Pubdate: Sun, 28 Mar 2004
Source: Birmingham News, The (AL)
Copyright: 2004 The Birmingham News
Contact:  http://al.com/birminghamnews/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/45
Author: Carla Crowder, News staff writer
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/prison.htm (Incarceration)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?199 (Mandatory Minimum Sentencing)

MISTAKES OF A LIFETIME: INMATES, STATE PAYING PRICE

One of the victims of Terry McLester's crime spree was a shopping mall, 
quiet and closed for the night.

He broke windows, rummaged through a handful of shops and made a big mess. 
Dothan police found him, hand bloodied from a punch through jewelry store 
glass.

McLester's life in 1979 was a bigger mess. A hot-headed 22-year-old in the 
middle of a divorce, the self-described "country bumpkin" got drunk and 
high every chance he had. He was drunk in a prison work-release program two 
years later when he threatened a convenience store cashier, was convicted 
of robbery, then sent to prison for the rest of his life.

McLester is serving life without a chance for parole under Alabama's 
Habitual Felony Offender Law. The law mandates sentencing enhancements that 
are among the longest and harshest in the country, according to an analysis 
by the Alabama Sentencing Commission. The commission cites the law as a key 
reason for the costly explosion in Alabama's prison population.

Now 47, McLester has spent more than half of his life behind bars since his 
rage through the mall. He is a mentor and counselor to other prisoners and 
is one of Holman prison's unpaid assistants to the chaplain and 
psychologist. He has a college degree and job offers from prison programs 
in California and Missouri.

Had he stabbed the cashier or stolen diamonds from the vandalized jewelry 
store, his sentence could not have been longer.

"I am not attempting to portray myself as an angel. That I certainly am 
not!" McLester wrote from Holman. "But I am an old man who has been 
incarcerated almost 25 years for nonviolent crimes."

Since 1980, the Habitual Felony Offender Law has required that judges 
sentence repeat offenders to life without parole on a fourth felony, if 
it's a serious (Class A) crime, regardless of whether the crime caused 
death or injury. A 2000 amendment gave a life option, so new offenders may 
someday be eligible for parole. But it was not retroactive, so it won't 
help hundreds of the permanently incarcerated, like McLester.

The man who prosecuted McLester believes he should be free. There's nothing 
he can do.

"As far as Terry, Terry's been up there since 1981 - I'd have no problem 
seeing Terry get out," said Tom Sorrells, retired Houston County district 
attorney.

Sentencing experts say about 900 Alabama prisoners are serving life or life 
without parole for crimes involving no serious bodily injury, sexual 
violation or death. There are new attempts in the Legislature this year to 
amend the law, to give relief both to these graying felons sentenced in 
youth and to broke, bulging prisons.

In the past, when the Legislature tried to free offenders such as McLester, 
the bills were vetoed by governors. Such bills can earn a politician the 
dreaded label of "soft on crime."

And district attorneys love the law. It gives them control, something 
they're fast losing with the overloaded system's growing reliance on quick 
paroles.

State Rep. Dick Brewbaker, R-Montgomery, is leading one effort for change. 
His bill would allow habitual offenders who never used a gun or seriously 
injured anyone to be considered for parole after 20 years in prison.

"You can't argue rationally that this is a soft-on-crime bill when you look 
at what we're doing now with parole, regardless of whether they're violent 
or not," Brewbaker said.

A broader bill sponsored by Rep. Demetrius Newton, D-Birmingham, could 
reduce sentences for about 900 prisoners. Sentencing analysts have told 
Brewbaker his bill could affect about 80. He doesn't believe all of them 
would get the parole board's green light. But it would free up precious 
maximum-security space. "If this keeps 50 murderers in jail, that's a good 
thing," Brewbaker said.

Are the district attorneys on board? "Absolutely not," said Randy Hillman, 
executive director of the District Attorney's Association.

For one thing, comparisons of habitual nonviolent offenders to people 
locked up less time for murder are unreasonable, he said. Murder is often a 
one-time crime of passion, while habitual offenders without long sentences 
are chronic menaces.

When someone is sent away for a long time, it is often because the criminal 
had seven, eight, sometimes 15 chances to stop selling drugs or stealing. 
"Unless and until they give us something better, we've got to keep what 
we've got," Hillman said. "They're trying to take away whatever leverage we 
have."

'A waste of money':

In 25 years of habitual offender crackdowns, Alabama's spending on prisons 
has ballooned 278 percent. Alabama keeps 21,000 more people locked up now 
than in 1979, when prisons held 5,700 inmates. State prisons are packed to 
nearly double capacity. Gov. Bob Riley doubled the size of the parole board 
to speed paroles this year to avert further crisis.

If get-tough laws have put a dent in crime, it's hard to tell.

In 1978, before the enhancement law took effect, 146,154 violent and 
property crimes were reported to police in Alabama, according to Carol 
Roberts, assistant uniform crime report division director for the state. 
After a decade of the law, the number rose to 184,185 crimes. By 2002, it 
swelled to 191,953, easily outpacing population growth.

So many factors influence crime rate changes, it's impossible to know the 
impact of one law without an intensive study, said Donald Bogie, director 
of the Center for Demographic Research at Auburn University Montgomery.

Demographers have found that a large cohort of youth in a population can 
cause a spike, as occurred in America's early 1990s crime wave. That's why 
many criminologists say it's a waste of tax money, in most cases, to keep 
older people in prison. (Sex offenders are a different story, which is why 
some states tailor habitual offender laws to keep them locked up.)

"Once you get past 35 or so, people behave themselves reasonably well," 
Bogie said.

That includes older people with a criminal past, he said, but to a lesser 
extent because prison is a training camp for crime.

UAB criminologist John Sloan has published two studies on the effects of 
these laws. He said the results show the laws are no deterrent to violence 
and likely increase murder rates.

Sloan compared crime rates in more than 100 cities, some in states with 
three-strikes or habitual offender laws, some without.

"In some instances, we found that cities and states with three-strikes 
laws, their murder rates actually increased compared to cities and states 
that do not have three-strikes laws. And they had no significant effect on 
other serious forms of crimes," said Sloan, professor of justice sciences 
at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Washington, another state that has been trying to stem prison growth, 
reserves its three-strikes law for violent criminals.

"The dilemma with three-strikes laws and mandatory sentences is that they 
don't in fact look at criteria that assesses the actual risk that someone 
represents," said Washington's Secretary of Corrections, Joseph Lehman. 
"You're asking taxpayers to pay for the confinement of someone, when that 
risk actually may be diminished."

His department focuses public resources on violent criminals and sex 
offenders, and puts most everyone else into drug treatment. "Incapacitating 
drug offenders for months or years and doing nothing about their addiction 
isn't going to help, and it's a waste of money," he said.

Lehman, a 35-year corrections veteran, has overseen prison systems in Maine 
and Pennsylvania.

Drug crimes:

Drug offenders are not immune to Alabama's repeat offender law.

Because the state has a low threshold for serious felony charges in drug 
cases, someone caught with more than 2 pounds of marijuana or a handful of 
oxycodone is a trafficker. That's a Class A felony, which counts toward a 
life sentence.

Take Michael Peek's case.

At 48, he's serving life without parole. A drug task force in southeast 
Alabama caught him and some friends with 4.75 pounds of marijuana in 1998.

"Until he (the judge) said life without parole, I didn't think I could get 
it. I told my wife I thought I'd get 25 years, but life without parole? I 
didn't kill nobody," Peek said.

Peek's father was a small-time dope seller in Macon County, and Peek grew 
up hunting, fishing and smoking pot. His criminal record reflects that, 
with three drug convictions from 1977 to 1990, including a federal case for 
conspiracy with intent to possess marijuana.

There is no violence on his record, and he lives in the honor dorm at St. 
Clair prison because he hasn't made trouble.

Peek is bald and stocky and angry. He considers this a death sentence. 
Violence in his world has been perpetrated by others. But they have not 
paid as dearly as Peek has.

His father was murdered nine years ago. One of the killers is eligible for 
parole in April. The other person convicted in the crime, Peek's own son, 
is already out of prison.

"You're probably not going to find any other state with some of the laws on 
the books that will get you life and life without (parole) than you'll find 
in Alabama," said Alabama Prison Commissioner Donal Campbell. He spent most 
of his career in Tennessee, which reserves enhanced sentences for repeat 
violent felons or serious drug criminals.

Federal and state court pressure has forced Campbell to rent out-of-state 
prison beds and spend $12 million in 2003 in overtime pay for prison officers.

'Just plain batty':

Campbell supports enhanced sentences for repeat offenders, and harsh 
punishment for violent criminals. But he said there are nonviolent 
prisoners who don't belong there.

Every district attorney interviewed for this story brought up the bicycle 
thief myth. "This mess about people getting life without parole for 
stealing a bicycle or cars, that's a lie," said Etowah County DA Jim Hedgspeth.

Hillman, of the DA's Association, said there are protections against abuses 
because the law limits life-without-parole sentences to repeat offenders 
who go on to get another serious Class A felony. What he calls "The Big 
Nasties."

Under Alabama's sentencing codes, murdering or raping a stranger is no more 
"nasty" than breaking into a house or keeping a few pounds of marijuana in 
your basement. They're all Class A's.

That's one reason a chorus of conservative voices has been speaking against 
versions of habitual offender laws for years.

John DiIulio Jr., a University of Pennsylvania professor and former 
director of faith-based programs in the Bush White House, criticizes 
mandatory minimums for drug crimes. He railed against New York and 
Massachusetts in a 1999 article published in the National Review, a 
conservative journal.

"In Massachusetts and several other states, about half of probationers are 
under supervision for a violent crime, while half of those in prison for 
drug law violations have no official record of violence. >From a crime 
control perspective, forcing drug-only offenders behind bars while violent 
offenders beat feet to the streets is just plain batty," he wrote.

Besides, he continued, "when one drug-only offender is incarcerated, 
another one assumes his sales and effectively takes his place."

Running out of time:

Like a lot of prisoners, Terry McLester has turned to God to cope.

"I am a prime example of the biblical passage of the prodigal son," he 
writes. "If only I had listened to my parents as a young, dumb teenager, I 
would never have come to prison."

S.A. and Annette McLester, who live on a Dothan farm, never turned their 
back on him. They tried to pay for the damage he did at the mall. They've 
spent $100,000 on appeals. They gathered 1,200 signatures on a petition and 
won their state representative to their fight.

Twice, then-Rep. Nathan Mathis sponsored bills that would have freed 
nonviolent lifers like McLester. His bills passed both houses, but were 
vetoed by Govs. Guy Hunt and Jim Folsom.

"Every day I feel like I failed in my job that I couldn't get him out of 
prison," Mathis said.

S.A. McLester is 74, retired from the Dothan Electric Department; Annette 
is 69.

Their youngest son Scott just died from lymphoma, and their daughter, Pat, 
has been diagnosed with the disease.

Twice a month, they drive 150 miles each way to see Terry in a crowded, 
locked room, sitting on stools, eating from a vending machine.

"You become accustomed to it. It breaks your heart," S.A. McLester said. 
"Really what breaks your heart is the fact that there's not justice there."

After 25 years, the McLesters still have hope.

"I just pray that God will allow me to share the few years they have on 
this planet with them," Terry McLester said.
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MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager