In January 2025, the Office of the State Public Defender (OSPD), in partnership with Redo.io, sent detailed letters to Public Defender’s Offices across California’s 58 counties that contain the names and case IDs of potential candidates for resentencing under PC1172, AB600, Racial Justice Act, or other channels for second look case reviews. These letters included incarcerated individuals in California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) custody who are serving time for non-violent, non-serious and non-sexual offenses. They were identified using our open database of over 95,000 prison sentences and, based on our analysis and criteria, may be serving an excessive or harsh sentence for low-level offenses.
In 2018, California passed the first Prosecutor Initiated Resentencing law in the U.S., supported by an $18 million, three-year pilot program in nine geographically and demographically diverse counties. This program provides resources for prosecutors, public defenders, and community groups to pursue resentencing. Additional funding was allocated to the RAND Corporation, an independent research group, to monitor and evaluate the program’s effectiveness.
However, since most resentencing channels are discretionary measures by legislative design, their application is inconsistent across the state. While some counties have embraced resentencing, others have used their discretion sparingly, and some have not used it at all (Wright et al., 2024).
Using our open database of over 95,000 prison sentences, which encompasses the entire CDCR population, we identified harshly sentenced individuals across the state, regardless of whether they were prosecuted by counties that actively pursue post-conviction relief through PIR or other methods.
Our eligibility lists include individuals sentenced to more than 20 years and who have served at least half of their sentence. We broadly exclude those convicted of homicide, sex offenses, and other violent felonies.
However, there are limitations to the data we provide. Since Redo.io’s prison sentence database is constructed using the California Public Records Act (CPRA), it is possible that some offenses might not have been disclosed to us due to privacy restrictions in the law. As a result, some individuals on our “eligible” list may actually be ineligible because they committed a disqualifying offense that was not revealed to us under the CPRA.
References:
Wright, Ronald F., & Levine, Kay L. (2024, June 15). Legislatures and Localized Resentencing. Wake Forest University School of Law Legal Studies Research Paper Series, Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology (forthcoming). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4930072
Dukmasova, M. (2024, March 15). Three strikes for Cook County prosecutors. Injustice Watch. https://www.injusticewatch.org/criminal-courts/prosecutors/2022/prosecutor-resentencing-failed-cook-county
