Ashcroft Makes Plea for Sentencing

Departing Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft, warning Tuesday that a recent Supreme Court decision could lead to more lenient treatment of violent offenders, called on Congress to enact tougher federal sentencing guidelines.

Ashcroft, who is to leave office once his replacement is approved by the Senate -- probably Thursday -- also said his greatest regret as the nation’s highest law enforcement officer for the last four years was not adequately explaining the Patriot Act to the American people.

He also vowed never to run for public office again.

Ashcroft made the remarks in a meeting with reporters and a speech to the conservative Heritage Foundation while the confirmation of the man nominated to succeed him, White House counsel Alberto R. Gonzales, was debated on the floor of the U.S. Senate. Gonzales is expected to be confirmed this week.

Ashcroft strongly defended the Patriot Act, enacted in the months after the Sept. 11 attacks, contending that it had been misunderstood and unfairly criticized.

Detractors have said the greater latitude it gave police on wiretaps and other tools has infringed on individual liberties.

Ashcroft’s Justice Department had decidedly mixed success in prosecuting alleged terrorists, with numerous cases reduced to lesser offenses or dismissed outright.

The onetime Missouri governor said the legislation led to more arrests and helped to bring down the national crime rate. He said it not only helped foil terrorists but also had been used in domestic cases.

He pointed to the quick arrest of the woman charged with killing Bobbie Jo Stinnett and stealing Stinnett’s baby from her womb, saying that had authorities not been able to tap into the victim’s e-mail, the suspect might never have been found.

The expectant mother from Missouri was strangled in December, and her nearly full-term baby girl was cut from her womb. Police searched Stinnett’s home computer and found that a woman had written to her asking for directions to the house that day. That woman, Lisa Montgomery, was arrested, and the baby, named Victoria Jo, was found alive. Ashcroft called it “a final act of grace in a sad, savage drama.”

In the Heritage Foundation speech, Ashcroft called last month’s Supreme Court ruling on federal sentencing guidelines “a retreat from justice that may put the public’s safety in jeopardy.”

Two decades ago, Congress set uniform sentencing requirements and largely took away discretion from judges, a move hailed by prosecutors. But the high court said in January that judges, many of whom have bemoaned the guidelines, should have more discretion with punishments.

Ashcroft disagreed. He said that “in all, 35 million Americans have been spared the pain of violent crime in the past decade -- in no small part because the criminals who would have victimized them were serving tough sentences.”

In his conversation with reporters, the attorney general, who earlier had served as a Republican governor and senator from Missouri, vowed never to seek political office again. He noted that he already had the ignominious distinction of being the only senator to lose reelection to a dead opponent, after his Democratic challenger in 2000, Gov. Mel Carnahan, died in a plane crash.

Ashcroft said that if he still had a security detail, he would want three armed guards and for all of them to stop him should he change his mind about reentering politics.

Why three?

“In case the first two misfire,” he said, laughing.