One thing I didn’t really pick up on with all the primary madness was the very important hearings on crime that the judiciary committee held on Tuesday. There are plenty of stories about it in local papers, including this one in the Courant. Some of the ideas floated there include a “three strikes” law, new and/or expanded prisons, expanding the use of GPS to track parolees, and others.
If you’re interested in this subject, full transcripts of the hearings and relevant documents are posted on the CGA website. (h/t Capitol Watch)
45 responses so far ↓
Kane is pitiful complaining about the IT system. The prosecutors for ten years blew off the law that required them to send sentecing transcripts to the Parole Board. First, they said the transcripts maent nothing. Thane they siad sending them would cost too much and now they are blaming the lack of modern IT. Where have they been for the last ten years with their excuses. Any big city Mayor – competent ones anyway – will tell you that paroleees inappropritely relesed are a major source of crime.
Did we have a massive problem before the Cheshire tragedy? Or has Chris Healy gone and done a good job of politicizing said tragedy, which has of course, pushed the Dems to follow along?
Call me soft on crime, but building more prisons and jailing more people, (at a significant cost btw), does not seem like the best course of action. Instead it strikes me as a gross over-reaction to what was, admittedly, one horrific crime.
Hey, I’m just saying a pair of psychopaths doesn’t necessarliy mean the system is completely broken. But if Chris Healy wants to také this tragedy and score political points, who am I to criticize?
However, while having this discussion, on getting tougher on criminals, I would like to know how can someone get their third DUI and not spend a single day in jail?
[quote comment="19038"]
Call me soft on crime[/quote]
You’re soft on crime.
But that’s okay, we expect that. What about a tougher 3-strikes law? That’s a start.
This isn’t an over-reaction. It’s an event that has revealed some serious holes in our system.
Healy isn’t politicizing this anymore than Lawlor/McDonald are, so don’t try to sell that here. We’re all stocked up on spin.
None of the “three strikes” laws would have changed the outcome in Cheshire. And Helay was ranting yesterday about the death penalty – the stae has one and it hasn’t prevented any crime. As for a massive problem before Cheshire, TBCT, you might ask DeStefano what he thinks of the state parole system.
Hey, I’m all for reform. But let’s do it in a calm, rational, bi-partisan way.
And again, I’m not for building more prisons and jailing more people for longer time periods. (That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t keep the true psychos off the streets.)
My point was that Healy is an ass to try and use the Cheshire tragedy and FEAR as a top GOP issue for 2008.
If we should be scared of anything, it should be of him getting back behind the wheel three years from now…
A true three strikes law would not significantly increase the prison population.
Perpetual offenders of serious crimes must be put away for life. We’re not talking about you’re average drug offender; we’re talking about the worst of the worst criminals.
Depending on how Judiciary crafts the law, a three strikes law could have certainly kept those monsters in jail for life. The younger guy no question, the older guy had several convictions of stealing guns. If you make that offense a strike, he’s in jail for life.
[quote post="963"]Hey, I’m all for reform. But let’s do it in a calm, rational, bi-partisan way.[/quote]
Agreed, the two would have been in jail instead of on parole if the bureacracy had been broken for over a decade. Amazing that Republicans want more laws when the probelm is clear the laws on the books weren’t followed by the bureucrats.
[quote post="963"]had been broken [/quote]
hadn’t been broken – whoops
[quote comment="19049"][quote post="963"]Amazing that Republicans want more laws when the probelm is clear the laws on the books weren’t followed by the bureucrats.[/quote]
Yeah, the prosecutors didn’t do their job sending the transcripts. They also never used the persistent felon law, which was poorly written and recently ruled unconstitutional.
I’m all for firing prosecutors, but the persistent felon law needs to be fixed (the CT Supreme court told us that last week), and a mandatory three strikes law could be easily written.
It’s not about “new laws.” It’s about fixing the ones we have.
And thug – you may want to consider that at least one of these criminals was sexually and otherwise abused as a kid among other crap that made him act like an animal. A good chunkof the state operating budget goes to social services and nobody evr looks at how the system doesn’t work, how it fails it’s clients and how it fails us all. Hey but Jodi wags her finger, Healy bashes his two gay nemeses on the Judiciary Committee whenever he gets a chance and…..
[quote comment="19055"]And thug – you may want to consider that at least one of these criminals was sexually and otherwise abused as a kid among other crap that made him act like an animal. A good chunkof the state operating budget goes to social services and nobody evr looks at how the system doesn’t work, how it fails it’s clients and how it fails us all. Hey but Jodi wags her finger, Healy bashes his two gay nemeses on the Judiciary Committee whenever he gets a chance and…..[/quote]
Wow – It only took ten posts for someone to say the ruthless killer was a “victim”. How many people who were abused or molested NEVER commit a brutal crime where the rape an elleven year old and set her on fire? I for one do not give a damn about the killers or their past – they deserve to be fried for what they did. Toucan, why don’t you come out of your basement lair and talk to some real people in your neighborhood – not the on-line nuts – and ask THEM if they feel bad a killer was abused as a kid and should be treated more compassionately. After burning a couple of girls alive…..
Six Pack – I said the guy should never have been let out of jail. Then I went on to say maybe the guy’s life of crime could have been prevented. Maybe you should stay away form the suds while you’re on the line.
Only that’s not what Toucan said. Nor me, nor anyone else.
I don’t think anyone feels for the perps in the Cheshire case.
But to examine what made the two killers go off the deep end shouldn’t be taboo.
Hey TBCT, I’ll go out on a limb here and say the killers should be locked up for life now w/o the possibility of parole. The death penalty is never right and unfortunatley some – Healy – have tried to make this tragedy about the death penalty instead of how to reduce crime.
And any bets on when the survivor of the Cheshire tragedy sues the state??
[quote comment="19047"]
Depending on how Judiciary crafts the law, a three strikes law could have certainly kept those monsters in jail for life. The younger guy no question, the older guy had several convictions of stealing guns. If you make that offense a strike, he’s in jail for life.[/quote]
Not true. The younger guy had only be arrested once before. That’s one strike.
trifles – thug is using new math!!!!!
[quote comment="19058"]I said the guy should never have been let out of jail. quote]
If you feel this way, you obviously support a strong three strikes law, because the current laws on the books would not have kept them in jail.
Komisarjevsky had been convicted of 21 felonies
Hayes had been convicted of 17
That is a lot of strikes.
This is about reducing crime by not letting serious offenders out to commit more of them. And both sides have politicisized this. Lawler has been out in front of so many cameras that Dick Blumenthal is jealous. The D’s push for the past few years was searching for ways to ease prison overcrowding – let poor convicts out, give them treatment, and society will win them over so they never commit another crime again. How did that work out? By letting two dirtbags out of jail when they shouldn’t have, let one of them skip his “treatment” sessions with zero consequence, and oh, those two guys raped, beat, burned and killed a family. So now to fit them back into prison, we have to let a couple other guys gets out and roll the dice – hope like Hell that it isn’t my house and my family where the next poor misunderstood ex-con out on parole decides this is the night to snap. Build more prisons – whatever the cost. And lock the dangerous people away so they won’t hurt anyone but each other again. No pricetag is too steap to allow another family to be brutally slaughtered.
Sixpack – have another beer while you blame Lawlor for the failure of the excutive branch to do its job to protect and serve the public.
Indeed, over 26% of Connecticut ’s budget – or 35%, including corrections – goes towards social services. And yet the average Connecticut citizen knows little about how this money is actually spent.
http://www.yankeeinstitute.org/main/social.php
Actually, Union Thug, I believe (and someone can correct me if I’m wrong) he had been arrested once and CHARGED with 21 felonies but plead guilty to one count of burglary. So he has only been convicted of one felony.
See http://www.nhregister.com/site/index.cfm?newsid=18729647&BRD=1281&PAG=461&dept_id=517515&rfi=8
“A California-style three-strikes law would not have applied to Komisarjevsky or Hayes. Komisarjevsky had no record when he was caught for a string of burglaries and Hayes committed mainly low-rent car break-ins. “
Well Toucan, at least you aren’t trying to politicisize the killings……
The law passed on reducing prison overcrowding was spearheaded by Reps. Lawler and Dyson. That law is why the administration let people go when they shouldn’t have. There is plenty of blame on both sides for the failure to let residents sleep safely at night in their own beds. But laws with unintended consequences, like the move to let felons out early, often also have a springboard effect to backfire when the problems in them arise. That is going to happen here – the state will be coming down much harder on violent offenders – as they should. More people are going to be locked up and for longer terms. And both sides will vote for the changes, because no one will want to run in 08 as “soft on crime”.
Sixpack – I don’t know anybody – including Bob Farr who didn’t oversee their release – that thinks had the Parole Board seen the sentencing transcripts as required by current law that these two would have been released – the system is badly badly broken and needs to be fixed.
I think the transcript might have made a difference in one of the cases, not the other. And the parole board is essentially a rubber stamp operation – anyone eligible who didn’t commit a “violent” offense gets out after serving half their time. So yes, the system is a mess and needs a fix, not a “study”. And you wonder why I drink…….
>>My point was that Healy is an ass to try and use the Cheshire tragedy and FEAR as a top GOP issue for 2008.
Do you have any idea what you’re talking about?
Seems to me that when the GOP party chair is doing the bidding of the family (Bill Petit Sr served on GOP state central for ages) that would be fair.
I see Bill’s other two sons almost daily (in fact the cigarette I just lit came from their store) and they haven’t expressed any problem with Healy’s actions either.
Komisarjevsky had three seperate convictions.
1/3/03 for burglary
12/20/02 for 12 burglary charges
10/10/02 for 6 burglary charges, and 6 larceny charges
You don’t need to be Ken Kaiser to count three strikes.
ACR–
Don’t make me go and dig up the partisan comments Healy has made about the Cheshire tragedy.
Yes, he toned it down a little when it became clear the Rell administration and the Farr-led parole board bore more responsibility than the Legislature.
But he hasn’t had a bi-partisan approach, and yes he’s trying to use this tragedy for political gain…
Healy is chairman of th Republican party…isn’t he supposed to make partisan comments? Same goes for Dinardo. That’s their job.
TrueBlue
If Chris Healy were to maintain a studious silence about the Petit murders, he’ be the only one not talking about it. Why don’t you take a moment to explain to us what is not political about this case. The legislature, a political body, is charged with making laws. Some people, Healy among them, believe that additional laws are needed to frustrate future criminals like the two who invaded the Petit home, raped young children, assaulted the homeowner and burnt the bodies of two victims in an attempt to cover up a crime. This is all politics with a capital “P.” So what? Healy is the Chairman of the Republican Party and by definition “a partisan.” Every thing he says is partisan. Again, so what? If Democrats object to partisanship on this particular issue, they can surmount this invidious horror by the simple expedient of agreeing with the Republicans that the so called “three strikes and your out” law was not working because its application was too discretionary. That’s waht Chris Powell of the Journal Inquirer said. He’s right.
[quote post="963"]Healy is chairman of th Republican party…isn’t he supposed to make partisan comments?[/quote]
It’s his bullshit blather that people have trouble with.
All party chairmen say crazy things. Are you new to this planet?
[quote post="963"]All party chairmen say crazy things. Are you new to this planet? [/quote]
Yeah, but healy is really crazy and the onle people he’s attracting to the GOP are crazy too – and not crazy like foxes either. And toucans have been on the planet for many years. Longer than republicans even
>>Don’t make me go and dig up …
Healy’s the problem you say?
Doesn’t look like it:
Lawlor, co-chairman of the Judiciary Committee, has promoted himself as a leading opponent of prison expansion and has lectured on the subject. However, his profile of Wikipedia, a popular website used by political officials to promote themselves, was altered by someone from a legislative IP address to remove a paragraph touting that position.
Read the entire press release here
Is there any way that we can have this discussion without thinking about the Cheshire tragedy? If you really think about this issue, and take the emotional baggage out of it, how many feel the same way?
I feel the same way.
Criminals who commit three serious felonies should spend the rest of their lives in jail.
Does anyone disagree?
ACR–
What I’m saying is that Healy is exploiting the Cheshire tragedy in an attempt to give the CT GOP a campaign issue going into 2008. (God knows they don’t have anything else to run on.)
I’m crying foul. Not on examining the criminal justice system, not on enacting needed reforms, but on the partisan attacks on Democrats which will only lead to a legislative over-reaction that will cost us all tens of millions if not hundreds of million of dollars, that could be better spent elsewhere.
What Healy’s press release omits is that the administration of the system has been in the hands of Rowland/Rell since 1994. Going after the State Legislature on this is purely a political act, and if Healy really cared about end results he’d park the vitriol.
PS–
As a Democrat I love it when Healy goes on attack, particularly about crime.
Why, because it gives me cover to bring up the fact that the hard-charging egomaniac is a career criminal himself. THREE friggin’ DUI’s?
With his 50th birthday coming up, I hope you all will chip in and buy him a really nice, bright red bicycle. Maybe Lt. Gov. Fedele could do the fundraising.
>>the system has been in the hands of Rowland/Rell since 1994
And which of those years did either have a Republican majority?
Both have been baby sitters just keeping the Dems from running the whole state totally into the ground.
Hasn’t keep the Dems from trying though.
UnionThug:
>>Criminals who commit three serious felonies
Depends; what’s “serious”?
Not that I’ve suddenly become a raving bleeding heart liberal…but; it seems to me that the key word should be “violence” as it’s not all that difficult through relatively minor `invention’ (read: `perjury’) to convert what should be a civil matter to a criminal felony.
I’ve witnessed such a stunt and wouldn’t want anyone to wind up having that play made on them, and having it count as 33%
We’ve all read or heard of people in other states where they thought they had a solid “3 strikes” law and wind up locking some poor schlep up over little more than a traffic ticket.
Such a statute needs to be carefully framed so as to avoid similar disasters here while simultaneously tossing out the key for those that simply can’t behave themselves and inflict injuries on others.
TBCT – Just because someone has a flaw doesn’t mean they shouldn’t strive to fix that flaw in others. Is every alcoholic who falls off the wagon a hypocrite if he has tried to warn kids of the evil of alcohol? No. Many men have tried to live good lives and fallen again and again. They are called sinners. It does not absolve them of the duty to continue to call it a sin and try to fix it. So, just because Chris Healey broke the law, doesn’t mean he should stand silent and not try to fix those laws when they aren’t working.
Ah, Tony is back! Where you been Buddy?
You do appreciate the irony of the words “three strikes” coming out of Healy’s big mouth. I’d be delighted to hear the Chris’s thoughts about fixing CT’s drunk-driving laws, as they clearly haven’t been tough enough to deter him from drinking and driving!
This isn’t a matter of the CT GOP chairman being an alcoholic. It’s a matter of him getting behind the wheel and jeopardizing other people’s lives.
It’s also about whether Healy can be a credible attack dog, particularly on an issue like crime, given his own criminal history.
Three strikes and it’s the wood chipper. But noooooo, Lawler and the left want us to feed, entertain and provide free health care the the viruses. If you had a virus wouldn’t you want to get rid of it or kill it? Put me iin charge for a week and the entire “pen” will be cleaned out and I’ll let God be my judge.
>>It’s a matter of him getting behind the wheel and jeopardizing other people’s lives.
Ah…you’ve just never ridden with me that’s all.
Most 1st timers scream a little…..others; quite a lot. They can be sooo distracting.
When a paunchy middle-aged guy in a 10 year old minivan is 2 feet behind someone and gaining, it’s a safe bet the guy in front is too damn slow.
You shoulda seem me 20 years ago in my Porsche days……..
[quote comment="19090"]>>
We’ve all read or heard of people in other states where they thought they had a solid “3 strikes” law and wind up locking some poor schlep up over little more than a traffic ticket.[/quote]
That’s a myth, ACR. The third strike has to be a felony, and a traffic ticket is not a felony.
But I get your point. I don’t think you need to say violent, because I think crimes like stealing guns or burglary, while not necessarily violent, should be considered a strike.
There is definite middle ground between a California type and the toothless law we have.
@44
Its all in how you define “violent” – California’s problem is that too much qualifies as a strike, so you do end up with some schlub stealing a bicycle and getting life.
As for our law, I will hold off on commenting until I see what they come up with…
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