WAYNE LAW OFFICERS OPPOSE REDUCING SENTENCES FOR CRIMINALS

Wayne County's Top Law-Enforcement Officials Say Legislators Should Not
Reduce The Sentences Of Certain Repeat Criminals.

Legislators are studying the possibility of cutting the sentences of
habitual nonviolent offenders in order to free space in the state's
overcrowded prisons for more violent offenders.

The state now has about 32,000 prisoners, a 67 percent increase in 10
years. Three new 1,000-bed prisons are planned to be completed in 2004, but
they are expected to be filled quickly. A state commission says the state
will need 7,000 more beds, at a cost of $525 million, by 2010. With the
state facing a $1 billion budget deficit, lawmakers may not want to spent
the money.

Wayne County District Attorney Branny Vickory, who prosecutes violent and
habitual felons, opposes any changes to the state's seven-year-old
Structured Sentencing Law. The law eliminated parole to ensure that
convicted offenders serve their entire sentences.

"We need to take every step we can to assure that the state doesn't lessen
the impact that habitual-felon laws have on crime in North Carolina," he said.

Vickory said that someone convicted of four break-ins over a period of time
could be sentenced to about 10 years in prison. But the legislators want to
reduce that time to less than two years and also bring back parole.

"How many times do these people break into houses without getting caught?"
he asked. "A conservative estimate is 15 or 20. Think about the number of
crimes that aren't taking place when they are in prison. If they were out,
think about what it would cost society."

An example of a "nonviolent" habitual offender who was released early from
prison was Lester Hardy Jr. of Goldsboro, Vickory said. Hardy, 39, was
charged in 1994, about five weeks before Structured Sentencing went into
effect, with possession of cocaine. He was sentenced under the old
guidelines to 14 years in prison. He was released in 2001 after serving
only six years.

Hardy then was arrested Jan. 15 and charged with brutally stabbing his
83-year-old aunt and her 68-year-old son to death in January. He is
awaiting trial on two murder charges.

Vickory called the legislators proposing these changes "as folks living in
ivory towers" who "were not aware of what was happening on the streets."

When Structured Sentencing went into effect, "we could tell the victims
that this is the amount of time someone would get for a certain crime and
the victims could believe that." As a result, Vickory said, the victims'
perception of the court system has improved.

The state's Conference of District Attorneys, of which Vickory is a member,
says North Carolina has had an inefficient prison system because so many
smaller prisons were built to appease legislators in those counties. The
state now has 1.7 inmates per Department of Corrections employee, while the
national average is 2.7. Vickory suggests that the state build large
"warehouse" prisons.

Police Chief J.M. Warrick Jr. has attributed a 6 percent decrease in crime
in Goldsboro to Structured Sentencing, among other reasons. It "is taking
the criminals off the streets longer," he said.

Maj. Tim Bell, who heads the Goldsboro Police Department's investigations
division, says the law has done what it was intended to do; it has stopped
the revolving door at the prisons and kept the violent and habitual
offenders behind bars.

"I'm afraid that if they take the bite from Structured Sentencing, with how
it deals with the habitual felon and the drug trafficker," Bell said,
"you'll see crime, especially property crime, go back up."

He called unthinkable any decision that would have the cost of new prisons
outweigh the public's safety. The Legislature should always "come down on
the side of public safety," he said.

Sheriff Carey Winders said that if more criminals were released, then more
would be on probation. Wayne County now has 2,100 people on probation.
Probation officers "are already overworked," he said.

Winders then wondered if the state would hire more probation officers to
handle the increased caseload.

"If we wouldn't see these prisoners again, it would be fine," he said, "but
lately we see the same ones over and over again."