Members of the newly appointed (and yet to be confirmed) parole board reviewed 177 eligible cases in March without granting a single release. Not one.
Just one example in its report is of a 55-year-old African American incarcerated for over 36 years. According to precedent, no board member actually met with this individual, nor did they confer with each other regarding the case, but each had access to information provided by an on-site interviewer and cast their votes online, choosing reasons from such options as the following:
Considering your offense and your institutional records, the Board concludes you should serve more of your sentence before being paroled.
Extensive criminal record
History of substance abuse.
History of violence.
Release at this time would diminish the seriousness of crime.
Serious nature and circumstances of your offense(s).
His list is a cookie cutter version of the reasons cited in the report, none of which acknowledge anyone’s accomplishments, and which brings up the following questions:
If our Department of Corrections (DOC) is unsuccessful in actually rehabilitating anyone, are we admitting that our $1.5 billion a year investment in “corrections” is a dismal failure?
How does the parole board’s actions reflect the DOC’s vision statement, “A premier correctional organization where all individuals achieve their full potential,” or its mission statement, “We are in the business of helping people to be better by safely providing effective incarceration, supervision and evidence-based re-entry services to inmates and supervisees”?
You have to wonder whether a Department of Education, for example, would deny students graduation based on “the seriousness of their ignorance” upon enrollment, rather than on their actual performance during their time in the classroom.
A 2021 report by law professors Bruck, Donovan and Engle and the W&L University School of Law’s “Parole Presentation Project” states, “Any discussion of potential reforms in Virginia’s parole system must start with the recognition that parole is a societal good. A decision to grant parole recognizes the successful rehabilitation of a prisoner. In other words, a parole grant is the result of the penal system functioning as we want it to.”
The non-profit and non-partisan Prison Policy Initiative, which does extensive research on the societal cost of mass incarceration, gives Virginia (and many other states, including California) a failing grade on its parole system. The very red and rural state of Wyoming earned its best rating, a B-, with Mississippi and Utah, along with two more urban states, Michigan and New Jersey, each earning C-’s.
The states given passing grades do not use the “seriousness of the offense” as a sole reason for denying parole, although the Board may consider the facts of a case. They mandate in-person, face-to-face parole hearings, and provide caseworkers to incarcerated individuals to help prepare them for their hearing. They allow incarcerated individuals access to the information the Board uses to determine whether to grant or deny, and allows them to question the accuracy of that information. They allow prison staff who have day-to-day perspectives on an individual’s character and growth to provide in-person testimony, and allow individuals on parole to reduce their length of supervision by accruing good time.
To the best of my knowledge, none of these things are true in Virginia’s parole system. Meanwhile, the grant rates in the above states are as high as 65%, closer to that of Virginia’s prior to 1995, and with positive outcomes.
Virginia’s release rates were well below 10% even under former administrations, and of those who remain eligible, most have been denied countless times, and are at the point of giving up hope. At nearby Augusta Correctional Center last year, for example, nearly 200 men, many with excellent behavior records and who had positive interviews by parole investigators, nevertheless were all denied release. Every one.
Having said that, our message to those behind bars should be clear. If you remain violent, anti-social and unrepentant you will remain incarcerated until you have served your time. But we are all better off if deserving persons are given second chance to become productive, taxpaying workers when they have been infraction-free for decades and have demonstrated thoroughly changed lives.
Not only will that improve the safety, security and morale of everyone in prison, but in light of the growing medical and other costs of incarcerating an ever greater number of elderly and infirm people behind bars, it will save us all a ton of money.
And maybe even result in our earning an A+ for having a Department of Correction that actually corrects and a Parole Board that actually paroles.
5 comments:
This is how the "Criminal Justice System" works. Several years ago I served on a Federal Grand Jury for a year. After being selected the Federal Prosecutor said to us that in 18 years he had never received a "No Bill," I wondered if I was going to be a mere rubber stamp!
Interesting. And sadly, very few cases are tried with a jury. Prosecutors press for some kind of plea bargain in which the client admits to a crime in exchange for what might be a lighter sentence than a jury would recommend. But is this justice?
Powerful commentary on the tragic and primitive state of our criminal justice system in Virginia. Thank you for keeping this issue alive.
Thanks, Anonymous.
As citizens and tax payers we must demand that the parole board do it's job and release inmates that are eligible for parole. We must do so by any means necessary. Including going to the state supreme court!!! What this parole board is doing is criminal!! And unjust! On so many levels. They are
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