Artwork stating 'Education Destroys Barriers', 'We Demand Treatment', and 'I Need A Chance'

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  • An alternative to arrest? Police turn to diversion for petty crimes

    January 07, 2021 |

    Sentinel Source (The Keene Sentinel) |

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    Response Location: United States, New Hampshire

    Prosecutors often make decisions about which criminal charges can be resolved by addressing underlying problems and holding people accountable for petty offenses without incarcerating them. Police-led diversion programs catch cases earlier in the criminal process. Various New Hampshire police departments and in neighboring Brattleboro, Vermont, use the approach in dozens of cases per year, sparing those people the burdens and shame of jail and conviction. The approach has been proven effective in Seattle’s LEAD program as a way to prevent rearrests and to make people's lives more stable.

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  • A felony could have ruined his life. This program gave him a second chance.

    January 05, 2021 |

    Sentinel Source (The Keene Sentinel) |

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    Response Location: United States, Vermont

    Vermont's decades-old court diversion program uses restorative justice practices to erase criminal records and give people charged with lower-level offenses a shot at being held accountable, and giving back, without incarceration and convictions. Expanded significantly after legislators in 2017 applied the program to more categories of cases, the program has helped more than 90,000 people and now is used in as many as one-third of all misdemeanor cases. The program saves the state money and appears to contribute to lower rates of re-offending.

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  • Revolving door in Montana corrections still turning, despite reforms

    January 04, 2021 |

    Helena Independent Record |

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    Response Location: United States, Montana

    A set of criminal justice reforms enacted in Montana in 2017 that were meant to reduce incarceration and reinvest some of the savings in crime prevention programs has had little effect on the prison population. The state's "justice reinvestment" program, using a model adopted in 30 other states, has failed to put plans into action, partly for a lack of public spending on programs for incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people. As a result, the prison population is tracking where it would have been had nothing been done, and recidivism remains high.

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  • New laws lead some Washington prosecutors to rethink three-strike life sentences

    January 03, 2021 |

    The Seattle Times |

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    Response Location: United States, Washington

    Nearly three decades after Washington voters made their state the first to enact a three-strikes law, imposing life imprisonment for repeated, serious offenses, some prosecutors have found ways to avoid the law's effects that are seen as unduly harsh or racially biased. Some have interpreted a law authorizing resentencing to apply to three-strikes cases. Others have pushed the governor to grant clemency more often. This new willingness to question the law's effects is not universal among prosecutors, and the state Supreme Court soon will weigh in on the issue.

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  • Prosecutors try to keep people out of pandemic-clogged courts through diversion programs

    December 30, 2020 |

    Missouri Independent |

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    Response Location: United States, St. Louis, Missouri

    Missouri legislators passed a law in 2019 clarifying that prosecutors can divert criminal cases to social services and healthcare agencies even before charges are filed. Small experiments that had been taking place in recent years suddenly grew in St. Louis County to help the courts focus only on serious cases during pandemic shutdowns. Now those innovations are spreading, as more drug cases and other low-level cases avoid the courts altogether. This eases the burden also on people, who in traditional drug courts still get arrested and face employment barriers even if their cases eventually get dropped.

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  • Pima County program getting people out of jail quicker, speeding up chances for a new life

    December 29, 2020 |

    Arizona Daily Star |

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    Response Location: United States, Tucson, Arizona

    An array of services in Pima County, Arizona, greets hundreds of people getting released early from jail or helps keep them out of jail in the first place. By providing drug treatment, housing, job assistance, and other help that people need instead of incarceration, the county's Criminal Justice Reform Unit and Jail Population Review Committee saved the county $2 million in jail costs over just part of 2020. Drug use also declined and officials hope to see longer-range benefits in lower recidivism.

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  • These gardens ask visitors to reconsider solitary confinement

    December 23, 2020 |

    Grist |

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    Response Location: United States, New Orleans, Louisiana

    Solitary Gardens is an art project that protests prisons' solitary confinement conditions. Incarcerated people connect with volunteers on the outside who plant flowers, vegetables, or herbs in beds matching the tiny dimensions of the prison cell that confined Herman Wallace for a record 41 years in Louisiana. The people inside prison imagine their garden, often with memory triggers of what they have lost, and their gardener carries out their plan. The idea is to make a place for grief, healing, public service, and public education, as the gardens in four cities teach about solitary confinement.

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  • Local initiative helps folks with cannabis-related charges find jobs—while pushing to decriminalize pot

    December 22, 2020 |

    The Philadelphia Citizen |

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    Response Location: United States, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

    When Pennsylvania's largest medical-marijuana dispensary, TerraVida Holistic Centers, struggled to find enough employees, given the state's ban on the industry's employment of people with marijuana convictions, TerraVida joined with the Urban League of Philadelphia to expand aid to the formerly incarcerated. Through Urban League's Out4Good program, the partnership helps people expunge their drug convictions. It also counsels and financially helps groups of 10 trainees at a time, dozens of whom have started careers and stayed out of trouble. The group also seeks a longer-term fix: marijuana legalization.

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  • Unique Housing Project Eases the Path to Re-Entry for Single Parents

    December 15, 2020 |

    Next City |

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    Response Location: United States, King County, Washington

    Single parents readjusting to life after incarceration face numerous hurdles to re-entering society. A housing program in Seattle now provides access to transitional housing alongside services that help parents reconnect with their children, access to mental health care, and work toward permanent housing. Passage Point’s wraparound services are an effective and unique resource for a population that is commonly blocked from accessing public housing.

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  • A secret settlement hid an officer's misconduct. Outside Maine, it would have been different.

    December 09, 2020 |

    Bangor Daily News |

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    Response Location: United States, Colorado

    A Colorado law enacted in 2016 requires law enforcement officers to disclose their past disciplinary records when seeking a new job at a different agency. By making such disclosures automatic, the law standardizes hiring practices statewide, protects past employers from liability for making the disclosures, and most importantly prevents rogue officers from hopping from one job to the next undetected. Maine has no such requirement., and so some of its agencies might unknowingly hire an officer with a record of misconduct.

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