nd, experiencing very high rates of street crime, which were associated in part with the use of crack cocaine and other dangerous drugs in its large cities, and of housebreaking crimes. The random nature of drive by and freeway shootings further fed public fears. Large segments of the public believe that government at all levels has not coped effectively with crime. Van den Haag cited a chilling set of statistics in 1994. Out of 34 million persons nation-wide who committed crimes in 1991, 6.4 million of which were violent, only 500,000 were convicted and on the average only 40 percent of those convicted served their full sentences.
(b) Switch from indeterminate to determinate sentences. In 1977, the California Legislature passed the Uniform Determinate Sentence Law, under which the state switched from its longstanding indeterminate sentence system, the characteristics of which were exceptionally high maximum prison terms, considerable judicial discretion in setting sentences and broad parole discretion, to a determinate sentence system. According to Casper, Brereton & Neal, "Long a leader in penal reform, California had been one of the early adopters of the rehabilitative or medical mode of imprisonment, as well as its concomitant, indeterminate sentencing, when this wave of reform swept the nation in the first decade of the twentieth century."
The determinate sentence law resulted from growing public disenchantment with the premature release of violent offenders and what was perceived to be excessive leniency shown to hardened criminals by the state's judiciary and parole boards.
In enacting that law, currently Penal Code, sec. 1170, the Legislature in sec. 1170(a)(1):
"finds and declares that the purpose of imprisonment for crime is punishment. This purpose is best served by terms proportionate to the seriousness of offenders committing the same offense under similar circumstances. The Legislature further finds a...