Introducing The First Step Act

The First Step Act of 2018 was a bipartisan sponsored bill that is considered the most significant prison reform legislation ever enacted. Signed into law on December 21, 2018 by then President Donald Trump, the bill (formerly known as the “Formerly Incarcerated Reenter Society Transformed Safely Transitioning Every Person Act”) was created to reform Federal prisons, reduce recidivism rates of Federal inmates, reduce Federal prison populations and change existing sentencing laws. You can read the entire enacted law here:https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/PLAW-115publ391/pdf/PLAW-115publ391.pdf

The act has three major components: (1) correctional reform via the establishment of a risk and needs assessment system at the Bureau of Prisons (BOP), (2) sentencing reform via changes to penalties for some federal offenses, and (3) the reauthorization of the Second Chance Act of 2007 (P.L. 110-199). The act also contains a series of other criminal justice-related provisions.

The First Step Act requires the Department of Justice (DOJ) to develop a risk and needs assessment system to be used by BOP to assess the recidivism risk of all federal prisoners and to place prisoners in programs and productive activities to reduce this risk. Prisoners who successfully participate in recidivism reduction programming and productive activities can earn additional time credits that will allow them to be placed in prerelease custody (i.e., home confinement or a Residential Reentry Center) earlier than they were previously allowed. The act prohibits prisoners convicted of any one of dozens of offenses from earning additional time credits, though these prisoners can earn other benefits, such as additional visitation time, for successfully participating in recidivism reduction programming. Offenses that make prisoners ineligible to earn additional time credits can generally be categorized as violent, terrorism, espionage, human trafficking, sex and sexual exploitation, repeat felon in possession of firearm, certain fraud, or high-level drug offenses. A list of those offenses can be found here: https://usafirststep.com/fsa-ineligible-crimes

The act makes changes to the penalties for some federal offenses. The act modified mandatory minimum prison sentences for some drug traffickers with prior drug convictions by increasing the threshold for prior convictions that count toward triggering higher mandatory minimums for repeat offenders, reducing the 20-year mandatory minimum (applicable where the offender has one prior qualifying conviction) to a 15-year mandatory minimum, and reducing a life-in-prison mandatory minimum (applicable where the offender has two or more prior qualifying convictions) to a 25-year mandatory minimum.

The act made the provisions of the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 (P.L. 111-220) retroactive so that currently incarcerated offenders who received longer sentences for possession of crack cocaine than they would have received if sentenced for possession of the same amount of powder cocaine before the enactment of the Fair Sentencing Act can submit a petition in federal court to have their sentences reduced. The act also expands the safety valve provision, which allows courts to sentence low-level, nonviolent drug offenders with minor criminal histories to less than the required mandatory minimum for an offense. Finally, the act eliminated the stacking provision, which allowed prosecutors to charge offenders with a second and subsequent use of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking or violent offense in the same criminal incident, which, if the offender is convicted, carries a 25-year mandatory minimum. Now, the mandatory minimum will only apply when the offender has a prior conviction for use of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking or violent crime from a previous criminal prosecution.

The First Step Act contains the Second Chance Reauthorization Act of 2018. This act reauthorizes appropriations for and expands the scope of some grant programs that were initially authorized under the Second Chance Act of 2007 (P.L. 110-199). The reauthorized programs include the Adult and Juvenile State and Local Offender Demonstration Program, Grants for Family-Based Substance Abuse Treatment, Careers Training Demonstration Grants, the Offender Reentry Substance Abuse and Criminal Justice Collaboration Program, and the Community-Based Mentoring and Transitional Service Grants to Nonprofit Organizations Program. The act also reauthorized and modified a pilot program that allows BOP to place certain elderly and terminally ill prisoners on home confinement to serve the remainder of their sentences.

Finally, the First Step Act includes a series of other criminal justice-related provisions. These provisions include a prohibition on the use of restraints on pregnant inmates in the custody of BOP and the U.S. Marshals Service; a change to the way good time credit is calculated so prisoners can earn 54 days of good time credits for each year of imposed sentence rather than for each year of time served; a requirement for BOP to provide a way for employees to safely store firearms on BOP grounds; a requirement for BOP to try to place prisoners within 500 driving miles of their primary residences; authority for the Federal Prison Industries to sell products to public entities for use in correctional facilities, disaster relief, or emergency response, to the District of Columbia government, and to nonprofit organizations; a prohibition against the use of solitary confinement for juvenile delinquents in federal custody; and a requirement that BOP aid prisoners with obtaining identification before they

are released.