Chapter 19
Accountability: Voting, Standards, and External Oversight
This Chapter presents materials on the political disempowerment of prisoners, and examines non-litigation oversight of prisons and jails. Materials examine the voting rights of people in custody, the principles of effective external jail and prison oversight, and examples of oversight documentation.
Featured Opinions
- None
Featured, Cited, and Supplemental Litigation Documents
- None
Statutes, Regulations, and Treaties
- None
Non-case Excerpts and Supplemental Documents
- ABA Criminal Justice Standards (3d ed.), Treatment of Prisoners (2011)
- Introduction: Commentary on the Purpose of Standards
- Part III: Conditions of Confinement
- Part XI: Accountability and Oversight
- American Correctional Association, Performance-Based Expected Practices for Adult Correctional Institutions (5th Ed. 2018) (Updated March 2020, here)
- Joanna Carns, Director, [Washington State] Office of the Corrections Ombuds, Annual Report 2019 (Nov. 1, 2019)
- Michele Deitch, Distinguishing the Various Functions of Effective Prison Oversight, 30 Pace L. Rev. 1438 (2010)
- Nicole D. Porter, Voting in Jails,
The Sentencing Project (May 7, 2022)
Additional Reading
Other Cited Sources
Voting
- Brennan Center for Justice, Criminal Disenfranchisement Laws Across the United States (Dec. 18, 2019)
- Sam Levine, Inmates Are Getting Registered To Vote In One Of The Country’s Biggest Jails, Huffington Post (Aug. 2, 2019)
- Jeff Manza, Locked Out: Felon Disenfranchisement and American Democracy (2006)
- Michael B. Mushlin, Rights of Prisoners, § 16:11: Voting Rights Generally (2019 ed.)
- Penal Reform Int’l, The Right of Prisoners to Vote: A Global Overview (Mar. 2016)
- Prison Policy Initiative, Prison Gerrymandering Project
- Brianna Remster and Rory Kramer, Shifting Power: The Impact of Incarceration on Political Representation, 15 Du Bois Rev. 417 (2018)
- The Sentencing Project, Six Million Lost Voters: State-Level Estimates of Felony Disenfranchisement, 2016 (Oct. 2016)
- The Sentencing Project, Expanding the Vote: Two Decades of Felony Disenfranchisement Reform (2018)
Media and public access
- Heather Thompson, What is Hidden Behind the Walls of America’s Prisons, The Conversation (June 4, 2017)
Standards
- American Correctional Association (ACA). See, e.g., Performance-Based Expected Practices for Adult Correctional Institutions (5th ed. 2018); Performance-Based Standards for Adult Local Detention Facilities (4th ed. 2004)
- National Commission on Correctional Health Care (NCCHC), Standards for Health Services in Prisons (2018); Standards for Health Services in Jails (2018)
- American Public Health Association (APHA), Standards for Health Services in Correctional Institutions (3d ed. 2003)
- American Psychiatric Association (APA), Psychiatric Services in Correctional Facilities (3d ed. 2016)
- American Bar Association (ABA), Standards for Criminal Justice: Treatment of Prisoners (3d ed. 2011)
Oversight
- Giovanna Shay, Ad Law Incarcerated, 14 Berkeley J. Crim. L. 329 (2009)
- Office of the Indep. Juvenile Ombudsperson, Ill. Dep’t of Juvenile Justice, “How Are the Children?” 2018 Annual Report (2019)
- Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Civilian Oversight Commission, homepage