DECRIMINALIZING CRIME

Once again the Legislature is tinkering with the correctional system in
order to avoid adding costly prison beds and avoid giving taxpayers the bad
news that there's a price to be paid to make the criminal justice system
work effectively.

In spite of euphemistic language about "low level, non-violent" offenders"
- -- burglars, thieves, drug dealers -- the fact is that a sentence to
community corrections usually means probation, during which these criminals
are free to continue burglarizing, stealing and selling drugs.

What the Legislature is really up to is another expansion of the
decriminalization process, which began in 1992 with the Kansas Sentencing
Guidelines that released 60 percent of the prison population. While
decriminalizing crime won't raise your taxes, further decriminalization is
guaranteed to raise your insurance premiums and business costs if not
jeopardize your personal safety.

Every time the Legislature decriminalizes a felony by exchanging probation
for incarceration, we are in effect saying that the increase in crime that
inevitably results, up to and including murders committed by so-called
"non-violent" offenders, is an acceptable alternative to raising taxes by a
few dollars annually.

It's your property, your life and your choice.

- -- Suzanne James, Topeka.