3 years ago, she was arrested for drug possession, given a suspended sentence, a pat on the head, and told not to do it again. She never reported to her probation officer nor complied with any of the terms the court set, because, why? Whatcha gonna do, give me another slap on the wrist?
2 years ago, she was arrested as part of a conspiracy to steal multiple cars and distribute meth. Again given a slap on the hand, though this time felony probation. The probation officer even made an attempt to call her and visited family to urge her to come in.
1 year ago, children now taken away, no contact orders issued, she slipped even deeper into the meth culture. Repeatedly arrested with meth, booked and released when taken to jail, most times the officers just took the drugs. She was ‘taking steps to get her life turned around’ by submitting to drug testing (yep, she's still doing drugs, probation officer didn't even bother having her hauled in.) She did get a job for 3 days.
A few days ago: When officers arrived at the scene of the shooting, they arrested the shooter as well as her - she was trying to hide the gun he used on her person, as well as having more meth again. Oops, slaps on the wrist are out the window; just in accrued suspended sentence time, she's looking at five years hard time, whereas before the longest she ever spent in jail was 3 days due to a holiday weekend. Shooter, her and her buddy were all felons.
The new charges will likely mean an additional 10 year sentence. Luckily the person shot will survive, but the DA is contemplating adding on carjacking, conspiracy charges, as well as attempted kidnapping (the shooting was over a friend who called someone to pick them up and the driver was shot at to prevent the friend from leaving...)
The criminal justice system failed this woman and her children. No responsibility for countless crimes and then all of a sudden it goes and drops a load on her. Not saying she didn't deserve it, but if with all her arrests she had spent at least a week in jail and actually had accountability in her probation program, she might not have decided to get involved in this latest incident.
This is what Northam is sentencing the youth of the state to as well as making hundreds of thousands of more victims. Soft on crime attempts have repeatedly been experimented with, and for every ‘success’ story there's a hundred who follow a similar path as my friend's daughter. Increasing levels of crime, fueled by meth, until she's looking at her kids becoming adults before she has a chance to get out on parole.
Virginians should say no. Not this time.
No, she failed herself. Nobody twisted her arm when it came to making all those bad decisions.
What did the state’s governor have to do with electing to carjack, kidnap and shoot someone in a crack house?
> The criminal justice system failed this woman and her children. No responsibility for countless crimes and then all of a sudden it goes and drops a load on her. Not saying she didn’t deserve it... <
That’s a reasonable statement. Suppose that the most common penalty for not filing your income taxes was usually a $5 fine, and nothing more. Lots and lots of folks would drift into that sort of behavior. And they’d keep on doing it until one day * surprise * it’s off to federal prison.
Giuliani was right. You’ve got to get tough on the small crimes if you want to reduce the big crimes.