Sentencing reform and the Justice Reinvestment Initiative: Reserving Prison Space for the Most Serious Offenses

The Justice Reinvestment Initiative has been identified as one of the most significant criminal justice reforms of the 21st century, involving partnerships between the federal government and individual states. The theoretical background of justice reinvestment suggests that financial reinvestment from incarceration to communities could reduce incarceration rates and provide funding for alternatives that would divert less serious offenses from prison while reserving prison space for the most serious offenses and offenders. A hallmark of JRI was enacting legislation that memorialized reforms. From analysis of hundreds of sentencing laws passed from 2010 through 2020 in a dozen states (seven JRI participants and five non-participants), we found that states that engaged in JRI were more likely than non-JRI states to pass sentencing laws that reduced penalties but only during their initial period of JRI engagement. Subsequently, JRI states enacted sentencing laws that increased penalties and did so at least as rapidly, if not more rapidly, than non-JRI states. During JRI participation, reserving prison space for the most serious offenders meant diverting less serious offenses from prison; after JRI participation, reserving prison space meant enacting new laws that enhanced the severity of punishment for the most serious (primarily violent) offenses and offenders. Non-JRI states also reserved prison space for the most serious offenders by enacting similar legislation to that enacted in JRI states. In both sets of states, the concept of what constitutes most serious offenses was broadened by punishment enhancement.