Shifting low-level offenders to county government control, giving good-time credits to some prisoners, and sending some inmates to out-of-state facilities will not get California’s prisons at a court imposed inmate population cap, according to a recent study.
In 2011, the U.S. Supreme court ordered state officials to cap its prison population at 137.5 percent of designed capacity or approximately 110,000 inmates. The current prison population hovers around 119,000. The state has until Dec 31 to meet the cap.
Overseeing state official’s efforts to meet the cap is a Federal District Court three-judge panel. The three-judge panel ordered state officials to create a list of prisoners who are least likely to reoffend if released from prison. The list is called the Low-Risk List. The three-judge panel told state officials if they cannot meet the cap, then they are to release prisoners based on the Low-Risk List.
When examining the current prison population, the Public Policy Institution of California found 44 percent are considered to be at low risk for reoffending. (A large portion of these low-risk offenders have committed very serious crimes, such as homicide or kidnapping.)
The study also found, “a quarter of the prison population is rated high risk for recommitting a drug, property, or violent crime. Among those serving for non-serious and nonviolent offenses, 50 percent are rated high risk to reoffend.”
According to the study, at end of 2012, the breakdown for the California inmate population:
Eighty-eight percent contained a prior violent or serious felony conviction
Sixteen percent registered sex offenders
Twenty-five percent Second Strikers
Nineteen percent serving life sentences with the possibility of parole
Seven percent Three-Strikers
Four percent serving life without the possibly of parole
The study finds that between 1990 and 2013, prisoners age 50 and older grew from 4 percent to 21 percent, while the percentage of prisoners age 25 and younger declined from 20 percent to 13 percent. “Given that aging offenders tend to have greater health care needs, these trends present a particular challenge to providing constitutionally adequate health care,” the study concludes.
These facts leave state officials with a conundrum: Do they release prisoners who committed a serious offense in the past, who have served their time and are now truly low risk? Or short-time prisoners who are more likely to return to crime once they’re free? The choice may seem obvious, but how does the state convince a skittish public that this is the safest way to reduce the prison population?
