After decades of building prisons and increasing the number of people behind bars, the pendulum of California’s criminal justice system has swung away from incarceration. Among the policies and laws that are changing the way offenders are sentenced is Proposition 47, which was passed in November 2014, and redefines six nonviolent felonies as misdemeanors. About 1 million Californians are being affected by this legislation—getting felonies cleared from their records, being resentenced, and in some cases getting out of prison earlier than expected. At an event co-presented by the California Endowment, Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Stephen V. Manley, Los Angeles Regional Reentry Partnership Executive Director Peggy Edwards, and Project Rebound Director Jason Bell told a full-house crowd at the Endowment’s downtown L.A. headquarters how Proposition 47 is changing the state’s approach to criminal justice and, more broadly, the challenges faced by prisoners upon reentry to society.
Edwards said that the first months of Proposition 47 have raised a number of questions that are slowly being answered. But the law is being received with a great deal of excitement among people with felony convictions, many of whom “are chomping at the bit” to be resentenced. Getting a felony conviction off your record clears ex-offenders to receive public housing and employment support.
Andy Furillo, who covers crime and punishment for The Sacramento Bee and served as the evening’s moderator, asked Judge Manley to talk about what kind of sanctions work to prevent recidivism in the offenders he sees in drug court.
[For more of this story, written by Sarah Rothbard, go to http://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/2015/02/19/when-a-felony-is-no-longer-a-felony/events/the-takeaway/]
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