Criminal Justice Reform
- alwjones3
- Jun 29, 2020
- 2 min read
Updated: Sep 24, 2020
Did you know that Oklahoma puts 33 percent more men and 91 percent more women in prison than the national average? And, that more than three-quarters of convicted criminals sent to prison in Oklahoma committed nonviolent crimes?
It's true. However, there's a way to reduce incarceration while keeping crime rates low and making our communities safer. The purpose of prison should be to lock up dangerous people and serve as punishment for the most serious crimes. Our criminal justice system should not push people into impossible-to-pay debts or compromise a person's ability to work beyond what is truly necessary to protect the public.
Nearly everyone arrested, even most of those who go to prison, will return to our communities one day. The best result of the criminal justice system is turning offenders back into law-abiding and productive members of society. That is not always possible, but states that have decreased prison time and focused on better reentry and probation processes have seen both costs and crime rates go down.
Rather than being hard on crime, or soft on crime, it is time for Oklahoma to be smart on crime.
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ADDITIONAL RESEARCH
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