By Robin Olsen, Ammar Khalid, Ashlin Oglesby-Neal, Tessa Upin

Many states have enacted comprehensive justice system reforms to reduce the use of incarceration and community supervision with the aim of focusing resources on people at higher risk of reoffending and investing in strategies to achieve better outcomes for people and communities. In 2015, Nebraska and Utah passed legislation to create a structured approach for responding to supervision violations. This included the use of time-limited incarceration stays that are shorter than full revocations of supervision. We conducted interviews with stakeholders and analyzed administrative data in both states to examine the implementation and effects of the reform to community supervision incarceration responses. Our analysis found that violation responses have changed in both states, moving from revocations or other prereform incarceration sanctions toward structured, short jail stays or incarceration caps. Additionally, while overall incarceration stays associated with supervision violations increased in both states after the reforms, the number of full revocations from felony probation decreased in Nebraska and the proportion of violations that received an incarceration response decreased in Utah. The analysis also showed that successful completions for both states’ supervision systems either increased immediately after reforms were implemented or increased after a brief decrease. However, the analysis found that the use of time-limited incarceration responses did not make successful supervision completion more likely for particular cases in Nebraska, and in Utah, cases that received time-limited incarceration responses had higher recidivism rates than similar cases that did not. This brief offers recommendations that Nebraska, Utah, and other jurisdictions considering similar policies can consider to build on these pieces of legislation, including closely tracking both system-level and individual outcome metrics, establishing policies and practices that meet the goals of their approaches to supervision violation responses, and limiting the overall use of incarceration because of its potential criminogenic impact.

Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2022. 53p.

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 Shannon Dodd · Emma Antrobus · Michelle Sydes

Corrective service agencies worldwide have started to introduce body-worn cameras (BWCs) in prisons as part of correctional ofcers’ personal protective equipment. Like the policing context, this technology is often introduced in haste, with little consideration of the privacy and ethical concerns that may be raised through this more intensive form of prisoner surveillance. No studies to date have explored the decision-making of correctional ofcers around BWCs. Thus, this article details a mixed-methods study of correctional officers' use of BWCs in Queensland, Australia. This study demonstrates how correctional ofcers exercise their discretion around BWC use, including how and in what situations they activate their camera and the ways they navigate the use of this technology amidst prisoner privacy and security concerns.

Security Journal, May, 2023.

By Brittany C. Cunningham; Daniel S. Lawrence; Michael D. White; Bryce E. Peterson; James R. Coldren, Jr.; Jennifer Lafferty; Keri Richardson

his final research report presents an evaluation of body-worn cameras (BWCs) in the Loudoun County, Virginia, Adult Detention Center. The goal of this study was to conduct a rigorous process and impact evaluation of BWCs in a correctional setting to inform researchers and practitioners about the implementation and potential impacts of BWCs on critical correctional outcomes. To achieve this goal, the study team implemented a 12-month, clustered, randomized controlled trial, and collected data using a mixed-method design. Primary data sources included the following: surveys of deputies; interviews of jail leaders, deputies, and external jail stakeholders; a focus group with deputies who serve on the Special Weapons and Tactics team; observations of jail operations and BWC trainings; review and analysis of jail administrative data, including response to resistance (RTR) events and resident injuries; and review and analysis of data collected from stationary cameras and BWC footage. Research findings suggested that BWCs have potential for improving the safety and security of correctional facilities by reducing RTR events and preventing injuries to incarcerated residents. However, findings from deputy surveys raised questions about the potential impact of BWCs on deputy-resident relations. The study also addressed one of the primary points of contention about implementing BWCs in correctional environments: that they are superfluous to the existing network of stationary cameras. This study found limitations with both types of cameras, as well as areas where they can complement one another to help overcome those limitations. The study team made several recommendations for policy and disseminated the research through both academic and practitioner conferences and publications.

Alexandria, VA: CNA Analysis & Solutions, 2023. 26p

By Ashley Nellis, Ph.D. and Liz Komar

In 2018, Congress passed and then-President Donald Trump signed into law the bipartisan First Step Act, a sweeping criminal justice reform bill designed to promote rehabilitation, lower recidivism, and reduce excessive sentences in the federal prison system. Lawmakers and advocates across both political parties supported the bill as a necessary step to address some of the punitive excesses of the 1980s and 1990s.

The First Step Act includes a range of sentencing reforms which made the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 retroactive,I enhanced judicial discretion, created earned time credits, increased good time credits, reduced certain mandatory minimum sentences, and expanded the safety valve that allows persons with minor prior convictions to serve less time than previously mandated.

The First Step Act also seeks to expand opportunities for people in federal prisons to participate in rehabilitative programming to support their success after release. The law aims to produce lower odds of recidivism by incentivizing incarcerated individuals to engage in rigorous, evidence-based rehabilitation and education programming. In exchange and based on a favorable assessment of risk to the community, they may earn an earlier opportunity for release to community corrections.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) reports promising results thus far. The recidivism rate among people who have benefitted from the law is considerably lower than those who were released from prison without benefit of the law. Among the nearly 30,000 individuals whose release has been expedited by the First Step Act, nearly nine in every 10 have not been rearrested or reincarcerated. This 12% recidivism rate lies in stark contrast to the more typical 45% recidivism rate among people released from federal prison.

Washington, DC: The Sentencing Project, 2023. 9p.

By Natasa Mavronicola

This open access book theorises and concretises the idea of ‘absolute rights’ in human rights law with a focus on Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). It unpacks how we might understand what an ‘absolute right’ in human rights law is and draws out how such a right’s delimitation may remain faithful to its absolute character. From these starting points, it considers how, as a matter of principle, the right not to be subjected to torture or inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment enshrined in Article 3 ECHR is, and ought, to be substantively delimited by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). Focusing on the wrongs at issue, this analysis touches both on the core of the right and on what some might consider to lie at the right’s ‘fringes’: from the aggravated wrong of torture to the severity assessment delineating inhumanity and degradation; the justified use of force and its implications for absoluteness; the delimitation of positive obligations to protect from ill-treatment; and the duty not to expel persons to places where they face a real risk of torture, inhumanity or degradation. Few legal standards carry the simultaneous significance and contestation surrounding this right. This book seeks to contribute fruitfully to efforts to counter a proliferation of attempts to dispute, circumvent or dilute the absolute character of the right not to be subjected to torture or inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and to offer the groundwork for transparently and coherently (re)interpreting the right’s contours in line with its absolute character. Winner of the 2022 SLS Peter Birks Prize for Outstanding Legal Scholarship.

London: Bloomsbury/Hart, 2022. 221p.

By Tammy Ayres, Ruth Hatcher and Emma Palmer

The Drug Recovery Prison (DRP) at HMP Holme House began in 2017 as a three-year pilot, jointly funded by NHS England (NHSE) and MOJ/HMPPS. The DRP aimed to address the supply of and demand for alcohol and illegal substances, improve treatment outcomes, and support ongoing recovery. The DRP process evaluation, jointly commissioned by MOJ and NHSE, aimed to understand how the pilot had been implemented, providing evidence on the roll out and capturing the perceptions and experiences of staff and prisoners.

Ministry of Justice Analytical Series, 2023. London: Ministry of Justice, 2023. 107p.

By Criminal Justice Testing and Evaluation Consortium

This technology brief is the third document in a four-part series (Figure 1) on technologies to support the monitoring and supervision of individuals on pretrial release, probation, and parole (i.e., community supervision). The goal of this series is to offer foundational insights from use cases, examine the challenges of community supervision, highlight example products, and discuss the future of select technologies and their implications for community supervision. This brief highlights technologies and solutions used to monitor alcohol and drug use for persons on community supervision.

CJTEC Retrieved October, 2023.

Edited by Bev Clucas, Gerry Johnstone, and Tony Ward

Not so long ago, the only respectable question for philosophical, legal, and political scholars to ask about torture was how to ensure its effective legal prohibition. Recently, however, some leading lawyers and legal theorists have challenged those who are absolutely opposed to torture, arguing that, in some circumstances, torture may be morally permissible or even required. This has provoked a range of responses, from outraged dismissal to cautious concessions that the law has to adjust to new realities. This volume contains writings by some of the leading contributors to these debates. Distinctively, it supplements the discussion about the morality of torture - and the morality of discussing torture - with essays which provide important legal, sociological, and historical analyses of this appalling human practice and of the attempts to control it. With an international and interdisciplinary authorship, Torture: Moral Absolutes and Ambiguities will be essential reading for legal and political theorists, philosophers, sociologists, historians, and indeed anybody interested in serious and informed thinking about this most disturbing phenomenon.

Baden-Baden, Germany: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG, 2009. 215p/

By Penal Reform International and the University of Nottingham

Mortality rates are up to 50% higher in prison than in the community, linked to a wide range of causes and contributing factors which raise serious concerns for human rights, public health, and prison management. Yet, information on who is dying in prison and why, including disaggregated data, remains a key problem in understanding and reducing deaths in prisons.

This briefing is a call to action for the international community and national actors to strengthen their approach to deaths in prisons, to take pro-active measures to prevent loss of life and, when deaths do occur, to respond appropriately and conduct robust investigations in line with international human rights standards to identify any systemic concerns and prevent future harm.

Published in partnership with the University of Nottingham, it is based on research conducted as part of the prisonDEATH initiative and survey responses to a call for input from PRI from a variety of stakeholders in 25 countries covering all regions, as well as 19 prison administrations facilitated by EuroPris. Aimed to inspire action, it includes some recommendations to guide human rights-based responses to prevent premature or avoidable deaths in prison.

London: PRI, 2022. 16p.

By Prison Reform International and the University of Nottingham

nvestigating deaths in prisons is an essential part of a state’s human rights responsibilities, including the obligation to guarantee the right to life and the prohibition of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. Investigations of deaths in prisons provide crucial evidence to find out what went wrong, provide redress to families, improve prison management and ultimately prevent future deaths.

This guide by PRI and the University of Nottingham provides prison authorities, policy makers, law enforcement officials, and families of persons deprived of liberty guidance and analysis on the basic features of human rights-based investigations into deaths in prison. It sets out key international and regional jurisprudence and includes recommendations to assist in designing and implementing an effective investigation system, as well as promising practices to inspire authorities to develop and implement reforms.

London: PRI, 2023. 26p.

By Susan McNeeley, Valerie Clark and Grant Duwe

Individuals released from prison have an elevated risk of premature death, especially during the first few weeks after release. Furthermore, these consequences of incarceration may be exacerbated by racial and ethnic disparities. This study examined three types of post-release mortality – all-cause mortality, natural deaths, and unnatural deaths which include accidents, suicides, and homicides – among individuals released from Minnesota state prisons in order to identify characteristics and experiences that place individuals at risk. In addition, we conducted race-specific models examining these types of mortality among White, Black, and Native American releasees. The results of Cox regression models showed, first, that several personal characteristics were related to risk of death. Black, Asian, and Latino people had lower risk of mortality than White people, while Native American people had higher risk. Those affiliated with security threat groups (STG) had higher risk of death, as did those with more mental and physical health diagnoses and those with higher body mass index (BMI). Second, several aspects of criminal history and incarceration were related to post-release mortality. Sex offenders had lower risk of death, while those incarcerated for driving while intoxicated (DWI) had higher risk. Prison visitation reduced the risk of mortality. Risk of death was higher among those with more prior prison admissions, those incarcerated for supervised release revocations, and those with more discipline convictions – but was lower when individuals were incarcerated for longer periods of time. Third, the circumstances of release were related to risk of death. Individuals released to the Twin Cities Metropolitan area had higher risk of mortality, while those released to community programs had lower risk. Finally, the results also showed that, while many risk or protective factors appeared to be universal, some race-specific risk factors do exist.

St. Paul, Minnesota Department of Corrections, 2023. 43p.

By Susan McNeeley and Doyun Koo

Prior research on violent victimization in prison suggests noncitizens may be less likely to experience violence while incarcerated. In an attempt to better understand this relationship, this study examined whether citizenship status predicts risk among a subsample of foreign-born incarcerated people. In addition, we modeled violent victimization separately for foreign-born and native-born individuals to identify any differences in risk factors between groups. We tested these relationships using a sample of 7,326 individuals incarcerated in Minnesota state prisons. The results of Cox regression models showed foreign-born citizens and foreign-born noncitizens had similar risk for violent prison victimization. We also found that some risk factors for victimization (age, physical health, MnSTARR 2.0 risk level, and idle status) differed across native-born and foreign-born incarcerated people.

St. Paul: Minnesota Department of Corrections, 2023. 27p.

By Nathan W. Link, Kathleen Powell, Jordan M. Hyatt, and Ebony L. Ruhland

Monetary sanctions levied on individuals on probation and parole may dramatically influence their ability to reintegrate into the community and to complete their community supervision. Yet very little work has empirically assessed how agencies respond to these obligations. This is critical, given that individuals under community supervision occupy a liminal space: free in the community yet often at risk of violation, rearrest, additional fines, or re-incarceration. In this article, we introduce an approach to the collection and management of monetary sanctions by an adult probation and parole agency in one Pennsylvania county. This specialized department focuses solely on repayment of fines, fees, and costs for a subset of probationers and parolees who have completed all other supervision requirements. We complement the conceptual overview by presenting administrative data on this caseload (N = 5,811) to describe the population under supervision and assess the factors associated with debt amount, having difficulty with repayment, and being the subject of an enforcement action for non-payment. We conclude with a discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of this model compared with historical and other existing models of debt enforcement during community supervision.

Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, Volume 37, Issue 1, February 2021, Pages 128-147

By Annie Harper, Callie Ginapp, Tommaso Bardelli, Alyssa Grimshaw & Marissa Justen & Alaa Mohamedali & Isaiah Thomas & Lisa Puglisi

People involved with the criminal justice system in the United States are disproportionately low-income and indebted. The experience of incarceration intensifies financial hardship, including through worsening debt. Little is known about how people who are incarcerated and their families are impacted by debt and how it affects their reentry experience. We conducted a scoping review to identify what is known about the debt burden on those who have been incarcerated and their families and how this impacts their lives. We searched 14 databases from 1990 to 2019 for all original research addressing financial debt held by those incarcerated in the United States, and screened articles for relevance and extracted data from pertinent studies. These 31 studies selected for inclusion showed that this population is heavily burdened by debt that was accumulated in three general categories: debt directly from criminal justice involvement such as LFOs, pre-existing debt that compounded during incarceration, and debts accrued during reentry for everyday survival. Debt was generally shown to have a negative effect on financial well-being, reentry, family structure, and mental health. Debts from LFOs and child support are very common among the justice-involved population and are largely unpayable. Other forms of debt likely to burden this population remain largely understudied. Extensive reform is necessary to lessen the burden of debt on the criminal justice population in order to improve reentry outcomes and quality of life.

American Journal of Criminal Justice (2021) 46:250–278

By Emily D. Buehler

This report describes substantiated incidents of inmate sexual victimization by another inmate or by staff. It presents data on the incidents of sexual victimization, such as location and time of day. It also provides characteristics of the victims and perpetrators of the victimization. The report details services provided to the victim and consequences for the perpetrator. In part, it fulfills BJS’s mandates under the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 (PREA; P.L. 108–79).

Highlights

• During 2016–18:

• Half of both inmate-on-inmate and staff-on-inmate sexual victimization incidents occurred in an area not under video surveillance.

• There were 2,886 victims of inmate-on-inmate sexual victimization and 2,496 victims of staff-on-inmate sexual victimization in adult correctional facilities.

• About 25% of victims of inmate-on-inmate nonconsensual sexual acts and 43% of victims of abusive sexual contact were female.

• The victim was given a medical examination in 61% of inmate-on-inmate nonconsensual sexual act incidents and in 36% of abusive sexual contact incidents

Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Statistics. 2023. 36p.