Success Story: Prison Populations See Big Drop

Reforms have been taken over the last five years in Oklahoma, the United States, which successfully reduced its prison populations and improved social rehabilitation for former inmates.

Following the implementation of the reforms, “Oklahoma’s criminal justice system has gotten smaller, less expensive, fairer, and more just”, as stated in the newly released report by FWD.us, a nonprofit justice think tank. “More than 15,000 people each year will now have an easier time finding and keeping a job, maintaining stable housing, and supporting their families.”

Common sense policy changes – a reduction of sentences for low-level drug and property crimes, the simplification of the parole process for nonviolent offenses, and the expansion of opportunities for record expungement – led to a 21% decline in the prison population, going from 28,342 in 2017 to 22,341 in 2022. Over the same five-year period, there has been a 33% decrease in people charged with a felony offense, and a 62% drop in imprisonment for drug offenses. “The improvements made to the criminal justice system in the last five years show that progress is possible.”