Habitual Offender Statutes
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Nearly half of the states in America drafted and passed habitual offender statutes between 1994 and 1996, most commonly under the banner of the baseball slogan, "three strikes and you're out." These laws have generally been enacted under the assumption that crime would be reduced despite predictions to the contrary that the courts, jails, and prisons would become overwhelmed and that the associated costs would skyrocket. Actual experience in states such as California has borne out the worst fears of many of those predictions--the intended effects have backfired on society. This research points to the failure of "three strikes" legislation to curb crime, the needless incarceration of petty criminals in addition to violent offenders, and the current and future costs to society in the wake of knee-jerk responses by politicians to the growing problem of crime in America. It was the night of October 1, 1993. In the suburban Petaluma, California home of Mr. and Mrs. Marc Klaas, Polly Klaas was having a slumber party with two of her friends. Her mother slept in the next room as Richard Allen Davis tied up the girls at knifepoint, then kidnapped Polly. Her sexually-abused body was located two months later, in a ditch just 35 miles from her home. Life had been strangled from her 12-year-old body. There was no apparent motive for the crime (Franklin, 1994, p. 25). But Richard Allen Davis had spent 14 of the last 18 years of his life to that point as a guest of the pena
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cases in the first five months after the law went into effect (Peyser, 1994, p. 53).
Indeed, the dramatic increase in trials is revealed in a comparison of Los Angeles County statistics for the year ending in June 1993 (prior to passage of the law) and the year ending in March 1995 (the first year after passage). Prior to the new law, less than 5 percent of all felony cases went to trial; since than, "about 50 percent of first-strike and more than 75 percent of second- and third-strike cases are going to trial" (Jacobius, 1995, p. 29).
This is also leading to a shortage of jurors, because trials involving a possible life sentence require a jury pool of at least 60 potential jurors, compared to other felony trials for which the standard number is 36 to 38 (Jacobius, 1995, p. 29). And other problems are coming to light, as well.
Three strikes laws have been written so loosely in some states that petty crooks are being sent to prison for life for such offenses as stealing a piece of pizza (Hornblower, 1996, p. 54), or prostitution, burglary, and drug trafficking (Benekos & Merlo, 1995, p. 5). The California three strikes law "makes no distinction between 'violent' and 'serious' felonies", Judge Lawrence Antolini said
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Approximate Word count = 2888
Approximate Pages = 12 (250 words per page)
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