PRISONS PITTED AGAINST LAWS

Symposium Looks For A Balance

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK -- Eleven years ago, North Carolina's prisons were
so overcrowded that some criminals were paroled almost as soon as they went
to their cells. It's not as bad today, thanks to a prison construction boom
and revised sentencing laws that toughened penalties for violent offenders
while steering more nonviolent criminals to probation, drug treatment and
community service.

But projections show the state will need several thousand new prison beds
by 2013 to cover the increasing demand. And that led a coalition of
criminal justice experts, drug treatment professionals and social justice
advocates to join together Tuesday at a "Smart on Crime" symposium to look
for ways to reduce the need for cells without endangering North Carolina
communities.

"North Carolina is at a crossroads," said Laura Sager, executive director
of Families Against Mandatory Minimums, a symposium co-sponsor. "It could
continue to build more prisons, or build on its thoughtful sentencing
policies."

Her group is a Washington-based nonprofit seeking to overturn tough
sentencing laws for nonviolent drug criminals and repeat offenders. It
supports the N.C. Sentencing and Policy Commission's proposals to reduce
some sentences to eliminate the need for roughly 4,600 prison beds over the
next 10 years.

In particular, the family group endorses the commission's proposal to
revamp the state's 37-year-old habitual felon law, which allows prosecutors
to classify nonviolent criminals as repeat offenders who would have to
serve at least 3 years, 8 months in prison once they receive their fourth
felony conviction.

Prosecutors say they need the law to get repeat offenders off the streets
before they commit more crime. But critics say it punishes nonviolent
criminals too harshly.

Prosecutors rarely used the law until the sentencing reforms took place 10
years ago. Today, they are putting more than 600 habitual felons behind
bars annually, and those inmates represent a fast-growing segment of the
prison population.

The commission's proposal would increase the sentences for habitual felons,
but not as dramatically as the current law. But it and the commission's
other proposals have not caught fire in the General Assembly.

Some legislators at the symposium said that's got to change because the
cost is taking money away from education and human service programs that
can steer people away from a life of crime.

"There is a balance between maintaining safety in the community and
punishing violent criminals, and it's time for the legislature to revisit
structured sentencing and habitual felon laws," said Rep. Beverly Earle, a
Charlotte Democrat and co-chairwoman of the House Appropriations Committee.