Families Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMM) is an American nonprofit

advocacy organization Advocacy is an activity by an individual or group that aims to influence decisions within political, economic, and social institutions. Advocacy includes activities and publications to influence public policy, laws and budgets by using fac ...

founded in 1991 to challenge

mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentencing requires that people convicted of certain crimes serve a predefined term of imprisonment, removing the discretion of judges to take issues such as extenuating circumstances and a person's likelihood of rehabilitation into co ...

laws and advocate for

criminal justice reform Criminal justice reform is the reform of criminal justice systems. Stated reasons for criminal justice reform include reducing crime statistics, racial profiling, police brutality, overcriminalization, mass incarceration, under-reporting, and ...

. FAMM promotes sentencing policies that give judges the discretion to distinguish between

defendant In court proceedings, a defendant is a person or object who is the party either accused of committing a crime in criminal prosecution or against whom some type of civil relief is being sought in a civil case. Terminology varies from one juris ...

s and sentence them according to their role in the offense, the seriousness of the offense, and their potential for rehabilitation. FAMM's members include

prison A prison, also known as a jail, gaol, penitentiary, detention center, correction center, correctional facility, or remand center, is a facility where Prisoner, people are Imprisonment, imprisoned under the authority of the State (polity), state ...

ers and their families, attorneys,

judge A judge is a person who wiktionary:preside, presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a judicial panel. In an adversarial system, the judge hears all the witnesses and any other Evidence (law), evidence presented by the barris ...

criminal justice Criminal justice is the delivery of justice to those who have been accused of committing crimes. The criminal justice system is a series of government agencies and institutions. Goals include the rehabilitation of offenders, preventing other ...

experts, and concerned citizens. In 2018, ''The Washington Post'' described FAMM as "one of the leading organizations that have pushed for criminal justice changes." The organization's founder, Julie Stewart, started FAMM shortly after her brother was convicted of growing marijuana plants near his home and given a mandatory five year federal prison sentence. FAMM organized lobbying efforts in support of the

First Step Act The First Step Act, formally known as the Formerly Incarcerated Reenter Society Transformed Safely Transitioning Every Person Act, is a bipartisan criminal justice bill passed by the 115th U.S. Congress and signed by President Donald Trump in ...

, a law which reforms the U.S. federal prison system and seeks to reduce recidivism and decrease the federal inmate population. The organizers succeeded in their efforts and the Act was passed by the

115th Congress The 115th United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States of America federal government, composed of the Senate and the House of Representatives. It met in Washington, D.C., from January 3, 2017, to January ...

and signed into law in December 2018. It changed U.S. federal criminal sentencing laws, among other reforms.

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* * {{authority control Political advocacy groups in the United States Criminal justice reform in the United States 1991 establishments in Washington, D.C.

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