By Diarmuid Griffin

Existing research on life imprisonment focuses on interrogating the sentence from a human rights perspective, exploring lived experiences, and examining release processes. There are few studies that analyse the judicial practice of imposing life imprisonment. This article examines judicial rationales in imposing and upholding discretionary sentences of life imprisonment in Ireland, from 1987 to 2022. The findings indicate that it is selectively imposed (primarily for sexual or homicide offences). Sentence selection is frequently influenced by the multiplicity of offending, the exceptional nature of the crime(s) and the vulnerability of the victim(s). Factors such as the risk of reoffending and previous criminal history also appeared to influence sentence outcomes. The indeterminate nature of the sentence was viewed as beneficial in addressing concerns relating to public protection. Author: Diarmuid Griffin

IRISH JUDICIAL STUDIES JOURNAL , 2024. 18p.

By Beatrix Immenkamp with Greta Baltikauskaite, Graphics: Samy Chahri

The European arrest warrant (EAW) is a judicial decision issued by a Member State with a view to the arrest and surrender by another Member State of a requested person for the purposes of a criminal prosecution or a custodial sentence. Between 2005 and 2022, some 231 005 EAWs were issued, and 69 688 persons were surrendered. The functioning of the EAW system – as set out in this infographic – requires a high level of trust between the judicial authorities of the issuing and the executing Member State, which has at times generated challenges and tensions. In the internal security strategy published on 1 April 2025, the Commission stated that it would 'assess the need to further strengthen' the EAW.

Brussels: EPRS | European Parliamentary Research Service, 2025. 2p.

By Kierra B. Jones Evelyn F. McCoy Natalie Lima Rod Martinez

Prosecutor-led diversion programs are growing in popularity in many jurisdictions across the country and offer a unique opportunity for prosecutors to address the impact prosecutorial decisions have in perpetuating mass incarceration and an opportunity to reduce local jail populations. Diversion programs can both hold people accused of wrong-doing accountable, while reducing the deleterious effects of incarceration. This case study, part of a series highlighting work supported by the Safety and Justice Challenge, examines how Milwaukee County, Wisconsin developed and implemented prosecutor-led diversion strategies to reduce the local jail population.

Washington DC: The Urban Institute, 2022.36p.

By Evelyn F. McCoy, Azhar Gulaid, Nkechi Erondu, Janeen Buck Willison

Increased rates of pretrial detention have driven overall growth in the jail population nationwide and carry significant individual and systemic impacts for people of color, who are disproportionately affected by pretrial policies. Targeting rates of failure to appear in court in local jurisdictions is key to reducing pretrial jail populations, especially because failure to appear can result in bench warrants and ultimately detention. This case study, part of a series highlighting work supported by the Safety and Justice Challenge Innovation Fund, examines the experiences of Tulsa County, Oklahoma, and Hennepin County, Minnesota, which implemented strategies to reduce rates of failure to appear in court and to reduce their respective jails’ pretrial populations.

Washington, DC: The Urban Institute, 2021. 22p

By Shamena Anwar, Patrick Bayer, Randi Hjalmarsson, Matthew L. Mizel

Virginia law states that any motorist pulled over for driving 20 miles per hour (mph) or more over the speed limit or driving in excess of 80 mph at any speed limit (or 85 mph as of July 2020) is eligible for a reckless driving citation, which is a Class 1 misdemeanor violation. However, both law enforcement officers and the courts can use discretion to reduce the misdemeanor charge to a simple traffic infraction. In this report, researchers use data on speeding violations in 18 Virginia counties over a nine-year period to examine whether there are racial disparities in who benefits from this discretion and why these racial disparities might exist.

Key Findings

Law enforcement and the courts are afforded significant discretion in misdemeanor cases

When Virginia officers pull over a motorist for speeding in the reckless range, they can either charge the motorist with a misdemeanor or downgrade the charge to an infraction. Officers in this sample downgraded the charge to an infraction 58 percent of the time.

At the court stage, the court can convict the motorist of the misdemeanor charge, amend the charge downward (typically to an infraction), or dismiss the charge entirely. In this sample, the courts amended or dismissed these misdemeanor speeding charges 42 percent of the time.

Penalties for a misdemeanor conviction are significantly higher than penalties for an infraction

A misdemeanor conviction results in a criminal record, higher fines and fees, and a worse driving record, all of which can have important impacts on an individual's life.

Black motorists were more likely to be convicted of a misdemeanor

Among motorists cited for speeding in a range that qualified for a misdemeanor, 36 percent of Black motorists were convicted of a misdemeanor, compared with 19 percent of White motorists.

Racial disparities were present at both the law enforcement and court stages of the process. Compared with White motorists, Black motorists both were more likely to be charged with a misdemeanor by law enforcement and, conditional on being charged, were more likely to be convicted by the courts.

The county in which a motorist was cited explained almost half of the racial disparity in whom law enforcement charged with a misdemeanor.

About four-fifths of the racial disparity in whom the court convicted of a misdemeanor could be explained by observable case characteristics, such as whether the motorist attended the court hearing and whether a defense attorney was present.

Recommendations

One potential way to remove the option for disparate treatment, and to ensure that motorists in different counties are policed in the same way, would be to move to a statewide system of automated speed enforcement, in which cameras are set up to identify and send citations to speeding vehicles. The misdemeanor speed threshold could be set so that the overall level of enforcement is similar to current levels (in which a majority of motorists' potential misdemeanor charges are discounted), but the criteria would apply to all motorists across the state in the same way regardless of race or location.

A large percentage of the racial disparities at the court stage occurred because of racial differences in who attended the court hearing. If this pattern is caused by racial differences in being aware that court attendance is required, the citation issued to motorists could be restructured to make the next steps in the process clearer, and text message reminders for upcoming court dates could be sent to motorists.

Many jurisdictions have started to develop online platforms so that court hearings for traffic violations can occur remotely. Such platforms might result in a more standardized process, which might lessen the importance of attorneys — another driver of the overall racial disparity observed at the court stage. Furthermore, these platforms could hide the race of the motorist from the judge, potentially reducing judges' ability to engage in disparate treatment.

Santa Monica, RAND, 2021. 73p.

BY THE PHILADELPHIA DISTRICT ATTORNEY'S OFFICE

Key Takeaways Archival research conducted for this report demonstrated that racial disparities observed in Philadelphia’s criminal court system are rooted in severe historical injustices and wealth inequality. For over a century, Black Philadelphians have been overrepresented in arrests and criminal charges, relative to their representation in the City’s broader population. Disparities have not been resolved and in many cases have been worsened by federal, state, and local laws and policies. Combining publicly-available datasets reveals that markers of systemic disinvestment such as poverty, unemployment, litter, health problems, and eviction are concentrated in formerly red-lined neighborhoods where residents are predominantly Black and Latinx. From 2015 to 2022, Black defendants were charged at disproportionately higher rates relative to other groups in seven of the eight most common criminal charge categories. Even when accounting for prior criminal record and illegal firearm charges, Black and Latinx individuals who are convicted of aggravated assault or burglary are more likely to be sentenced to incarceration than white individuals convicted of the same crime. Latinx individuals convicted of possessing drugs with intent to distribute (PWID) are more likely to be sentenced to incarceration than Black or white defendants, even when they have no prior record or illegal firearm charges. While this administration’s policies have helped to reduce disparities in supervision and probationary sentences, large racial disproportionalities remain in Philadelphia’s court system. Justice agencies and social institutions must work together to fix the structural racism that creates disparities across systems 

Philadelphia: The District Attorney's Office, 2023. 68p.

by Terry Huang, Katarzyna Wyka, Maria Khan,

The US incarcerates more people than any country in the world. Driven by racial bias in policing policies, practices and sentencing, as well as biases toward individuals of lower socio-economic background, minority groups are disproportionately exposed to police contact and incarceration. People who have a history of incarceration face elevated risk of adverse health outcomes prior to incarceration, and incarceration is likely a determinant of the racial/ethnicity disparity in health. There is strong evidence showing that criminal legal system involvement (CLI) plays a role in cardiovascular disease (CVD) and STI/HIV exposure. CLI also appears to be associated with other chronic conditions such as diabetes22, and adverse pregnancy outcomes such as miscarriage. In addition, there is evidence CLI increases exposure to violence, including homicide and suicide. Given the intersection of incarceration and a myriad of health risks, there is a critical need to develop public health programs for people released from incarceration focused on client-centered goals to best protect health and wellbeing, and promote social integration, upon return to the community. The New York City Health Justice Network (NYC HJN), an innovative health service delivery program for individuals returning from incarceration, was developed and implemented by the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH), with criminal justice reform funding from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office (DANY) Criminal Justice Investment Initiative (CJII). NYC HJN sought to provide individuals recently released from incarceration with peer support from community health workers (CHW) with lived experience of successful reentry from the criminal legal system and access to integrated primary care and social services. As an intersectoral strategy to improve community health and well-being, NYC HJN aimed to reduce the likelihood of further contact with the criminal legal system. NYC HJN addressed a wide range of client health needs, including support with health insurance, primary care, dental care, mental and behavioral health, and social service needs such as assistance with employment, housing, food security, obtaining vital documents (e.g., identification), and legal support. CHWs provided social and emotional support and served as critical advocates to help clients navigate the healthcare system as well as a wide range of social service organizations deemed critical to successful community reentry. The NYC HJN program served people released from both prison and jail. Those served generally represented the incarcerated population in NYC. This final evaluation report aims to examine the association of NYC HJN program participation with criminal legal system re-involvement outcomes, including re-arrests, conviction/reconviction and reincarceration at 6- and 12- months post program start. For the purpose of this evaluation, a sample of HJN clients who enrolled in the program between 2020-2022 were recruited and consented into the study. Using administrative data from criminal justice agencies in New York, HJN clients were compared to a sample of controls matched on age, sex, time spent incarcerated during the last jail or prison stay, top charge for the last incarceration, and frequency of incarceration in the past 5 years. For the final analysis, 203 HJN clients were matched against 339 individuals serving as controls. Bivariate results showed that HJN clients had a lower average number of re-arrests at 6-months compared to controls, as shown in Figure 1 below. This trend was present up to 12 months after program start. Other outcomes such as rates of conviction/reconviction and reincarceration were lower among HJN program participation relative to controls but were not statistically significantly different between the two groups. After adjusting for covariates, there were no significant differences in any of the outcomes at 6- or 12-months between HJN clients and controls, except for the lower mean number of re-arrests in the HJN group. The lack of statistical significance among other variables should be interpreted with caution, as the results may have been affected by the small sample size and relative short duration of the study.

New York: NYU-CUNY Prevention Research Center , 2025. 45p.

By Alejandra Garcia, Taylor DeClerck, Amber Moe, Sarah Blanco, Karen Otis, Danielle Pugh

TIPS Lab was born out of the need to address trauma in criminal courts—an urgent need shown by statistics on the prevalence of violence and victimization in the United States. For defendants in criminal courts, the prevalence of trauma is estimated at twice the rate as that of the general population,1 and for female, transgender, and juvenile defendants, experiences of victimization are nearly ubiquitous.2 Trauma can lead to justice system involvement through several mechanisms: substance use spurred by trauma, which can lead to arrest and prosecution for drug-related crimes; coercion to engage in criminal activity by an abusive partner or exploiter; trauma symptoms such as emotional dysregulation, hypervigilance to threat, and angry outbursts that increase risk for engaging in violent behavior and arrest; and utilization of violence as a survival strategy and learned behavior.3 Involvement in the system itself, including arrests, arraignments, and jail stays, are also opportunities for re-traumatization. Individuals who have experienced trauma within the criminal court system may exhibit symptoms such as flashbacks, overwhelming emotional and physiological responses, numbing, and dissociation. These symptoms can impact their well-being and hinder their ability to participate in the legal process. Trauma within the criminal legal system can manifest as attempts to gain a sense of control and safety; difficulty with attention, concentration, and memory; guardedness; and difficulty trusting court practitioners. When trauma is left unaddressed, defendants can cycle through the system, experiencing repeated arrests and prosecutions. Additionally, criminal court practitioners may have had their own traumatic experiences and can also be traumatized, or re-traumatized, which can affect their well-being and effectiveness as a practitioner.4 Practitioners can implement the recommendations in this blueprint to address trauma in order to enhance the consistency and effectiveness of criminal court practice, resulting in processes that are less stressful, calmer, and more comfortable for all court users

New York: Center for Court Innovation, 2025. 64p.

By UK Ministry of Justice

In the summer of 2024, capacity pressures brought the prison system dangerously close to collapse. The adult prison population, estimated to be over 87,000 as of April 2025,1 currently exceeds the capacity the system is designed to accommodate and is projected to increase. To address these capacity challenges, successive governments have been forced to adopt emergency measures to free up spaces, including reducing the release point for some prisoners from 50% of their sentence to 40% (SDS40).2 These measures cannot resolve the capacity crisis in the long term nor fortify the effective running of our prisons. Commissioned by the Ministry of Justice in October 2024, this Independent Sentencing Review (“the Review”) was given the task of a comprehensive re-evaluation of our sentencing framework, to ensure the country is never again in a position where it has more prisoners than prison places, and the government is forced to rely on the emergency release of prisoners. This Review also welcomes the opportunity to think more imaginatively about how we sentence and use custody, holding the view that our current system, regardless of prison capacity pressures, requires considerable reform to rehabilitate offenders more successfully, reduce reoffending and support victims. The purposes of sentencing, as set out in legislation, are punishment, reduction of crime, reparation, rehabilitation and public protection. The Review’s Part 1 report History and Trends in Sentencing found that over the last two decades, sentencing has focused disproportionately on punishment with a view from politicians and the media that “the only form of punishment that counts is imprisonment.”3 Punishment is an important aim of the criminal justice system and prison plays a vital role in delivering punishment. However, too often political decision-making has been based on an approach that punishment is all that matters, with political parties lacking appropriate focus on the most effective ways to reduce crime. This is demonstrated by the high levels of reoffending, suggesting that the current approach is failing to achieve rehabilitation and address the root causes of offending. Overall, proven reoffending rates for adult offenders have fluctuated between

Recommendations

There are nine detailed chapters in the review, each with accompanying recommendations – a total of 48 in all. I summarise the nine chapter headings and overall recommendation for each below.

Revisiting the statutory purposes of sentencing – recommends amending the statutory purposes of sentencing to emphasise the importance of protecting victims and reducing crime.

Strengthening alternatives to custody in the community – recommends revising the sentencing framework to ensure sentencers can take full advantage of the flexibility of community sentencing, including financial penalties and ancillary orders.

Reducing reliance on custody – the expected recommendation to legislate to ensure short custodial sentences are only used in exceptional circumstances.

Incentivising progression from custody to community – prisoners can be released earlier through “earned progression” defined as rewarding compliance with prison rules.

Taking a victim-centred approach – recommendations to improve public awareness and information on sentencing, more transparency about sentence lengths and better support to victims.

Targeted approach to different groups – recommendations aimed at prolific offenders, women, drug and alcohol offenders, older offenders, Foreign National Offenders and sex offenders.

The role of the probation service – more investment in the service itself and funding for Third Sector and community organisations.

The role of technology – rapid roll out of technology in offender supervision, improved data sharing and explore use of advanced AI.

A sustainable prison system – longer term recommendations including an external advisory body and transparency around the impact of new legislation on prison capacity.

London: UK Ministry of Justice, 2025. 192p.

By Roland Neil and Beau Kilmer

As policymakers and criminal justice agencies review how they have addressed problems related to illegal drugs over the past decade, it is useful to examine relevant data and policy changes from this period. This paper first analyzes trends in multiple criminal justice indicators related to drugs, focusing primarily on the period from 2010 onward. It then highlights a handful of noteworthy policy changes that have been implemented, accelerated, or in some cases reversed during the ongoing overdose crisis. Finally, it presents some key findings from the analysis and offers some recommendations to policymakers and criminal justice practitioners. KEY FINDINGS Trends in criminal justice indicators ■ From 2010 to 2019, drug offenses accounted for 12%-16% of all reported arrests nationwide, making them the largest category of arrests during that period. ■ Data from the Uniform Crime Reporting system show a decline in drug possession arrests from 2010 to 2019, primarily driven by a reduction in cannabis-related arrests. When excluding cannabis, drug possession arrests increased, largely due to the “Other − dangerous nonnarcotic drugs” category, which includes methamphetamine. ■ More recent trends are harder to track due to changes in how the Federal Bureau of Investigation collects and reports arrest data. However, our analysis of data from 17 states with reliable National Incident-Based Reporting System coverage suggests that drug arrests—even excluding cannabis— generally declined from 2017 to 2022. ■ While caution is advised when interpreting drug seizure data for insights into law enforcement or drug seller behavior, the data show a sharp increase in fentanyl seizures and a noticeable decrease in heroin seizures. Methamphetamine seizures surged for much of the period but appear to have reversed in recent years. ■ As with most offense types, more individuals convicted of drug offenses are supervised in the community (e.g., via probation or parole) than incarcerated. ■ The number of individuals on probation or parole for drug offenses dropped by approximately 22% and 15%, respectively, between 2011 and 2021. However, due to incomplete data on offense types, these figures are rough estimates. ■ The federal and state prison populations for individuals serving sentences for drug offenses have also declined substantially over the past decade. Notably, the most significant drop in state prison populations was among Black individuals, whose numbers decreased by more than 50% between 2010 and 2019. ■ There are limited data on drug prices over the past decade, though one study found that the purity-adjusted price of fentanyl powder in the lower-wholesale market dropped significantly from 2016 to 2021, despite the sharp increase in seizures. Changes in drug policies and practices ■ A growing number of jurisdictions have implemented police-led diversion or deflection programs aimed at facilitating treatment and reducing arrests and criminal justice consequences. However, the evidence base for these emerging programs remains thin. ■ At the same time, there has also been an increase in the application of drug-induced homicide laws and Good Samaritan laws. While both Oregon and Washington have relaxed their drug possession laws in recent years—Oregon through a ballot initiative and Washington via a court decision—both states’ legislatures later passed laws recriminalizing possession. ■ Carrying naloxone to respond to overdoses is now a common practice among U.S. police. Though less common, some law enforcement agencies have also made efforts to follow up with individuals who have overdosed. RECOMMENDATIONS ■ Improve data infrastructure: Although data collection on drug-specific arrests has improved significantly, major gaps remain in many criminal justice indicators related to drugs, particularly regarding jail admissions, the role of drugs in probation and parole revocations, and drug prices (especially purity-adjusted prices). Data infrastructure and access should be improved to enable comprehensive analysis and informed policymaking. ■ Refrain from using drug-induced homicide laws: Jurisdictions should avoid enacting or applying drug-induced homicide laws, as there is no empirical evidence supporting their effectiveness and they run counter to what we know about how deterrence works. These laws may also deter individuals from calling authorities during an overdose. ■ Pilot and evaluate police-led diversion and deflection programs: Police-led diversion and deflection programs should be piloted and rigorously evaluated. We must also recognize that the success of these programs will likely vary depending on the outcomes measured (e.g., overdose deaths versus rearrests) and the availability and quality of services in the community. ■ Consider context and evidence when evaluating alternatives to criminal penalties for drug possession: The liberalization of drug possession laws in Oregon and Washington coincided with a surge in fentanyl use. In Oregon, the substance use disorder treatment infrastructure was already weak and there were serious implementation issues related to the rollout of Measure 110. While drug possession arrests have clearly declined, many other outcomes remain uncertain and lack consensus. Jurisdictions exploring alternatives to criminalizing possession should consider the experiences of Oregon and Washington, the emerging research on these policies, and evidence from other countries on decriminalization. ■ Reconsider how criminal justice resources are allocated: In areas heavily affected by fentanyl, law enforcement agencies currently focused on supply-reduction efforts—in the hope that such efforts will increase fentanyl prices and thus curb consumption in the long run—may want to consider reallocating some of these resources to other strategies. Depending on the jurisdiction, these can include addressing open-air drug markets that create disorder and trauma in neighborhoods, partnering with service organizations to pilot diversion and deflection programs, training and equipping officers to respond to overdoses, and combating the violence, corruption, and money laundering tied to illegal drug markets. While the evidence base for some alternative approaches to traditional drug law enforcement remains limited, this sometimes reflects their novelty rather than their potential. Meanwhile, current efforts are not often grounded in evidence-based best practices. Given the severity of the overdose crisis and the widespread and increasingly entrenched presence of fentanyl in much of the country, policymakers and criminal justice practitioners must think outside the box. Experimenting with promising new approaches, even when evidence is scarce or unavailable, is urgently needed to improve upon the status quo. As these models are implemented, it is crucial to rigorously evaluate them to determine what works and establish best practices for law enforcement’s response to fentanyl and the overdose crisis.

Washington, DC: Foreign Policy at Brookings, 2024. 41p.

By The UK Comptroller and Auditor General

Family justice is concerned with keeping children safe and helping families resolve disputes. It includes cases on protecting children, who children live with and how they spend time with their family, as well as divorce, adoption and associated financial arrangements. In this report we will use the term family justice to refer to government activity on these cases. Family justice is distinct from civil and criminal justice. Family justice cases account for around one in seven cases heard in family, civil or criminal courts. Family justice uses shared assets, such as courtrooms, and shared staff. In this report we focus on the two categories of family justice cases that involve legal disputes over children: ‘public law’ and ‘private law’. Public law cases are brought by local authorities to protect a child from harm. Private law cases involve parental disputes, such as the living or contact arrangements for their child. These two types of cases are among the most costly and time-consuming family court cases as they can involve vulnerable children, substance misuse and domestic abuse. In 2024, there were 15,980 new public law cases and 51,473 new private law cases. Family justice involves the judiciary and several central government organisations and public bodies working together. The Department for Education (DfE) and the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) are the lead policy departments for public law and private law, respectively. Local authorities are statutorily responsible for safeguarding children and social work. HM Courts & Tribunals Service (HMCTS) is responsible for administration of the courts and judges and magistrates hear the cases. The Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) and its equivalent in Wales, Cafcass Cymru, advise the courts on what is safe for children and in their best interests. Independent solicitors and barristers represent families at court and may be funded by legal aid. The way a case is managed differs between public law and private law (Figure 2) but broadly involves: • working with families to improve care or provide support to resolve issues before court; • if the child’s safety is at risk or a solution cannot be found, an application is made to the court; • assessments are made, evidence is collected and court hearings held; and • the magistrate or judge will decide on the best course of action and make a court order. These can vary from taking the child into local authority care to setting parental contact. Scope 5 This report reviews the government’s approach to improving how public law and private law cases are managed, with a specific focus on improving family justice services for children. This report covers England and Wales. The main government bodies we have audited are MoJ, DfE, HMCTS and Cafcass in England. Cafcass Cymru is a devolved service, delivered and funded by the Welsh Government, and is therefore outside the scope of this report. We do not audit the judiciary, which is constitutionally independent of the executive branches of government. Therefore, although we are aware of judicial-led improvement work, we have not evaluated this work in our audit. We have focused on the family courts process from where a case is brought to court onwards, and have not audited the work of local authorities. We have not audited the quality of children’s services or the outcomes of cases. Timeliness of family courts 6 Family courts have a backlog of cases but have recovered better than criminal courts after the COVID-19 pandemic. In December 2024, there were 47,662 outstanding cases; 10,121 in public law and 37,541 in private law. Unlike in Crown Courts where the outstanding caseload has continued to rise following the pandemic, the outstanding caseload in family courts has reduced by 18,081 (28%) from a peak of 65,743 cases in August 2021. This is partly because family court demand has fallen over the period. Also, MoJ increased funding and sitting days for family courts in 2020-21 to help reduce the outstanding caseload. Both the backlog and funding have since reduced; HMCTS expenditure on family courts was 17% lower than in 2021-22 in 2023-24 prices (£368 million in 2020-21; £307 million in 2023-24). The government has not set out how it assesses the appropriate capacity to manage the caseload most efficiently (paragraphs 1.6, 1.7, 2.21, Figure 4 and Figure 5). Children and families are still waiting too long to have their cases resolved. A statutory time limit was introduced in 2014, for most public law cases to be resolved within 26 weeks. However, the average time taken has consistently been longer and there is no limit to the number of extensions that can be given. In 2024, a public law case lasted 36 weeks on average. There is no timeliness target for private law, and in 2024 a case took 41 weeks on average. There is significant regional and local variation in timeliness. For example, in December 2024, public law cases lasted on average 29 weeks longer in London (53 weeks) than in Wales (24 weeks) and private law cases lasted on average 52 weeks longer (70 weeks in London and 18 weeks in Wales). In December 2024, there were over 4,000 children involved in public and private law proceedings that have remained open for more than 100 weeks. The proportion of children waiting over a year for a public law case increased from 0.7% in January 2017 to 12% in December 2024 (paragraphs 1.8 to 1.10 and Figure 6). (Continued)

London; The UK National Audit Office (NAO) , 2025. 57p.

By LINDSAY GRAEF, SANDRA G. MAYSON, AURÉLIE OUSS & MEGAN T. STEVENSON

This Article aims to reorient the conversation around “failure-to-appear” (FTA) in criminal court. Recent policy and scholarship have addressed FTA mostly as a problem of criminal defendants in connection with questions about how bail systems should operate. But ten years of data from Philadelphia reveal a striking fact: it is not defendants who most frequently fail to appear but rather the other parties necessary for a criminal proceeding—witnesses and lawyers. Between 2010 and 2020, an essential witness or private attorney failed to appear for at least one hearing in 53% of all cases, compared to a 19% FTA rate for defendants. Police officers, victims, other witnesses, and private attorneys each failed to appear at rates substantially higher than defendants. In short: FTA is a systemic phenomenon.

The systemic nature of FTA calls into question the extreme asymmetry between the treatment of defendant and non-defendant FTA. Bail reform has generated intense debates about when cash bail, detention, and other pretrial interventions are warranted to ensure defendants’ appearance. Given that witnesses and lawyers also have a legal duty to appear, the systemic nature of FTA requires more comprehensive thinking about how best to get people to court and when restrictions on liberty are appropriate.

Systemic FTA also has systemic consequences, because when essential witnesses don’t show, cases are dismissed or withdrawn. FTA thus serves a regulatory function by providing a check on the nature and volume of criminal adjudications. Sometimes this function seems beneficial, as when witness FTA carries information about the strength or worth of the case, but other times it seems like a problem. The sheer volume of police officer FTA creates an impression of arbitrariness, dysfunction, and disrespect. Other aspects of this regulatory dynamic are more ambiguous. For instance, victim FTA rates are so persistently high that many appear to be effectively “opting out” of the criminal proceeding. Does this tell us that certain classes of harm are better dealt with outside of the criminal legal process? Or are we, as a society, losing something valuable when cases are dismissed due to victim or witness nonappearance? More generally, when is witness FTA a problem and when is it a healthy check on the system? This Article aims to draw attention to systemic FTA as an important feature of contemporary U.S. criminal legal systems, identify the core questions that it raises, and lay a path for future research.

172 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1 (2024)., 60p.

By Amanda Y. Agan, Andrew Garin, Dmitri K. Koustas, Alexandre Mas, and Crystal Yang

All results in this paper using IRS data are drawn from the publicly available working paper “The Impact of Criminal Records on Employment, Earnings, and Tax Filing,” which is available on the IRS Statistics of Income Tax Stats website. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this paper are entirely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or the official positions of the U.S. Department of the Treasury or the Internal Revenue Service. All results have been reviewed to ensure that no confidential information is disclosed. Researchers Agan, Garin, and Koustas received funding for this research through the Clean Slate Initiative, a project of the New Venture Fund. We thank staff at the Philadelphia DA's office, especially Michael Hollander and Betsey Carroll for help with the Clean Slate data and analysis. We also thank the numerous interns who worked on this project: Camilla Adams, Kaan Cankat, Sarah Frick, Jared Grogan, Bailey Palmer, Kalie Pierce provided instrumental research assistance. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research.  

  WORKING PAPER · NO. 2024-57  

Chicago: University of Chicago, The Becker Friedman Institute for Economics, 2024. 80p.

By Andrew Jordan, Ezra Karger, and Derek Neal

We examine ten cohorts of male eighth graders in public schools in Chicago, IL: 1995-2004. We find large racial disparities in academic achievement, socioeconomic status (SES), and adult criminal justice involvement. Although our measures of SES and academic achievement are strong predictors of future felony arraignment and incarceration, even among students of the same race who attend the same school, these measures predict only small portions of the overall Black-Hispanic disparities in adult criminal justice involvement. These same measures predict between roughly half or more of Black-White criminal justice disparities and over eighty percent of Hispanic-white disparities. The relationships between various valueadded measures of eighth-grade school quality and future criminal justice outcomes vary by race. Schools that excel at promoting on-time matriculation from eighth grade to high school significantly reduce rates of criminal justice involvement among Black males.  

WORKING PAPER · NO. 2024-140  

Chicago: University of Chicago, The Becker Friedman Institute for Economics , 2024. 52p.

By Adam Ali, Anita Dockley, Stephen Farrall, Sarah Lewis, Jake Phillips and Kam Stevens

Hope, efficacy, optimism and positive expectations are connected to greater levels of psychological and physical wellbeing (Alarcon et al., 2013) and peoples’ ability to change (Bartholomew et al., 2021). Hope is important for people who have a desire to change following a period of punishment or criminalisation (Burnett and Maruna, 2004; Farrall et al., 2014). However, research on the concept of hope in criminology has tended to focus on prisons and – to a lesser degree – desistance from offending. Little research has focused on hope in the context of probation despite facilitating change being one of probation’s central aims. We thus undertook research to look at: • how people on probation supervision and people who have experience of working in probation conceptualise hope • how the Probation Service in England and Wales might facilitate hope • what people hope to get from probation and what ‘gets in the way’ of probation supporting them to achieve those hopes • what needs to happen to make probation a more hopeful experience for people on probation. The most widely used definition of hope is the ‘perceived capability to derive pathways to desired goals and motivate oneself via agency thinking to use those pathways’ (Snyder et al., 2002: 249). So people need goals that are, at least to some degree, achievable and that they think or believe can be achieved. It is as a ‘way of thinking’ (ibid.) and is thus relevant to probation practice because it ‘may be helpful in fostering adaptive rehabilitation processes through the use of intervention techniques aimed at creating clearer and more sustainable goals, increasing pathways thoughts, and instilling greater agency’ (Snyder et al., 2006). Moreover, to have hope one must feel like one has the agency to work towards and achieve those hopes (see Miceli and Castelfranchi, 2015:161-3). Considering the links between agency and desistance (Healy, 2013), we can further see the potential importance of hope for people on probation supervision. Hope has been variously conceptualised in imprisonment studies. Institutional hope was seen as an adaptive strategy to cope with the challenges of imprisonment, as a ‘key mechanism of psychological survival’ (Crewe et al., 2020:126). It can also be a protective factor against the adverse effects of imprisonment (Wai-Ming Mak et al., 2021), that supports higher levels of wellbeing. While deep hope is transformational and involves moving away from previous ways of living. Seeds (2022: 241) suggests hope is ‘sparked by the absence of an institutional apparatus, hope is a process of reorientation’. In turn, hope might lead to a ‘re-narration’ in which people in the criminal justice system reconstruct their own identities and commit to being better people (Seeds, 2022). There are clear links with desistance research which emphasises the role of redemption scripts enabling people to actively re-tell their lives and, crucially, their future (Maruna, 2001). Elsewhere, Farrall et al. (2014) point to the changing nature of hope that people experience as they desist from offending. Hope has been incorporated into some models of criminal justice practice such as the Good Lives Model (GLM) (Ward and Brown, 2004) which focuses on developing peoples’ ‘goods’ and creating a more hopeful outlook. The GLM asks practitioners to practice in a way which ‘adds to … personal functioning’ rather than removing or managing problems (Ward et al., 2007). For example, research with women in prison constructed hope as a belief in a better future and was ‘heavily dependent upon outside sources that would provide structure and discipline’, demonstrating the potential for probation services to provide strengths-based re-entry programmes, mentorship and goal-setting strategies (Stearns et al., 2018). Whilst these strategies can support people to be more hopeful, they tend to be specialist interventions and so are not widespread. In this Academic Insights paper, we share the ideas, perceptions and possibilities found in our research for probation practice if hope were to be incorporated into its thinking and practice. A more detailed discussion of the research and findings can be found in Phillips et al. (2025)

Manchester, UK: Inspectorate of Probation, 2025. 18p.

By Phil Bowen and Ellie Brown

• This briefing considers the three criminal justice Bills currently before Parliament— the Sentencing Bill; the Criminal Justice Bill; and the Victims and Prisoners’ Bill— and estimates the impact they will have on the demand placed on the prisons and on probation specifically. (In a separate briefing, we have looked specifically at how to strengthen provision for victims within the Victims and Prisoners’ Bill). We recognise our estimates include a good deal of guesswork but we have tried as far as possible to ground them in the existing Government figures in the public realm. • The backdrop of these new Bills is stark. From court backlogs, high probation service caseloads and an overcrowded and overflowing population in the adult male prisons, the adult criminal justice system is already struggling with demand. The Sentencing Bill itself was originally announced as part of a broader response to acute prison capacity issues, and included a new executive early release scheme. • Our assessment is that, taken together, the proposals to reduce demand on, and increase the capacity of, our prison system are unlikely to adequately deal with the acute pressures on the adult male prison estate in the medium term. Measures like a presumption against short sentences may delay the point at which demand outstrips supply but we estimate that, by December 2026, we are likely to reach a capacity crunch point again. • Turning to probation, a number of the measures to alleviate prison demand place do so by placing additional burdens on the probation service (we estimate 14,000 extra cases over the next four years). There is currently insufficient assurance that probation have the workforce and resources to take this on. We have concerns that the current proposal to place individuals onto Suspended Sentence Orders (SSOs) as an alternative to short prison sentences could backfire due to this lack of probation resourcing, and this may further undermine judicial and public confidence in community sentences more generally. • We suggest that the Ministry of Justice pay special attention to the recommendations of the Justice and Home Affairs Committee of the House of Lords report on community sentences that “Deferred sentencing can be used… to create incentives for low-level, repeat offenders to engage with more intensive rehabilitative activities.” We also recommend the Ministry of Justice extends existing alternatives to short prison sentences for women (both diversion away from the court system as well as problem-solving court alternatives for women), and ensure that the presumption against short sentences applies for people under 18 as well. • Finally, we have concerns about the measures in the Criminal Justice Bill to tackle rough sleeping and nuisance begging through new civil orders which, if breached, can result in criminal proceedings. There is a lack of credible evidence advanced for these proposals and the Government’s own impact assessment seems to ignore the considerable evidence that similar attempts to use these types of order have been ineffective, poorly implemented, disproportionately punish the most vulnerable and do so while draining resources away from evidence-based preventative measures. We are also concerned that the proposals are accompanied by no assessment of their impact on the courts or other parts of the criminal justice system

London: Centre for Justice Innovation 2023. 10p.

By Jose Pina-Sánchez, Julian V. Roberts and Jonathan Bild,

This Research Bulletin reports findings from the first comprehensive analysis of ‘sentence inflation’ in England and Wales. Unlike previous analyses, this one encompasses all years since 2005 and all offences.

In a previous research bulletin by the Sentencing Academy Pina-Sánchez et al. (2023) documented a significant increase in sentence severity in England and Wales over the last two decades. However, the extent to which this increase in sentence severity is due to a genuine process of ‘sentence inflation’ was unclear. The changing nature of crime might have affected the offence mix processed through our criminal courts. It is possible that the cases sentenced by the courts have become more serious over the period in question. To the extent that this has occurred it would constitute ‘explainable’ or natural inflation. If the cases sentenced are more serious, sentence severity should reflect this changing pattern.

The analysis relates two indices. One – the Imprisonment Index – measures sentence severity by combining the custody rate and Average Custodial Sentence Length (ACSL). The second index measures the seriousness of cases appearing for sentencing.

The Sentencing Academy’s submission to the Sentencing Review reported new analyses comparing trends of sentence severity and crime seriousness for three offence groups: sexual offences, drug offences, and criminal damage offences. In this report, we expand that preliminary analysis to include all major offence groups. This enables us to estimate the overall increase in sentence severity independent of changes in the mix of offences sentenced.

We estimate that since 2005, sentence severity has increased by 62%, while the seriousness of crimes processed through courts has increased by only 8%. This means that 87% of the increased sentence severity over the period was due to changes in sentencing practice, or as we term it, ‘sentence inflation’. Put differently, we estimate that sentencing in England and Wales is today 54% more punitive than in 2005. This is the first analysis to provide an estimate of the overall degree of sentence inflation in this or any other jurisdiction.

Our analysis reveals that sentence inflation has been far from uniform. Whereas no discernible pattern can be detected for drug offences, or public order offences, sentence severity for offences involving violence or weapons related offences has doubled since 2005. Sentence severity for fraud offences has tripled.

London: The Sentencing Academy, 2025. 7p.

By Kaan Yilmazturk, John Williams, Sarah Sandford, Seth Reynolds

Voluntary organisations working in and with the criminal justice system (CJS) face a complex funding landscape. This report explores what funding streams from statutory and philanthropic funders exist, and how they reach voluntary organisations (predominantly charities). We believe that a better understanding of these funding flows can inform changes to funder practice that will help criminal justice voluntary organisations best support some of the most vulnerable people in our society. NPC is a think tank and consultancy for the impact sector. We were commissioned by Lloyds Bank Foundation, with feedback from His Majesty’s Prison & Probation Service (HMPPS), AB Charitable Trust and Clinks, to research the funding landscape for voluntary organisations working in and around the CJS. We adopted a mixed methods approach to this research including: • quantitative data collection on a sample of 624 charities using Charity Commission and 360Giving data • interviews with sector stakeholders (nine charities, five funders, and three advocacy and research organisations respectively) • a survey completed by 55 voluntary organisations working in and around the CJS • case studies conducted on 10 voluntary organisations working with women and racially minoritised people. Funding flows into the criminal justice voluntary sector • Statutory funding makes up double the share of income for criminal justice charities than the wider voluntary sector. 57% of the total income of our sampled criminal justice charities comes from statutory sources, compared to just 26% for the wider voluntary sector. • Almost all statutory funding goes to larger charities. 94% of statutory funding goes to charities with annual incomes above £2m. Charities with annual incomes up to £500k received only 1.42% of statutory funding. o Trusts and foundations are the main source of income for ‘small’ charities (£100k-£500k annual income) and ‘medium-sized’ charities (£500k-£1m annual income) in our sample. o Micro-charities are underrepresented criminal justice funding flows. Of the 624 charities we sampled, 46% had annual incomes of less than £100k. For comparison, 80% of the wider voluntary sector is made up of these charities. • Only 3% of total income goes to criminal justice charities working with specific ethnic groups. Just 7% of sampled charities identified ‘people of a particular ethnic or racial origin’ as the beneficiary group they focus on. o ‘Children/young people’ is the beneficiary group that has received the highest proportion of income over the previous five years. o The most common beneficiary groups selected by charities in our sample are the ‘general public’, ‘children/young people’, ‘other defined groups’, ‘older people’, and ‘people with disabilities’. • Around three-quarters (71%) of criminal justice charities in our sample work on ‘offender support and rehabilitation’. The remaining 29% are classified as ‘prevention and safety’. Education/training’ is the most common subtheme, both in number of charities and the proportion of total income.

London:: lloyds Bank Foundation, 2025. 54p.

By The Justice Policy Institute

Despite the limited evidence base for its effectiveness and the significant burden it imposes on those under supervision, jurisdictions across the United States have expanded the use of electronic monitoring (EM) – technology that tracks and sometimes restricts a person’s movements – to supervise justicesystem-involved people released to the community. EM presents an appealing alternative to judges and prosecutors who want to limit jail or prison use but seek additional security to ensure public safety. This is true in Maryland, where the use of EM to supervise pretrial clients has grown significantly over the past decade and increased sharply following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, due in part to a one-time federal allocation of resources to fund supervision by private providers. However, despite this increase, there is very little information about the use of EM to supervise people awaiting trial in Maryland. We have no idea how many people have been monitored by the technology, its impact on their lives, or how effective it is with various populations. To inform these decisions, the Justice Policy Institute conducted a study on the use of EM to supervise pretrial clients in Maryland. This report explores the day-to-day realities of electronic monitoring, its effects on individuals under supervision, and offers recommendations to enhance service delivery based on proven best practices. Research on the efficacy of pretrial EM suggests that: • EM Does Not Reliably Reduce Failure to Appear (FTA) or Recidivism in Pretrial Populations. Although the use of EM has skyrocketed across the country, there is no clear and convincing evidence that EM effectively reduces FTA rates or recidivism for pretrial supervisees. This contrasts with other strategies like court notification and reminder systems, which have much stronger evidence of efficacy in reducing FTA rates. • Best Practices in Pretrial Release, Supervision, and EM Are Grounded in Validated Risk and Needs Assessment. The central elements that comprise an evidence-based approach to pretrial justice involve: • Expanding citation and diversion options; • Implementing a legal framework with a presumption of least restrictive release; • Ensuring due process in all hearings; • Grounding all decision-making in the use of a validated pretrial risk and needs assessment instrument (PRAI); and • Strictly limiting the use of pretrial detention and other restrictive measures, including electronic monitoring, to instances where an individual is at high risk of failing to appear or reoffending. EM Imposes a Significant Burden That Must Be Considered in Policy and Practice Decisions. EM surveillance presents serious challenges for individuals and severely limits their freedom. If EM is assigned to those at low risk of FTA or recidivism and drives net-widening in the corrections system, it is likely to cause unnecessary harm. However, when implemented and monitored effectively and humanely, it can be a useful strategy when used as a true alternative to jail and to increase the number of people released to their homes. 

Baltimore, MD: The Abell Foundation, 2025. 48p.

By William J. Sabol and Thaddeus L. Jjohnson

Although significant gaps remain, disparities between Black and White people continued to narrow at nearly every stage of the criminal justice process between 2016 and 2020. In some cases, the pace of the decline slowed; in others, the disparity gap closed entirely.

These trends extend patterns from 2000 to 2016 that were identified in CCJ's first report on correctional control by race and sex. Subsequent reports will explore trends in disparity among female populations and by ethnicity, assess trends in multiple states, and seek to identify what, if any, policy changes may have contributed to reductions in racial disparities.

Washington, DC: Council on Criminal Justice, 2022. 36p.