Tag: Uniform Act

New York Bar adopts reentry recommendations

In 2012 newly elected President of the New York State Bar Association (NYSBA), Seymour James, Jr., drew upon his 38 years of experience at the Legal Aid Society of New York City to establish a Special Committee on Reentry and appointed committee members who would spend the next three years researching and studying issues relating to reentry and reintegration.

The goal of this Special Committee was to develop a report and recommendations including a consideration of collateral consequences that can have an impact on reentry regarding education, housing employment, medical health, mental health and juveniles. The report identifies some of the best practices to ensure productive lives and minimize recidivism of formerly incarcerated adults and detained juveniles, and of adults and juveniles who can avoid convictions and delinquency findings through innovative diversion programs.

On January 29, 2016 the NYSBA House of Delegates adopted the report and recommendations of the Special Committee.

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New York certificate scheme found inaccessible and ineffective

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The certificate system for restoring rights after conviction in New York no longer serves its intended purposes, according to an investigation by City Limits.  The problem is that Certificates of Relief from Disabilities (CRD) are supposed to be a means to rehabilitation for people sentenced to probation, but the judges authorized to issue them see them (in the words of one public defender) “as a gold star, as a thing you get after you’ve been rehabilitated.”  The Parole Board appears similarly Read more

Long waits for expungement frustrate public safety purposes

whiteegret2Recently, in commenting on a new expungement scheme enacted by the Louisiana legislature, we noted the disconnect between the stated reentry-related purposes of the law and its lengthy eligibility waiting periods.  If people have to log many years of law-abiding conduct before they can even apply for this relief, it is not likely to be of much help to people returning home from prison.  Were Louisiana lawmakers unaware that the new expungement law would be unlikely to serve its stated purposes, or did they have some reason for advertising the new law in terms they knew were inapt.

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Is pardon making a comeback? Probably not, but law reform may be

A recent issue of Governing Magazine reports that pardoning is “making a comeback” after decades of neglect.  It would be nice if it were true.

h2_31.132.34But the evidence of comeback is thin. Almost all of the jurisdictions where pardoning is thriving today are the same ones where it was thriving a decade ago.  In a dozen states, including Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Nebraska, South Carolina and South Dakota, pardon has never been neglected, much less abandoned by responsible officials. In these jurisdictions and a handful of others, pardon has deep roots in the justice system and is supported by accountable institutions of government.

It is certainly true that Pat Quinn of Illinois and Jerry Brown of California have made generous use of the power of their office after years in which the pardon power in their states languished unused.  Terry McAuliffe of Virginia is a newcomer to the small group of governors who evidently feel that pardoning is a responsibility of office.  All three are to be commended for it.  But three swallows do not make a summer.

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Special interests succeed in watering down NJ Opportunity to Compete Act

In updating our book on New Jersey Collateral Consequences, J.C. Lore and I analyzed the provisions of New Jerseys’ new Opportunity to Compete Act, signed by Governor Christie in August and scheduled to become effective on March 15, 2015.   The Act applies a ban-the-box requirement to most public and private employers with more than 15 employees.  Having followed the bill through its passage in the House last spring, we were disappointed but not surprised to see that there were a number of employer-friendly amendments added to the Act just prior to final action in the Senate, with the result that there is a great deal of uncertainty about what the law actually accomplishes.  The important provisions omitted from the bill in the Senate, after lobbying by business and industry groups, includedstock-photo-usa-american-new-jersey-state-map-outline-with-grunge-effect-flag-insert-101188936

  • A prohibition on considering certain types of criminal histories, including conviction records after a certain number of years;
  • A private right of action against employers;
  • A definition of “initial employment application process” that permits inspection of criminal records at an earlier stage of the employment process;
  • A requirement that an employer make a good faith effort to discuss the applicants criminal record if it is of concern; and
  • A provision permitting negligent hiring suits in cases of “gross negligence.”

The bill as amended also preempted local ban-the-box laws, so that Newark’s more progressive ban-the-box ordinance appears to be on life support.

Attached are the enacted version of the New Jersey Opportunity to Compete Act, as well as the “advance law” with brackets to show which language was removed in the Senate.

EDITOR’S NOTE:  Much chastened, the author of the NACDL Restoration of Rights Resource has made appropriate modifications in the New Jersey profile.  Note that similar last-minute amendments also substantially weakened the Delaware ban-the-box law, omitting similar provisions that would have prohibited employers from considering certain types of criminal records, notably convictions more than 10 years old.  In the same fashion, last-minute amendments to Vermont’s Uniform Collateral Consequences of Conviction Act restricted its coverage to less serious offenses, disappointing its sponsors.

The lesson for advocates is that they must be eternally vigilant for last-minute lobbying by special interests to dilute provisions of progressive legislation intended to give people with a criminal record a fairer chance in the workplace. – ML

More states rely on judicial expungement to avoid collateral consequences

Oklahoma is the most recent state to expand its expungement laws to make more people eligible fOklahomauntitledor record-clearing at an earlier date.  While the specific changes adopted by the Oklahoma legislature are relatively modest, involving reduced waiting periods and fewer disqualifying priors, they are significant as part of a national trend toward enlarging this type of “forgetting” relief for people with minor criminal records.  Details of Oklahoma’s law are available here.

Other states that have enacted new expungement laws or broadened existing ones in the past two years include Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Indiana, Minnesota, and Tennessee.

Alabama’s new expungement law is the first record-closing law in that state and applies only to non-conviction records.  Arkansas and Minnesota broadened or consolidated existing expungement schemes that were already quite extensive.  The Indiana expungement scheme is entirely new and particularly comprehensive and progressive. (An analysis of the new law by its primary sponsor in the Indiana legislature will be posted in this space very soon.)  The effect of this type of “forgetting” relief varies widely from state to state, from complete destruction of records in states like Pennsylvania and Connecticut to more limited relief in Kansas and Indiana, where expunged records remain accessible to some employers as well as law enforcement.

The other type of individualized judicial relief from collateral consequences that is growing in popularity relies not on limiting public access to a person’s criminal record, but instead on Read more