Bill Stewart wrote:
Not much - Government Radio said tonight that they're not allowed to plea-bargain third strike felonies down to misdemeanors. The LA public defender's office is absolutely swamped, partly because third-strike cases are supposed to get diligent support, and partly because they have to go to trial rather than plea-bargaining a guilty, which is less work. The county jails are also having serious crowding problems, because prospective third-strikers are being kept in them pending trial to avoid risk of flight, so non-third-strike jailees are getting out early (especially drug violators.)
The Friday (3/8/95) NYT has an article by Fox Butterfield on this which points out that CA is unique in having a three strikes law that does not require three violent felonies. Apparently most other states do require three serious violent felonies. Wilson (the CA governer and would be presidential candidate) is claiming that the extremely harsh CA law is reducing crime rates for two straight years for the first time - but others point out that they have been falling nationally, including in states without three strike laws. The article also points out that in a state with a 7% black population 43% of the three time losers are black. The article mentions that 192 people were sentenced under the law for marijuana possesion compared to 40 murderers, 25 rapists and 24 kidnappers. Sorry for the digression from crypto ... Dave Emery die@die.com