A dozen scientists and engineers from the 天美影视传媒 have been elected to the . According to a statement released by the organization, the new members were selected for “their outstanding record of scientific achievement and willingness to work on behalf of the academy in bringing the best available science to bear on issues within the state of Washington.”

Three of the new members from UW were chosen because they had been elected recently to one of the National Academies 鈥� the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Medicine. The other nine were elected by current members.

In all, UW faculty make up half of the 24 new members, who will be formally inducted in September during an annual meeting at the Museum of Flight in Seattle.

Elected through recent admission to a National Academy:

: professor of computer science and engineering, to the National Academy of Engineering

: professor of atmospheric sciences, to the National Academy of Sciences

: professor of pediatrics, director of the Center for Clinical and Translational Research and associate director of the Pediatric Clinical Research Center at Seattle Children鈥檚, to the National Academy of Medicine

Elected by current members of the Washington State Academy of Sciences:聽聽

: professor and chair of chemical engineering, adjunct professor of bioengineering

: professor of sociology

: associate professor of physiology and biophysics

: professor of oceanography

: professor of nursing, adjunct professor of medicine

: professor of environmental and forest sciences

: professor and chair of bioengineering

: professor of biochemistry, professor of chemistry

: professor of chemical engineering, director of the Clean Energy Institute, adjunct professor of materials science and engineering

Incorporated by legislation in 2007, the Washington State Academy of Sciences initially had just 105 members. With this new crop of members from UW and other institutions around the state, the academy’s total membership will rise to 264. The academy’s mission is “to provide expert scientific and engineering analysis to inform public policymaking in Washington, and to increase the role and visibility of science in the state.”

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For more information, contact James Urton in the UW Office of News & Information at 206-543-2580 or jurton@uw.edu.

Stricter state sentencing laws in Washington have swelled the ranks of inmates serving life sentences to nearly one in five.

And some lifers who opted to go to trial are serving much longer sentences than others who committed the same crimes and plea-bargained 鈥� raising questions about equitable treatment of prisoners.

Those are among the findings in a new analysis by undergraduate honors students in the 天美影视传媒鈥檚 program, who sought to determine the number of lifers in Washington prisons, the legal processes that lead to life sentences and the cost of housing those inmates, many of whom will die behind bars.

Washington largely eliminated its parole system after the state鈥檚 Sentencing Reform Act was enacted in 1984. The SRA was intended to increase consistency in sentencing and shift the goal of sentencing from rehabilitation, which research at the time indicated did not reduce crime, to punishment.

鈥淎t the time, the conventional wisdom was that rehabilitation didn鈥檛 work, and that parole boards were making arbitrary decisions,鈥� said , a professor in the Law, Societies & Justice program and the Department of Sociology, who oversaw the students鈥� research.

The upshot of the SRA was that except for a few categories of inmates 鈥� juveniles, certain sex offenders sentenced to life and prisoners sentenced before the law was enacted 鈥� most prisoners would never go before a review board, have their sentences reconsidered or have a chance at early release. Ever.

Two consequent voter-approved initiatives caused the numbers of lifers in Washington state to increase dramatically over the past two decades. The so-called 鈥溾�� law of 1993, the first of its type in the nation, mandated life without parole for three serious felony convictions. The initiative followed two years later, requiring mandatory sentence additions for crimes involving guns. The report mentions one prisoner who was sentenced to 83 years due to weapons charges alone.

The students analyzed data for all felony cases sentenced in Washington state from July 1985 to July 2013, more than 600,600 in total.聽They聽found that:

• Almost one in five (19.3 percent) of inmates in Washington are serving life sentences.
• Of Washington鈥檚 prisoners, 11.3 percent are serving life with parole 鈥� most are sex offenders eligible for review, and a few are inmates sentenced before 1984 鈥� and 8 percent are serving official life without parole sentences or 鈥渄e facto鈥� ones of 470 months or more, based on the of a life sentence.
• Nationally, one in nine prisoners is serving an official life sentence.
• De facto lifers make up almost half the state鈥檚 life without parole population.
• African-Americans comprise only about 4 percent of Washington鈥檚 population, but make up 28 percent of prisoners serving life without parole.
• The average life without parole sentence costs taxpayers $2.4 million per prisoner. Before 1984, when lifers were often released, the average cost was $767,895 per prisoner (in 2014 dollars).
• Half of those serving life without parole sentences were sentenced under the three strikes law, and almost 20 percent of de facto lifers are serving sentences of 39 years or more solely due to additional weapons charges.

The students also found widespread discrepancies in the life sentences given for identical crimes committed by inmates who opted for trial compared with those who accepted plea bargains. Prisoners who were tried for homicide, for example, got sentences 9.6 percent longer on average than their counterparts who plea-bargained, the students found.

The gap was even greater for less serious offenses. Inmates convicted of first-degree assault through trial got sentences 45.3 percent longer than those who accepted plea bargains. Two-thirds of life without parole sentences were handed down after trials, the report found, while only 5 percent of cases resulting in other sentences had gone to trial.

鈥淭his suggests that there is a correlation between [life without parole] sentences and the trial process, and raises the possibility that people who take their case to trial are being penalized for doing so,鈥� the authors write.

Alex Lynch, one of the report鈥檚 authors, said the data also suggests that the Sentencing Reform Act鈥檚 goal of reducing sentencing disparities has failed.

鈥淲e ran the data over and over and over,鈥� said Lynch, who graduated this year. 鈥淭he ranges are remarkable. They speak to the question of how effective the SRA has been.鈥�

Another question is how the death penalty might impact life sentences. Washington is one of 31 states with the death penalty, which was suspended in the U.S. between 1972 and 1976. During that time, Beckett said, many states authorized life without parole sentences as an alternative to the death penalty but retained it even after capital punishment was reintroduced.

Opposition to capital punishment seems to have strengthened life without parole sentencing, she said, as opponents push for it as a more acceptable alternative.

鈥淥pposition to the death penalty has made life without parole seem more normal,鈥� Beckett said.

The study coincides with a growing national conversation about mass incarceration in the United States, which has the world鈥檚 largest prison population 鈥� about 2.2 million people, according to the . Presidential hopefuls and have made mass incarceration a campaign issue, and other Democratic and Republican candidates are calling for .

The UW study makes three recommendations: that Washington create a review board and process that allows every lifer to be re-evaluated after a pre-determined amount of time, repeal the three strikes and Hard Time for Armed Crime laws and expand rehabilitative programs to help inmates reintegrate into society after release.

In February, the state house passed that would ease the Hard Time for Armed Crime law. The UW students hope to present their report to the Washington State Sentencing Guidelines Commission, and Lynch said she鈥檚 encouraged by feedback the document has received from local stakeholders.

鈥淲e鈥檝e gotten overwhelmingly positive support,鈥� she said. 鈥淲e鈥檝e had a lot of positive interactions with folks that are in a position to make some change.鈥�

The study鈥檚 co-authors are Dakota Blagg, Madison Brown, Alison Buchanan, Bryce Ellis, Olivia Gee, Andreas Hewitt, Zoe Liebeskind, Katelyn Lowthorp, Hannah Schwendeman and Nicholas Scott.