By Julian V. Roberts, Lilly Crellin, Jonathan Bild and Jade Mouton

This report summarises findings from a survey of the public conducted in 2024. It contributes to the well-established and still growing literature on public opinion and imprisonment. The primary focus was upon public knowledge of prisons and prison trends in England and Wales. This survey is a follow-up to an earlier report by the Sentencing Academy on public knowledge of sentencing. Key Findings ¨ Most people acknowledge that they know little about prisons in England and Wales, with almost three-quarters of respondents stating that they knew either ‘not very much’ or ‘nothing at all’. ¨ More than nine in ten respondents significantly over-estimated the proportion of women within the prison population; 93% of respondents thought that women made up 10% or more of the prison population. The correct answer is 4%. ¨ Respondents also over-estimated the proportion of the prison population serving a sentence for a violent offence; whilst around one in three adult sentenced prisoners have been sentenced for a violent offence, 58% of respondents thought that violent offenders made up 40% or more of the prison population. ¨ Offenders who have served a short prison sentence of less than 12 months have the highest re-offending rate. However, most respondents considered that prisoners released after having served longer sentences had a higher re-offending rate. ¨ When asked to specify what they considered to be the single most important purpose of imprisonment, the most popular option, chosen by 42% of respondents, was protecting the public by removing offenders from society. Rehabilitation was the next most commonly-chosen purpose, attracting 19% of respondents. ¨ Approximately three-quarters of respondents (73%) considered prisons to be either ‘not at all’ or ‘not very’ effective at rehabilitating offenders and preventing re-offending. Whilst the perception of prisons as being effective at punishing offenders was less negative, over half of respondents (53%) thought prisons were ‘not at all’ or ‘not very’ effective in performing this function. ¨ In common with many previous surveys, a significant proportion of respondents considered prison conditions to be ‘too easy’, with 49% of respondents holding this view.  

London: Sentencing Academy, 2024. 20p.

By Kisha Bird, Caitlin Dawkins, and Lisa Johnson

Too many young people cycle in and out of prison, jails, and detention centers and face probation and parole conditions that keep them locked out of opportunity. These interactions with the criminal justice system demand the need for both equitable practices and programs that support second chances and large-scale investments in decarceration. They also require critical analysis and undoing of historical policies that manifest in an unequal and unjust criminal justice system. From Surviving to Thriving: Supporting Transformation, Reentry and Connections to Employment for Young Adults, from FHI 360 and CLASP, offers practical programmatic solutions that support second chances for young people and raise policy and systems considerations to address equity, collateral consequences, and opportunity. The report features insights of best practices from nine communities that are part of the Compass Rose Collaborative (CRC). Launched in 2017, the CRC began as a three-year program funded by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL). The CRC connects young adults ages 18-24 who have had contact with the juvenile justice or criminal justice system to employment, education pathways, and supportive services across nine communities. Policymakers and practitioners can use this analysis to increase equity and access to jobs and education for young people in need of another chance and in navigating the converging fields of workforce development, education, and criminal justice. Ultimately, the lessons shared here can offer a variety of stakeholders, including public agencies and employers, a roadmap to better understand strategies to support dismantling structural barriers and implementing strategies that support young adults on a journey of transformation and connectedness.

Washington, DC: CLASP, 2020. 28p.

By The Texas Sunset Advisory Commission

 As the criminal justice system works through the final lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on court backlogs, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) along with the other adult criminal justice entities subject to this Sunset review — the Board of Pardons and Paroles (BPP), Windham School District, and Correctional Managed Health Care Committee — are once again at a critical point. This Sunset review occurred in the context of TDCJ’s systemwide prison lockdown due to unprecedented levels of contraband and violence and inmate population projections that exceed TDCJ’s operational capacity, raising basic questions about TDCJ’s ability to handle its current and future realities. The state’s criminal justice entities are confronting serious challenges in executing their mission to safely confine, supervise, and provide services for adults convicted of certain crimes in Texas. This Sunset review therefore seeks to best position TDCJ and its counterparts so that they are able to prevent current problems from becoming unmanageable, widespread crises in the coming years. While the sheer size and complexity of Texas’ sprawling prison system is unique, TDCJ faces the same national trend as its peers in other states — hiring people to work in corrections is difficult. The Legislature and TDCJ have long recognized correctional officers, who play a vital frontline role overseeing Sunset seeks to position TDCJ to be able to prevent problems from becoming widespread crises. incarcerated adults, as deserving of additional attention and resources for recruitment and retention. Yet the uncomfortable reality the Sunset review found is some of Texas’ prisons are located in places where hiring sufficient correctional staff is nearly impossible. As that reality is unlikely to change, TDCJ is forced to spend significantly on transporting staff around the state and maintaining facilities that hold thousands of vacant, unusable beds. Furthermore, while difficulty hiring correctional staff isn’t unique to this state, the agency has not done enough to mitigate this problem. Serious and systemic deficiencies in human resources functions, which form the backbone of effective agency operations, contribute to agencywide hiring and retention problems, with more than half of TDCJ divisions at a vacancy rate of at least 20 percent in fiscal year 2023. This staffing crisis extends to parole officers who supervise releasees in Texas communities and several other critical divisions. Ultimately, the Sunset review found TDCJ must concurrently plan for the future to locate or expand facilities in places where the agency can adequately staff them while also greatly improving internal human resources functions and processes to retain existing staff. T he Sunset review also found TDCJ to be in significant need of modernization, as decades-old technology and paper-based and manual processes limit the agency’s ability to effectively and efficiently leverage its $3.9 billion annual budget. But the lack of modernization is not limited to technology. Without better strategic planning and data practices, the agency will continue to reactively lurch from emergency to emergency. Additionally, TDCJ’s approach  to rehabilitation programs, many of which inform BPP’s determination of the potential for an inmate to safely reenter the community, suffer from deficiencies that undermine the Legislature’s significant investment in these programs. To overcome these deficiencies, this review recommends requiring enhanced rehabilitation planning and evaluation to better ensure beneficial program outcomes rather than simply encouraging participation regardless of efficacy. T his Sunset review also took a close look at the parole system — both the processes by which BPP decides whether to grant early release to eligible inmates and the processes by which TDCJ’s parole officers supervise releasees. Given the high stakes of inmates reentering the community and the discretionary nature of making such decisions, BPP voters understandably take a cautious approach. As it has in previous reviews of BPP, Sunset focused on improved fairness, consistency, and transparency of BPP’s decision-making processes. Separately, the review also found the need for more efficient TDCJ parole processes to ease burdens on the often underappreciated parole staff who serve a critical public safety role in Texas communities. T his review did not have findings or recommendations in two key areas: probation and correctional health care. TDCJ’s role in probation is limited to maintaining standards for and providing funding to local Community Supervision and Corrections Departments (CSCDs). Overall, Sunset staff found TDCJ adequately performs this function, and many ideas for changes to probation largely amounted to calls for increased funding. To this end, TDCJ has requested through its 2026-27 Legislative Appropriations Request additional funding to support both CSCD staff salaries and supervision activities. Additionally, this review found the Correctional Managed Health Care Committee’s role, which primarily is to develop a statewide managed healthcare plan, to be functioning adequately. TDCJ works effectively with its contracted partners at the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center and the University of Texas Medical Branch to deliver healthcare services as the Legislature intended. Despite finding considerable areas for improvement across the criminal justice entities under review, Sunset staff determined that Texas continues to benefit from TDCJ’s oversight and management of a system in which a single state agency supports probation and directly provides incarceration and parole supervision. Accordingly, Sunset staff recommends continuing TDCJ for 12 years and aligning its Sunset review to coincide with that of the other criminal justice entities. The following material highlights Sunset staff’s key recommendations for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Board of Pardons and Paroles, Windham School District, and Correctional Managed Health Care Committee. 

Austin, TX: The Commission, 2024. 189p.