So the Honorable “Wild Bill” Tough-on-Crime Janklow gets
100 days in jail for second-degree manslaughter. Plus a few thousand dollars in fines and no driving for three years. Not even an apology to the family of the man whose death ended this reckless, recidivist scofflaw's political career. It’s doubtful we’ll be hearing Republicans, Fox News or rightwing pundits crying about how this sentence reflects a soft-hearted, criminal-coddling legal system.
Some people have argued that an unfortunate accident is no reason to be hard-nosed with a man who has served the state so long. The trouble with that argument is -- given Janklow’s driving record -- the fatality at that rural intersection was no accident, it was a statistical certainty.
In fact, the outspoken Janklow got a lot more mercy from the judge than he typically gave others as a prosecutor and state attorney general and governor. For instance, his pet
bootcamp for juvenile offenders is a morass of abuse.
Unlike many states, there are no mandatory minimums in South Dakota. That’s a good thing. Discretion is supposed to be one of the reasons we have judges handing out sentences instead of clerks. Mandatory sentences have filled our prisons with non-violent offenders and wrecked the lives of tens of thousands of people who often would have benefited from more innovative penalties. But the chasm between Janklow’s punishment and what lesser South Dakotans face is immense.
Janklow could have gotten as much as 11 years in prison.
The Associated Press found that the average prison sentence in second-degree manslaughter cases in South Dakota is seven years and the average jail sentence for this crime is six months. Instead, Janklow will be (shudder) back on the streets before summer.
As prosecutor, attorney general and governor, Rep. Janklow contributed in great part to the racial divide that dates back to the 1870s in South Dakota.
During the American Indian Movement activism of the 1970s [full disclosure: in which I participated], Janklow once noted to reporters: “The only way to deal with the Indian problem in America is to put a gun in the AIM leaders' heads and pull the trigger."
None of that has anything to do with the current case, of course. But the attitude expressed by Janklow then provides a context now for cases not so different from his.
The cases of Mark Appel and Melanie Seaboy,
for instance.
In 1999, 17-year-old Appel, a white, ran over and killed 21-year-old Justin Redday, a Lakota Indian, on a deserted stretch of road in Roberts County. Appel, said Redday was lying in the road and that he didn’t swerve because “it is illegal to cross the white line, or if it is a solid yellow line, or even if it wasn’t, it is illegal to swerve." Appel was legally drunk when the accident occurred. He was indicted by a grand jury for vehicular homicide, but prosecutors later reduced the charge to driving while drunk. He didn't serve any jail or prison time.
Redday’s mother told a South Dakota newspaper, “If my son had been driving, rather than the victim, he’d be serving 20 years.” Sound like hyberbole? It’s not.
In 1998, 18-year-old Melanie Seaboy, a Lakota, drove her car into a Jeep Cherokee driven by a non-Indian, killing him instantly. Seaboy was legally drunk and pleaded guilty to vehicular homicide and second-degree manslaughter. She was sentenced to 14 years, one year short of the maximum, and three times the average sentence for such an offense.
Bill Janklow is a towering public figure in his state, and 64 years old, so it is no surprise that he got off with this wrist-slap. I suspect it will be a warm January in Rapid City before South Dakotans of lesser status can count on similar mercy.