News

For weekend reading or re-reading: From Pew: 10 Things We Know About Race and Policing. And Seth Stoughton on 8 Things We Get Wrong About Policing.  With Geoffrey Alpert and Jeffrey Nobel on How to Actually Fix America’s Police. And Sen. Cory Booker on police reform. And – Charles H. Ramsey, Ronald L. Davis, Roberto […]

We grieve for George Floyd’s family and write to express our deep support for all who stand for justice in his case and in so many others.  We have a three-part mission at the Center for Science and Justice: to do work that addresses accuracy, risk, and needs in the justice system.  These heartbreaking current […]

The Minneapolis police department’s use of force policies are receiving national scrutiny after the death of George Floyd. The agency patrol guide is available online here.  Their policy begins in a way that Seth Stoughton and I have criticized, by relying on the U.S. Supreme Court’s Fourth Amendment caselaw, which uses a very broad “reasonableness” […]

We hope you enjoy our May Center newsletter featuring our recent reports, events, publications and writing on this blog: https://mailchi.mp/e4d89e8bf980/dukecsj-newsletter-first-3883053 If you have not already, please subscribe!

Last Tuesday, Ian MacDougall of Propublica reported (also printed in Salon) some remarkable news regarding the risk assessment instrument adopted under the landmark FIRST STEP ACT of 2018.  They report: ProPublica obtained a copy of the document, which does not appear to have been finalized, and its existence surprised and baffled lawyers, prison reform advocates […]

A new short piece in the Harvard Law Review Blog, “Constitutional Criminal Procedure Post-COVID,” provides an overview of litigation occurring nationwide against local jails, state prisons, federal prisons, and immigration detention centers, as individual people, groups, and persons seeking class certification, file civil rights, habeas, and state law litigation seeking release and improved conditions of […]

We have launched the official website for the ODonnell Court-Appointed Monitor.  Information about our Monitor Team is available, as well as the Community Working Group, and documents, including our recently posted Monitor Plan for the first year of our work.  The website is here: https://sites.law.duke.edu/odonnellmonitor/ As we describe there, for the next seven years beginning […]

We have been tracking official state responses to COVID-19, as reported by their Departments of Corrections, as well as media coverage of prison releases across the country. Below are five key takeaways from that coverage so far: Prison responses to the pandemic are varying and fragmented. Governors’ executive orders, Departments of Corrections’ policy changes, parole […]