PROSECUTORS LOOK FOR WAYS TO STUNT PRISON GROWTH

State prosecutors recommend doing away with mandatory minimum sentences for
most of the state's non-violent felony crimes. They also recommend making
drug court, treatment programs or community sentencing an option for people
who are convicted of drug possession for the first time.

Rob Wallace, chairman of the Oklahoma District Attorneys Council, made the
recommendations Thursday to the Oklahoma Sentencing Commission as part of
prosecutors' annual input to the commission on how to reduce overcrowding
problems in Oklahoma's prisons.

Wallace, district attorney in Le Flore and Latimer counties, said changing
drug possession punishments is perhaps the most sweeping of his group's
recommendations for the coming legislative session. Prosecutors still want
mandatory minimum sentences for drug trafficking and manufacturing
convictions, he said.

Wallace said Oklahoma would need to provide considerably more money for
alternative programs, along with changing the law.

Just 27 of the state's 77 counties have drug courts, while 42 counties have
community sentencing, officials with the Oklahoma Criminal Justice Resource
Center said.

"Our community sentencing programs during the past five years have been
growing across the state," Wallace said.

He added, however, that it is important for the Legislature to keep in
place the possibility of incarceration for such crimes to compel people to
show up for their community sentences or counseling.

Wallace urged the sentencing commission to use restraint before making too
many recommendations to the Legislature on how to manipulate state required
punishments.