The federal prison population has dropped by nearly 5,000 inmates this year, the first decline in decades, according to the Justice Department. In a speech Tuesday at New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. highlighted the decline as a breakthrough for criminal-justice reform advocates who have tried to reverse the trend of rising incarceration. He said that in fiscal 2016, the federal prison population is projected to drop by 10,000 inmates, or the equivalent of six federal prisons. [read the full story here]