Assignment:
1. Develop a policy regarding the three strikes laws in the State of California. Address the following in your policy:
- What alternatives would be placed in the law to give the state prosecutor more freedom to manipulate the third strike?
- Many prosecutors "load up" charges against defendants to force a plea bargain. What can be done to limit or prevent this practice?
- Will your policy allow multiple counts arising from the same incident to count as multiple strikes? (For instance, a man arrested for aggravated robbery because of the use of a weapon is charged with aggravated robbery and a felony gun possession charge. Should that count as 1 strike or 2?)
- If one of the alternatives was supervised probation, how would you convince the public that it would be more cost-effective for the person to be supervised than incarcerated?
- Show the public where you would be saving money by not incarcerating the perpetrator.
- If brought up in the legislature to be an amendment to the law, could this be grandfathered in to help older inmates?
- Could this have a backlash from the public, or would they approve? How? Why?
2. Once you are finished with the policy, draft an executive summary of the policy to be used for political decision making.
3. Use 6 to 10 scholarly resources to support the provisions of your policy. Dictionaries and encyclopedias are not scholarly sources. Look at federal and state legislation and court cases.