Relative to criminal justice reform

What it means

The Senate's criminal justice bill, which changes many parts of the criminal laws. On juveniles and records, it raises the upper age of juvenile court from 18 to 19 and the lowest age for a delinquency charge from seven to 12, lets people seek expungement of some offenses committed before 19, and shortens record-sealing waits from 5 to 3 years and 10 to 7 years. On crimes and sentences, it rewrites drug distribution penalties, makes supplying drugs during trafficking that cause a death punishable as second-degree murder, raises the felony larceny threshold from $250 to $1,500, adds new crimes such as sexual relations between school or state agency staff and students or clients, and creates diversion and restorative justice options. On courts and prisons, it rewrites bail rules to consider ability to pay, limits jailing people only for unpaid fines when counsel was not offered, sets standards for restrictive housing (solitary confinement), and creates task forces on mandatory minimum sentences and on raising juvenile court age to 21; parts take effect on dates from July 1, 2018 to July 1, 2020.

Source: official text and history of S.2200 on malegislature.gov. This describes the bill text posted there; amendments may have changed the version that was voted on.