Criminal Justice in an Era of Mass Deportation: Reforms from California

IF 0.4 Q2 Social Sciences
Ingrid V. Eagly, Ingrid V. Eagly
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引用次数: 13

Abstract

After a sustained period of hypercriminalization, the United States criminal justice system is undergoing reform. Congress has reduced federal sentencing for drug crimes, prison growth is slowing, and some states are even closing prisons. Low-level crimes have been removed from criminal law books, and attention is beginning to focus on long-neglected issues such as bail and criminal court fines. Still largely overlooked in this era of ambitious reform, however, is the treatment of immigrants in the criminal justice system. An unprecedented focus on immigration enforcement targeted at “felons, not families” has resulted in a separate system of punitive treatment reserved for noncitizens, which includes crimes of migration, longer periods of pretrial detention, harsher criminal sentences, and the almost certain collateral consequence of lifetime banishment from the United States. For examples of state-level solutions to this predicament, this Essay turns to a trio of bold criminal justice reforms from California that (1) require prosecutors to consider immigration penalties in plea bargaining; (2) change the state definition of “misdemeanor” from a maximum sentence of a year to 364 days; and (3) instruct law enforcement agencies to not hold immigrants for deportation purposes unless they are first convicted of serious crimes. Together, these new laws provide an important window into how state criminal justice systems could begin to address some of the unique concerns of noncitizen criminal defendants.
大规模驱逐时代的刑事司法:来自加州的改革
在经历了一段持续的过度刑事化时期后,美国刑事司法制度正在进行改革。国会已经减少了对毒品犯罪的联邦判决,监狱增长正在放缓,一些州甚至关闭了监狱。低级别犯罪已经从刑法中删除,人们开始关注长期被忽视的问题,如保释和刑事法院罚款。然而,在这个雄心勃勃的改革时代,移民在刑事司法系统中的待遇问题在很大程度上仍被忽视。针对“重罪犯而非家庭”的移民执法前所未有地受到重视,这导致了一个针对非公民的单独惩罚性待遇体系,其中包括移民犯罪、更长的审前拘留、更严厉的刑事判决,以及几乎肯定会被终身驱逐出美国的附带后果。作为解决这一困境的州级解决方案的例子,本文转向加利福尼亚州的三项大胆的刑事司法改革:(1)要求检察官在辩诉交易中考虑移民处罚;(2)将国家对“轻罪”的定义从最高刑期一年改为364天;(3)指示执法机构不以驱逐出境为目的扣留移民,除非他们首先被判犯有严重罪行。总之,这些新法律为了解州刑事司法系统如何开始解决非公民刑事被告的一些独特问题提供了一个重要的窗口。
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来源期刊
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期刊介绍: Focused on examinations of crime and punishment in domestic, transnational, and international contexts, New Criminal Law Review provides timely, innovative commentary and in-depth scholarly analyses on a wide range of criminal law topics. The journal encourages a variety of methodological and theoretical approaches and is a crucial resource for criminal law professionals in both academia and the criminal justice system. The journal publishes thematic forum sections and special issues, full-length peer-reviewed articles, book reviews, and occasional correspondence.
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