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 […]
Category: Homepage News
Curtis Flowers, Attorney Talk Justice, Death Row, Innocence and Hope for a Better Legal System
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 […]
Ongoing Research Offers Insight into Implementing Psychiatric Advance Directives
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, […]
Roundtable: There are Better Alternatives to Police Response in Behavioral Crises
By Ruthie Kesri Responding safely to behavioral health crises requires sensitivity, extensive training and de-escalation practice. Police have become the de facto first responders to those crises despite rarely receiving adequate training to safely and effectively handle the situation. The Wilson Center recently hosted a roundtable discussion on the topic. The event brought together three […]
Urban Institute Report: NC Revocations on Decline Thanks to Justice Reinvestment Act
By Annie Han The Urban Institute recently released an assessment of the outcomes from changes made to the Supervision Revocation Policy in 2011. The report examines outcomes for individuals on probation, post-release supervision, and parole supervision before and after the changes were implemented. In 2010, North Carolina’s prison population was projected to increase 10 percent […]
Durham Invests in Police Alternative to Address Gun Violence
By De’Ja Wood The 2020 murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, Rayshard Brooks, and countless others catalyzed national protests against the police state and discourse about the need to reimagine public safety. Organizers across the nation, including in Durham, began to demand their local and state governments divest from the police and carceral […]
The Key to Public Safety? Time, and Officers Need More of It
By Brandon Garrett I recently spoke to Washington state legislators about the proposed HB 1310, a bill introduced in January that concerns permissible uses of force by law enforcement and correctional officers. I explained, in brief remarks, that it has long been a pressing national issue that far too many people are killed in encounters […]
Attorney for Man Granted Clemency: At Minimum, Legal System Should Clear Hurdles for Exonerated
By Ruthie Kesri Gov. Roy Cooper announced in late December he would be issuing pardons of innocence to five men he believed were innocent, serving time for crimes they did not commit. Cooper’s actions allow for those five men to apply to receive compensation from the state for each year they were wrongly imprisoned. In […]
Duke Professor Co-Authors Washington Post Opinion Piece About ‘Broken’ Policing System
John Rappaport and Ben Grunwald are no strangers to writing about flaws in the American policing system – you may recognize their bylines from their research last year about wandering officers, a coin they termed for police officers who were fired by one department, often for something serious, but who later found work in another […]
Support During Justice System Re-entry: A Look at Critical Time Intervention
By Chinmay Amin It’s widely documented that individuals who live in homeless shelters and suffer from mental illness often experience cycles of recurrent homelessness during their transition to living independently. The same is true for homeless persons with mental illness navigating justice system re-entry. After staying in a shelter for an extended period of time, […]