WITNESS
Devon Brown became commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Corrections in April 2002, and oversees more than 9,500 employees, 14 institutions, and a jurisdictional inmate population of approximately 27,000 housed in state facilities, county jails, and community halfway houses.
Commissioner Brown has over three decades of experience in the correctional field. He has held a wide array of executive, managerial, and direct service positions, beginning as a forensic psychologist in the New Jersey Department of Institutions and Agencies. He has served as warden of the Maryland Reception, Diagnostic and Classification Center; assistant commissioner of administration in the Maryland Division of Corrections; and director of the Montgomery County (Maryland) Department of Correction and Rehabilitation. In 1998, he was appointed deputy trustee in the Office of the Corrections Trustee for the District of Columbia, where he served as interim director of the District of Columbia Department of Corrections.
Commissioner Brown received the "2005 Best in the Business" award by the American Correctional Association, the 2004 Gene Carte Memorial Award by the College of New Jersey for outstanding correctional leadership, and the prestigious John B. Pickett Fellowship by the National Institute of Justice at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University in 1997. Brown earned a Juris Doctor from the University of Maryland School of Law, a Master of Public Administration from the University of Baltimore, and a Master of Arts in psychology from the University of Toledo.
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STATEMENT
Benjamin Franklin once described New Jersey as "a valley of humility between two mountains of conceit." Of course, the mountains to which he referred are New York City and Philadelphia. But I respectfully take issue with Mr. Franklin, and believe he had an ax to grind, as his son William, the royal governor of New Jersey, remained a loyalist throughout the war for independence, causing a rift between father and son which was never healed. Hence his "valley of humility" description!
I would contend, ladies and gentlemen, that New Jersey, though smaller than her neighbors to the north and south, holds national prominence in many arenas-stem cell research, scientific and pharmeceutical exploration-and, if you will forgive my slight and benigned conceit-progressive correctional policy and intervention.
Far from being the lesser sibling of the law enforcement family, the New Jersey Department of Corrections has been in the national forefront of providing definitive, research-driven innovations in the custody and care of the offender population, and our dedicated correctional employees charged with their supervision are indeed second to none. With your kind indulgence, I shall outline a few of our contributions to the advancement of the field.
Excerpted from his remarks welcoming the Commission to Newark
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