Three strikes and you're out - for good - proposed Life Imprisonment for Egregious Recidivists bill, known as LIFER for repeat violent criminals - Column

0 Comments | Insight on the News, May 17, 1993 | by Deroy Murdock

Some people just never learn. After serving less than five years of two 15-year prison terms for convictions in two rapes, Walter "Animal" McFadden did it again. In 1981, he was sentenced to another 15 years for the kidnapping and rape of a woman while he was on parole. By 1985, though, McFadden was out on the street once more. Within a year, he met an 18-year-old Texas girl, whom he raped and murdered. Then he killed her two young friends.

Ambrose Harris doesn't get it either. Authorities say that after 44 trips to jail for rapes and armed robberies, Harris, 40, abducted Kristin Huggins, a 22-year-old Philadelphia-area artist. A week before this past Christmas Eve, Harris allegedly shot Huggins twice in the head, then buried her. Spinning through the justice system's revolving door apparently made Harris dizzy Perhaps that's why he laughed through his arraignment.

Violent crime is no laughing matter to the 5 million Americans a year who the Census Bureau estimates fall victim to murder, rape, armed robbery and other barbarities. The living among them might take comfort in House Resolution 93, the Life Imprisonment for Egregious Recidivists bill, or more euphonically, the LIFER bill.

If enacted, this measure would require that after three convictions for violent felonies (generally those involving the use or threat of force), criminals be sentenced to life in prison. No parole, no furloughs, no sob stories about abusive parents. This bill is no effort to spare criminals from the electric chair. It concludes that it "shall not be construed to prevent the imposition of the death penalty."

The LIFER bill is the brainchild of Sen. Trent Lott of Mississippi and Rep. Bob Livingston of Louisiana, both Republicans. A former New Orleans prosecutor, Livingston has had it with the mayhem on the streets. "Rehabilitation advocates won't like LIFER's approach at first" he wrote recently, "but even they must recognize that a line must be drawn somewhere. Victims' rights must come first."

Livingston also asserted that permanently shelving the most dangerous criminals would have a disproportionately favorable impact on safety: By some estimates, he observed, "sentencing 1,000 of the worst offenders to jail would avert 187,000 felonies. The additional costs in prison funding of $25 million pale in comparison to the $100 billion annual national price tag for crime."

If you sense that our streets have become shooting galleries, you're right. Since 1960, the per capita violent crime rate has climbed 355 percent. In 1990, the Bureau of Justice Statistics estimates, 23,440 Americans were murdered, 124,480 were raped and 265,630 were injured while being robbed. Also, 108,710 were victims of serious assault. Each of these categories grew substantially from the previous year.

Meanwhile, sentences have fallen for those convicted of these crimes. In a detailed study released this past December, the National Center for Policy Analysis in Dallas calculated the "expected punishment" a criminal would endure when the odds of arrest, prosecution, conviction and sentencing are combined. The center found that a murderer in 1990 could expect to spend an average of just 1.8 years in jail, down from 2.3 in 1988, and a rapist could expect an average of 60 days, down from 80.5. The average term of 6.4 days expected for aggravated assault in 1990 was less than half the expected average of 13.2 days in 1988.

"The reason we have so much crime is that for many people the benefits outweigh the costs," the center concluded. For some people, a criminal career is more attractive than their other career options."

Where could we incarcerate dangerous criminals if LIFER goes into law? Why not turn abandoned military bases into prisons? In fact, New Jersey's Fort Dix will reopen in 1994 as our largest federal penitentiary. With barracks and security systems already in place, such base conversions should be relatively easy to achieve.

Of course, we always can wedge more convicts into supposedly overcrowded prisons. No one wants to see a cruel and unusual American gulag, even for violent offenders. However, who says prisoners are entitled to comfort? The lawful should feel secure in giving prisoners no more space than the minimum required by, say, the United Nations High Commission for Human Rights.

Federal facilities are teeming today with prisoners of the war on drugs, many of whom have sold a bag or two of dope but are essentially nonviolent. Releasing inmates who are in for nonviolent and victimless crimes would open space for brutal offenders.

LIFER drives straight to the heart of the violent crime epidemic. Its simple message should soothe those who cower at home behind burglar bars and deadbolt locks just as it should chill the armed thugs who prey upon them: One, two, three strikes, you're out. Slam the jailhouse door, gather the keys and melt them into handcuffs.

Deroy Murdock is a New York writer and president of Loud & Clear Communications, a marketing and media consultancy.