News

The Wilson Center for Science and Justice is one of several organizations that signed on to a letter last week urging U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland to augment efforts to transfer federal incarcerated persons to home confinement and pursuant to compassionate release, and to not pursue re-incarceration of released persons. The single most effective strategy […]

By De’Ja Wood On Tuesday, March 9, Alice Marie Johnson and Dontae Sharpe joined the Wilson Center for Science and Justice at Duke Law to discuss community re-entry challenges for those people who have been incarcerated. Johnson is a criminal justice reform advocate and former federal prison who served almost 22 years in prison. It […]

By Annie Han Months of Black Lives Matter marches across the nation followed the tragic murder of George Floyd to protest police use of excessive force against Black individuals. Professors Brandon L. Garrett of Duke Law School and Christopher Slobogin of Vanderbilt University School of Law recently assessed how American constitutional law continues to ignore […]

By Chinmay Amin In its yearly report, the Virginia Sentencing Commission directly cited a recent paper co-authored by Wilson Center Director Brandon Garrett and colleagues John Monahan and Anne Metz. The Commission is a state judicial branch agency made up of 17 members – appointed by the Virginia governor, chief justice, and the legislative branch […]

By Ruthie Kesri Criminal justice is front and center this election season. Politicians across the country are increasingly aware of the need for reforms addressing the high risk of wrongful conviction within this system. “Eyewitness Identification Speed: Slow Identifications from Highly Confident Eyewitnesses Hurt Perceptions of Their Testimony,” is a paper authored by Chad S. […]

HOUSTON, T.X. – The independent monitors overseeing Harris County’s historic bail reform agreement filed their report describing their first year of work and findings with the federal court this week, noting an increase in releases, a reduced use of cash bail, no change or a decline in repeat-offending, and the implementation of a range of […]

By Annie Han Curtis Flowers recently joined The Wilson Center to discuss his experience of being tried six times for the same four murders he didn’t commit and serving 23 years on death row. He was joined by his North Carolina attorney, Henderson Hill. Flowers was first suspected of the fatal shooting of four people […]

By Belle Allmendinger People with severe mental illness, such as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, can experience crisis in which they are unable to make competent decisions and by themselves cannot give consent to treatment. As a result, they may be involuntary committed to psychiatric facilities. Whether it is because of security and safety, for convenience, […]