Issues

Ending both mass incarceration and the ineffectiveness of our current criminal legal system cannot be achieved without addressing the rampant racism that supports it.

Get the facts on rates of incarceration for white, Black and Latinx Americans in our report, The Color of Justice: Racial and Ethnic Disparity in State Prisons.

Despite the criminal legal system’s purported goal of securing justice for crime victims, all too often, survivors of domestic violence are arrested, prosecuted, and punished. Our latest report, “Sentencing Reform for Criminalized Survivors: Learning from New York’s Domestic Violence Survivors Justice Act,” offers guidance to states on creating a more trauma-informed approach to sentencing practices for survivors.

Restoring voting rights for people with felony convictions can improve community safety. Our new report, Increasing Public Safety by Restoring Voting Rights, finds that having the right to vote or the act of voting is related to reduced recidivism for Americans who have been involved with the criminal legal system.

We can’t fight crime by locking up more of our kids. Incarcerating youth damages young people’s physical and mental health, impedes their educational and career success, and often exposes them to abuse.

Get the facts in our new report, “Why Youth Incarceration Fails: An Updated Review of the Evidence.”