By Melody Gutierrez
SF Gate
SACRAMENTO — California’s prisons have released 2,700 inmates after their felonies were reduced to misdemeanors under a ballot measure that voters approved in November, easing punishment for some property and drug crimes.
The mass inmate release over the past four months under Proposition 47 has resolved one of the state’s most ingrained problems: prison overcrowding, state prisons chief Jeffrey Beard told a Senate committee at a legislative hearing Thursday. Prop. 47 has allowed the state to comply with a court-ordered inmate reduction mandaate a year ahead of schedule, Beard said.
But law enforcement leaders say they’ve already seen an increase in crime, and they believe it’s because of Prop. 47.
“The good news is we’ve addressed our jail overcrowding situation in California, which wasn’t acceptable to anybody,” said San Francisco Police Chief Greg Suhr in a phone interview. “The thing we are grappling with is the tremendous rise in property crime.”
Full story: California prisons have released 2,700 inmates under Prop. 47