Big Changes to Parole Are Here. How Will ‘Less is More’ Hold Up?
By Reuven Blau and Rachel Holliday Smith via The City For decades, New York state law allowed parole officers to toss people back into jail for low-level infractions like missing a curfew or having marijuana in their system. When it comes to jailing parolees across the nation, New York has been an outlier. The state returns more people […]
A second chance: How the parole justice movement has gained steam in New York state
By Robbie Sequeira via BronxTimes Without a second chance, Donna Hylton would have never transformed her life. Without a second chance, Hylton may only be remembered for a traumatic childhood that included repeatedly being trafficked from native Jamaica and sexually and physically abused. Subsequently, Hylton would end up serving a 27-year prison stint for the […]
Kenyatta Muzzanni: Connecticut proposals would criminalize young people in insidious new ways
By Kenyatta Muzzani Via Hartford Courant In the past two years, Connecticut residents pushed for and won major reforms of the criminal legal system, including passing legislation on police accountability and the erasure of certain convictions through Clean Slate. And we achieved these victories during one of the largest civil rights uprisings against systemic racism in U.S. history, an […]
Justice Reform Funders: Stop the Poverty Pimping
If You’re Really Behind Grassroots Movements, Get Out of the Way By: Lorenzo Jones via Medium.com Over the past 10–15 years, the political landscape in the U.S. has undergone monumental change with the rise of a broader, deeper movement to end mass incarceration. During this period, local, state-based movements have expanded through national developments including […]
A cancer patient was sent to prison for DUI. Two months later, he was dead from COVID
By Dave Altimari and Kelan Lyons via CT Mirror William Lamprecht stood before the judge in a Torrington courtroom in September fearing the four months he was about to spend in prison would become a death sentence. The 62-year-old man, who had been battling an alcohol and drug addiction for years, was awaiting his fate after pleading […]
Protests for and against ‘Less is More’ law in Rochester
By Matt Driffill via Rochester First ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WROC) — Those for, and against, the “Less is More” law demonstrated outside the Monroe County Hall of Justice Monday. The bill was signed into law by Gov. Kathy Hochul in September. It prevents paroled prisoners from being incarcerated on a technical violation, like missing a curfew. The goal of the […]
Protesters, counterprotesters rally over New York State’s ‘Less is More’ law
By WHEC TV via whec.com ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WHEC) — Protesters and counterprotesters rallied outside of the Hall of Justice Monday over New York State’s “Less is More” law. The law made it so that parolees can no longer be held for what the state calls “technical violations” — which include missing curfew or testing positive for drugs. […]
“This Is Your Brain on Racism”: Reflections on the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986
By: gabriel sayegh via Medium.com This week marks the 35th anniversary of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, which Congress passed four months after the death of University of Maryland star forward Len Bias. The Boston Celtics had just drafted him, and it was widely reported that he died from using crack. That was wrong: Bias […]
The Riverdale Press:Law makes parole violations much more rare
By Ethan Stark-Miller via The Riverdale Press Gov. Kathy Hochul and Mayor Bill de Blasio took another step toward alleviating what they described as the crisis on Rikers Island earlier this month by agreeing to temporarily transfer more than 200 women and transgender-identifying inmates to two upstate prisons. This latest measure isn’t without controversy, however, as […]
City Limits:Advocates, Attorneys Push Back Against Plan to Transfer Women and Transgender People Off Rikers
By JeanMarie Evelly via City Limits Beginning Monday, the city and state started transferring more than 200 women and transgender people being held at Rikers Island to state-run prison facilities in Westchester County—a move officials say will help ease staffing issues at the troubled city jail complex, where conditions have deteriorated in recent months to crisis […]
