Punishment for Drug Offenders

In response to “Judge Denounces Mandatory Sentencing Law,” Dec. 19:

U.S. District Judge J. Spencer Letts is primarily concerned with the equity of sentences among criminals, particularly that a crack offender not be punished more harshly than other drug offenders. This approach overlooks the terrible punishment the crack culture levies against our society--need I only mention crack babies?--that demands the strongest possible deterrent against these crimes and criminals.

When it passed the mandatory sentencing laws, Congress was correctly concerned with the equity of sentences in the context of threats to society posed by these crimes. Cruel and unusual punishment is meted out every day in Los Angeles by crack dealers and addicts against innocent and law-abiding citizens.

The very day that Letts called the sentencing guidelines “barbaric,” a frail 80-year-old woman was attacked in broad daylight on the streets of a respectable neighborhood in West Los Angeles by what appeared to be a member of the crack culture, thrown to the ground, and robbed of her purse. She sustained fractures in both shoulders. Cost to society for medical treatment will be at least $20,000. The trauma suffered by the victim defies description in monetary terms. The criminal got about $10 and of course was not apprehended. Compared to the punishments suffered by innocent citizens at the hands of a too-lenient justice system, I consider cutting off the hand of a convicted criminal a very moderate punishment indeed.

H. HECHT

Los Angeles