NO-PAROLE LAW DEEMED A SUCCESS

Seven years after North Carolina's no-parole law hit the books, law
enforcement officials are seeing the results: Violent crime rates across
the state have dropped sharply since 1995, but the number of violent
inmates in state prisons has increased dramatically.

Prison administrators, prosecutors and police say both trends prove the
law, called structured sentencing, is working.

About 16,700 criminals are incarcerated in state prisons for committing
violent crimes, a 21 percent increase since 1995, according to the N.C.
Department of Correction. But during roughly the same period, violent
crimes in North Carolina have dropped 12 percent, according to the State
Bureau of Investigation.

Those trends are even more pronounced in the Triad, where violent inmates
from Guilford County jumped 31 percent from 1995 to this year. During the
same period, violent crime in the county dropped about 18 percent.

None of this is a surprise to police, prosecutors and politicians who
helped implement the state's structured-sentencing law in 1994.

"This is exactly what we predicted," said Susan Katzenelson, executive
director of the N.C. Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission. "... If you
are a violent offender, especially a repeat violent offender, you will get
prison time."

Law enforcement officials say it's easy to draw a link to the drop in
violent crimes and the increase in violent criminals in the state's prison
population.

"If they are in prison, they are not out on the street committing crime,"
said Andrew Gregson, an assistant district attorney in Randolph County.

Structured sentencing mandates a sentencing range for each crime. It was
designed to alleviate crowded prisons while ensuring that people convicted
of violent crimes -- murder, rape, robbery, aggravated assault -- serve
their entire prison sentence. Crime statistics indicate it has been
successful in both respects: Violent criminals are serving longer
sentences, and the prison population has remained relatively steady since 1994.

But structured sentencing has had its share of pitfalls. The state's prison
population is expected to swell again soon as more violent criminals enter
the system. And, while violent criminals are getting locked up for longer
periods of time, local police and prosecutors complain that nonviolent
criminals are avoiding jail.

Structured sentencing requires community service or short prison sentences
for many nonviolent crimes that used to garner substantial prison sentences.

The number of inmates convicted of nonviolent property crimes dropped 30
percent between 1995 and 2000, even though the number of property crimes
reported only dropped 10 percent, according to the SBI and the N.C.
Department of Correction. Criminals serving time for drug-related crimes
dropped 8 percent, even though drug arrests across the state rose 5 percent.

Structured sentencing has been "a trade-off," said Greensboro Assistant
Police Chief David Wray. "Bad people are being put in jail for longer
periods of time .... But some of the annoying types of crimes are not
seeing a lot of time."

And that frustrates prosecutors like Gregson. "These people who are
breaking into homes, no matter how many times they do it, they are getting
a (low-level) felony," he said. "If they do get time, it won't be much."

The influx of inmates convicted of violent crimes also has created problems
for correction officials. Inmates convicted of a violent crime require
closer supervision -- more prison guards, more secure facilities -- than
other criminals, according to Daniel Stieneke, chief deputy secretary of
the N.C. Department of Correction.

"Structured-sentencing inmates tend to be more troublesome for conventional
staff to supervise," he said. "Everything from (the number of) emergency
calls to assaults tend to be higher."

Prisoners have less motivation to behave properly because structured
sentencing eliminated the possibility of parole, Stieneke said. And a room
full of violent criminals is often more dangerous than a room full of
nonviolent criminals.

Since 1995, when structured sentencing took effect, criminal infractions in
North Carolina prisons have risen 33 percent, according to statistics from
the Department of Correction.

The state began building three 1,000-bed, close-custody prisons -- prisons
typically are composed of single cells and divided into cellblocks -- last
week to deal with the rise in the violent-prisoner population.

North Carolina's prison population has increased slightly during the last
five years, but it will soon increase dramatically, Katzenelson said. With
so many prisoners serving long sentences without the possibility of parole,
an extra 5,000 to 7,000 beds will be needed within the next decade, she added.

Violent criminals convicted shortly before structured sentencing served an
average of about two years of their sentences, according to a study that
examined North Carolina's sentencing. Violent criminals sent to prison
under structured sentencing served an average of 3.3 years.

Prisoners locked up for property crimes served an average of 1.4 years
before structured sentencing. Now, the average sentence is almost a year.