Is Wrongful Imprisonment Worth Something?

It is hard to think of something more patently unfair than a person being convicted and imprisoned for a crime they did not commit. But that is exactly what happened in 1980 to Cathy Woods. Cathy spent nearly thirty-four years…
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Expungement Reform in Arizona: The Empirical Case for a Clean Slate

Sonja B. Starr* Full Article. Introduction In the past several years, dozens of states have adopted or expanded laws providing for expungement of some adult criminal convictions.[1] Several states have recently passed groundbreaking “Clean Slate” legislation, which makes expungement automatic…
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Reforming Sentencing Policies and Practices in Arizona

Cassia Spohn. The early 1970s witnessed calls for reductions in state and federal prison populations and predictions that the use of incarceration would decline. For example, in 1973 the National Advisory Commission on Criminal Justice Standards and Goals, which concluded…
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The Incentives of Private Prisons

John F. Pfaff* Full Article. Introduction Few institutions in our deeply flawed and troubled criminal justice system draw as much immediate ire as private prisons. In his 2016 campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, for example, Senator Bernie Sanders’s first…
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Advancing Bail and Pretrial Justice Reform in Arizona

Henry F. Fradella** & Christine S. Scott-Hayward*** Full Article. I. Introduction In its 2017 “State of Pretrial Justice in America” report, the Pretrial Justice Institute (“PJI”) praised Arizona’s pretrial justice reform efforts.[1] Arizona was one of nine states awarded a…
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