Tuesday, March 31, 2020
Texas, going backwards
As people who have been following this blog well know, I'm very concerned about the impact of COVID-19 in prisons. I hope I'm wrong, but it does seem that the danger is very real of a disastrous outbreak, based on the nature of this disease and the conditions inherent to incarceration.
Some states are taking strong pro-active measures. New York, for example, has announced some releases. Texas, meanwhile is going in the other direction. My former student David Moore sent me a link to an order signed by Texas Governor Greg Abbott, which you can read here. Rather than expand releases, it restricts the ability of local officials and wardens from releasing prisoners who are categorized as "violent offenders."
There is a natural appeal to that, but the problem is that the order is terribly over-broad. We apply the label of "violent offender" to many people whose crime did not involve violence, for example. And some people convicted of violent offenses have proven themselves over years or decades to have been rehabilitated (it is possible, after all).
We'll see what happens next...
Some states are taking strong pro-active measures. New York, for example, has announced some releases. Texas, meanwhile is going in the other direction. My former student David Moore sent me a link to an order signed by Texas Governor Greg Abbott, which you can read here. Rather than expand releases, it restricts the ability of local officials and wardens from releasing prisoners who are categorized as "violent offenders."
There is a natural appeal to that, but the problem is that the order is terribly over-broad. We apply the label of "violent offender" to many people whose crime did not involve violence, for example. And some people convicted of violent offenses have proven themselves over years or decades to have been rehabilitated (it is possible, after all).
We'll see what happens next...
