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Proposal Details

Proposal ID	675
Proposal	2012 Platform amendment proposal: Criminal justice - CA
Presenter	Platform Committee Sponsored by GPCA
Floor Manager	Budd Dickinson
Phase	Closed - Adopted
Discussion	05-29-2012 - 06-10-2012
Voting	06-11-2012 - 06-17-2012
Presens Quorum	Two Thirds of Active Accredited States/Caucuses
Consens Quorum	Two Thirds of Yes and No Votes

Background

During the 2010 platform amendment process, three different proposals were passed by the NC on Criminal Justice: #500 from MO (http://gp.org/cgi-bin/vote/propdetail?pid=500), #499 from CA (http://gp.org/cgi-bin/vote/propdetail?pid=499) and #479 from GA ((http://gp.org/cgi-bin/vote/propdetail?pid=479). Subsequent to their passage, MO and CA worked upon a consolidation between the three planks and submitted that to the Platform Committee, but that consolidation was never forwarded to the NC by the Platform Committee for approval.

Instead, the existing GPUS Platform website http://www.gp.org/committees/platform/2010/social-justice.php#1001999 has just combined the separate introductions to the three different proposals into a single introduction without any specific authorization by the NC and then lists the policy planks for each proposal separately as three separate sections of Criminal Justice, which ends up having duplicative text between the three sections.

This proposal would seek to

- give the NC the final say on how the introduction should be written in combining the three proposals

- combines/reduces duplicative text among the three existing sub-sections

- separates out the 'war on drugs' text into its own clear and distinct fourth sub-section

Proposal

That the following text below replace the existing text at Section H in the Criminal Justice section.

Current text:

Social Justice
H. Criminal Justice

With less than five percent of the world’s population, the United States locks up nearly a quarter of the world’s prisoners. More than forty percent of those 2.3 million locked down come from America’s black one-eighth. The Green Party recognizes that our nation’s ostensibly color-blind systems of law enforcement and crime control, from police practices to prosecutorial prerogatives, to mandatory sentencing and zero-tolerance have effectively constituted an ubiquitous national policy of racially selective mass incarceration, a successor to Jim Crow as a means of social control, a policy that must be publicly discussed, widely recognized, and ultimately reversed.

The nearly universal, though largely unspoken nature of this policy makes piecemeal reforms not accompanied by public discussion of the larger policy ineffective outside the context of a broad social movement. Only a broad and multifaceted grassroots social movement can accomplish this goal, and the Green Party must contribute to that movement by running candidates for office at every opportunity who publicly draw attention to the nation’s swollen carceral state, and its failed, malevolent social experiment with racially selective mass imprisonment.

In addition to the Green Party’s prior positions on felony disenfranchisement, the provision of medical care, human and civil rights, and educational opportunities to those in prisons and jails, opposing state and federal three strikes laws, the incarceration of juveniles with adults and related matters, the Green Party favors the radical shrinkage of the nation’s enormous carceral apparatus, the sunset of all existing mandatory sentencing laws and the institution of racial and ethnic disparity impact studies for new and existing categories of offenses.

The United States has the highest incarceration and recidivism rates of industrialized countries, while our nation's criminal justice system in general is too often inhumane, ineffective, and prohibitively expensive. Our law enforcement priorities place too much emphasis on drug-related and petty, non-violent crimes, and not enough on prosecution of corporate, white collar, and environmental crime. The majority of prisoners are serving terms for non-violent, minor property and drug addiction crimes, or violations of their conditions of parole or probation, while the poor, the under-educated and various racial and ethnic minorities are over-represented in the prison population.

The negative effects of imprisonment are far-reaching. Prisoners are isolated from their communities and often denied contact with the free world and the media. Access to educational and legal materials is in decline. Prison administrators wield total authority over their environments, diminishing procedural input from experts and censoring employee complaints.

Our priorities must include efforts to prevent violent crime and address the legitimate needs of victims, while addressing the socio-economic root causes of crime and practicing policies that prevent recidivism.

The Green Party opposes the increasingly widespread privatization of prisons. These prisons treat people as their product and provide far worse service than government-run prisons. Profits in privately-run prisons are derived from understaffing, which severely reduces the acceptable care of inmates. Greens believe that greater, not lesser public input, oversight and control of prisons is the answer.

1. Alternatives to Incarceration:

Encourage and support positive approaches to punishment that build hope, responsibility and a sense of belonging. Prisons should be the sentence of last resort, reserved for violent criminals. Those convicted of non-violent offenses should be handled by alternative, community-based programs including halfway houses, work-furlough, community service, electronic monitoring, restitution, and rehabilitation programs.
Treat substance abuse as a medical problem, not a criminal problem. Free all non-violent incarcerated prisoners of the drug war. Provide treatment to parolees and probationers who fail a drug test instead of re-incarceration.
Release prisoners with diagnosed mental disorders to secure mental health treatment centers. Ensure psychological and medical care and rehabilitation services for mentally ill prisoners.
Release prisoners who are too old and/or infirm to pose a threat to society to less expensive, community-based facilities.
Make reduction of recidivism a primary goal of parole. Treat parole as a time of reintegration into the community, not as a continuation of sentence. Provide community reentry programs for inmates before their release. Provide access to education, addiction and psychological treatment, job training, work and housing upon their release. Provide counseling and other services to the members of a parolee's family, to help them with the changes caused by the parolee's return. Prevent unwarranted search without reasonable cause to parolees and their homes.
Increase funding for rape and domestic violence prevention and education programs.
Never house juvenile offenders with adults. House violent and non-violent juvenile offenders separately. Continue the education of juveniles while in custody. Substantially decrease the number of juvenile's assigned to each judge and caseworker to oversee each juvenile's placement and progress in the juvenile justice system.

2. Prison Conditions, Prisoner Treatment and Parolees:

Ensure prison conditions are humane and sanitary, including but are limited to heat, light, exercise, clothing, nutrition, libraries, possessions, and personal safety. Meet prisoners' dietary requirements. Ensure availability of psychological, drug, and medical treatment, including access to condoms and uninterrupted access to all prescribed medication. Minimize isolation of prisoners from staff and one another only as needed for safety. Make incarceration more community-based, including through increased visitor access by families. Establish and enforce prison policies that discourage racism, sexism, homophobia and rape.
Ban private prisons.
Implement a moratorium on prison construction. Redirect funds to alternatives to incarceration.
Require that each state prison system install a rehabilitation administrator with equal authority as the highest authority.
Ensure that all prisoners have the opportunity to obtain a General Education Diploma (i.e. high school equivalency diploma) and higher education. Education has proven to reduce recidivism by 10%.
Ensure the First Amendment rights of prisoners, including to communicate with journalists, write letters, publish their own writings, and become legal experts on their own cases.
Provide incarcerated individuals the right to vote by absentee ballot in the district of their domicile, and the right to vote during parole.
Restore the right to hold public office to felons who have completed their prison sentence.

3. Criminal Justice Reform:

a. Abolish the death penalty.

b. Repeal "three strikes" laws. Restore judicial discretion in sentencing. Abolish mandatory sentencing.

c. End the "war on drugs." Support expanded drug counseling and treatment. 30. The Green Party recognizes that the “war on drugs” is an ill conceived program that has wasted billions of dollars misdirecting law enforcement resources away from apprehending and prosecuting violent criminals in the United States. We believe it is time for a new approach to the serious problem of drug abuse in our communities, and that the decades old “war on drugs” be ended as soon as possible. The Green Party calls for new drug policies that are practical, honest, community based, and multifaceted.

d. The Green Party supports amending the Controlled Substances Act to reflect that drug use, in itself, is not a crime, and that persons living in the United States arrested for using drugs should not be incarcerated with those who have committed victim oriented crimes.

e. The Green Party supports implementing a step by step program to decriminalize all drugs in the United States.

The Green Party supports the redirection of funds presently budgeted for the “war on drugs” toward research, education, prevention, and treatment.
The Green Party believes people who have been incarcerated for the use of marijuana, without any convictions for victim oriented crimes, who do not require treatment for abuse of hard drugs, should be given complete amnesty, and should be immediately released from confinement in federal and state prisons, and in county/city jails, without any further parole or probation; all felony charges related to convictions for marijuana possession should be stricken from persons record.
The Green Party believes a system should be set up to systematically transfer prisoners convicted of using drugs, other than marijuana, into rehabilitation facilities if such prisoners choose to receive help for their addiction, but only if they have not been convicted of committing any victim oriented crimes.

f. Legalize possession of cannabis/marijuana.

g. Establish and fund programs to strengthen self-help and community action through neighborhood centers that provide legal aid, alternative dispute-resolution practices, mediated restitution, community team policing, and access to local crisis/assault care shelters.

h. Establish elected or appointed independent civilian review boards with subpoena power to investigate complaints about prison guard and community police behavior. Sharply restrict police use of weapons and restraining techniques such as pepper spray, stun belts, tasers and choke holds.

i. Prohibit property forfeiture and denial of due process of unconvicted suspects.

j. Establish freedom on bail as a right of all defendants charged with non-violent crimes. Incorporate mental health and social services in bail agreements.

k. Increase compensation for jurors and provide child care for those serving jury duty.

l. Protect victims' rights. Ensure the opportunity for victims to make victim-impact statements. Consider forms of restitution to victims.

Proposed replacement text:

Section title: Criminal Justice

Section subtitle: More Justice, Less Crime

Our position: Reduce the prison population, invest in rehabilitation, and end the failed war on drugs.

The United States has the highest incarceration and recidivism rates of industrialized countries, while our nation's criminal justice system in general is too often inhumane, ineffective, and prohibitively expensive. With less than five percent of the world’s population, the United States locks up nearly a quarter of the world’s prisoners. Our law enforcement priorities place too much emphasis on drug-related and petty, non-violent crimes, and not enough on prosecution of corporate, white collar, and environmental crime. The majority of prisoners are serving terms for non-violent, minor property and drug addiction crimes, or violations of their conditions of parole or probation, while the poor, the under-educated and various racial and ethnic minorities are over-represented in the prison population.

The negative effects of imprisonment are far-reaching. Prisoners are isolated from their communities and often denied contact with the free world and the media. Access to educational and legal materials is in decline. Prison administrators wield total authority over their environments, diminishing procedural input from experts and censoring employee complaints.

Our priorities must include efforts to prevent violent crime and address the legitimate needs of victims, while addressing the socio-economic root causes of crime and practicing policies that prevent recidivism.

Greens oppose the increasingly widespread privatization of prisons. These prisons treat people as their product and provide far worse service than government-run prisons. Profits in privately-run prisons are derived from understaffing, which severely reduces the acceptable care of inmates. Greens believe that greater, not lesser public input, oversight and control of prisons is the answer.

Greens call for an end to the "war on drugs", legalization of drugs and for treating drug abuse as a health issue. The “war on drugs” has been an ill conceived program that has wasted billions of dollars misdirecting law enforcement resources away from apprehending and prosecuting violent criminals, while crowding our prisons with non-violent drug offenders and disproportionately criminalizing youth of color.

Greens also call attention to the fact that more than forty percent of those 2.3 million locked down come from America’s black one-eighth.

The Green Party recognizes that our nation’s ostensibly color-blind systems of law enforcement and crime control, from police practices to prosecutorial prerogatives, to mandatory sentencing and zero-tolerance have effectively constituted an ubiquitous national policy of racially selective mass incarceration, a successor to Jim Crow as a means of social control, a policy that must be publicly discussed, widely recognized, and ultimately reversed. The nearly universal, though largely unspoken nature of this policy makes piecemeal reforms not accompanied by public discussion of the larger policy ineffective outside the context of a broad social movement.

Green Solutions

1. ALTERNATIVES TO INCARCERATION

a. Encourage and support positive approaches to punishment that build hope, responsibility and a sense of belonging. Prisons should be the sentence of last resort, reserved for violent criminals. Those convicted of non-violent offenses should be handled by alternative, community-based programs including halfway houses, work-furlough, community service, electronic monitoring, restitution, and rehabilitation programs.

b. Treat substance abuse as a medical problem, not a criminal problem. Free all non-violent incarcerated prisoners of the drug war. Provide treatment to parolees and probationers who fail a drug test instead of re-incarceration.

c. Release prisoners with diagnosed mental disorders to secure mental health treatment centers. Ensure psychological and medical care and rehabilitation services for mentally ill prisoners.

d. Release prisoners who are too old and/or infirm to pose a threat to society to less expensive, community-based facilities.

e. Make reduction of recidivism a primary goal of parole. Treat parole as a time of reintegration into the community, not as a continuation of sentence. Provide community reentry programs for inmates before their release. Provide access to education, addiction and psychological treatment, job training, work and housing upon their release. Provide counseling and other services to the members of a parolee's family, to help them with the changes caused by the parolee's return. Prevent unwarranted search without reasonable cause to parolees and their homes.

f. Increase funding for rape and domestic violence prevention and education programs.

g. Never house juvenile offenders with adults. House violent and non-violent juvenile offenders separately. Continue the education of juveniles while in custody. Substantially decrease the number of juvenile's assigned to each judge and caseworker to oversee each juvenile's placement and progress in the juvenile justice system.

2. PRISON CONDITIONS, PRISONER TREATMENT AND PAROLEES

a. Ensure prison conditions are humane and sanitary, including but are limited to heat, light, exercise, clothing, nutrition, libraries, possessions, and personal safety. Meet prisoners' dietary requirements. Ensure availability of psychological, drug, and medical treatment, including access to condoms and uninterrupted access to all prescribed medication. Minimize isolation of prisoners from staff and one another only as needed for safety. Make incarceration more community-based, including through increased visitor access by families. Establish and enforce prison policies that discourage racism, sexism, homophobia and rape.

b. Ban private prisons.

c. Implement a moratorium on prison construction. Redirect funds to alternatives to incarceration.

d. Require that each state prison system install a rehabilitation administrator with equal authority as the highest authority.

e. Ensure that all prisoners have the opportunity to obtain a General Education Diploma (i.e. high school equivalency diploma) and higher education. Education has proven to reduce recidivism by 10%.

f. Ensure the First Amendment rights of prisoners, including to communicate with journalists, write letters, publish their own writings, and become legal experts on their own cases.

g. Provide incarcerated individuals the right to vote by absentee ballot in the district of their domicile, and the right to vote during parole.

h. Restore the right to hold public office to felons who have completed their prison sentence.

i. Conduct racial and ethnic disparity impact studies for new and existing categories of offenses.

3. CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM

a. Abolish the death penalty.

b. Repeal "three strikes" laws. Restore judicial discretion in sentencing. Abolish mandatory sentencing.

c. Establish and fund programs to strengthen self-help and community action through neighborhood centers that provide legal aid, alternative dispute-resolution practices, mediated restitution, community team policing, and access to local crisis/assault care shelters.

d. Establish elected or appointed independent civilian review boards with subpoena power to investigate complaints about prison guard and community police behavior. Sharply restrict police use of weapons and restraining techniques such as pepper spray, stun belts, tasers and choke holds.

e. Prohibit property forfeiture and denial of due process of unconvicted suspects.

f. Establish freedom on bail as a right of all defendants charged with non-violent crimes. Incorporate mental health and social services in bail agreements.

g. Increase compensation for jurors and provide child care for those serving jury duty.

h. Protect victims' rights. Ensure the opportunity for victims to make victim-impact statements. Consider forms of restitution to victims.

4. END THE WAR ON DRUGS

a. End the "war on drugs." Redirect funds presently budgeted for the “war on drugs” toward expanded research, education, counseling and treatment.

b. Amend the Controlled Substances Act to reflect that drug use in itself is not a crime, and that persons living in the United States arrested for using drugs should not be incarcerated with those who have committed victim oriented crimes.

c. Legalize possession of cannabis/marijuana.

d. Strike from the record prior felony convictions for marijuana possession.

e. Grant amnesty and release from confinement without any further parole or probation, those who have been incarcerated for the use of marijuana in federal and state prisons and in county/city jails, and who otherwise are without convictions for victim oriented crimes, or who do not require treatment for abuse of hard drugs. Provide the option for drug treatment to those leaving confinement.

f. Implement a step by step program to decriminalize all drugs in the United States.

Resources

IMPLEMENTATION: Approval of this proposal will amend the 2012 Draft Platform, to be presented for approval at the 2012 Presidential Nominating Convention

CONTACTâ€¨
Platform Committee
Jan Martell, co-chair, 919-682-2472, ninth.st@frontier.com
Bruce Hinkforth, co-chair, 262-569-1370, bhinkforth@milwpc.com
Section editor: Jack Ailey, jjailey@comcast.net

References

2010 Platform: http://www.gp.org/committees/platform/2010/index.php
Proposition 636: http://gp.org/cgi-bin/vote/propdetail?pid=636

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