By Lucy Lang Inspector General

The myriad manifestations of systemic racism in the complex web of social systems throughout New York State and America writ large are well-documented. Criminal justice systems in particular are rife with racial inequities at every stage, from initial contact to arrest, trial, and sentence, and through re-entry and beyond, which are themselves inextricably connected to devastating racial disparities in inter-related and surrounding systems including, for example, education, housing, and public health. In December 2016, The New York Times1 reported on a specific alarming instance of such disparities—those in the allocation of behavioral infraction tickets2 and the attendant punishment by the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS) to incarcerated individuals in the year 2015.3 Following publication of the New York Times findings, the then governor directed that the New York State Inspector General “investigate the allegations of racial disparities in discipline in State prisons” and recommend solutions.4 After an initial review, the Inspector General recommended that DOCCS engage the National Institute of Corrections (NIC) 5 , a federal agency that is part of the U.S. Department of Justice, to complete a comprehensive assessment based on their extensive national expertise. The Inspector General oversaw that process and the implementation of the accepted recommendations. Over the following half-dozen years, with the cooperation of DOCCS, the Inspector General continued to monitor these trends to determine whether the NIC recommendations had the desired impact, to observe the impact of additional measures implemented by DOCCS to identify and address possible racial bias in its facilities, programs, and disciplinary actions, and  to gather more comprehensive data in hopes of conclusively identifying the root causes of the observed disparities. As part of that effort, the Inspector General conducted its own comprehensive analysis of data maintained by DOCCS on the discipline of incarcerated individuals. This analysis expanded upon the methodology used by the Times6 by covering a broader period (2015-2020), using an alternate method of tallying of incarcerated populations7, and including reports of rule violations, which are known as Misbehavior Reports, that were ultimately dismissed. 8 In addition, the Inspector General retained a professor who is an expert in statistics to review and comment on its analysis.

United States, New York State Office of the Inspector General. 2022, 175pg

By: Matt Davis, Desiree L. Fox, Ciara D. Hansen,, Ann M. Miller

Native people are disproportionately incarcerated in the United States. Several factors contribute: a history of federal oppression and efforts to erode Native culture, a series of federal laws that rejected tribal justice systems in place long before European contact, historical trauma that has a lasting impact on the physical and mental well-being of Native people, a complicated jurisdictional structure that pulls Native people further into justice involvement, and a deficiency of representation for the accused in tribal courts. Although people accused of crime in tribal courts are afforded the right to counsel, tribal governments are not constitutionally required to provide appointed counsel for the indigent. As a result, there are uncounseled convictions in tribal courts used against Native people in state and federal systems.

There are 574 federally recognized tribal governments in the United States, each with its own culture, sovereign government, justice system, and historical relationship with the United States government. For this reason, interventions meant to address over-incarceration of Native people should start at the tribal level. Tribes could impact disparity on a national level by providing supportive and restorative services for those involved in their own justice systems. Tribes could impact disparities by providing public defender services, in particular, holistic public defense that employs a restorative approach. A holistic model of public defense addresses the issues that contribute to people’s involvement in the criminal justice system and the collateral consequences to criminal charges and convictions. Providing services that address underlying needs results in improved life outcomes that predictably result in less criminal justice involvement. This article highlights the Tribal Defenders Office (TDO) for the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes that has implemented holistic defense in a tribal setting.

Initially modeled after the Bronx Defenders, the Tribal Defenders holistic defense practice aligns with tribal values by going beyond the criminal case to view the accused as a whole person with a range of legal and social support needs that if left unmet will continue to push them back into the criminal justice system. Over the years, the Tribal Defenders’ team has worked to integrate into the community, listen to feedback from clients and the community, and refine the program accordingly. Through twelve years of integrated practice, TDO staff learned several lessons that have shaped their success: services come first, invest in culturally relevant research and services, listen to clients and the community, and adhere to cultural safety.

Although the article promotes holistic defense to the indigent as a solution to inequities facing justice-involved Native people, it also highlights other promising practices. Tribal systems have access to national organizations that support their efforts to address criminal justice challenges. There are tribal courts, victim services, probation departments, and reentry programs that have taken traditional, restorative principles and applied them in innovative ways to promote healing, wellness, and community safety.

United States, Safety & Justice Challenge. 2023. 23pg

By Michelle S. Phelps, H. N. Dickens, De Andre’ T. Beadle

Advocates for reform have highlighted violations of probation and parole conditions as a key driver of mass incarceration. As a 2019 Council of State Governments report declared, supervision violations are “filling prisons and burdening budgets.” Yet few scholarly accounts estimate the precise role of technical violations in fueling prison populations during the prison boom. Using national surveys of state prison populations from 1979 to 2016, the authors document that most incarcerated persons are behind bars for new sentences. On average, just one in eight people in state prisons on any given day has been locked up for a technical violation of community supervision alone. Thus, strategies to substantially reduce prison populations must look to new criminal offenses and sentence length.

United States, Socius Sociological Research for a Dynamic World. 2023, 3pg

By Jacqueline Beard

In March 2020 the Justice Secretary told the Justice Committee that the pressure on prisons in England and Wales due to coronavirus was acute.“a potential hotbed for viral transmission”, stating that “they are overcrowded, understaffed and often dirty”.2 The Head of the Prison Governors Association told the Guardian: 1 The Chair of the Justice Committee described prisons as a combination of prison overcrowding, prisoner lockdown and staff shortages as a result of prison workers needing to isolate themselves meant that the system was facing unprecedented pressure.3 The physical health of the prison population, across a broad range of conditions, is much poorer than that of the general population.4 The proportion of prisoners aged over 50 increased from 7% in 2002 to 16% in March 2019.5 Living conditions across much of the prison estate are poor. As at February 2020, 60% (70) of prison establishments were crowded.6 These 70 prisons accommodated around 60,000 prisoners or 71% of the total prison population. On 27 April 2020 the Justice Secretary said that the numbers of coronavirus cases and deaths in prisons were lower than had been originally predicted and that “while we are not out of woods”, prisons were coping and dealing well with the threat of covid-19. 7  A press release from the Ministry of Justice on the 28 April 2020 said that “jails are successfully limiting deaths and the transmission of the virus within the estate”.8 As of 12 May, 404 cases had been confirmed amongst prisoners. 21 prisoners and 7 members of prison staff had died.9  Public Health England (PHE) reported on 24 April 2020 that data it had collected “suggests that the ‘explosive outbreaks’ of COVID19 which were feared at the beginning of the pandemic wave are not being seen. Instead, there is evidence of containment of outbreak”.10 PHE’s report stated that because access to testing for prisoners has been limited and variable, the number of confirmed cases reported “does not represent the true burden of infection in the prison system”. It states that in addition to the 304 laboratory-confirmed cases in prisoners in England and Wales (at the time the report was written) data showed there had been also over 1,783 possible/probable cases. 

London, House of Commons Library. 2020. 10pg

By Emily Richards

Welcome to the first edition of The Cheal report - Understanding prisoners abroad. This report, compiled using the data that Prisoners Abroad has access to, aims to bring together important insights into the number and characteristics of British people that are detained in prisons overseas, their family and friends, and those that return to the UK. This inaugural report is named after one of Prisoners Abroad’s founders, Chris Cheal. Chris had been in prison in the 1970’s when he was visited by Joe Parham on behalf of the drugs charity Release. A few years later, after his release, Chris and Joe, along with Craig Feehan, decided to “start something new”, which went on to become Prisoners Abroad. When the charity started in 1978, it was not possible for a person to request to transfer to serve their sentence in the UK. Chris worked hard with a group of lawyers to draft a Bill for Parliament that led to the Council of Europe Convention on the Transfer of Sentences which made such transfers possible. The tremendous impact of Chris’ work is still being felt today and, over 45 years later, we hope he would be proud of what Prisoners Abroad has become. In what we hope will be an annual publication, we look at how the numbers and characteristics are changing over time, and identify trends and challenges, across three key groups of people: (1) People in prison overseas, (2) Families and friends, and (3) People returning to the UK. The number of people we supported last year saw a gradual increase during the year and we expect numbers to continue to rise. Of the 1,170 people in prison overseas that we supported, significant numbers face isolation. Of those in non-English speaking countries, almost three-quarters do not speak the language of the country where they are imprisoned. Six in every ten people (61%) in prisons overseas do not receive any visits, 59% were not resident in the country of their detention prior to their arrest, and nearly a third (31%) do not receive any money or financial support from anyone outside the prison. 35% of people said they were not able to take part in any activities (e.g. education, sport) and only 29% said they had some form of work opportunity in the prison where they were detained. British people are facing acute health issues too. 38% of people in prison overseas reported to us that they had physical health issues, 24% had mental health issues, and 13% had substance abuse issues. We suspect these are an under-estimate as some people will be reluctant to tell us through prison communications, and we know that a significant number of people are experiencing a combination of these - for example, 105 clients report both physical and mental health issues, and 64 clients report experiencing all three. Of those returning to the UK, an increasing proportion are returning with health issues, with 35% reporting substance abuse issues (compared to 35% two years ago) and 47% reporting mental health issues (compared to 30% two years ago). In this first edition, all of the data we have drawn on is what we have collected. As part of our strategic objective to ensure that all British citizens in prisons overseas are aware of what we do and are able to access our support, we are looking at what more can be done to better understand the total number of British citizens in prison overseas and where they are, and we hope that in the next edition there will be more data of this type.

United Kingdom, Prisoners Abroad. 2023, 20 pg

By James Hess

The California Prison Industry Authority (CALPIA) is a self-supporting training and production program currently operating within the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR). CALPIA provides training, certification and employment to inmates in a variety of different fields. The goods and services produced by CALPIA are sold to the state and other government entities, which provides an economic benefit to the state. In addition to the vocational and economic aspect of the program, one of CALPIA’s missions is to reduce the subsequent recidivism of their inmate participants. This research examines the effect of participation in CALPIA on the recidivism of CDCR inmates released into the community. 

Irvine, California, School of Social Ecology. 2021, 40pg

By Brian Bailey

FROM THE COVER: From the appointment of the infamous Jack Ketch in 1663 to the abolition of the death penalty in 1969, England saw three-hundred years of hanging for a multitude of crimes from stealing a loaf of bread to murder. Public hangings drew vast crowds and the hangman himself became an almost mythical figure of fascinated revulsion. Certainly the men who undertook this gruesome duty were an unusual breed. At first they were often recruited from the same prisons as their victims, and perhaps unsurprisingly they ended up, like John Price, 'dancing the Tyburn jig' at the end of the same rope.

Barnes and Noble. NY. 1989. 230p.

By John J. Dilulio, Jr.

FROM THE COVER: The American prison, in conventional wisdom, 1s doomed to be filthy, violent, and unproductive. It is a breeding ground for crime rather than a punishment for it, an institution where lawless inmates and abusive guards confront each other in riots that erupt in response to oppressive conditions. Now, John J. Dilulio, Jr., already considered one of the most original thinkers about prisons in a generation, challenges all these accepted notions about incarceration. Dilulio argues that-far from necessarily being hellish traps for society's refuse-prisons must and can be safe and humane, despite overcrowding, budget limitations, and racial polarization. The key is good government.

The Free Press. London. NY. 1987. 357p.

By Benjamin Justice

Researchers have written a good deal in the last two decades about the relationship between public education and criminal justice as a pipeline by which public school practices correlate with or cause increased lifetime risk for incarceration for Black and Latinx youth. This article flips the script of the school-to-prison pipeline metaphor by reversing the question. What are the effects of criminal justice on public schooling? Reviewing recent social science research from multiple disciplines on policing and incarceration, this article describes the relationship of criminal justice to public education as hobbling, a social process by which the massification of policing and incarceration systematically compromises the ability of target demographics of American children to enjoy their rights to a free and appropriate public education.

Annual Review of Law and Social Science, vol. 17, 2021. pp 31-51

By The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)

This report focuses on an ongoing crisis in many of America’s jails and prisons: the near total denial of medication for addiction treatment (MAT) for people with opioid use disorder (OUD). Despite a crisis of overdose deaths, which have spiked further in the wake of COVID-19, many jails and prisons are ignoring a vital public health tool that is proven to curb the deadly effects of the opioid epidemic. MAT is basic healthcare for individuals with OUD. There are three MAT medications approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA): methadone, buprenorphine, and naltrexone. Methadone and buprenorphine are proven to be effective, while the evidence supporting the effectiveness of naltrexone is more limited. In far too many jails and prisons around the country, none of these medications are available to incarcerated people with OUD, or only naltrexone is available. OUD is common in jails and prisons, affecting nearly a quarter of the incarcerated population. This denial of treatment leaves people with OUD at a much higher risk of relapse and overdose upon release from incarceration. MAT is a practical solution to this problem. MAT reduces the risk of death from any cause by 85%, and the risk of death from an overdose by 75% in the weeks following release.5 As discussed herein, there is a growing consensus among policy makers, medical professionals, and corrections officials that MAT is appropriate for incarcerated people with OUD. And many of the jails and prisons that have implemented MAT programs report that it is affordable and can be safely administered.

New York: ACLU, 2021. 32p.

By Ammar Khalid, Rochisha Shukla, Arielle Jackson, and Andreea Matei

Pima County, Arizona, has implemented multiple reforms to address probation-related drivers of jail incarceration through its participation in the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation’s Safety and Justice Challenge, including strengthening transitional housing support intended to provide short-term housing options for people experiencing housing instability. The Urban Institute conducted a study, in partnership with the Pima County Adult Probation Department, to describe probation pathways to jail incarceration and system-level trends, as well as the effects of providing transitional housing support to people on probation, particularly in terms of jail use.

WHY THIS MATTERS

Many jurisdictions across the country have implemented strategies to reduce jail incarceration for people on probation because probation violations contribute significantly to rising jail populations in the United States: 33 percent of all people incarcerated in jails were arrested while on probation, and 27 percent of the people in jails for probation violations were incarcerated for technical violations alone. Housing instability can heighten the risk of criminal legal system involvement, particularly for people on probation.

WHAT WE FOUND

Our main takeaways include the following:

Roughly 10 percent of all jail bookings in Pima County were due to probation violations, representing an overall low share of jail admissions. However, average length of stay for people in jail for probation violations was considerably longer at 66 days, nearly three times as long as that for the pretrial population (25 days) and five times as long as that for the sentenced population (13 days).

Probation violations resulting in jail incarceration represented 16 percent of all terminated probation cases and were largely driven by technical violations, which include absconding charges.

There were some observable racial and ethnic disparities in jail use as a formal probation revocation petition outcome. Native American and Hispanic people had higher odds—by 97 percent and 46 percent, respectively—of being revoked to jail compared with white people. Black people were 24 percent more likely to receive coterminous outcomes compared with white people.

Between January 2020 and June 2022, 331 people received financial assistance to access transitional housing. The number of people receiving assistance increased over time and the probation department prioritized people with higher risk and needs when making decisions about funding for transitional housing.

The odds of a probation termination to jail were not significantly different for people who received funding for transitional housing and those who did not. These null effects, however, could owe to the small number of people served and the limited data available on people who received transitional housing support. Interviewed stakeholders, though, perceived this support for people on probation to be a crucial stabilizing force and extremely meaningful to their well-being.

Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2023. 63p.

By Erin Harbinson, Kelly Lyn Mitchell, Courtney Hougham, and Danette Buskovick

This report details a collaboration between the Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice (the Robina Institute) and Hennepin County Department of Community Corrections and Rehabilitation (DOCCR) to examine whether probation conditions are aligned with evidence-based practices in corrections, specifically the risk-needs-responsivity (RNR) principles (i.e., Andrews, Bonta, & Hoge, 1990) for community supervision, and to explore the effect of alignment on supervision outcomes. This project was conceived in order to test whether there is a need to bridge the sentencing process with the RNR principles followed by DOCCR. Research suggests that in order to reduce re-offending, probation conditions should reflect RNR principles and that over-supervising low risk individuals can increase recidivism (Lowenkamp, Latessa, & Holsinger, 2006). But because sentencing often occurs before the risk assessment has been completed, the probation conditions imposed at sentencing may not relate to the probationer’s risk and needs, or may require a higher degree of contact and intervention by the corrections department than suggested by the probationer’s risk to reoffend. Since Hennepin prepares a presentence investigation (PSI) for some cases and administers a pre-screener for others, this practice provides a natural “experiment” to explore how assessment might influence conditions. The project explored the relationship between the sentencing process and RNR principles by asking the following three questions: 1. How well do the risk/needs of offenders align with probation conditions? 2. Does the timing of assessment impact this alignment? 3. Are supervision outcomes improved when conditions are aligned with risk/needs? Key Findings The key findings from this study were as follows: • Most people on probation were assigned a similar number of conditions and similar types of conditions; there was not much variation. • The average number of probation conditions assigned to people on probation increases with risk, but only slightly. This increase ranged from less than one condition to one condition per increase in risk level. • People who received a PSI have on average approximately 5 more conditions assigned at each risk level when compared to people who did not receive a PSI. • A majority of the supervision conditions people were assigned did not target their criminogenic needs. Ø However, most people who had identified needs in the drugs and alcohol domain were assigned probation conditions that aligned with that need, though alignment was better when a PSI was conducted before sentencing Ø The majority of people who had identified needs in the family/marital, leisure and recreation, companions (criminal vs. anticriminal), and antisocial pattern were not assigned probation conditions that align with those needs. Ø When a PSI was not administered, the majority of people who had identified needs in pro-criminal attitudes and orientation were not assigned probation conditions that align with that need; when a PSI was administered, a more substantial proportion of individuals with this need were assigned such a condition. Ø When there is better alignment between needs and supervision conditions, it appears to be associated with the administration of a PSI, and to be driven by the assignment of conditions to address the domains for alcohol and drugs, education and employment, and pro-criminal attitude and orientation. • Improved alignment of supervision conditions with risk and needs did not significantly reduce the likelihood of reconviction one year out, however, more research is needed on measuring alignment since this non-significant finding might be due to the small variation in the number of conditions by risk level.

Minneapolis: Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice University of Minnesota Law School 2020. 36p.

Kelly Lyn Mitchel, Erin Harbinson and Julia Laskoruns

This report examines the role of prosecutors in the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office in influencing the contours of felony probation sentences. The main target of this study was to determine how prosecutors view and influence the length of probation, but the study also included an examination of the other key components of a felony probation sentence, namely the probation type (stay of imposition versus stay of execution) and conditions of probation, as well as the role of prosecutors in the probation violation process.

Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice. 2020. 49p.

By Dafna Gozani, Laura Ridolfi and Snna Wong

Probation is the most common court ordered outcome imposed on youth in juvenile court in California. Too often, youth are placed on probation for an unspecified amount of time, while under the microscope of overly burdensome and confusing probation conditions. Youth needlessly spending years on probation limits their potential and wastes precious resources. This report provides key data and explores the harmful outcomes of excessive probation programs, highlights promising approaches, and provides policy recommendations.

Oakland, CA: National Center for Youth Law and W. Haywood Burns Institute, 2021. 15p.

By Sino Esthappan and Janine Zweig

Probation plays a critical role in the juvenile justice (JJ) system, but the absence of clear intended outcomes for youth who are justice involved might contribute to the unnecessary use of judicial dispositions to probation and out-of-home placement, as well as to high rates of recidivism. In this brief, we describe findings from a developmental evaluation of the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s (the Foundation’s) expansion of the Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative® to the deep end of the JJ system. Through its deep-end work, the Foundation aims to safely and significantly reduce the use of out-of-home placements for youth, especially youth of color. The findings in this brief build on those presented in Keeping Youth Out of the Deep End of the Juvenile Justice System: A Developmental Evaluation Overview of the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Deep-End Reform, which provides an overview of the evaluation of the deepend reform and its findings (appendix A provides details on the methods used for the evaluation). Qualitative and quantitative data collection occurred between April 2014 and August 2018. In addition, the Foundation provided additional supports to two deepend sites—Lucas County, Ohio, and Pierce County, Washington—as part of their probation transformation focus (the Foundation details the rationale for this work in a 2018 report)

Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2020. 11p.

By Kathryn Bird and Melena Ward

Probation services in England and Wales are delivered through the Probation Service, which is responsible for protecting the public and reducing reoffending, both by delivering and enforcing the punishments and orders of the court and by supporting rehabilitation through empowering people on probation to reform their lives. The Probation Service is a statutory criminal justice agency and is part of Her Majesty’s Prisons and Probation Service (HMPPS) working together to supervise adult individuals at all levels of risk. People under the age of 18 who are serving sentences in the community are supervised by Youth Offending Teams, which are coordinated by local government authorities and overseen by the Youth Justice Board (a non-departmental public body). The Probation Service’s operations are divided into twelve Probation Regions (eleven in England and one in Wales), each of which is overseen by a Regional Probation Director (RPD) who works closely with other local and national partners to deliver effective supervision and can commission rehabilitative services from external voluntary and private sector providers.

Utrecht: CEP, Confederation of European Probation 2021. 54p.

By Gerald Gaes and Julia Laskorunsky

This study examines the response of the Colorado Board of Parole to the COVID-19 pandemic.

To mitigate the spread of the virus within correctional facilities, it increased the parole grant rate, expedited case review, and utilized special needs and fast-track parole programs for non-routine releases. This response provided an opportunity to evaluate the Board’s decision-making processes and to investigate the role of early release mechanisms in reducing prison populations.

Several factors expedited early release including: pressure from the governor and legislature; board member’s sense of responsibility to safely release as many individuals as possible; and the availability of early release authority. Our findings show that to release more people, the Board slightly changed its release standards, placing less emphasis on risk scores but continuing to heavily emphasize readiness for release. The Board reverted to its previous release patterns a few months into the pandemic, highlighting the difficulty of reducing prison populations through back-end mechanisms.

Special needs and fast-track parole were the mechanisms used to promote early release. Special needs parole releases are typically people who have severe medical problems, long sentences, and serious commitment offenses. Targeting them in Colorado substantially decreased time served. The fast-track releases were mostly low risk people with shorter than average sentences. Targeting them had no effect on reducing time served. This demonstrates that early release mechanisms that target “safe bets” – that is, individuals who would have been released quickly through routine mechanisms are not an effective way to reduce prison populations.

We also discuss the importance of grant rate standards, suggesting that jurisdictions establish empirically based ranges contingent on risk and readiness composition of the release population. Future research should investigate how much parole grant rates can be increased without compromising public safety.

This study was conducted as part of a larger project which examined how state prison systems responded to the COVID-19 pandemic. It was generously supported and funded by Arnold Ventures. While we hope the findings from this study are useful to the parole board and funding partners, the views and opinions expressed in this report do not necessarily reflect the views of Arnold Ventures.

St. Paul, MN: Robina Institute,,,,2023. 29p.

By Karin D. Martin, Bryan L. Sykes, Sarah Shannon, Frank Edwards, and Alexes Harris

This review assesses the current state of knowledge about monetary sanctions, e.g., fines, fees, surcharges, restitution, and any other financial liability related to contact with systems of justice, which are used more widely than prison, jail, probation, or parole in the United States. The review describes the most important consequences of the punishment of monetary sanctions in the United States, which include a significant capacity for exacerbating economic inequality by race, prolonged contact and involvement with the criminal justice system, driver’s license suspension, voting restrictions, damaged credit, and incarceration. Given the lack of consistent laws and policies that govern monetary sanctions, jurisdictions vary greatly in their imposition, enforcement, and collection practices of fines, fees, court costs, and restitution. A review of federally collected data on monetary sanctions reveals that a lack of consistent and exhaustive measures of monetary sanctions presents a unique problem for tracking both the prevalence and amount of legal financial obligations (LFOs) over time. We conclude with promising directions for future research and policy on monetary sanctions.

Annu. Rev. Criminol. 2018. 1:471–95

Day Fines Systems: Lessons from Global Practice

By Fair Trials

Many European countries use day fines as an alternative to short-term incarceration. With day fines, fines are proportional to a defendant’s income, allowing for higher fines for wealthy offenders and serious offenses. This report details the scope of day fines in different justice systems, how ability to pay is determined, and the impact on indigent defendants. Fair Trials used a mix of desk research, survey and interviews of criminal defense attorneys, and public information requests to research the use of day fines in Austria, Hungary, Finland, France, Poland, Spain, Sweden, England, and Wales. Findings suggest it is possible to administer a day fines system without reliance on incarceration for non-payment, but these systems have typically been adopted alongside other reforms aimed at reducing incarceration. The author proposes using day fines in the U.S. to make fine setting fairer.

Key Findings:

• Police in Finland have access to tax records, allowing them to make on-the-spot assessments of the ability to pay during simple traffic stops.

• Imprisonment for non-payment is only available following a trial in Finland, and the sentence may range from four to 60 days.

• Only four percent of people sentenced to a fine ended up in prison for non-payment in Spain.

• 58 percent of convictions in Sweden are sentenced to day fines, primarily for minor drug offenses, small theft, traffic offenses, and drunk driving.

• Austria determines the ability to pay based on personal circumstances and the economic capacity of the defendant.

• In France, seizure of property is a more common tool for enforcement for those who fail to pay their fines than incarceration.

• In 2016, 34 percent of convictions were sentenced to

• a fine in Poland.

Brussels; London; Washington, DC: Fair Trials, 2020. 40p.

By Briana Jones & Laura Goren

Virginia can be a place where every young person has the support and resources to reach their full potential and where young people who get into trouble are helped to get back on the right track. Unfortunately, currently in Virginia, the youth court system frequently imposes fines and fees on troubled young people and their families, placing additional barriers in their path. This creates long-standing harm for children who enter the system and their families, with Black teenagers most often being swept into the youth criminal legal system and therefore facing the greatest financial and family harms. Analyses of these economic and social impacts of fines and fees on Black and Brown teenagers highlight the pressing challenges these children and their families can face and offer alternative measures that could better help youth who encounter the juvenile justice system.

Richmond, VA: The Commonwealth Institute, 2022. 6p