Keystone Clean Slate Expansion, FBI Data Analysis & More

“We believe in second chances and we believe in opportunity for all Pennsylvanians.”

Governor Josh Shapiro held a press conference and ceremonial bill signing on the effective date of Pennsylvania's newest Clean Slate iteration this week. Expanding Pennsylvania's record-sealing initiative to include low-level, non-violent drug felonies, the new law once again makes Pennsylvania a national leader in automated expungement policy. The Governor was joined by legislative leaders, the Pennsylvania business community, and advocates, including the Justice Action Network. 

“Almost all crime data is imperfect, and the quarterly data adds an important imperfect piece to the national crime trend jigsaw puzzle.”

The FBI's preliminary data for Q1 2024 shows a significant decline in crime compared to Q1 2023, further indicating that the downward trajectory in crime rates is here to stay. Still, criminal justice data Analyst Jeff Asher cautions that the extent of the decline may be overstated so advocates should take care to communicate clearly until numbers are confirmed for the year. In some areas, Asher says corrections will likely be small or even reflect bigger declines, but, in others, the FBI's numbers show a much bigger decline than does local publicly available data. 

“[W]e are struck by the breadth and depth of the evidence of how the excessive caseload has impacted the Public Defender’s representation of indigent defendants.”

Florida and Georgia's indigent defense systems are in dire straits. The third installment in Radley Balko's on-going series on public defense was released this week, revealing yet two more places where court appointed attorneys struggle with overwhelming caseloads -- handling up to 500 felonies annually in Florida, for instance -- and severe underfunding, leading to high turnover rates and poor outcomes for the people who cannot afford to hire private counsel when charged with a crime. Earlier installments in the series provide a deep dive into the state-by-state public defense crisis. 

"The reality is, it costs more to incarcerate someone than it does to provide that same person a monthly EBT card with about $8.33 per day to feed themselves and or their family."

The 1996 welfare reform legislation permanently banned individuals with felony drug convictions from receiving SNAP benefits. Today, 27 states have opted out of enforcing the policy, but 22 others continue to have partial bans in place, and in South Carolina, the full effect of the policy keeps some returning citizens and their families in a state of food insecurity that compromises their successful reentry. Experts say removing the ban at the federal level remains the best solution to a policy that is believed to increase recidivism and cost taxpayers more in the long-term.

“This is heinous conduct that we cannot tolerate."

A Washington Post investigation revealed that over the past two decades, hundreds of U.S. law enforcement officers have sexually abused children, with systemic failures across the criminal justice system allowing these crimes to persist. The investigation identified at least 1,800 officers charged with child sexual abuse crimes from 2005 to 2022, with nearly 40% of convicted officers avoiding prison. The report highlights that police departments often failed to perform adequate background checks, ignored red flags, and mishandled investigations, while prosecutors and judges frequently offered lenient plea deals and sentences, leaving children in every state vulnerable to abuse.