Expungement is set up to give people with a criminal history a second chance. It’s a clean slate, a fresh start. But, it is often only available if you can afford to pay for it.

Phil Telfeyan Speaks to KCBS Radio Morning News

"That contract has spiraled out of control into a scheme of extortion," Telfeyan said. "What's happening is people are being assigned by the county to LCA and LCA is threatening to jail folks if they can't afford to pay."

chrysse haynesSeptember 6, 2018electronic monitoring, ankle bracelet, GPS device, wealth based discrimination

A Look Inside the Lives of Home Imprisonment

Private companies have developed a strategy to incarcerate individuals for their alleged crimes by strapping GPS shackles on their ankles. The use for these devices have more than doubled in the past decade. The largest providers of these devices in the United States are BI Incorporated and Securus Technologies. Both companies had histories of unethical profiting and exploiting criminalized populations. They’re also the targets of protests and court cases.

The First Step Act - A Pros and Cons List

The FIRST STEP Act, short for Formerly Incarcerated Reenter Society Transformed Safely Transitioning Every Person Act, or H.R.5682 is a bipartisan prison reform bill passed by the House of Representatives on May 22, 2018. The bill’s timid reach is evident in its name, indicating the bill is only the first step in reforming the federal criminal justice system, with future reform on the horizon.

Expanding SNAP Work Requirements: a Dangerous Game Ending in Poverty

In the classic children’s board game Chutes & Ladders, players move along a game board by rolling a dice, encountering either ladders that advance their progress, or chutes that send them slipping backward.It’s an analogy for the predicament 40 million Americans are soon to be in is fitting. The game carries an eerie resemblance for those who rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) to move them past the scary pitfalls associated with income inequality and food insecurity.

Dror's Story: Efficiency and Justice Have Nothing to Do with Each Other

“His wife knocked on the door one morning and burst into tears, and explained what happened,” Gruffudd recalls. He describes a certain despair accompanying the excitement in the visiting area, “full of families and children, dressed in their Sunday best.” Meanwhile, the inmates appeared emotionally and physically deteriorated.

DOJ Opens Racial Discrimination Investigation into San Francisco’s Bail System in the Wake of Two Successful Settlements Against Other Counties

In response to complaints filed by Equal Justice Under Law against numerous counties across the nation, the Justice Department is now scrutinizing jurisdictions that disproportionately deny pretrial release to people of color, or more commonly, set bail at substantially higher amounts for people of color than for white defendants accused of the same or similar offenses.

Federal Ruling in Calhoun, Ga. Case is Why We Can't Stop Pushing Back on Money Bail

In a 2-1 decision, the justices said Wednesday that the city's bond rules are constitutional, even though defendants who can't afford bail remain behind bars for up to 48 hours after their arrests. Two days in jail does not cause unreasonable harm to a person's life, the justices argued.

Press Release: Nashville and Davidson County Tennessee Take First Steps to Reform Money Bail

Specifically, the complaint alleges that the Twentieth Judicial District’s practice of requiring defendants to post secured money bail as a pretrial condition of release had a discriminatory effect on African Americans because they are disproportionately detained in jail prior to trial.

Trapped: How Fee-Based GPS Monitoring Puts a ‘Price Tag on Freedom’

An Op-Ed by Equal Justice Under Law Executive Director, Phil Telfeyan. William Edwards was giving a lift to a friend in Oakland, Ca., in November 2016 when he was stopped by police. After searching his car without a warrant, the officers found drugs in the friend’s bag.

Press Release: City of Newark Arkansas Banishes Residents Who Are Poor

NEWARK, ARKANSAS – On July 17th 2018, Equal Justice Under Law, a national civil rights organization based in Washington, D.C., filed a federal civil rights complaint against the City of Newark for blocking and banishing residents simply because they do not own an expensive home.

In 2015, the Newark City Council passed an Exclusion Ordinance forbidding any mobile home worth less than $25,000 (single-wide) or $35,000 (double-wide) from existing within the city limits. Failure to do so is punishable with fines up to $500 a day.

S.F. Ordinance Targets Fees Faced by Poor Defendants

A number of fees like those faced by our plaintiffs would be wiped out under legislation that San Francisco city Board of Supervisors President London Breed plans to introduce. The ordinance, backed by Supervisor Malia Cohen, along with the city’s treasurer, public defender and district attorney, seeks to change a system that proponents say fails to deter crime while unfairly burdening poor defendants and hindering the rehabilitation of people convicted of crimes.

We Applaud Google For Banning Money Bail Ads

The money bail system is one of the most corrupt parts of our criminal justice system, so we applaud Google for taking this unprecedented move to ban ads for bail bonds from its platforms.