Three years after Oklahomans voted to reclassify several drug and property crimes as misdemeanors—and six months after lawmakers agreed to make those changes retroactive—462 people were released from state prison in November in what lawmakers called the largest single-day commutation in United States history.
The mass release was a significant step in Oklahoma’s effort to reform its criminal justice system. The state has a history of high incarceration rates, “locking up a higher proportion of its residents than any other state or country.”While some cautioned that Oklahoma still has a long way to go to reverse decades of mass incarceration, the move prompted one state official in Kansas to consider taking similar action.
The road to release began in 2016, when Oklahoma voters approved two referendums: State Question 780, which reclassified as misdemeanors instead of felonies simple drug possession and nonviolent property crimes under $1,000; and State Question 781, which mandated that the cost savings from reduced incarceration be used to fund community rehabilitation programs, such as mental health and substance abuse services.
While the first ballot initiative held the potential to influence the state’s prison population—possession of a controlled substance was the most common charge of those incarcerated in Oklahoma between 2005 and 2015—it wasn’t retroactive, so those already behind bars could not benefit from it.
That changed in May 2019, when Governor Kevin Stitt signed a bipartisan bill that retroactively applied the voter-approved reform.Release was not automatic: those eligible had to apply to the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board. Eight hundred and fourteen people requested sentence commutation and early release consideration.
In November, the parole board recommended 527 applicants for commutation (the others were rejected for behavioral infractions or prosecutor objections, and 65 remain behind bars on immigration issues or pending charges in other states).The parole board estimated that Oklahoma would save $11.9 million from the sentence reductions and could have as many as 2,000 empty beds in the system by the end of 2019.
The goal of the mass clemency, however, was more than just lowering the prison population, the board noted.Key to lasting change was helping the newly released people successfully transition back into their communities. To this end, Oklahoma held “transition fairs” inside 28 prisons, where those granted release met with groups that provide housing, employment, counseling, and other reentry support.Some were able to secure state ID cards or driver’s licenses before their release.
The commutations, however, did not automatically expunge the records of the 462 Oklahomans. They still have felonies on their records, even though their offenses are classified as misdemeanors today. They can seek expungement, but that can be a pricey and complicated process.
Mass clemency—which includes commutation (reducing sentences), as occurred in Oklahoma, as well as pardons (reversing convictions)—used to be much more common until the mid-1980s, when politicians began to run more frequently on “tough on crime” platforms.But as more states take steps to enact criminal justice reform, the use of clemency is gaining ground.In September, for example, California Governor Gavin Newsom commuted the sentences of 21 people convicted of violent felonies after reviewing applications and taking into consideration a number of factors—citing, for some, their youth at the time of their crimes as well as “disproportionately long sentencing enhancements."And, in Pennsylvania, nine people serving life without parole received recommendations for commutations from the state’s board of pardons in September; only 16 people had been so recommended in the state since 1995.Pennsylvania’s lieutenant governor helped change the commutations process to make it more accessible—including eliminating application fees—and even visited prisons to encourage those serving life sentences to apply.
At the federal level, the issue has made its way into the platforms of the leading Democratic presidential candidates, with several proposing the creation of a bipartisan clemency commission that would identify candidates for release—taking the power of recommendation out of the hands of federal prosecutors.