{"id":33505,"date":"2020-11-12T01:00:15","date_gmt":"2020-11-12T07:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/?p=33505"},"modified":"2021-06-18T10:08:20","modified_gmt":"2021-06-18T15:08:20","slug":"early-release-dates-for-oklahoma-prisoners-just-got-pushed-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2020\/11\/12\/early-release-dates-for-oklahoma-prisoners-just-got-pushed-back\/","title":{"rendered":"Early release dates for Oklahoma prisoners just got pushed back"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_33514\"  class=\"wp-caption module image aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px;\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-large wp-image-33514\" src=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2020\/11\/2019-Graduation-Dick-Conner_-1920x1397.jpg\" alt=\"Prisoners in blue graduation gowns sit during graduation ceremony.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1397\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2020\/11\/2019-Graduation-Dick-Conner_-1920x1397.jpg 1920w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2020\/11\/2019-Graduation-Dick-Conner_-672x489.jpg 672w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2020\/11\/2019-Graduation-Dick-Conner_-768x559.jpg 768w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2020\/11\/2019-Graduation-Dick-Conner_-150x109.jpg 150w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2020\/11\/2019-Graduation-Dick-Conner_-300x218.jpg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2020\/11\/2019-Graduation-Dick-Conner_-620x451.jpg 620w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2020\/11\/2019-Graduation-Dick-Conner_-1484x1080.jpg 1484w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Quinton Chandler \/ StateImpact Oklahoma<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Prisoners attend a graduation ceremony at Dick Conner Correctional Center. Educational programs are one way prisoners earn credits to take time off their sentences.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"width: 100%; height: 170px; margin-bottom: 20px; border-radius: 10px; overflow: hidden;\"><iframe style=\"width: 100%; height: 170px;\" src=\"https:\/\/player.captivate.fm\/episode\/2fa6caef-12aa-40ff-b601-e880e59765bd\" frameborder=\"no\" scrolling=\"no\" seamless=\"\"><\/iframe><\/div><p>Glen Blake told the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board this month that his clients seeking parole were just hit with hard news.<\/p><p>A policy that gave Oklahoma prisoners time off their sentences for good behavior and completing reentry programs has been canceled. Reentry programs are designed to help prisoners get ready for life after prison. The Department of Corrections believes the long-standing practice isn&#8217;t legal.<\/p><p>Blake is a public defender in Tulsa and he\u2019s the lead attorney for Project Commutations which helps Oklahoma prisoners get early release. The policy change means if they aren\u2019t released on parole, a lot of his clients won\u2019t be freed as soon as they previously thought.<\/p><p>For decades, Oklahoma law has allowed the Department of Corrections to offer prisoners credits that take time off their sentences in exchange for completing programs such as earning a GED and finishing job training. One credit is equal to one additional day off a sentence.<\/p><p>There are several requirements dictating what prisoners can do to earn credits. The corrections agency now says good behavior credits adopted in 2009 and reentry credits adopted in 2016 aren\u2019t among them.<\/p><p>\u201cSeeing that taken away is obviously disappointing,\u201d Glen Blake said.<\/p>\n<h3>Why aren\u2019t the credits legal?<\/h3><p>The agency reached the conclusion after its legal counsel asked the state Attorney General\u2019s Office for help.<\/p><p>Ethan Shaner, the deputy general counsel for the Attorney General&#8217;s Office <a href=\"https:\/\/documentcloud.adobe.com\/link\/review?uri=urn:aaid:scds:US:1ae3e29c-9743-4726-a337-1a8c31bbd0fe\">wrote in an informal letter<\/a> that state law and Department of Corrections policy require credits to be awarded when prisoners complete programs with specific goals. He said the good conduct and reentry credits didn\u2019t meet those requirements.<\/p><p>Even if good behavior could be defined as a program, Shaner said prisoners received good conduct credits for doing the same thing over and over again. He said the law doesn\u2019t allow credits to be awarded for repeatedly completing the same program.<\/p><p>\u201cI mean, now that I see the Attorney General&#8217;s opinion, I understand where it&#8217;s coming from,\u201d Blake said. \u201cBut I had never really known that it was viewed as potentially problematic. But obviously it was.\u201d<\/p><p>Several other methods of earning credits, such as securing a birth certificate and a social security card also don\u2019t qualify anymore. After receiving the letter, the Department of Corrections chose to eliminate the disputed credits.<\/p>\n<h3>How does this affect prisoners?<\/h3><p>The Attorney General is expected to send the corrections agency a formal opinion on the issue, which would provide legal justification for changing the policy.<\/p><p>Justin Wolf is the director of communications and government relations for the Department of Corrections.<\/p><p>He stresses that this change won\u2019t eliminate the credit system. He says prisoners can still earn time off their sentences, just in different ways.<\/p><p>\u201cThere are a lot of programs available to inmates,\u201d Wolf said.<\/p><p>He adds that the new policy isn\u2019t retroactive \u2013 prisoners who already earned time off for good behavior and for participating in reentry programs before November 1 won\u2019t lose those credits.<\/p><p>Glen Blake says this will be a hard reality for his clients to face.<\/p><p>\u201cLiterally every client who was getting good credits before, which is pretty much every one of our clients, is no longer getting them,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<h3>Prison terms will increase<\/h3><p>Blake says the credits the Department of Corrections has stopped offering were a lifeline for people sent to prison for serious crimes like drug trafficking.<\/p><p>\u201cIf you have a 20-year sentence for trafficking, I mean, and you don&#8217;t come up for parole, the difference between getting good conduct achievement credits and not getting good (conduct) achievement credits on a 20-year sentence is six or seven years,\u201d Blake said.<\/p><p>The Department of Corrections estimates 80% of prisoners who were getting these credits could spend around two additional months in prison for every year of their sentence. Most of the state\u2019s prisoners qualified for the good conduct credits as long as they didn\u2019t break the rules.<\/p><p>The agency projects the policy change will increase its prison population by 3.6% in two years and to a lesser extent with each new year.<\/p><p>Blake hopes the state Legislature will consider rewriting the law to bring the credits back.<\/p><p>\u201cIt&#8217;s rewarding positive behavior, you know what I mean,\u201d he said. \u201cI feel like that&#8217;s got to have a positive impact on people, right?\u201d<\/p><p>The Department of Correction&#8217;s legislative agenda is decided by the state Board of Corrections. The board is scheduled to meet next on November 18.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The state prison population is projected to grow an additional 3.6% in two years after the state Department of Corrections eliminated a method of shortening prisoners&#8217; sentences. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":201,"featured_media":33514,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"page-noFeature.php","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18],"tags":[1315,1314,1319,1317,1316,1318,1313,890],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33505"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/201"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33505"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33505\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34131,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33505\/revisions\/34131"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33514"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}