SB388 Criminal Procedure – Expungement – Restorative Justice Programs
In the Senate – Hearing 2/19 at 1:00 p.m.

SB526 Maryland Second Chance Act of 2015
In the Senate – Hearing 2/19 at 1:00 p.m.

SB686 Maryland Uniform Collateral Consequences of Conviction Act
In the Senate – Hearing 2/19 at 1:00 p.m.

SB111 Inmates – Life Imprisonment – Parole Reform
In the Senate – Hearing 2/19 at 1:00 p.m.

HB303 Inmates – Life Imprisonment – Parole Reform
In the House – Hearing 2/20 at 1:00 p.m.

SB602  Justice Reinvestment Coordinating Council
In the Senate – Hearing 2/26 at 1:00 p.m.

HB388 Justice Reinvestment Coordinating Council
In the House – Hearing 2/26 at 1:00 p.m.

HB244: Maryland Second Chance Act of 2015
In the House – Hearing 2/26 at 1:00 p.m.

HB659 Maryland Uniform Collateral Consequences of Conviction Act
In the House – Hearing 2/26 at 1:00 p.m.

HB791 Criminal Procedure – Expungement – Restorative Justice Programs
In the House – Hearing 2/26 at 1:00 p.m.

HB1059  Maryland Uniform Collateral Consequences of Conviction Act
In the House – Hearing 2/26 at 1:00 p.m.

Saturday, February 21, from 9:00 to 1:00

Lobby Day Training in Baltimore City

• Where: Hicks Community Center, 2718 W. North Avenue, Baltimore 21216
• Who: You, if you want to help bring changes to Maryland’s criminal justice system
• What: Learn to lobby effectively, whether in person, by phone, by letter, or by email.
  Learn about the changes MAJR is proposing in its bills before the Maryland General Assembly this year
• Why: Because the current system isn’t working. The justice system needs more justice (and common sense).
• How: By all of us working together.

Please pass this along to anyone you think might be interested.

Thursday, February 26 (9:30 am, all day)     Lobby Day in Annapolis: Housing & Jobs

Annual lobby day organized by Jobs Opportunity Task Force (JOTF), Healthcare for the Homeless, Out for Justice.  Day will include rally, march and opportunities to meet with legislators.

Hoping for a big turnout.  Bring groups of friends!  For more information or assistance with transportation, contact: Caryn York Aslan, JOTF or Diamonte Brown, Out for Justice

Let’s make a difference in

• Alternatives to incarceration (mediation, restorative justice, diversion)
• Screening of low-risk offenders for more effective corrections
• Prisoners’ employment and rehabilitation resources
• Pre-release support for jobs and re-entry services at detention centers
• Employer incentives for post-release job placement
• Awareness of collateral consequences re guilty pleas
• Second Chance–shielding records for misdemeanors
• Parole Board final decisions for “lifers with parole”

MAJR (www.ma4jr.org ) is promoting 8 bills in the 2015 MD General Assembly, bringing together legislation under one umbrella from varied organizations: Annapolis Friends Peace and Justice Center, Job Opportunity Task Force, MD Restorative Justice Initiative, Uniform Laws Commission.

Alliance partners include interfaith groups, churches, Quaker meetings, and criminal justice reform organizations such as: Committee of Concerned Citizens, Maryland CURE, Out for Justice, People for Change, Friend of a Friend, Interfaith Action for Human Rights, Community Conferencing.

Two Lobby Training Opportunities:

Saturday, January 10 from 9-1 at the MOVE Training Center 1450 Mercantile Lane #157, Upper Marlboro, MD 20774

Saturday, January 17 from 10-2 at Liberty Rec & Tech Center 3901 Maine Avenue (Liberty Heights/Garrison Blvd.), Baltimore, MD

RSVP to MAJR.legislation@gmail.com or 443-583-4251

Or just come–All welcome!!

We have been hearing a lot lately about police shootings of unarmed young African American men, and many member of AFM have been working on another aspect of our criminal justice system: the excess incarceration of people for minor offenses, with the black community being hit disproportionately hard. The Annapolis Peace and Justice Center was central to forming the Maryland Alliance for Justice Reform (MAJR) to work for legislative solutions to this problem and in the process to increase public safety by not sending young minor offenders to prison to live with hardened criminals and learn their ways.  Continue reading →

The Marshall Project is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization covering America’s criminal justice system.

Neil Barsky, the founder of this project notes:

The seeds of The Marshall Project were planted a few years ago after I read two books. The first, Michelle Alexander’s “The New Jim Crow,” argues that mass incarceration — which dates roughly from President Ronald Reagan’s War on Drugs in the 1980s to the present—represents the third phase of African-American oppression in the United States, after slavery and Jim Crow. Alexander documents how the United States came to be the world’s biggest jailer by enacting policies that represented a bipartisan shift in how we address addiction, mental illness, and other non-violent forms of misconduct. Fueled in part by a reaction to civil rights gains and in part by fear of escalating crime, Alexander claims, we enacted tough drug laws, imposed greater mandatory minimum sentences, and ignited a prison boom. Intent can be difficult to prove; impact is irrefutable.

Read more …