Early predictions that the implementation of Three Strikes would rapidly overload the California prison system have proven untrue. In the Fall of 1994, the prison population in California was approximately 125,000. The California Department of Corrections estimated that with the new law, the prison population would expand to 190,000 by 1998 � a 52 percent projected increase. The actual population in 1998 was 158,207 � only a 27 percent increase and nearly 3,000 fewer inmates than were predicted even before Three Strikes was passed into law.
Deterrence
Prior to 1994, career criminals took advantage of the prisons system�s revolving door. Three Strikes proponents argued that if punishment for crimes was swift and sure, we would be able to use the threat of a double or triple sentence as a deterrent to prevent repeat offenders from continuing their life of crime.
As Secretary of State Bill Jones has said, �With Three Strikes, we gave career criminals three choices: straighten up, leave the state or go to prison.�
Five years later, we now have evidence that fewer crimes are being committed, fewer inmates than expected are going to prison, and more career criminals on parole have left the state for more crime-tolerant locales.
As has been reported by the Department of Justice and the California Department of Corrections, California has seen a net exodus of parolees to other states since the implementation of the Three Strikes law. In 1994, the year Three Strikes was put in place, more parolees left California than entered for the first time since 1976. The trend continues to this day.
That statistic is even more startling when you consider that California passed a law in 1995 that denied parolees the right to leave the state until all of the parolee�s restitution and restitution fines have been paid.
Economic Benefits from Reduced Crime
During the initial debate on Three Strikes, much discussion was focussed on the cost of implementing Three Strikes, but little attention was paid to the vast economic benefits a society realizes from reduced crime.
�While it is impossible to place a dollar value on the loss of a life or the physical and emotional damage caused by rape and other violent crimes, the National Institute of Justice, in 1996, attempted to measure the tangible and intangible costs of crime. The tangible costs include productivity lost, medical care, public safety services, victim services, and property damage losses. The other figures include intangible costs such as quality of life.
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