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Today In Criminal Justice
Corporate Corruption in the Age of Trump
Appeals Panel Skeptical of Trump Travel Ban Order
More Terror Suspects Enter from Canada than Mexico
Trump Backs Asset Forfeiture in Meeting with Sheriffs
Some States Are Pursuing Civil Forfeiture Reforms
Trump Continues to Cite Incorrect U.S. Murder Rate
'Implicit Bias' Influences Cops in Deadly Force Incidents: Study
How Many Black Police Are Needed To Cut Violence?
Sessions Confirmation as Attorney General Due Tonight
Mauer ‘Not Overly Optimistic’ About Sessions on Sentencing
MD High Court Adopts Compromise Bail Reform
Groups Sue Louisiana Over Lack of Lawyers for Poor
Top Story
Corporate Corruption in the Age of TrumpThe president’s pledge to do a “big number” on Dodd-Frank legislation won’t open the door to more financial chicanery, writes Gregg Barak, a criminal justice professor at Eastern Michigan University. That door was never closed, says an expert on multinational corporate crime. The Crime Report Appeals Panel Skeptical of Trump Travel Ban OrderThe Justice Department struggled to convince a federal appeals court panel to allow the federal government to resume enforcement of President Trump’s travel ban executive order, Politico reports. The Trump administration hopes to persuade the court to stay the entire Seattle federal judge’s order blocking key parts of the Jan. 27 directive blocking all refugee admissions and suspending travel to the U.S. from seven majority-Muslim countries. The three 9th Circuit Court of Appeals judges hearing the issue were skeptical enough of the government’s case that Justice Department attorney August Flentje repeatedly raised a fallback option that the court rein in the Seattle judge’s order without lifting it altogether.
After claiming that the courts should have little or no role in reviewing Trump’s decision, Flentje found himself on the defensive as two judges pressed him on the potentially stark implications of that position. “Could the president simply say in the order we’re not going to let any Muslims in?” asked Judge William Canby Jr. “That’s not what the order does here,” Flentje replied. “Oh, I know. Could he do that?” Canby asked again. Judge Richard Clifton expressed “serious concerns” about the scope of the lower court order and seemed inclined to rein it in. Judge Michelle Friedland said the court would act “as soon as possible.” If either side loses outright at the 9th Circuit, a further appeal to the Supreme Court is expected. Politico More Terror Suspects Enter from Canada than MexicoPresident Trump keeps talking about the threat from the U.S.-Mexico border, but he may be looking in the wrong direction, the Daily Beast reports. FBI reports say that far more suspected terrorists try to enter the U.S. from the northern border with Canada than from the south. Seven FBI Terrorist Screening Center “monthly domestic encounter reports” dating from April 2014 to August 2016 detail the number, type and location of encounters with known or suspected terrorists across the nation. In all seven reports, the numbers of encounters at land border crossings were higher in northern states than southern. “Not to say that Mexico isn’t a problem, but the real bad guys aren’t coming from there—at least not yet,” said a senior Department of Homeland Security official.
This week, White House press secretary Sean Spicer told reporters he would not disclose evidence behind the president’s claims that jihadis are “pouring” into the country. “I’m not going to get into specific information that the president has,” he said. FBI reports obtained by the Daily Beast provide data on known or suspected terrorists attempting to enter the country, or who are already here. These reports show hundreds of watchlisted passengers encountered on domestic flights, meaning they are already in the U.S., and a smaller percentage crossing the border over land. Those encounters are reported back to the FBI’s Terrorist Screening Center and used to compile the monthly domestic encounter overview reports, which are classified “Law Enforcement Sensitive.” The Daily Beast Trump Backs Asset Forfeiture in Meeting with SheriffsAt a meeting with sheriffs, President Trump joked about destroying the career of a Texas state senator who supported curtailing a controversial police practice for seizing people’s property. the Washington Post reports. Trump asked the assembled sheriffs yesterday if anyone wanted to “make a statement as to how we can bring about law enforcement in a very good civil lovely way, but we have to stop crime, right?” Sheriff Harold Eavenson of Rockwall County, Tx., cited the issue of civil asset forfeiture, which allows authorities to seize cash and property from people suspected, but in some cases not convicted or even charged with a crime.
Eavenson told Trump of a “state senator in Texas that was talking about legislation to require conviction before we could receive that forfeiture money.” “Can you believe that?” Trump interjected. Eavenson said, “I told him that the cartel would build a monument to him in Mexico if he could get that legislation passed.” “Who’s the state senator?” Trump asked. “We’ll destroy his career,” he joked. In 2014, federal authorities seized $5 billion from suspected criminals, more than the total losses to burglary that year. That number doesn’t count seizures by state and local law enforcement. Critics say the broad leeway to law enforcement officers in most states creates a system ripe for abuse. A 2015 ACLU investigation found that Philadelphia police routinely seized what amounted to “pocket change” from poor residents. The Post reported in 2014 that police seized $2.5 billion in cash from motorists not charged with crimes as part of a federal program. When told of the practice, a large majority of Americans opposed it. Washington Post Some States Are Pursuing Civil Forfeiture ReformsAs proceeds from civil forfeiture have swelled, so has the controversy surrounding the practice. A number of states are considering changes, from creating tracking systems that promote transparency to effectively banning forfeitures without a criminal conviction, Stateline reports. In many states, police need only to establish probable cause in order to seize property. During the judicial process, civil charges are brought against the property itself, which means the owner has no guarantee of legal representation in court. Costly attorneys’ fees can easily exceed the value of the seized property. A majority of states require forfeited property to be connected to criminal activity by a preponderance of evidence — a low bar in the civil court system.
Advocacy groups from the left-leaning American Civil Liberties Union to the libertarian Institute for Justice argue that property owners who face civil forfeiture suits are denied one of their most basic rights: the presumption of innocence until proven guilty. Last month, Gov. John Kasich of Ohio signed a measure barring forfeitures under $15,000 without a criminal conviction. Between 2010 and 2012, proceeds from civil forfeiture in Ohio totaled nearly $26 million. Most forfeitures fall well below the $15,000 threshold. A review of forfeitures in 10 states by the Institute for Justice found that the median value of forfeited property ranged from about $450 in Minnesota to $2,050 in Utah. The requirement of a criminal conviction affords property owners greater protections when their property is seized, such as the right to an attorney and a higher burden of proof — “beyond a reasonable doubt” — than in civil suits. A proposed Texas bill would require a criminal conviction in forfeiture cases, but the proposal faces a tough road ahead. Recent attempts to reform civil forfeiture in Texas have failed. Stateline Trump Continues to Cite Incorrect U.S. Murder RatePresident Trump continues to decry a record-high murder rate that doesn’t exist, CNN reports. Yesterday, he said during his meeting with sheriffs that, “the press doesn’t like to tell it like it is … The murder rate is the highest it’s been in I guess 45-47 years.” The reason there’s no reporting on a 45- or 47-year high murder rate is because the U.S. rate isn’t close to such record highs.
Trump repeatedly cited the faulty figure during his presidential campaign as he sought to paint the nation as besieged by crime unseen in decades, presenting his leadership as necessary to clean up the country. In 2015, the nation’s murder rate was lower than it was 45 years prior. The U.S. did experience its highest one-year increase in the murder rate in half a century between 2014 and 2015. The rate in 2015 was just 4.9 per 100,000 people. That figure is dwarfed by crime figures in the 1990s, when the murder rate hovered between 8 and 10 murders per 100,000 people. CNN 'Implicit Bias' Influences Cops in Deadly Force Incidents: StudyA study of the 990 incidents in 2015 in which deadly force was used by police and resulted in death has found that African Americans were more than twice as likely to have been unarmed during the encounter. The authors of the study, published in the most recent volume of the American Society of Criminology’s Criminology & Public Policy journal, concluded that “implicit bias” was a critical factor leading to a police officer’s failure to judge whether such encounters represented a serious threat. The Crime Report How Many Black Police Are Needed To Cut Violence?If police departments better reflected the racial makeup of the communities they served, would incidents of police violence drop? That rationale seemed intuitive, and Ferguson, Mo., offered fertile ground for testing the theory. In 2015, two in three residents in the city of 21,000 were black, but only three officers in the 53-member force were. This disparity appeared as a tangible underlying factor that may have contributed to Brown’s death. Black people are involved in and are victims of police-involved killings at greater proportions than any other racial group, but research findings on the role of race in police violence have been inconclusive and sometimes contradictory, NPR reports.
A study to be published in the Public Administration Review will complicate that body of research even more. “What we find is evidence that [having] more black police officers probably doesn’t offer a direct solution to this problem,” says Sean Nicholson-Crotty, a political scientist at Indiana University. The researchers concluded that as the ratio of black officers in police departments rose — up to a certain threshold — so did the number of fatal encounters between officers and black residents. When black officers reach 25 percent of the police force, the rate of fatal police-involved incidents levels off. The study also found that once a police department became about 40 percent black, the trendline flipped — the more black officers a department has after that point, the less likely the incidence of fatal encounters with black people. The study suggests that what departments really need isn’t just to simply add more black officers, but to reach a critical mass of black officers. In fact, so many black officers that they would be overrepresented relative to the local black population. Only 15 of the 100 largest cities have 40 percent black officers. NPR Sessions Confirmation as Attorney General Due TonightThe Senate is working overtime toward confirming Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), to become the nation’s top law enforcement officer as attorney general, reports the Associated Press. Sessions appears headed toward confirmation tonight by a nearly party-line vote. Democrats harshly criticized Sessions for being too close to Trump, too harsh on immigrants, and too weak on civil rights. “There is simply nothing in Senator Sessions’ testimony before the Judiciary Committee that gives me confidence that he would be willing to stand up to the president,” said Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT). “He has instead demonstrated only blind allegiance.”
Republicans say Sessions has demonstrated over a long career in public service — and two decades in the Senate — that he possesses integrity, honesty, and is committed to justice and the rule of law. “We all know him to be a man of deep integrity, a man of his word, and a man committed to fairness,” said Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley (R-IA). Sessions enjoys unanimous backing from fellow Republicans and cleared a procedural vote yesterday by a 52-47 margin, with West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin crossing over to back him. Last night, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) was given a rare rebuke for quoting Coretta Scott King, widow of the late civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., on the Senate floor. Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said Warren had violated the chamber’s rules by reading a three-decade-old letter from Mrs. King that dated to Sessions’ failed judicial nomination three decades ago and “impugning the motives” of Sessions. Associated Press Mauer ‘Not Overly Optimistic’ About Sessions on Sentencing“I’m not overly optimistic’ about the prospects for federal sentencing reform under Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Marc Mauer of The Sentencing Project tells AlterNet. He notes that the Alabama senator has backed “some criminal justice reform in the past, most notably the Fair Sentencing Act and the Prison Rape Elimination Act … but in other areas, he’s pretty much a hardliner. He was one of a handful of Republicans who vocally opposed sentencing reform legislation that was moving through Congress last year.”
Mauer says that whether Sessions “makes this a priority issue or lets his GOP colleagues on Capitol Hill take the lead will tell us a lot about the prospects.” With support from some Republicans at the state level, reform there “will continue to a significant extent,” Mauer predicts, noting that “by now, a number of states have had good experiences with reducing prison populations, with no adverse effects on public safety. The public has been supportive, or at least not opposed.” His conclusion is that “criminal justice reform has never been easy … but it’s come to the point where the public environment has been shifting in a more rational, compassionate direction.” AlterNet MD High Court Adopts Compromise Bail ReformMaryland’s highest court adopted a landmark rule aimed at ending the practice of holding criminal defendants in jail before trial when they cannot afford bail, reports the Baltimore Sun. The seven-member Court of Appeals unanimously okayed a compromise that does not abolish money bail, as some advocates have urged, but instructs judges and court commissioners to look first to other ways to ensure a defendant appears for trial.
Chief Judge Mary Ellen Barbera called the final language “the best possible proposed rule we can expect when we’re working with all stakeholders.” The rule won praise from both bail reform advocates and the bail bond industry, which felt threatened by the original proposal from the court’s rules committee. “Certainly there’s a consensus that the lack of money should not keep someone in jail before they have a trial,” said law Prof. Douglas Colbert of the University of Maryland and a longtime advocate for criminal justice reform. Nicholas Wachinski, representing bondsmen, said the rule keeps the option of money bail. “It preserves judicial discretion and allows judges to be judges,” he said. Baltimore Sun Groups Sue Louisiana Over Lack of Lawyers for PoorLouisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards was sued Monday by lawyers who say the public defender system denies effective representation to the poor, the Associated Press reports. The suit describes defendants waiting months in jail to meet a lawyer, defenders who are woefully overworked and so little funding that in some areas, low-level offenders don’t get a public defender at all. Without lawyers to advocate for them, it says, defendants have been advised to plead guilty rather than pursue their right to try clearing their names. The Southern Poverty Law Center, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, and two law firms sued on behalf of 13 criminal defendants. They seek class-action status to cover all the indigent defendants accused of non-capital crimes in Louisiana.
Kristen Clarke of the Lawyers’ Committee, said as many as 20,000 defendants could be affected. About 85 percent of the state’s defendants are so poor they qualify for a public defender. The lawsuit cites cases like that of Ashley Hurlburt in Winnfield Parish, who has been jailed since June 2016 on a charge of negligent homicide after her child’s death, and “remains entirely in the dark about the proceedings and her future,” the lawsuit says. Her first public defender left over a conflict of interest; her second was appointed three months ago but she’s never met the lawyer. The median funding level across the state’s 42 judicial districts was $238.69 per case, well below what many lawyers charge for a single hour of work. Associated Press | |
| | On every business day, The Crime Report (TCR) and Criminal Justice Journalists (CJJ) provide a summary of the nation's top crime and justice news stories with Internet links commentary, and New & Notable research in the field. We gratefully acknowledge the support of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, the Langeloth Foundation and the Urban Institute. Today's report was prepared by Ted Gest and Alice Popovici. Please send comments or questions to alice@thecrimereport.org. | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
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