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1 Letter: Governors' Executive Authority to Release Vulnerable People Who Pose No Risk to Public Safety from Incarceration [1] (April 6, 2020)

handle is hein.brennan/bcjgvnvp0001 and id is 1 raw text is: BRENNAN CENTER IFOR UT ICE April 6, 2020 The Honorable Governors of the fifty states Re: Governors' Executive Authority to Release Vulnerable People Who Pose No Risk to Public Safety from Incarceration To the Honorable Governors of the fifty states: We recognize that these are unprecedented times and that all of you are at the front lines dealing with the greatest public health crisis of our generation. As of today, the United States has reported that over 200,000 people have tested positive for Covid-19, with over 4,000 deaths nationwide.' In fact, the United States currently has the highest number of reported Covid-19 infections in the world, with many cases still undetected. Based on our current inability to treat this novel virus and its extremely contagious nature, state and local leaders across the nation have made difficult policy decisions to protect the public to the best of their ability: issuing stay-at-home and shelter-in-place orders, closing doors to non-essential businesses, and providing guidance about social distancing - all in the interest of public safety. However, the almost 2 million people behind bars at the county and state level, plus the thousands of employees who work in correctional institutions, face an even greater risk of illness and death than the general public. We write today to urge you to use your full authority as Governors to release as many people as possible from incarceration, provided they do not pose serious public safety threats, for the duration of the pandemic. This effort should focus on people who are especially vulnerable to infection. Specifically, we recommend you take the following steps, which we explain in depth below: * Make full use of your clemency authority to commute the sentences of vulnerable people to time served, allowing their immediate release, or fashion other appropriate relief; * Expand your States' good time credit or equivalent programs to reduce overall incarceration; 1 COVID-19 Map: Coronavirus COVID-19 Global Cases, Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University, last accessed April 1, 2020, 1iIr I. Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law 120 Broadway, Suite 1750 NewYork, NY 10271

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