By Wendy Thomas Russell
Staff writer
This is a reproduction of the Long Beach Press-Telegram series on Three Strikes. Dated October 31, 2000. |
| Terry Bryant was 37 years old, homeess and drunk when she stole several pairs of boxer shorts from a Long Beach JC Penney store in July 1997. |
| The cost of the clothing. $24.99. The cost of her crime: 25 years to life in a Chowchilla women's prison. |
| Bryant, who already had two robberies and an assault on her record, was one of 196 defendants sentenced at the Long Beach courthouse to at least that mandatory minimum term during the first five years of California's "three-strikes" law. |
| The law targets habitual offenders - criminals with at least two serious or violent felonies on their records - who commit another felony, regardless of severity. It also doubles the sentences for second strikes. |
| Not all habitual offenders are swept up in the net, however. About 80 percent of the Long Beach third-strike defendants sentencing during the law's first five years received terms of less than 25 to life, primarily through plea bargaining. |
| To find out who was making the cut, the Press-Telegram reviewed the case files of 191 Long Beach third-strike defendants sent away for 25 to life between March
1994 and March 1999. (Five files were unavailable). |
| Here's what we found: |
| Seventy percent - or 133 - of those studied were convicted of nonviolent third strikes, such as burglary, joyriding or petty theft with a prior theft conviction. |
| Burglary accounted for 20 percent of the total cases studied. Residential burglaries are considered a serious crime because of the potential for violence, while commercial burglaries are not. |
| Thirty percent - or 58 - of the 191 were convicted of violent third strikes, such as robbery, assault, child abuse and murder. |
| Robbery was the most common violent offense, accounting for 13 percent of the 191 cases studied. |
| More than a quarter of the third-strikers (continued) |
|
LUCAS ARGILAGO, 42.
PRIOR STRIKES: Two residential burglaries in 1986 and 1987. |
RALPH SILVA, 38
PRIOR STRIKES: Assault with a deadly weapon and use of a gun with great bodily injury in 1980, and a robbery in 1988. |
 |
TERRY BRYANT, 40.
Sentenced to 25 years to life in April 1998 for petty theft with a prior theft conviction.
PRIOR STRIKES: Roberry and assault with a deadly weapon in 1983, and robbery in 1990. |
WILLIAM HOBSON, 30.
Sentenced to 27 years to life in June 1996 for selling a controlled substance.
PRIOR STRIKES: Three residential burglaries in 1990 and 1991. |
CURTIS McCOWEN, 31.
Sentenced to 40 years to life in October 1996 for robbery.
PRIOR STRIKES: Three robberies in 1988 and 1991. |
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