FACTS ABOUT INDIANA CRIMINAL AND CORRECTIONS LAWS

Indiana has 3,940 individuals, or 14% of its total incarcerated population, serving either life with parole, life without parole, or virtual life sentences (Mandatory Minimum Sentences) in 2020. Foreclosing the opportunity to ever apply for parole not only strips them of hope and denies their capacity to rehabilitate, life and mandatory sentences waste public resources and do not actually promote public safety. Expanding post-conviction relief remedies would allow all people serving life and mandatory sentences the opportunity for a sentence review to assess their maturity and efforts towards rehabilitation.

A majority, or 3,724, has been sentenced to at least 50 years bars, the report concluded that 14% of the Hoosier state’s overall prison population is serving a virtual life sentence. This is the highest percentage in the country. Nebraska and Iowa follow at 11% and 9% respectively.

Punitiveness not Public Safety

We are often told that we have to continue life and mandatory sentences to be fair to victims and appropriately punish those who convicted of violent crime. This dichotomy is inconsistent with public safety. Many persons who commit violent crime have also experienced violent crime. In general, most persons age out of crime. Criminal offending peaks in one’s early to mid-twenties and declines as one ages. 

Life and mandatory sentences deny this reality and minimize restorative justice practices that an assist trauma and healing for crime survivors. Recalibrating Indiana’s sentencing practices to support meaningful post-conviction release remedies can aid rehabilitative personal development to improve public safety by reducing future criminal offending. 

Why This Matters?

A result of long sentences like MMS and life without parole our prison population is aging; 22% of persons sentenced to life sentences in Indiana are 55 or older. Not only do people age out of crime, but it is also two to three times more expensive to house an elderly prisoner than an average prisoner in the general population. The prison system is not designed or equipped to properly care for the elderly, sick, and dying. In terms of public safety, imprisoning people who pose no threat is a waste of resources.

Life and Mandatory Sentencing alone do not further public safety goals.

• Not a deterrent. It has been proven that the severity of the punishment does not actually deter criminal activity. 
• Not rehabilitative. Permanent incarceration without a meaningful opportunity at release gives up on a person’s ability to ever rehabilitate. 
• Not retributive. Life and mandatory sentences do not make society better and is a contradiction to the notion of restorative justice.

SUPPORT CHANGING BILL No.1202/1006

Expanding Sentencing Reforms to Include Life and Mandatory Minimum Sentences

Synopsis: First time felons should be able have a parole hearing after 15 years and be discharge if he or she is found to be reform and does not pose to be a threat to society. 

After July 1, 2014, Bill 1006 

1. a person serving a sentence for murder 45-65 years does not get an opportunity to go before a parole board in 15 years; 
2. an inmate has to serve 85% of his or her time with only 2 years of time cuts and only two attempts to modify his or her sentence. 
3. Mandatory Minimum Sentencing is like a life sentence, but it does not have the same policies.

Before July 1, 2014

4. A person sentenced to life upon conviction of a felony to a determinate term of imprisonment is eligible for consideration for release on parole upon completion of one-half (1/2) of his determinate term of imprisonment or at the expiration of twenty (20) years, whichever comes first, less the credit time he has earned with respect to that term. 
5. The person serving life gets a better deal by serving 15-20 years with an opportunity to be paroled out of prison. 
6. After July 1, 2014 a person convicted of 48 year this person has to serve 35.5 years before being consider for parole and 26 years for a clemency. 7. H.B, 1202 does not include felons; parole board hearings; and life sentences.

Author: Sheryl Jackson Co-Author: Nicole Porter