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Rebecca Silber

Rebecca Silber

All Work by Rebecca

A Question of Compassion

Medical Parole in New York State

Compassionate release laws enable incarcerated people who are elderly, seriously ill, incapacitated—or some combination thereof—to obtain parole in order to receive treatment in a community setting and in the company of loved ones. In recent years, the number of older adults in U.S. prisons has soared, even as the overall prison population has decl ...

Publication

Rebecca Silber, Léon Digard, Jessi LaChance

April 27, 2018

Publication

Report to Tulsa County Stakeholders on Jail Reduction Strategies

Like many counties across the country, Tulsa County, Oklahoma has experienced a dramatic increase in its jail population over the past five decades, with the per capita jail incarceration rate growing nearly 200 percent between 1970 and 2016. In response to concerns about the continued growth of the jail population, its costs to taxpayers, and impa ...

Publication

Nancy Fishman, Rebecca Silber, Kelsey Reid, Stephen Roberts, Navena Chaitoo

December 14, 2017

Publication

Aging Out

Using Compassionate Release to Address the Growth of Aging and Infirm Prison Populations

Developing effective policies and practices to respond to elderly and infirm prison populations is a critical issue for all state corrections departments, which are facing a growing number of older people in prison and the associated costs of medical care. Through the Justice Reinvestment Initiative (JRI), some states are working to expand a policy ...

Publication

Rebecca Silber, Alison Shames, Kelsey Reid

December 11, 2017

Publication

Greater Oklahoma City Chamber Criminal Justice Reform Task Force

Report and Recommendations

For years, Oklahoma County has been grappling with an overcrowded and run-down jail. With discussions abounding about whether to replace it with a larger facility, the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce convened a task force to examine the county’s local justice system and needs. Chaired by Clayton Bennett, chairman of the Oklahoma City Thun ...

Publication

Nancy Fishman, Kaitlin Kall, Hanna Dershowitz, Jessi LaChance, Stephen Roberts, Rebecca Silber

December 14, 2016

Publication

Justice in Review

New Trends in State Sentencing and Corrections 2014-2015

In 2014 and 2015, 46 states enacted at least 201 bills, executive orders, and ballot initiatives to reform at least one aspect of their sentencing and corrections systems. In conducting this review of state criminal justice reforms, Vera found that most of the policy changes focused on three areas: creating or expanding opportunities to divert peop ...

Publication

Rebecca Silber, Ram Subramanian, Maia Spotts

May 26, 2016

Publication

Tennessee’s new vision for public safety has lessons for criminal justice reform nationwide

As the 2016 legislative session gets underway in states across the nation, it’s a hopeful time for those who support criminal justice policy rooted in a holistic vision of public safety that embraces not only efficiency, but also justice, compassion, and a commitment to human dignity. In Tennessee, Governor Bill Haslam has announced his second-term ...

News

Rebecca Silber

February 12, 2016

News

Report of the Vera Institute of Justice to the Tennessee Governor's Task Force on Sentencing and Recidivism

Recommendations to the Public Safety Subcabinet

While the national prison population has begun to decline—and states around the country have achieved reductions in their prison populations, their recidivism rates, and their crime rates—Tennessee’s imprisonment rate has climbed 256 percent since 1981, its prison population grew by 0.4 percent in 2013, and its violent crime rate ranks among the to ...

Publication

Christine Herrman, Rebecca Silber, Sara Sullivan, Elena Vanko, Jessa Wilcox

August 13, 2015

Publication

California voters say yes to Proposition 47

If you only followed the election day coverage of candidate races, you might not be aware that bipartisan support for criminal justice reform is alive and well at a time when partisans throughout the political spectrum bemoan logjams in policymaking. In California, Proposition 47—which revises felony thresholds for certain drug possession and theft ...

News

Rebecca Silber

November 06, 2014

News

Justice Reinvested

Billions of dollars are spent in the U.S. every year to incarcerate the largest prison population in the world, and with corrections costs soaring, more and more states are embracing justice reinvestment, an approach to criminal justice intended to lower costs, reduce prison populations, and reinvest savings into policies and programs that provide ...

News