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Is a total overhaul of parole and probation possible?
Last week, Meek Mill and Jay-Z announced the launch of their criminal justice organization, REFORM Alliance. The organization, to be headed by Van Jones of #Cut50, aims to “[advance] criminal justice reform and [eliminate] outdated laws that perpetuate injustice, starting with probation and parole.” [Michelle Kim / Pitchfork]
The organization’s goals are directly tied to the issues that led to Meek Mill’s incarceration in November 2017. A decade-old case had resulted in first a five-year and then a 10-year sentence. When he was then sentenced to a two-to-four year prison term for a technical violation of probation, it set off intense criticism of the judge in his case and the wider system, in Pennsylvania and nationally, that made such an outcome possible. [P.R. Lockhart / Vox]
Writing in the Crime Report the day after REFORM Alliance’s launch, Vincent Schiraldi of the Justice Lab at Columbia University called for this and other efforts to take an “elemental, rather than incremental, approach to reforming probation and parole.” He offered examples of some of the nonsensical ways people can lose their freedom under these systems. In one New York case, a man who had been under parole supervision for nine years was sent back to prison for, in parole parlance, associating with someone with a criminal record. He had simply married his girlfriend. Cases like this, Schiraldi writes, “represent the broad range of behavior─some of it barely illegal, some illegal only for those under supervision, some not illegal at all─for which a person under probation or parole can be deprived of their liberty.” [Vincent Schiraldi / Crime Report]
Nationally, the era of mass incarceration has corresponded with an era of mass supervision, and parole and probation systems have received less attention and been allowed to grow unchecked for longer. In a series of reports since last year, the Justice Lab has highlighted the problem of mass supervision. By 2007, there were over 5 million people under probation or parole supervision. In 2016, that number was still over 4.5 million. Any decline has been driven solely by a drop in the use of probation. The number of people under parole supervision has actually gone up since 2007. [“The Wisconsin Community Corrections Story” / Justice Lab]
These systems impose “conditions” that severely curtail the freedom of people subject to them. On average, people under probation or parole supervision are subject to an average of 10 to 20 conditions. These conditions can include curfews, restrictions on travel, mandated attendance in treatment programs, urine testing, and restrictions on association—as in the case of the man sent to prison for getting married. [“Too Big to Succeed” / Justice Lab]
Besides constituting their own bloated system, probation and parole supervision have become a major pipeline to prison. “Mass supervision,” a recent Justice Lab report observes, “has functioned as a net widener and a driver of mass incarceration, rather than serving as a true alternative to incarceration.” [“The Wisconsin Community Corrections Story” / Justice Lab]
The Justice Lab’s most recent report, released last week, looks at community supervision in Wisconsin. The state’s parole supervision rate is one and a half times the national average. Unlike most states, Wisconsin’s rate of parole supervision began rising sharply the early 2000s and continues to climb. The length of time people spend under parole supervision is nearly twice the national average and rates at which people “fail” are also far higher than other states. And while nationally, Black people are disproportionately supervised and disproportionately reincarcerated for supervision violations, the picture in Wisconsin is even worse. [“The Wisconsin Community Corrections Story” / Justice Lab]
Experts and community supervision administrators nationally have begun to recognize the problem, and some states have made progress addressing it. New York State’s parole system has had a runaway rate of reincarceration for parole violations but New York City, between 1996 and 2014, was able to significantly reduce the size of the probation system and incarceration driven by it. Declining numbers of people under probation supervision has meant more expenditure per person on probation, which allows for lower caseloads, more contracts with nonprofits that provide services, and more neighborhood offices. Louisiana, in 2017, passed legislation that capped parole violation terms and also prohibited the use of jail for first and second low-level violations. [“Less Is More in New York” / Justice Lab]
In Pennsylvania, Meek Mill’s case has spurred reform efforts. The state “supervises its citizens at one of the highest rates in the Western world,” according to the Justice Lab. This week, a state senator introduced legislation that would cap terms of probation supervision at five years for felonies and three years for misdemeanors. This is consistent with recommended best practices and would end the state’s current practice of allowing probation terms as long as the maximum possible sentence. The bill would also introduce shortened terms for good behavior and curbs on judicial discretion. [Cherri Gregg / KYW Newsradio ]
A courtroom scene last spring from Philadelphia, where 44,000 people are on probation, showed how troubling judges’ approaches to probation can be. A probation officer appears in court to argue for the termination of probation for a man under supervision since 2013. Ordered to complete substance abuse treatment, he had been repeatedly jailed over the five years for technical violations. His probation officer argued, “I don’t think what’s going on necessarily warrants jail time. He’s a young man who can’t beat his addiction … the more time he spends in jail … the more he is going to be in front of your honor for years to come.” The judge disagreed. “The problem I face here,” he said, “is I need leverage to hold over his head.” [Samantha Melamed / Philadelphia Inquirer]
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