JUSTICE ACTION NETWORK APPLAUDS INTRODUCTION OF BIPARTISAN LEGISLATION TO PROTECT ELDERLY, MEDICALLY VULNERABLE PEOPLE FROM COVID-19 IN PRISONS
COVID-19 Safer Detention Act Expands, Clarifies Compassionate Release, Home Detention programs
Justice Action Network’s Inimai Chettiar: “Allowing sick and elderly people to be transferred to home confinement or granted compassionate release will save lives, without threatening public safety.”
(Washington, DC) – Today, Inimai Chettiar, Federal Director of Justice Action Network, the country’s largest organization dedicated to advancing bipartisan criminal justice reform at the federal and state levels, released the following statement in support of the COVID-19 Safer Detention Act, bipartisan legislation introduced by Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Dick Durbin (D-IL), and co-sponsored by Senators Thom Tillis (R-NC), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Kevin Cramer (R-ND), Chris Coons (D-DE), Roger Wicker (R-MS), and Cory Booker (D-NJ):
“This pandemic has taken an awful toll on elderly and medically vulnerable people in prisons—hundreds of thousands have become infected, and thousands have died. Allowing sick and elderly people to be transferred to home confinement or granted compassionate release will save lives, without threatening public safety.
“It should come as no surprise that this legislation was driven by Senators Durbin and Grassley, whose bipartisan partnership was the driving force behind the First Step Act. We are heartened to see that criminal justice reform continues to be the issue that bridges the partisan divide.
We encourage lawmakers on both sides of the aisle to join with Senators Durbin, Grassley, Tillis, Whitehouse, Cramer, Coons, Wicker, and Booker, and support this critical legislation. If Congress does not act now, thousands more people may fall victim to this deadly disease, risking the lives of other prisoners, correctional officers and entire surrounding communities.”
The COVID-19 Safer Detention Act:
Clarifies that the percentage of time served required for the Elderly Home Detention Pilot Program should be calculated based on a person’s sentence, including reductions for good time credits;
Expands the eligibility criteria for the Elderly Home Detention Pilot Program to include people convicted of nonviolent offenses who have served at least 50 percent of their term;
Clarifies that elderly people convicted of nonviolent D.C. Code offenses who are in BOP custody are eligible for the Elderly Home Detention Pilot Program and that people sentenced before November 1, 1987 are eligible for compassionate release;
Subjects elderly home detention eligibility decisions to judicial review (based on the First Step Act’s compassionate release provision); and
Provides that, during the period of the pandemic, COVID-19 vulnerability is a basis for compassionate release and shortens the period people must wait for judicial review for elderly home detention and compassionate release from 30 to 10 days.
This legislation has earned broad, bipartisan support, with endorsements from Americans for Prosperity, Drug Policy Alliance, Due Process Institute, FAMM, Federal Public and Community Defenders, FreedomWorks, Innocence Project, Justice Action Network, Law Enforcement Leaders, National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL), Prison Fellowship, Right on Crime, Sentencing Project, Taking Action For Good, Tzedek Association, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, ACLU, Americans for Tax Reform, Dream Corps JUSTICE (formerly #cut50), and Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.