Law Got Tougher, but Singleton Was Free

Had Lawrence Singleton been sentenced under today’s tougher laws for his 1978 rape and mutilation of a teenage girl, he would have been behind bars in California this week and not in the doorway of his Florida home with bloody hands and a dead woman on the floor.

That irony touched off anguished regret across California on Thursday, as activists who had hounded Singleton out of the state and politicians who had pushed for stricter sentencing laws mourned a tragedy that many considered grimly predictable.

“It makes no sense to release a guy like Singleton because he does a good job folding shirts in prison,” Gov. Pete Wilson said. “Now some woman has paid for it.”

Singleton got the maximum sentence possible when he was convicted for the gruesome crime of raping hitchhiker Mary Vincent, chopping off her forearms and stuffing her unconscious body into a concrete culvert near Modesto. But at the time, judges were not allowed to impose consecutive sentences for each felony. So the most Singleton could get was 14 years and four months.

By working in prison and behaving, Singleton managed to win parole after seven years and nine months.

And so he was a free man Wednesday--until Hillsborough County, Fla., sheriff’s deputies arrested him at his home and charged him with killing Roxanne Hayes, a 31-year-old mother of three who had been arrested dozens of times on prostitution and drug charges.

Asked whether California deserved the blame for Hayes’ death, Wilson replied: “I’m afraid that’s an accurate charge.”

Partly as a result of the Singleton case, Wilson noted, the state’s sentencing laws have been stiffened significantly.

If Singleton had been sentenced today for the charges he was convicted of in the 1978 case--including rape, attempted murder and sex offenses--he would have drawn multiple 25-year-to-life sentences. And a judge could have stacked the sentences for each conviction instead of letting Singleton serve them simultaneously.

Singleton would not have been eligible for parole until he had served 49 years, a state Department of Justice spokesman said--more than six times as long as he actually spent behind bars.

Singleton’s victim never expressed the same kind of outrage that others did when they learned of his relatively light sentence. “In my extensive dealings with her, she never said to me that the law let her down,” said Vincent’s longtime attorney, Mark Edwards of Santa Ana.

Vincent did, however, fear Singleton--especially when he was released from the California Men’s Colony near San Luis Obispo in 1987. She spoke of persistent nightmares. And she was so intent on keeping her location and identity secret that she had her marriage records sealed so no one could find out her new last name.

Mary Vincent’s mother said her daughter reacted calmly to the news of Singleton’s latest arrest.

“She feels sorry for whoever it was he killed, but in a way she’s happy he’s back in jail,” Lucy Vincent told a San Francisco television station Thursday. “They should really stick to him and just put him away and do their job right this time. These people in Florida should really, really make sure that he’s put away for good.”

Edwards said that Mary Vincent, now single, lives with her two children somewhere in the Northwest, reluctant to have her whereabouts known.

Community leaders across California say they understand that fear. When Singleton was released from prison, several communities refused to let him settle in their midst. Demonstrating and filing lawsuits, they made it clear he was a most unwelcome neighbor.

“I’m glad I was instrumental in getting him out of here or else [Wednesday’s murder victim] could have been one of our local residents,” said George Livingston, the former mayor of Richmond in the Bay Area. “He tried to be humble and polite, but he was like a dog who will look at you and smile and then bite you. He was that kind of guy.”

In Florida too, residents let Singleton know they did not want him around. The news media covered his arrival in June 1988, and the protests started immediately. A local car dealer offered to give Singleton $5,000 cash and pay his air fare if he would leave town. Suggested destinations: Cuba or Libya.

The St. Petersburg Times pleaded for tolerance, writing: “To those who must accept him as their neighbor, Lawrence Singleton may seem a symbol of all that is evil. But Singleton is also something else. He is a citizen.”

Six days later, a bomb blew a four-foot crater in the frontyard at the home of Singleton’s brother, Walter.

Although residents of Walter Singleton’s community of Forest Hills were the primary protesters, Lawrence Singleton never lived there. When arrested, he lived about 15 miles away in a Tampa-area neighborhood known as Orient Park.

He had registered with state authorities as a convicted felon, as required by law. But local law enforcement did not have any obligation to notify his new neighbors of his past.

Florida recently passed a Sexual Predators Act mandating such notification. That law, however, applies only to people who committed crimes after Oct. 1, 1995. So no one had an obligation to tell Orient Park residents about Singleton.

Even Singleton’s former defense attorney said Thursday that he wished more people had been told about the 1978 rape and mutilation.

“Because the charges against him were so serious, it would be hard to argue that his neighbors didn’t have a right to know,” said San Diego criminal defense lawyer Robert Grimes.

Even after news footage in which Singleton was heard saying “this time I did it” as he was led away in handcuffs Wednesday night, Grimes maintained that his former client was not as dangerous as “many of the young people released every day on parole, the gang members and such.”

Still, Grimes said that the public should take consolation in the fact that the new sentencing laws will keep criminals off the street longer.

The statewide association of criminal defense lawyers opposes both community notification laws and mandatory sentences. The group also opposes back-to-back sentences for multiple convictions.

The group’s spokeswoman, Mary Broderick, said the loud I-told-you-so’s coming from politicians now reek of political opportunism, not a commitment to judicial reform.

“There’s a knee-jerk reaction when you have a high-profile case . . . and politicians are falling all over each other to appear tougher than the next one,” Broderick said. “Perhaps if legislators put more money into dealing with children with problems than they did with locking up adults, there might be fewer crimes.”

Times staff writer Dave Lesher reported from Sacramento, correspondent Mike Clary from Florida. Times staff writers Stephanie Simon and Jeff Leeds in Los Angeles contributed to this report.