A bipartisan criminal justice reform bill introduced in the Senate last week includes changes to mandatory minimum sentences for low level drug offenses.

With St. Louis jails disproportionately filled with blacks and other populations underserved by health care, the move could prove disastrous for inmates.

Only 15.4% of detainees with mental health disorders receive treatment. 31% of former youth prisoners were not sure where to go for treatment.

Black girls were about three times as likely as white girls to be referred to juvenile court, and 20% more likely to be detained than white girls. American Indian/Alaska Native girls were 50% more likely to be locked-up.

A federal lawsuit in New Orleans, Louisiana, and a report by the ACLU of New Hampshire, document the practice of jailing people unable to pay their court debts, violating the due process rights of the poor by failing to provide them with legal counsel and ability-to-pay hearings.

Progressive Arizona congressman Raúl Grijalva expressed dismay that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) signed an $11 million contract with GEO Care because its parent company, GEO Group, profits off detaining women and children in horrific conditions. Yet, remarkably, Grijalva is the sponsor of a bill, which contains specific exemptions allowing companies

A new report details how families pay a high price for the incarceration of a relative—a price “felt most deeply by women, low-income families and communities of color.”  It examines the various ways families and former prisoners “pay” for their incarceration, even after they are released. The report, “Who Pays? The True Cost Of

Last week, the New York City Council sent eight bills to Mayor Bill DeBlasio’s desk aimed at bringing greater transparency to the city’s jails. The wave of legislation was introduced this past spring and its passage marks the latest efforts by the city to reign in the brutal culture of violence and impunity that has reigned inside its jails for years.

Democratic presidential candidate, Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT), has introduced legislation to abolish aspects of the prison industrial-complex. However, despite being touted as a private prison abolition bill, it would still leave some areas of corrections open to contractors. On September 17, Sanders joined Representatives Raúl M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.), Keith Ellison (D-Minn.)

Formerly incarcerated youth in Cook County, Chicago, were diagnosed with psychiatric disorders at a rate higher than that of the general population, according to new research. The research also found Black former juvenile inmates had lower prevalence rates for psychiatric and substance abuse disorders over time than compared to whites and Hispanics, despite the fact that they constitute a disproportionately larger segment of the incarcerated population.