It’s no secret that California prisons are overcrowded, just look at how quickly Lindsay Lohan is released each time she’s forced to serve time and now California officials are attempting to ease that over crowding in a new way, by releasing 4,000 incarcerated moms.
Under the plan mothers with 2 years or less left on a “non-serious, non-sexual” crime will have the opportunity to be released early, a number that is expected to be close to half the states 9,500 female prisoners.
Once those mothers leave the prison system they will be required to wear GPS ankle bracelets to complete their sentences.
According to one prison official who spoke with the Los Angeles Times the program is “a step in breaking the intergenerational cycle of incarceration,” while they added, “Family involvement is one of the biggest indicators of an inmate’s rehabilitation.”
The release will also allow some imprisoned dad’s to receive release if their crimes are also “non-series, non-sexual” and if they are the “primary caregiver” for their children. Gang members are not eligible for the early release program and anyone who has tried to escape prison in the last 10 years will also be denied early release.
According to advocates of the program, the move will “reduce the likelihood that inmates’ children will embark on a life of crime.”
On the other side of the coin one crime-victims group argues:
“If they were such great mothers to begin with, they never would have committed the heinous crime that got them sent to state prison.”
Some lawmakers worry that women and men who are not parents will sue the state over pure and simple discrimination.
