“Expanding Compassion Beyond the COVID-19 Pandemic”

The title of this post is the title of this paper now on SSRN authored by Katie Tinto and Jenny Roberts. Here is its abstract:

Compassionate relief matters.  It matters so that courts may account for tragically unforeseeable events, as when an illness or disability renders proper care impossible while a defendant remains incarcerated, or when family tragedy leaves an inmate the sole caretaker for an incapacitated partner or minor children.  It matters too, as present circumstances make clear, when public-health calamities threaten inmates with literal death sentences.  It matters even when no crisis looms, but simply when continued incarceration would be “greater than necessary” to achieve the ends of justice.