Op-ed by Gregory Mingo, Vera Institute, May 14, 2024.
While I applaud New York Governor Kathy Hochul for transitioning to a system of granting clemency on an ongoing basis, rather than just once at the end of each year, I would like to challenge our governor and representatives to see the advantages of going further during this legislative session. We need to do more to expand clemency—both pardons and commuted sentences—for the benefits it provides for everyone, not only for incarcerated people themselves, but for their families and communities, as well as for state budgets and society. The United States metes out some of the longest prison sentences in the world. Here, we unconscionably sentence teenagers to life in prison. We allow people in their older years, including those who are critically ill, to remain in prison long past the time they could pose any threat to others.
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Op-ed by Steve Zeidman, New York Daily News, January 14, 2024.
New York State has its own crisis of mass incarceration. There are more than 32,000 people, disproportionately people of color, in state prison. More than 2,700 are at least 60 years old. More than 6,500 are serving life sentences. While scholars and advocates call for maximum sentences of 20 years, New York’s prisons hold almost 7,000 people serving sentences with 20-year minimums.
New York law, however, does contain a humane, though under-utilized, off ramp for people facing criminal charges. The law explicitly permits a judge to dismiss charges “in the interests of justice” even if the charges are supported by the facts and… Read more >>
By Rachel Rippetoe of Law360 on May 5, 2023
On the last Monday in April, Bruce Bryant woke up in his cell in New York’s Sing Sing Correctional Facility one final time. Hours later, he’d watch the large brick building, perched on a hill overlooking the Hudson River, fade from the rearview window of his family’s car as they drove him home after nearly three decades in prison.
For Bryant, who was granted clemency by Gov. Kathy Hochul in December and paroled in February, it was a day that came after years of work. He first applied for clemency in 2019, with a packet of more than 300 pages of recommendation letters from nonprofit leaders around New York State, a pastor and even a prison warden, all singing Bryant’s praises. Steve Zeidman, director of the Second Look Project at the City University of New York School of Law, called him “the poster child for clemency.” But three Christmases came and went, and he remained incarcerated for a murder he has always maintained he didn’t commit.
The hope that had kept Bryant alive all those years in prison came to fruition on April 24, 2023. The day was more than just a homecoming: It was the day Bruce Bryant died, and Bruce Bryan was reborn.
The “t” at the end of Bryan’s name was a clerical error, tacked onto his surname when it was entered into the system in 1993. He was 24 years old. Now at 53, he’s ready to shed the name that New York State gave him.
“We’re the Bryans — they took that from him, but now we’re getting it back,” Bryan’s sister Jestina Collins said as she shed joyful tears at his homecoming celebration that Monday at a buzzing recreation center in Brooklyn. “It’s over. It’s happiness forever now.” Read more >>
