New Orleans' Priorities

Just today, the Times-Pic reported that "New Orleans judges have in the last three...years illegally used public money to buy more than $800,000 in supplemental insurance, and spent excessively on travel and lodging expenses." Their actions contravene a Louisiana statute that prevents judges from paying a different rate on their insurance premiums than other state employees.

There's a lot to pick at here. A curious soul might wonder whether Leon Cannizzaro, a former New Orleans judge and the city's current DA, was aware that his actions were illegal when he "may have participated at some time in the conduct [1]." Perhaps our intrepid inquisitor would inquire as to where the $800,000 came from in the first place. Presumably, this person would be shocked to learn that the cash came from a judicial expense fund that judges order criminal convicts to pay into: as much as $250 for a misdemeanor and $2,000 for a felony [2].  If our swiftly jaded protagonist dug a little deeper, they would find that Cannizzaro (who, it seems, ought to know) has claimed that judges extort money from convicts with the threat of revoking their probation [see 1].

From Been There, Done That.

So, in short, judges have been extracting a tax (of sorts) from convicts that is supposed to be used to fund necessary court operations, but is actually used to pay for the judges' healthcare.

One of the more disheartening aspects of this story is the fact that many parts of New Orleans' criminal justice system desperately need more funding. Orleans Public Defenders is always on perilous financial footing [3], as is the nascent pretrial services program.

The pretrial services program seeks to assess defendants and determine the risk that they will fail to appear for court dates or be rearrested if released. It is an attempt to provide judges with more information, and more knowledge about what information matters, so that those judges can make an intelligent decision about bail. A well-run pretrial services program can lead to cost savings (less people will be detained pending disposition), increased public safety (potentially dangerous defendants are flagged and detained), and a more just system (release decisions are based on evidence and not on a defendant's ability to pay for bail).

From NOLA.COM

The New Orleans pretrial services program started on April 30th, and has been screening roughly 60% of felony defendants. The program has cost New Orleans only $200,000 because of grants from the Bureau of Justice Assistance and Baptist Community Ministries. Those grants are expiring, though, and - if the program is to continue and expand to screening all defendants - the city will need to find $623,000. At the moment, it has only scrounged up $184,000 [3].

I truly hope that the Landrieu administration is putting on a show in the hopes that the tab will be picked up by someone else, and that they are not actually considering ending the program.

After its first three months of operation, the program had screened 928 felony defendants. Nearly 30% of those defendants were released on low or no bond ($325 or less), and 93% of the released defendants had appeared at their next court date. The program screens for indigence (i.e. whether the defendant needs a public defender) and for the DA's diversion program [4]. The program is still young, but stakeholders from every part of the criminal justice system of have praised it, and it is reasonable to expect that it will lend a strong consistency to bail decisions in New Orleans (for a concise report on the otherworldly pre-Katrina situation, take a gander at the Metropolitan Crime Commission's 2005 report on bail bond) and help reign in the cost of pretrial detention. In 2010, New Orleans' jails held roughly 1,956 defendants [5]. At $22.39 a day, for a year, the detention of those men cost New Orleans almost $16,000,000 [6].

$623,000 seems a small price to pay.

Thanks for reading.

J

Camden's Police Force

The NY Times has an article about Camden's crime problem, and the what the city is trying to do to solve it. The city has become so poor that it can no longer afford to sustain a police force of the size that it needs (the article cites generous union contracts as a partial cause). In order to resolve the issue, Camden is planning to shutter its police department in favor of pooling its resources with other municipalities to establish a county-wide police force of 400 officers.

As a point of reference, I should point out that Wilmington, DE - just 30 miles down the Delaware from Camden - has a comparable population (Camden is home to roughly 6,000 more people) and a comparable police department (289 officers to Camden's 273; Wilmington's force costs about $5 million less than Camden's). In 2010, Camden's violent crime rate was 2,328 per 100,000 residents, while Wilmington's was 1,909 per 100,000 residents. Neither of those numbers is good (by the violent crime rate measure, Wilmington and Camden are both more dangerous than Detroit), but I think that they imply that there are a number of things that Camden's police department could do to improve public safety that are less radical than shutting down completely.

From The Streets of Camden.

The larger issue is that it's unclear how a county-wide force will make things better. The force will have to patrol a much larger area (228 square miles instead of 10) that holds a much larger number of people (513,241 vs. 79,081) with a number of officers that hardly exceeds the size of Camden's department before layoffs in January 2011. It's difficult to see how Camden and the county will both be able to get the service they need.

Perhaps the hope is that a new department will allow officers to start from a new baseline in their relationships with communities in Camden, and in terms of department morale and organization. I think that this is the best justification for a radical restructuring, but I'm skeptical of its success without a sense of specific plans. It's in no way clear that the division of the new department that patrols Camden will be much different from the old Camden police department (even if, as the article says, there is a cap on the number of old officers that the new department can hire, that won't mean that those rehired officers can't be disproportionately staffed in Camden). Alternatively, one can imagine a system like the NYPD's where rookies cut their teeth in places like Brownsville and East NY before gaining seniority and opting to move to more affluent areas. A structure like this would ensure an inexperienced force in Camden. As for relationships with Camden residents, I'm curious about what is planned beyond a simple rebranding.

I sympathize with the city's dire situation and understand that civic leaders feel like the need to do something, but it's worth asking whether this reform will do much of anything to improve Camden's situation.

Thanks for reading.

J

Central Park Five

California Proposition 36

Proposition 36, a ballot initative in California meant to ameliorate harsher elements of CA's three strikes law, was approved last night. The media hasn't paid much attention yet (people appear to be more caught up in gay marriage and the legalization of marijuana), but it's wonderful news and will lead to a much more just policy for repeat offenders.

Specifically, the proposition modifies the three strikes law so that it only applies when an offender's third conviction is for a serious or violent crime (i.e. no more Ewing v. California), and it allows judges to re-sentence convicts who were incarcerated under the harsher three strikes law. As many as 3,000 of the current 8,800 inmates serving life under the three strikes law could be resentenced[1], which would - on top of rectifying thousands of appalling sentences - save the state gobs of money.

Curiously, Proposition 34, which would have repealed the death penalty, did not pass. Prop 36 won the majority of the vote in every single county [2], while Prop 34 lost by wide margins in most counties, only garnering most of the vote in urban centers along the cost [3].

A gym full of voters, not prisoners. From SFGate.





Criminal Justice in New Orleans

Before Katrina, and in its wake, the criminal justice system in New Orleans was a total mess. It didn't succeed in ensuring public safety, it didn't produce just outcomes, and it did both of those things at an exorbitant price. Over the last few years, a number of people have worked hard to alter the status quo. The NOLA PBS affiliate is running a three-part series detailing aspects of that effort. Watch the first installment here.

School to Prison Pipeline

On October 24th, the Justice Department has filed a lawsuit against against Meridian and Lauderdale County in Mississippi for maintaining a regimen of school discipline that includes incarceration at a detention center 80 miles away. The list of offenses that a student can be incarcerated for include flatulence and dress code infractions. Need I even note the complete absence of due process? The Washington Post has a more here.

Shaken Baby Syndrome

First of all, let me apologize for the long hiatus. A period of intense inquiry into graduate school and Hurricane Sandy are largely to blame...

Over at Slate, Emily Bazelon has an interesting piece about a criminal case in Arizona that has recently been overturned. It seems that the scientific consensus behind what signs and symptoms indicate that has a baby has been shaken has frayed (in some cases, at least). Take a look.