Research and data for criminal justice reform

Criminal Justice Research Library for January 6, 2021 Bringing you the latest in empirical research about mass incarceration

We've The Prison Policy Initiative has added 25 new reports to the Research Library [[link removed]]: Racial prejudice predicts police militarization [[link removed]] by Tyler Jimenez, Peter J. Helm, Alexis Wilkinson, & Jamie Arndt, December, 2020

"Studies 2 and 3 are the first to explicitly connect these variables, finding that racial prejudice is predictive of both support for police militarization and actual police acquisitions of military equipment." Categories: Police and Policing [[link removed]] Race and ethnicity [[link removed]] Eating Behind Bars: Ending the Hidden Punishment of Food in Prison [[link removed]] by Impact Justice, December, 2020

"Budget cuts and stagnant spending have led to fewer hot meals, smaller portions, lower-quality protein, fewer fresh fruits and vegetables, and more ultra-processed foods, as well as poorly equipped and ill-supervised kitchens that compromise quality." Categories: Conditions of Confinement [[link removed]] Learned Helplessness, Criminalization, and Victimization in Vulnerable Youth [[link removed]] by Square One Project, December, 2020

"In the United States and worldwide, youth detainment has become an immediate, catch-all response to challenges perceived as affecting public order and safety." Categories: Youth [[link removed]] Counterevidence of crime-reduction effects from federal grants of military equipment to local police [[link removed]]Paywall :( by Gunderson et al, December, 2020

"We show that the 2014 data are flawed and that the more recent data provide no evidence that 1033 SME reduces crime." Categories: Police and Policing [[link removed]] Exploring Disproportionate Minority Contact in the Juvenile Justice System Over the Year Following First Arrest [[link removed]]Paywall :( by Padgaonkar et al, December, 2020

"Black youth committed fewer offenses prior to arrest than White youth, Black and Latino youth were more likely to be formally processed, and Black youth were most likely to be rearrested." Categories: Race and ethnicity [[link removed]] Youth [[link removed]] Experience to Action: Reshaping Criminal Justice After COVID-19 [[link removed]] by Council on Criminal Justice, December, 2020

"The size, scale, and scope of the criminal justice system, along with the absence of effective public health coordination, posed a significant obstacle to COVID-19 prevention and control." Categories: Health impact [[link removed]] The Prison Industry: How It Started, How It Works, How It Harms [[link removed]] by Worth Rises, December, 2020

"This report maps the twelve sectors of the prison industry and details the extraction of wealth from the families that have been most disproportionately brutalized by over-policing, mass criminalization, mass incarceration, and mass surveillance." Categories: Privatization [[link removed]] Hotbeds of Infection: How ICE Detention Contributed to the Spread of COVID-19 in the United States [[link removed]] by Detention Watch Network, December, 2020

"ICE's failure to release people from detention during the pandemic added over 245,000 cases to the total U.S. caseload." Categories: Health impact [[link removed]] Immigration [[link removed]] The Accreditation Con: A Broken Prison and Detention Facility Accreditation System That Puts Profits Over People [[link removed]] by Office of Senator Elizabeth Warren, December, 2020

"It reveals that the ACA's private prison accreditation system is riddled with conflicts of interest, lacks transparency, and is subject to zero accountability even though millions in taxpayer dollars to flow to the ACA and private prison companies." Categories: Conditions of Confinement [[link removed]] Privatization [[link removed]] Prisons shouldn't be charging medical co-pays - especially during a pandemic [[link removed]] by Prison Policy Initiative, December, 2020

"Our December survey of medical co-pay policies shows that some states are reinstating medical co-pays as COVID-19 continues to spread in prisons." Categories: Health impact [[link removed]] Privatization [[link removed]] Just how overcrowded were prisons before the pandemic, and at this time of social distancing, how overcrowded are they now? [[link removed]] by Prison Policy Initiative, December, 2020

"41 states are currently operating at 75% or more of their capacity, with at least 10 of those state prison systems and the federal Bureau of Prisons operating at more than 100%." Categories: Conditions of Confinement [[link removed]] Health impact [[link removed]] The research is clear: Solitary confinement causes long-lasting harm [[link removed]] by Prison Policy Initiative, December, 2020

"Prisons and jails are already inherently harmful, and placing people in solitary confinement adds an extra burden of stress that has been shown to cause permanent changes to people's brains and personalities." Categories: Conditions of Confinement [[link removed]] Incarcerated people and corrections staff should be prioritized in COVID-19 vaccination plans [[link removed]] by Prison Policy Initiative, December, 2020

"38 of the 49 states addressed (or seemed to address) incarcerated people as a priority group at all, in the original plans or in later updates. But in many states, correctional staff are prioritized before incarcerated people." Categories: Health impact [[link removed]] Trends in Issuance of Criminal Summonses in New York City, 2003-2019 [[link removed]] by Data Collaborative for Justice, December, 2020

"Almost half of all marijuana possession summonses were issued to Black people (45.5%). Over 40% of summonses issued for disorderly conduct, public consumption of alcohol, and violations of transit authority rules were issued to Black people." Categories: Race and ethnicity [[link removed]] Police and Policing [[link removed]] States Can Shorten Probation and Protect Public Safety [[link removed]] by The Pew Charitable Trusts, November, 2020

"Many people on supervision serve longer terms than are necessary for public safety." Categories: Probation and parole [[link removed]] Reducing Violence Without Police: A Review of Research Evidence [[link removed]] by John Jay College of Criminal Justice Research and Evaluation Center, November, 2020

"Non-policing approaches to violence prevention can produce significant benefits without the attendant harms of policing and punishment." Categories: Crime and Crime Rates [[link removed]] Medicaid's Evolving Role in Advancing the Health of People Involved in the Justice System [[link removed]] by The Commonwealth Fund, November, 2020

"Siloes between correctional and community health care providers disrupt care coordination and create gaps in treatment and health services that can be life-threatening." Categories: Health impact [[link removed]] Emergency Department visits for depression following police killings of unarmed African Americans [[link removed]]Paywall :( by Abhery Das, Parvati Singh, Anju K.Kulkarni, and Tim A. Bruckner, November, 2020

"Police killings of unarmed African Americans correspond with an 11% increase in ED visits per 100,000 population related to depression among African Americans in the concurrent month and three months following the exposure (p < 0.05)." Categories: Police and Policing [[link removed]] Race and ethnicity [[link removed]] Officer Use of Force and the Failure of Oversight of New York City Jails [[link removed]] by Jennifer Ferentz, November, 2020

"Ultimately, this Note argues the actors responsible for changing the rules governing New York City jails and the practices carried out within them are abdicating that responsibility when it comes to this violence." Categories: Conditions of Confinement [[link removed]] Institutional Responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic in American Prisons [[link removed]] by Meghan A. Novisky, Chelsey S. Narvey, and Daniel C. Semenza, October, 2020

"Correctional facilities remain high-risk locales for outbreaks and it is imperative that policies moving forward protect those who are most vulnerable while ensuring equity in access to those protections." Categories: Health impact [[link removed]] Defund Sheriffs: A Toolkit for Organizers [[link removed]] by Working Families, Sheriffs for Trusting Communities, Faith in Action Fund, & Community Resource Hub for Safety and Accountability, October, 2020

"Defunding sheriffs should be an urgent priority for anyone concerned with mass incarceration and police violence." Categories: Police and Policing [[link removed]] Jails [[link removed]] Institutionalizing inequality in the courts: Decomposing racial and ethnic disparities in detention, conviction, and sentencing [[link removed]]Paywall :( by Marisa Omori and Nick Petersen, September, 2020

"Our findings indicate that inequality is, in part, institutionalized through legal case factors." Categories: Race and ethnicity [[link removed]] Trials [[link removed]] "Defunding the Police" and People With Mental Illness [[link removed]] by Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, August, 2020

"We should dramatically reduce the role of the police in the lives of people with mental illness. As the same time, mental health services should be expanded and racial disparities in their delivery eliminated." Categories: Police and Policing [[link removed]] Mental Health [[link removed]] The "Radical" Notion of the Presumption of Innocence [[link removed]] by Square One Project, May, 2020

"Of the approximately 612,000 individuals that are currently being held in county jails, the vast majority, about 460,000, are awaiting some type of adjudication and thus are presumed innocent." Categories: Jails [[link removed]] Pretrial Detention [[link removed]] The Impact of Incarceration on Food Insecurity among Households with Children [[link removed]] by Sally Wallace and Robynn Cox, October, 2012

"Food insecurity for adults and households with children (a less dire level of food insecurity than very low food security) is affected by parental incarceration under most specifications with magnitudes of impact from 4 to 15 percentage points." Categories: Poverty and wealth [[link removed]] Families [[link removed]] Please support our work [[link removed]]

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Other news: We oppose the Trump Administration's new banking rule, which would give more power to prison industries [[link removed]]

The OCC (an obscure but powerful federal agency) has proposed a new rule that would hinder banks from divesting from private prisons and other problematic industries. We joined a great group of allies in submitting comments [[link removed]] in opposition to the rule.

Read about the proposed new rule and our comments. [[link removed]]

We join allies in Massachusetts to demand immediate parole reform [[link removed]]

We joined over 70 Massachusetts organizations yesterday in calling on state leaders to make long-overdue changes to the state's parole system. With 1 in 5 incarcerated people in Massachusetts having tested positive for COVID-19, parole reform should be implemented immediately to save lives.

Read news coverage [[link removed]] of our demands to Massachusetts leaders.

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