Washington Votes Forum

Introduced in the House on January 17, 2012

Click here to view bill details.

The intent of the bill is to release convicted criminals early by establishing a citizen's custody review board. And one of the five members of the board- a former convicted criminal. So not only will this newly created board take away the authority of the DOC but listen to a former criminal for advice. Only a liberal could come up with something like this.

 I am in support of this bill.  Not all people are made alike.  Some people actually grow, some are basically immature for the rest of their lives, and some do not know how to have an open mind.  

 It would help to know if this bill gives the created board the authority to release criminals or if it only gives advise to the duly authorized board within the DOC. It would also be good to know if the DOC review board is over burdened with release requests due to crowding or costs of incarceration. And... one more thing... it would be good to know how the members of the citizen board are selected and if they are paid...

But generally, abdicating responsibility to a "citizen board" is a bad thing.

 Not all former convicts are bad people. We made bad choices. I went to AZ DOC in 2004, got out on an early release bill in 2006. Guess what i am a professional, 8 years in recovery, A CITIZEN of society, and a human. Not all people who are incarcerated are bad, we made bad choices. There is one thing in this world that is consistent and thats change. Over 84,000 people have been incarcerated in 8 years for petty crimes in arizona. what does arizona want to do about the problem? Build more prisons and take away any education or rehabilitation that is proven to change the statistics of recitivim.