Soft on Crime.
I guess legislative leaders might be proud of being mentioned in the Conservative Review but the rest of the Republicans ought to hang our heads in shame. This story from Friday covers the soft on crime legislative wave that has crashed upon Oklahoma for the last few years and the outcome of a surge in crime of all types.
And for years the Sooner Tea Party has warned of the consequences of soft on crime legislation and doing story after story that proves exactly what this story says:
According to Jason Hicks, many criminals are barely serving time as it is. “A five-year sentence or even up to a 10-year sentence, those folks are serving a very, very small amount of time in DOC on a nonviolent crime,” said Hicks at the recent hearing in the House Judiciary Committee. “In fact, you’re going to serve roughly 90 days on a 10-year-or-less nonviolent crime and, if you haven’t done anything else, you’re getting an ankle bracelet and getting sent back home.”
The article goes on to compare Oklahoma to San Francisco despite Oklahoma being the reddest state in the Union because we adopted the drug legalization and pro property crime legislation of California. Who needs liberals when you have soft on crime Republicans covering for SQ 780 and celebrating the single largest prison release in our nation's history?
The article excoriates Governor Stitt for the mass release without considering the fact that Oklahoma simply doesn't lock up people for small drug offenses, only for trafficking or for violating parole for other crimes. The author also points out that the failure to have consequences for property crime lands heavily on the property owners, businesses, and the common citizens who are victimized by criminals. The story also covered the new task force set up by the sheriff's office to combat the growing burglary crimes due to the drop in dollar levels before charging as a felony. There has been a seven percent rise in larceny crimes in Oklahoma County between 2017 and 2018 and the homeless population is exploding as vagrants move to Oklahoma because they know they can do their drugs and the petty crime they depend upon to earn the money for the drugs with zero fear of being arrested and prosecuted.
The story covers the drop in crime since 1994 until 2015 when the liberal soft on crime plans began gaining traction. Since then violent crime is up over 12%, aggravated assaults up by nearly 18%, and vehicle theft us up by 24%.
The numbers for the rise in crime between 2014 and 2017 in Tulsa is troubling:
- Murder: 30%
- Rape: 22%
- Aggravated assault: 36%
- Larceny: 10%
- Motor-vehicle theft: 38%
The rest of the story goes on to echo what STP has told you for years; people in prison in Oklahoma had to work their butt off to get there. Few are there for drug use, most of the drug related cases are for drug trafficking or have agreed to plea deal on drug charges to wipe out more serious violent crime charges. The majority, 60%, are there for murder, rape, assault, robbery, or burglary.
Drugs drive crime according to my bail bondsman friends. Drugs are expensive, drug users either cannot hold a job or do not want to hold a job, so they break into your house and fence the stolen items for a fraction of their value, usually doing more damage to the doors and windows during the burglary than what they get from selling the stolen goods.
And now, merely one day after the historic mass release of prisoners, Oklahoma is facing another petition drive that would prevent legislators or prosecutors from factoring in previous criminal convictions when adjudicating criminal acts in court.
Where in all of this sympathy for the hardened criminals is the sympathy for the victims of crime? Where is the common sense that ought to say that raising the bar on shoplifting offenses just creates more shoplifting and added cost to the retailers that is passed on to the customers?
Time after time we have taken one of Kris Steele's poster girls or poster boys and shown their criminal background prior to being incarcerated for “drug use”. They always had a ten to fifteen year history of serious crimes, multiple crimes while out on bail or parole, a refusal to pay their court fines and fees leading to a revocation of their suspended sentences which led to their prison stay.
The simple fact is that the one main valid purpose of the government is to protect you from me and me from you and both of us from outsiders. Only 7% of Oklahoma's state budget is spent on locking up the worst of the worst criminal yet that money is targeted by the socialists at the legislature and desired for doing for voters what they ought to be doing for themselves.
