Crim Justice Reform – Parole
Parole’s about taking an inmate’s “word” (parole is French for “word”). The word in this case is that prisoners promise to obey the conditions of early release. Parole boards need to be convinced that candidates for parole have learned their lessons in prison and will be decent rule-abiding citizen in the future. I’ve written about parole here and here with regards to O.J. Simpson.
O.J. Simpson
To illustrate how parole works, let’s look at the NFL star, actor, and suspect in the killing of his ex-wife (Nicole Brown) and her friend (Ron Goldman). O.J. Simpson recently gained parole after serving 9 years of a substantial sentence for armed robbery. His parole was decided by fairly rigid rules in Nevada that leave parole board members little real say. To wit:
Nevada by law had to apply 11 largely objective factors, most of which favored Simpson. Each factor offered clues as to whether an inmate who is eligible for parole would, if released from prison, likely follow the law.
Criminal justice reform needed?
The 11 factors included age at the time of first arrest, gender, current age and the presence or absence of disciplinary write-ups during the inmate’s incarceration. Each factor carried a score between -1 and +2. Inmates hoped for the fewest number of points: an inmate who exceeded 5 points was classified as a “medium” or “high” risk. One who scored fewer than 5 points was a “low” risk.
Under this metric, Simpson was an excellent candidate for parole.He was a senior citizen, had no gang affiliation and had avoided disciplinary problems while incarcerated. He’d taken education courses during that time. He’d been housed in a medium-security rather than maximum-security facility. Only a few factors counted against Simpson, one of which was that he was male.
It’s no surprise he was paroled.
Pros
Author makes the case for the reforms proposed by two New York legislators.
“Think about the last time you got stuck in traffic or waited for a delayed train. Maybe it made you late to work, maybe you were late to pick up your kids from school, maybe you missed a doctor’s appointment or a meeting.
For many of us these inconveniences, though frustrating, are just a part of everyday life. But for the 35,000 New Yorkers living on parole in New York State, delays like these could cost them their freedom if it means missing an appointment with their parole officer.
Spending the night at a friend or family member’s home or dating without your parole officer’s permission may seem like benign, harmless activities to most people, but for some parolees, they are actually technical parole violations that could land them back in jail.
The severity of parole violations vary, but it is fair to say many are minor activities that would baffle the average New Yorker when told the potential consequence. In 2019, 40 percent of all admissions to New York State prisons were made up of parolees being reincarcerated for technical parole violations.
New York State sends more people to prison for parole rule violations than any other state in the country – and sends Black New Yorkers back to prison for these violations at five times the rate of white New Yorkers.
We spend three times as much on the services that police, incarcerate, and supervise our communities as we do on services that help them flourish. New York spends $18.2 billion on the carceral system, including state police, prison, and the parole system, among other aspects of the system – while spending just $6.2 billion on mental and public health services, youth programs, recreation, and elder services.
Our current system of parole not only derails people’s efforts to reenter society, but it also costs taxpayers millions of dollars, taking away money that could be spent on more pressing priorities in under-resourced communities across New York State.
We need parole reform that supports rehabilitation and enables community members who have served their time to continue living and working in their communities.
This disjointed spending on parole doesn’t just occur in urban centers like New York City, it occurs statewide, creating financial burdens for counties like Nassau ($7 million), Suffolk ($7 million), Erie ($9.95 million), Westchester ($6.6 million), and Monroe ($12.5 million).
Without systemic reform of the parole system, these costs will likely exceed $6.8 billion over the next 10 years, or nearly 20 percent of the state’s entire 2022 education budget.
This disparity isn’t an accident.”
What do you think of Mr. Cone’s Crim Justice Reform?
Cons
A letter to the editor of the Buffalo News by a former Parole bureau chief, Stephen Uminski.
“We have recently been subject to TV ads advocating reform of the New York State Parole System. The parole system is portrayed as a bloated and costly system which returns releases from New York prisons for trivial violations and denies them legal representation for these violations. Parolees are portrayed as being cited for “technical” violations, such as “missing appointments.”
After University at Buffalo Law School, I defended assigned parole violation cases and discovered that parole staff are now also calling rule violations technical violations. Although both begin with T, technical violations are not trivial in nature. “Missing an appointment” may or may not be a serious violation but failing to report as instructed can have serious implications for public safety.
Do you agree with Mr.Uminski re Crim Justice Reform?
Crim Justice Reform – Bail.
Bail is simply an amount of forfeitable money a suspect released from jail puts up to show a court s/he will not flee justice. Here’s a summary and video from the Vanguard:*
“When the California Supreme Court ruled in March, in the Humphrey decision, that the judges are required to consider a person’s ability to pay when setting their bail amounts, a big question was whether that would lead to more pretrial release or whether judges would simply detain more people without bail, citing a public safety concern.
In a new policy brief released in late May by the nonpartisan California Policy Lab, the early results show that when San Francisco was required to set more affordable bail amounts, judges in San Francisco chose to release more people to intensive supervision programs instead.
This new analysis provides a preview of what may happen in other counties after the California Supreme Court applied that decision to the rest of the state earlier this year.
Talking about this study and what it means is Dr. Johanna Lacoe, Research Director at the California Policy Lab, and a co-author of the analysis.”
Any reactions to these “bail” developments?
*Disclaimer: the views expressed by guest writers are strictly those of the author and may not reflect the views of the Vanguard, its editor, or its editorial board. The Vanguard is a community-based watchdog and news reporting organization that seeks to cover community debates and other events in a full and thorough manner. As our audience has grown, we seek to codify our goals and principles underlying our operations. Our goals are to provide transparency, accountability and fairness to local government, while promoting social justice and democracy, and adhering to principles of accuracy and fairness in our reportin
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