Overview:
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The US Parole Commission (USPC) is a semi-autonomous agency within the US Department of Justice that decides parole cases involving certain federal and District of Columbia (DC) prisoners. A much larger commission at one time, the USPC has seen its role shrink and its very existence threatened over the past 20 years following a landmark change in sentencing laws in the 1980s.
History:
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The federal government’s first parole board was established in 1930 in Washington, DC, consisting of three full-time members appointed by the US Attorney General (AG). The parole board’s primary responsibility was to decide whether eligible federal prisoners should be allowed to finish out their sentences outside of prison while still under law enforcement supervision. The parole board reported to the Bureau of Prisons until August 1945 when the Attorney General ordered the board to report directly to the AG.
Following World War II, increases in the US prison population caused a corresponding rise in the workload for the parole board. As a result, the Attorney General in 1948 appointed two additional members to the board, increasing its panel to five members. The board’s size grew again in 1950 when legislation expanded it to eight members. The legislation also changed who appointed board members. From then on, the President, with the advice and consent of the Senate, appointed members for six-year, staggered terms. The 1950 legislation also shifted the board’s reporting duties to the Department of Justice (DOJ). Three of the eight members were designated by the Attorney General to serve as a Youth Corrections Division pursuant to the Youth Corrections Act.
Even more changes were implemented in the 1970s to accommodate the growing caseload of the board. In 1974 the board reorganized itself by creating five regions throughout the country in order to better handle parole hearings. Each region was assigned one board member and five hearing examiners. The chairman and two members remained in Washington, DC, at the headquarters office. Other changes included the creation of explicit guidelines for parole release decision-making, written reasons for parole decisions and an administrative appeals process.
In May 1976, Congress adopted the Parole Commission and Reorganization Act. The legislation re-titled the Board of Parole as the United States Parole Commission (USPC) and established it as an independent agency within DOJ. The act provided for nine commissioners appointed by the President for six-year terms. These included a chairman, five regional commissioners and a three-member National Appeals Board. The commission also absorbed the duties of the Youth Corrections Division, which was eliminated.
Eight years later, the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984 created the US Sentencing Commission which established sentencing guidelines for the federal courts and a regime of determinate sentences. The chairman of the Parole Commission became an ex-officio, non-voting member of the Sentencing Commission. The decision to establish sentencing guidelines was based in part on the success of the Parole Commission’s development and implementation of parole guidelines. In April 1987, the Sentencing Commission submitted to Congress its initial set of sentencing guidelines, which took effect on November 1, 1987. Defendants sentenced for offenses committed on or after November 1, 1987 served determinate terms under the sentencing guidelines and were not eligible for parole consideration. Post-release supervision, termed “supervised release,” was provided as a separate part of the sentence under the jurisdiction of the court.
The adoption of determinate sentencing under the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984 was supposed to mark the beginning of the end for the Parole Commission. The act allowed the Parole Commission to retain jurisdiction over defendants who committed their offenses prior to Nov. 1, 1987, while at the same time the act declared that the commission would cease to exist as of Nov. 1, 1992 (five years after the sentencing guidelines took effect). But this phase-out provision did not adequately provide for persons sentenced under the law in effect prior to November 1, 1987 who had not yet completed their sentences. Eliminating or reducing parole eligibility for such cases would have raised ex post facto issues. Congress decided to avoid this problem by extending the life of the Parole Commission until Nov. 1, 1997, as declared under the Judicial Improvements Act of 1990.
By the time the mid-‘90s rolled around, Congress still wasn’t in the mood for tackling the ex post facto issue, so it adopted the Parole Commission Phaseout Act of 1996 which again extended the life of the commission, this time until Nov. 1, 2002. The act also reduced the number of parole commissioners to two by Dec. 31, 1999, and one commissioner by Dec. 31, 2001. It also required the Attorney General, beginning in 1998, to report to Congress annually on whether it was more cost effective for the Parole Commission to continue as a separate agency or for its remaining functions to be transferred elsewhere. The Attorney General has reported each year that it is more cost effective for the Parole Commission to continue as a separate agency.
The following year, the Parole Commission received a new lease on life thanks to federal legislation geared around improving the governance of the District of Columbia. The National Capital Revitalization and Self-Government Improvement Act of 1997 abolished the District of Columbia Board of Parole by August 5, 2000, and transferred its responsibilities to the US Parole Commission, which assumed jurisdiction over all parole and mandatory release supervision and revocation decisions for DC prisoners. Given this new power over DC offenders, the Parole Commission was in need of new commissioners, so the act reversed the 1996 legislation and allowed for five commissioners.
The 1997 act also required the District of Columbia to move to a determinate sentencing system for certain offenses, imposed terms of supervised release to follow the determinate sentences and gave the Parole Commission ongoing responsibility for supervision and revocation decisions for DC prisoners subject to terms of supervised release under the new determinate sentencing system. Three years later, DC enacted a determinate sentencing system for all offenses committed on or after August 5, 2000.
Over time Congress also has given the Parole Commission additional responsibilities, including parole matters involving foreign transfer treaty cases for offenses committed on or after November 1, 1987 (Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988); jurisdiction over all state defendants who are accepted into the US Marshals Service Witness Protection Program (Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988); the responsibility forthe release and supervision of all remaining indeterminate sentence DC Code felony offenders (National Capital Revitalization and Self-Government Improvement Act of 1997); and responsibility for the supervision of all new-law DC Code determinate sentence felony offenders released on supervised release (National Capital Revitalization and Self-Government Improvement Act of 1997). In addition to these duties, the Parole Commission continues to have responsibility for the remaining “old-law” indeterminate sentence federal offenders in prison or under supervision, as well as ongoing responsibility for military code offenders serving sentences in Bureau of Prisons institutions.
The 21st Century Department of Justice Appropriations Authorization Act of 2002 extended the life of the Parole Commission until November 1, 2005. Additional legislation was crafted in 2005 that provided for another three-year extension until 2008.
Bibliography for Federal Parole System
What it Does:
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The US Parole Commission (USPC) is a semi-autonomous agency within the US Department of Justice that handles all matters of parole for eligible federal and District of Columbia (DC) prisoners. The USPC makes parole release decisions; authorizes method of release and the condition under which release occurs; issues warrants for violation of supervision; determines probable cause for revocation process; prescribes, modifies and monitors compliance with the terms and conditions governing offender’s behavior while on parole or mandatory or supervised release; revokes parole, mandatory or supervised release of offenders; releases from supervision those offenders who no longer pose a risk to public safety; issues rules, regulations and guidelines pertaining to the national parole policy.
The USPC has jurisdiction over the following types of offenders:
- All Federal offenders who committed an offense before November 1, 1987;
- All DC Code offenders;
- Uniform Code of Military Justice Offenders who are confined in a Bureau of Prisons facility;
- Transfer treaty cases (US citizens convicted in foreign countries who have elected to serve their sentence in this country); and
- State probationers and parolees in the Federal Witness Protection Program.
Because of changes in federal law in the 1980s that created a determinate sentencing system, the USPC’s role has changed over the past two decades. While it still has jurisdiction over some federal prisoners, the majority of cases that USPC oversees are DC criminals. At the end of FY 2005, more than two-thirds of the nearly 15,000 persons under USPC supervision were persons convicted of breaking laws in the District of Columbia. For the 12-month period ending March 31, 2006, USPC issued almost five times as many warrants for DC Code offenders as it issued for federal offenders (2,013 vs. 412).
Organizational Structure
The chairman and commissioners of the USPC carry out numerous duties. They render decisions in National Appeals Board cases; create and maintain a national parole policy; grant or deny parole to all eligible federal and DC prisoners; modify parole conditions; and/or revoke the parole or mandatory/supervised releases of offenders who have violated the conditions of supervision.
The Executive Office provides management and advisory services to the commissioners. This includes providing human resources management and training, budget and financial management, contracts and procurement, facilities and property management, telecommunications and security.
The Office of Case Operations conducts parole hearings with federal and DC prisoners and parole revocation hearings with parole violators. It also plans and schedules parole hearing dockets, ensures that victims and witnesses are given an opportunity for input into the parole decision-making process and administrates the records management program.
The Office of Case Services monitors the progress of prisoners and parolees through pre-release and post-release. It prepares and issues warrants, drafts letters of
reprimand, requests and analyzes preliminary interviews and issues parole certificates.
The Office of Information Technology delivers and supports information technology systems and services. It also maintains and reports statistical workload data and management of the quality control functions.
The Office of the General Counsel advises commissioners and staff on interpretation of the agency’s enabling statutes. It drafts implementing rules and regulations and assists US Attorney’s Offices in defending the USPC against lawsuits brought by prisoners and parolees. The office also oversees responses to requests submitted under the Freedom of Information Act and Privacy Act.
Where Does the Money Go:
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Those who are most interested in the work of the Parole Commission are convicted criminals who come under its jurisdiction and the victims of said criminals. The USPC maintains a victims program that offers information on how to participate in parole hearings. While the USPC largely maintains a low-profile, its decisions in some parole cases have garnered widespread attention or controversy.
Controversies:
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Sara Jane Moore
In January 2008 the USPC paroled Sara Jane Moore, 77, the one-time attempted assassin of President Gerald Ford. Moore had been serving a life sentence for trying to shoot President Ford outside a San Francisco hotel in 1975. She was denied parole in the mid-1980s but was given another chance at freedom under federal sentencing regulations that call for considering paroling prisoners after serving 30 years if they are not deemed a threat and have behaved well while incarcerated.
Moore did escape for four hours from a federal prison in 1979, but a spokesman for the USPC said it appeared nothing in her recent record blocked her release. Moore expressed regret for trying to kill President Ford, who died in December 2006.
One of Ford’s Would-Be Assassins Is Paroled (by Randal C. Archibold, New York Times)
Manuel Noriega
In January 2007, the USPC announced that Manuel Noriega, the former dictator of Panama, would be released from his US prison in September. Noriega was the target of Operation Just Cause, the code name for the military invasion of Panama in 1989 that led to his arrest on charges of drug-trafficking. Noriega was tried, convicted and sentenced to 30 years in prison in Miami. The Parole Commission determined that after serving almost two-thirds of his sentence, Noriega was eligible for parole.
Noriega, however, still remains in his Miami prison. Upon his pending release from US prison, French officials requested the former dictator be extradited to France so he could be tried on charges of money laundering. Noriega’s lawyers have fought the extradition through various appeals, forcing Noriega to remain in prison past the deadline for his release. Noriega has said he wants to return to Panama, which has also requested his extradition in order to try Noriega on charges of murder.
Judge blocks efforts to extradite Manuel Noriega to France (Agence France-Presse)
Leonard Peltier
In some instances, the USPC has gained attention for what it hasn’t done. The case of Leonard Peltier has drawn ridicule from civil rights activists and supporters of Peltier who insist the Native American man was framed in 1975 for the murder of two FBI agents on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. The Parole Commission has sided with the FBI and its supporters in refusing to grant parole to Peltier, who’s serving two consecutive life sentences at Leavenworth federal prison.
The Martyrdom of Leonard Peltier (by Scott Anderson, Outside)
Anthony Kelly
From 2002 to 2004, the USPC found itself facing ridicule along with other government corrections agencies in a series of articles in the Washington Post for allowing a violent felon to go free. The felon, Anthony Kelly, was subsequently arrested on charges of killing three people, raping two women, assaulting a police officer and stealing five guns and five cars—all in the nine months after he was paroled.
At the time he was paroled, Kelly had served half of a 10-year sentence for threatening to kill a relative with a handgun. That crime was preceded by convictions of 34 second-degree burglaries, 12 car thefts and 27 thefts from autos. Prison records also had noted that Kelly repeatedly fought with inmates and argued with guards and was described as “extremely troubled” and “a pathological liar.”
Yet the USPC granted Kelly parole in December 2001. An investigation by the Washington Post found that the commission failed to catch important details and falsehoods regarding Kelly while reviewing his case. The mistakes included not identifying the phony GED certificate Kelly had submitted or uncovering the millions of dollars in loans Kelly had sought from banks for a nonexistent business. The false GED helped Kelly maintain an “ordinary program achievement” record, a status that changed his score on an agency grid from “deny parole” to getting parole “with highest level of supervision.”
As Lapses In Parole Rose, So Did Killings (by Neely Tucker, Washington Post)
Who Let a Killer Into Erika Smith's World?
(by Colbert I. King, Washington Post)
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- Table of Contents
- Overview
- History
- What it Does
- Where Does the Money Go
- Controversies
- Suggested Reforms
- Comments
- Leave a comment
Founded: 1930
Annual Budget: $12 million
Employees: 96
Official Website: http://www.usdoj.gov/uspc/index.html
U.S. Parole Commission
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