Criminal Justice Updates 

Badger Institute Policy Analyst Julie Grace will testify on SB 78, an expungement reform bill, before the state Senate Committee on the Judiciary and Public Safety on Thursday, May 6. The hearing begins at 10 a.m.


Testimony: Changes to Wisconsin’s illogical, arbitrary expungement law are overdue
Thank you for allowing me to testify today in support of Senate Bill 78, which would make long-overdue reforms to Wisconsin’s expungement law, including allowing judges to rule on expungement eligibility after the completion of a sentence, removing the arbitrary age restriction and ensuring that expunged crimes are not considered convictions for employment purposes.

The Badger Institute surveyed Wisconsin voters on this topic a few weeks ago and found that nearly three-quarters of Wisconsin voters support reforming the state’s expungement law to allow a judge to grant an expungement after completion of a sentence. Support for that change extends across party lines, with 77% of Republicans, 69% of Independents and 70% of Democrats supporting the reform.  

Wisconsinites support this change because it simply makes sense. Wisconsin is the only state in the nation that requires a judge to rule on an expungement application at the time of sentencing when very little information is known about an offender’s likelihood of rehabilitation. Changing the timing of that decision will allow judges to make better-informed decisions and will incentivize good behavior on the part of offenders.

Read Grace’s full testimony here.
 
New research: Proposed expungement law would mostly help misdemeanants
Eighty-seven percent of people who would qualify for an expungement under proposed legislation have never committed anything more serious than a misdemeanor, according to new data from the Badger Institute.

The legislation would remove the arbitrary 25-year-old age limit in current state law, essentially making anyone with a nonviolent Class H or I felony (with no previous felonies) or a misdemeanor conviction, regardless of age, eligible to have his or her case removed from public record.

Wisconsin is one of only a handful of states that currently limits expungements based on age at the time of the offense.

About 35,000 people a year who are 25 years or older and have no prior felonies commit expungement-eligible offenses, the Badger Institute found.

Roughly 24,000 of that total are people who commit misdemeanors. Another 6,600 are individuals who had a misdemeanor charge reduced to a forfeiture and, therefore, were never found guilty of a criminal offense. The remainder would be individuals who committed a lower-level felony.

Read the full findings here.
 

Op-ed: Wisconsin voters overwhelmingly support criminal justice reform
(Editor’s note: Following is an excerpt of an op-ed co-authored by policy analyst Julie Grace that appeared in the May 2 Wisconsin State Journal.)

Wisconsin voters often split evenly on big elections and key issues. But voters on the right and the left agree on the dire shortcomings of the state’s corrections system and the need for reform.

Policymakers should take heed.
 
Our organizations worked with Public Opinion Strategies to conduct a statewide poll of Wisconsin voters and found that a majority across the ideological spectrum believes the state’s criminal justice system “needs significant improvements.” Most think the state spends too much money on prisons, crowding out funding for other public safety priorities.
 
We agree, and we have research-backed policy solutions that would reduce one-size-fits-all approaches, save taxpayers money, restore families and communities, and maintain public safety. A few areas are especially ripe for reform.
 
You can read the entire op-ed here.

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