News & Commentary

When Connecticut violates an incarcerated person’s right to freedom from cruel and unusual punishment, it should not be able to give itself a discount.

Information is power, and this transparency bill is a necessary step – but only the first step – toward placing power over police squarely where it belongs: with the people.

Smart Justice is just getting started on its efforts to create prosecutorial transparency and accountability, and our work to reform the CJC will continue.

People living with a record have already earned the right to be part of our communities. But in many cases, a record of arrest or conviction can become a permanent, life-long sentence.

The bill is a direct result of the ACLU of Connecticut’s Smart Justice leaders, who are directly impacted by the justice system, calling for change, and it is part of a longer-term Smart Justice effort to create meaningful prosecutorial accountability.

S.B. 880, An Act Increasing Fairness and Transparency in the Criminal Justice System, is now Connecticut law. Passing a law, however, is just a first step toward creating transparency about prosecutors’ actions and using that information to end mass incarceration and racism in the justice system.

Together, the ACLU of Connecticut and Connecticut Coalition to End Homelessness filed a public comment opposing the federal HUD proposed rule regarding "mixed-status" families. The Proposed Rule is another federal government attack against immigrants that would hurt people in Connecticut.

On Monday, Smart Justice leader AnnMarie Stockmeyer and I were honored to attend a policy conversation, “Data Driven Justice: Prosecutorial Accountability and Transparency,” at the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, D.C. We had been invited by U.S. Representative Alma Adams of North Carolina, who had learned about Smart Justice’s success in Connecticut with the passage of SB 880, “An Act Increasing Fairness and Transparency in the Criminal Justice System.”

Connecticut is the Land of Steady Habits, and many government officials here mistake the habit of letting police do whatever they want for a requirement, even when it is not. The Hamden Police Commission's response to residents is the latest example.