By The Justice Policy Institute

The Justice Policy Institute (JPI) has long opposed the use of solitary confinement and has collaborated with national and local partners to develop strategies to end this harmful practice across all levels of the criminal legal system. The December 2024 killing of Robert Brooks by correctional staff, followed by an unlawful work stoppage that left tens of thousands of incarcerated individuals in dangerous conditions, has brought New York State’s prison system to a crisis point. A Moment of Reckoning highlights significant concerns about violence, accountability, and the treatment of individuals in custody, offering a policy blueprint for meaningful reform. It presents concrete steps to reduce the prison population through expanded release mechanisms and to implement proven violence-prevention strategies, enhancing conditions for both incarcerated individuals and staff. Drawing on successful models from New York and other jurisdictions, this blueprint establishes a framework for creating a safer, more just prison system that upholds dignity and accountability.

Policy Blueprint

Washington, DC: The Justice Policy Institute, 2025. 34p.

By Bruce Western, Jessica Simes, and Kendra Bradner

In a given year, one in five people incarcerated in the U.S. prisons is locked in solitary confinement. We study solitary confinement along three dimensions of penal harm: (1) material deprivation, (2) social isolation, and (3) psychological distress. Data from a longitudinal survey of incarcerated men who are interviewed at baseline in solitary confinement are used to contrast the most extreme form of penal custody with general prison conditions observed at a follow-up interview. Solitary confinement is associated with extreme material deprivation and social isolation that accompanies psychological distress. Distress is greatest for those with histories of mental illness. Inactivity and feelings of dehumanization revealed in qualitative interviews help explain the distress of extreme isolation, lending empirical support to legal arguments that solitary confinement threatens human dignity.

Incarceration Volume 3(1): 1–25, 2021.

By Bruce Western, Jessica Simes, and Kendra Bradner

In a given year, one in five people incarcerated in the U.S. prisons is locked in solitary confinement. We study solitary confinement along three dimensions of penal harm: (1) material deprivation, (2) social isolation, and (3) psychological distress. Data from a longitudinal survey of incarcerated men who are interviewed at baseline in solitary confinement are used to contrast the most extreme form of penal custody with general prison conditions observed at a follow-up interview. Solitary confinement is associated with extreme material deprivation and social isolation that accompanies psychological distress. Distress is greatest for those with histories of mental illness. Inactivity and feelings of dehumanization revealed in qualitative interviews help explain the distress of extreme isolation, lending empirical support to legal arguments that solitary confinement threatens human dignity.

Incarceration Volume 3(1): 1–25, 2021.

By Storm Ervin and Azhar Gulaid

With 11 million admissions a year, jails in the United States are overused, overcrowded, and carry significant individual and systemic impacts for people of color, who are disproportionately detained in jail pretrial. But people are detained in jail via actions and processes that occur across agencies and decision points, making cross-agency collaboration essential to system responses to reduce the jail population. The criminal legal system in the United States is a fragmented system that is siloed by varying decision points, such as arrests, the pretrial and prosecution stages, and sentencing. Within local jurisdictions, agencies and officials often use their discretion for decision-making with different goals in mind. This process limits the potential for innovation and system improvement and prevents shared goals or a “vision” for the overall system (Borakove et al. 2015). To counteract this fragmentation and effect systemwide change locally, jurisdictions can implement formal (or informal) collaborative bodies that cut across agencies and stakeholders and include non-system actors, such as representatives from community-based organizations and other local stakeholders. This case study is part of a series highlighting work supported by the MacArthur Foundation’s Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC) (box 1) and examines how East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana; the City and County of San Francisco, California; and St. Louis County, Missouri, implemented strategies intended to reduce local jail populations by creating collaborative bodies in their respective jurisdictions. To develop this case study, Urban conducted 22 semistructured interviews with stakeholders involved in the SJC work across the three jurisdictions. Interview participants had a range of connections to local justice reform and jail use; they worked in courts, pretrial services, probation, public health, community organizations and nonprofits, criminal justice coordinating councils, and SJC technical assistance providers. Urban supplemented these interviews with reviews of internal and public-facing reports and other relevant documentation, including data from the sites and the CUNY Institute for State and Local Governance.

Washington DC: Urban Institute, 220. 31p.

By Jesse Jannetta and Storm Ervin

Millions of people enter and exit local jails in the United States each year, making jail incarceration the country’s most common type of incarceration experience. Even brief periods of jail incarceration have a wide range of negative effects (such as disruption to employment and family connections) on people who experience it (Dobbie, Goldin, and Yang 2018; Lowenkamp, VanNostrand, and Holsinger 2013; Stevenson 2018s).1 Moreover, jails in many places are antiquated, understaffed, and unsafe, resulting in high rates of victimization for people incarcerated in them. And although racial disparities in jail populations have decreased in recent years, these disparities are still very high, as Black people are jailed at a rate of 600 per 100,000 Black US residents, Latinx people at a rate of 176 per 100,000 Latinx US residents, and white people at a rate of 184 per 100,000 white US residents (Zheng and Minton 2021). For these reasons, many local justice reform efforts are focusing on rethinking how jails are used and reducing jail populations and disparities. Among the most prominent of these reform efforts is the Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC), a multiyear, multisite effort funded by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation to change how jails are used in the United States (box 1). The central goals of the SJC are reducing jail populations and reducing racial and ethnic disparities in jail populations. For SJC sites to realize those goals locally they need to understand what drives their jail populations, where to target interventions to address those dynamics, whether interventions are functioning as intended, and whether interventions are generating system impact. They also need to communicate what they are doing to the broader public to secure and maintain buy-in and support system accountability. Effective use of data is necessary for all of these efforts

Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2022. 39p.

By Rochisha Shukla, Ammar Khalid, and Arielle Jackson

This case study presents trends in jail incarceration for the probation population in Pima County, Arizona, using datasets for jail bookings (2015–2020) and petitions-to-revoke (PTRs) (2016–2020).1 It was developed as part of a research initiative funded by the Safety and Justice Challenge examining the impact of providing housing support on jail use for people on probation in Pima County, in partnership with the county’s Adult Probation Department. 2 People on probation in Pima County can be incarcerated in jail for various reasons. They can be held in jail as an intermediate sanction (i.e., a short jail stay without a formal petition), as they await a violation hearing (e.g., for absconding), and because of a PTR outcome (e.g., probation revocation or coterminous sentence3 ).

Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2022. 6p.

By Susan Nembhard and Evelyn F. McCoy

The Catalyst Grant Program is a collaboration between the Urban Institute and the Microsoft Justice Reform Initiative to help nonprofit organizations use data and technology to advance racial equity in the criminal legal system. This guide is for community groups interested in launching a community survey in order to understand perspectives on the criminal legal system. It discusses how to design a survey, write survey questions, administer the survey, and share findings. This is one of a series of guides for community groups that draws on the experiences of Catalyst grantees and Urban researchers

Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2023. 5p.

By Robin Olsen

The Northwestern District Attorney’s Office, which prosecutes crimes in Hampshire and Franklin Counties, two rural counties in Massachusetts, runs the Drug Diversion and Treatment Program (DDTP) to divert people arrested for crimes driven by drug use and instead give them the opportunity to receive substance use treatment from a community partner. The DDTP takes a health-focused approach to its planning and execution, and it benefits from wide community support from a variety of stakeholders. This case study, which is part of the Mapping Prosecutor-Led Diversion Project, centers on the DDTP’s health-focused approach to diversion and the strong community and stakeholder support available to the program’s leaders and staff, highlighting takeaways for prosecutors looking to launch similar programs. The information included is based on the office’s response to the Mapping Prosecutor-Led Diversion Project survey and on interviews with program leaders, staff, and partners. This case study is intended as an overview of the DDTP’s diversion strategy and is not an assessment or evaluation.

Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2023. 5p.

By Cassandra Ramdath Bethany Young with Lauren Farrell, Alice Galley, Azhar Gulaid, Jahnavi Jagannath, Alexandra Kurland, Colette Marcellin, Travis Reginal, Georgia Bartels-Newton, Jesse Jannetta, and Katie Robertson

After decades of neglect, US prisons have attracted increasing inquiry and oversight in recent years. This has been compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic, which has had devastating effects on carceral facilities throughoutthe country. Advocates, journalists, and oversight entities are documenting the conditions, cultures, and climates of prisons and putting forth new, more humane, and innovative models of confinement that align with those in more progressive European countries. Research should be at the center of efforts to better understand and improve prison environments, and data should be leveraged to promote transparency of substandard conditions, document and evaluate innovative reforms, and hold systems accountable for making transformative change. But far too often the research community is handicapped by a paucity of data about what happens in prisons as well as by restricted access to them, both of which severely inhibit the generation of new knowledge. Indeed, US prisons are uniquely closed systems, lacking transparency, oversight, accountability, and access, despite being public institutions operating with taxpayer dollars. Research can help discern the types of prison climates and conditions that reflect and promote safety, dignity, humanity, respect, and autonomy for people incarcerated in prisons and staff that work in them. Prison climate—the social, emotional, organizational, and physical characteristics of a prison as perceived by incarcerated people and prison staff—is a vital but underresearched aspect of justice policy. To implement innovations in a prison without documenting and understanding its underlying climate is to neglect crucial context that could either thwart or facilitate such efforts. And prisons with poor conditions can lead to trauma and the development or worsening of mental health issues. Better metrics on prison climates and conditions that are collected routinely, integrated into prison operations and management, and publicly disseminated could be used to identify areas of improvement, support oversight efforts, hold prison leadership accountable, prompt changes to policies and practices, and provide a baseline from which to measure the impacts of those changes. This research agenda is a starting point for building a foundational knowledge base that moves past decades-old prison research grounded in traditional notions of confinement within a security-andcontrol paradigm. Instead, it underscores the importance of leveraging research and data to promote transparency and accountability in carceral systems, and to do so through a racial equity lens. The goal of this agenda is to encourage researchers to pursue groundbreaking inquiry that will ultimately transform prisons into safer, more humane, rehabilitative, and more equitable environments. It begins by setting forth guiding principles and then presents concrete strategies for advancing transformative change in US prisons, reducing racial inequity, improving metrics of well-being, advancing transparency and accountability, and more broadly promoting human dignity in carceral settings.

Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 74p.

By Jason A. Higgins

The United States has both the largest, most expensive, and most powerful military and the largest, most expensive, and most punitive carceral system in the history of the world. Since the American War in Vietnam, hundreds of thousands of veterans have been incarcerated after their military service.

Identifying the previously unrecognized connections between American wars and mass incarceration, Prisoners after War reaches across lines of race, class, and gender to record the untold history of incarcerated veterans over the past six decades. Having conducted dozens of oral history interviews, Jason A. Higgins traces the lifelong effects of war, inequality, disability, and mental illness, and explores why hundreds of thousands of veterans, from Vietnam to Afghanistan, were caught up in the carceral system. This original study tells an intergenerational history of state-sanctioned violence, punishment, and inequality, but its pages also resonate with stories of survival and redemption, revealing future possibilities for reform and reparative justice.

Amherst; Boston: University of Massachusetts Press, 2024.

By Eric Petterson

The United States of America incarcerates nearly two million people, more than any other country in the world, at a rate of 565 people per 100,000 residents.1 Just fifty years ago, the incarceration rate was ninety-seven imprisoned people per 100,000 residents in the general population.2 The rate of incarceration increased over 500% in fifty years. Many scholars and criminal justice reform advocates cited these statistics while advocating for the need to end the War on Drugs.3 The need for criminal justice reform to address mass incarceration has grown in popularity; however, many people focus on the War on Drugs to the exclusion of other issues in the criminal legal system, even though only twenty percent of the incarcerated population is incarcerated on drug charges.4 In contrast, nearly half of all people imprisoned in prisons and jails are imprisoned for violent offenses.5 Releasing all drug offenders would still not solve America’s overincarceration problem. Since four out of five incarcerated people are behind bars for non-drug related offenses, we must address how America punishes other crimes to end mass incarceration. Too often, states implementing criminal justice reforms exclude violent offenses, focusing instead on people convicted of nonserious, nonviolent, and nonsexual offenses—or “non, non, nons.”6 The staggering number of violent crime incarcerations is not due to the crime-rate, but to the overly long sentences given to people convicted of violent crimes.7 Many crimes defined as “violent” in the criminal legal system do not involve any physical harm, including purse snatching, manufacturing methamphetamine, burglary of an unoccupied dwelling, and stealing drugs.8 Yet violent offense convictions result in severe repercussions, including triggering mandatory minimums and three-strikes laws.9 Addressing “non, non, non”10 offenses is politically easier to do than addressing violent offenses, but both must be addressed to end mass incarceration. This Article will examine America’s unique use of extremely harsh and lengthy prison sentences and how these sentencing policies contributed to the rise of mass incarceration. First, this Article will examine the history of prisons and sentencing policy. It will explore how sentencing policy, “tough on crime” politics, and the mass media contributed to the rise of mass incarceration. Next, this Article will discuss how America’s overreliance on extremely lengthy sentences makes us an outlier to the rest of the world. This Article will examine the literature on incarceration and lengthy sentences, arguing that lengthy sentences are not effective because they do not effectively deter crime, do not promote public safety, do not prevent reoffending, are unnecessary because people age out of crime, and are not favored by crime victims. It will propose reducing the lengths of sentences and shortening sentences based on the good behavior of incarcerated people. Lastly, this Article will propose a political messaging framework to promote criminal justice reforms.

55 St. Mary's L.J. 475 (2024), 37p.

By Janeen Buck Willison, Nkechi Erondu

In 2018, change agents within the Camden County (NJ) Department of Corrections introduced a five-pronged community engagement strategy to reduce the use of jail and improve reentry outcomes for people released from incarceration. Central to this strategy are the County’s NuEntry Opportunity Specialists (NOS), previously incarcerated individuals who serve as credible messengers to people released from incarceration and who work to reduce the stigma of incarceration through community education and outreach. This case study, part of a series highlighting work supported by the Safety and Justice Challenge, describes Camden County’s community engagement strategy and examines its implementation and reported impact. Lessons and recommendations derived from implementation of the county’s community engagement strategy and its sustainability efforts are also discussed.

Washington DC: The Urban Institute, 2022. 23p.

By John Shaffer, Bryce Peterson, KiDeuk Kim, Rochisha Shukla

Cell phones have become a ubiquitous part of society, with more than 97 percent of US adults owning one (Pew Research Center 2021). For prison and jail officials, however, they represent a serious and growing concern. In a recent survey of state correctional agencies, Urban found that most respondents consider cell phones a serious problem for a facility’s overall security and for the safety of incarcerated people, staff, and members of the public (Kim, Peterson, and Shaffer 2023). Corrections officials have employed several technological and nontechnological solutions to address contraband cell phones in their institutions (Peterson et al. 2022; Russo et al. 2022). No one strategy appears to be completely effective at combating contraband cell phones. Most strategies are limited in their ability to prevent cell phone use across an entire facility, while others are difficult to implement or prohibitively expensive (see Peterson et al. 2022). Conversely, signal jamming has received broad support among criminal justice practitioners as a potentially effective and straightforward interdiction strategy. Officials can use signal jamming to prevent people from using cell phones throughout their facilities by compromising a phone’s ability to receive signals or by modifying received signals to be inaccurate or inoperable. A typical application of cell phone jamming involves overwhelming the phone with a higher-power signal, usually a pure signal or random noise, so the phone can no longer function properly. Although many corrections officials are interested in implementing signal jamming in their agencies, the Federal Communications Commission currently prohibits the use of this technology in the United States, as guided by the Communications Act of 1934. Some federal agencies are exempt from the Communications Act and are allowed to implement jamming solutions by requesting and receiving Special Temporary Authority licensing from the Federal Communications Commission. The Federal Bureau of Prisons is among these agencies. No state or local entities are currently allowed to use signal jamming technology. The selective prohibition against jamming has been a source of tension between federal regulators and corrections officials, and federal lawmakers have made efforts (for instance, through the Cellphone Jamming Reform Act of 2022) to revise the Communications Act and allow state correctional agencies to jam cell phones. Despite corrections officials’ interest in jamming and the ongoing discussion around legislative changes, little is known about the use and application of this technology in correctional settings. To address this knowledge gap, the Urban Institute, along with partner organizations (CNA Corporation, Correctional Leaders Association, and American Correctional Association) and subjectmatter experts (John Shaffer and Joe Russo), reviewed current industry practices and interviewed officials with firsthand experience implementing jamming. In summer and fall 2021, we spoke with corrections officials in the United States, New Zealand, and Australia to formulate an understanding of the benefits and challenges of cell phone jamming as a cell phone interdiction strategy.2 This report is a resource for stakeholders and the public on the mechanics of jamming, its potential effectiveness, and the legal and pragmatic considerations involved in its implementation in correctional settings

Washington DC: The Urban Institute, 2023. 18p.

by Marina Duane, Megan Russo, Matthew Williams

Women are the fastest-growing population in America’s correctional facilities. Researchers estimate that the number of incarcerated women has increased between 750 and 900 percent over the past four decades (The Sentencing Project 2019).1 In response, many jails are working to better assess justice-involved women’s risks and needs, improve their conditions of confinement and service delivery, and support community reentry. This case study belongs to a series highlighting work supported by the Safety and Justice Challenge’s Innovation Fund. It describes Project Safe Release, a pilot implemented in Cumberland County, Maine, to better identify the needs of women entering the Cumberland County Jail, understand their victimization histories, and connect them to appropriate services before and after release. It also outlines Project Safe Release’s inception, evolution, and implementation (including key policies and processes); examines early outcomes and implementation challenges; and shows how other localities can better coordinate services for women released on pretrial supervision

Washington DC: The Urban Institute, 2020. 27p.

By Vincent Schiraldi

This research brief assesses the impact of a March 27, 2020 announcement from the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS), indicating that it would release up to 1,100 people jailed in county facilities for accusations of technical parole violations in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Infectious disease spreads easily and quickly in congregate settings such as jails and prisons. New York State incarcerates more people for non-criminal, technical parole violations than every state except Illinois, and the first two incarcerated people to die of COVID-19 in the Rikers Island jail complex - Michael Tyson and Raymond Rivera - were held there for technical parole violations for missing appointments and failing a drug program.

The research brief concludes that the state released around three-quarters of those originally anticipated by the NYS Department of Corrections and Community Supervision.

It additionally finds that in the two months since the directive was issued, more than 160 people accused of technical parole violations were newly sent to the Rikers jails. This number appears to be accelerating and is projected to surpass the number of people released by June or early July, 2020.

In response to the limited and waning effect of the March release order, the report recommends immediate steps for both the NYS Department of Corrections and Community Supervision and state policymakers:

Unless an individual poses a demonstrable and imminent public safety risk, all people held in jails and prisons for technical parole violations be released

DOCCS cease issuing new warrants for technical violations until the pandemic subsides

State policymakers should enact legislative reforms such as ending automatic pre-hearing incarceration for people facing technical violations; eliminating incarceration for less serious technical violations; capping incarceration terms for technical violations; and incentivizing parole compliance through grants of “merit time” for following the rules.

The above recommendations comport with best practices in the field, limit exposure to dangerous correctional settings now and in the event of a COVID-19 rebound, and will save considerable resources at the state, city, and county level

New York: Columbia University Justice Lab, 2021.9p.

By Tyler Nims, Kendra Bradner, Johnna Margalotti, Zachary Katznelson, and Vincent Schiraldi

New York State sends more people to prison for parole rules violations than any other state in the country. In 2019, 40 percent of the people sent to New York prisons were incarcerated not for a new felony conviction, but for parole violations such as not reporting to a parole officer, living at an unapproved residence, missing curfew, or failing drug or alcohol tests. Black and Latinx people are significantly more likely than white people to be incarcerated for parole violations. The fiscal impact on New York state and local taxpayers is enormous. In 2019, New York’s state and local governments collectively spent $683 million to incarcerate people on parole for rules violations, without evidence that this massive expenditure of resources meaningfully contributed to public safety. ƒ New York State spent $319 million in 2019 to incarcerate people for parole rule violations in state prisons ƒ New York counties—excluding the five counties in New York City—collectively spent more than $91 million to jail people who were accused of technical violations ƒ New York City spent $273 million to jail people accused of technical violations There is a growing nationwide consensus that incarcerating people for parole rules violations does little for public safety and is often counterproductive. Rather than continuing to devote extensive public resources to incarcerating people for parole violations, policymakers should: ƒ Reduce the number of persons reincarcerated for technical parole violations in New York and incentivize compliance with supervision ƒ Reinvest correctional savings into services and opportunities that support successful reentry from state prisons to communities, and ƒ Involve communities that are heavily impacted by parole supervision in designing and operating services, supports and opportunities in their own neighborhoods New York State lawmakers have an opportunity to enact meaningful parole reform. There is a diverse coalition calling for parole reform, including district attorneys, sheriffs, the State and New York City Bar Associations, grassroots organizations, formerly incarcerated people, and justice reformers. The Less Is More parole reform bill— which is supported by nearly 240 organizations across the state as well as law enforcement officials—would significantly reduce the number of people on parole who are reincarcerated at the state and county levels.

New York: Columbia University Justice Lab, 2021 23p.

By Columbia University Justice Lab, et al.

With the closing of Rikers Island, New York City has a unique opportunity to revolutionize the treatment of women and gender-expansive people who are currently at the Rose M. Singer Center on Rikers.

The Prison and Jail Innovation Lab at the University of Texas at Austin, the Center for Justice, and the Columbia University Justice Lab collaborated with the Women’s Community Justice Association and HR&A Advisors on a report detailing the design, model and operations of “The Women’s Center for Justice,” a proposed first-of-its kind gender-responsive, trauma-informed facility. The report calls for New York City and State to come together to transform the Lincoln Correctional site at West 110th Street into a site for women and gender-expansive people. Lincoln, which is owned by the state, is currently not in operation and could easily be converted into a facility for women and gender-expansive individuals. Lincoln is zoned as a correctional facility and would not need to go through a lengthy land-use review process.

The report outlines a groundbreaking “Reentry at Entry” approach and holistic care model that aims to end the cycle of incarceration.

New York: Columbia University Justice Lab, 2022. 38p.

By Katherine LeMasters, Samantha Nall, Cole Jurecka, Betsy Craft, Paul Christine, Ingrid Binswanger & Joshua Barocas

In response to the U.S. overdose crisis, many states have increased criminal penalties for drug possession, particularly fentanyl. This study sought to qualitatively explore diverse community perspectives on increasing criminal legal penalties in Colorado for fentanyl possession (House Bill 22-1326) and the broader role of the criminal legal system in addressing substance use and overdose prevention. We conducted 31 semi-structured interviews in 2023 with community leaders directly working with people who use drugs, individuals with lived experience with drug use and the criminal legal system, and law enforcement throughout Colorado. Interviewees were asked about the perceived impact of House Bill 22-1326 on their communities and agencies. After interviews were complete, we created templated summaries and matrix analyses to conduct rapid qualitative analysis, an action-oriented approach to qualitative data analysis.

Results

Respondents included peer support specialists (n = 7), policymakers (n = 6), community behavioral health/harm reduction providers (n = 6), criminal legal program staff (n = 8), and law enforcement (n = 4), with nine participants from rural counties. Analysis revealed that participants found increasing criminal penalties for fentanyl possession to be misguided: “And the felony [of HB-1326] is such a good example of a policy being led by feelings rather than evidence.” This was in the context of participants’ divergent views on police as conduits to treatment and punishment and perceiving jail as an (in)appropriate response for substance use disorder treatment.

Conclusions

All participants supported policy efforts to prevent fatal fentanyl overdoses, yet, most thought that increased use of police and incarceration as avenues to prevent overdose was misguided. This study highlights a diverse array of community perspectives that can inform policy decisions concerning criminal penalties for fentanyl possession and distribution and can inform policies that affect people who use drugs broadly.

Health & Justice volume 13, Article number: 26 (2025)

By Stephen Koppel, Michael Rempel, Min Xie, Olive Lu, Jeremy Travis, & Preeti Chauhan

Executive Summary The premise of this project is simple: In determining its response to crime and violence, New York City stands at a crossroads. For several decades up until the 2020s, the City saw dramatic crime reductions take place alongside a shrinking criminal legal system— represented by fewer arrests, less reliance on jail and prison, and the expansion of alternatives to incarceration. This period culminated in sweeping reforms to New York State’s bail, discovery, and parole laws that sought to extend the pendulum toward less unnecessary incarceration and greater fairness. Recent years, however, have witnessed a series of dislocations and reversals. A global pandemic disrupted the country’s social and economic fabric, and violent crime increased after years of decline. The 2020 Black Lives Matter protests generated a robust public dialogue about the role of police and the criminal justice system in producing public safety and the need for greater investments in community-based public safety strategies. However, both the reality and perception of rising crime led to increases in low-level enforcement by the New York City Police Department, including more pedestrian street stops, summonses for minor misconduct, and misdemeanor arrests. At the same time, the City is legally mandated to close the violent and decrepit jails on Rikers Island. This requires further reductions in the jail population, for example by expanding mental health services and speeding up case processing, in addition to improving morale, training and oversight of jail staff and expediting construction of modern, humane replacement jails. To provide context for discussions on the best path forward, we sought to ground policy discussions in objective data concerning the City’s trajectory from the 1990s to the present moment. To this end, we released two reports on the same project landing page. Extending two earlier analyses, one report relied on official data sources to track crime, law enforcement activity, decision-making by courts and prosecutors, incarceration, community supervision, and racial disparities. The second report relied on data from the annually administered National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) to provide trends in both reported and unreported victimization. This executive summary presents key findings from both reports. We believe that understanding New York City's crime trends, the experiences of crime victims, and the history of the City's response to crime will shed light on the choices the City faces today. We address several questions, with the resulting main themes and findings summarized below

New York: Data Collaborative for Justice, at John Jay College, 2025. 4p

By Sabrina C. Pearce

The number of people sentenced to life in prison has drastically increased over the last five decades. Of the 194,803 people serving life sentences in 2024, nearly half of them, 97,160 people, were serving parole-eligible sentences. A parole-eligible life sentence is also referred to as life with parole (LWP) or life with the possibility of parole (LWPoP). Parole is the conditional release of an incarcerated individual after spending a portion of their sentence in prison. Its purpose at inception was to serve as a bridge between an incarcerated person and their community, balancing the needs of the individual and the needs of the community, with the aim toward reintegration.

To be eligible for parole, a person sentenced to life must serve a required minimum sentence or reach their “parole eligibility date.” The minimum parole eligibility date is the earliest point at which an incarcerated individual may be considered for parole, minus any time credits earned. Once the required minimum sentence is served, these individuals may re-enter society upon the approval of a paroling authority, most often a parole board. But as this report shows, over the past 50 years legislators across the country have raised the minimum sentence required for parole eligibility, delaying release of millions and significantly transforming the meaning of a life sentence.

In addition, governors have appointed parole commissioners who are reluctant to grant parole. As a result of both factors, newly paroled life-sentenced individuals have served longer prison terms than those in years past. Furthermore, even fewer people are receiving parole hearings in recent years as political, public, and media pressures to adopt more punitive practices continue to rise. The result: increased prison terms and prolonged punishment.

Longer prison sentences are costly and divert important investments away from effective measures to prevent crime and incarceration, such as mental health support, healthcare services, jobs, education, and other resources that produce healthier and safer communities. Lengthy periods of delay can lead to disillusionment and diminish the hope and well-being of those incarcerated as well as their supportive loved ones and communities as they longingly await the day of release. Timeliness in parole hearings is crucial as parole delays interfere with an incarcerated person’s ability to preserve family, friends, community, and other ties, which may present challenges for successful reintegration upon release.

Through in-depth profiles of five states and the experiences of two individuals, this report illustrates the trend toward increasing wait times for initial parole hearings, subsequent rehearings, and sometimes the elimination of parole eligibility entirely for individuals serving parole- eligible life sentences.

Washington, DC: The Sentencing Project, 2025. 24p.