Victims not keen on long prison terms

A survey that a crime victims’ group described as the first of its kind in California yielded some findings contrary to conventional wisdom Thursday: Most victims question the benefits of imprisoning more criminals and prefer rehabilitation, education and Gov. Jerry Brown’s realignment program. “This report turns on its head the notion that victims care only about tough-on-crime sentences,” said Lenore Anderson, director of Californians for Safety and Justice, the nonprofit that commissioned the poll. Full Article

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Quotes about Surveys:
“Aw, people can come up with statistics to prove anything, Kent. Forfty percent of all people know that.”
– Homer Simpson quote from Simpsons Episode: “Homer the Vigilante”

“Money won’t buy happiness, but it will pay the salaries of a large research staff to study the problem.”
– Bill Vaughan quotes

“I like to do my principal research in bars, where people are more likely to tell the truth or, at least, lie less convincingly than they do in briefings and books.”
– P.J. O’Rourke quotes

“USA Today has come out with a new survey – apparently, three out of every four people make up 75% of the population.”
– David Letterman quotes

“If you surveyed a hundred typical middle-aged Americans I bet you’d find that only two of them could tell you their blood types, but every last one of them would know the theme song from “The Beverly Hillbillies.”
– Dave Barry quotes

“A survey says that American workers work the first three hours every day just to pay their taxes.”
– Unknown quotes

“A recent survey was said to prove that the people we Americans most admire are our politicians and doctors. I don’t believe it. They are simply the people we are most afraid of. And with the most reason.”
– Unknown quotes

“Asked about the power of advertising in research surveys, most agree that it works, but not on them.”
– Eric Clark quotes

“According to a recent survey, men say that the first thing they notice about a woman is their eyes, and women say the first thing they notice about men it they’re a bunch of liars.”
– Anonymous

I have to go along with Alert, as it seems most times when a group with an agenda pays for a survey, “surprisingly” the results come out to support their point of view.

Nonetheless, I do believe there is great misunderstanding of the public outlook about crime and punishment, and the Legislators are reacting based on this misunderstanding. I think the public outlook is far more nuanced than the politicians and others believe. I do not think the public generally has a hard core attitude about harsh punishment for crime across the board. I believe the public makes distinctions, is only hard core about hard core offenses, which would be serious felonies.

This is why I have argued for years that in seeking relief for SOR, the politicians can be swayed to at least eliminate it for misdemeanors, which by definition are minor offenses. The public doesn’t even know misdemeanants have to register, and I know the public would not support SOR for misdemeanants. Gee, I have argued with the Los Angeles Times repeatedly about their absolute refusal to acknowledge in their news coverage that SOR applies to misdemeanants. They just won’t do it, even dared to argue back that nearly no one has to register simply for a misdemeanor, that they either also committed a felony that requires registration or shortly after their misdemeanor committed a felony SO so have to register for that anyway! This is completely false, but they insist this is what the state Justice Department insists. They use this false argument to support the idea that there is no point in even mentioning that misdemeanants have to register. And so the public doesn’t even know minor offenders are caught up in this.

This is just background on why I argue that the push for tiers at the state level should not be putting misdemeanors in a tier of 10 years, most especially the misdemeanors that can get a certificate of rehabilitation in 7 years, that is, the ones the law already considers the least of the least of misdemeanors. This is why I push to argue to the legislators to simply conform to federal, because the feds don’t even require minor offenses to register, and that point to conform is VERY sellable. And once done, we can then stop being distracted by the state, since we will be at the minimum the state can do, and instead focus all resources on fighting the federal rules.

We should NOT be arguing for a completely separate state system, one that is far more draconian than the federal requirement, arguing for a tier system with terms of SOR that are just plain indefensible! We should be arguing to conform. That is a VERY sellable argument. It provides cover for the politicians in voting for it. It eliminates many offenses from SOR. And it allows all guns to be pointed at the feds to overwhelm them.

My daughter tried for months to get the DA to offer a plea of 2-4 yrs. DA didn’t want to offer it because it was her agenda to stick it to all SO’s. She said daughter was too young to understand what she wants – who is btw 16!

Then when daughter didn’t want to testify the DA bullied her. The detectives tried to get CPS to take my daughter Away because I was supporting him and after trial, the DA was retaliating against me because I retracted some of my statement saying that daughter was in a hostile environment.

Same office pursued charges against a man even though they know the kids were lying, and has been heard saying they don’t care if he isn’t guilty, they only want a conviction.

The legal system is corrupt! They will also go after anyone who challenges them