Author Archives: Eliza Hersh

Eliza Hersh

Eliza Hersh is a CCRC Board Member and a 2016 Soros Justice Fellow at Berkeley Law School’s Center for the Study of Law & Society. The views and opinions expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Open Society Foundations.

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Felony Disenfranchisement: Setting the Record Straighter

Recently, a woman standing outside of a Berkeley grocery store asked if I wanted to register to vote. I asked her, “Can I vote if I’m on probation?” She looked at me with horror, gripped her clipboard, and physically recoiled from me and the cantaloupe I was holding. Once she regained some composure, she sincerely, confidently, and erroneously informed me that California’s laws prohibit voting while on probation.

That encounter inspired me to draft these goals for all of the voter registration advocates (including me!) working the sidewalks this election season:

1: Practice not physically recoiling in horror from people we encounter in life.

2: Learn the voting laws in our jurisdictions to avoid disenfranchisement through disinformation.

Each state has its own laws about voting following a felony conviction.  Two states never disenfranchise voters following conviction. (Hey, Maine! Hey, Vermont!) Some states permanently terminate the voting rights of outrageous numbers of its citizens: Florida’s draconian voting laws disenfranchise 10% of its total population. In 2000, Florida disenfranchised 600,000 citizens with felony convictions. That same year, its presidential race was decided by 537 votes.

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Ampersands – Brock Turner & conflicts of justice

georgiaI recently had the chance to meet with one of the leading international experts on the treatment and punishment of people who have committed sex offenses. I noticed she has a small tattoo of an ampersand on the inside of her wrist. I keep thinking of that ampersand as I read Brock Turner rage memes, which I both hate and find so satisfying.

Ampersand: This difficult fact is true AND this other, seemingly contradictory fact is also true. It’s difficult to hold all of it at the same time– fury against the man who raped an unconscious woman behind a dumpster, AND relief at the rare flash of humanity and mercy extended to him in our otherwise unrelenting carceral system, AND anger about the race and class context of that mercy.

Our current sex offense policies thwart accountability by perpetrators, re-traumatize victims of sexual assault, foster racialized implementation of laws, decrease public health and public safety in our communities, and, despite their failures, cost us billions of dollars each year. In short, it’s a crisis.

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Clean slate remedies help overcome collateral consequences

Eliza Hersh, director of the Clean Slate Clinic at the East Bay Community Law Center and one of CCRC’s contributing authors, has co-authored a most persuasive op ed in the LA Times, which we are pleased to reprint here in full.  

Should a shoplifting conviction be an indelible 1016829040562382727EwjStKwcscarlet letter? Not in California

What exactly is the appropriate punishment for someone who commits a low-level, nonviolent crime? Should a conviction for minor drug possession, shoplifting or writing a bad check result in a lifetime of stigma and denied opportunities, or do people with criminal records deserve a second chance?

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California’s Proposition 47 and collateral consequences: Part II (reentry and restoration of rights)

Prop 47 and restoration of rights 

California’s recently enacted Proposition 47 fundamentally alters the landscape for a handful of lower-level felony offenses in California. As discussed by Jeffery Aaron in a previous post, Prop 47 reclassifies eight offenses as misdemeanors, including simple drug possession offenses and theft of less than $950. Anyone with a qualifying conviction, who also does not have a disqualifying prior, can now petition under Prop 47 to have a felony reclassifiedimages as a misdemeanor. The most significant and immediate relief will be for people who are incarcerated for qualifying low-level felonies and who are now eligible for resentencing and release. Public defender offices around the state are busy filing those petitions.

But, Prop 47 also allows two other populations to petition for reclassification of their qualifying felonies to misdemeanors: People who are under supervision but not incarcerated (on probation, parole, or post-release community supervision), and people whose sentences were completed long ago. This aspect of the new law presents good opportunities for tens of thousands of Californians, and not insignificant implementation challenges.

Simply by reclassifying certain offenses from felonies to misdemeanors, Prop 47 can undo some of the most serious collateral consequences.  It’s clear from our experience providing reentry legal services to thousands of clients over the years that people with felony, as opposed to misdemeanor, convictions face increased barriers to employment, housing, and full and meaningful community reintegration and citizenship. For example, people with a felony conviction, even a decades-old low-level offense, can never serve on a jury in California. For many people, Prop 47 will reverse this lifetime disenfranchisement and move them one step closer to full civic engagement.

But unfortunately, many of the statuary and extra-legal barriers to successful reentry that block people convicted of felonies also apply to people with convictions for misdemeanors and criminal infractions. Consequently, Prop 47 relief alone is not a cure-all for collateral consequences, and for most people it’s not even the most important petition they can file to overcome the statutory disabilities they face.  The following section describes how Prop 47 relief interacts with other California relief mechanisms. Read more