There aren’t many things that you can get the majority of Alabamians to agree on with ease. Favorite football team? Prepare for a heated conversation. Politics? That’s no walk in the park of guaranteed agreement either. Surprisingly, one thing that has brought together people from every walk of life in Alabama is the urgent need to fix the state’s failing parole system.
This fact became more clear than ever in 2023, when the state’s parole grant rate was a historic low 8%. This led to a large increase in public pushback on how the Alabama Board of Pardons and Paroles determines who is eligible for approval, and why so many are being denied—even as the state is facing a lawsuit from the Department of Justice for overcrowded prisons. Alabama Values and Alabama Justice Initiative recently hosted a panel as part of the Justice in Focus initiative that reimagines public safety in Alabama. The panel featured some of the many people that are impacted by or play a role in improving the state’s parole system.
The discussion was led by Alabama Justice Initiative’s Deputy Director, Veronica Johnson, and featured ACLU of Alabama Legal Director Alison Mollman, SPLC Senior Policy Associate Katie Glenn, Alabama CURE Board Member Pat Vandermeer, and John Woods, a man that experienced the Alabama parole system. The full briefing can be found here.
The evening’s moderator, Veronica, started the discussion off with an overview of what attendees could expect before asking John Woods the first question. Woods spoke on the personal devastation he felt after being denied the first time he was up for parole. “It bothered me a lot mentally. I was destroyed for about a year or so because I had expectations that I was told from the beginning. ‘You do this many amount of years and if you do right, you’ll be released.’ That’s what was told to me 10 years before I came up (for parole) one time. After that, I started losing confidence and faith,” John shared in a moment that impacted many listeners who had family members inside of Alabama prisons. He went on to share how board workers’ false promises of him getting out at future dates negatively impacted his parents’ health.
The discussion then focused on changes that the parole board faced in 2019. Katie Glenn shared a few negatively impactful moments including a reactionary law that essentially locked down parole in Alabama and long-time famously “tough on crime” Alabama politician Charlie Graddick being appointed as Director of the Alabama Bureau of Pardons and Paroles—which led to no parole hearings for months. Alison Mollman laid out the consequences of these legislative and executive decisions clearly, saying “People are dying in Alabama’s prisons and their work release facilities because they are being denied parole.”
Pat Vandermeer shared her perspective of being in Alabama prisons 3 days a week and witnessing the people inside’s response to the parole rate dropping to near-zero. “What I was seeing and hearing from the men was hopelessness. ‘Why do I need a GED? It’s not going to help me’,” she recalled hearing, “What we saw was more drugs and more violence in the facilities. We’ve got to change this because there’s a lot of men and women who’ve transformed their lives and need to be back in the community.”
Key resources were referenced throughout, including a mention of The People’s Parole Reform Coalition which many of the speakers are a member of. Katie informed listeners of their right to comment on the state’s parole system and ensure that the Board makes adjustments every 3 years. Alison responded to an audience question on how people can document injustices faced inside prison by offering that people reach out to an organization such as ACLU of Alabama to help gather these reports and send them to the Department of Justice.
Some common sense legislative options were also mentioned. One proposed bill includes parole board accountability (proposed by Rep. Chris England), which would require the board to follow the guidelines that are in place for approval. Another proposed bill would give those up for parole the ability to virtually be present in their hearing. Alabama is one of only two states that doesn’t currently allow attendance during a hearing, which removes the human element from the process. Pat Vandermeer mentioned that another bill focused on parole for the elderly and sick. She put it plainly by stating that “our prisons are becoming nursing homes” and her experience of celebrating a 104th birthday inside of a prison.
The Locked In panel told us many things we already know about Alabama’s parole system. The most important: it is failing the people it is supposed to help. But the briefing also gave us further insights into why these problems are caused, how they can be fixed, and a look at some of the organizations working hard to make a better parole system in Alabama a reality.
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