REPEAT OFFENDER LAW STRIKES ACTIVISTS AS EXCEEDINGLY UNJUST

The meetings always begin with a prayer. They also end with one. And in
between, it is clear why so much praying needs to be done. Because inside
the old Craftsman home south of downtown Los Angeles, two dozen folks meet
every Monday night to stoke a revolution.

Not a violent one, though they are angry. Not a desperate one, though they
are passionate about their cause. No, this is a measured insurrection. One
organized and carried out by ordinary citizens who are united in the simple
yet daunting goal of changing one of the most significant criminal justice
laws ever enacted in California: Three strikes.

Now to be clear, they do not ask that the landmark 1994 law be stricken.
They want it changed. Despite its original intentions to crack down on
career criminals, they believe that it has gone too far. It has locked up,
sometimes for life, too many members of their families for petty crimes.
How else, they ask, do you describe a law that sends someone to prison for
life for stealing two sips of gin. Or making off with soda cans. Or
possessing a flake of cocaine.

So five years and almost 50,000 new prisoners after the law took effect,
this group, Families to Amend California's Three Strikes, is pushing to
make it apply only to violent felonies, not the drug crimes, petty thefts
or burglaries that make up most convictions.

Under the current law, any ex-felon convicted of a "serious"--such as a
burglary--or "violent" felony can see his potential prison time greatly
enhanced if he is again found guilty of a felony. Even if that offense is
not classified "serious" or "violent." Even if the earlier crimes were
decades ago.

For a second strike, that means doubling of a normal prison sentence. And
for strike three, it means going away for 25 years to life. The group
believes that only violent felonies should be considered second or third
strikes and that no juvenile crime should count as a strike. In addition,
members want those now serving time under three strikes to be resentenced
under the proposed new rules.

"Let the time fit the crime" is how members state their case. And they have
their work cut out for them.

"No question, it will be an uphill battle," said Geri Silva, co-founder of
the group. "There is no hope that we're going to have all the . . .
politicians moving to change the law. It's not going to happen that way."
Instead, she and the other members believe that the law will be amended
through a public awareness campaign--here and throughout California--that
Sacramento lawmakers cannot ignore. Toward that end, this group of mothers,
fathers, grandparents and others fans out every week to churches, schools
and community halls to urge a change.

"Each thing we do in the community makes our voices stronger, and each
person we educate makes our movement bigger," said Silva, who has had
friends, but no relatives, imprisoned under the law. And although the group
has not reached its goal, it is also far from the place where it started.
"We've taken steps," Silva said. "We're not at the beginning at all."

Launched two years ago in Los Angeles, the group now has chapters as
diverse as California--in Oakland, Sacramento, San Jose, San Bernardino,
San Diego, Santa Barbara and Orange County. Statewide, according to Silva,
the group has 600 to 700 active members and more than a thousand others on
its mailing list.

Most of them have husbands or brothers in prison. Micky Neal has both.

"My brother's last case was burglary. He went into a Thrifty store and
stole 11 bottles of shampoo," Neal said.

Her husband, Lamont, she said, is doing 25 years to life for petty theft.
"He went in on a charge of possessing a stolen credit card," she said. "He
went down to Alvarado and purchased a credit card and ID. He tried to use
it to buy a TV."

Carmen Ewell joined after her husband, John, was sent to prison for passing
a stolen check. With two previous convictions for second-degree robbery,
the 42-year-old cosmetologist pleaded guilty to the stolen check charge
when authorities offered him a deal, he said from state prison in Norco.
Plead guilty, prosecutors said, and we'll overlook a prior conviction, so
this will count as a second, not third, strike. In doing so, Ewell avoided
a trial and the possibility of a sentence of 25 years to life. Still,
pleading to a second strike meant that his prison term was doubled--to
seven years.

"If they were to amend three strikes, I could probably go home next year,"
said Ewell, whose offense normally carries a 3 1/2-year prison term. Said
his wife: "I think it's an injustice. . . . His attorney told me if my
husband had not gotten the priors, he probably would have [faced] a
misdemeanor."

Like many of those in the group, Carmen Ewell, an insurance claims analyst,
did not know about the group until long after her husband was sent to
prison. "My niece and I were going to church and saw a demonstration. . . .
It was like 50 or 60 people. They were around the whole block," she said.
"I have been involved ever since."

During a recent meeting, Ewell, 37, presided over a meeting of the group's
Outreach Committee. Over the course of an hourlong discussion, she and
others ticked off a list of upcoming events and stressed that members must
press local churches and other groups to join their cause. Doug Kieso, an
accountant and former corporate attorney who developed the group's Web
site, tells the group that he will be speaking to a local school about the
three-strikes law. He also mentions that a recent documentary about the law
can be made available to groups. "The big thing about our organization is
that we are one of the few groups trying to change a law [in a way] that
would help prisoners," Kieso said. "There are very few lobbying groups that
have any power in that regard, so we are up against a huge [opponent]."

Politicians. Law enforcement organizations. Victims rights groups. "These
are people who have millions of dollars . . . and we are bare bones," Kieso
said. As the meeting opens, his point becomes clear. Sitting in clusters,
members salvage stamps from mailers that were never sent out. Increasingly,
the position of state and local lawmakers on three strikes infuriates some
members who say they are too often brushed off by officials, including
those whose poorer districts are especially affected by three strikes.

"To let them stay in office and be untouchable is an insult," said Tommy
Plummer, a 51-year-old Los Angeles city employee.

Unlike most in the group, Plummer first became aware of the law serving as
a juror in a 1997 case in which a drug addict's arrest for possessing $15
in rock cocaine--his first arrest in almost 20 years--would have landed him
in prison for 25 years to life if a jury had not deadlocked. Dennis Duncan,
president of the group's Los Angeles chapter, is also in the minority among
its members.

He voted for three strikes. "I had voted for . . . every prison thing that
came down the pike," he said. But Duncan changed his mind after hearing
about who was being swept up by the new law.

"I have not been directly affected by the three-strikes law. I am just a
citizen who feels a responsibility for doing something about it," he said.
"I am not saying that everybody is in prison incorrectly and [that] I want
to open the gates and let everybody out.

"I do believe that people do bad things and they should be punished," he
said. "But I also believe the time should fit the crime." So do the others.

"God help me, if I knew someone in prison for three strikes," Plummer said,
shaking his head, "I don't know how I could handle it."