Probation and Parole

Probation and parole drive Pennsylvania’s mass incarceration crisis. Pennsylvania's lengthy probation sentences are unnecessary and disproportionate compared with the rest of the country. People charged with technical violations of probation and parole fill our state prisons and people held on probation detainers fill our county jails. As with many other aspects of our troubled criminal justice system, racial disparities plague probation and parole revocations. Reform is sorely needed.

• The Pennsylvania legislature should strictly limit incarceration for technical violations of parole.
• The legislature should eliminate consecutive probation sentences and cap the length of time a person can be kept on probation.
• District attorneys, judges, and probation departments, should eliminate the practice of pretrial confinement for technical violations of probation (detainers).
• District attorneys should stop requesting incarceration at probation revocation hearings when the probationer is charged with technical violations.
• District attorneys should request shorter probation sentences, never longer than 1 year for a misdemeanor and never longer than 3 years for a felony.
• The legislature should allow automatic termination of parole and probation after a person successfully completes twelve months of community supervision.
• The Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole should improve parole and release policies and practices to ensure that more people are released earlier from prison and should establish a presumptive parole program whereby parole would automatically be granted to people at their minimum for anyone serving less than five years.
• The legislature could also establish some form of parole eligibility for the thousands of people serving life sentences in Pennsylvania.