Locking up moms destabilizes families and doesn’t make us safer

Locking up a mom punishes more than one person — it punishes her children, her family and her neighborhood.

As a retired police officer, I have seen firsthand that women must face consequences when they break the law. I have also seen that the current system isn’t built to hold them accountable effectively.

Arrests of women have surged by 48 percent since 1980, and their incarceration rate has climbed by one-third just since 2020 — nearly twice the increase for men. At the same time, women’s share of violent crime arrests has jumped by about 70 percent, and women’s drug crime arrests are up more than 300 percent...