Pubdate: Fri, 20 Jan 2006
Source: Oakville Beaver (CN ON)
Copyright: 2006, Oakville Beaver
Contact:  http://www.haltonsearch.com/hr/ob/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1600
Author: Von Jeppesen
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?199 (Mandatory Minimum Sentencing)

MANDATORY MINIMUM PRISON SENTENCES DON'T WORK

Ah, the joy of opening the mail box. Usually a bill or two waiting, 
the occasional government cheque, even the possibility of a postcard 
from a distant cousin visiting Pago Pago.

I didn't get any cheque, and surprisingly no bills. Not even that 
postcard from Pago Pago. What I did get though, was a pamphlet from 
local Conservative Terence Young.

Alright Terence, I'm ready to listen, so lay it on me baby. So I 
opened the pamphlet and first off: Accountability in Government.

Alright Mr. Young, no arguments there. Safer Streets was next with 
the first bullet (no pun intended) being "Mandatory minimum sentences 
for crimes involving guns." Oh no Terence, please tell me this was a 
misprint? The dreadful MMS?

You may be unaware Mr. Young, but our American counterparts already 
impose "mandatory minimum sentences" for drug offences, and the 
effects have been devastating.

In fact, many states are proposing legislation to abolish mandatory 
minimum sentencing.

A recent study done by the American Bar Association, Justice Kennedy 
Commission went on to urge "a fundamental change of course toward 
less reliance on incarceration and greater attention to more 
effective alternatives.

The system is broken

"Now we need to get smarter. We can no longer sit by as more and more 
people -- particularly in minority communities -- are sent away for 
longer and longer periods of time while we make it more and more 
difficult for them to return to society after they serve their time. 
The system is broken. We need to fix it."

The report also concluded that the "many get-tough approaches to 
crime don't work and some, such as mandatory minimum sentences for 
small-time drug offenders, are unfair and should be abolished.

"Laws requiring mandatory minimum prison terms leave little room to 
consider differences among crimes and criminals.

"More people are behind bars for longer terms, but it is unclear 
whether the country is safer as a result."

The Justice Fellowship, an "online community of Christians working to 
reform the criminal justice system" also agreed, noting that 
"Mandatory sentencing laws have proven to be ineffective," as "they 
limit a judge's ability to consider the actual facts of the case.

"The mandatory sentencing policy is also the least cost-effective."

The problem is so frustrating that scores of federal judges have 
refused to hear drug cases in protest of mandatory minimum sentencing 
laws and that Supreme Court Justices and a Chief Justice, all of whom 
are Republican appointees "have also found mandatory minimums to be a 
flawed sentencing system," and even going as far as calling them 
"imprudent, unwise and often an unjust mechanism."

A Conservative criminologist John DiIulio, once a backer of long 
mandatory sentences, recently wrote in support of the abolition of 
MMS, going on to say that "With mandatory minimums, there is no real 
suppression of the drug trade, only episodic substance-abuse 
treatment of incarcerated drug-only offenders, and hence only the 
most tenuous crime-control rationale for imposing prison terms 
mandatory or otherwise on any of them."

Not only have they been ineffective in stopping drug crime, 
"mandatory minimums also disproportionately affect minorities."

The average drug sentence for African/Americans is now 49 per cent 
higher than sentences for the same offense for whites.

Finally, the most fitting, was by the Elizabeth Fry Society. They 
noted that "The new mandatory minimum sentence of four years 
imprisonment for offences involving a firearm provides an example, as 
do numerous Private Member's Bills that propose new minimum sentences 
for offences and offenders that have been the subject of 
media-induced panic. The new mandatory minimum sentence was 
introduced for offences involving weapons with little public debate 
or justification, as it was buried in the gun control legislation. It 
was intended to appease gun owners by punishing severely the "real 
criminals" - those who use guns in the course of committing other crimes.

"These minimum sentences, just like the mandatory minimum for murder, 
are essentially politically expedient solutions to grave social 
problems that have moral as well as legal implications."

Their No. 1 recommendation?

"Abolish the mandatory minimum sentence of life imprisonment for 
first and second degree murder, and all other mandatory minimum sentences."

Fighting the war on drugs

You see Mr. Young, the U.S. has been fighting a "war on drugs" for 
over 20 years. Since then, drugs are of higher quality, are cheaper 
on the streets and the rate of incarceration in the United States 
(702 inmates per 100,000 residents) continues to be the highest in 
the world. Needless to say, they have been fighting a losing battle. 
Drugs, guns, gangs it is all connected. It should not be a shock to 
see that gangs + drugs = GUNS.

As Sterling Johnson, Jr., a special narcotics prosecutor for New York 
City once wrote, "Drugs are to organized crime what gasoline is to 
the automobile."

As long as we keep drugs on the black market, we will continue to 
give them a means to buy things such as weapons. The time to stop 
being politically correct when dealing with drugs has long passed, 
it's time to actually start changing a failed system. A failed war.

I'll leave you with the words of the Justice Kennedy Commission's 
chair, Steven Saltzburg:

"For too long we have focused almost exclusively on locking up 
criminals. We also need to look at the other side of the coin: what 
happens when they get out. We have to remember that roughly 95 per 
cent of the people we lock up eventually get out. Our communities 
will be safer and our corrections budgets less strained if we better 
prepared inmates to successfully re-enter society without returning 
to a life of crime."

VON JEPPESEN
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom