Criminal Justice

Recommending Common-Sense Improvements to the State’s Sentencing Scheme

In 2009, New Jersey created the Criminal Sentencing and Disposition Commission to examine racial and ethnic disparities in the state’s criminal justice system. In 2024, Governor Murphy named Christopher Porrino, Lowenstein Partner and Litigation Chair, to lead the Commission.

Upon his appointment, Governor Murphy said of Chris that “he is exactly the right person to build consensus for reforms that will make our sentencing laws fairer and more equitable.” Under Chris’s leadership, and with legal and research support from firm lawyers, the 13-member Commission has already released a report recommending a series of legislative reforms. The Commission is comprised of designees of prosecutors and law enforcement, the Attorney General’s Office, the Public Defender’s Office, and the judiciary, as well as public members appointed by the Governor and the Legislature. The Commission has operated by consensus: All four of its recent recommendations were arrived at unanimously, with the entire body agreeing that the reforms would bring about “a more rational, just, and proportionate sentencing system.”

The Commission recommended:

• Abolishing mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent drug crimes;
• Permitting judges to reduce or waive fines or fees for defendants who cannot afford them;
• Allowing judges to consider abuse that a defendant suffered at the hands of their victim in mitigation of sentence; and
• Providing an opportunity for older incarcerated people who have served lengthy prison sentences to earn opportunities for early release.

The Commission is continuing to meet and recommend common-sense sentencing reforms.

Reforming the State’s Parole System

Firm lawyers helped the Governor’s office draft proposed legislation that aims to address the 1,700 people who are incarcerated for technical parole violations in the state of New Jersey. Technical violations include failing to reside at an approved address, failing to obtain permission to relocate, failing to report to a parole officer, and possessing or using illegal substances. Technical violations do not include any new criminal charges; they exclusively pertain to violating supervision conditions.

Under the current system, once parole is revoked, the person is returned to state prison for a minimum of seven months (and an average of more than 14 months) before their custody is reviewed. Research demonstrates little to no public safety benefit to revoking parole for technical violations: These violations cannot reliably serve as a proxy for new criminal behavior, and reincarceration has no significant impact on rearrests.

The current system lags behind that of many states in its treatment of technical parole violations. Many states have sophisticated systems for awarding credits to incentivize compliance with parole rules. And many other states have implemented revocation caps, which limit incarceration (or the length of incarceration) for technical violations.

To address these concerns, firm lawyers helped draft legislation that would:

• Restore a standard for parole release that focuses on the likelihood that the person will commit a new crime, rather than their ability to follow rules of parole;
• Expand access to parole compliance credits, which reduce the length of the parole period for parolees who have complied with conditions of parole and increase the rate at which the credits are earned;
• Differentiate the consequences of technical parole violations from non-technical violations, limit the technical violations for which incarceration is permissible, and limit the length of incarceration in those cases;
• Streamline the procedure for handling technical violations of conditions of parole; and
• Create a fair and efficient system for addressing non-technical violations of parole.