EASTHAMPSON, MASS – A recent report released by the Prison Policy Initiative exposed probation’s “burdensome rules that govern the lives of nearly three million people” (and) “doom many to inevitable further punishments.”
The report, entitled “One Size Fits None,” alongside accompanying data, allows readers to compare their personal state’s rules of probation to other states’ rules, writes Prison Policy Initiative.
PPI then reveals ways in which multiple legal systems “turn everyday behaviors into acceptable reasons for re-incarceration.”
The report provides the following answers to “what aspects of people’s lives do probation rules typically address? What types of probation rules are at the discretion of probation officers to define? How do standard conditions intersect with the life circumstances of people most likely to be on probation, including low-income people and people with mental health conditions or substance use disorders?”
Report author Emily Widra commented that “our analysis of 76 jurisdictions finds that people on probation must abide by 12 standard conditions every day, on average, plus any special conditions that a judge or an officer imposes.”
The financial requirements for those on probation, within 64 of the 76 jurisdictions studied, require regular payments. These regular payments can be monthly fees, treatment fees, child support, and the costs that come with drug testing.
As for specific rules impacting employment, the majority of the jurisdictions studied both require the maintenance of full time employment and “impose rules that make it harder for people to get and keep a job,” according to the report.
Within the same report, it is stated that nearly all of the jurisdictions apply movement restrictions to those on probation, and other restrictions within 31 of the jurisdictions on social relationships with specific groups.
For instance, Arkansas, according to the report, is the only jurisdiction that “clarifies that unavoidable associations via work or treatment programs are not prohibited.”
The extensive report on the 76 jurisdictions issues sweeping recommendations to state and local lawmakers who wish to ensure that probation rules work toward, rather than against, the goals of probation,” according to PPI.
“Probation conditions today are not only burdensome; they are often in conflict with one another,” comments Widra, adding the conditions put “people in impossible situations where violations are unavoidable.”
The report on the jurisdictions can be found here, and the accompanying data by Prison Policy Initiative here.
