An essay about california's three strikes law.
Three-strikes law mandates doubling sentences for a second felony conviction and imposing life in prison for a third conviction. Many would think that the Eighth Amendment's prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment would over rule this law, but it was not in violation. On a website that I found they calculated that $4.5 billion to $6.5 billion per year was needed to accommodate this law. The intent of the three-strikes law is, of course, to lock up repeat offenders longer, and that requires the construction and operation of more prisons. Some say that police and court costs could be saved by not having to deal so often with such offenders once they are locked up, but greater prison costs overcome such savings.
I am very indifferent about his law; in studies it has shown that the rates in crime have decreased. Bill Jones is the author of the three strikes law. He reports, a thirty-eight percent decline in violent crime since the passage of the three strikes law. He also anticipated that approximately one million crimes have been prevented and $21.7 billion in costs associated to those crimes have been saved. When we look at these rates they sound amazing but if we are putting third time offenders to a life of incarceration, it will cost is tremendously. For a person to stay in jail for a year it cost twelve thousand dollars, imagine that times sixty years, and later including elderly care for prisoners.
If the state got rid of strikes and instead pledged that those convicted of a serious crime serve their full sentence it would be much more logical. In other words, taking on a law that sends all those convicted of a serious felony to prison, eliminates good time for felons so that they must serve...
More Law & Government Essays
essays:
Proposition 184 in California "Three Strikes and You're Out!"
... the three strikes law at sentencing."(Horn, 2004) There have been several attempts to challenge the constitutionality of proposition 184, most commonly based on a potential violation of the eighth amendment, which guarantees prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. In the ...
Court cases dealing with the 14th amendment
... narcotics." On appeal, a state appellate court confirmed Robinson's conviction. Was the California law an infliction of cruel and unusual punishment prohibited by the Eighth Amendment? In ...
Death Penalty and the Eight Amendment
... a cruel and unusual punishment, but the treatment of prisoners before being executed is also cruel and unusual. In August ...
Capital Punishment, should it or should it not be used in today's criminal judging system
... existing laws 'the imposition and carrying out of the death penalty...constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the eighth and Fourteenth Amendments' This ...
In cold blood:death penalty
... as '...cruel and unusual punishment.' In this country, although laws governing the application of the death penalty have undergone many changes since biblical times, the punishment endures , and controversy has never been greater. A prisoner's ...
The Death Penalty Process.
... were cruel and unusual punishment and therefore a violation of the Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. In 1976, the Court reversed this decision in the ...
The Three Strikes Law is Lost in a Dessert The
... The ‘three strikes’ law more often accrues for a minor felony. People go to prison for much less. Often there is no violent crime at all and they ...
This essay is about the legality of marijuana.
... drug crimes would drop, allowing the police to turn their attention to more serious problems. There is a marijuana smoker arrested every 45 seconds in the United States. Normally, they receive large fines and small jail time but repeat offenders can ...