The Marietta Daily Journal – Bill signed here will help state be smart on crime

via The Marietta Daily Journal – Bill signed here will help state be smart on crime.

Gov. Nathan Deal signed the state’s latest criminal justice bill into law in Marietta last Thursday, and said it would help the state be “smarter on crime.” He is correct.

House Bill 349 frees judges in certain circumstances from having to impose “mandatory minimum” sentences. They’ll now be able to hand down more appropriate sentences in drug cases, for example, where the defendant in question was not the primary suspect or ringleader but previously stood to be punished as if he were.

“Public safety will be improved by giving prosecutors leverage in certain cases and by ensuring that our prison resources are reserved for the ‘kingpins’ while the ‘mules’ are given a chance at reform,” he said.

The governor noted that Georgia, which has the 10th-largest population in the country, also has the fourth-largest prison population. That’s a result of the so-called “war on drugs” and items like the “three strikes and you’re out” law passed in the 1990s that mandated life sentences for those convicted a third time for certain offenses.

Our jails are full, yes — and costly. Keeping someone behind bars costs more than $18,000 per year, and nearly five times that for juvenile offenders.