Last week Meteor Blades wrote an article about mandatory minimum sentences and the countless lives they have ruined. He referenced an article by Judge Mark W. Bennett published in The Nation about how mandatory minimum sentences do not work and cannot be rationalized.
I have seen how they leave hundreds of thousands of young children parentless and thousands of aging, infirm and dying parents childless.
Judge Bennet is not alone. Many other impassioned pleas have come from people in positions of power; one wonders why things still are the way they are? Some
notable quotes: "In too many cases mandatory minimum sentences are unwise and unjust." -US Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy. “Mandatory drug sentences have utterly failed to achieve Congress’s goals . . . Longer sentences and more people in prison haven’t translated into safer streets.” -Congresswoman Maxine Waters. "Congress should no longer pass laws with mandatory minimum sentences." -Rachel E. Barkow
The New York Times. "Such laws do a disservice to the people accused of the crimes, to the judges before whom their cases are reviewed, to communities that are largely poor and black or Latino, and to society." -Andre M. Davis
The Baltimore Sun.
If you are someone who is more pocketbook oriented consider that "mandatory minimums are exorbitantly expensive to taxpayers. It costs $28,000 annually to incarcerate each federal prisoner -- that's more than the average American makes each year. [The average median income in the United States was $26,364 in 2010.] In comparison, outpatient drug treatment is $1,800 annually and $6,800 yearly for residential drug treatment programs." -FAMM.org.
One recent example of reform to these antiquated and draconian laws was The Fair Sentencing Act of 2010, signed by President Barack Obama. This bill alone has been estimated by The Congressional Budget Office to reduce the prison population by 1,550 person-years saving $42 million between 2011–2015. This is just one bill and all it did was reduce the sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine from 100:1 to 18:1 while eliminating the 5 year minimum sentence for first time crack possession.
There is so much more to do. So many more lives and an enormous amount of taxpayers money can be saved. For starters Californians can approve Proposition 36 and revise the draconian 3 Strikes Law which if approved by voters, will allow approximately 3,000 convicted felons currently serving life terms [whose third strike conviction was for a nonviolent crime] to petition the court for a new, reduced, sentence. Reducing the sentences of just these current prisoners could result in saving between $150 to $200 million a year, let alone the people that will not be unjustly charged in the future.
These mandatory minimum laws are wrong and unethical. They are a hallmark of a very sick and gravely ill society with deeply misguided federal and state policies relating to drug sentencing. Every day there are new and unjust convictions. Trials are unfair. US federal juries are not allowed to be informed of the mandatory minimum penalties that will apply if the defendant is convicted. This is because the jury's role is limited to a determination of guilt or innocence. However knowing this, coupled with the information that the Judge will be powerless to sentence the convicted based on the specifics of the crime and individual circumstances, would certainly influence many juries convictions.
I post on KOS anonymously, however I will say that these draconian laws have affected me personally. I have had to see not one, but multiple people suffer at the hands of these laws. Judges want the opportunity to give individual sentences. People want the opportunity to go to trial and not just plea bargain based on coercion. Families do not want to see their dear ones locked up. Society does not want to pay for these exorbitant sentences. We must do something about this and the appropriate time to do this [since we can't go back in time] is right now.