Ex-Convict Gets Sentence of Nearly 42 Years Under Law for Repeat Offenders

A San Diego federal judge Tuesday sentenced an ex-convict who fired more than 2 dozen shots at police during an 11-hour standoff last summer to nearly 42 years in federal prison.

U.S. District Judge Gordon Thompson Jr. sentenced James Scott Daly, 28, of San Diego to 41 years and eight months under a novel law that targets repeat offenders--felons the law labels “career criminals.”

A jury found Daly, who has 10 prior felony convictions, guilty Nov. 28 of being a repeat felon in possession of a gun during the standoff last June at a Pacific Beach motel.

“I told the judge (Daly) should be put away long enough that when he got out he would be physically incapable of committing another violent crime,” said Assistant U.S. Atty. Larry Burns, who prosecuted the case. “We believe the sentence imposed today will have that effect.”

Federal sentencing rules call for Daly to serve at least 85% of the sentence, or about 36 years of the nearly 42-year term.

Daly is the seventh offender convicted and sentenced at the San Diego court during the past 18 months under the law, Burns said. The 5-year-old law allows prosecutors to seek a prison sentence ranging from 30 years to life without parole.

One of those seven, Warren James Bland, was sentenced Dec. 20 to the no-parole term, the first person in California to receive the life term under the law.

Daly also faces an April 9 trial in federal court on bank robbery charges.

In Superior Court, he was convicted Jan. 29 of various charges, including attempted murder, in connection with last June’s standoff with San Diego police, and awaits sentencing. He faces up to life in prison on those charges.

The standoff began last June 22 when Daly, who had been paroled from state prison in September, 1989, barricaded himself in a room at the Western Shores Motel in the 4300 block of Mission Bay Drive in Pacific Beach.

Eleven hours later, early on June 23, he was flushed out by tear gas fired by the Police Department’s SWAT squad.

During the standoff, Daly fired more than 2 dozen times at officers, police said. No one was hurt.

When Daly was arrested, police said, he was wearing jeans and a T-shirt proclaiming “Bad to the Bone.” A firearm lay on the floor nearby, police said, and the federal indictment against Daly charged him with possession of a 9-millimeter handgun.