3-strikes bill should avoid California flaws

THE ISSUE Lawmakers are considering a bill that would impose a mandatory 30-year prison term for committing three violent felonies.

CALIFORNIA'S "three strikes" sentencing law has resulted in absurd sentences and crowded prisons since its approval by voters 12 years ago. The tough posture remains politically popular in Hawaii's Legislature, but any such formula should avoid the California pitfalls.

While judges in California are handcuffed by the provisions, a version approved by the Hawaii House Judiciary Committee would allow judges to depart from the mandatory sentence under "extraordinary circumstances" cited by the defense. That could prevent sentences that have brought ridicule to California.

Two cases, both upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, resulted in a 50-year prison sentence for a man whose third offense was stealing $153 worth of children's videotapes and a sentence of 25 years for a man who stole golf clubs worth $1,200.

A homeless man who tried to break into a church pantry as his third offense was sentenced to life; a bill approved by the Hawaii Senate could create an identical scenario by including burglary as a triggering offense.

The House and Senate versions would impose mandatory terms of 30 years to life in prison for committing three violent felonies. The Senate version includes burglary, robbery, use of a firearm in commission of a felony, child abuse and sexual assault of a minor.

The California law has had little effect on violent crime but has turned that state's prisons into crowded geriatric wards. A 2004 study by the Washington, D.C.-based Justice Policy Institute found that 42,000 three-strike inmates, two-thirds of whom were serving time for nonviolent crimes, comprised one-fourth of the prison population.

Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley is asking voters to change the California law to require that the third felony be for a "serious or violent" crime. "We're fixing it in order to save it," the Republican prosecutor said. Hawaii legislators should avoid enacting a law that will need similar fixing.