Notable new PPI report on “Contending with Carveouts: How and Why to Resist Charge-Based Exclusions in Reforms”

The folks at Prison Policy Initiative have this intriguing new advocacy document titled “Contending with Carveouts: How and Why to Resist Charge-Based Exclusions in Reforms.” Here is how the document gets started:

Criminal legal system reforms are being introduced at a rapid pace across the United States, often with the stated goal of reducing our extreme prison and jail populations.  Too often, however, these reforms are handicapped because they exclude large categories of people impacted by the criminal legal system.  These “carveouts” generally exclude people charged with or convicted of violent, sex-related, or other serious charges.  This is sometimes referred to as focusing on the “non, non, nons” — nonviolent, non-sexual, and non-serious charges.  “Serious” charges often include drug crimes that involve specific controlled substances, like fentanyl or methamphetamines.  Too often, policymakers believe that these carveouts are politically necessary in order to pass legislation, or believe that they are actually good policy.

Some criminal legal system reformers make the mistake of assuming that carveouts are an unavoidable or necessary part of all criminal legal reform.  But the reality is that criminal legal system reform will never achieve its goals if we continue to focus only on non-violent, non-sexual, and non-serious charges.  Carveouts dramatically lessen the impact of criminal legal system reforms, and create a more difficult political landscape for later reform.

Carveouts are common, but not inevitable.  Below, the Prison Policy Initiative has gathered a set of resources for advocates and policymakers to understand the problems posed by carveouts and equip them with arguments to make sure that criminal legal reform can be for everyone, not just for a small subset of impacted people.