In Los Angeles County, home to the country's largest jail population, the city and local organizations are partnering to create more equity in the legal process by focusing on mental health. The Center is helping to implement the LA-based Rapid Diversion Program, which helps individuals with mental health diagnoses connect with case management, treatment, housing and job services, and cases are dismissed when a participant completes the program. "If we’re able to help one person and change their trajectory, it can have compounding impacts for their families and their communities,” Chidinma Ume, our interim director of policy, says. Brett Taylor, senior advisor of West Coast Initiatives is also quoted.
The vast majority of women at Rikers are awaiting trial, and this op-ed by former Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman and Sharon White-Harrigan lays out the path to reduce the population of women and gender-expansive people currently detained on Rikers Island, referencing our co-authored report, Path to Under 100.
WNYC Radio Rookies reporter Deborah Ugo-Omenukwa worked with the Center to explore restorative justice in youth courts. She spoke with our Brownsville Community Justice Center to learn more about restorative approaches to the legal system, and the difference between punishment and consequences.
Gothamist reports on our study, supported by the Robin Hood Foundation, that finds vast over-involvement of Black and Brown people in misdemeanor prosecutions. While few of these cases result in criminal convictions, there is a heavy burden and cost to these interactions with law enforcement and the court system.
Saadiq Newton-Boyd knows from his experience with Brooklyn Justice Initiatives that you have to genuinely see potential in the community and let its members lead the way on the solutions to enact positive change.
Anna Pomper believes that we can work towards healing through people-centered justice: how we treat each other and how we address harm when it’s caused.
Eric Lach for the New Yorker spends time in the courtroom at arraignment to understand some of the factors fueling the current crisis on Rikers Island. The article cites our research that identified a 2020 spike in judges setting bail and explores the alternatives that judges have to bail--like someone being released on their own recognizance or supervised release.
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