Drug and other crimes have been systemically decriminalized across Washington state, at the state, city and county levels, due in part to their implementation of Seattle’s “Law Enforcement Assistance Diversion” (LEAD) program (or a variation of it) which essentially prevents arrests for selective drug and other crimes in favor of connecting the offender to public services.
Officials were sold on the program with claims that LEAD reduced recidivism by 58% and reduced felony charges by 39%, reduced costs and increased odds of being employed by 46%.
The underlying research contradicts those claims. For example, program proponents claim "LEAD reduced recidivism for all crimes by 58%," but in the study, the LEAD group appears to benefit from reduction in warrant arrests due to a higher rate of dropped and reduced charges, while the control group does not. The LEAD and control groups were also subject to different recruitment practices, different patterns of law enforcement, different timelines, and different geographic areas. These differences appear favorable to LEAD and unfavorable to the control group. No clear difference in arrests rates can be reliably claimed.
Millions at the city, county, state and national levels have been budgeted for LEAD implementation based on erroneous claims. Send WPC”s report, Widespread and Systematic Factual Errors in Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD) and tell your elected officials that to truly aid the addicted, the homeless and the communities impacted, criminal justice reform must be built on facts.