I spent yesterday with a man who was given a 27 years to life sentence. The crimes were serious, but not violent and it was a shock when the sentence was handed out back in the last years of the previous century. It wasn't the first time he had been to prison, he'd gotten 6 years for a home burglary and had violated previous grants of probation on other charges. The sentencing hearing was a fiasco with the defendant getting pissed off at the prosecutor and jumping up and shouting during the hearing.
A couple of years were spent up in the high desert in prison, and some time at Soledad and even a brief excursion to one of the lower rings of hell at Pelican Bay. On one of the first days in the joint a southerner jabbed a shank all the way through the neck of a northerner. As our prisoner sat there gawking, "some of the brothers grabbed me and told me not to look over there or they'll think you're involved." He learned the ways and stayed out of trouble except where it was necessary. One day he was walking in the yard and began to cry. This was May 2, 2002. He signed up for various programs and became a model prisoner, he even became a sort of mentor to rookies who came in. He had the rest of his life to live and even if it was in the joint, change had to be made.
In 2012 the voters of California passed the ThreeStrikes Reform Act (Prop 36), and the first day permitted the Department Head of the Public Defender's office in the North Bay County filed the paperwork for a rehearing. After some paper wrangling the case was brought to court and the original Judge that handed down the sentence was given the task of resentencing. Options ranged from leaving the sentence intact, modifying it to include less time, release on Parole, to termination of the sentence and no Parole.
Back in Court the Defendant was swinging back and forth from hope to despair on a minute by minute basis, but thought that going back in front of the original Judge was not a good sign.
The Judge listed the Defendant's crimes and the resulting failures on Probation and Parole, he detailed the various chances that the Defendant had squandered, and then he noted the Defendant's prison record. He noted the lack of incidents from 2002 on, and the various programs that the Defendant had finished, not with an eye to impressing a Judge, but rather to try to change. The Judge concluded that the Defendant had changed and that he deserved a chance to try to live in society again.
He released him from prison and did not impose any further supervision on him. He went from a life sentence to the street. One of his previous victims allowed him to stay in their guest room. He stayed there for a short while, then had to leave because the daughter moved back in after a divorce. Another friend let him stay on the couch. His hips had gone bad and he was given double hip replacements under MediCal and applied for Disability, this was denied and an appeal was pending.
I met him when the Public Defender asked me to try to find services for the Defendant, we've been to food banks, and other places like that and he has tried to make do with what he can get. I worked with a wonderful Probation Officer who was active in the local Baptist Church and the ex-Defendant wanted to find a church to go to. Yesterday we met up with the Probation Officer.
It was a joy to see them connect. The ex-defendant was sincere, open and vulnerable. The PO was affirming and supportive and I witnessed a powerful conversation between two men who had much in common, and many differences.
It costs $40k minimum to keep a person locked in prison. A few thousand dollars spent on transition would make a big difference. When I mentioned that the person who had gone from Defendant, to Ex-defendant to citizen told me that he was just grateful that he had a chance to be free again, he said that he deserved to be punished for what he had done, but that what he originally got was too much. But he said that the facing up to a life sentence had changed him, and that he was already grateful for the change long before the law gave him hope for a 2nd chance.
Thousands of good people sit in these jails and prisons that do not need to be there. Spare a thought for them on this day of Thanksgiving.
