Barry Krisberg quoted in Daily Journal (registration required), September 15, 2014
“While there may be arguments about the best way to accomplish services for mentally ill inmates, we’re no longer arguing whether we should or shouldn’t do it.”
New judge taking over prison civil rights lawsuit as solutions sought
Proposition 47 ceases criminal charges; stirs little reaction
Barry Krisberg quoted in San Francisco Chronicle, September 3, 2014
“I think what is fascinating is that there seems to be almost no opposition to this,” says Barry Krisberg. “You’d think in the usual California politics you’d have the right saying this and the left saying something else. But there’s been no campaigning (in opposition) to speak of, no one is spending any money on defeating it and the polls have been running 60 percent positive.”
Early jail releases have surged since California’s prison realignment
Barry Krisberg quoted in Los Angeles Times, August 16, 2014
Krisberg said stopping the early releases would require a fundamental change in California’s criminal justice system. Just “shifting the location of incarceration” from prisons to jails doesn’t change much, he said.
As juvenile arrests plummet, California still investing in incarceration facilities
Barry Krisberg quoted in The Chronicle for Social Change, July 23, 2014
“The traditional view toward at-risk youth is to lock them up and give them treatment,” said Barry Krisberg…. “Quality treatment behind a razor wire doesn’t ring true.”
A city that pays criminals to behave
Barry Krisberg quoted in Aljazeera America, June 6, 2014
“This culture is fixated on punishment and control as the way in which we deal with crime and other problems. It’s essentially a military solution,” said Barry Krisberg … adding that the city’s high crime rates, historically, are rooted in severe poverty, isolation and dim prospects for growth. “The research has been clear that doesn’t work very well.”
In gentrifying neighborhoods, residents say private patrols keep them safe
Barry Krisberg and David Sklansky quoted in Al Jazeera America, May 30, 2014
Some criminal justice experts say the solution to crime isn’t more patrolling but greater opportunities for young people and people coming out of prison. “If you want to bring down robbery, you’ve got to reduce the unemployment rate in the city,” says Barry Krisberg.
“There’s a degree of ambiguity about how private patrols actually operate,” said David Sklansky.
Ohio to agree to reform, eventually eliminate juvenile solitary confinement
Barry Krisberg quoted in Aljazeera America, May 21, 2014
Krisberg, meanwhile, said that putting a young person already upset and going through an emotional crisis into seclusion can often make the problem worse, adding “there’s not a shred of evidence that putting somebody in solitary confinement helps them.”
New criteria for clemency opens up application process for federal inmates
Barry Krisberg interviewed by KPCC-FM, Take Two, April 22, 2014
“We enacted all these laws, mistakenly thinking that this was going to deter drug use, and it didn’t. Now people are looking at those sentences and saying that they were wildly disproportionate, that they use up a tremendous amount of incarceration costs, and that we really need to do something different if we want to reduce drug use in American society.”
The ‘superpredator’ scare
Barry Krisberg interviewed by The New York Times Retro Report, April 6, 2014
“This country went into a moral panic about ‘superpredators.’ But the calculations were wrong. They made it up…. It was a myth, and, unfortunately, it was a myth that some academics jumped onto. The fear of the ‘superpredator’ led to a tremendous number of laws and policies that we’re just now recovering from.”
Re-entry programs & recidivism: the connection continued
Barry Krisberg quoted in Corrections, March 24, 2014
Barry Krisberg … noted that, “Everything we know from the most rigorous research suggests if you want to reduce recidivism rates, you have to address housing, security, availability of jobs, and social connections.”