THE RAPID SPREAD of the novel coronavirus in the United States is expediting criminal justice reforms that advocates have pushed for decades. At least nine prosecutors are now fast-tracking reforms to reduce the number of incarcerated people kept in conditions that can speed the rate of infection, and to stop new prosecutions of low level nonviolent offenses.
People in prison should enjoy quality health care that is at least equivalent to that available in the community and should have access to necessary health-care services free of charge without discrimination on the grounds of their legal status.
As the world faces up to the challenges of dealing with the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, CRIN will be looking at the ways that the human rights of children are affected. We start this week with a focus on children in prisons and detention facilities within the criminal justice system.
Some jails are releasing people to stem outbreaks, but critics say it is not happening quickly enough to save lives and resources.
Throughout the country, governors, courts, corrections systems, and law enforcement agencies are implementing new policies to limit the spread of coronavirus in jails and prisons.Officials in at least 43 states and the federal prison system have adopted policies to reduce their incarcerated populations. Efforts range from police departments issuing summonses instead of making arrests for lower-level offenses to fast-tracking parole hearings to early releases for individuals who are nearing the end of their sentences or who have pre-existing medical conditions.
Governors in at least 11 states have issued executive orders that block new transfers into state prisons, allow early release for some prisoners, or both. At the county level, judges, prosecutors, and public defenders are working together to release low-risk pretrial detainees and inmates serving sentences for nonviolent offenses. And the federal prison system has transferred hundreds of prisoners to home confinement.
Dismantling mass incarceration in the United States is not a question of possibility or costs, but a matter of imagination and will. Take the relationship between the criminal legal system and the Covid-19 outbreak. Families and activists have demanded the release of people currently detained in jails, prisons and immigrant detention facilities, and in some cases, they have won. New York has released 300 elders from Rikers Island – not enough, but a start. Massachusetts courts, under pressure from activists, are considering whether to release anyone. When California released an additional 3,100 people from prison, a media outlet was sure to note that Governor Gavin Newsom’s order included sentence commutations for "killers".
Prisons and jails are amplifiers of infectious diseases such as the coronavirus, because social distancing is impossible inside and movement in and out of facilities is common. But criminal justice officials have the power to prevent coronavirus deaths.On this page, we’re tracking which state and local governments are taking meaningful steps to protect people behind bars (and the general public). We’ve also published a detailed guide to what the criminal justice system should be doing, as well as several other resources about the coronavirus in prisons and jails.