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Tag "realignment"

Gov. Brown could sign vote-from-jail law

Heightening the stakes in the criminal justice debate roiling the country at large, Gov. Jerry Brown could soon greenlight a law that would allow some state felons to vote from jail. California has wound up in the middle of the pack on state

Fight flares over ‘realignment,’ Prop. 47 effects on crime

Chris Reed March 25, 2016

The battle over state policies that some call soft on crime and some see as humane and thoughtful appears to be flaring anew, with prominent law-enforcement officials on both sides. The first of the policies was Gov. Jerry Brown’s 2011 decision

Gov. Brown pushes prison forgiveness initiative

James Poulos February 16, 2016

Convinced California’s prison population still must be lowered, Gov. Jerry Brown has begun to push a ballot initiative that would forgive some felons. The initiative’s details, first announced in late January, “would amend the fixed-sentence law Brown signed in 1976, to

CA settles prison suit, curbing solitary

James Poulos September 3, 2015

A momentous court settlement has given new shape to California’s multi-year struggle with the courts over its criminal justice system, rolling back the state’s reliance on solitary confinement as a way of dealing with gangs and violence in prison. “Many such

CA prison population drops below court-ordered level

James Poulos February 4, 2015

After an improvised scramble to reduce populations in accordance with federal court orders, Gov. Jerry Brown’s administration has succeeded in lowering the number of state prison inmates to the judicially prescribed level. He largely accomplished that through his Public Safety

CA voters may upend national crime policy again

James Poulos October 16, 2014

Thanks to a new ballot measure, Proposition 47, voters in California could soon eliminate the last vestiges of the state’s tough-on-crime reputation. In a sea change from the 1990s, when high-profile, grisly crimes seized the state’s attention, Californians have helped drive the

Early release from CA prisons now a flood

James Poulos August 20, 2014

Spurred by a series of court decisions ruling the state’s prison crowding unconstitutional, Gov. Jerry Brown’s ongoing “realignment” effort sought to make adequate room for the state’s worst convicts by diverting lesser criminals to county jails. There, however, the changes have caused a snowball effect.

Prison litigation brings no relief for taxpayers

James Poulos April 29, 2014

A panel of three federal judges recently granted California two additional years to bring the state’s prison system into compliance with legally mandated limits on incarceration numbers. Explained the San Jose Mercury News, “At the same time, the judges set strict guidelines for how

Will failed Prop. 209 rollback help GOP with Asian voters? It depends

Chris Reed March 19, 2014

With Asian-Americans making up 14 percent of the state’s electorate, there is a small but real chance that this past month’s developments in the Legislature could prove the biggest story in California politics in years. I refer to Asian Democratic

CA auditor demolishes Jerry-Brown-saved-state narrative

Chris Reed September 27, 2013

The eagnerness of national media to lionize Gov. Jerry Brown as the guy who saved California amounts to an extreme form of cherry-picking. In some ways, Brown has done a better job than his two immediate predecessors in forcing some