And yet this is happening every day in federal and state courts across
the United States. Judges, bound by mandatory sentencing laws that they
openly denounce, are sending people away for the rest of their lives for
committing nonviolent drug and property crimes. In nearly 20 percent of
cases, it was the person’s first offense.
As of 2012, there were 3,278 prisoners serving sentences of life without parole for such crimes, according to an extensive and astonishing report
issued Wednesday by the American Civil Liberties Union. And that number
is conservative. It doesn’t include inmates serving sentences of, say,
350 years for a series of nonviolent drug sales. Nor does it include
those in prison for crimes legally classified as “violent” even though
they did not involve actual violence, like failing to report to a
halfway house or trying to steal an unoccupied car.
This is a New York Times editorial. Tom
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