/archives/2006/0306wagneredwards.html

Opportunity Agenda Katrina Anniversary Toolkit
August 29th marks the one-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. This toolkit contains a set of tools designed to highlight the vastly unequal opportunity revealed by Katrina and advance solutions that can expand opportunity in the Gulf Coast region and beyond.
http://www.opportunityagenda.org/si...819/k.58FA/Katrina_1_Year_Later.htm

Responding to the Needs of Justice-Involved Combat Veterans With Service-Related Trauma and Mental Health Conditions
A Consensus Report of the CMHS National GAINS Center Forum. August 2008
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/CVT_IssueBrief-GAINS.pdf

The State of Black America
The annual Urban League Report addresses the issues central to Black America in the current year. The publication is a barometer of the conditions, experiences and opinions of Black America. It examines black progress in education, homeownership, entrepreneurship, health and other areas. The publication forecasts certain social and political trends and proposes solutions to the community's and America's most pressing challenges. March 2006.
http://www.nul.org/thestateofblackamerica.html

A System in Crisis
Overburdened long before Katrina, the public mental health network here is finding it impossible to meet need. By Claudia Feldman. "For every million people who move here," Burruss says, "between 7 (percent) and 10 percent have a major mental disorder. And if you add those with substance-abuse problems, those percentages are even higher. Also consider that a third of the population of Harris County is uninsured. And factor in recent cuts in Medicaid and Medicare."
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/chronicle/4128667.html

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Disenfranchisement and Census Issues

A 'Crazy-Quilt' of Tiny Pieces: State and Local Administration of American Criminal Disenfranchisement Laws
By Alec Ewald, Union College. A new report published by The Sentencing Project finds widespread confusion and errors in the implementation of felony disenfranchisement laws. Among the report's key findings are: more than one-third (37%) of local elections officials interviewed misunderstand state eligibility law. The report concludes that disenfranchisement is a "time consuming, expensive practice" and calls on state policymakers to review voting restrictions, particularly for non-incarcerated people. The Sentencing Project, November 2005.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/pdfs/crazyquilt.pdf

Barred for Life: Voting Rights Restoration in Permanent Disenfranchisement States
By Marc Mauer and Tushar Kansal. Examines the rights-restoration process in the 14 states in which disenfranchisement may last for a lifetime. The study finds that in 11 of these states, less than 3% of disenfranchised persons have had their rights restored in recent years. The study identifies a range of obstacles in most states, including overly cumbersome processes, lengthy and confusing waiting periods, inappropriate character tests, and inadequate data collection.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/pdfs/barredforlife.pdf

Connecticut: Parole Disenfranchisement Analysis
The state of Connecticut expanded voting rights to people on probation in 2001, but parolees are still disenfranchised in the state. Reform efforts are underway to repeal the ban on parolee voting. A new briefing paper by The Sentencing Project analyzes the effect of current policy in the state, and finds that 77% of the affected population is African American and Latino. In addition, Connecticut has experienced a 198% rise in its parole population since 1997, 25 times the average growth rate nationally, thus dramatically increasing the number of citizens who have lost the right to vote.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/pdfs/ct-disenfranchisement.pdf

A Decade of Reform: Felony Disenfranchisement Policy in the U.S.
October 2006. The Sentencing Project has released a new report revealing a new wave of reforms of state felony voting laws and growing momentum toward restoring voting rights. Findings published in "A Decade of Reform: Felony Disenfranchisement Policy" in the United States disclose that since 1997, 16 states have implemented policy reforms that have reduced the restrictiveness of these laws, and more than 600,000 people in seven states have regained their voting rights. The report also states: U.S. disenfranchisement laws remain among the world's most severe despite public opinion polls showing 80% support for restoring the vote to those who have completed their sentences. During this year alone, 73 bills on felony disenfranchisement were introduced in 22 states and 85% of these initiatives sought to expand voting rights. More than 5 million Americans still will be banned from voting this Election Day; three quarters of those banned - 3.9 million - are living in the community. An estimated 1 in 12 African Americans is disenfranchised, a rate nearly five times the rate of non-African Americans.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/pdfs/FVR_Decade_Reform.pdf

Diminished Voting Power in the Latino Community: The Impact of Felony Disenfranchisement Laws in Ten Targeted States
MALDEF, 2003.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/maldef-rpt.pdf

Expanding the Vote: State Felony Disenfranchisement Reform, 1997- 2008
Documents a reform movement over the past eleven years that has resulted in more than 760,000 citizens having regained their right to vote. The report found that since 1997, 19 states have amended felony disenfranchisement policies in an effort to reduce their restrictiveness and expand voter eligibility. The report finds: Nine states either repealed or amended lifetime disenfranchisement laws.Two states expanded voting rights to persons under community supervision (probation and parole).Five states eased the restoration process for persons seeking to have their right to vote restored after completing sentence. The Sentencing Project. September 2008
http://sentencingproject.org/PublicationDetails.aspx?PublicationID=623

Felon Disenfranchisement and Democracy in the Late Jim Crow Era
Arguing that there is no reasonable justification behind felon disenfranchisement, "Locked Out: Felon Disenfranchisement and American Democracy" (Oxford University Press 2006) by Jeff Manza and Christopher Uggen is reviewed in the Ohio State University Journal of Criminal Law, entitled "Felon Disenfranchisement and Democracy in the Late Jim Crow Era," by University of Arizona Professor Gabriel J. Chin, and focuses on the history and policy behind disenfranchisement. (November 2007)
http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/osjcl/Articles/Volume5_1/Chin-PDF.pdf

The Modern-Day Poll Tax: How Economic Sanctions Block Access to the Polls
An article by Erika Wood and Neema Trivedi of the Brennan Center for Justice in the Clearinghouse Review, June 2007. The article details the over two-centuries-old tradition of disenfranchisement and how it became a practice in targeting formerly incarcerated individuals. "The spread of felony disenfranchisement laws in the late 1800s was part of a larger backlash against the adoption of the Reconstruction Amendments. Despite newfound eligibility, many freedmen remained practically disenfranchised as a result of organized efforts to prevent them from voting," the article states.
http://sentencingproject.org/Admin/...ications/fd_clearinghousereview.pdf

NY Board of Elections Survey: Misinformation Costs Thousands of Eligible New Yorkers Their Vote
Survey of 63 county boards of elections shows that fully one-third are systematically and improperly preventing formerly incarcerated persons from registering to vote. March 2006.
http://www.demos.org/page440.cfm

Prisoners of the Census: Electoral and Financial Consequences of Counting Prisoners Where They Go, Not Where They Come From
By Eric Lotke and Peter Wagner, 2005.
http://www.library.law.pace.edu/PLR24-2/PLR218.pdf

ProCon.org
Should felons be allowed to vote? This site presents in a simple, nonpartisan, pro-con format, responses to the core question "Should felons be allowed to vote?"
http://felonvoting.procon.org/viewtopic.asp

A Study of Felon and Misdemeanant Voter Participation in North Carolina
Analyzes the effects of the growing number of felony convictions in the United States (more than one million per year) on political participation by studying the impact of convictions on voter registration and turnout in North Carolina.

The study also proposes a model of how crime policies affect participation that encompasses the effects of legal disenfranchisement along with other mechanisms which may suppress participation. Burch finds that before their convictions, people with felony convictions had lower registration and turnout rates than people who had never been convicted but that felony convictions further depress registration and turnout rates. The Sentencing Project February 2007.
http://sentencingproject.org/PublicationDetails.aspx?PublicationID=576

Violations of Article 25: Voting Rights
A 2006 report by The Sentencing Project to the United Nations' Human Rights Committee regarding the United States' compliance with dictates specified in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).
http://www.sentencingproject.org/pdfs/violationsofarticle25.pdf

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The Real Cost of the War on Drugs

Behind Bars II: Substance Abuse and America's Prison Population
Source: National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University. From press release: Of the 2.3 million inmates crowding our nations prisons and jails, 1.5 million meet the DSM IV medical criteria for substance abuse or addiction, and another 458,000, while not meeting the strict DSM IV criteria, had histories of substance abuse; were under the influence of alcohol or other drugs at the time of their crime; committed their offense to get money to buy drugs; were incarcerated for an alcohol or drug law violation; or shared some combination of these characteristics, according to Behind Bars II: Substance Abuse and America's Prison Population. Combined these two groups constitute 85 percent of the U.S. prison population.
http://www.casacolumbia.org/articlefiles/575-report2010behindbars2.pdf

Benefit-Cost in the California Treatment Outcome Project: Does Substance Abuse Treatment 'Pay for Itself'?
Examines costs and monetary benefits associated with substance abuse treatment.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/...ed&list_uids=16430607&dopt=Abstract

The Changing Racial Dynamics of the War on Drugs
(The Sentencing Project April 2009) For the first time in 25 years, since the inception of the "war on drugs," the number of African Americans incarcerated in state prisons for drug offenses has declined substantially, according to a Sentencing Project study. It finds a 21.6% drop in the number of blacks incarcerated for a drug offense, a decline of 31,000 people during the period 1999-2005. The study also documents a corresponding rise in the number of whites in state prison for a drug offense, an increase of 42.6% during this time frame, or more than 21,000 people. The number of Latinos incarcerated for state drug offenses was virtually unchanged.The study notes that the black declines in incarceration represent "the end result of 50 state law enforcement and sentencing systems" which need to be examined individually. But overall, the decline in blacks incarcerated for a drug offense follows upon declining arrest and conviction rates for blacks as well. In reviewing the study's findings, African Americans are still imprisoned at more than six times the rate of whites for all offenses. Moreover, high incarceration rates for low-level drug offenses remain a function of the largely punitive approach to drug abuse that has proven expensive and ineffective.
http://sentencingproject.org/Admin/Documents/publications/dp_raceanddrugs.pdf

Claiborne Amicus Brief
Amicus brief that The Sentencing Project and the ACLU submitted on December 21, 2006 to the U.S. Supreme Court in the case of Claiborne v. U.S. The Claiborne case results from the Supreme Court's 2005 Booker decision that declared the federal sentencing guidelines unconstitutional and required that the guidelines be advisory. The issue in Claiborne and the companion Rita case concerns the exercise of judicial discretion in imposing a "reasonable" sentence.

The Claiborne case involves a sentence for crack cocaine. The amicus brief focuses on the policy issues regarding mandatory sentencing, and argues that the crack cocaine laws have inappropriately targeted low-level offenses and have created unwarranted racial disparities. The case is scheduled to be heard by the Supreme Court on February 20, 2007.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/pdfs/ClaiborneAmicusBrief.pdf

Decades of Disparity: Drug Arrests and Race in the United States
March 2, 2009. Human Rights Watch. This 20-page report says that adult African Americans were arrested on drug charges at rates that were 2.8 to 5.5 times as high as those of white adults in every year from 1980 through 2007, the last year for which complete data were available. About one in three of the more than 25.4 million adult drug arrestees during that period was African American.
http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/us0309web_1.pdf

Disparity by Design
A new national report shows that drug-free zone laws fall to protect youth from drug sales and worsen racial disparity in prisons. Justice Policy Institute. March 2006. Judy Greene, Kevin Pranis, Jason Ziedenberg, authors. Commissioned by the Drug Policy Alliance
http://www.justicepolicy.org/article.php?list=type&type=111

Disparity by Geography: The War on Drugs in America's Cities
By Ryan King of The Sentencing Project. The first city-level analysis of drug arrests, examining data from 43 of the nation�s largest cities between 1980 and 2003. The study found that, since 1980, the rate of drug arrests in American cities for African Americans increased by 225 percent, compared to 70 percent among whites. Black arrest rates grew by more than 500 percent in 11 cities during this period; and, in nearly half of the cities, the odds of arrest for a drug offense among African Americans relative to whites more than doubled. May 2008.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/Ad...ublications/dp_drugarrestreport.pdf

Drug Courts: A Review of the Evidence
The report assesses the impact of the drug court movement. The Sentencing Project, April 2009. Originally conceived in 1989 as an alternative to incarceration for persons convicted of low-level drug offenses, there are now more than 1,600 drug courts nationally, covering all 50 states. The Sentencing Project surveyed a wide-range of research to outline general findings on the operation and efficacy of drug courts, and to highlight benefits and potential concerns. Overall, they found:
- 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.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/Admin/Documents/publications/dp_drugcourts.pdf

Drug Law Reform 2008 - Dramatic Costs Savings For New York State
(Legal Action Center-December 2008) 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.
http://www.lac.org/pdf/RDL08_Cost%20Savings%20Report%2012_08.pdf

Drug Law Resentencing: Saving Tax Dollars with Minimal Community Risk
Legal Aid Society Report Finds that 2004 and 2005 Rockefeller Drug Law Reforms Huge Success: Tens of Millions of Dollars Saved with Low Levels of Recidivism by Individuals Released from Prison - New York Prosecutors Lose Credibility as Report Counters Past and Current Misleading Claims. A report released on January 14, 2010 by the Legal Aid Society of New York shows that the changes to the Rockefeller Drug Laws in '04 and '05 have been a huge success with tens of millions of dollars being saved and remarkably low levels of recidivism of people who have been re-sentenced and released from prison. On average, people who were re-sentenced and released early from prison as a result of the 2004 and 2005 drug law reforms have an overall recidivism rate of 8.5 percent, while the overall rate of recidivism rate for people released in the same period is nearly 40 percent.
http://www.legal-aid.org/media/127984/drug-law-reform-paper-2009.pdf

The Economic Cost of Methamphetamine Use in the United States, 2005
By Nancy Nicosia, Rosalie Liccardo Pacula, Beau Kilmer, Russell Lundberg, James Chiesa. This first national estimate suggests that the economic cost of methamphetamine (meth) use in the United States reached $23.4 billion in 2005. Given the uncertainty in estimating the costs of meth use, this book provides a lower-bound estimate of $16.2 billion and an upper-bound estimate of $48.3 billion. The analysis considers a wide range of consequences due to meth use, including the burden of addiction, premature death, drug treatment, and aspects of lost productivity, crime and criminal justice, health care, production and environmental hazards, and child endangerment. Other potential harms of meth, however, could not be included due to a lack of scientific evidence or to data issues. Although meth causes some unique harms, many of the primary cost drivers are similar to those identified in economic assessments of other illicit drugs. Among the most costly elements are the intangible burden of addiction and premature death, which account for nearly two-thirds of the economic costs. The intangible burden of addiction measures the lower quality of life experienced by those addicted to the drug. Crime and criminal-justice costs also account for a significant share of economic costs, as do lost productivity, removing a child from the parents' home, and drug treatment. One unusual cost captured in the analysis is that associated with the production of meth, which requires toxic chemicals that can result in fire, explosions, and other negative events.
http://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/2009/RAND_MG829.pdf

Everyone Pays: A Social Cost Analysis of Incarcerating Parents for Drug Offenses in Hawai’i
By Thomas E. Lengyel, Associate Director of Research & Evaluation, American Humane Association, Denver, CO; and Marilyn Brown, Associate Professor, Department of Sociology, University of Hawai’i-Hilo, Hilo, Hawai’i. June 2009. Executive Summary and Complete Paper. Contact info for tom Lengyel: toml@AmericanHumane.org. From the Summary: "This apparent windfall from the incapacitation of drug offenders must be balanced against the costs caused by their removal from society and confinement to prison. The $85,000 per prisoner savings from incapacitation is exceeded simply by Hawai’i’s costs for providing a prison bed, which amount to $123,000 per prisoner over the 39 month average length of stay. That is the tip of the iceberg for the social costs of incarceration, which include significant losses to the prisoner and the prisoner’s family in terms of reduced quality of life, lost earnings while in prison, lost future earnings of the release, lost taxes to the state on lost earnings, up-front criminal justice system costs, the cost of parole, foster care for the children of some prisoners, and a host of other costs, some of which are yet to be estimated. Pursuing this cold reality to its logical conclusion shows that the per-prisoner costs of incarceration for the average length of stay exceed the social benefits by $600,000. The net cost to the state for incarcerating the entire cohort comes to $15.6 million, and adding costs to the prisoner and the prisoner’s extended family brings the total cost charged against the welfare of the Hawai’i community to $102 million." (cohort group is 197 prisoners.)
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Everybody_Pays_full.pdf

The Failure of the War on Drugs: Charting a New Course for the Commonwealth
The Massachusetts Bar Association Drug Policy Task Force. June 2009. 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...20task%20force%20final%20report.pdf

Falling Through the Cracks: Loss of State-Based Financial Aid Eligibility for Students Affected by the Federal Higher Education Act Drug Provision
Source: Coalition for Higher Education Act Reform (CHEAR) "The drug provision of the Higher Education Act expressly denies federal aid to persons convicted of state or federal drug offenses for specified periods of time.4 However, the law offers no prescribed method by which states should determine eligibility for state financial aid. This has led to inconsistency and confusion among state financial aid offices, leaving many qualified applicants without the resources they need to go to college, and many financial aid officers believing, incorrectly, that they must deny aid to students who have been convicted of drug offenses simply because the federal government has done so. This report details the findings of research conducted on how the 50 states and the District of Columbia determine eligibility for state-based financial aid for persons who have reported having drug convictions on Question 31 of the Free Application for Student Financial Aid (FAFSA). The report also makes recommendations for how states can clarify the situation so that students losing federal aid because of drug convictions can still receive state aid."
http://www.raiseyourvoice.com/statereport/fallingthrough.pdf

The Geography of Punishment: How Huge Sentencing Enhancement Zones Harm Communities, Fail to Protect Children
By Aleks Kajstura, Peter Wagner and William Goldberg, Prison Policy Initiative.July 2008.
http://www.prisonpolicy.org/zones/

Harmful Drug Law Hits Home: How Many College Students Have Lost Their Financial Aid Due to Drug Convictions?
Students for a Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP) obtained college applicants - nearly 200,000 - who have been denied financial aid due to drug convictions, and released this state-by-state report.
http://www.njisj.org/pubdocs/2006/red_052605_ssdp-state-report.pdf

Intersecting voices: Impacts of Illinois' Drug Policies
By Kathleen Kane-Willis. The Illinois Consortium on Drug Policy. August 2006. Two decades of steadily toughening laws, Illinois now puts more people in prison for drug crimes than any state except California. The report finds that more people are being incarcerated for possessing narcotics than for selling them and that the state's prisons hold about five black inmates convicted of drug offenses for every white inmate--one of the largest racial disparities in the country.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/intersectingVoices.pdf

The Next Big Thing? Methamphetamine in the United States
The Sentencing Project has released a major new study disproving the popular belief that there exists a growing methamphetamine "epidemic" within the United States. To the contrary, the report reveals that methamphetamine is actually one of the rarest of illegal drugs used, with its use declining among youth, stabilizing among adults and demonstrating no increase in first-time users. The Next Big Thing? documents the sensationalist coverage of "meth" by most media sources that have distorted national trends of the drug's actual prevalence, growth, dangers and treatment. Important findings of the report include:

• Methamphetamine is among the least commonly used drugs.
• Methamphetamine remains a rare occurrence throughout most of the country and is not indicative of a nationwide problem.
• Methamphetamine use is declining among our nation's youth.
• Drug treatment programs are effective in combating methamphetamine addictions.

Poor Prescription: The Costs of Imprisoning Drug Offenders in the United States
(2000). This report, issued by the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice, has many useful graphs and statistical comparisons focused on individual states and the inequities of incarceration based on race.
http://www.cjcj.org/pubs/poor/pp.html

Principles of Drug Abuse Treatment for Criminal Justice Populations: A Research Based Guide
July 25, 2006, the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA). Report encourages methadone and other addiction medications, not just reliance on 12-step programs. Asserts that relapse is to be expected, even after long periods of incarceration, if effective treatment is not provided during and after time spent in prison. The report includes information on brain changes that help explain why addiction is a form of chronic disease. The report states that "continuing or re-emerging drug use during treatment requires a clinical response either increasing the 'dosage' or level of treatment, or changing the treatment intervention."
http://www.drugabuse.gov/PDF/PODAT_CJ/PODAT_CJ.pdf

Proposition 36: Five Years Later
Justice Policy Institute report documents huge taxpayer savings through doing away with prison sentences in favor of treatment. That report said the program, saved California $173 million in its first year and $2.50 for every dollar invested since then. www.justicepolicy.org. April 2006.
http://www.justicepolicy.org

Sentencing with Discretion: Crack Cocaine Sentencing After Booker
The report coincides with the one-year anniversary of the historic U.S. Supreme Court decision in United States v. Booker, in which the Court struck down the mandatory application of the federal sentencing guidelines as unconstitutional, but kept the guidelines intact by requiring that they be consulted in an advisory capacity. Examining published court decisions, the new report assesses how judges have utilized their expanded range of discretion in one of the most contentious areas of federal sentencing, crack cocaine offenses. The key findings of the report are the following:

• Continuing Harsh Sentences -- Federal judges continue to impose stiff prison sentences in crack cocaine cases despite deviations from the federal guidelines. Of the published decisions analyzed, defendants in crack cocaine cases were sentenced to an average prison term of 11 years.
• Judges Using Discretion in Individual Cases -- Judges are employing their discretion to assess individual case characteristics and in selected cases, to impose sentences that better meet the goals of sentencing. These factors include defendant circumstances, goals of sentencing, and policy recommendations of the U.S. Sentencing Commission.
• The report recommends that: 1) There is no need for a Booker "fix" since judges appear to be imposing harsh penalties in serious cases, but distinguishing these from those cases in which the defendant is less culpable; and, 2) Congress should reconsider the crack/powder cocaine sentencing disparity in order to expand the range of cases in which judges can consider individual case characteristics.

Should We Be Sentencing for Dollars: Rethinking the Proposed Drug Tax
By Patricia Warth and Alan Rosenthal, Center for Community Alternatives. The 2008-2009 New York Governor's budget proposes a tax on illegal drug activity that will be imposed on people convicted of drug-related crimes. The Governor estimates that this "Drug Tax" will add $13-$17 million per year to New York's general fund. While the Governor's desire to close New York's budget deficit is understandable, the proposed Drug Tax will not help to achieve this goal. Instead, it will adversely affect reintegration and public safety, producing financial and human costs that will dwarf any revenues the tax generates.
http://www.communityalternatives.org/pdfs/drug%20tax.pdf

Shoveling Up
A report by The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University (May 2009) documents the federal, state and local governments spend almost half a trillion dollars every year - almost 11 percent of their total budgets - as a result of alcohol, tobacco and other drug abuse and addiction. That's right. Out of every dollar federal and state governments spent on substance misuse in 2005 (the latest data available), 95 cents paid for the enormous burden of this problem on health care, criminal justice, child welfare, education, and other programs. And only 2 cents were invested in prevention and treatment programs that could reduce many of these costs - and save lives. Researchers studied all federal, state and local budgets for 2005 using careful, conservative methods to determine how much of each major budget category was directly linked to substance misuse. For example, they determined how much of each state's Medicaid and other health care expenses were due to one of over 70 medical diagnoses that are caused or made worse by alcohol, tobacco and other drug abuse and addiction. They did the same for criminal justice, welfare and other key government budgets. They also identified all government spending on prevention, treatment and research, regulation of alcohol and tobacco products and drug interdiction. When the numbers are added up, the total is really shocking: 467.7 billion dollars. Spending less than 2% of the federal and state costs for prevention and treatment, and more than 95% shoveling up the mess, is upside down public policy that wastes billions in taxpayer dollars at a time when resources are scarce, and results in untold human suffering.
http://www.jointogether.org/NO

Study Examines Support for Mandatory Minimum Sentences for Cocaine
First-time cocaine offenders caught with five grams of the drug should go to drug treatment or get probation, not prison, three of four white Americans say. The Substance Abuse Policy Research Program (SAPRP) reported that the survey conducted by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago also found that those who called for imprisoning cocaine users were more likely to make moral judgments about users, to blame users for their addictions, to deny that racism is a problem in the U.S., and to believe that blacks are more likely than whites to use cocaine. The survey of 783 white Americans found that 51 percent favored treatment for cocaine offenders, while 26 percent favored probation. "Scholars have suggested that racism and moralism have influenced American attitudes on addressing drug problems, and we believe that this is the first study to empirically test whether these factors are related," said study co- author Kenneth Rasinski.Added Rosalyn Lee, the other co-author of the study: "Our study shows that racial attitudes were related to the tendency to blame and make moral judgments about addicts for addiction; and those with a tendency to blame and moralize were more likely to support prison sentences."
http://www.saprp.org/m_press_Rasinski060906.cfm

Targeting Blacks: Drug Law Enforcement and Race in the United States
Human Rights Watch documents with detailed new statistics persistent racial disparities among people with drug convictions sent to prison in 34 states. All of these states send black drug offenders to prison at much higher rates than whites. Across the 34 states, a black man is 11.8 times more likely than a white man to be sent to prison on drug charges, and a black woman is 4.8 times more likely than a white woman. In 16 states, African Americans are sent to prison for drug offenses at rates between 10 and 42 times greater than the rate for whites. The 10 states with the greatest racial disparities in prison admissions for drug offenders are: Wisconsin, Illinois, New Jersey, Maryland, West Virginia, Colorado, New York, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Michigan. (May 2008)
http://hrw.org/reports/2008/us0508/

Treatment Instead of Prisons: A Roadmap for Correctional Policy in Wisconsin
By Kevin Pranis and Judy Greene, Justice Strategies, January 2006
http://www.justicestrategies.net/States/WI.htm

Tulia: Tip of the Drug War Iceberg
The report examines the connections between racial profiling, law enforcement misconduct, and federally funded drug task forces; and provides recommendations for preventing similar incidents. Open Society Policy Center, January 2005.
http://www.soros.org/resources/arti...blications/tulia_20050101/tulia.pdf

A 25-Year Quagmire: The War on Drugs and Its Impact on American Society
Sentencing Project has released a report that examines the burden of the "war on drugs" on the criminal justice system and American communities. The report assesses the strategy of combating drug abuse primarily with enhanced punishments at the expense of investments in treatment and prevention. It documents how the drug war has produced a record expansion of prison and jail systems and highlights additional indicators of the war's impact on the criminal justice system and communities, including: * Drug arrests have more than tripled since 1980 to a record 1.8 million by 2005; * Four of five (81.7%) drug arrests were for possession offenses, and 42.6% were for marijuana charges in 2005; * Nearly six in 10 persons in state prison for a drug offense have no history of violence or high-level drug selling; * Only 14% of persons in 2004 who report using drugs in the month before their arrest had participated in a treatment program, a decline of more than half from participation rates in 1991; * A shortage of treatment options in many low-income neighborhoods contributes to drug abuse being treated primarily as a criminal justice problem, rather than a social problem. September, 2007
http://sentencingproject.org/Admin/Documents/publications/dp_25yearquagmire.pdf

The Vortex: The Concentrated Racial Impact of Drug Imprisonment and the Characteristics of Punitive Counties
Justice Policy Institute (JPI) released a report (December 4, 2007) which finds that 97 percent of the nation's large-population counties imprisoned African Americans at a higher rate than whites. The report documents racial disparities in the use of prison for drug offenses in 193 of the 198 counties that reported to government entities. "The Vortex: The Concentrated Racial Impact of Drug Imprisonment and the Characteristics of Punitive Counties" is the first study to examine drug imprisonment rates at the county level. It is also the first study to document the disproportionate impact of drug imprisonment on African American communities at the county level. Major findings of The Vortex include: While tens of millions of people use illicit drugs, prison and policing responses to drug behavior have a concentrated impact on a subset of the population. In 2002, there were 19.5 million illicit drug users, 1.5 million drug arrests, and 175,000 people admitted to prison for a drug offense. While African Americans and whites use and sell drugs at similar rates, African Americans are ten times more likely than whites to be imprisoned for drug offenses. Of the 175,000 admitted to prison nationwide in 2002, over half were African American, despite the fact that African Americans make up less than 13 percent of the U.S. population. There is no relationship between the rates at which people are sent to prison for drug offenses and the rates at which people use drugs in counties. Higher county drug prison admission rates were associated with how much was spent on policing and the judicial system, higher poverty and unemployment rates, and the proportion of the county's population that is African American. The full report and a very good interactive map of states and counties is at:
http://www.justicepolicy.org/content.php?hmID=1811&smID=1581&ssmID=69

The War on Marijuana: The Transformation of the War on Drugs in the 1990's
Marc Mauer and Ryan King. The Sentencing Project, May 2005.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/pdfs/waronmarijuana.pdf

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The Real Cost of Prisons for Women and Their Children

Abolitionism and its Enemies
By Wendy Cranmer, St Giles Trust. Presented at "Time to Make a Difference: the Abolition of Prison for Women", conference, London, 27 June 2006.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Abolitionism_and_its_enemies-women.doc

CASASARD: Intensive Case Management Program for Drug-Addicted Mothers
A new approach to helping drug-addicted women on welfare that treats substance abuse and addiction as a chronic disease promises better outcomes of sobriety and employment than current approaches that focus on employment first, according to new research from the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University. Researchers found that the case-management group had three times greater rates of treatment initiation, engagement and retention, were almost twice as likely to be abstinent at 12- and 24-month follow-ups, and were more than twice as likely to be employed full-time after two years. The study was published in the February 2009 issue of the American Journal of Public Health.
http://www.jointogether.org/resources/pdf/casasard-white-paper.pdf

Caught in the Net: The Impact of Drug Policy on Women and Families
(2005). By the ACLU, Break the Chains: Communities of Color and the War on Drugs, the Brennan Center at NYU School of Law
http://www.fairlaws4families.org

Dignity Denied: the Price of Imprisoning Older Women in California
Documents the conditions of confinement for the more than 350 women over the age of 55 in state prisons. Because of the "Three Strikes" law and a reluctance to grant parole, more Californians are growing older in prison than ever before. It is estimated that by 2022, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) will incarcerate about 30,000 elders. Due to health-related expenses, the annual cost of imprisoning an older person, at a conservative estimate, is at least $70,000, twice that of a younger prisoner. The report questions the wisdom of committing such vast economic resources for the continued punishment of older prisoners, the group with the lowest recidivism rate of any segment of the prison population.
http://prisonerswithchildren.org/news/dignity.htm

From Prison to Home: The Effect of Incarceration and Reentry on Children, Families, and Communities Incarceration. Reentry, and Social Capital: Social Networks in the Balance
By Dina R. Rose and Todd R. Clear, John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/prison2home02/Rose.htm

A Higher Hurdle: Barriers to Employment for Formerly Incarcerated Women
By Morris, Sumner and Borja. The Thelton E. Henderson Center for Social Justice at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law. December 2008. The Henderson Center created resumes that were sent in pairs to Bay Area employers who had advertised job openings. For each job listing, one resume in the pair included a period of incarceration, the other did not. Key results included: When resumes indicated a recent period of incarceration, applicants were 31% less likely to receive a positive response compared to women whose resumes did not indicate a recent period of incarceration. Resumes submitted by African American women received the fewest positive responses.
http://www.law.berkeley.edu/files/A_Higher_Hurdle_December_2008.pdf

Annotated bibliography: The Henderson Center also completed an annotated bibliography, summarizing the findings of more than 50 research studies and other articles. The summaries provide an overview of the challenges faced by formerly incarcerated people as they struggle to reenter the workforce and their communities after being released.
http://www.law.berkeley.edu/files/December_2008_FIP_Annotated_Bibliography.pdf

The Hurt Inside: The Imprisonment of Women and Girls in Northern Ireland
Rev. Edition 2005. By Phil Scranton and Linda Moore. Rev. edition. Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/the_hurt_inside.pdf

Incarcerated Parents and Their Children: Trends, 1991-2007
"Incarcerated Parents and Their Children: Trends, 1991-2007" reviews data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics and documents the growing impact of incarceration on children and families. As of 2007, 1.7 million children had a parent in prison, an 82% increase from the figure of 936,000 in 1991. The racial/ethnic variation among this group is quite broad: 1 in 15 African-American children has a parent in prison, as does 1 in 42 Latino children and 1 in 111 white children. Due to the distance from home in which many parents are incarcerated - 62% of parents in state prisons are more than 100 miles from home - visits from children are declining over time. In 2004, more than half of parents in state prisons and nearly half in federal prisons had never had a visit from their children. The Sentencing Project. February 2009.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/Ad...cations/inc_incarceratedparents.pdf

International Profile of Womens Prisons
April 2008, International Centre for Prison Studies, King's College London, University of London.
http://www.hmprisonservice.gov.uk/a...prisons_int_review_final_report.pdf

Invisible Bars: Barriers to Women's Health and Well-Being During and After Incarceration
By Kim Carter, Time for Change Foundation. A new study of women, health care, and other needs, in the CA Institution for Women in San Bernardino and the needs of women after they leave prison. The study was done by women who have been incarcerated and who others who advocate for women.
http://www.timeforchange.us/news/9_12_06.pdf

MA Department of Correction Advisory Council's Recommendations Regarding Female Offenders
Preliminary report, July 2005.
http://www.mass.gov/Eeops/docs/doc/DOCAC_prelim_report.pdf

Mothers, Infants and Imprisonment
Women's Prison Association. "Mothers, Infants and Imprisonment" profiles existing and soon-to-open prison nursery programs in nine states: California, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Nebraska, New York, South Dakota, Washington, and West Virginia, and also looks at community-based residential parenting programs in Alabama, California, Connecticut, Illinois, North Carolina, Massachusetts, and Vermont. In addition, residential parenting programs operated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Texas, and West Virginia are discussed. Many women parenting their infants in prison nurseries could be doing so in the community instead, the report finds. The profile of women in prison nurseries is nearly identical to that of participants in community-based programs. Women in both types of programs are serving relatively short sentences for non-violent offenses, and will continue primary caretaking responsibility for their child(ren) upon release. Further, most women in prison nursery programs present little risk to public safety. Women's Prison Association (May 2009)
http://www.wpaonline.org/pdf/Mothers%20Infants%20and%20Imprisonment%202009.pdf

The Nation's Most Punitive States For Women
July 2007 fact sheet by National Council On Crime and Delinquency.
http://www.nccd-crc.org/nccd/pubs/2007_MPS_factsheet.pdf

People, Places, and Things: The Social Process of Reentry for Female Ex-Offenders
By Andrea M. Leverentz. August 2006. Source: National Institute of Justice. This study examined the social lives of female with felony convictions to determine the features of their relationships after their release from prison.
http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/215178.pdf

Pierce the Future for Hope: Mothers and Prisoners in the Post-Keynesian California Landscape
By Ruth Wilson Gilmore
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/TTT_paper4.pdf

The Prison Within: The Imprisonment of Women At Hydebank Wood
2004-2006. By Phil Scranton and Linda Moore. Rev. edition. Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/the_prison_within.pdf

The Real Cost of Prisons on Women and Children
Background Paper prepared by Kiaran Honderich for the Real Cost of Prisons workshop.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/rcpp_background_women.pdf

Reducing the Incarceration of Women: Community-Based Alternatives
By Andrea Wolf. National Council on Crime and Delinquency. August 2006. "BACKGROUND: Currently, there are over 10,000 women in jail, 12,000 women in prison, and 12,000 women on parole in California. NCCD's report, Reducing the Incarceration of Women: Community-Based Alternatives, spells out an effective strategy for reform for over two-thirds of the women in prison in our state. Recent research reveals that women could be much more effectively rehabilitated in their home communities, close to their children-the best known motivator for change. Women in community programs that provide comprehensive services and give them frequent contact with their children in a healthy environment re-offend at a rate of just 14 percent -- a sharp contrast with the typical rate of 46 percent. Assembly Bill 1XX, introduced by Assemblywoman Lieber, provides community- based facilities for 4,500 women inmates." My question is, if 87% of the 12,000 women who are in prison in CA are there for non-violent convictions, why is that this proposal wants 4,500 of them to be incarcerated in secure "community-based" facilities?
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/WIP_Special_Report_Final.pdf

Reproductive Rights in Theory and Practice: The Meaning of Roe v. Wade for Women in Prison
By Rachel Roth. January 20, 2006. Center for American Progress. In 1973, when the Supreme Court handed down its decision in Roe v. Wade, there were about 14,000 women incarcerated in the United States; today, there are over 180,000. If the ultimate legacy of Roe is that women have the freedom to make decisions about pregnancy and motherhood, then what does this anniversary mean to women who are literally not free, those in jails, prisons, and immigration detention centers? Because prisons are shielded from public scrutiny, and the women in them are "out of sight and out of mind," their concerns rarely enter the debate about reproductive rights and health.
http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=1365971

State Standards for Pregnancy-Related Health Care in Prisons
ACLU on-line Guide provides a short summary of minimum national standards for pregnancy care in correctional facilities; an overview of how different state policies measure up; and a state-by-state directory where you can view pregnancy-related correctional policies available online, or find contact information to request policies from state department of corrections.

For additional information about the rights of pregnant women who are incarcerated, and the ACLU's work to secure these rights in prison and jails throughout the country go to http://www.aclu.org/reproductiverights/abortion/index.html.
http://72.3.233.244/reproductiverights/gen/pregnancycareinprison.html

Stop the Expansion of Women's Prisons
From Californians United for a Responsible Budget (CURB), December 2006. 30 pages. Statements and position papers from CURB, academia, the community, legislators and others focusing on organizing to stop the expansion of community-based jails for women in CA.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/CURB_packet.pdf

When Free Means Losing Your Mother: The Collision of Child Welfare and the Incarceration of Women in New York State
This report by the Correctional Association of New York examines the damaging, far-reaching and often overlooked collateral consequences of maternal incarceration on children and families. The report includes interviews with caregivers, foster care workers, formerly incarcerated mothers and young people with mothers in prison, and offers practical recommendations for criminal justice, corrections and child welfare policy reforms."

"This report by the Correctional Association of New York examines the damaging, far-reaching and often overlooked collateral consequences of maternal incarceration on children and families. The report includes interviews with caregivers, foster care workers, formerly incarcerated mothers and young people with mothers in prison, and offers practical recommendations for criminal justice, corrections and child welfare policy reforms." February 2006.
http://www.njisj.org/pubdocs/2006/red_031606_mother.pdf

Women in Prison in Massachusetts: Maintaining Family Connections
A Research Report, March 2005. Erika Kates, Paige Ransford and Carol Cardozo.
http://www.umb.edu/news/2005news/releases/march/prison_report.doc

Women in the Criminal Justice System
May 2007. The Sentencing Project. The series documents the gender implications of changes that have occurred over the last 20 years within the criminal justice system, including expansive law enforcement, stiffer drug sentencing laws and re-entry barriers. Women in the Criminal Justice System notes that since 1985 the number of women in prison has increased at almost double the rate of incarcerated men - 404 percent vs. 209 percent. Reasons for the increasing rate for women are directly related to the 'war on drugs,' economic disadvantage, and the criminal justice system's failure to carefully consider women's involvement in crimes. The analysis also reports that 30 percent of all females incarcerated are black and 16 percent are Hispanic. Further, the briefing sheets delve into family, socioeconomic and physical and mental health issues that women - and their families - face as a result of being incarcerated. Women in the Criminal Justice System contains five sections: Overview; Involvement in Crime; Mothers in Prison; Inadequacies in Prison Services; and Barriers to Re-entering the Community.
http://sentencingproject.org/Admin/Documents/news/womenincj_total.pdf

Women's Prison Association Articles and Factsheets:
A Portrait of Women in Prison (December 2003)
Trends in Incarceration (October 2003)
Barriers to Re-entry for Women (October 2003)
http://realcostofprisons.org

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Youth

Adoration of the Question: Reflections on the Failure to Reduce Racial and Ethnic Disparities in the Juvenile Justice System
Examining circumstances that continue to influence the juvenile justice system and outlining the early system's approach towards youth of color, DMC (Disproportionate Minority Confinement) and its perceived causes. The publications analyzes the well-intentioned federal mandates that have largely failed to reduce entrenched disparities in the system over the 20 years since Congress first mandated that states "address" DMC. The Burns Institute, December 2008.
http://www.burnsinstitute.org/downloads/BI%20Adoration%20of%20the%20Question.pdf

Alternatives to the Secure Detention and Confinement of Juvenile Offenders
Explores efforts underway in many states and counties to provide alternative community-based supervision for juveniles involved in the justice system. Many jurisdictions are struggling with crowding in juvenile detention facilities, yet recent data demonstrate that up to one-third of juveniles populations are potentially low-risk offenders detained for technical parole violations. The report, sponsored by the US Department of Justice's Office of Justice Programs, surveys programs in use from San Fransisco to Baltimore which identify low-risk juveniles and divert them from traditional detention facilities. These alternatives -- including intensive supervision, electronic monitoring, diversion, skills training and residential programs -- often programs prove more cost-effective and result in lower recidivism than incarceration. October 2005.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materi...ives_to_Juv_Incarceration-10-05.pdf

America's Invisible Children: Latino Youth and the Failure of Justice
National Council of La Raza (NCLR) and the Campaign for Youth Justice. May 2009. On any given day, close to 18,000 Latino youth are incarcerated in America. The majority of these youth are incarcerated for nonviolent offenses. Most Latino youth are held in juvenile detention facilities (41%) and juvenile long-term secure facilities (34%). However, one out of every four (24%) incarcerated Latino children is held in an adult prison or jail even though youth in adult facilities are in significant danger of suicide and rape. Latino youth are overrepresented in the U.S. justice system and receive harsher treatment than white youth. In order of rising disparities, Latino youth are 4% more likely than white youth to be petitioned, 16% more likely than white youth to be adjudicated delinquent, 28% more likely than white youth to be detained, 41% more likely than white youth to receive an out-of-home placement, 43% more likely than white youth to be waived to the adult system, and 40% more likely to be admitted to adult prison. States with the highest levels of disparity of Latino youth in adult prison (rates over 5 times that for white youth) were California, Minnesota, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Nine out of ten (90%) Latino youth ages 10 to 17 live in states that permit pre-trial detention in adult jails for youth prosecuted in the adult system. According to a study of 40 large urban jurisdictions, Latino youth prosecuted in the adult system are routinely incarcerated in adult jails. Overall, a higher proportion of white youth are released pretrial (60%) than any other racial or ethnic categories. Most (54%) of Latino youth prosecuted in the adult system were detained pretrial; of the Latino youth detained pretrial, 72% were held in adult jails. The National Council of La Raza is the largest national Latino civil rights and advocacy organization in the U.S., working to improve opportunities for Hispanic Americans.
http://campaignforyouthjustice.org/documents/Latino_Brief.pdf

Amici Curiae in support of Graham v. Florida and Sullivan v. Florida.
On Nov. 9, the Supreme Court will hold oral argument in Sullivan vs. Florida and Graham vs. Florida, two cases that will determine whether it is constitutional to sentence a teenager to life in prison without parole for a crime that did not involve the taking of a life. Petitioners in amici curiae include former "juvenile offenders including Former Senator Alan Simpson, Charles Dutton, R.Dwayne Betts, Ishmael Beah and others.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/sullivan_amici_curiae.pdf

California Department of Corrections' New 'Plan' for Juvenile Justice
The plan, however, was criticized by some juvenile justice advocacy groups and a top legislative critic of the state's youth prison system who contend the proposed reforms don't go far enough. "What we need is a detailed vision for moving this department philosophically toward education and rehabilitation," said state Sen. Gloria Romero, D-Los Angeles, "not just incarceration of youth." The reforms would be implemented through at least the next five years, depending on funding, and state officials contend they will lower recidivism rates, provide safer facilities and better prepare youths to integrate into society. Lenore Anderson, director of the activist group Books Not Bars in Oakland, had hoped the department would close some facilities. The 2-year-old organization founded by San Francisco's Ella Baker Center for Human Rights has long been critical of the youth authority. "Any plan that keeps abusive youth prisons run by prison guards open is a set-up for failure," Anderson said. "The solutions have been obvious for a long time, and we're disappointed that it doesn't call for closing any facilities." Under the reforms, none of the current facilities are slated to be closed.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/merc...s/special_packages/cya/13300039.htm

Catholic Bishops of the South: "Suffer the Little Children..." Juvenile Justice in the South
Part of a series of pastoral statements by Catholic Bishops of the South on the Criminal Justice process.
http://www.catholiclabor.org/church-doc/CBS-3.htm

The Consequences Aren't Minor: The Impact of Trying Youth as Adults and Strategies for Reform
Presents research, statuary analysis, and case studies to highlight the problems with the policies and practices that treat young people as adults in the justice system. The study examines the laws and data in seven key states: California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, North Carolina, Virginia, and Wisconsin. An estimated two hundred thousand youth end up in the adult system each year, and 40 states allow or require the jailing of youth in adult facilities before they ever go to trial. About the Campaign for Youth Justice: The Campaign for Youth Justice (C4YJ) is dedicated to ending the practice of trying, sentencing and incarcerating youth under the age of 18 in the adult criminal justice system. Learn more at http://campaign4youthjustice.org.
http://www.campaign4youthjustice.or...NEWS/JPI014Consequences_Summary.pdf

The Consequences of Dropping Out of High School: Jailing and Joblessness of High School Drop Outs and the High Cost to Taxpayers
By Andrew Sum, Center for Labor Market Studies, Northeastern University. October 2009. "The report puts the collective cost to the nation over the working life of each high school dropout at $292,000. Mr. Sum said that figure took into account lost tax revenues, since dropouts earn less and therefore pay less in taxes than high school graduates. It also includes the costs of providing food stamps and other aid to dropouts and of incarcerating those who turn to crime." "The picture is even bleaker for African-Americans, with nearly one in four young black male dropouts incarcerated or otherwise institutionalized on an average day, the study said. That compares with about one in 14 young, male, white, Asian or Hispanic dropouts." (NY Times)
http://www.clms.neu.edu/publication..._of_Dropping_Out_of_High_School.pdf

Cost-Effective Youth Corrections: Rationalizing the fiscal architecture of juvenile justice systems
Summary: In most states, juvenile delinquency is handled at the county-level, with youth being arrested by local police and processed in local courts. If they are adjudicated delinquent and sentenced to options such as drug treatment, mental health counseling, or community service, then the county must pay to provide these services. However, if youth are sentenced to state secure confinement, they are sometimes sent to there at little cost to the county. In Cost-Effective Youth Corrections: Rationalizing the Fiscal Architecture of Juvenile Justice Systems, the Justice Policy Institute profiles several states that have altered the fiscal architecture of their juvenile justice systems to reduce the inefficient, ineffective and sometimes damaging affect of fiscal incentives that make it cheaper to send youth to state secure care. Pennsylvania, California, Wisconsin, Ohio and Illinois have demonstrated that, by rethinking how they fund their juvenile justice systems, states and localities can succeed in keeping more youth at home, reduce the number of youth incarcerated, and promote better outcomes for young people. March 2006.
http://www.justicepolicy.org

The Costs of Confinement: Why Good Juvenile Justice Policies Make Good Fiscal Sense
States spend about $5.7 billion each year imprisoning youth, even though the majority are held for nonviolent offenses. The brief concludes that most youth could be managed safely in the community through alternatives that cost substantially less than incarceration and could lower recidivism by up to 22 percent. These alternatives are also more cost-effective in reducing crime than incarceration, yielding up to $13 in benefits for every dollar spent. Justice Policy Institute: May 2009
http://www.justicepolicy.org/images...05_REP_CostsOfConfinement_JJ_PS.pdf

Crime Rates and Youth Incarceration in Texas and California Compared: Public Safety or Public Waste?
By Mike Males, PhD, Christina Stahlkopf, PhD, and Daniel Macallair, MPA. May 2007. Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice in California. A look at juvenile crime and incarceration in Texas and California. Over the last decade, both states have seen a nearly identical drop in youth crime (as measured by arrest rates). Where California and Texas differ is their incarceration policy the last 10 years: From 1995 to 2006, Texas increased the number of youth that were incarcerated under the age of 18 by 48%. This was done through harsh sentencing practices that targeted non-violent, property and drug offenders. In contrast, during the same period, California drastically reduced the total number of juveniles incarcerated in youth prisons by 75% —an unprecedented decline—by imprisoning only the most violent offender.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materi...n-texas-and-california-compared.doc

CRINMAIL 805 - Special Edition on Children in Conflict with the Law
10 August 2006. Contents: GUIDE: International Norms and Standards for Juvenile Justice; FACTS AND FIGURES: Children in the Criminal Justice System Around the World [fact sheet]; SOUTH AFRICA: Justice System Grapples to Deal with Children [news]; GOOD PRACTICE: Working with Children in Conflict with the Law; TURKEY: Children May Be Tried Under New Anti-Terror Law [news]; JUVENILE JUSTICE INDICATORS: Fifteen Indicators Developed to Increase Visibility and Protection for Children in Conflict with the Law; RESOURCES: Publications and Recommended Websites; EUROPE: Second International Conference on Juvenile Justice - A Frameworkfor Integration [conference]
http://www.crin.org/email/crinmail_detail.asp?crinmailID=1466

Critical Condition: African-American Youth in the Justice System
Campaign for Youth Justice. December 2008
http://campaignforyouthjustice.org/documents/AfricanAmericanBrief.pdf

Cruel and Unusual: Sentencing 13 and 14 Year Old Children In to Die in Prison
Equal Justice Initiative, Montgomery, AL. November 2007. American prisons are home to 73 inmates locked up for life for crimes they committed when they were 13 or 14. Bump that age limit up three years and we have 2,225 prisoners locked up for the rest of their lives for crimes they committed when they were 17 or younger.

Article 10 of The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights states, in part, "Accused juvenile persons shall be separated from adults and brought as speedily as possible for adjudication," and, "The penitentiary system shall comprise treatment of prisoners the essential aim of which shall be their reformation and social rehabilitation. Juvenile offenders shall be segregated from adults and be accorded treatment appropriate to their age and legal status."
http://eji.org/eji/files/20071017cruelandunusual.pdf

The Dangers of Detention: The Impact of Incarcerating Youth in Detention and Other Secure Facilities
Rather than promoting public safety, detention - the pretrial "jailing" of youth not yet found delinquent - may contribute to future offenses. Studies from around the country show that incarcerated youth have higher recidivism rates than youth supervised in other kinds of settings.
http://justicepolicy.org/reports_jl...ers/dangers_of_detention_report.pdf

Early Violent Death Among Delinquint Youth: A Prospective Longitudinal Study
By Linda Teplin and others. Pediatrics. June 2005.
http://www.rwjf.org/files/research/Early%20violent%20deaths.pdf

Education and Incarceration
By Bruce Western, Vincent Schiraldi and Jason Ziedenberg. Justice Policy Institute, 2003.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Education-and-Incarceration.pdf

Education on Lockdown: The Schoolhouse to Jailhouse Track
(2005). This report from the Advancement Project examines how zero tolerance policies in schools have profound impacts on childrens' future and involvement with the juvenile justice system. Also - visit the new quot;Schoolhouse to Jailhouse" website: http://www.stopschoolstojails.org.
http://www.advancementproject.org/reports/FINALEOLrep.pdf

Effective Investments in Public Safety
Educational attainment, in itself, does not predetermine whether an individual will engage in crime. However, there is evidence that suggests that education and graduation rates may relate to crime rates, and this new research comes at a time when education programs are receiving less and less funding, while more money is being spent on incarceration—a public safety policy that has not been proven to lower crime rates. Data from numerous sources, including the Bureau of Justice Statistics, show that those people with the least education are often the ones who end up committing crimes and being imprisoned. Funding for more education services rather than corrections would have a significant positive effect on public safety. State by state information included in this document from the Justice Policy Institute, 2006.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materi...ve-Investments-in-Public-Safety.doc

Effects on Violence of Laws and Policies Facilitating the Transfer of Youth from the Juvenile to the Adult System
A study published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), led by a Task Force on Community Preventive Services, released November 29, 2007 finds that transferring youth to the adult criminal justice system significantly increases crime and rather than improve public safety, produces the opposite effect. Youth who have been previously tried as adults are, on average, 34% more likely to commit crimes than youth retained in the juvenile justice system. After an extensive review of published scientific evidence, the Task Force on Community Preventive Services recommended "Against laws or policies facilitating the transfer of juveniles from the juvenile to the adult judicial system." The CDC published the Task Force findings in their latest Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report - Reports and Recommendations. The study found that violent outcomes associated with the transfer of youth to the adult system include an increase in pretrial violence, victimization of juveniles in adult facilities, and elevated suicide rates for juveniles incarcerated in adult facilities.
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/pdf/rr/rr5609.pdf

Focus: Children Exposed to Violence
National Council on Crime and Delinquency. August 2009
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Youth_Exposure_to_Violence.pdf

From Prison to Home: The Effect of Incarceration and Reentry on Children, Families, and Communities Incarceration. Reentry, and Social Capital: Social Networks in the Balance
By Dina R. Rose and Todd R. Clear, John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/prison2home02/Rose.htm

Gang Wars: The Failure of Enforcement Tactics and the Need for Effective Public Safety Strategies
Written by Judith Greene and Kevin Pranis, undertakes an extensive review of the research literature on gangs to clarify persistent misconceptions and examine the effectiveness of common gang control strategies. According to the report, in cities like Los Angeles where gang activity is most prevalent, more police, more prisons and more punitive measures haven't stopped the cycle of gang violence. Most surprising are conclusions that gangs are responsible for a relatively small share of crime; gang activity has not grown in the U.S.; whites make up a large- if largely invisible- proportion of gang members; most gang-involved youth quit before reaching adulthood; and heavy-handed suppression tactics can increase gang cohesion while failing to reduce violence. Justice Policy Institute, July 2007.
http://www.justicepolicy.org/reports_jl/7-10-07_gangs/report.htm

Girls do what they have to do to survive: methods used by girls in the sex trade and street economy to fight back and heal
Young Women's Empowerment Project. "Girls do what they have to do to survive. We listen. We've been there." New research. September 2009.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/girls_do_what_they_have_to.pdf

Hearing on H.R 4300, Juvenile Justice Accountability and Improvement Act of 2007
House Judiciary Committee Hearing. Testimony by Richard Dudley, Jr., MD. September 11, 2008
http://realcostofprisons.org/materi..._Justice_Improvement_Act-Dudley.pdf

Hearing on H.R 4300, Juvenile Justice Accountability and Improvement Act of 2007
House Judiciary Committee Hearing. Testimony by Elizabeth Calvin, Children's Rights Advocate, Human Rights Watch. September 11, 2008
http://realcostofprisons.org/materi..._Justice_Improvement_Act-Calvin.pdf

Jailing Juveniles: The Dangers of Incarcerating Youth in Adult Jails in America
The Campaign for Youth Justice. The report provides a summary of the risks that youth face when incarcerated in adult jails, facts and figures about how many youth are incarcerated in jails nationwide, and a review of the limited federal and state laws protecting youth in jails. Released: November 15, 2007.
http://www.campaignforyouthjustice....ing_Juveniles_Report_2007-11-15.pdf

A Just Alternative to Sentencing Youth to Life in Prison Without the Possibility of Parole
Issue brief co-authored by Beth Colgan, Managing Attorney of the Institutions Project at Columbia Legal Services, and Jody Kent, Director of the National Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth. Published March 2010 by the American Constitution Society. The issue brief looks closely at our country's deeply flawed practice of sentencing youth to die in prison. It highlights how this United States practice disregards scientific research, is implemented unfairly, and undermines America's moral standing.
http://www.acslaw.org/files/Kent%20...venile%20Life%20Issue%20Brief_0.pdf

Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana Report: Teenagers Held in Detention During Hurricane Katrina Endured Horrific Conditions
About 150 teenagers held in detention during Hurricane Katrina endured horrific conditions in the storm's aftermath, including standing for hours in filthy floodwater, having nothing to eat and drink for three to five days, and being forced to drink sewage-filled water as a result, according to "Treated Like Trash: Juvenile Detention in New Orleans Before, During, and After Hurricane Katrina". The report was prepared by the Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana, a group that has long advocated changes in the state's troubled juvenile system, and was based on interviews with more than 60 teenagers held at the Orleans Parish Prison during the storm, as well as with prison staff members.
http://www.njisj.org/pubdocs/2006/red_051206_jjpl_rpt.pdf

Juvenile Offenders and Victims: 2006 National Report
(NCJ 212906) March 2006 Report, 260 page(s) Snyder, H., and Sickmund, M. Presents comprehensive information on juvenile crime, violence, and victimization and on the juvenile justice system. This OJJDP National Report brings together the latest available statistics from a variety of sources and includes numerous tables, graphs, and maps, accompanied by analyses in clear, nontechnical language.
http://ojjdp.ncjrs.gov/publications/PubAbstract.asp?pubi=234394

Juvenile Transfer Laws: An Effective Deterrent to Delinquency?
Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP), U.S. Department of Justice. August 2008 Research by the OJJDP found that transfer laws have little or no deterrent effect on juvenile crime. The report, also mentions that recidivism rates have increased, because of the transfer laws. Key findings from OJJDP report: Laws to make it easier to transfer youth to the adult criminal court system have little or no general deterrent effect, meaning they do not prevent youth from engaging in criminal behavior; Youth transferred to the adult system are more likely to be rearrested and to reoffend than youth who committed similar crimes, but were retained in the juvenile justice system; Higher recidivism rates are due to a number of factors including the youth's:
� Stigmatization/negative labeling effects of being labeled as a convicted felon;
� Sense of resentment and injustice about being tried as an adult;
� Learning of criminal mores and behavior while incarcerated with adults;
� Decreased access to rehabilitation and family support in the adult system;
� Decreased employment and community integration opportunities due to a felony conviction.
http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/ojjdp/220595.pdf

Know Your Rights: A Guide to Young People's Rights in Juvenile Delinquency Court
(May 2007) The booklet is designed to teach young people their basic constitutional rights as it applies to the law. According to the Know Your Rights booklet in 2003: 2.2 million arrests were made of persons under the age of 18; 136,500 of these arrests were for violating curfew and loitering laws; Black youth account for 27% of all juvenile arrests, even though they only make up 16% of the youth population; and Girls account for 29% of all juvenile arrests, which represents a 45% increase in arrests of girls over a period of approximately twenty years Additionally, the booklet cites in recent years, reports of abuse and mistreatment in youth correctional facilities have increased. For example, in 2004 there were 2,821 reports of sexual violence against youth and 26 deaths of youth in facilities.
http://www.gaultat40.info/pdfs/kyr_booklet.pdf

Media Images of (Youthful) Offenders: A Comparative Analysis of Race, Class, Gender in Germany and the United States of America
Comparing media representations of (youthful) offenders in Germany and the U.S., this paper looks at the lessons of electoral campaigns for penal abolitionists. In a recent election campaign in Germany, a "law-and-order" discourse by a conservative party seems to have backfired, whereas in the US such "homeland security" discourse of fear usually brings about positive election results. Election campaigns in the Global North often use media images of "super-predator" youth to shore up a moral panic among voters who may already be concerned about various behavior patterns attributed to marginalized people such as immigrants, especially from the Global South, or naturalized people of color. In the post 9/11 era the deviant Other is a Muslim, preferably a young male immigrant from the Middle East who perhaps supplants the stereotype of angry black male. How do we respond to these stereotypical representations in advertising campaigns?
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Nagel_media_images.pdf

No Turning Back: Promising Approaches to Reducing Racial and Ethnic Disparities Affecting Youth of Color in the Justice System
The Building Blocks for Youth initiative has released its final report. The report discusses the Casey Foundation's Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative, the W. Haywood Burns Institute, and campaigns in 12 cities, counties, and states to reduce disproportionate youth of color contact within the justice system.
http://www.buildingblocksforyouth.org/noturningback/ntb_fullreport.pdf

Pennsylvania Senate Committee on the Judiciary Public Hearing on Juvenile Lifers
Testimony by Ashley Nellis, PhD, Research Analyst, The Sentencing Project. September 22, 2008.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/TSP_Juvenile_Lifers_in_PA_9-08.pdf

Pennsylvania Senate Committee on the Judiciary Public Hearing on Juvenile Lifers - Statement by Laurence Steinberg, PhD
September 22, 2008.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materi...ile_Lifers_in_PA_9-08-Steinberg.pdf

Real Impacts: the actual results of Rhode Island's new law that charges 17-year-olds as adults
"Real Impacts: the actual results of RI's new law that charges 17-year-olds as adults" documents what has happened since July, 2007 when the RI legislature adopted this new policy. The report found that the new policy is not only more costly, it unduly punishes juveniles, particularly juveniles from disadvantaged backgrounds and from communities of color. In fact, 17-year-olds of color are 28 times more likely to end up in adult prison than white 17-year-olds. The report recommends that the new long be reversed as soon as possible and that the records of those already affected be retroactively undone. Family Life Center, October 2007.
http://realcostofprisons.org/materials/Real-Impacts.pdf

The Rest of Their Lives Life without Parole for Child Offenders in the United States
Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, October 2005. Includes state by state rankings of incarceration-for-life of children.
http://hrw.org/reports/2005/us1005/

Risking Their Futures: Why Trying Non-violent 17-year-olds as Adults is Bad Policy for Wisconsin
Wisconsin Council on Children & Families (WCCF), explores the effects and trends of sending this age group through the adult system. WCCF looked at 1,000 17-year-olds brought before adult court between September, 2001 and September, 2007 to examine sentencing patterns, recidivism rates, educational opportunities available during incarceration, and racial components to sentencing. More than half of the group was sentenced to jail or prison, even though nearly 80% of trials were only for misdemeanor charges. Moreover, 70% of these 1000 juveniles sent through adult court were convicted of a new crime during the period studied, equally split between felonies and misdemeanors. This recidivism rate is nearly double that of similar age groups sent through the juvenile system. In addition, racial disparities emerged in the sentencing trends. When compared to Caucasian youth, African-American youth were far more likely to be incarcerated and far less likely to be returned to the community through deferred prosecution, fines, or probation. This trend held true for American Indians and Latinos as well.
http://www.wccf.org/pdf/risking_their_futures.pdf

A Road Map for Juvenile Justice Reform
2008 KIDS COUNT Data Book essay, "A Road Map for Juvenile Justice Reform" looks at the nearly 100,000 children confined to juvenile facilities on any given night in the United States and what can be done to reduce unnecessary and inappropriate detention and incarceration and increase opportunities for positive youth development and community safety. The essay is released in conjunction with the 2008 KIDS COUNT Data Book, an incredible resource which gives national and state-by-state profiles of the well-being of America's children through rankings on 10 key measures and information on the economic, health, education, and social conditions of America's children and families.
http://www.aecf.org/kidscount/sld/databook.jsp

Saving Futures, Saving Dollars: The Impact of Education on Crime Reduction and Earnings
Source: The Alliance for Excellent Education. "America's standard of living and international competitiveness will be strengthened if its high schools are improved. Research indicates that about 75 percent of America's state prison inmates, almost 59 percent of federal inmates, and 69 percent of jail inmates did not complete high school. Additionally, the number of prison inmates without a high school diploma has increased over time (Harlow, 2003). Reforming the nation's high schools could potentially increase the number of graduates and, as a result, significantly reduce the nation's crime-related costs and add billions of dollars to the economy through the additional wages they would earn. Increasing the graduation rate and college matriculation of male students by only 5 percent could lead to combined savings and revenue of almost $8 billion each year."
http://www.all4ed.org/publications/SavingFutures.pdf

The School to Prison Pipeline and Criminalizing Youth: Costs, Consequences, and Alternatives
By Marsha Weissman in The Link, an online journal of the Child Welfare League, discusses the growing trend to criminalize adolescent behavior and the pathways that lead from school to prison. There are both direct links between school and prison evidenced by the growing presence of police in schools and the increase in numbers of young people arrested in school, and indirect links which are reflected by school suspensions and expulsions. Also highlighted Strategies for Success, a Center for Community Alternatives' program that has been in operation since 2000 and has reduced both suspensions and arrests of students who would otherwise be trapped in the school to prison pipeline.
http://www.cwla.org/programs/juvenilejustice/thelink2008spring.pdf

Something is Wrong: Exploring the Roots of Youth Violence
Project NIA, The Chicago Freedom School and Teachers for Social Justice have partnered along with other volunteers to develop a curriculum guide in order to contribute to the ongoing efforts by young people and their adult allies to analyze the root causes of youth violence and to create local solutions.

Through this curriculum, they want to challenge youth to think about a) the roots of violence in their lives; b) the enforcers and victims of violence; c) the effects of violence on both victims and perpetrators; and d) how violence can ultimately be minimized through systemic changes.

At a time when frustration is running high and many are expressing a sense of powerlessness in the face of pervasive violence, this 350-page curriculum guide is an offering intended to make a positive contribution to the dialogue about violence in the lives of young people. In the words of historian and community activist Barbara Ransby, our goal is to help young people to constructively “channel their righteous rage” towards the actual sources of their oppression. Sample Units Include: 1. Understanding Oppression 2. Understanding Root Causes (Mikva Challenge) 3. Roots of Heterosexism (Gender Just) 4. Power and Violence 5. Youth Homicide in Chicago 6. Media Violence (Beyondmedia Education) 7. Gangs and Violence: Historical Context & Root Causes 8. Police Violence: Fear & Loathing among Youth of Color 9. American Casino: Economic Violence in the U.S. 10. Exploring the Roots of and Community Responses to Violence: A Youth Action Research Project (All Stars Project of Chicago)
http://www.project-nia.org/docs/Something_Is_Wrong-Curriculum.pdf

Until They Die A Natural Death: Youth Sentenced to Life Without Parole In Massachusetts
The report followed a two-year review of most of the cases in which children ages 14, 15, and 16 were tried in adult court and sentenced to life. Massachusetts has one of the harshest laws in the country for sentencing murderers as young as 14 to life in prison without parole, and many of the 57 people serving such mandatory sentences are first-time offenders. African Americans make up 47 percent of the juveniles sentenced to life without parole but account for less than 7 percent of children under 18 in Massachusetts, said the report.The Children’s Law Center of Massachusetts (September 2009)
http://www.clcm.org/UntilTheyDieaNaturalDeath9_09.pdf

When I Die, They’ll Send Me Home: Youth Sentenced to Life without Parole in California
Human Rights Watch Report, 2008
http://hrw.org/reports/2008/us0108/

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Immigration

A Broken System: Confidential Reports Reveal Failures in U.S. Immigration Detention Centers
By the National Immigration Law Center and the ACLU of Southern CA. August 2009.
http://www.nilc.org/immlawpolicy/arrestdet/A-Broken-System-2009-07.pdf

Comprehensive Immigration Reform and America's Security and Prosperity Act of 2009
Border security, conditions of detention, due process, repeal of 287g, employment verification, visa reform, promotion of family unity, legalization, DREAM Act, farmworkers, integration of new Americans.
http://immigrationpolicy.org/sites/default/files/docs/CIR_ASAP_2009_Summary.pdf

Guilty by Immigration Status
By the Human Rights Immigrant Community Action Network (October 2009). This report details how the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has, over the last eight years, created an "immigration control regime" in which it is promoting the criminalization of immigration status as a means of detaining and deporting individuals for often minor offenses. With the detention of immigrants taking place in record numbers and the militarization of the U.S. border on the rise, the report also describes how DHS and other police, public officials, and agencies, routinely trumped civil rights and constitutional protections in order to question, detain, and/or jail individuals based solely on their perceived or actual immigration status. To access the report:
http://www.nnirr.org/hurricane/GuiltybyImmigrationStatus2008.pdf

Local Democracy on ICE: Why State and Local Governments Have No Business in Federal Immigration Law Enforcement
New Report from Justice Strategies (Feb 2009). Democracy on ICE 287(g) is a tiny provision in federal immigration law that allows Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to take local police away from their mission of fighting crime, and pull them into the murky territory of targeting immigrants for arrest without suspicion of crime. ICE described the 287(g) program as a public safety measure to target "criminal illegal aliens," but its largest impact has been on law-abiding immigrant communities. Rather than focusing on serious crime, police resources are spent targeting day-laborers, corn-vendors and people with broken tail-lights. This report details findings from a year-long investigation of 287(g) by Justice Strategies, and recommends that the ICE program be terminated.
http://www.justicestrategies.net/files/JS-Democracy-On-Ice.pdf

Restoring Integrity to the Immigration System
By Tom Barry. Americas Program Policy Report. May 2009. A comprehensive essay on immigrant "crimmigration." [Excerpt]: Mass Incarceration for Immigrants: The immigrant crackdown and the accompanying "crimmigration" of immigration law have led to the mass incarceration of immigrants. Throughout the country, private prison firms are hurriedly constructing new immigrant prisons for the immigrant detainees and prisoners of ICE, USMS, and the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP). At a time when the U.S. criminal justice system is coming under new public and congressional scrutiny because of its high costs and high rates of incarceration, the federal government (in close collaboration with local governments and the private prison industry) is imprisoning unprecedented numbers of illegal and legal immigrants.
http://americas.irc-online.org/pdf/reports/0905integrity.pdf