EDITORIAL: IT'S TIME FOR ACTION ON BARLAND'S ADVICE

It's time to spring people like Mario Martinez and Todd Graham Smith from
prison.

But they might not want to leave.

After all, Martinez and Smith are in the Duluth Federal Prison Camp, dubbed
"Club Fed" by some, and recently enjoyed a relaxing meal of steak and lobster.

Before dinner, the inmates could use the tennis and racquetball courts,
work in the machine shop, see a movie in the 300-seat theater (complete
with a popcorn machine), use the computer lab or warm up in front of the
fieldstone fireplace.

And Martinez and Smith can thank Wisconsin's taxpayers for their stay. The
state pays the federal government $44 a day to take care of Martinez and
Smith. They are in Duluth because the state has no room for them in Wisconsin.

There is growing evidence that, in the craze to toughen criminal laws and
penalties, there are too many people like Martinez and Smith spending too
much time behind bars.

In 2001, the Department of Corrections spent more than $910 million,
according to a Sunday story in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, which
detailed the care and feeding of Martinez and Smith.

The story also emphasized the sensible views of former Eau Claire County
Judge Thomas Barland, who led two task forces on criminal justice and
prison reform issues.

"We are sending people to prison who could be handled in a way other than
going to prison without endangering the public and for less money," Barland
said.

Prison populations have exploded in Wisconsin, which now exports more
inmates than any other state. The state has about 21,000 inmates, nearly
triple the number of 10 years ago, and the state is 4,000 beds short of
having room for its criminals.

While the Legislature has passed a law requiring convicts to serve all of
their sentence, lawmakers have not agreed on guidelines that would have
shortened sentences to comply with the "truth-in-sentencing" legislation.

Wisconsin also has been slow to embrace measures that other states use
successfully as alternatives to long prison sentences for convicts who
aren' t a danger to society.

Former Gov. Tommy Thompson put together a committee to find ways to enhance
probation for non-violent offenders. But the result of that committee's
work, completed 18 months ago, still hasn't been officially received and
reviewed.

Four years ago Barland warned Thompson and other state officials that
Wisconsin needs to take steps or face a severe problem when the
truth-in-sentencing law took effect.

"I cannot emphasize more strongly the need to reinvent and enhance
probation now, so that the state can have an attractive alternative to
prison when judges begin sentencing under truth-in-sentencing next year,"
Barland wrote in 1998. His words went unheeded.

This means that people like Martinez and Smith are sitting in a comfortable
federal facility instead of in the workforce, earning money to repay the
victims of their white-collar crimes.

Martinez, a lawyer, stole more than $75,000 from his clients and got eight
years in prison. Smith is serving six years behind bars for writing $3,100
in bad checks in St. Croix County.

Neither Martinez nor Smith pose a threat to the public. Both say they would
be better off out of prison where they could start repaying their
court-ordered restitution.

Wisconsin, with a $1.2 billion budget deficit, needs to rethink who judges
send to prison and for how long. It's time to dust off the advice Barland
issued four years ago and make some fundamental changes in the criminal
justice system.

- -- Doug Mell, managing editor