Since the pandemic began, New York has released 1400 people, all non-violent offenders. But thousands of elderly people in prison aren’t being considered for release, because they’re in for a violent crime, even if they’ve served decades of their sentence and studies show they’re unlikely to reoffend.
It turns out, that’s a stance even liberal politicians like Governor Andrew Cuomo so far aren’t willing to take.
Public health experts say the best way for states to prevent a COVID-19 outbreak in prisons is to release people, to thin out the prison population. The top ten coronavirus clusters nationwide are all in prisons.
Read and listen to this full story from North Country Public Radio: https://www.northcountrypublicradio.org/news/story/41971/20200724/why-new-york-is-releasing-so-few-inmates-during-the-pandemic
