THREE-STRIKE LAWS

The stuff of another time, another place Practically everybody was all agog
a few years back when states started passing those
three-strikes-and-you're-out sentencing laws.

It was a way to get repeat criminals off the street, and it seemed like a
good idea at the time.

Now that we've seen such laws in use for a while, though, the luster has
worn off.

Their are two main problems with them:

First, a matter of principle: Every criminal case should be judged on its
own merits -- the deed, the motive and every consequence.

The laws have proven to give unfairly long sentences for relatively minor
crimes. Good examples are the two cases that the U.S. Supreme Court has
decided to accept to test the three-strikes laws.

Second, a matter of practicality: We simply do not have, and cannot afford
to build, enough prison space to house people year after year because they
committed minor crimes.

Both of the cases that the Supreme Court will consider are from California,
which has one of the toughest three-strike laws. Both involve shoplifting.

In one case, a man got 50 years to life for stealing $150 worth of
videotapes from two discount stores in 1995, the year after California's
three-strikes law was passed. He had three previous burglary convictions.
Still, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled last year that his
sentence was unconstitutionally long, considering the crime.

The other case involves the attempted shoplifting of three golf clubs from
a pro shop. That would have been a misdemeanor except that the thief had
three earlier robbery and burglary convictions. For stealing the golf
clubs, he got 25 years.

These cookie-cutter sentences are reminiscent of Jean Valjean in Victor
Hugo's novel "Les Miserables." Valjean got 19 years for stealing a loaf of
bread in Paris in the 19th century. When released, he violated his parole
by committing a minor crime and was haunted endlessly thereafter by an
obsessive policeman.

We look at such stories from other societies with arrogance and disdain.
Our own system is not supposed permit such things to happen.

- --MIKE ROUSE