THREE-STRIKES LAW 'A FAILURE

California's controversial "three-strikes" law, which automatically
sentences criminals to life after a third conviction, has failed to act as
a deterrent, according to a new study.

Franklin Zimring, a law professor at the University of California,
Berkeley, said his analysis of the arrest records of 3,500 criminal
defendants in Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco, before and after
the 1994 law was enacted, found no evidence that it has any statistically
significant impact on the conduct of criminals.

Now opponents of the three-strikes measure hope that the study, which was
instigated by a California Senate committee, will help to swing public
opinion in favour of a Bill changing the law to apply only to violent crimes.

The law, the most stringent mandatory sentencing law in the United States,
was pushed through by a huge public and political groundswell after the
kidnapping and murder of 12-year-old Polly Klaas in 1993.

The girl's father, Marc Klaas, initially supported the measure, and
campaigned alongside another grieving father, Mike Reynolds, whose daughter
Kimber was shot point-blank by a purse snatcher. But Klaas ultimately
became the measure's strongest opponent.

Yet despite his change of heart, a 1996 opinion poll showed that
Californians remained supportive of the law by 75 per cent to 21 per cent -
up on the 72 per cent who voted in favour in the 1994 ballot to implement
the law.

However, those polled also agreed with the California Supreme Court
decision to give judges discretion to disregard a felony. The court ruled
after the now notorious case of a man sentenced to life for stealing a
slice of pizza.

Comedians ridiculed Californian law, counting the decades the perpetrator
would spend in jail for each slice of pepperoni.

There are some signs that public opinion is turning in favour of a more
drastic overhauling of the law. A group named Families to Amend
California's Three Strikes has been formed, supporting a Bill by state
Senator Tom Hayden that would require a third strike to be a serious or
violent felony.

A recent and highly-publicised television documentary, The Legacy, also
struck home with the statistic that 80 per cent of offenders sentenced
under the law had committed non-violent crimes. Some voters are now
questioning the cost of keeping petty criminals locked up for life: the
state's prison population is expected to double by next year, with 242,000
inmates predicted by the year 2000, compared to 121,000 in 1995.

However, supporters of the law are pointing to a 38 per cent drop in
California's crime rate. Alfie Charles, spokesman for the author of the
law, California Secretary of State Bill Jones, challenged the Berkeley
study. He said: "The entire crime rate drop isn't attributable to three
strikes, but is a major factor."

But Mr Zimring said the crime rate had been declining for more than two
years before the three strikes law was passed in March 1994.

He also pointed out that the percentage of felony defendants facing
three-strikes sentences only declined from 13.9 percent, in the two and a
half years before three-strikes, to 12.8 percent in the same period after.

"The three-strikes defendants are indistinguishable from the general run of
felonies," Mr Zimring told a news conference.

"If California's crime decline were a three-strikes effect, we would expect
to see the drop in arrests concentrated among the target groups. Instead
the decline is spread evenly among both three-strikes and first and
second-time offenders."