Tag: Criminal Justice System

Minimal Impact Analyzing State Sentencing Reforms and Racial Disparities in Selected State Prison Populations

Introduction

Over the past 20 years, most American states have adopted a wide range of changes to their criminal sentencing statutes. The goals of the reforms varied. Some targeted certain offenses for greater or lesser penalties. Others aimed to cut correctional costs, expand alternatives to incarceration, and reduce recidivism. Few laws were enacted explicitly to reduce racial and ethnic disparities. Still, many policymakers hoped they would do just that, and the starkly disproportionate incarceration of Black people has been a central component of the national conversation about criminal justice reform.

— Read on reports.counciloncj.org/racial-disparities/multi-state-report

Teenage victims and criminals have increased since ‘raise the age’ law passed

This year, New York City residents have been benefitting from historic declines in shootings and homicides, and from less-sharp, but still meaningful, decreases in other crime categories.
— Read on nypost.com/2025/08/08/opinion/teenage-victims-and-criminals-have-increased-since-raise-the-age-law-passed/

Vital City | Calling the Cops Less Often

Polling shows that public safety is among New York City voters’ top concerns. But it’s important to be specific when talking about the issue. Candidates in the recent Democratic mayoral primary focused mainly on quality-of-life issues — homelessness, mental illness, public drug use — and not on violent crime. There’s good reason for that: New York has seen a remarkable drop in murders, with the NYPD reporting shootings at an all-time low through the first half of the year. Of course, there is work left to do, including stemming a years-long rise in felony assaults — but it seems as though lower-level crimes are top-of-mind for many New Yorkers.
— Read on www.vitalcitynyc.org/articles/calling-the-cops-less-often

How You Start is How You Finish? The Slave Patrol and Jim Crow Origins of Policing

Originating in Virginia and Maryland, the American slave codes defined slaves from Africa as property rather than as people (Robinson 2017); that is, without rights. American slave codes were rooted in the slave codes of Barbados. According to Dr. Robinson (2017), the British established the Barbadian Slave Codes (laws) “to justify the practice of slavery and legalize the planters’ inhumane treatment of their enslaved Africans.” American policing in the South would begin as an institution—slave patrols—responsible for enforcing those laws (Turner et al., 2006), as slave uprisings were a threat to the social order and a chronic fear of plantation owners.

The first slave patrols were founded in the southern United States, the Carolina colony specifically (Reichel, 1992), in the early 1700s. By the end of the century, every slave state had slave patrols. According to Dr. Potter (2013), slave patrols accomplished several goals: apprehending escaped slaves and returning them to their owners; unleashing terror to deter potential slave revolts; and disciplining slaves outside of the law for breaking plantation rules.
— Read on www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/resources/human-rights/archive/how-you-start-how-you-finish-slave-patrol-jim-crow-origins-policing/

Intercept Briefing Podcast: Policing’s Past Haunts the Present

Rick Loessberg and Akela Lacy trace the trajectory of America’s unfinished reckoning with policing, from the 1967 Kerner Report to the George Floyd protests to Trump 2.0.
— Read on theintercept.com/2025/08/01/briefing-podcast-racism-police-protests-kerner/

See also at:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-intercept-briefing/id1195206601?i=1000720202827