George Soros-Funded Group to Governors: Release as Many Prisoners as Possible Due to Coronavirus

Another recommendation was for delayed sentencing for those who have been convicted but haven’t yet been put in prison.

The Brennan Center for Justice, located at NYU School of Law, is heavily financed by Soros’s Open Society Foundations and is the recipient of numerous Open Society grants.

While the Brennan Center’s recommendations for clemency and sentence reduction are expansive, the progressive group is not alone in advocating for such reprieve.

Advocates, criminal attorneys and family members of those incarcerated have urged the harder hit states to release older prisoners and those who at higher risk for coronavirus complications due to underlying health conditions.

California already began fast tracking the release of about 3,500 inmates serving sentences for nonviolent crimes and who are also due to be paroled within 60 days.

The New York Post reported that thousands of state and federal inmates are using coronavirus fears to push for early release, with their attorneys citing underlying health conditions.

“Everyone from killers, drug traffickers and gang members to mobsters, fraudsters and accused rapists are making a bid to get out of the clink,” the New York Post reported.

U.S. Attorney General William Barr expedited a directive to release certain inmates to home confinement if they are at high risk for coronavirus, with focus on federal inmates in Connecticut, Louisiana and Ohio.

Eligibility under Barr’s directive would be determined by age, vulnerability to coronavirus, prison conduct, whether they have a re-entry plan and whether the inmates would be a danger to their communities.

“We are experiencing significant levels of infection at several of our facilities,” Barr stated. “We have to move with dispatch in using home confinement when appropriate to move vulnerable inmates out these institutions.”

“Some offenses, such as sex offenses, will render an inmate ineligible for home detention,” the directive added. “Other serious offenses would weigh more heavily against consideration for home detention.”

In a second memo, Barr encouraged prosecutors to consider coronavirus risks when weighing bail and whether to send a defendant to jail while awaiting trial.

“You should now consider the medical risks associated with individuals being remanded into federal custody during the COVID-19 pandemic,” Barr wrote in the memo, which was obtained Politico. “Even with the extensive precautions we are currently taking, each time a new person is added to a jail, it presents at least some risk to the personnel who operate that facility and to the people incarcerated therein.”

Barr’s bail memo reportedly made clear that defendants who pose a public threat must be detained.

“Controlling weight should be given to public safety, and under no circumstances should those who present a risk to any person or the community be released,” Barr wrote. “COVID-19 presents real risks, but so does allowing violent gang members and child predators to roam free.”

Story cited here.

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