{"id":29189,"date":"2021-02-10T16:21:05","date_gmt":"2021-02-10T22:21:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=29189"},"modified":"2021-02-10T16:21:05","modified_gmt":"2021-02-10T22:21:05","slug":"good-time-changes-proposed-for-county-jail-inmates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=29189","title":{"rendered":"Good time changes proposed for county jail inmates"},"content":{"rendered":"

Individuals incarcerated in county jails would start earning credit toward their sentences earlier under a bill heard by the Judiciary Committee Feb. 10.<\/p>\n

\"Sen.
Sen. Matt Hansen<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Currently, when inmates begin serving a state prison sentence, they are eligible to earn day-for-day \u201cgood time\u201d credit toward their sentences for following rules and not engaging in prohibited conduct. Inmates serving a sentence in a county jail also can earn this good time, but only after the first 14 days of their sentence.<\/p>\n

LB444, sponsored by Lincoln Sen. Matt Hansen, would amend the good time rate for jail sentences to mirror the state prison good time rate, effectively abolishing the 14-day waiting period.<\/p>\n

It is not good policy, Hansen said, to discount an entire two weeks of a jail sentence from being eligible for good time.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would argue that the first two weeks are a time when this tool would be most helpful to jail staff,\u201d he said. \u201cAt the same time, it would streamline shorter jail sentences to match those at our prisons.\u201d<\/p>\n

The bill also would give judges the discretion to apply any unused good time credit earned during a previous incarceration if an individual is arrested on a new charge. Judges already have this authority when imposing state prison sentences.<\/p>\n

George Dungan, representing the Nebraska Criminal Defense Attorneys Association, spoke in support of LB444. From a purely logistical perspective, Dungan said, creating harmony between the state and county good time statutes would add some clarity to an already complex process.<\/p>\n

\u201cCertainly, we want to be encouraging individuals in custody to maintain that good time,\u201d he said. \u201cIf we\u2019re going to be making sure that individuals are cooperative and working inside that jail, I think it makes sense to let them start earning that good time from the very first day that they\u2019re in custody.\u201d<\/p>\n

No one testified in opposition to the bill and the committee took no immediate action on it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Individuals incarcerated in county jails would start earning credit toward their sentences earlier under a bill heard by the Judiciary Committee Feb. 10.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13],"tags":[154],"class_list":["post-29189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-judiciary","tag-sen-matt-hansen"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29189"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29190,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29189\/revisions\/29190"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}