There was a news story today about the Three Strikes law in California. You might remember this law. It provides that if a person is convicted of a third felony the minimum sentence is 25 years to life. About 15 years ago a man with two previous nonviolent crimes was convicted of a burglary for breaking into a food pantry to steal something to eat.The man got the sentence that was required by law.
At that particular time most people were in agreement with that sentence. After all, this guy had had two opportunities before that. He committed another felony. He should go to jail for at least 25 years.
The news story today was that a judge let him out of jail. This judge said that the sentence was unreasonable, unduly harsh, cruel and unusual punishment. The judge confined his decision to this case. Most people now seem to agree with him.
The law students at Stanford University Law school are working on a project reviewing many of these Three Strike cases. In cases where the punishment seems severe for the crime, especially the third crime, they are filing court challenges to the reasonableness of the sentence. I don’t know how successful they are being. But it does bear some scrutiny.
One of the problems we have with our legal system is that a criminal laws are passed by elected legislators acting on emotion. These legislators, in an effort to pander to their constituents, frequently put harsh sentences on various crimes. When the crime rate doesn’t go down they go back to their legislatures and raise the penalties. They then go back to their constituents and brag about how hard they are on crime.
The answer to lowering the crime rate is not in harsh prison sentences. We should have learned this lesson some time ago. We haven’t. Crime does need to be punished. But it needs to be punished appropriately. What we need is truth in sentencing.
If a person is sentenced to serve 15 years, they should serve 15 years. Perhaps they should get some time off for good behavior. But it should probably not be more than 10%. Usually the time off for good behavior works to the benefit of the prison guards. If the prisoners have an incentive to behave well they are less inclined to be a problem to the guards. That is a good thing.
Unfortunately in the state of Missouri we do not have truth in sentencing. One person might be sentenced to seven years in the penitentiary and do seven years. The next person might be sentenced to seven years in the penitentiary and do 15 months. That is wrong.
The problem with imposing long, harsh prison sentences is that even the enforcers will not impose those sentences on most offenders. People who are involved in the legal system will frequently look at mandatory prison sentences and realize that they are unreasonable.
Legislators should take a look at the penalties imposed for certain offenses and make them reasonable. Long mandatory sentences result in prison overcrowding. Decisions then have to be made by bureaucrats as to who to let go in order to make room for other prisoners.
It is easy to look at a person who has committed a third felony and assume they have no hope in life. Maybe they don’t. However, locking them up for the rest of their lives is not the answer. This especially applies to nonviolent criminals. Will they be in and out of jail for the rest of their lives? If not for the rest of their lives, at least for most of their lives. But we, as citizens, must be reasonable. Long sentences do not solve the crime problem.
Reasonable sentences that will be enforced and reasonable sentences that can be imposed are the answer.
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