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The report is among the first to support, with data, the progressive criminal justice movement away from tough-on-crime tactics and toward policies that divert defendants accused of certain low-level crimes to social service programs, rather than the criminal justice system. The belief is that the diversion prevents a cycle of incarceration and repeat offenses.
Suffolk District Attorney Rachael Rollins won a surprise victory in 2018 touting more progressive policies, overcoming more conservative opponents who vowed to be tougher on crime. Even after taking office in 2019, Rollins has sought to fend off criticism that her effort to effectively decriminalize 15 categories of nonviolent low-level crimes such as shoplifting and driving offenses is too easy on criminals; her opponents argue that letting criminals go without punishment encourages them to commit more crimes.
“What I hope this does is say we are really serious about data-based, and evidence-based solutions,” Rollins said in an interview about the new study. “This data show the policies we proposed are working.”
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Rollins had granted the researchers unprecedented access to the data in February 2019, a month after taking office. She vowed it would be a real-time test of her public policy positions, and committed to using the research findings to shape her future policies, even if the findings turned out to be contrary to her efforts.
“We would be adapting right now because at the end of the day it’s not about policies, it’s about what are we doing to keep the people of Suffolk County safe,” she said.
The review, titled Misdemeanor Prosecution, found that defendants whose misdemeanor charges were dropped before arraignment were 58 percent less likely to return to the criminal justice system for a subsequent offense within the next two years, and were more likely to avoid charges for any serious violent crimes: Only 24 percent returned to court for another offense within two years, compared with 57 percent of defendants whose charges were fully prosecuted.
The study initially reviewed cases from Suffolk County — including Boston, Chelsea, Revere, and Winthrop — from 2004 to 2018, during the tenure of former Suffolk district attorney Daniel F. Conley. Though Conley never implemented a wholesale policy to dismiss certain charges, and had a more conservative approach, it was not uncommon for his prosecutors to exercise their discretion and drop cases.
Harvey said researchers factored in the varying decisions by different assistant district attorneys, who — some more lenient than others — had largely been deciding whether to dismiss charges on a case-by-case basis. In many ways, she said, a defendant’s success in having a charge dismissed depended on the luck of the draw of their prosecutor on the day of their arraignment.
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But a review of cases in 2019 and 2020 over the first two years of Rollins’s administration, which had a more deliberate approach, found the same success in diverting defendants away from subsequent offenses and a return to the criminal justice system. (The study of the more recent data in 2019 and 2020 could only measure whether defendants returned to the system within one year, rather than two, but the trends were similar.)
Harvey said the goal of the study was to find out the effects of dropping certain misdemeanor cases: Did it help divert defendants from the system? Did it encourage them to commit a new crime?
She said researchers focused on Suffolk County data because Rollins gave them access, what Harvey called a rare agreement by a prosecutor to put their political policies to the test.
“She said, ‘I want to know the truth,’ ” Harvey said. “ ‘I need to know: Are these policies harmful to the public or beneficial?’ ”
Harvey said that a defendant’s introduction to the criminal justice system could have unintended lasting impacts, particularly in Massachusetts, where an arraignment for a minor offense can remain on a defendant’s criminal history for life. Though the definition of misdemeanor can range from minor possession of a controlled substance to shoplifting, Harvey said many cases that wind up in court involve motor vehicle violations.
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What’s more, the burden of having a case proceed through the criminal justice system could cause hardships to a defendant, economic and otherwise. The study found that charges not dismissed at the outset could take six months or longer to proceed through the courts. And even then, only a quarter of those cases end up with a guilty finding, the study found, suggesting that a policy to drop such cases earlier in the process can help reach the same conclusion far sooner.
Harvey said the trend of dismissing cases has grown in popularity nationwide, particularly among elected prosecutors who are “largely driven by voter frustration with what seems to be a criminal justice system that, for many people, many communities, doesn’t seem to be working as effectively as it could.”
Rollins said that since taking office two years ago, she has tweaked her office’s guidelines to give more community groups and law enforcement officials a say in the process, particularly in certain crimes such as shoplifting, or when a defendant was arrested as a last resort after being given a chance to correct their behavior. She also said that she recognized that even nonviolent crimes can plague communities, and that they deserve their own consideration.
But she returned to her message from three years ago that the current criminal justice system has created undue hardships and created inequities in communities of color, and that officials should focus on directing defendants away from the cycle of the criminal justice system.
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“Accountability does not need to have incarceration,” she said. “That’s the key point, where once I’m arraigned, that’s a tattoo or a brand that goes on my criminal history, that cannot be undone.”
Milton J. Valencia can be reached at milton.valencia@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @miltonvalencia.
The Link LonkMarch 29, 2021 at 01:50PM
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Study shows no-prosecution policies may work - The Boston Globe
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