Citizens for Criminal Justice Reform – New Hampshire

A bill SB371 to give judges the discretion to punish individuals who sexually assault a child with surgical castration advances from Senate Judiciary C. Baton Rouge Senator Regina Barrow’s bill allows for the sentencing of surgical castration if the victim is under the age of 13.

Law enforcement in Kansas recorded the front of a man’s home for 68 days straight, 15 hours a day, and obtained evidence to prove him guilty on 16 charges. The officers did not have a search warrant, using a camera on a pole positioned across the street to capture Bruce Hay’s home. A federal court ruled on Tuesday that it was fine for law enforcement to do so, in what’s potentially a major reduction in privacy law.

“Mr. Hay had no reasonable expectation of privacy in a view of the front of his house,” said the U.S. Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals in its decision on U.S. vs Hay. “As video cameras proliferate throughout society, regrettably, the reasonable expectation of privacy from filming is diminished.”

Read the full article

April 4, 2024

Sandy RozekRetroactivity, Sex Offender Registry, WI SB874, Wisconsin

By Sandy . . . It is a given that if one is convicted of a crime, some sort of punishment will follow. Why? It has been thus from the beginning of time. The hope is that the punishment will evoke a repulsion toward the criminal act and the unpleasantness that resulted from it and cause a turning away from it. If the lesson is learned as intended, society benefits.

The CSG Justice Center’s nonpartisan analysts and justice experts have created two new resources to assist your state in improving community safety:

• State Data Snapshots: This resource contains the most recent data for every state on crime, arrests, behavioral health, workforce, recidivism, and more. 
• 5 Ways States Can Reduce Violent Crime: Through our research and work across the country and with the state and local leaders who serve on our advisory board, we have identified five strategies that states should adopt to reduce violent crime and improve outcomes in your communities. 

The CSG Justice Center is available to help you unpack this data and dig deeper into how your state can improve community safety! Please contact Madeleine Dardeau at mdardeau@csg.org to schedule a meeting with our expert staff.