NYUJ Executive Director Alexander Horwitz addresses the racial discrepancies surrounding parole.
NYUJ Executive Director Alexander Horwitz says a 76% recidivism rate in local prisons is due to largely to ‘technical parole violations’ -not new crimes. These are things such as violating ruleas about where someone can live, who they can associate with, and other parole rules. A Black person compared to a White person out on parole, Horwitz adds, is 12 times more likely to be sent back to jail.
“The racial disparities are absolutely obvious. You take all of this together and what it means is it is time for New York to act. It is time for wholesale and complete parole reform that will root out the racism in this system.”
WBFO s Thomas O Neil-White reports.
As the Executive Director of PeacePrints Western New York, McEachon’s goal is to provide a link to services on the outside for people at the end of their journey through the state prison system. A system which overwhelming houses Black and Brown bodies.
McEachon echoes many criminal justice reformers when she said former inmates are often ill-prepared to re-enter society after a lengthy prison sentence.
“But what you know on the outside is a memory,” she said. “Because worlds change. Our world moves at a rapid, rapid-fire pace and in the facility, it doesn’t. It’s very slow, it’s very routine and that is intentional in how it operates. It’s almost a thoughtless environment.”
2:38
Prisons are hotspots for COVID-19, and criminal justice advocates are calling for reform to minimize ongoing spread.
The Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS) only recently began testing asymptomatic prisoners. Horwitz explains how this change in testing revealed the drastic increase.
“The sudden increase as a result of this change validates what we have been warning about for months, which is that these infections are going unchecked, undocumented and untreated in DOCCS facilities. And that is a totally unacceptable outcome.”
Horwitz is also worried about the virus spreading to the community, as one documented case in Greene County spread from a prison to a nursing home. Correction officers’ health is also at risk. About 65% of them at one prison reported being unsatisfied with DOCCS’s response to COVID-19. Horwitz suggests a different approach.