Three-Strikes Law Is Missing the Mark

Six years ago, my granddaughter, Polly Klaas, was snatched from her bedroom and murdered by a man who should have been behind bars. In response, our family and Californians rose up and passed the “three strikes” law, a law designed to remove predators like her murderer, Richard Allen Davis, from our streets.

Or so we thought.

Five years later, the data suggest that most people locked up for second or third strikes are not like Polly’s killer. Rather, the majority have been convicted of nonviolent crimes, like marijuana possession or petty theft.

Added to the grief that Polly’s death has caused, my family now regrets that the law passed in her name casts too wide a net, fails to target the hard-core offenders it set out to reach and has diverted critical funds from crime prevention and education.

Now the California Legislature is considering a bill that could help put our minds at rest. Introduced by Sen. John Vasconcellos (D-Santa Clara), the bill would authorize the state legislative analyst to study the impact of the three-strikes law. By signing this bill, Gov. Gray Davis could set in motion a process that will help us separate facts from fiction.

When they sought our votes, the sponsors of three-strikes promised the public that their bill would remove dangerous criminals from our streets. Today, only a fraction of those serving 25-to-life sentences fit that profile, while a staggering 78% of second-strikers and 50% of third strikers were convicted for nonviolent offenses.

Crime has plummeted in the Golden State since 1994. But while three-strikes proponents have cited this as irrefutable proof that the law works, no evidence links the statute to this welcome decline. In fact, the drop in crime merely reflects a national trend that has seen crime fall at a quicker rate in non-three-strikes states like Michigan and Alabama than in California.

Meanwhile, California’s prisons are bursting at the seams. More than 160,000 inmates are jammed into prisons that were made to house 80,000, and almost one-third of those prisoners are serving second- or third-strike sentences. Three-strikes enforcement will tie up billions of taxpayers dollars for decades to come.

Consider the following:

* Each prisoner serving a 25-to-life sentence will cost the state about $500,000 over his or her lifetime.

* The annual cost of housing 29,000 nonviolent second- or third-strikers is $632 million.

* Los Angeles County, which prosecutes about 40% of three-strikes cases statewide, racked up $322 million in enforcement costs from 1994 through 1997.

* San Francisco has not sought three-strikes convictions for nonviolent offenses, yet crime (both violent and nonviolent) has fallen faster there than in Los Angeles.

The impact of three-strikes reverberates far beyond the prison walls. Defendants who fear adding strikes to their name are bringing the legal system to a virtual standstill as they reject plea bargains and opt for trial. And with second-and third-strikers flooding our prisons, other serious offenders are securing early release with alarming frequency.

The time has come for Californians to pose a painful question: Does three-strikes offer enough benefits to justify its huge fiscal and societal impact?

In a climate in which the words “soft on crime” sound the death knell for anyone who aspires to political office, few in power dare question the value of the three-strikes statute. How many more prisons must we build before our leaders realize that locking up more nonviolent offenders doesn’t equal being tough on crime?

My family and I understand more than most why we need strict laws that prevent monsters like Richard Allen Davis from hurting our kids, But we also owe it to ourselves to be smart about law enforcement. We must seek out the truth about three-strikes and inform the debate with solid facts and figures.

It’s too late to bring Polly back. But it’s not too late for Gov. Davis and the Legislature to take this step toward making California a wiser, safer state.