Covid-19: Number Of Arrests In CT At Historic Low During Pandemic

In April, there were 2,734 arrests in Connecticut, down 46 percent from the month before (5,041), according to the state’s Office of Policy and Management’s (OPM) Criminal Justice Public Policy and Planning Division.

In the month of March, when the pandemic first struck, there were 5,041 people arrested, which itself represented a historic low. Court arraignments also fell from 1,741 to 671 (61 percent) from March to April.

From May 1, 2019 to May 1 this year, the correction population fell by 2,000 people, equivalent to the size of Connecticut’s MacDougall-Walker Correctional Institution, the most populous correction facility in New England, according to OPM.

“Following two consecutive months with numerous historic declines, the correction population sits roughly 1,200 people below OPM’s February 2020 forecast,” officials noted. “In the coming months, it is anticipated that as arrests pick up and the Judicial Branch returns to normal operations, admissions to the correction system will resume.”

OPM noted that agencies ratcheted up the use of specialized discretionary release mechanisms to increase transitions of eligible prisoners to the community. 

Since the pandemic, the DOC also managed to reduce halfway house placement, which created space to allow for social distancing and sanitizing protocols.

According to OPM, moving forward, the state is in uncharted waters, and projection models that were released earlier this year are no longer reliable due to the fallout from the pandemic.

“The coming changes are as difficult to predict as the sudden and unexpected decline was,” officials said. “After all, forecast models rely heavily on historical data. In this case, precedents seem elusive.

“The February forecast no longer works as a true measuring stick; rather it demonstrates historical system performance. The forecast therefore will continue depicting the correction system’s typical ebbs and flows.”

The complete report from OPM can be found here.

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