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04-05-2004

Page history last edited by PBworks 17 years, 6 months ago

April 5, 2004

CRIME PANEL BACKS MANDATORY POST RELEASE SUPERVISION

Move saves money, eases transition into society for offenders

 

Massachusetts needs to focus on new cutting-edge strategies to fight crime, including mandatory post-release supervision for inmates, Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey said today as she unveiled the recommendations of the Governor’s Commission on Criminal Justice Innovation.

 

“All too often, there has to be a tragedy for our criminal justice system to be reformed,” said Healey, the Commission’s chairman. “The criminal justice reforms outlined today are not backward looking or reactive. They are meant to position us on the cutting edge of crime fighting strategies.”

 

Healey, a former consultant to the US Justice Department, called the report a “strategic plan” for updating the state’s criminal justice system.

 

The Commission assembled over 150 of the state’s top law enforcement practitioners, key government officials, leaders from research firms and academia, social workers and community leaders who spent the past seven months examining the business of law enforcement in Massachusetts.

 

Governor Mitt Romney accepted the report and said it will serve as a “useful blueprint for making changes in our criminal justice system.”

 

The Commission focused their recommendations on five key areas: urban crime strategies, prisoner re-entry, interagency information sharing, forensic sciences and law enforcement education and training.

 

Currently, Massachusetts lacks a mandatory post-release supervision system for the approximately 20,000 inmates who return home each year from incarceration. According to a 2002 “Comprehensive Recidivism Study” by the Massachusetts Sentencing Commission, 49.1% of all offenders recidivate after one year.

 

According to Healey, “Ninety-seven percent of offenders are returned to the community. It makes sense from both a fiscal and public safety perspective to look at re-entry and mandatory post-release supervision to increase the chance that those offenders will become productive citizens.”

 

Without adequate post-release supervision, prisoners once released are often ill prepared to overcome such barriers to successful re-entry as substance abuse, mental and physical health issues and lack of access to housing and employment, the report said.

 

It costs approximately $40,000 a year to incarcerate an offender. Estimates based on effective re-entry programs operating here in Massachusetts suggest the cost for the last year of incarceration and the first year of release can be cut by two-thirds with better programming.

 

The report also notes that sex offenders may require permanent supervision “not so much as a means of rehabilitation but as a protection to the community.”

 

Essex County Sheriff Frank Cousins, who co-chaired the subcommittee on Re-Entry and Post-Release Supervision, said more intensive post-release supervision is critical to “reduce the risk of recidivism of offenders leaving prison.”

 

Among the report’s other recommendations:

 

 

New ways to focus resources on so-called “impact players,” those individuals who are most at-risk of falling into a life of crime or committing repeat offenses.

 

New systems to better manage the Commonwealth’s forensic labs, including new capacity for storage of electronic evidence and stronger tools to fight computer crime.

 

An integrated crime-fighting plan that will allow criminal justice data to flow between agencies and – in the context of homeland security – to flow up seamlessly from the officer making the arrest to state and federal agencies that can turn that information into intelligence.

 

Innovative steps to provide higher training standards for new law enforcement recruits and better on-the-job training for police and prosecutors, including a minimum standard of a two-year associate’s degree for entrance into a policing career.

U.S. Attorney Michael Sullivan praised the work of the Crime Commission for “bringing together this multi-agency, cross discipline group of high level law enforcement, public safety and health and human service professionals.”

 

Added Public Safety Secretary Edward Flynn: “This report is illustrative of the importance of broad-based collaboration across branches of government and state agencies in the creation of an effective anti-crime strategy. It is my hope the ideas and strategies proposed can reduce crime and enhance the quality of life for the people of Massachusetts.”

 

Governor's Crime Commission Report

 

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