Sunday, October 08, 2006

Dallas public defender tells what's wrong with probation

What's wrong with probation in Texas and how should we fix it?

PovertyLawyer1 at The Wretched of the Earth continues his excellent series on reforming probation from the perspective of a Dallas public defender, inviting those with other views to participate in the discussion. His series in part reacts to this Grits post proposing public-safety oriented criminal justice reforms. Here's what he's written so far:
The writer also said he liked this idea Grits mentioned from California to allow non-violent parolees to earn their way off probation by completing a drug treatment program. (Me too.) He rightly suggests that a similar approach would be useful for probationers. Good stuff from somebody on the front lines everday at the Dallas PDs office. Anyone interested in strengthening probation and reducing recidivism should give it a read.

1 comment:

Mike Howard said...

Thanks, Scott. I'm going to keep this series going. I'm now moving from probation to other aspects of the system. So far I've covered how we should lessen the punishments for Driving With a Suspended Licence and Possession of Marijuana.

Thanks for the links again. Keep 'em coming!