News and Events

Greta Thunberg started out all alone, but she’s not alone anymore.

Davontae Sanford spent years in prison for a crime he was found to never have committed. Under a new Detroit law making wrongly convicted inmates eligible for $50,000 compensation per year of incarceration, Sanford’s new lawyers obtained a $408,000 award for him.

The First Step Act shows that laws change, even though sometimes those changes take years, decades, or even centuries.

In 2018, American courts handed down fewer than 50 new death sentences, while the states still allowing capital punishment carried out fewer than 30 executions. This data, along with other recent updates, shows the decline of capital punishment in the U.S.

More than 15 years after the bill's last renewal expired, Congress updated the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act with an unusual degree of consensus.

On December 18, by an unexpectedly large 87-12 margin, the Senate passed the “First Step” criminal justice reform bill, setting the stage for final action (House approval of the Senate’s changes and presidential signature). Two days later, the House of Representatives cleared the Senate-passed bill, which President Trump has pledged, by …

For the first time, there is a real solution to a problem that has crippled America in so many ways. If the First Step Act becomes a reality, the problems are finally on their way to being solved.

A legislative session’s final days can be unpredictable, and the revised First Step Act still has some hardline opponents. But with more states, including some generally conservative ones, adopting their own sentencing reform bills, it looks increasingly likely Congress may do something similar for federal crimes in 2018.

Under the newly approved amendment, Florida residents who’ve been convicted of a felony can have their voting rights restored after they complete all terms of their sentence, including parole, probation, or restitution.

Congress passed the Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA) in 1984, aiming to bring longer sentences to career criminals committing violent felonies.