This brief describes the efforts the state of Delaware has made using justice reinvestment to reduce its incarcerated population while ensuring public safety. “Justice reinvestment is a data-driven approach to corrections policy that seeks to cut spending and reinvest savings in practices that have been empirically shown to improve safety and hold offenders accountable … As other jurisdictions consider how best to invest limited public safety dollars, Dela¬ware’s experience offers a helpful example of what can be accomplished through a close consideration of data and social science. Because it is a unified system—one of only a handful in which the state’s Department of Correction has custody of both pretrial and sentenced populations—Delaware’s recent work is relevant not only to other states, but also to local jurisdictions, which typically are responsible for jail populations” (p. 1). Sections following an executive summary are: background; Delaware Justice Reinvestment Task Force findings and recommendations—analyzing the data (Delaware’s large pretrial population, probation violations, and long lengths of stay), five recommendations, and projected fiscal impact; moving from research to legislation—pretrial risk assessment, responses to violations of supervision, and recidivism reduction; and conclusion. SOURCE: Vera Institute of Justice (New York, NY). Authored by James, Juliene. [read the full story here]