Pubdate: Wed, 20 Feb 2002
Source: Goldsboro News-Argus (NC)
Copyright: 2002, Goldsboro News-Argus
Contact:  http://www.newsargus.com/index.html
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/969
Author: Jack Stephens, News-Argus Staff Writer

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."
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