Habitual Felons in NC

There have been efforts afoot in the North Carolina legislature to water down our state's habitual felon law that causes repeat offenders to enjoy additional prison time.  In some cases, it has been maintained that the length of these sentences has been inappropriate.  And there is apparently a desire to save money on prison space.

Senate Majority leader Phil Berger said the following yesterday after a couple of bills on this topic passed the Senate:

“Protecting law-abiding citizens is the first obligation of government.  Today, Senate Democrats failed in their primary responsibility.  This is what you get from years of spending every dime in sight while ignoring the need for additional prison space.  Now instead of cutting waste and inefficiency in state government, Democrats chose to shorten prison sentences and give dangerous criminals an early return to North Carolina’s communities.”

Meanwhile, Tara Servatius reveals that the felon classes targeted by some of these efforts-- H and I-- include the crime of breaking and entering:

North Carolina's already lax laws on housebreaking have lead to North Carolina having the highest home break-in rate (the FBI calls it "burglary") of any state in the nation according to the FBI's Uniform Crime Report. This is because in North Carolina, for breaking and entering to count as a higher level "burglary" felony carrying far more time, the crime must occur at night when the victims are home. The penalty for most daytime break-ins is probation. Criminals know they can be convicted of breaking into homes at least four times without ever serving a day in prison, which has lead to a free-for-all on North Carolinians' property.

If anything, we need to toughen our breaking and entering laws. Currently, the only way for a prosecutor to put a repeat house-breaker away for a significant amount of time is to use the habitual felon law. It's frightening to ponder how much our already atrocious home break-in/burglary rate would rise if certain legislators and the state's newspapers succeed in gutting the habitual felon law.

In addition, we learned last year of the serious problems North Carolina has with our probation system.  We have been unable to adequately monitor those on probation.  The response of the Democrats in Raleigh is to increase the numbers on probation-- but will they be monitored aggressively?

It's beginning to feel a bit like 1960's New York.

Phil Berger is right.  Maintaining civic order is the first priority of local and state government.  Our criminal justice system needs to maximize crime control, and should not be tweaked just to satisfy liberal agenda items.

Comments

[cpa101]

The best deterrent to breaking and entering is having Smith & Wesson ready. If more people should be ready to protect themsleves then these criminals would think twice about doing the crime.

[brandonB]

You are right CPA, but there is a lot of baggage that goes along with defending yourself during a time of crisis rather than let the state put the offender in time out after the fact.

[Bubba]

".....but there is a lot of baggage that goes along with defending yourself during a time of crisis rather than let the state put the offender in time out after the fact."

There is a lot of baggage carried by your surviving loved ones when the B&E perp uses a weapon and you didn't have the means to defend yourself.

[Ken Hill]

I'd rather be tried by twelve than carried by six.