Jul
A rare opportunity to hear from Michele Deitch, one of the foremost US experts on prisons and sentencing policy.
Michele Deitch will be in discussion with our Director, Richard Garside and other invited guests, on the real lessons of recent Texas prisons policy. These include the earned progression model for prisoners – the so-called ‘good time’ scheme – under which prisoners can earn an earlier parole hearing on the basis of good behaviour.
The Texas ‘good time’ scheme has been praised in David Gauke’s recently-published Independent Sentencing Review, and by the government, with Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood telling parliament that Texas had “brought their prison population under control”.
Inspired by the Texas scheme, the government is exploring the potential for an earned progression scheme in England and Wales. Under the scheme, those who cooperate could earn early release, while those who “behave excessively badly” would have to wait longer than currently is the case to be released.
- Is the Texas ‘good time’ scheme all that it is cracked up to be?
- Can an earned progression scheme really help England and Wales bring its prison population under control?
- Is the Texas approach one to be emulated, or one to be avoided?
Last year, Michele Deitch argued that the good time scheme was “necessary but not sufficient by itself”. Significant investment in community-based programmes and services, limitations on recall, and effective resettlement programmes were among other factors that helped Texas reduce its prison population.
As the government gears up for what could be a once-in-a-generation opportunity to address a major prisons crisis, it is vital that we learn the correct lessons from the Texas scheme, and avoid making mistakes that risk making the problem worse.
About Michele Deitch
Michele Deitch is a distinguished senior lecturer at the University of Texas at Austin, holding a joint appointment at both the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs (LBJ) and the Law School. She is also former policy director of the Texas sentencing commission.
She directs LBJ's Prison and Jail Innovation Lab (PJIL), a policy resource centre focused on the safe and humane treatment of people in custody.
She is an attorney who has worked for over 35 years on criminal justice and juvenile justice policy issues with state and local government officials, corrections administrators, judges and advocates. She specializes in independent oversight of correctional institutions, prison and jail conditions, managing youth in custody, and youth in the adult criminal justice system.
Deitch co-chairs the American Bar Association's Subcommittee on Correctional Oversight, and helped draft the ABA's Standards on the Treatment of Prisoners.
She is currently a visiting academic at the Centre for Criminology, University of Oxford.
