Imprisonment Inertia and Public Attitudes Toward 'Truth in Sentencing'

51 Pages Posted: 2 Apr 2014 Last revised: 1 Feb 2016

See all articles by Michael M. O'Hear

Michael M. O'Hear

Marquette University - Law School

Darren Wheelock

Marquette University Department of Social and Cultural Sciences

Date Written: March 31, 2014

Abstract

In the space of a few short years in the 1990s, forty-two states adopted truth in sentencing (“TIS”) laws, which eliminated or greatly curtailed opportunities for criminal defendants to obtain parole release from prison. In the following decade, the pendulum seemingly swung in the opposite direction, with thirty-six states adopting new early release opportunities for prisoners. However, few of these initiatives had much impact, and prison populations continued to rise. The TIS ideal remained strong. In the hope of developing a better understanding of these trends and of the prospects for more robust early release reforms in the future, the authors conducted public opinion surveys of hundreds of Wisconsin voters in 2012 and 2013 and report the results here. Notable findings include the following: (1) public support for TIS is strong and stable; (2) support for TIS results less from fear of crime than from a dislike of the parole decisionmaking process (which helps to explain why support for TIS has remained strong even as crime rates have fallen sharply); (3) support for TIS is not absolute and inflexible, but is balanced against such competing objectives as cost-reduction and offender rehabilitation, (4) a majority of the public would favor release as early as the halfway point in a prison sentence if public safety would not be threatened, and (5) a majority would prefer to have release decisions made by a commission of experts instead of a judge.

Keywords: criminal law, truth in sentencing, imprisonment, policy, public opinion

Suggested Citation

O'Hear, Michael M. and Wheelock, Darren, Imprisonment Inertia and Public Attitudes Toward 'Truth in Sentencing' (March 31, 2014). Brigham Young University Law Review, Vol. 2015, No. 2, p. 257, Marquette Law School Legal Studies Paper No. 14-08, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2418282

Michael M. O'Hear (Contact Author)

Marquette University - Law School ( email )

Sensenbrenner Hall
P.O. Box 1881
Milwaukee, WI 53201
United States
414-288-3587 (Phone)
414-288-5914 (Fax)

Darren Wheelock

Marquette University Department of Social and Cultural Sciences ( email )

United States

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
173
Abstract Views
2,920
Rank
311,233
PlumX Metrics