The Failed Promise of Sentencing Reform / Michael O'Hear.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

O'Hear, Michael, author.

Series:

Gale eBooks

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Law reform--United States.

Law reform.

Sentences (Criminal procedure)--United States.

Sentences (Criminal procedure).

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xx, 268 pages) : illustrations

Edition:

1st ed.

Distribution:

New York : Bloomsbury Publishing (US), 2023.

Place of Publication:

Westport, CT : Praeger, 2017.

System Details:

text file HTML

Summary:

Despite 15 years of reform efforts, the incarceration rate in the United States remains at an unprecedented high level. This book provides the first comprehensive survey of these reforms and explains why they have proven to be ineffective. After many decades of stability, the imprisonment rate in the United States quintupled between 1973 and 2003. Since then, nearly all states have adopted multiple reforms intended to reduce imprisonment, but the U.S. imprisonment rate has only decreased by a paltry two percent. Why are American sentencing reforms since 2000 been largely ineffective? Are tough mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent drug offenders the primary reason our prisons are always full? This book offers a fascinating assessment of the wave of sentencing reforms adopted by dozens of states as well as changes at the federal level since 2000, identifying common themes among seemingly disparate changes in sentencing policy and highlighting recent reform efforts that have been more successful and may point the way forward for the nation as a whole. In The Failed Promise of Sentencing Reform, author Michael O'Hear exposes the myths that American prison sentencing reforms enacted in the 21st century have failed to have the expected effect because U.S. prisons are filled to capacity with nonviolent drug offenders as a result of the "war on drugs," and because of new laws that took away the discretion of judges and corrections officials. O'Hear then makes a convincing case for the real reason sentencing reforms have come up short: because they exclude violent and sexual offenders, and because they rely on the discretion of officials who still have every incentive to be highly risk-averse. He also highlights how overlooking the well-being of offenders and their families in our consideration of sentencing reform has undermined efforts to effect real change.

Contents:

Introduction : an era of treading water

The great U.S. imprisonment boom, 1973-2000

War on drugs : escalation and (Equivocal) de-escalation

The early release "Revolution"

Justice reinvestment : dominant reform model of the treading water era

Federal sentencing in the age of Bush and Obama

Sentencing in the Supreme Court

California : is the glass half empty or half full?

Conclusion : looking back, looking ahead.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Format:

Print version: O'Hear, Michael, 1968- author. Failed promise of sentencing reform

ISBN:

9798400649493

9798216082903

OCLC:

962025939