MANDATORY SENTENCING: JUDGES LEFT WITH FEW OPTIONS

Theresa Wilson isn't bitter about the five years she spent in prison
after being given a life without parole sentence for a first-time
drug offense.

"I'm just disappointed with the judicial system," Wilson said.

Wilson said part of the blame for what happened to her is "get tough
on crime laws" passed by the Legislature that require mandatory
sentences for certain offenses and leave judges with few options.

"There needs to be sentencing alternatives," Wilson said.

Wilson, a mother of two children, was convicted in 1998 of selling a
morphine mixture to an undercover police officer. She received the
stiff sentence because of a 1986 law passed by the Legislature that
required the life sentence because of the amount of the morphine
mixture involved in the sale.

"I think the Legislature had the best of intentions, but when you
pass a law that takes discretion away from the judge, you make a
mistake more likely," said one of Wilson's attorneys, Mark White. He
said no actual drug barons or kingpins were given life without parole
sentences under the law used to sentence Wilson.

Allen Tapley, executive director of the Sentencing Institute, said
mandatory sentencing laws often sound good when being debated in the
Legislature, but turn out to be impractical when judges try to make
them work.

"If someone has a large amount of dope, it sounds real good to say
you are going to spank them good. That's how it all gets started,"
Tapley said.

Attorney General Bill Pryor supports the work of the Sentencing
Commission, which was created by the Legislature to make
recommendations on ways to make sentencing fairer and more balanced
across the state. While declining to talk specifically about Wilson's
case, Pryor said sentencing in drug cases is a key area that needs to
be studied by the commission.

"I think the biggest problem we face is drug cases," Pryor said. He
suggested more drug cases be handled by drug courts and other
alternative sentencing programs that offer intensive treatment
instead of prison time.

"We need a lot more of that kind of work. The law has to acknowledge
and make important distinctions between different types of cases,"
Pryor said.

"We need to be tough on crime, but we also need to be smart on crime," he said.

Pryor said he expects the Sentencing Commission to issue
recommendations to the Legislature next year.

After two days of being home in Birmingham with her children, the
34-year-old Wilson said she's just glad that the law finally worked
in her case.

"I'm still in shock," Wilson said. "It's indescribable what it's like
being able to wake my children up to go to school. It's something I
have dreamed about for five years."

An eighth-grade dropout who received her GED in prison, Wilson said
she now hopes to go to college and become a drug counselor.

"I have a lot of insight. I've been through a lot and my eyes have
been opened," Wilson said. "I want to help others so they won't
experience what I've experienced."