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MARYLAND ISSUES

Hogan crime bills won't actually reduce crime.

Violence in Baltimore continues at soar and city residents are desperate for solutions. Unfortunately, Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) has proposed crime bills that sound tough but that won’t actually reduce crime. Straight from the Trump-Sessions playbook, the governor’s plan relies on lengthy mandatory-minimum prison sentences. This approach wastes taxpayer dollars and results in higher recidivism rates. This outdated model of fighting crime that reflects a desire to “do something” to look tough shows little evidence that longer, mandatory sentences work. The Department of Justice’s National Institute of Justice has found that it is the certainty of being caught and the swiftness of the response, not the length of the sentence, that deters future crime. Cities with record-low crime rates, like New York City, pursue tactics such as “hot spot” policing that target high-crime street corners and focusing resources on closing cases and getting convictions.