By Jamie Jenkins

The largest book ban in the United States takes place in this country’s prison system. Prison officials can ban any book that threatens the security or operations of the facility. Books about Black people in America and books about the history and politics of prisons are often targeted for their potential to be divisive or incite unrest. The result is that Black people, who are already disproportionately victimized by the criminal punishment system, are prevented from reading their own history and the history of the institution imprisoning them. This Note examines the legal backdrop enabling these draconian book bans to persist today. As an example, it highlights the recent ban of Heather Ann Thompson’s “Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and its Legacy” in Attica Correctional Facility. It situates book bans in prisons alongside the anti-CRT mania plaguing our school systems, and labels both practices as forms of “memory law” meant to stifle the democratic engagement of marginalized groups. Finally, this Note argues for a rebalancing of interests that centers the rights and needs of incarcerated people.

(January 16, 2023). Columbia Law Review, Forthcoming, Available at

By David H. Cloud; Brie Williams; Regine Haardörfer, et al

Question What is the association between exposures to extreme heat and suicide-watch incidents in a state prison system without air-conditioned living units?

Findings This case series of 6576 facility-incarceration days found that extreme heat was significantly associated with a 30% increase in the incident rate of daily suicide-watch incidents.

Meaning These findings suggest that extreme heat may increase vulnerabilities to situations that lead to suicide-watch placements for incarcerated people, bolstering calls for heat mitigation and decarceral interventions to assuage heat-induced harms among incarcerated populations.

Importance Extreme heat poses a distinct risk to the 2.1 million incarcerated people in the United States, who have disparately high rates of behavioral health conditions. Suicide is a leading cause of death among people in prisons.

Objective To examine associations of extreme heat, solitary confinement, and an indicator of suicidal behaviors among incarcerated men in a Deep South US prison system.

Design, Setting, and Participants This longitudinal case series panel study included adult men in prisons in Louisiana, a state with one of the largest prison systems in the United States that has been engaged in litigation due to lack of air conditioning and extreme heat. The unit of analysis was prison facility-days. A facility-level data set was created by merging administrative data files, which included demographic characteristics, health classification, housing location and movement, disciplinary records, and involvement in suicide-watch incidents for all incarcerated men in Louisiana during the observation period. Individual-level variables were aggregated to facility-days to merge in daily maximum heat index data from the US Local Climatological Data, which were linked to the zip codes of prisons. The observation period was January 1, 2015, to December 31, 2017. Data set construction occurred from August 2020 to September 2022, and analysis was conducted from December 2022 to February 2023.

Exposure The focal exposure was extreme heat days. Daily maximum heat index data were categorized into 6 bins (<30 °F, 30-39 °F, 40-49 °F, 50-59 °F, 70-79 °F, and ≥80 °F) and as an indicator for any facility-day where the maximum heat index exceeded the 90th percentile of heat indices for total days in observation period. Conditional fixed-effects negative binomial regression models were used to calculate incident rate ratios to test associations between extreme heat and suicide watch incidents, while controlling for covariates.

Main Outcomes and Measures The focal outcome was daily count of suicide watch incidents that were recorded in a carceral system database. Covariates included daily percentages of incarcerated persons at each prison with serious mental illness diagnosis, daily rate of solitary confinement, and total facility population.

Results The sample of 6 state-operated prisons provided 6576 facility-days for the analysis. Results suggest a dose-responsive association between extreme heat and daily counts of suicide-watch incidents; compared with days with temperatures between 60 and 69 °F, the rate of daily suicide incidents increased by 29% when the heat index reached the level of caution (ie, 80-89 °F) and by 36% when reaching extreme caution (90-103 °F) (80-89 °F: incidence rate ratio [IRR], 1.29; 95% CI, 1.17-1.43; P < .001; 90-103 °F: IRR, 1.36; 95% CI, 1.15-1.61; P  95% CI, 1.18-1.45; P < .001).

Conclusions and Relevance Findings suggest an association between extreme heat and an indicator of suicidality among an incarcerated sample, contribute to an emerging literature exploring linkages between climatological events and health outcomes in prisons, and may have implications for legal interventions and advocacy seeking to abate heat-induced morbidity and mortality in carceral contexts.

JAMA Netw Open. 2023 Aug; 6(8): e2328380.

By Ben Grunwald

With mounting support for dramatic criminal justice reform, the question is no longer whether we should decarcerate American prisons but how. This question is far more complicated than it might seem. We could cut the prison population in half, for example, by drastically shortening sentences. Or we could reduce prison admissions. Or we could do both. And we could do either or both for countless combinations of criminal offenses. Moreover, even when they reach the same numeric target, these strategies are not equivalent. They would have vastly different consequences for both prisoners and the public and widely varying timeframes to take effect. To pick among them, we need richer metrics and more precise empirical estimates to evaluate their consequences.

This Article begins by proposing metrics to evaluate the relative merits of competing decarceration strategies. The public debate has focused almost exclusively on how we might decarcerate while minimizing any increases in crime and has, therefore, underappreciated the costs of prison itself. We should consider at least three more metrics: the social harm of incarceration, racial disparity, and timing. Next, the Article develops an empirical methodology to identify the range of strategies that would reduce the national prison population by 25, 50, and 75%. Finally, it identifies the best performing strategies against each metric.

The results have several broader takeaways. First, the optimal approach to decarceration depends heavily on which metrics we value most. The results thus quantify a stark set of policy choices behind a seemingly simple objective. Second, the results confirm that, to dramatically shrink prisons, it is critical to decarcerate a substantial number of people convicted of violent offenses—a fact that may surprise the majority of Americans who believe people convicted of drug offenses occupy half of prison beds. Finally, the results show that race-neutral decarceration strategies are likely to exacerbate rather than mitigate racial disparities. Armed with the conceptual tools and methodologies developed in this Article, we can make more informed decisions about how to best scale down prisons, given our priorities and constraints.

33 Stanford Law & Policy Review (2022 Forthcoming), Duke Law School Public Law & Legal Theory Series No. 2021-41,

By Richard Walton

Prisons exist to keep the public safe by depriving the most serious offenders of their liberty, and to enable them to become law-abiding citizens. In recent years, those priorities increasingly have been neglected by the Ministry of Justice and Her Majesty’s Prisons and Probation Service. The collective rights of the vast majority of the public have been overlooked, without noticeable benefit to those who have been sentenced to prison. The case of Usman Khan, who launched an Islamist terror attack in central London in November, despite being released on supposedly strict licence conditions, illustrates the inherent risks of an approach that appears to set poorly researched offender rehabilitation programmes above the safety of ordinary citizens. This is especially true in the context of extremist offenders, who are ideologically motivated and more difficult, sometimes impossible, to rehabilitate. Khan, previously convicted for involvement in a plot to bomb the London Stock Exchange, hoodwinked his supervisors, who allowed him to travel to the heart of the capital, with fatal consequences for two young people and their families. This should not have happened: the process that led to it has to be re-examined. It is clear that a reordering of priorities for ministers, officials, police and probation officers is urgently required. The alleged terrorist attack at HMP Whitemoor, which is said to have featured replica suicide vests, is further evidence that the most dangerous offenders are not being monitored effectively and in the public interest – even within a Category A prison. This report sets out some of the organisational changes that would help to achieve the necessary change.The recommendation for the Home Office to reabsorb Her Majesty’s Prisons and Probation Service (HMPPS) is persuasive. The Ministry of Justice, formed in 2007, has proven to be institutionally flawed and a cultural timidity still persists among officials around the management of terrorist offenders. The 13-year experiment, which removed prisons from the purview of the Home Office, has failed and should be brought to a close. It would make far more sense – in operational and strategic terms – for the Home Secretary, who has ministerial responsibility for domestic security, policing and public safety, to be once again accountable for the management of all prisoners, with the assistance of an able and knowledgeable Prisons Minister. A Home Office structured along traditional lines would also be in a stronger position to direct information-sharing and more carefully assess the risks to public safety posed by prisoners – notably terrorist offenders – on their release. A revamped Home Office must review how prisoner behaviour is evaluated, as well as the schemes designed to deradicalise terrorist offenders and rehabilitate other dangerous offenders. As the report explains, there has been little empirical study into the effectiveness of schemes designed to challenge extremist world views. Specialist training is vital here, and the use of the best psychological and neurological techniques to assess risk and danger. This is not work for the generalist: as Usman Khan’s case shows, those who are ideologically motivated of Islamist extremism are capable of hiding their true intent for long periods in order to carry out devastating acts of violence. Finally, legislating to prevent seriously dangerous convicted terrorists and possibly some other dangerous offenders from being released early into the community on licence is an idea that deserves serious consideration (and properly informed debate in both Houses of Parliament). It is likely to gain public support but judges must be persuaded of its legal integrity too. As the Government explores these legislative changes and structural changes in the round, it must ensure that public safety is paramount.

London: PolIcy Exchange, 2020. 28p.

By Daniela Ronco, Alvise Sbraccia, Giovanni Torrente

This project’s goal is to assess strategies and programmes which prevent, deter and counter radicalization in prison and identify and analyse good practices regarding new or existing deradicalization, disengagement and rehabilitation programmes and risk assessment tools. The analysis has been carried out having in mind the international and European standards for the the protection of detainees' rights. Research incorporates qualitative and quantitative data analysis on official government documents and interviews with stakeholders from prison administration and management, prison staff, Imams, chaplains and other religious representatives. The relevance of results is to develop practices across Europe to effectively manage individuals considered radicalized, at risk of being or to prevent others. Ensuring common knowledge by disseminating to national and European networks will improve de-radicalization measures across prisons.

European Prison Observatory 2019. 47p.

By Gary LaFree , · Bo Jiang and· Lauren C. Porter

Abstract Objectives In the current study we consider the link between imprisonment and post-prison participation in violent political extremism. We examine three research questions: (1) whether spending time in prison increases the post-release risk of engaging in violent acts; (2) whether political extremists who were radicalized in prison are more likely to commit violent acts than political extremists radicalized elsewhere; and (3) whether individuals who were in prison and radicalized there were more likely to engage in post-prison violent extremism compared to individuals who were in prison and did not radicalize there. Methods We perform a two-stage analysis where we frst preprocess the data using a matching technique to approximate a fully blocked experimental design. Using the matched data, we then calculate the conditional odds ratio for engaging in violent extremism and estimate average treatment efects (ATE) of our outcomes of interest. Results Our results show that the efects of imprisonment and prison radicalization increases post-prison violent extremism by 78–187% for the logistic regression analysis, and 24.6–48.53% for the ATE analysis. Both analyses show that when radicalization occurs in the context of prison, the criminogenic efect of imprisonment is doubled. Conclusions In support of longstanding arguments that prison plays a major role in the identity and behavior of individuals after their release, we fnd consistent evidence that the post-prison use of politically motivated violence can be estimated in part by whether perpetrators spent time in prison and whether they were radicalized there.

Journal of Quantitative Criminology, (2020) 36:473–498

Anna Schlieher and Ben Crewe

The politics involved in cell-sharing reach into the most personal parts of prisoners’ lives and are highly determinate of their experiences of imprisonment. While there is a small amount of research on the impact of cell-sharing on personal wellbeing and prison quality, much less has been written about the daily dynamics and significance of negotiating shared space under conditions of coercion. In this paper, based on in-depth research undertaken in England & Wales, we explore the experience of cell-sharing and how dynamics in the cell matter both intimately and socially. Essentially, we locate the cell as one of the primary sites of ‘where the action is’ in prisons, and where matters of safety, dignity and abjection are of particular relevance.

The British Journal of Criminology, 2022, 62, 484–500

By Ben Laws

Recent calls from senior managers, human rights groups and academics continue to scrutinize the impact of solitary confinement. But much less attention has been paid to prisoners’ own motivations for segregation. By analysing interviews with 16 segregated men in a high-security prison (Category-A) in England, this article foregrounds motivation. The argument involves a detailed description of the complex, and sometimes contradictory, motives that may lead prisoners into seeking isolation. It further attempts to explore the relationship between segregation and the wider prison environment. For many prisoners, segregation has a ‘negative benefit’ or amounts to a form of ‘lesser evil’. Such phrasing hints at the difficult decisions that prisoners navigate and offers an alternative perspective on solitary confinement.

The British Journal of Criminology, 2021, 61, 1452–1468

Ryan Williams, and Alison Liebling

Sociological studies of prisons require expanded methodologies and interdisciplinary concepts to address challenges posed by changing prisoner demographics and transformed geopolitics. We aim to revitalize sociological inquiry on prisons and prisoner leadership by focussing on the question of whether prisons cause radicalization. Our findings support those of the most persuasive original studies: distinct prison climates generate different hierarchies, only some of which are violent. Through extensive fieldwork we explore the differences between a prison with high levels of ‘political charge’, or anger, and another with less, drawing on extremist events that unfolded over time. We contrast the dangerous dynamics of prison 1 with the more fluid, prosocial religious explorations facilitated by prison 2, considering the implications for prison radicalization studies.

The British Journal of Criminology, 2023, 63, 97–114

By Scott H. Decker and David C. Pyrooz

There is considerable speculation that prisons are a breeding ground for radicalization. These concerns take on added significance in the era of mass incarceration in the United States, where 1.5 million people are held in state or federal prisons and around 600,000 people are released from prison annually. Prior research relies primarily on the speculation of prison officials, media representations, and/or cross-sectional designs to understand the imprisonment-extremism nexus. We develop a tripartite theoretical model to examine continuity and change in activism and radicalism intentions upon leaving prison. We test these models using data from a large probability sample of prisoners (N = 802) in Texas interviewed in the week preceding their release from prison and then re-interviewed 10 months later using a validated scale of activism and radicalism intentions. We arrive at three primary conclusions. First, levels of activism decline upon reentry to the community (d = -0.30, p < .01), while levels of radicalism largely remain unchanged (d = -0.08, p = .28). What is learned and practiced in prison appears to quickly lose its vitality on the street. Second, salient groups and organizations fell in importance after leaving prison, including country, race/ethnicity, and religion, suggesting former prisoners are occupied by other endeavors. Finally, while we identify few correlates of changes in extremist intentions, higher levels of legal cynicism in prison were associated with increases in both activism and radicalism intentions after release from prison. Efforts designed to improve legal orientations could lessen intentions to support non-violent and violent extremist actions. These results point to an imprisonment-extremism nexus that is diminished largely by the realities of prisoner reentry.

PLoS ONE 15(11):. 2020. e0242910. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal. pone.0242910

By Kevin R. Reitz

This article recommends the development of broad policies of preclusion regarding the use of incarceration for offenders who are highly unlikely to commit a violent crime in the future. The proposal builds on the new Model Penal Code: Sentencing's provision on the limited utilitarian purposes of incarceration. Such low-violence-risk-preclusion strategies (LVRPs) would stand on the most powerful predictive capabilities of today's risk assessment technology. If implemented properly, there is reason to believe that substantial drops in prison rates could be realized in most states. The preclusion groups would include defendants who should not be sent to prison or jail by sentencing judges even though the law allows for such penalties; those serving prison sentences who should be released by parole boards or other releasing authorities at the earliest opportunity; and probation and parole violators who should not be revoked to prison or jail. The strongest objection to the LVRP proposal is the fear of racial or other unacceptable biases in its apportionment of reduced-incarceration benefits. Given current high levels of disproportionality in prison and jail populations, however, there is reason to think that the benefits of LVRP would be especially pronounced in disadvantaged communities.

Behav Sci Law. 2020;38:207–217.

By Beverly Powis, Louise Dixon and Jessica Woodhams

Study aims This exploratory qualitative study explores the extent and nature of prisoner radicalisation in three high security prisons in England, how the establishments were managing extremist prisoners and responding to the risk of radicalisation. Approach and interpreting findings Interviews were conducted, between January 2014 and January 2015, with 83 male prisoners and 73 staff from a range of disciplines, including, prison wing officers, security staff, psychologists, offender supervisors and chaplains across the three establishments. Interview material was analysed using thematic analysis. The findings should be viewed with a degree of caution as the views presented may not be representative of all prisoners or staff. Key findings While the study aimed to examine all forms of extremism, only Islamist extremism was reported by respondents, as this was considered to be the most prevalent extremist ideology in prisons at the time of the fieldwork. This study found that, despite their small number, those convicted of Islamist extremist offences had a disproportionately disruptive influence in the prisons, exerting power and influence over other prisoners. However, not all were interested in pursuing an Islamist extremism agenda. They tended to either be motivated by an extremism agenda or interested in orchestrating anti-establishment and criminal activities of what was frequently described as a ‘prison gang’. Those who were motivated by extremism were making attempts to radicalise others. While some prisoners outside of these groups were reported to express sympathies with Islamist extremism, there was little suggestion they would act upon this when released. Prisoners who were considered to be more susceptible to Islamist radicalisation were those thought to be most vulnerable within prison, who had the strongest sense of loss, loneliness, and alienation. They also tended to have grievances against society and the prison system, channelling their anger and frustration into extremism

Ministry of Justice Analytical Series 202. London: Ministry of Justice, 2021. 35p.

By Julia Laskorunsky, Kelly Lyn Mitchell and Sandy Felkey Mullins

This report examines the challenges and opportunities that states faced in deciding whether to release people from prison during the COVID-19 pandemic. It focuses on the legal mechanisms available to jurisdictions and the factors that influenced whether they were willing or able to use those mechanisms to release people from prison. Our goal is to illuminate whether back-end release mechanisms can be used to reduce prison populations that have been bloated by the policies of the mass-incarceration era or whether relief from mass incarceration must take some other form. The report presents case studies of six states—Alabama, Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, and Washington—to gain a more in-depth view of how events unfolded during the pandemic. Overall, our study found that the number of individuals released early from prisons during the pandemic was limited due to a variety of factors, including politics, risk-averse decision-making, shifting external pressures, the limited scope of compassionate and medical release statutes and the use of discretion to deny release. In addition, few changes to policy or practice that occurred during the pandemic had a lasting impact on back-end release practices. We conclude that the back-end release mechanisms offer only a modest opportunity to reduce mass incarceration, and the current system is unlikely to make a substantial difference in addressing mass incarceration due primarily to risk aversion. Instead, state-level carceral policies that focus on diffusing responsibility for back-end release and that reduce incarceration in the first place have the greatest chance of achieving long-term reductions in prison populations.

St. Paul, MN: University of Minnesota Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice, 2023. 73p.

By Michelle S. Phelps

Between 1980 and 2007, probation rates in the United States skyrocketed alongside imprisonment rates; since 2007, both forms of criminal justice control have declined in use. Although a large literature in criminology and related fields has explored the causes and consequences of mass incarceration, very little research has explored the parallel rise of mass probation. This review takes stock of our knowledge of probation in the United States. In the first section, I trace the expansion of probation historically, across states, and for specific demographic groups. I then summarize the characteristics of adults on probation today and what we know about probation revocation. Lastly, I review the nascent literature on the causal effects of probation for individuals, families, neighborhoods, and society. I end by discussing a plan for research and the growing movement to blunt the harms of mass supervision.

Annual Review of Criminology, Annu. Rev. Criminol. 2020. 3:261–79

By Kevin R. Reitz and Edward F. Rhine

Decisions tied to parole release, supervision, and revocation are major determinants of the ebb and flow of prison populations across two-thirds of US states. We argue that parole release, as an institution, has been an underacknowledged force in American incarceration and reincarceration policy and an important contributor to the nation's buildup to mass incarceration. In paroling states, no court or state agency holds greater power than parole boards over time actually served by the majority of offenders sent to prison. We examine the leverage exercised by parole boards through their discretionary release decisions and their powers to sanction violators of parole conditions. We note the state-by-state diversity and complexity associated with parole-release decisions and the absence of successful state systems that might serve as a model for other jurisdictions. We highlight the procedural shortfalls universally associated with parole decision-making. We discuss the long reach of parole supervision and the pains it imposes on those subject to its jurisdiction, including the substantial financial burdens levied on parolees. We then turn to the prospects for parole reform and outline a comprehensive blueprint for improving parole release in America.

Annual Review of CriminologyVol. 3:281-29, 2020.

By Edward E. Rhine, Kelly Lyn Mitchell, and Kevin R. Reitz

Paroling authorities play an important, if often unrecognized role, in American prison policies. Discretionary parole processes decide the actual release dates for most individuals subject to confinement in 34 states. Additional leverage over time served is exercised through parole boards’ revocation and re-release authority. The degree of discretion these back-end officials exert over the dosage of incarceration is vast, sometimes more than that held by sentencing courts.

Any comprehensive program to change American prison policy must focus to a significant degree on prison-release discretion, where it exists, and its relationship to time served. During the buildup to mass incarceration, many parole boards became increasingly reluctant to grant release to eligible prisoners. Today, if it were possible to reverse this upward driver of prison populations, parole boards could be important contributors to a new evidence-based status quo of lower prison rates in many states. Reasonable objectives of reform include policy-driven increases in the likelihood of parole release, and more rational decision making overall about time served.

This report describes twelve “levers of change,” each associated with potential reforms in the realm of discretionary parole release. The reforms are called “change levers” because, once a lever is pulled, it is designed to impact prison populations by altering parole grant rates and durations of time served. The report identifies 12 areas of innovation that, to some degree, have already been tried by a number of states. In most cases, from a distance, it is impossible to evaluate the quality of each state’s implementation of one or more change levers, or the results that have been achieved. But the fact that states have begun to experiment in specific areas shows that there is an appetite for reform. In addition, actual experimentation indicates that some of the groundwork has been laid for evaluation, improvement, and dissemination of promising ideas to many additional states.

Some levers have become embedded in the decision protocols of parole boards over the past 20 years and more, while others have emerged only recently. One of the goals of this report is to demonstrate how combining the levers is key to reform. This report maps the terrain of the 12 identified change levers, to the degree permitted by available information. The map shows a huge amount of state-by-state variation, even without hands-on study of each system. The report further classifies individual levers based on the number of jurisdictions in which they have been identified, and their potential impact on states’ prison populations.

St. Paul, MN: Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice, 2022. 36p.

By Kelly Lyn Mitchell, Lily Hanrath, Erin Harbinson

Ramsey County Community Corrections (RCCC) and the Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice partnered to participate in the Reducing Revocations Challenge, a national initiative of Arnold Ventures and the CUNY Institute for State and Local Governance dedicated to understanding the drivers of probation revocations and identifying ways to reduce them when appropriate. The study involved two broad questions. First, what is the pathway to revocation for people on probation in Ramsey County? Second, what are the drivers of revocations in Ramsey County? Drawing from three sources of information—a legal and policy review, data regarding a cohort starting probation in 2016, and interviews with criminal justice system stakeholders—the primary goals were to identify the factors driving revocations and to collaborate with other stakeholders and members of the community to identify changes in policy and practice that can reduce probation revocations and lead to better outcomes for individuals on probation while protecting public safety

St. Paul, MN: Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice, Minneapolis, MN2022. 70p.

By Sara Rahman

LCM is a multiagency approach to offender management where the Department of Communities and Justice, the NSW Police Force and NSW Health work in partnership to provide tailored case management and wraparound support to offenders under Community Corrections supervision. This support may include referrals to housing services, disability services, health and mental health services, drug and alcohol services, victim services, and relationship services in addition to any rehabilitation programs.
We study whether LCM is associated with changes in four outcomes: any reoffending, serious drug, violent, and property reoffending, domestic violence reoffending, and return to custody, each within 12 months of referral.
To do this, we compare reoffending rates of LCM offenders with reoffending rates of a matched control group.
We supplemented this analysis with an event study analysis comparing offending before and after referral to LCM versus a matched group with similar community order start dates.
Crime and Justice Bulletin No. CJB257

Sydney: NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research, 2023. 37p.

By The Crime and Justice Institute

In 2015, the Oklahoma County Detention Center (OCDC) was facing an overcrowding crisis.i This was compounded by a deteriorating facility, high incidences of violence within the jail, several high-profile lawsuits, and an overall lack of public trust in the county’s justice system. The Greater Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce (Chamber) in collaboration with community leaders created the Oklahoma County Criminal Justice Reform Task Force (Task Force) to assess the county’s criminal justice system and make recommendations to safely reduce the jail population and create a more effective justice system. The assessment, conducted by the Vera Institute of Justice, culminated in six recommendations for the county to responsibly reduce the jail’s population and promote public safety. These included the following, as well as several sub-recommendations within each broader category: Executive Summary In August 2022, the Oklahoma County Criminal Justice Advisory Council (CJAC) requested a follow-up study to identify what recommendations the county has and has not fully implemented as well as what further improvements in the system are necessary to achieve the Task Force’s goals. To conduct this analysis, CJAC sought assistance from the Crime and Justice Institute (CJI), which analyzed data from the OCDC, reviewed state statutes and agency policies, and interviewed numerous system stakeholders. The result of this assessment included seven findings about the county’s criminal justice system identified within this report. Overall, the county has achieved its primary goal of reducing its population to address overcrowding, as the population is down 46 percent since its peak in 2015. Despite this success, the analysis yielded three main challenges that persist in the county’s criminal justice system that will require the county’s attention to resolve. First, while the overall jail population has decreased since 2015, including the total number of individuals detained pretrial, the ratio of sentenced individuals to pretrial individuals has remained steady. Looking at the composition of this population, a measurable number of individuals are being held for low-level offenses or violations such as traffic offenses. Second, Oklahoma has made significant progress in establishing diversion programs 1. Create oversight and accountability mechanisms for the local justice system; 2. Reduce jail admissions for municipal violations and low-level misdemeanors; 3. Create a fair and efficient pretrial release process that safely reduces unnecessary pretrial incarceration; 4. Identify and address district court case processing delays that increase jail admissions and length of stay; 5. Expand meaningful diversion program options, focusing on those with mental illness and substance use disorder; and 6. Reduce the impact of justice system fines and fees as a driver of jail growth and recidivism. by creating partnerships in the community to move individuals to treatment and supervision instead of custodial settings. However, procedural hurdles continue to delay the assessment and placement of individuals in noncustodial settings leading to increased length of stays for individuals in jail longer than 48 hours. And third, a closer examination of the jail data shows that while admissions overall have decreased, the percentage of Black individuals admitted to OCDC has increased. Although the overall population has declined, white admissions have declined at a faster rate than Black admissions (50% v 37%), increasing the overrepresentation of Black individuals admitted to the jail. In sum, Oklahoma County made measurable progress since 2016 in addressing the jail population crisis at the time. This progress was driven by a combination of leaders in county government and the criminal justice system and was supported by community-based stakeholders who contributed greatly to components of the implementation plan. The county’s interest in assessing how effective its efforts have been as well as understanding areas that remain problematic is commendable and the next steps toward expanding the progress made will require similar commitment from leaders and partners throughout the system.

Boston: Crime and Justice Institute, 2023. 37p.

By Molly Robustelli; Colby Dawley; Molly Buchanan.; Carrie Chapman; Maura McNamara; Amanda Coscia; and Christian Schiavone

Across the United States, the majority of people under correctional supervision serve their sentence on probation or parole. As of 2020, data show that while just under 2 million people are incarcerated in either prison or jail, about 3.9 million individuals are on probation or parole.1 Of the 1.8 million individuals who exit probation or parole annually, almost half do not successfully complete supervision. Of those who do not complete their supervision, 211,000 will return to prison or jail.2 This has made revocation from probation or parole a leading driver of incarceration in the United States.3 Florida has one of the largest community supervision populations in the country. By the end of 2020, the state had 183,900 individuals on community supervision. Florida ranks fifth highest in the nation for its probation population in the same period, while the state’s parole population is ranked 32nd highest at just over 4,000 individuals. 4 The impact of revocations on the state’s prison population is significant. Florida corrections leaders recognize this challenge and have been working to identify and implement strategies that reduce revocations from community supervision. Despite previous reform efforts, thousands of individuals continue to enter Florida’s prisons due to a revocation of community supervision.5 In January of 2019, the Florida Department of Corrections requested assistance from the Crime and Justice Institute (CJI) in analyzing the factors driving revocation trends in an effort to reduce revocations and recidivism while strengthening community supervision practices. Over 18 months, CJI assessed Florida’s community supervision system, analyzing individual-level and case-level data, reviewing the administrative and legal frameworks governing community supervision, conducting focus group interviews with stakeholders across the state, and disseminating a survey to understand practices on the ground. Through this assessment, CJI found that: • Florida’s revocation rate has consistently hovered near 48 percent since 2012; • Among all revocations from 2010 to 2019, 57 percent were due to technical violations; • Revocation rates are highest for those on three types of supervision: community control, drug offender probation, and felony probation; • Six of the top 10 violations linked to revocations in 2019 were for technical violations; • Nearly one in three revocations resulted in state prison time, but the use of jail has increased over the past decade; • There have been efforts to implement an alternative approach to responding to violations, but responses vary by judicial circuit, limiting the effectiveness and equitable use of these practices; and • A number of barriers impacted individuals’ success on supervision, including limited resources in the community to respond to the needs of individuals on community supervision and a misalignment between the conditions ordered and the areas that should be targeted to reduce recidivism. Based on these findings, CJI identified 14 potential opportunities to safely reduce revocations and improve community supervision outcomes in Florida. These opportunities fall into three overarching goals, which include, addressing barriers to success, focusing resources on the highest-risk population, and ensuring sustainability of evidence-based practices.

Boston: Crime and Justice Institute, 2022. 39p.