This edition of the Review summarizes research activities that took place throughout 2024, including new Research Consortium memberships, updates on newly funded work, and recently published research products, with a spotlight on women and survivors of violence in the criminal legal system. 

To learn more about the impact of emergency COVID-19 measures on jail reduction efforts, and think about emergency measures that could continue in the post-pandemic era, CUNY ISLG funded Justice System Partners (JSP) through the Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC) to conduct a mixed-methods case study on the emergency jail population reduction strategies implemented in Multnomah County, Oregon.

Two years out from COVID-19’s peak, there continues to be no apparent correlation between changes in incarceration and violent crime. Most individuals released from jail on pretrial status did not return to jail custody, and local violent crime rates varied regardless of changes to the jail population—suggesting that jail reduction reforms can be implemented safely.

This edition of the Review summarizes research that took place in 2023, including new Research Consortium member organizations and reviewers, updates on newly funded work, recently published research products, and what has been learned to date across research projects about racial and ethnic disparities in the criminal legal system.

Research on conditions of confinement has historically been limited by a lack of access to the perspectives of individuals residing in jail. To understand the factors driving inequity in jail culture, CUNY ISLG funded Justice System Partners to partner with Wellbeing & Equity Innovations (WEI) to conduct a mixed-methods study in an SJC site using community-based participatory research methods.

In its eighth year, the SJC now supports a diverse network of more than 57 cities, counties, and states across the country in developing and implementing decarceration strategies. This report breaks down its the data-driven model of criminal justice reform, including what kinds of data were captured, how data were mobilized for change, and lessons learned when using administrative data for policy design and evaluation.

Research has uncovered that community safety cannot be treated in a one-size-fits-all manner, and conversations about safety should be locally oriented, bearing in mind the unique local contexts and nuances.