Voices Chiming In

An interesting day in sentencing news today, with lots of Washington voices chiming in on a variety of important reform issues.  Here are some selections for your reading pleasure:

• The Anchorage Daily News provides a nice summary of the alleged prosecutorial abuse that occurred in the case of Senator Ted Stevens, as well as Senator Lisa Murkowski's proposed legislation to prevent such abuses in the future.  
• Former Congressman Artur Davis writes a thought-provoking article about the drug war, calling for more flexibility in sentencing options -- including the ability to depart from mandatory minimum sentences or use smarter, cheaper alternatives like drug courts at the federal level.
• Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer offers some interesting feedback in this speech on both last year's crack cocaine sentencing reforms and federal sentencing guidelines for white collar/economic crimes.

Young, Black, and Male in America

That's the title of this engaging series of articles that address various aspects of a big problem:

The news for young black men is not good: they are disproportionately singled out for discipline in school, they are more likely to be stopped and frisked by New York City police officers, and according to Michelle Alexander in her book, “The New Jim Crow,” nearly one-third of black men are likely to spend time in prison at some point in their lives.

Would pulling back on draconian drug laws or legalizing marijuana be enough to fix this imbalance? What else needs to be done?

Commentators include representatives from Law Enforcement Against Prohibition and Justice Fellowship and authors Paul Butler and Peter Moskos.

Here's what else we know about young black men and the criminal justice system:  mandatory minimum sentences contribute to racial disparities (particularly in the way they are used at the charging phase).  Surely many people of color would benefit if these laws were scaled back or removed altogether, giving judges the freedom they need to tailor sentences to fit each individual and each offense.

Blackstonian Covers 3 Strikes in Massachusetts

Blackstonian has a full-length issue devoted to Massachusetts' consideration of a new three-strikes law.  Read perspectives and opinions (including one from FAMM's Massachusetts Project Director, Barb Dougan, on page 4) from a variety of voices, and learn this issue inside-out.

And if you're following the state reform effort, remember to keep checking our Massachusetts page for updates.

Good and Mad Reading for the Weekend

These two articles are so outrageous, they need no editorializing from us:

"Private purchasing of prison locks in occupancy rates"  In layperson's terms:  "We'll run your prisons, but only if you promise to keep them full!"  How is that good for sentencing reform, or for state budgets?!

"Proposal to buy prisons raises ethical concerns" The former director of the federal Bureau of Prisons is now securing deals for private prison companies.  You be the judge.

Faith, Drug Court, Redemption

The final installment from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution's series on drug courts is up, and it's about how one man's drug court experience and his faith propelled him to a cocaine- and crime-free life.  Certainly a worthwhile read and a heartening story.

One way drug courts differ from mandatory minimum sentences is of vital importance:  drug courts allow the court to address all parts of the offender.  Judges can tailor the program's requirements to fit individuals -- but no such option is available when a mandatory minimum sentence applies.

More Moving Stories from Georgia Drug Courts

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution's series on Georgia drug courts continues with these latest, quite moving installments:

"Drug court gave woman 'stability' to get life back"

"Drug court helps man ditch meth, regain family's trust"

Too often, it's crime horror stories that grab the headlines. We need to hear more positive stories of reform like these!

The Power of Perception -- and the Pen

This New York Times article details how a recent book on race and criminal justice became a best-seller and is changing perceptions even in unlikely places.

The book is Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow, and it

marshals pages of statistics and legal citations to argue that the get-tough approach to crime that began in the Nixon administration and intensified with Ronald Reagan’s declaration of the war on drugs has devastated black America. Today, Professor Alexander writes, nearly one-third of black men are likely to spend time in prison at some point, only to find themselves falling into permanent second-class citizenship after they get out. That is a familiar argument made by many critics of the criminal justice system, but Professor Alexander’s book goes further, asserting that the crackdown was less a response to the actual explosion of violent crime than a deliberate effort to push back the gains of the civil rights movement.

For many African-Americans, the book — which has spent six weeks on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list — gives eloquent and urgent expression to deep feelings that the criminal justice system is stacked against them. ... 

The book is also galvanizing white readers, including some who might question its portrayal of the war on drugs as a continuation of race war by other means. ...

Rick Olson, a state representative in Michigan, was one of the few whites and few Republicans in the room when Professor Alexander gave a talk sponsored by the state’s black caucus in January.

“I had never before connected the dots between the drug war, unequal enforcement, and how that reinforces poverty,” Representative Olson said. “I thought, ‘Gee whiz, let me get this book.’” ...

The Rev. Charles Hubbard, the pastor at Gloria Dei Lutheran Church, a mostly white evangelical congregation in Garland, Tex., said he had started carrying the book with him everywhere and urges fellow pastors to preach about it, though he acknowledged it could be a tough sell in Texas.

“I think people need to hear the message,” he said. “I don’t think Anglo folks have any idea how difficult it is for African-American men who get caught up in the criminal justice system.”

The article is a much-needed reminder that changing public perceptions is at the core of work on criminal justice reform -- including sentencing reform. We're in the changing-hearts-and-minds business here at FAMM. Building empathy for offenders -- and getting others to understand the bitterness and sense of unfairness so many feel toward the system -- is long, arduous work. Whether you agree or disagree with Alexander's conclusions, it is good news that people are taking notice and starting to try to understand the impact of and anger over racial disparities in the criminal justice system.

Federal Lawmakers: Take Notes!

Don’t miss a chance to dip into this latest release from the Vera Institute:  Reallocating JusticeResources:  A Review of 2011 StateSentencing Trends. It reviews reforms in 14 states, prompted by budgetary concerns but fashioned by policy makers using

a new approach to reform in which bipartisan, multidisciplinary policy groups are using analysis of state population and sentencing data, harnessing the political will emerging from the budget crisis, relying on decades of criminal justice research, and reaching out to key constituencies .... [and] bipartisan stakeholders using evidence-based methods to solve criminal justice problems and save taxpayer dollars. The result is legislation that aims to make more targeted use of incarceration and to invest the cost savings into community programs geared toward reducing recidivism and victimization.

What a grown up approach!  It stands in stark contrast to the old ways of criminal justice policy making, where the crime du jour drove the criminal law du jour.  These new tools and fresh collaborative approaches are proving effective and should stand the test of time, even when the financial crises have faded.

Our federal lawmakers could stand to learn a thing or two from their state counterparts!

Help on the Way for Pardon Seekers?

According to this latest article in ProPublica's multi-part expose of the flawed presidential pardoning process, former Maryland Governor Bob Ehrlich plans to launch a program to help people seek pardons -- by setting up a student-staffed law clinic at a Washington, DC-area law school:

Ehrlich's proposal takes aim at the inequities identified by ProPublica's investigation into the dispensation of presidential pardons over the past decade. White applicants were nearly four times as likely to receive forgiveness as minorities, the ProPublica analysis showed. African Americans had the worst chances of being pardoned. Applicants with congressional support were three times as likely to receive pardons as those without it.

Ehrlich, who granted clemency to more than 200 convicts while in office from 2003 to 2007, said a pardons program would help disadvantaged applicants and give law school students the experience [of] dealing with people seeking a second chance, fostering "a sense of fairness and justice."

FAMM applauds Governor Ehrlich for striving to fill this gap in the legal aid available to those with criminal records.  Ehrlich is still seeking funding and a university to house and run the clinic.

ProPublica's investigative journalism has revealed deep flaws in how the presidential pardon process operates.  Reforms have been suggested, but so far have never been put in place:

[Former White House Counsel Greg] Craig advocated for pardon reform while in the White House, assigning a group of lawyers to design a process that would make pardons more attainable. Among the options discussed was support for a law school clinic.

But none of the pardon reforms formulated early in the administration have advanced. Kathryn Ruemmler, who became Obama's third White House counsel last June, was among the lawyers who worked with Craig on them. Obama has turned down more pardon applicants, 1,019, and pardoned fewer, 22 - two of whom were minorities - than any modern president at this point in an administration.

The Justice Department's Office of the Pardon Attorney assesses each pardon candidate and makes recommendations to the president. Obama has followed them in nearly every case, as did President George W. Bush. ProPublica found that the pardon office recommends white candidates almost four times as often as minorities. Bush pardoned 189 applicants. Only seven were African American.

Craig said lawyers in the Obama administration developed plans to remove the pardons process from the Justice Department, but have not acted on them. At the state level, pardons are often handled by an independent board similar to a parole board.

FAMM supports frequent, wise, and accountable use of the pardon power -- including granting more commutations to reduce unjust and excessive mandatory minimum sentences.  Half of all federal prisoners are drug offenders; most of those are nonviolent; many are serving sentences that are far too harsh; many deserve a second look and a second chance.  A broken pardon review process doesn't help those prisoners, and it doesn't help the president do justice, either.