Another congressional hearing on federal prisons, this time with testimony from out-going BOP director

As noted in this prior post, a couple weeks ago the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security of the US House Judiciary Committee held a hearing with multiple witnesses on "The First Step Act, The Pandemic, and Compassionate Release: What Are the Next Steps for the Federal Bureau of Prisons?".  This morning, as detailed here, another similar hearing was conducted, though with only one witness, Michael Carvajal, the Director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons.  Carvajal has already resigned, though is serving until his replacement in place.  And in that role, he submitted this written testimony which is worth a full read.  Here are some excerpts:

We have begun awarding inmates FSA earned time credits for successful participation in FSA programs and moving eligible inmates to supervised release or pre-release custody. These credits are governed by a new regulation that the Bureau issued in January 2022. Working closely with other Department of Justice components, we are exercising our discretion to apply time credits towards supervised release for the sentences of over 4,900 inmates and anticipate moving over 2,500 inmates to Home Confinement or a Residential Reentry Center based on the published final rule governing the awarding of FSA earned time credits....

Based on the March 26, 2020 and April 3, 2020 guidance issued by Attorney General Barr, the Bureau began and continues to migrate eligible inmates to Home Confinement. I am pleased to report that since March 26, 2020, the Bureau has transferred more than 37,000 inmates to community custody, with more than 9,000 transferred directly pursuant to the authority granted by the CARES Act. Review of medically vulnerable inmates for potential placement in home confinement remains ongoing and will continue for the duration of the pandemic....

As the Committee is aware, the Department’s Office of Legal Counsel recently issued an opinion indicating that the Bureau may use its preexisting authorities and discretion to permit prisoners granted CARES Act Home Confinement to continue such placements after declaration of the end of the COVID-19 Emergency. The Department of Justice is preparing regulations to implement this decision....

[T]he First Step Act of 2018 paved the way for an inmate to file directly with the sentencing court, after the inmate has fully exhausted the internal appeals process, or 30 days after the warden received the inmate’s compassionate release request. Since the enactment of the FSA, we are aware of 4,025 compassionate releases regardless of the tens of thousands which have been sought. Since the passage of the CARES Act, 3,851 inmates have been released via compassionate release. The Bureau cannot track inmate-filed motions, as the Bureau is not a party to those cases....

The Elderly Offender Home Detention Program was reauthorized by the FSA, and it allows certain elderly federal inmates to seek placement on home confinement before the expiration of their prison sentence. Since passage of the FSA, the Bureau has approved 1,177 inmates to home confinement under this program.