Deconstructing Carmona: The U.S. War on Drugs and Black Men as Non-Citizens

Article published in the VaLaw U.Law Review

Mercy Towards Decarceration: Examining the Legal Constraints on Early Release from Prison

There are close to seven million people under correctional supervision in the United States, both in prison and in the community. The U.S. criminal justice system is widely regarded as an inherently unmerciful institution by scholars and policymakers, but also by people who have spent time in prison and their family members; it is deeply punitive, racist, expansive and damaging in its reach. In this article, we probe the meanings of mercy for the institution of parole

Deconstructing Carmona: The U.S. War on Drugs and Black Men as Non-Citizens

Article published in the VaLaw U.Law Review

Principles of Procedurally Just Policing

The guiding principle of this document is that police departments' policies should be conducive to building and maintaining law enforcement legitimacy and public trust. By legitimacy, we mean the public's belief that the authority enforcing the law has the right to do so. We emphasize this concept because empirical evidence persuasively demonstrates that perceptions of legitimacy have a greater impact on compliance with the law than do instrumental factors, such as sanctions imposed by authorities on individuals who commit crimes. The more legitimate members of the public perceive actors in the criminal justice system to be, the more likely they will be to obey the law.The theory of procedural justice is grounded in the idea that people's perceptions of police legitimacy will be influenced more by their experience of interacting with officers than by the end result of those interactions. For instance, a driver's perception of his experience of being stopped by a police officer will depend less on whether he receives a ticket, and more on whether he feels the officer has treated him in a "procedurally just" way. Individuals evaluate whether they have received procedurally just treatment by considering four central features of their interactions: whether they were treated with dignity and respect, whether they were given voice, whether the decision-maker was neutral and transparent, and whether the decision-maker conveyed trustworthy motives. Research demonstrates that when members of the public perceive police officers to behave in a procedurally just manner, they have a more positive view not only of their individual encounters with those officers, but of the legitimacy of law enforcement more generally.Notably, the recommendations made herein are in concert with those of the President's Task Force on 21st Century Policing

Manual / Issue 9 / Out of Line

Manual, a journal about art and its making. Out of Line. The nineth issue. This issue of *Manual*—themed Out of Line—is a collection about the way that lines disrupt, point outward. In poetry, the attention to detail one takes in crafting a line is all about making the line disappear, making something it holds to take front stage. . . . The space between the lines creating the image . . . the space around that argues for the importance of all that the lines hold. Manual 9 (Out of Line) complemented Lines of Thought: Drawing from Michelangelo to Now, presented in collaboration with the British Museum, on view at the RISD Museum October 6, 2017 to January 7, 2018. Softcover, 76 pages. Published 2017 by the RISD Museum. Manual 9 (Out of Line) contributors include Fida Adely, Reginald Dwayne Betts, Stefano Bloch, Mimi Cabell, Namita Vijay Dharia, Douglas W. Doe, Jared A. Goldstein, Lucinda Hitchcock, Jan Howard, Kate Irvin, Douglas Kearney, Amber Lopez, Jeffrey Moser, Sheida Soleimani, and Craig Taylor.https://digitalcommons.risd.edu/risdmuseum_journals/1035/thumbnail.jp

Reading: Reginald Dwayne Betts

In this audiovisual recording from Thursday, October 22, 2020, as part of the 51st Annual UND Writers Conference: “The Working Classes,” Reginald Dwayne Betts reads some of his poetry. Betts reads from “Blood History,” “The Lord Might Have Given Him Wings,” “Exile,” “Whisky for Breakfast,” “Ghazal” “Parking Lot,” “Parking Lot, Too,” “Essay on Reentry,” “For a Bail Denied,” “Elegy Ending with a Cell Door Closing,” and others from his collection Felon. Betts also responds to audience questions about what projects are next for him, what held him together in prison besides reading poetry and memoir, his favorite poets, the Million Book Project, and his writing routine. Introduced by President Andrew Armacost

Mercy-oriented reentry and reintegration: Lessons from Policy and Practice

In the U.S. criminal justice system, sentencing determinations are frequently divorced from the social history of the individual accused of a crime. Sentencing determinations, from community penalties to imprisonment, are rarely informed by our empirical knowledge about what forces may lead an individual to desist from offending. Yet, this knowledge can help to drive key decisions to grant mercy to individuals at all stages of the criminal justice process, from plea to parole. This chapter argues that the comprehensive social history of individuals accused of crimes can inform our knowledge about their capacity to desist from crime and can and should be presented at sentencing and parole in order to inform a decision to grant mercy

Panel: Class and Place

In this audiovisual recording from Thursday, October 15, 2020, as part of the 51st Annual UND Writers Conference: “The Working Classes,” Reginald Dwayne Betts, Roy G. Guzmán, and Laila Lalami participate in a panel called “Class and Place.” The panelists discuss how they’re holding up both personally and professionally during the pandemic, the role of art and artists in difficult societal and cultural moments, the extent that their writing places a reader in a different position and space, the difference between creative and academic work and how one can manage to do both, among other topics. The panel ends with each panelist sharing one final thing they haven’t yet had the chance to express during the panel. Moderated by Dr. Paul Worley

Panel: Class and Society

In this audiovisual recording from Thursday, October 22, 2020, as part of the 51st Annual UND Writers Conference: “The Working Classes,” Reginald Dwayne Betts, Richard Tsong-Taatarii, and Matt Young participate in a panel called “Class and Society.” The panelists discuss how they see class represented in their work, to what degree they see their work challenging society, how they think about the audiences of their work, what kind of resistance they’ve received from their audiences, and moments within their work that stand out to them. The panelists also respond to audience questions about how they manage to work with traumatic experiences while at the same time taking care of themselves and whether the process of writing or making art changes them. Moderated by Dr. Daphne Pedersen, Chair of the Department of Sociology