I always enjoy "year in review" pieces, even in years like 2020 that many folks may quite rightly be quite eager to forget. So I figured I might as well "celebrate" the end of a rough year with a "bloggy" accounting of 2020 based on an all-too-quick review of some blog posts from the past year. This accounting is not meant to be representative or even all that reflective of the year that was, it is just a list of a few post titles catching my eye for each month as I went though my 2020 archives:
From January 2020
- Two jurisdictions to watch closely in 2020 for the future of the US death penalty (mentioning Ohio and US)
- Might the 2020 campaign bring back "law and order" as a political wedge issue?
- Preliminary FBI reports indicate considerable drops in murder and other violent crimes as well as in property crimes in first half of 2019
From February 2020
- Some GOP Senators, fully aware of the mandatory minimum sentence, embrace a form of jury nullification to justify acquittal of Prez Trump
- Prez Trump's reelection campaign premieres ad focused on criminal justice reform during Super Bowl
- Roger Stone gets 40-month federal prison sentence ... but will he ever actually serve it?
- "Trump grants clemency to 11, including former junk bond king Michael Milken"
- Without any comment, SCOTUS quickly denies cert on two big cases raising the constitutionality of acquitted conduct sentencing
From March 2020
- Citing Williams v. New York repeatedly, NY prosecutors urge judge to consider Harvey Weinstein's "lifetime of abuse" at sentencing
- "'Complete chaos': How the coronavirus pandemic is upending the criminal justice system"
- Growing reports of growing numbers of prisoners and staffers testing positive for COVID-19
- Will thousands of federal prisoners be eligible for home confinement under AG Barr's new guidelines?
From April 2020
- Latest BOP numbers with ever growing number of COVID cases (and deaths) in ever growing number of federal facilities
- What can and should we really learn from crime data in the midst of a pandemic and lockdowns?
- Additional COVID-influenced grants of federal sentence reductions using § 3582(c)(1)(A)
- According to BOP reporting, federal prison population now shrinking about 1,000 persons per week
From May 2020
- The new death penalty: COVID has now killed more US prisoners in weeks than the US death penalty has in over a decade
- Federal Defenders write to members of Congress to detail BOP/DOJ failings in response to COVID-19
- Memorializing more drug war casualties: updating the federal drug sentences that COVID-19 turned into death sentences
- Council on Criminal Justice releases big new reform report titled "Next Steps: An Agenda for Federal Action on Safety and Justice"
From June 2020
- An initial list of federal sentencing reforms to advance greater equity and justice for congressional consideration
- "America’s Criminal Justice System Is Rotten to the Core"
- Justice Department announces the scheduling of four new federal execution dates
- Time for another long list of (mostly COVID-influenced) federal sentence reductions using § 3582(c)(1)(A)
- SCOTUS denies, by 7-2 vote, cert petition from federal death row defendants challenging federal execution protocol
From July 2020
- Notable criminal justice reform recommendations from Biden-Sanders Unity Task Force
- SCOTUS holds in McGirt, via 5-4 vote with Justice Gorsuch authoring majority opinion, that big part of Oklahoma is a reservation precluding state prosecutions
- Feds, revving up machinery of death, complete third execution of week
- Back by popular demand, another VERY long list of federal sentence reductions using § 3582(c)(1)(A)
- A century after his birth, just a few choice quotes to celebrate Marvin Frankel, father of sentencing reform
- First Circuit panel reverses death sentence of Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev
From August 2020
- Prez Trump finally announces full slate of (unlikely to be confirmed?) new nominees for the US Sentencing Commission
- Via video, Lori Loughlin and her husband get agreed fixed short prison sentences in college admission scandal
- The new death penalty: COVID has now killed more US prisoners in months than the US death penalty has in the last two decades
- Am I crazy to think Joe Biden's pick of Senator Kamala Harris for his running mate bodes well for federal criminal justice reform?
From September 2020
- Reviewing how much and how little the FIRST STEP Act has achieved
- Some notable quotables from a high-profile speaker sounding like an advocate for criminal justice reform
- Second Circuit panel rules unanimously that district courts have broad discretion to consider "any extraordinary and compelling reason for release that a defendant might raise"
- In (sentencing) memoriam: noting a few major sentencing majority opinions by Justice Ginsburg
From October 2020
- "Drug Reforms on the 2020 Ballot"
- Bureau of Justice Statistics reporting that, as of end of 2019, "US imprisonment rate at its lowest since 1995"
- Some notable (and mostly heartening) criminal justice discussion in final Prez debate of 2020
- With Justice Barrett seated, isn't it now time to pack the Supreme Court ... with constitutional criminal procedure cases?
From November 2020
- Can we be hopeful federal leaders will make deals to advance federal criminal justice reforms in the next Congress?
- Exploring what Prez-elect Biden might (or might not) get done for criminal justice reforms
- The new death penalty: COVID has now killed more US prisoners than capital punishment over last three decades
From December 2020
- US completes execution of Brendan Bernard despite high-profile appeals for relief
- Highlighting arguments that incarcerated persons should be high on the list for the COVID vaccines
- Noticing the many regular forgotten folk so far left behind in Prez Trump's clemency capers
- Pondering next steps in federal sentencing reform on the second anniversary of the FIRST STEP Act
- Congress agrees on education reforms that include restoring Pell Grants for incarcerated persons!!
- Federal prison population closes out 2020 at new modern low of 152,184 according to BOP
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