A Great Act - Public Safety & Rehabilitation Act of 2016

Great news! An incredible act called the Public Safety & Rehabilitation Act of 2016 (PSRA) is trying to improve public safety, and save California taxpayers money by reducing frivolous spending on our correctional system. One pivotal point of this act, is to transfer the power back to the judge and away from the District Attorney, to decide whether a minor of 14 years of age or older should be tried as an adult. Key factors have to be considered when making this decision such as: the minor's family and school life. It has to be a clear process to decide the outcome of the minor’s life.

Next, for those who are incarcerated with non-violent offenses, Public Safety & Rehabilitation Act of 2016 will add funds for rehabilitation, and will give credit for completion of educational programs with an early release. Ultimately, it is the next step to improve Prop 47.

Altogether, 1 million signatures need to be collected in order for this act to make it on the ballot in November. Governor Brown supports and is willing to sign this act, but requested 100,000 signatures by the end of April 2016 be gathered.  

Equally important, collaborative help is needed for the collection of the mandatory signatures from all that are in support of this act. Let’s be overt, prison reform is needed in the state of California, and this is a productive step towards obtaining that goal. 

For more information or to support the (PSRA) contact Vanessa Rhodes at vanessarhodes@gmail.com or visit SafetyandRehabilitation.com.

By: 

Porscha N. Dillard

Special Project Coordinator 

Time For Change Foundation

Court Rules that Denial of Sentencing Relief to Juveniles is Unlawful

The 4th District Court of Appeal, in a stunning rebuke to San Diego District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis, today ruled that Proposition 47’s sentencing reclassification provisions apply equally to children and adults.

San Diego District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis had sought to deprive juvenile offenders of the retroactive relief the initiative provides. Her office argued that juveniles are not eligible to have their past offenses reduced to misdemeanors, even though adults convicted of the same felonies may petition for such relief.

“Bonnie Dumanis, in her ongoing quest to mete out the harshest punishments to the most vulnerable San Diegans rather than pursue smart justice, disregarded the will of California voters and asked the Court to treat juveniles with misdemeanors as if they were felons,” said Margaret Dooley-Sammuli, director of the ACLU of California’s Criminal Justice and Drug Policy Project. “Had her unsupported reading of the law been upheld, it would have given prosecutors across the state the authority to do what many would consider unthinkable – criminalize children more harshly than adults.”

Proposition 47, a measure which passed with nearly 60% of the vote in November 2014, ended felony sentencing for six petty crimes, including simple drug possession and petty theft, and created a resentencing process for those certain felonies to be retroactively reclassified as misdemeanors.

The ACLU argued that denying juveniles the resentencing relief provided to adults with identical offenses, and denying these juveniles similar relief to that provided to juveniles charged after the initiative went into effect, violates juveniles’ equal protection rights under the California and U.S. Constitution.

“Today’s ruling makes the future a little brighter for many young people in San Diego. The Court recognized that juveniles have the same rights as adults under Proposition 47 and may petition to have eligible felony adjudications reclassified as misdemeanors. Such relief opens up doors in education, employment, and the military, and will assist those facing any future criminal or immigration proceedings,” said Chessie Thacher, an attorney at Keker & Van Nest. “Keker & Van Nest is very pleased to have been involved in this outcome and hopes the Court’s well-reasoned decision sets the stage for consideration of this issue across the state.”

It would be absurd for adults to enjoy rehabilitation as misdemeanants while children are punished with felony records and all the collateral consequences. “Doing so would not only run contrary to the rehabilitative purpose of the juvenile justice system, but would be an abdication of a district attorney’s responsibility to seek justice,” said Dooley-Sammuli. “And the Court has now confirmed it is unlawful, something that our district attorney should have known.”

After Proposition 47 passed and went into effect, a juvenile, Alejandro N., and 75 other children petitioned the court to ask that their offenses be reclassified as misdemeanors, thus minimizing the myriad negative consequences of a having a felony on their records. California and San Diego voters overwhelmingly approved the initiative that included the expressly retroactive resentencing and reclassification provisions in order to achieve the broadest relief possible for nonviolent, non-serious offenders.

The children’s cases were joined by the superior court after District Attorney Dumanis opposed them, arguing that Prop 47 should be read to treat child offenders more harshly than adults.

This is now the law of the state of California.

Via: https://www.aclunc.org/news/court-rules-denial-sentencing-relief-juveniles-unlawful

Capitol Alert: Jerry Brown signs bill giving prisoners convicted as juveniles shot at parole

Gov. Jerry Brown has signed legislation requiring special parole hearings for prisoners who were prosecuted as adults and sent to prison for crimes they committed as juveniles, his office announced late Monday.

Senate Bill 260, by Sen. Loni Hancock, D-Berkeley, will make inmates imprisoned for crimes they committed before turning 18 eligible for parole during their 15th, 20th, or 25th year of incarceration, depending on the severity of their sentences.

The bill excludes certain sex offenders, people sentenced under the state's "three strikes" law and those sentenced to life without the possibility of parole.

The bill was supported by the American Civil Liberties Union, Prison Law Office and Human Rights Watch, among others. Supporters argued existing law fails to afford people given lengthy sentences for crimes they committed as juveniles a chance to demonstrate rehabilitation and maturity.

The bill was opposed by many law enforcement groups, who said the new hearing process could lead to the release of dangerous offenders. According to a legislative analysis, opponents objected specifically to a provision of the law requiring the state Board of Parole Hearings to give "great weight to the diminished culpability of juveniles as compared to adults, the hallmark features of youth, and any subsequent growth and increased maturity of the prisoner in accordance with relevant case law."

By David Siders

PHOTO: Gov. Jerry Brown talks to members of the press on Tuesday, April 23, 2013. The Sacramento Bee/Hector Amezcua

© Copyright The Sacramento Bee. All rights reserved.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2013/09/16/5742346/capitol-alert-jerry-brown-signs.html#storylink=cpy

One-Size: A Need for Prison Reform

One-size-fits-all is a concept that never made sense to me. How can something like a T-shirt be a good match for everyone from a small child to a 300-pound NFL lineman? The answer is that it’s obviously not. It will be way too big for one extreme and way too small for the other.

If one-size-fits-all is an illogical way to manufacture something as insignificant as an article of clothing, how can we possibly justify it as a reasonable way to handle something as serious as sentencing criminal offenders?

But one-size-fits-all punishments for crime are being widely used across the nation, and they’ve driven up the size of our prisons at an enormous cost to taxpayers. These punishments are called mandatory minimums and they force judges to impose mandatory prison time on offenders whose criminal behavior often spans extremes as mismatched as the little kid and the NFL giant.


There is no question that violent and serious offenders like murderers, rapists, and child abusers need to be locked up for a very long time. They pose a real threat to society and deserve severe punishment for their crimes. But adopting the same approach through mandatory sentences for nonviolent offenders like small-time drug offenders is counterproductive as it often leads to exploding costs and less public safety. Research by the Pew Charitable Trusts and others is clear that for many offenders prison terms can be decreased without affecting recidivism or crime. The extra time is all cost and no benefit to public safety.

The sad reality is that many nonviolent offenders simply learn how to become better criminals in prison, instead of reforming their behavior so they can become productive members of society. Even when a prison is well run, the unfortunate truth of locking up so many people together is that it is a place for criminals to earn their advanced degrees in crime.

There are many less costly, more effective alternatives to prison for nonviolent offenders that will help prevent them from reoffending and ending up back in our prison system. We can save taxpayers money and cut crime across the country by using options we know work, like drug courts, which combine intensive supervision with drug treatment and frequent drug testing, instead of expensive prison beds.

Most importantly, mandatory minimums can have a terrible impact on families. When someone serves a sentence that is disproportionate to the crime, it creates financial and emotional strain on his or her family, often for decades at a time. Often, the family doesn’t fully recover from the pain and hardship of separation and economic stress, and society has to deal with yet another broken family. The sooner we can reintroduce nonviolent offenders into society after they have served a reasonable punishment, the better it will be for their families, who too often bear the collateral cost of incarceration.

As a signatory of Right on Crime, a national campaign for better criminal and juvenile justice policies, I join conservative leaders who are supporting reforms that restore judges with their discretion to consider factors like the role of the defendant in the crime and his criminal history when imposing sentences. This accomplishes two important goals: it helps focus expensive prison beds on those who deserve them the most, and it helps restore the separation of powers between the judicial and legislative branches of government as required by our constitution.

Americans should always ask whether we are getting the best possible results for the lowest possible cost out of any government service. When our corrections spending is sky high because we are locking up so many nonviolent offenders for such nonsensical amounts of time, I think the answer is clear.

via townhall.com