Second Chances Resource Library

What happens when someone in prison gets very sick and there is no mechanism in place for the system to allow for compassion? That’s the situation that Joseph Palmer and his family are in right now. They – and many others like them – urgently need the state to put medical parole in place.

In 2020 and 2021, Oregon Governor Kate Brown granted clemency to approximately 1,026 convicted felons, comprising three groups: (1) individuals “vulnerable to the effects of COVID-19,” (2) individuals who had fought “the historic wildfires that ravaged the state around Labor Day 2020,” and (3) 73 individuals who were sentenced as juveniles prior to the passage of a non-retroactive law that established early release hearings after 15 years of incarceration for juvenile offenders. Two district attorneys and four family members of victims challenged these commutations. The Oregon Court of Appeals concluded that the commutations at issue here were a lawful exercise of the broad clemency power afforded Oregon governors by constitution and statute.

The American Bar Association (ABA) Working Group on Building Public Trust in the Justice System has canvassed existing ABA policies, supplemented them and compiled the whole into a set of Ten Principles, which, if employed together and consistently over time, would set the United States on a path toward ending mass incarceration. This includes two principles related to second chances:

Principle 6: Adopt “second look” policies, requiring review of sentences of incarceration at designated times to determine if they remain appropriate.

Principle 8: Expand opportunities for incarcerated individuals to obtain early release under compassionate release or similar programs.

This resolution by the American Bar Association urges urges all jurisdictions to enact legislation permitting courts to hear petitions that allow de novo hearings to take a “second look” at criminal sentences where individuals have been incarcerated for ten years, to create guidelines for these hearings that allow petitioners to receive notice and obtain the assistance of counsel, and to develop due process procedures.

The Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 reduced the disparity in sentencing for crack cocaine and powder cocaine offenses from 100:1 to 18:1. But true justice won’t come until the ratio is 1:1. Until then, thousands of people, more than 80 percent of them Black, remain behind bars serving harsh and unfair sentences. Now, legislation before Congress, the EQUAL Act, would finally end the disparity once and for all, bringing the ratio down to 1:1. For Terrance and Sagan Stanton and their children, the fight for this reform is very personal.

There’s nothing romantic about prison. But here’s a FAMM story that’s undeniably romantic. It’s about what happens when fierce advocacy, Fantasy Football, 35 birthday cards, and a second chance come together …

“My roots weren’t strong, and when the storms of life came, I couldn’t hold on,” says Charles Scott, currently serving more than 51 years in federal prison – 45 of which are “stacked” mandatory enhancements.

This report discusses how the current incarceration practices in the United States, particularly multi-decade sentences, are an inefficient use of public resources and are not shown by evidence to have a deterrent effect on crime. It is part of a series of papers that Arnold Ventures commissioned exploring the relationship between the justice system and public safety.

Governors in most states have executive clemency authority that allows them to change the terms of someone’s criminal justice system involvement, including by issuing pardons or by granting commutations to adjust the sentences of people in prison. Though many clemency deliberations are independent case-by-case assessments, in some cases, governors can also extend clemency eligibility categorically to groups of people in prison to mitigate structural issues or accomplish larger reform goals. In this report, we provide a high-level overview of state executive categorical clemency and offer examples of how state governors have used this strategy as a corrective tool to address problems in the criminal justice system.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court asked a trial court to review the latest neuroscience on how the brain develops in those under 21. The court also asked the trial court to examine two cases involving teenagers sentenced to life in prison without parole for first-degree murders. In this decision, the trial court holds that it is unconstitutional under the Massachusetts Constitution to automatically sentence people under the age of 21 to life in prison without the possibility of parole.