As advocates representing poor people convicted of federal crimes, the overwhelming majority of whom are Black and Brown men, we have seen the ease with which harsh mandatory minimum sentences have become part of our criminal system.
For example, in 2008 at a federal courthouse in Fort Wayne, Indiana, our client Dion Walker received a mandatory life sentence for selling cocaine to a government informant. Because Walker had two prior convictions for nonviolent drug offenses, the judge had no choice but to sentence him to life in prison.
Highly controversial, this “three strikes” law represents the darkest excesses of our “tough on crime” approach to federal drug offenses.
Nonetheless, we have also seen modest progress toward reform. In 2018, Congress passed the First Step Act, which modified drug laws such that if Walker were sentenced today, his mandatory minimum would be 15 years, rather than life.
As reforms often are, however, the First Step Act was imperfect: Congress did not make its changes retroactive, meaning Walker continues to languish in prison for a sentence Congress overwhelmingly recognized as unjustifiably long.
Second chance for prisoners serving unjust, outdated sentences
On Nov. 1, another promising reform takes effect, providing hope that Walker and hundreds of others serving unjust and outdated sentences might receive a second chance at life outside of prison walls. Under new guidance from the U.S. Sentencing Commission, the agency responsible for setting federal sentencing policy, individuals like Walker can now ask judges to reduce their “unusually long sentences.”
The underlying legal basis is a law passed by Congress in 1984 – informally known as “compassionate release” – that permits judges to reduce a sentence when an individual can show an “extraordinary and compelling” reason for doing so.
Criminal justice footprint shrinking:Don’t just focus on bad news about crime. We ignore progress at our peril.
The Sentencing Commission’s commonsense expansion of compassionate release makes us hopeful that our federal criminal system can carve out a little space for redemption, mercy and a recognition that we don’t always get it right the first time around.
Unfortunately, even with the promise of and need for the commission’s new guidance, the future of compassionate release is uncertain. The Department of Justice has objected to the commission’s recognition that legal changes resulting in an unjust sentence can qualify as an extraordinary and compelling reason justifying relief.
Justice Department should not obstruct compassionate release
With the Sentencing Commission’s new guidance soon to be in effect and binding on federal judges, the DOJ and Attorney General Merrick Garland must decide whether they will support the commission – or whether they will fight to keep people such as Walker behind bars.
We urge AG Garland to follow the commission’s example and allow compassionate release to “rekindle” “the light of redemption (that) has almost been extinguished from our federal prisons,” as Commission Chair Judge Carlton W. Reeves explained when announcing the new sentencing guidelines.
Supporting the commission’s expansion of compassionate release is particularly urgent as other mechanisms to review unjust federal sentences are increasingly unattainable. Congress abolished federal parole in 1984. The Supreme Court has narrowed post-conviction habeas corpus to near extinction, and presidents of both parties have failed to embrace their clemency power.
Our system’s obsession with sentence finality is overwhelming our duty to achieve justice. For the lucky ones who have been released early through compassionate release, success stories abound. For example, Bryant Brim, who was serving a mandatory life sentence for a drug offense that could not be imposed today, shared his story of redemption with the commission during a public hearing earlier this year.
Compassionate release – increasingly the only realistic hope for relief for individuals such as Brim and Walker – will create more success stories.
School police officers do more harm than good. Why do politicians still push for them?
Walker, for example, has been in prison nearly 20 years and has already overserved the 15-year mandatory minimum that would apply to him today.
He is also not the same person he was when he was arrested in 2005. He has an exemplary prison record, and he has a loving family and several job opportunities waiting for him in his Indiana hometown.
Walker is a victim of the worst excesses of our “tough on crime” obsession; we hope he can benefit from the Sentencing Commission’s modest counterweight to that excess.
Undoing the injustice and excessive harshness of our federal criminal system will be a long process – no single action will be enough. But giving Walker and the other individuals incarcerated for sentences they could not receive today the chance at justice they deserve is a good start.
We celebrate the Sentencing Commission for giving them that chance and urge the DOJ not to stand in the way when individuals like Walker take it.
Erica Zunkel is a clinical professor at the University of Chicago Law School and teaches in the Criminal and Juvenile Justice Clinic. In February, she testified before the U.S. Sentencing Commission about expanding compassionate release. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter: @ezunk
Nathaniel Berry is a third-year law student and a student attorney in the Criminal and Juvenile Justice Clinic.
This post was originally published on this site be sure to check out more of their content.
