Five Things: Opioid Epidemic May Increase Homicides & More

Here are five things you should know about justice reform this week:
 
"...were it not for the violence associated with the opioid market, the national drop in killings would have been greater."
 
Hundreds of thousands of lives have been lost to the opioid epidemic over the last two decades, and a new report published this week examines whether this toll has been accompanied by an increase in violence resulting from growth in the illicit opioid market. The results are unsettling: authors found that increases in activity in this market were associated with—and arguably caused—increased levels of homicide, particularly in Appalachia. Between 1999 and 2015, the growth in overdose rates among Whites was associated with a 9% increase in homicide across all U.S. counties, and a 19% increase within Appalachia.
 
"17 million households with children likely experienced shortfalls in food, housing, healthcare, or other essentials because a parent was saddled with court debt."
 
A new report from the Fines and Fees Justice Center is shedding light on the impact of court debt on families across the nation. Among the findings: 99% of parents of minors who were subject to unaffordable court debt had to cut back on at least one necessity to pay their fines and fees. 
 
"It is a disgrace that our government institutions lock more than 120,000 people in solitary confinement each day."
 
A year after President Biden issued an executive order aimed at overhauling the use of solitary confinement, a new analysis has found the practice is surging across the country. The report found, among other things, that an eye-popping 122,000 individuals are held in solitary confinement in prisons and jails across the United States. According to the report, 26% of Nevada’s prison population is housed in solitary confinement, making it the state with the highest percentage of its prison population housed in these brutal settings. 
 
"That we would then deny them any opportunity to change and contribute seems an epitome of injustice and disregard for youth."

Despite incredibly low recidivism rates among people who are released decades after being sentenced to life without parole as a minor—just 1%—advocates have faced an uphill battle in changing decades-old, tough-on crime policies. Now, due to U.S. Supreme Court decisions, state-level reforms, and clemency measures, some people who were once sentenced to serve the rest of their lives in prison for crimes they committed as minors have become the strongest advocates for change. In Michigan, they're making progress in one of the toughest states of all. 
 
"It's how we hold people accountable and how we do it in the most equitable way, in a way that isn't inhumane and overly punitive."
 
Nebraska, which has the most overcrowded prisons in the country, became the latest state to advance a large criminal justice reform bill with the passage of LB 50 this week. The measure opens earlier parole eligibility dates, creates a new geriatric parole framework for elderly and medically vulnerable inmates, allows jurisdictions to establish specialty “problem solving” courts, and more. The bill now heads to Governor Pillen.