The term “three strikes” normally brings up baseball connotations. Men and women who are playing softball or baseball often have three chances to hit the small baseball that is pitched towards home plate. If they swing and miss three times, they are “out.” Yet did you know that this isn’t the only area of life where the “three strikes” mentality is invoked? In fact, in some states, the three strikes law governs criminal cases. According to one criminal defense lawyer, the three strikes law is a measure that is enacted by several states in order to target repeat offenders. In states that uphold the three strikes law, three felonies mean your “out.” “Out” typically refers to removal from society, or a life in prison.
In most states, those three strikes can be virtually any crime that is categorized as a felony. Shoplifting, murder, or white collar crime can all bring on a strike. Normally, judges say that the crimes post a danger to society, and they want to get societal hazards behind bars where they cannot harm anyone. In many three strike states, the first two “strikes” are serious crimes. For example, if a criminal is convicted of one count of murder and one count of assault with a deadly weapon, he will probably have two of these strikes on his or her record. These crimes can normally bring on about 25 years in prison up to a life sentence by themselves.
Courts normally have a lower threshold regarding the third crime. Forgery, stealing, or a variety of other “smaller” crimes can still count as the third strike, because the court will believe that the offender has a repeat pattern of criminal actions. The three strikes law wasn’t brought into the justice system until the 1990s, though forms of the punishment have been around since before this time. The first state to adopt this as an official law was Washington, followed by California. Many states amend or appeal their three strikes law, and the punishments are often up for debate in a criminal’s trial. Some states have found the law ineffective in reducing crime and believe that it only overcrowds prisons.
Some states have a similar law that is called the “habitual offender” statute. Similarly, this law gives harsher to those with multiple marks on their criminal record. Often this statute is applied to those who are convicted of multiple sex crimes, or have an issue with DUIs. In some places, these three-peat offenders can end up with lengthy sentences, but aren’t necessarily doomed to a life sentence. Over half of the states in the US have some form of the three strikes law. These include South Carolina, Vermont, Montana, Maryland, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Florida, Georgia, Colorado, Alabama, Arkansas, Wyoming, Virginia, Wisconsin, and Indiana, among others.
Some critics say that the three strikes law oversimplifies the justice system, leads to prison crowding, and has no impact on the real crime rates. They believe that the automatic sentences force judges to view the crime as a black and white issue, rather than looking at the details that caused the crime to come about. Often times, it takes careful thought to work out gray areas in a court case. A 2005 study by Vincent Shiraldi and Geri Silva declared that 65 percent of all three-strike convicts in California were imprisoned for non-violent crimes, and that 25 percent of all inmates were serving a life-sentence for a three-strike offense. If you have committed three felonies, and live in a three-strike state, then you will want an aggressive and convincing lawyer on your side. You may even need to challenge the benefits of the three-strike law in your state in hopes to avoid a life-sentence in prison for your actions. Talk to someone at a criminal defense law firm in your county today!
