The Return
The Return weaves together stories of those affected after California voters passed Prop. 36, which amended the harsh 3 Strikes Law, the first time U.S. history citizens voted to shorten sentences of the incarcerated.
Awards & Recognition
Nominee
2016 Peabody Awards - George Foster Peabody Award
Nominee
2016 News and Documentary Emmy Awards - Outstanding Current Affairs Documentary
In 2012, California voters amended the state’s Three Strikes Law, one of the harshest criminal sentencing laws in the nation. The landmark passage of Proposition 36 constituted the first time in history that U.S. citizens voted to shorten sentences of the currently incarcerated. Within days, the reintegration of thousands of “lifers” – men and women once expecting to die in prison – was underway.
Shot in immersive verité, The Return weaves together narratives of characters on the front lines of this unprecedented shift: prisoners suddenly freed, families turned upside down, attorneys and judges wrestling with an untested law, and reentry providers negotiating unfathomable transitions. Taken together, these stories yield an illuminating meta-narrative of an unfolding and historic reform, exploring what it can teach a nation reckoning with mass incarceration.