Kentuckians continue to be charged, jailed and fined for cannabis-related offenses at high rates, despite dramatic shifts in public opinion, according to a new report.
Kaylee Raymer, policy analyst at the Kentucky Center for Economic Policy, said many people might not view a cannabis misdemeanor as a big deal. But hundreds or thousands of dollars in criminal fines and fees along with a record appearing on background checks can affect people financially and make finding employment difficult.
She noted depending on a person's criminal record, they could find themselves on probation.
"What the data shows us is people are being charged with this," Raymer observed. "They're being prosecuted, and more than half of them are being convicted. So these consequences are real for a lot of Kentuckians."
Kentuckians in 120 counties have faced cannabis offenses, but Western Kentucky is the region with the highest conviction rate, followed by the Appalachian region and Louisville. Before a newly passed medical cannabis law goes into effect in 2025, possession, trafficking and cultivation of cannabis remain illegal.
Raymer argued any legislation to legalize cannabis in Kentucky should also include provisions such as expungement and other measures to would address the criminal justice effects.
"For people who have been affected by this in the past, like these 300,000 people we're talking about," Raymer urged. "So that they don't continue to be harmed by these collateral consequences."
In addition to calling for the legalization, taxation and regulation of cannabis, the report called on state lawmakers to take steps to remedy the disproportionate effect such convictions have on communities of color, noting legalization policies should include proactive steps to ensure any potential tax revenue generated by the cannabis industry is invested back into affected communities.
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More than 153,000 Kentuckians are still being denied the right to vote because of a past felony conviction, according to recent data from the League of Women Voters of Kentucky.
More than 191,000 Kentuckians regained the right to vote under Gov. Andy Beshear's 2019 executive order, yet the report found the Commonwealth of Kentucky disenfranchised more than 4.5% of its voting-eligible population in last year's presidential election.
Tip Moody, member of the League of Women Voters of Kentucky, said the state is experiencing a troubling trend.
"We are now number four in the country," Moody pointed out. "We are worse in our percentage of disenfranchised citizens than we were two years ago."
Between April 2020 and last Jan. 2, the Kentucky Department of Corrections vetted and forwarded 815 individual petitions requesting a partial pardon to the Office of the Governor. So far during his time in office, Beshear has granted 114 pardons.
Becky Jones, vice president of the League of Women Voters of Kentucky, said the state has lagged behind on the issue of voting rights restoration because it has not been a priority among lawmakers.
"I think it could be a priority for legislators if the public started applying pressure to them to make them understand how important it is to them," Jones observed. "We're talking about hundreds of thousands of people that have been affected."
Kentucky is one of only three states in the country to disenfranchise or strip away the right to vote for a citizen who has committed a felony offense for the rest of their life.
Moody explained he had his voting rights restored but pointed out the journey for most other residents is an uphill battle.
"People like me, regardless of what is in our past and what we are doing in our present, there is still a stigma associated with that, and there is a lack of value," Moody added.
The report showed nearly 2,000 Kentuckians with felony convictions had their sentences extended in the past year, because they could not pay what the court ordered them to pay, creating a further barrier to having the means to begin the voting rights restoration process.
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As Mississippi grapples with chronic violence and unconstitutional conditions in its prisons, new research provides a roadmap for reducing harm and improving safety for both incarcerated individuals and staff.
Nancy Rodriguez, professor of criminology law and society at the University of California and study author, examined prison systems in seven states, highlighting the complex drivers of violence while offering evidence-based strategies to address them. Her findings show that there is a small fraction of people who will repeatedly engage in violence.
"Approximately about 10% of people who are in our prison systems will continue to engage in violence now if we know who these individuals are, state systems are able or have the capacity to identify them and target them in ways that would certainly reduce violence," she said.
That includes identifying high-risk individuals and providing them with targeted programming and case management. Rodriguez's findings come as the U.S. Department of Justice has condemned conditions in three Mississippi prisons, citing rampant violence, understaffing, and inadequate medical care.
The study also revealed that the harms of violence are often underreported. Rodriguez emphasized that violence in prisons is not isolated, and it impacts everyone, even beyond the prison walls.
"Violence is pervasive, and the harms of violence are profound, and we heard this both from incarcerated individuals, and we heard this from staff, and unfortunately, the data mechanisms that are in place, that should be capturing this are absent," she continued.
Rodriguez, part of the Prison Violence Consortium, found that 71% of violence occurs between incarcerated individuals, while 29% targets staff. In Mississippi, officials have implemented reforms such as increasing correctional staff, enhancing security, and expanding de-escalation training and mental health support, leading to reported reductions in violence. However, Rodriguez emphasizes that more can be done, including creating a uniform definition of prison violence and improving documentation of injuries.
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The ACLU of Ohio is calling for a repeal of the state's current death penalty laws, but some conservative state lawmakers have another idea.
House Bill 136, passed in 2021, prohibits the death penalty for offenders with a mental illness. Senate Bill 101, proposed in 2024, would abolish the death penalty.
Two Ohio senators with support from the Ohio Catholic Conference have introduced legislation which would combine death penalty revisions with restrictions on abortion and what they refer to as "assisted suicide," under one law.
Sean McCann, policy analyst for the ACLU of Ohio, said legislators acted this week.
"The bill that was announced by the group of lawmakers and the Catholic Conference of Ohio now has been introduced in the Ohio House as House Bill 72," McCann noted. "After reviewing the language, we remain steadfastly opposed to this attempt to tie the death penalty repeal to restrictions on abortion and medical aid in dying."
Proponents of the bill see it as tying the three policies under one "pro-life" umbrella. But under current Ohio law, medical aid in dying for people with terminal illnesses is not permitted, and state funding for abortion services is illegal. The bill would remove funding for abortion medications, which critics say would violate Ohio's Reproductive Freedom Amendment.
The Ohio Attorney General's Office Capital Crimes Report indicated between July 18, 1981, the state's last execution date, through Dec. 31, 2023, 336 people have received a combined 341 death sentences. Of those, 56 sentences have been carried out. The report also stated a condemned inmate spends more than 21 years on death row as attorneys file appeals.
McCann emphasized the ACLU of Ohio does not support adding issues like abortion to the debate.
"We certainly view these issues as two separate issues," McCann stressed. "And we would also remind legislators, Ohio voters did approve the reproductive freedom Amendment by an overwhelming 57% to 43% margin in November 2023."
McCann argued the numbers showed voters do not want the legislature to continue tampering with their reproductive freedom. The ACLU of Ohio supports a repeal of the death penalty with a replacement of a life sentence without the possibility of parole.
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