Second Chances Resource Library

To assess the impact of the use of long sentences of 10 or more years in the U.S., it is critical to appreciate how the interplay between the laws and administrative rules governing prison release affect the actual length of time individuals spend behind bars. Based on research conducted as part of the Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice’s Prison Release: Degrees of Indeterminacy project, this brief’s first section provides an overview of the nation’s parole and non-parole prison release systems. This overview sets up an examination of how these systems’ statutory and administrative policy frameworks influence release decisions, sentence credit awards, and the actual time individuals serve against the sentence they receive in court (i.e., the judicial maximum term). In the second section, the brief uses Colorado as a short case-study to show how one state’s back-end laws and policies affect the time individuals serve. Finally, in the concluding section, the brief points to future research and policy work on prison-release decision making including other empirical factors other than statutory and administrative frameworks that influence how much time an individual serves.