MORE THAN 1M NONVIOLENT PRISONERS

WASHINGTON -- Get-tough crime-fighting policies such as mandatory
minimum sentences and ``three strikes, you're out'' laws helped drive
the number of nonviolent inmates in American jails and prisons above 1
million last year, a group that opposes minimum sentences says.

The report Wednesday from the liberal-oriented Justice Policy
Institute concluded that since 1978, the number of criminals entering
jail or prison for violent offenses doubled, while those entering
incarceration for nonviolent convictions tripled.

The study follows a Justice Department report earlier this month that
showed the country's prison and jail population overall rose to about
1.8 million by the middle of last year -- its highest level ever and
double the number from 12 years before.

The liberal institute used the recent Justice Department statistics to
calculate the national breakdown of violent and nonviolent prisoners.

The Justice Department study did not break down violent and nonviolent
prisoners in the same way. But a department statistician, Allen J.
Beck, did not quibble with the Justice Policy Institute's calculation
that the nonviolent population has topped 1 million.

Beck did note that the most dramatic growth in all prison populations
peaked several years ago, and that the latter 1990s have been marked
by relative stability. ``The story is a lot more complex,'' than a
simple breakdown of violent and nonviolent inmates suggests, Beck said.

``Another problem is that here are some fairly serious offenses that
are considered nonviolent -- burglary, arson and drug trafficking for
example -- that reasonable people would consider very serious
offenses,'' Beck said. Justice Department statistics from mid-1998
show 74 percent of local jail inmates, 53 percent of state prison
inmates, and 88 percent of federal prisoners ``were imprisoned for
offenses which involved neither harm nor the threat of harm to a
victim,'' the Justice Policy Institute's report said.

The report estimates that at the end of 1998, there were 440,088
nonviolent jail inmates, 639,280 nonviolent state prison inmates and
106,090 nonviolent federal prisoners for a national total of 1,185,458
nonviolent prisoners.

The report calls 1998 the first full year the nonviolent prison
population was above 1 million, but its authors noted that the total
has hovered near 1 million for several years, and may have actually
passed that mark late in 1997.

Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., cited the study as he pushed for
legislation eliminating mandatory five-year penalties for crack
cocaine crimes and an end to the sentencing disparity between offenses
for crack and powder cocaine.