More Than 800 New Jersey Prison Inmates Released Under COVID-19 Pandemic Law

(L-R) Re-entry program participants Rosalie Buthea, Franklin Williams, and Dwight Johnson, at the community celebration for the grand opening of Martin’s Place, an all-inclusive prisoner re-entry program that provides ex-offenders and the unemployed with on-site addiction treatment from Integrity House, transitional housing, job training, and employment, in Jersey City, N.J., on Sept. 15, 2014. Samira Bouaou/Epoch Times

Hundreds of inmates in New Jersey prisons were released early over the weekend under a law signed by Gov. Phil Murphy in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

A total of 852 prisoners were granted early release as part of the “Public Health Emergency Credits” law enacted in October 2020. Under the law, credits are awarded to certain inmates and parolees during a public health emergency.