OJJDP Investigation

I have been following the investigation into the OJJDP grant practices very carefully. Frankly, I have been sulking.

As many of you know, J. Robert Flores, administrator of the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) is under investigation by the Justice Department. The allegations are that he subverted the peer review process and awarded grants to contractors who shared his ideological viewpoint.

This is not meant to be a bash of the Republican Party as I know that this type of bias can arise under any administration. My concern is that the baby will get thrown out with the bath water. What will happen to all the grants that are being held up because of this investigation and will this impact other departments of the Justice Department?

Here is a link to one article on ABC News.

Totally Unshocking Crime Headlines, Vol. 10

"[Nathaniel] Abraham arraigned on drug charges"

A refresher: In 1997, 11-year old Nathaniel Abraham shot and killed 18-year old Ronnie Greene, Jr. Two years later, at the age of 13, Abraham became one of the youngest people ever tried and convicted as an adult in the U.S. -- and the youngest ever in Michigan. Though tried as an adult, Abraham received a juvenile sentence in January 2000: he was incarcerated in a maximum-security juvenile detention facility until his 21st birthday, after which he was released in January of last year.

Naturally, at the time of his trial Abraham gained national (and international) notoriety, propelled in no small part by defense counsel Geoffrey Feiger. (Who can forget the image of an avuncular Feiger leading a cardigan-clad Abraham into court by hand? A stroke of theatrical brilliance if ever I saw one.) However, Abraham caused an equally big media stir last year for the outlandish outfit he wore upon his release, which many observers interpreted as a tasteless (and egomanical) taunt to the public. As if to underscore Abraham's prominence in the public consciousness, he was personally summoned by Oprah Winfrey to a private meeting with Greene's relatives, during which Winfrey convinced Abraham to apologize to the Greene family. Needless to say, this young man was under far more public scrutiny than the average recently-released offender.

However, Abraham also received far more benefits than the average recently-released offender as well -- namely, state-funded rent and college tuition:

[Abraham] is being given free services through a Foster Care Demonstration Project. The pilot program is designed to help Wayne County foster care children who are phased out of the system at age 18 but still need the support of the state....

Under the program, Abraham will be eligible for two years of free rent, full college tuition paid by Michigan Rehabilitation Services through age 25 and food stamps, which he has applied for. He must live in Michigan and attend college in the state to remain eligible in the program.

And yet. And yet. And yet last week he was picked up on drug charges -- specifically, possession with intent to distribute ecstasy:

Undercover officers were working surveillance at about 1 a.m. in the neighborhood where there had been three separate armed robberies recently, when one of them witnessed what appeared to be a drug sale between Abraham and a man on a bicycle.

Abraham, 22, had parked a red 1970 Cadillac convertible in the parking lot of a Sunoco station on North Perry Street just south of Pontiac Northern High School. After the officers witnessed the exchange, they called for additional officers and moved in on Abraham, who was standing behind the vehicle with the trunk open. As the officers approached, they asked to see Abraham’s hand, and he said he was just changing a tire.

“He didn’t see the guys coming up behind him, and he threw away a bag,” said Pontiac police Sgt. Kevin Braddock.

When officers recovered a purple Crown Royal liquor bag, they found inside 254 individual tablets of the street drug ecstasy. Police said the pills typically sell on the street for between $10 and $30 each. Abraham was arrested without incident, and the vehicle, which did have a flat, was impounded.

Since his release, the Michigan Department of Human Services has spent $1,200 on Abraham – money that helped him set up an apartment and paid his rent, said DHS spokeswoman Maureen Sorbet.

And really, how many people expected any other outcome? Though his mentors and supporters are "shocked and devastated" that Abraham failed to make good on his promise to stay clean (by -- what else? -- becoming a famous rapper), he exhibited many warning signs of failure:

Looking back on the year, Abraham says he tried college, one semester at Wayne State University last fall, but chose not to reapply to focus on his music. He is also writing stories that he hopes to put into a book.

Abraham has his own apartment in Oakland County and has worked a series of odd jobs, but has not taken any full-time employment.

So, all of this makes his arrest last week a complete and utter non-surprise. The only question is, who is to blame here? Is it Abraham himself, who has made incredibly poor choices even in the face of unparalleled social and economic support? Or the system itself, which treated a troubled boy (who committed a very serious crime, true) as a mature adult and incarcerated him for the bulk of his formative years? Or the news media, whose incessant coverage of his case granted an impressionable youngster instant celebrity status of the worst kind? Most likely the answer is "all of the above" -- not that attributions of blame make this case any less sad.

"Huh?!?" CJ Story of the Day

It is not often that I hear a cable news anchor offer an astute criminological analysis (or, really, an astute analysis of any type). And yet, I couldn't agree more with CNN's Mike Galanos about the absurdity -- and potentially devastating consequences -- of this decision:

"A man is jailed because his daughter failed the GED several times"

Honestly, isn't this the most ridiculous thing you've heard in a long time?

Home, Home on the Range

When I graduated from high school in the mid-90s, life in my home town in northern Minnesota was, for the most part, stereotypically idyllic. While there is not much crime in most rural areas anyway, my small town had almost none. I went to college wanting to to do police work in this way of life. The cops I knew never arrested anyone – they simply drove around town “BS-ing” with the locals and talking about where the fish were biting or who shot the biggest deer this season.

The year after I left, the taconite mine that literally built the town in the 50s unexpectedly and immediately shut down. Some of my classmates who had stuck around to live the lives their fathers had were shell-shocked when only a few months after signing 30-year mortgages they found out that their well-paying job had just been pulled out from underneath them. Many people speculated that the town would not make it. Taxes had been essentially paid by the mining company, and so there would be no money to fix roads and pay for teachers and cops (my parents still pay less than $200 PER YEAR for property taxes). As a result of the closure, many people left the town. Surprisingly, though, many people stayed. Many of the residents were retirees and could survive because of the low cost of living.

Something even more surprising has happened in the last few years: the price of precious metals has increased so much that now other mining companies are talking about coming back to the Iron Range. One company has spent the last 3 years fixing up the facilities abandoned by the original mine. There are multi-million dollar building projects going on and hundreds of new jobs are forecasted. In fact, everyone is talking about this being the biggest economic boom for northeastern Minnesota in a generation. Seems like all good things for my childhood community.

The question I want to pose here, is, what are the social (and criminological) implications of such a rapid change? The area went from boom to bust and now back to an apparent boom in the matter of only a few years. Sounds like classic anomie to me. There is a very good article in the Duluth News-Tribune this morning written by an economist at the College of St. Scholastica in Duluth about some of these issues. Tony Barrett writes:

Face it, we’re in for several years of upheaval. Positive upheaval, for the most part, but upheaval nonetheless. Change does not come easily for anyone and the communities on the Range will be no different.

Are we prepared for such changes and should we expect an increase in crime as a result? How will the life-long Rangers get along with those who come from elsewhere? What can we do NOW to prepare for the changes? There is very little analysis of rural crime issues in the literature, though it seems to me that this is a case study of how rapid social change can affect rural areas.

Drug Cocktail Used for the Dealth Penalty Not Cruel and Unusual

I am sure that most of you saw the Supreme Court decision on the 3-drug cocktail used for lethal injection in Kentucky.

The case involved concerns in the effectiveness and pain involved in using a 3 drug cocktail. The case was not necessarily brought on to stop the death penalty, but to gain further insight into the relative 'pain-free' nature of the method of execution.

The prisoners had contended that the three-drug procedure used on death row — one drug each to sedate, paralyze and end life — was unconstitutional, and that in any event there were strong indications that Kentucky had bungled some executions, creating unnecessary pain for the condemned. Through their lawyers, they maintained that problems could be largely solved by administering a single overwhelming dose of a barbiturate, as opposed to the three-drug procedure.

The decision itself is very interesting. Here are some of my favorite
elements from the NYT article.

Perhaps most interestingly, Justice Stevens filed an opinion concurring in the judgment of the court, but by no means embracing capital punishment. Indeed, he asserted that recent decisions by state legislatures, Congress and the Supreme Court itself to preserve the death penalty “are the product of habit and inattention rather than an acceptable deliberative process that weighs the costs and risks” of the ultimate punishment.

This is such a poignant comment and is consistent with much of or criminal justice, institutional management. As suggested by Feeley and Simon, we have moved toward risk only models and 'waste management'. I am not arguing, per se, that the death penalty doesn't have a role in corrections. It is widely supported. At the same time, simply sweeping the death penalty and concerns over a humane treatment under the rug has large implications for how we treat inmates overall.

Contrary to the comment of the court that "Judged under that standard (the 8th Amendment), this is an easy case.” There are no easy cases in terms of the death penalty, and I truly believe that how we classify and speak of our most violent offenders has strong implications for lower-level criminals and the citizenry in general. Silly me - I had become optimistic after Roper v. Simmons.

Hillary Clinton's New Anti-Crime Initiative

Senator Hillary Clinton unveiled a $4 billion crime-fighting package today.

According to her website, Senator Clinton's new anti-crime agenda "would cut the murder rate in big cities in half and put 100,000 new police officers on America’s streets".

TalkLeft has some analysis here -- anyone else have comments? I will offer my thoughts after I've had the chance to look at the proposed plan in more detail.

Previous discussions of the presidential candidates' crime platforms can be found here and here.

Thanks to Steve O for the heads up! (No, not that Steve-O.)

Presidential Candidates' Positions on Crime Issues

Some time ago Velma inquired about the presidential candidates' positions on crime and justice issues. At the time there was not a great deal of information to be had, and what was available was limited to the democratic candidates. Recently, however, the Sentencing Project released a guide to the current candidates' platforms on a variety of criminal justice issues, including capital punishment, felony disenfranchisement, sentencing policy, and others. Information about the platforms of Senators Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and John McCain is available in PDF format here.

The End of Cigarettes as Prison Currency?

As reported in the Lansing State Journal today, the MDOC will not allow smoking by prisoners or staff on the grounds of any Michigan prison (inmates cannot smoke indoors now, only outdoors--but by 2009 there will be no outdoor smoking allowed either).

I certainly understand the desire to have healthier prisoners & staff, but this really undermines the entire inmate economic system. Perhaps their primary goal is to quash the cigarette economy with the secondary aspect of improved health--who knows?

Also, don't addicts usually substitute one addition for another? Isn't this why most recovering alcoholics are smokers? Will this push inmates toward other, more harmful substances?

Given that Michigan has been dealing with a Hepatitis C epidemic for the past several years, perhaps now is not the best time to institute a smoking ban.

The Law of Unintended Consequences

The LA Times reported today about the unintended consequences of "Jessica's Law," which restricts paroled sex offenders in California from living within 2,000 feet of parks, schools, and other places where children are likely to gather. According to a report released by the California Sex Offender Management Board, at issue is the increasing number of parolees made homeless by this law. Especially in areas that have a high concentration of parks and schools, the law's residency restrictions "make large swaths of housing off-limits". This situation is complicated by the law's inadequate definition of what constitutes an "off-limits" location. But, the residency restriction poses other problems as well:

Tom Tobin, the board's vice-chairman and a psychologist, said that homelessness removes offenders from their support systems, such as family members, which increases the chances they will commit new crimes.

I thought this story was so interesting for several reasons. First, we have discussed many times on this blog the importance of instituting criminal justice policies that are data-driven and subjected to evaluations of their efficacy. Absent evidence to support them, these types of laws (whether well-intentioned or not so well-intentioned) often create more (or different) problems than they were designed to reduce. For whatever reason, this seems to be particularly true of sex offender laws, perhaps because the sexual predation of children provokes such a visceral response in voters' minds that blind support for "tough on sex crime" laws is easily generated. Indeed, the state board's report acknowledged that citizens are misinformed about how best to protect their communities from sex offenders:

The report suggests that the public misunderstands the best way to protect against sex offenders.

It cited studies showing that residency restrictions in other states did not reduce the number of new crimes committed by sex offenders.

And it cited a national survey that found nine out of 10 sex crimes are committed by acquaintances or relatives of victims, undercutting the notion that keeping them away from schools and parks makes a difference.

As with the multi-state "crackdown" last October that kept paroled sex offenders from participating in Halloween, laws that keep sex offenders away from areas where children congregate perpetuate the notion that creepy strangers on park benches are the people parents should shield their kids from. Of course, some sex offenders do lure children away from parks and playgrounds -- I am not suggesting that that's not the case. However, sexual predators are far more likely to target children in their youth groups, scout troops, little league teams, neighborhoods, and -- perhaps most tragically -- in their own homes. Unfortunately, policies like "Jessica's Law" do little to address the threat of predators who are familiar to, and often loved by, the children they assault.

Story courtesy of Ted Gest.

The Democratic Candidates' Positions on Crime

A while back Velma asked for information about the presidential candidates' positions on issues related to crime and imprisonment. Today I came across this San Francisco Chronicle article comparing Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama on crime issues.

Talk Left has more about how the democratic candidates stack up on issues such as mandatory minimums, crack/powder cocaine sentencing, etc. If I find similar information for McCain, Huckabee, or Ron Paul, I'll be sure to post it.

So Much for Evidence-Based Decision-Making

Looks like my former hometown has decided that DARE needs to stay after all. Oh well, at least I tried...

"Undone by its Own Metaphor": The Failure of America's War on Drugs

About two weeks ago, NPR's Talk of the Nation took up the issue of America's War on Drugs. Featured in this discussion was Ben Wallace-Wells, a contributing editor for Rolling Stone who recently authored a damning account of U.S. drug policy entitled "How America Lost the War on Drugs".

I don't typically consider Rolling Stone to be a source of hard-hitting investigative journalism, but listening to Mr. Wallace-Wells' interview I was impressed and intrigued by the extent of his knowledge about the War on Drugs. When I finally sat down to read his article (linked above), I found it to be a fascinating and fairly comprehensive analysis of contemporary American drug policy. I know some of you may balk at this, but I would totally consider assigning this article in class, so impressive is its scope. (It's very lengthy; divided into twelve chapters, it took me over an hour to read.)

What I appreciated most about this article is that it recognizes, and sharply criticizes, the utter disconnect between contemporary American drug policy, on the one hand, and the findings of empirical drug policy evaluation research on the other:

Thanks to new research, U.S. policy-makers knew with increasing certainty what would work and what wouldn't. The tragedy of the War on Drugs is that this knowledge hasn't been heeded. We continue to treat marijuana as a major threat to public health, even though we know it isn't. We continue to lock up generations of teenage drug dealers, even though we know imprisonment does little to reduce the amount of drugs sold on the street. And we continue to spend billions to fight drugs abroad, even though we know that military efforts are an ineffective way to cut the supply of narcotics in America or raise the price.

This article also examines many criminal justice policies and initiatives that developed as a consequence of the War on Drugs: The Boston Gun Project and Operation Ceasefire, community policing efforts in Boston, High Point, NC, and elsewhere, drug courts, mandatory minimums, and so on. It also offers a cogent political analysis, deftly illustrating how thoroughly efforts to appear "tough on crime"-- by Republicans and Democrats alike -- have influenced and shaped contemporary drug policy, even while academic research has been largely ignored:

The federal budget that [former Clinton-era drug czar Lee] Brown's office submitted in 1994 remains a kind of fetish object for certain liberals in the field, the moment when their own ideas came close to making it into law. The budget sought to cut overseas interdiction, beef up community policing, funnel low-level drug criminals into treatment programs instead of prison, and devote $355 million to treating hardcore addicts, the drug users responsible for much of the illegal-drug market and most of the crime associated with it. White House political handlers, wary of appearing soft on crime, were skeptical of even this limited commitment, but Brown persuaded the president to offer his support, and the plan stayed. Still, the politics of the issue were difficult. Convincing Congress to dramatically alter the direction of America's drug war required a brilliant sales job. "And Lee Brown," says Bergman, his former legislative liaison, "was not an effective salesman."

...But in the early days of the Bush administration, police departments were in no hurry to experiment with an approach that focused on drug-related murders and mostly ignored users who weren't committing violence. [Criminologist and pioneer of the Boston Gun Project David] Kennedy's efforts proved to be yet another missed opportunity in the War on Drugs - an experience that made clear how difficult it is for science to influence the nation's drug policy.

Indeed, from an academic perspective, this is perhaps the most dispiriting observation of this article: that U.S. drug policy has been, and continues to be, woefully uninformed by criminological and governmental research and instead is shaped largely by political concerns:

But despite their evident success, the most forward-looking programs remain buried at the fringes of drug policy, featured not in the president's budgets but in academic journals and water-cooler talk in cities like High Point....Thirty-five years after Richard Nixon launched the War on Drugs, the most promising ­programs continue to be shunted aside by Washington's unswerving emphasis on law and order.

I would love to hear others' thoughts on this article, given that I am not a drug researcher. What do you make of the author's conclusions? How can his research be used to inform discussions about the extent to which academic research matters to policy-makers? What does that mean for us as criminologists? I am left with many questions...not the least of which is: would I lose all credibility if I assigned a Rolling Stone article for my students?

Crime and the Candidates

I have been working on a handout for my classes that details the presidential candidate's positions on crime and imprisonment. Easy task - right? Not so much. Terrorism is addressed on most websites. Silly me, but I still believe that most crime is local. With 2 million people in prison and crime spending overtaking many state budgets, I thought there would be more discussion. I guess I was wrong.

Let me know if you find any information on the candidates' platforms.

(UPDATE)

I found a bit more info after some searching. It is interesting, Clinton and Obama have information on domestic crime policy on their Senate web pages - not on their presidential candidate pages. Romney has a few TV ads responding to Huckabee's pardon decisions, but that is about it. As Dr. Cranky suggested, most of the information concerns tougher sentencing practices - particularly for meth and sexual offenses. Not a surprise. I guess because crime is local, it would make sense for crime to be more of a congressional issue. At the same time, many of our large initiatives come out of fed money.

My class enjoyed the presentation of the material. Many times scholars blame mass incarceration on conservative politics. These statements may be correct when examining imprisonment races by county or state, but it is clear that 'get tough' policies are embraced by both sides of the political debate. Even after the search, I still have no idea who to vote for and I only have a few weeks.

The Ineffectiveness of DARE and Its Implications for CJ Policy

(The article below is the op-ed I mentioned in my previous post. It is reprinted with permission from the Daily Record, 1/11/08. Links have been added to this blog post that did not appear in the original piece.)

I read with interest the article about Denville township’s decision to cut funding for the DARE program. While I no longer live in New Jersey, I attended school in Denville from kindergarten through high school, and I like to keep informed on the goings-on in my former hometown.

While it may not be a popular decision among parents in the district, the decision to cut funding for DARE programming was a correct one. A large body of research on this topic indicates that the DARE program is not effective. Even the federal government has acknowledged this fact. In 2003 the Government Accountability Office reviewed several long-term studies of the DARE program and reported that DARE neither reduces drug use among juveniles nor changes their attitudes about drugs. These studies compared students in schools with DARE programs to schools without DARE programs, and found no meaningful differences in drug use, attitudes, or in susceptibility to peer pressure.

While it does not reduce drug use, DARE may have some positive effects—it improves community perceptions of the police. This is certainly a benefit IF the district believes improving police/community relations is something needed and worthy of funding. If so, there are other programs that are actually designed to improve police/community and police/youth relationships that may have lower costs. If not, the program is unnecessary.

So, if DARE doesn’t work, how do we reduce drug use among teenagers? Research has determined that parental involvement is a key factor in reducing the likelihood of drug use. Parents need to know where their children are, whom they are with, and what they are doing. They need to know the parents of their children’s friends and make sure that those parents are capable guardians. Difficult as it is to believe, there are parents who allow drinking and drug use in their homes or at least turn a blind eye to the behavior. As the saying goes, knowledge is power—and that seems to hold true for juvenile drug use, and juvenile delinquency more broadly.

Parents can also reduce the likelihood of drug use by their children by displaying a strong anti-drug philosophy. One might conclude that drug resistance education by parents has a greater effect on drug use than the education provided by police in the DARE program.

Another factor that can lower the risk of drug use among adolescents is the behavior of their peers. Children who have drug-using peers are significantly more likely to use drugs themselves. Here also, parental involvement is vitally important—the more involved parents are with their children and the more aware they are of their children’s activities, the less likely they are to come into contact with drug-using peers.

Finally, parents who use (or abuse) alcohol and drugs increase their children’s risk of illicit drug use, just as parents who smoke are more likely to have children who smoke. You may recall the public service announcement in the mid-1980’s, in which a young boy is caught using drugs by his father. After being confronted by his father, the boy responds “I learned it by watching you!” The tag line, “parents who use drugs have children who use drugs” has been supported in the academic literature.

One of the frustrations of criminal justice researchers is the common belief that a program that “sounds good” will work. Unfortunately, common sense does not always mean a program, no matter how well intended, will be effective. In fact, programs with positive goals can actually be harmful to participants. For example, the documentary “Scared Straight”, filmed in Rahway State Prison in New Jersey, led to programs in several states attempting to divert youth from a life of crime. A recent review of the studies in this area has indicated that Scared Straight programs actually makes high-risk youth WORSE than if they had not experienced the program at all. Like DARE, these programs are difficult to cut due to the public belief that the programs work. Unlike DARE, there are young men being harmed by participating in these programs by increasing their risk of future crime and incarceration.

One of the most difficult things for leaders to do is to cut popular programs that do not work. Like it or not, Denville has made the correct decision to cut DARE—something other districts should consider as well.

ShockProf is an Associate Professor of Criminal Justice at Michigan State University. She graduated from Morris Knolls High School in 1986, and has focused her research on the effect of drug use on recidivism, violence against women, and police response to crime.

Why Can't We Admit When Programs Don't Work?

Well, I opened my big mouth last week and am now hated by parents and police officers alike in Denville, New Jersey.

It seems the Mayor of Denville (my former home town) decided to cut personnel in the Police Department. The Chief of Police then decided the three people being cut would mean the DARE program must be cut in Denville schools. At the following public meeting, the parents arrived in great numbers to protest the cuts (I'd like to link to the original story, but it's archived).

I wrote a letter to the editor, something I have never done. They emailed me back the next day asking if I could lengthen it to an op-ed piece. I did, and they published it last Friday. Basically, I cited the research and findings that DARE isn't working, including the GAO report from 2003. It appeared in the paper on Friday, but did not appear on the paper's web page (sorry, no link).

I've been peeking in to read the letters to the editor though, and wanted to share. This one in particular contains a comment written by a police officer who also emailed me directly. While his letter to me was a bit nicer than the comments, I'm still left bewildered by how anyone can think my personal feelings have entered into this at all.

So, why can't we let go of programs when presented with evidence that they are ineffective? I suppose it has to do with the idea of "buy in". Maybe it's that people feel so strongly about DARE, they find it hard to believe it doesn't do anything. A police officer once told me that she didn't care what the research said--she knew DARE worked and helped keep kids off drugs. I didn't try to change her mind, because I knew I couldn't--just as I can't change the mind of at least one police officer in Northern New Jersey.

(And it is not lost on me that by linking to the article above I have allowed the public and our blog readers--all 8 of them, and by "them" I mean "us"... the ones who write it--to see behind the mask and know my secret identity!)

Public Shaming of Juveniles

I was saddened to read this headline in my Ted Gest email today:

"Juveniles face 25 years on Florida's sex-offender Web site"

Here is some information and the link to the Orlando Sentinel -

A new state law requires posting [juveniles'] faces and addresses on the Internet along with adult rapists and pedophiles. Some legal experts say this goes against the purpose of juvenile court where rehabilitation and confidentiality are key. The courts restrict public access to the juveniles' legal files, but their identities and addresses are now available with a click of a mouse.

Do I understand why we have registries? Of course! That said, juveniles are at the cusp of adulthood and this type of stigma is likely to be particularly damaging. As I have stated many times before, sex offenders are a very heterogeneous group. Applying the same law (or risk instrument) to someone who had sex with his 14-year old girlfriend is not the same as the rapist who jumps out of the bushes with a knife. Similarly, if this is such an important issue for the community, where are the registries for violent offenders?

Will the Death Penalty Be Put to Death?

Yesterday the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments about whether the method of execution used in most states -- a lethal combination of three drugs, administered in succession via IV -- violates the 8th amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. Specifically at issue is the execution protocol in Kentucky, which also is used in 35 of the other 36 states that have the death penalty.

The first drug, sodium thiopental, is used to render the condemned prisoner unconscious. The second drug, pancuronium bromide, is a paralytic designed to restrict involuntary muscle convulsions, thereby rendering the prisoner's death more "dignified". The third drug, potassium chloride, stops the prisoner's heart.

The argument against this 3-drug cocktail -- which, incidentally, was long ago abandoned by veterinarians for euthanizing pets in favor of a single-drug barbituate overdose -- is that the third drug causes excruciating pain in conscious individuals. If the first drug is unsuccessful at rendering the prisoner unconscious, the second drug would prevent the prisoner from expressing pain, leaving tremendous ambiguity about whether or not the lethal injection caused undue suffering to the prisoner:

If the first chemical works, there is no dispute that the process is quick and painless. If it does not, there is no dispute that the inmate will suffer intense and terrifying pain. But because the inmate is paralyzed, it may not be possible to tell whether the first drug worked.

What is more, in Kentucky the trained medical professionals responsible for administering the lethal injection exit the "death chamber" once the IV has been inserted, leaving only the warden and deputy warden present -- both of whom are wholly unqualified to determine whether the first drug worked.

As usual, NPR offered the most comprehensive and straightforward summary of the case before the Supreme Court. An abbreviated print article as well as the full audio report by legal correspondent Nina Totenberg can be found here.

Two other articles offer more critical analyses of the complicated American relationship with capital punishment. The first (the New York Times article linked above), describes how individual states are reluctant to lead the way of execution reform. It seems that nobody wants to "go first" in terms of altering the methods of lethal injection, for fear of the political fallout:

The answer, experts say, seems to be that no state wants to make the first move. Having proceeded in lock step to adopt the current method, which was chosen in part because it differed from the one used on animals and masked the involuntary movements associated with death, state governments would prefer that someone else, possibly the courts, change the formula first.

One final interesting point: Experts quoted in the article commented that adoption of the veterinary (single-drug) protocol for capital punishment may lead critics to argue that human beings are being treated like animals. However, opponents of the existing 3-drug method make the exact opposite argument: that condemned prisoners ought to be treated at least as humanely as our pets.

The second article from TIME magazine contextualizes the death penalty in the U.S., describing it as being "expressive of some of our society's deeply held values". This article provides a good analysis of the complicated moral and political relationship Americans have with the death penalty. Particularly instructive is the following passage:

Our death penalty's continued existence, countering the trend of the rest of the developed world, expresses our revulsion to violent crime and our belief in personal accountability. The endless and expensive appeals reflect our scrupulous belief in consistency and individual justice. This is also a nation of widely dispersed power--many states, cities and jurisdictions. Out of this diversity has emerged the staggering intricacy of death-penalty law, as thousands of judges and legislators from coast to coast struggle to breathe real-life meaning into such abstract issues as what constitutes effective counsel, what is the proper balance of authority between judge and jury, what makes a murder "especially heinous," what qualities and defects in a prisoner compel mercy, and so on.

Finally, while I do not necessarily oppose the death penalty on strictly moral grounds, there is no denying that the system as it currently exists in this country is hopelessly, inherently, and, in my view, irreparably broken. With any luck, the Supreme Court will take this opportunity to truly question whether capital punishment has a continued place in contemporary American society. The system is indeed "a wreck," and uncertainty about the constitutionality of lethal injections is only a small part of the problem.

According to NPR, a decision in this case is expected sometime this summer. It remains to be seen whether the Supreme Court will decide to sentence capital punishment -- at least via lethal injection -- to death. We can only hope.

Sorry About the Impending Hurricane - No Bus for You!

From Ted Gest.

Future TX Evacuees Will Be Checked For Criminal Records

Texans seeking to escape the next hurricane or state emergency by evacuation bus will first be submitted to criminal background checks, the state's emergency management director says. The idea, according to Jack Colley, is to keep sex offenders and others who may be wanted by police off the same buses used by the most vulnerable during an evacuation: the elderly, disabled residents, and children.

In theory, I think this will be a very popular public policy, but how are we going to enforce this in Texas. Do we have a tiered system of evacuation? What types of offenders should be relegated to the last bus? Are sex offenders really going to prey on people on the bus?

They suggest a bracelet system so that people can be found after relocation. I actually think this is a good idea if sex offenders (or parolees in general) aren't given a specifically designed bracelet. In addition, I would think that outreach efforts would be needed to make sure those who are less fortunate are able to get the bracelet.

After Hurricane Katrina, nearly 1,700 parolees failed to check in with authorities in Texas, Mississippi, and Louisiana. "We're all entitled to privacy, but we're not entitled to anonymity," Colley said.

This is an important point, and I am wondering if anyone has read anything about how parolees were managed following the hurricane. I know that some research is being conducted at the National Poverty Research Center. I will let you know if I find out more.

See more here - Houston Chronicle

Alleviating Racial Disparities in the Criminal Justice System

Today came news of two efforts -- one at the federal level and one at the state level -- aimed at alleviating racial disparities in the U.S. criminal justice system.

First, the U.S. Sentencing Commission voted unanimously yesterday to retroactively apply a recently-passed amendment to the federal sentencing guidelines reducing sentences for crack cocaine offenses. The goal of this amendment is to help bring some measure of parity to the federal sentences for crack and powder cocaine offenses.

The Commission’s actions today, as well as promulgation of the original amendment for crack cocaine offenses, are only a partial step in mitigating the unwarranted sentencing disparity that exists between Federal powder and crack cocaine defendants. The Commission has continued to call on Congress to address the issue of the 100-to-1 statutory ratio that drives Federal cocaine sentencing policy. Only Congress can provide a comprehensive solution to a fundamental unfairness in Federal sentencing policy. The Commission has consistently expressed its readiness and willingness to work with Congress and others in the criminal justice community to address this very important issue.

While not addressed specifically in the Sentencing Commission's statement, a key element of the fundamental unfairness of federal cocaine laws -- aside from the 100-to-1 ratio -- is racial disparities, with Blacks receiving a disproportionate number of the harsher crack sentences.

Talk of the Nation had a terrific discussion of this decision today. It's somewhat lengthy (30 minutes), but if you have time it's worth a listen. I was disappointed that race was not discussed more explicitly (the commissioner of the Sentencing Commission skirted the issue, in my opinion), but at the very least it was included in the broader conversation.

Second, the Michigan House of Representatives reviewed a proposal today to broaden the pool from which potential jurors are drawn, in an effort to increase the representation of racial/ethnic minorities (as well as people living in poor communities) on juries:

The bills could potentially add the names of taxpayers, registered voters and the recipients of government assistance to the pool of potential jurors; currently, jury pools are formed from lists of driver's license and state identification card holders.

One measure also calls for jury pools to be required to maintain proportional representation by ZIP code, to address what backers said was low participation by the poor concentrated in urban areas...

Wayne County Circuit Judge Deborah Thomas told the committee a 2006 study of the county’s jury selection system found the names of more than one million residents had been removed from consideration for jury duty because they had failed to respond to a jury questionnaire. Thomas also urged the committee to consider restoring the rights of convicted felons to serve on juries after they have finished their sentences and parole or probation.

In addition to jury composition, this proposal also addresses felony disenfranchisement, another criminal justice policy that disproportionately disadvantages people of color, particularly Black men. (According to the Sentencing Project, Black men are disenfranchised at a rate seven times the national average.)

I was pleased to read about both of these efforts, and curious to see what (if any) real-life changes occur because of them.

Joe...

AZ Sheriff Starts Pink-Shirted DUI Convict Chain Gangs

(retrieved from the Ted Gest newsletter)

Maricopa County, Az., Sheriff Joe Arpaio, known for housing inmates in old military tents, now is establishing chain gangs of drunken driving convicts wearing pink shirts and performing burials of people who died of alcohol abuse, reports the Associated Press. Arpaio wants the chain gang to act as a deterrent to potential drunken drivers.

Pink shirts I can handle, but assisting in the burials of anyone seems a bit over the top for me. Even in the Wild West. The rationale behind the punishment is an increase in crime.

Arizona had the sixth- highest number of alcohol-related fatalities in the nation last year at 585, up 15 percent from the previous year. In June, the state legislature passed one of the nation's toughest DUI laws, requiring ignition-interlock devices for first-time offenders, increased fines, and providing a minimum of 45 days in jail for some DUI convictions.

I know I am a crazy liberal, but I think that DUI courts may be a better alternative to mortuary duties. I know that Joe is popular, but I think this is bad policy. We have very little evidence that supports this type of scared straight, deterrence-based punishment. Treatment may not be as politically satisfying, but there is evidence that it can work.**

See the full story here - Associated Press/USA Today

** I am in no way implying that people should 'get off' for DUI offenses. I think that jail time and fines are appropriate, particularly for repeat offenders. I just don't know of any research that suggests that humiliation reduces crime. In fact, the labeling aspect of this type of punishment may have an opposite effect.

*** Yes, I have a Joe Bobble Head in my office.