High-profile inmate and New Jersey release order highlight another remarkable night for the coronavirus

I decided to try to mostly get off line Sunday night, and these days this means I have lots to catch up with on Monday morning.  I do not have time to provide another review of all the big prison and prisoner headlines, but these two seemed the most notable of the bunch:

• "At New York prison, Harvey Weinstein put in isolation after contracting virus"

• "ACLU-NJ: NJ Order to Release People in County Jails Breaks New Ground in COVID-19 Pandemic"

The average person is likely to be most interested in the first of these stories, but here are excerpts from the second piece (which is a press release) highlighting its importance:

Late in the evening Sunday, March 22, New Jersey Chief Justice Stuart Rabner signed an order that had been negotiated by criminal justice stakeholders, including the ACLU-NJ.  All people serving sentences in county jails across the state are subject to the order, although prosecutors can challenge the release of specific individuals where they contend there exist significant risks to the person being released or to public safety.  The order could impact up to 1,000 people incarcerated in county jails.

The order does not commute people’s sentences, but instead orders their temporary release during the COVID-19 public health crisis.  At the conclusion of the emergency, judges will determine whether any sentences should be commuted.  The order takes extraordinary steps to prevent unnecessary incarceration or superfluous interactions with the criminal justice system altogether during this time, such as suspending most outstanding warrants and preventing in-person reporting to probation officers.

This order from the Supreme Court of New Jersey runs 14 pages and is available at this link.