The Price Of Punishment Lock ‘Em Up Idaho’s Tough-On-Crime Movement Feeds Minor Offenders Into Swelling Prisons

Peaceful Idaho, with its pine forests and sagebrush deserts, its mountain lakes, churches and small towns, has the third fastest-growing prison population in the country.

It’s not that Idaho is infested with crime. The crime rate is well below the national average, and has edged up less than 1 percent a year the past decade.

The reason, instead, lies squarely in the beige-domed state Capitol, where state legislators top each other year after year in getting tough on crime.

As a result, Idaho imprisons people for offenses that aren’t even felonies in most other states. If you write a bad check for as little as $50 or drive without a license, you could end up in prison. The same goes for drunken driving and possessing even tiny amounts of drugs.

Legislators continue to pass laws designed to lock up more people for longer terms. Once those convicts are behind bars, problems with the state’s parole system slow their release back into the community.

Prisons have become the fastest-growing part of the state budget, gobbling dollars that could go to Idaho’s traditional priority, education.

It’s unclear whether the state’s crackdown on criminals has made Idaho a safer place to live. But it has created an inmate load that’s overflowing the state’s cellblocks.

The prison population more than doubled in the past seven years, and the growth is accelerating. For lack of space, nearly a quarter of Idaho’s 4,100 prison convicts are housed out of state or in county jails.

Taxpayers now spend more than $60 million a year on prisons. That’s more than $50 for every man, woman and child in Idaho.

“You don’t base your crime policy on the fact that it costs you money,” said House Speaker Mike Simpson. “I think Idahoans want to be tough on crime, and they’re willing to pay for it.”

This get-tough policy started in 1986, when lawmakers enacted the Truth in Sentencing law. The measure eliminated time off for good behavior, and replaced it with a system where judges set a minimum and a maximum sentence.

In the 10 years since, the state’s population grew by 20 percent while the number of prisoners soared 169 percent.

A 1994 U.S. Justice Department report says Idaho’s criminal sentences exceed the national average for all types of felonies.

Another 1994 Justice Department study ranked Idaho fourth in the nation for the high percentage of their sentence that inmates actually serve. Two of the three states with higher percentages handed out shorter sentences.

Retiring state Supreme Court Justice Charles McDevitt said Idaho has always taken a hard line against crime.

“It’s the nature of the people,” McDevitt said. “We’re still a state that believes we ought to have rules and standards, and they ought to be enforced.”

Violent crime remains relatively rare in Idaho. The murder rate is half the national average, and 20 percent below neighboring Washington’s. Idaho ranks 37th in the nation for crime - one place back from its ranking 10 years ago of 36th.

Political leaders, including Gov. Phil Batt, contend Idaho has bought itself safety from crime with its get-tough policies.

But troubled by rising prison costs, Batt has proposed a series of reforms that he says will result in fewer inmates in prison without sacrificing public safety.

Robert Marsh, a professor and chairman of the Criminal Justice Department at Boise State University, doesn’t think tougher sentences mean less crime.

Research shows that longer sentences don’t substantially reduce recidivism rates, he said. But locking criminals away for a long time makes people feel safer, Marsh said.

“We’re dealing with fear of crime, not real crime.”

From traffic stop to prison

People often think of prison as a dangerous place full of murderers, rapists and robbers.

The truth is, 78 percent of the people sent to prison in Idaho in the past year were nonviolent offenders, Department of Corrections records show.

In fact, four crimes that aren’t even felonies in most states account for nearly a quarter of Idaho’s prison population: simple drug possession, drunken driving, driving without a license and writing bad checks.

And that percentage is growing. Those four offenses account for 35 percent of criminals sent to prison in the past year.

Only one other state - West Virginia - treats all four of those crimes as felonies punishable by a prison sentence.

“Those hardly seem like imprisonment offenses,” said Hubert Locke, chairman of Washington state’s Sentencing Guidelines Commission.

In Washington, drunken driving, driving without a license and writing bad checks for less than $250 are misdemeanors. Drug possession is a felony, but the sentencing ranges are well under a year, which means jail time rather than prison.

More people are sent to prison in Idaho for drug possession than any other crime. Drunken driving is No. 4, followed by driving without a license (No. 6) and bad checks (No. 11).

Robbery and rape aren’t among the top 10.

It costs $15,000 to $20,000 per year to house an inmate in prison. That’s enough money to hire a beginning teacher for an overcrowded North Idaho school, and nearly equals the Panhandle’s per-capita annual income of $17,755.

The annual cost to house the 290 inmates Idaho has gained so far this year is enough to build a new elementary school or reconstruct a five-mile section of U.S. Highway 95.

Troy Rockwell, a 28-year-old Spokane factory worker, saw a traffic stop in Kootenai County turn into a two- to five-year prison sentence. He was pulled over in May 1995 for a bad muffler, and arrested for driving with a suspended license. A search turned up a vial containing a small amount of methamphetamine.

Convicted of drug possession, his home now is the upper bunk in a two-man cell at the Idaho State Correctional Institution in Boise.

When this is over, he said, “I don’t ever want to see Idaho again.”

Idaho’s drug possession law doesn’t require any particular amount of drugs for a conviction. Mere residue qualifies.

“The amount I had, it was just a vial with residue around the vial,” Rockwell said.

He thinks if he’d been caught in Washington, just 10 miles to the west, he might have gotten into drug treatment rather than going to prison.

“They would try to help me instead of punish me,” he said. “I want to stay clean, but I’m an addict.”

Paul Russell’s journey into the state prison system started with alcohol.

The Wallace, Idaho, drywaller lost his license for drunken driving, but continued to drive to get from his girlfriend’s home in Osburn to work.

At the end of July he was one of 101 inmates serving prison time for driving without a valid driver’s license.

Idaho is one of only five states that imprison people for repeatedly driving without a valid license, a crime called “driving without privileges.”

The state has 52 ways drivers can lose their licenses, from too many traffic tickets, to drunken driving, to failure to pay child support.

Russell was arrested in October 1994 for driving without a license. He was sentenced to Idaho’s boot camp prison program, but flunked because of a fight with another inmate.

After a year and a half in prison, Russell got paroled, but lasted less than two months before he was caught drinking - a violation of his parole.

Now he’s assigned to a fire crew out of the Idaho Correctional Institution at Orofino. He’s still amazed at the charge that landed him in prison.

“They’re locking people up that are driving home from work,” he said. “That’s exactly what I was doing.”

Within a few months, he’ll finish his three-year prison term.

Legislation to eliminate Idaho’s felony driving without privileges law unanimously passed the House this year, but died in the Senate.

Now Gov. Phil Batt is calling for the change, saying driving without privileges isn’t a serious enough crime by itself to warrant prison time.

Crackdown on drunken driving

Like other states, Idaho continues cracking down on drunken driving. It’s one of 21 states that make third-time drunken driving a felony.

At the end of July, there were 362 inmates in Idaho prisons whose worst crime was drunken driving.

“Everything we’ve done in the area of drunken driving doesn’t suggest that the public wants to lessen the penalties,” said House Speaker Simpson, R-Blackfoot. “If anything, we’re going the other way.”

This year, the Legislature dropped the threshold for drunken driving charges from .10 percent blood alcohol to .08. Supporters argued the new standard will persuade people not to drink and drive, so it won’t mean more prisoners.

Idaho is one of only 11 states that send people to prison for writing small-time bad checks, those under $250.

In fact, writing a bad check for any amount can land you in prison. Gov. Batt has proposed dropping the felony charge for people whose bad checks are under $50.

As of the end of July, Idaho had 64 people in prison for bad checks.

Olivia Craven, executive director of the state Commission for Pardons and Parole, shakes her head over the check writers she sees come before the commission - not forgery artists, but those who’ve written bad checks on their accounts.

“We have people in prison that are never going to be able to pay the restitution,” she said.

That’s because they’re locked up rather than earning money to pay back the people they’ve fleeced.

They can serve up to three years in prison, but many come out still not knowing how to manage a bank account, Craven said.

“I would like to see them ordered into consumer credit counseling, and to pay the responsible parties,” she said.

In California, writers of small-time bad checks can be diverted into a program to teach them how to avoid repeating their mistakes. In Washington, prison is not among the penalties.

‘Continue to put ‘em away’

Idaho legislators don’t want to look like they’re retreating in their campaign against crime.

“Our state statutes seem to be working, that’s all I can say,” said Sen. Denton Darrington, R-Declo, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary and Rules Committee.

James Judd, a judge in Coeur d’Alene for the past 11 years, said some of the penalties may seem a bit harsh. But people need to realize that offenders often commit these same crimes over and over.

“If there’s no significant consequence, they don’t see an incentive to change,” Judd said.

“That’s why you get some of these people going to the penitentiary for a $60 bad check. You’ll say that’s outrageous, but he might have a string of 600 $60 checks.”

Lawmakers say they are particularly committed to putting drug users behind bars.

“I guess I don’t know that we can be too hard on drug possession and drugs,” said Senate President Pro-tem Jerry Twiggs.

Simpson, a dentist who likes to contrast Idaho’s relatively safe streets with the crime-ridden St. Louis he endured in dental school, said he doesn’t mind taking a look at why Idaho laws are so strict.

But, he said, “I don’t want to make that decision based on, ‘Gee, if this is a felony it sure is expensive.’ It ought to be, ‘Is this a felony because it’s a serious enough crime that it ought to be?”’

Darrington said he’s open to discussing how Idaho’s system can be improved, and he’s looking for ways to modify the law on driving without a license.

But Twiggs warned, “Until the public says, ‘By golly, we’re spending too much money on prisons and we’re feeling plenty safe without putting all these people away,’ we’re going to probably continue to put ‘em away.”

Idaho Attorney General Al Lance said he thinks Idahoans are willing to spend their tax money on prisons, and he doesn’t believe that schools or other state programs suffer as a result.

“I think the education thing is a red herring, because we can’t have safe schools unless we have safe streets, and we can’t have safe streets unless we have a very aggressive program of law enforcement and corrections in the state of Idaho.”

But Lance supports Batt’s efforts to look at the system with an eye toward making it work better.

Batt, who likes to say he’s “not one to coddle criminals,” uses words like “logical” and “reasonable” when talking about prison reform.

Everyone wants to put state money into “more productive things,” the governor said. Criminals who are dangerous to society should be locked up, he said, but there’s no point in going overboard.

“The question is, how much of a threat is it to the public, and consequently how long should a person be put away for it?”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 5 Photos (3 Color); 2 Graphics: Where inmates do their time, Idaho crime rate-Inmate counts-Idaho population

MEMO: These 4 sidebars appeared with the story:

1. IN THIS SERIES Today Idaho’s crime rate is low, but its prison population is soaring from a flood of get-tough laws aimed at locking up even minor criminals. Monday Anti-crime legislation is passed in a highly charged atmosphere in which being soft on crime is considered a sin and any mention of costs seems crass. Tuesday Idaho’s parole system excels at keeping the worst offenders behind bars, but it can be slow in moving less dangerous offenders back into the community. Next Sunday As prisons gobble an increasing share of Idaho’s state budget, Gov. Phil Batt and others say changes are needed.

2. SOURCE LIST To report on Idaho’s prison population and the forces driving its increase, The Spokesman-Review: Built and analyzed two computer databases with thousands of inmate records from the state Department of Corrections. Analyzed laws passed by the Idaho Legislature in each of the past 10 years, and researched state statutes in Idaho, Washington and other states. Reviewed state and national studies, reports and statistics developed in the past decade. Toured prisons, attended parole hearings and other proceedings, and interviewed dozens of people, including legislators, judges, prosecutors, corrections officials, national experts and inmates.

3. WHEN YOU CROSS THE STATE LINE Here are the penalties for a sampling of crimes in Idaho and in Washington.

1. Driving without a valid driver’s license, third offense: Washington: Gross misdemeanor, punishable by 180 days in jail. Idaho: Felony, punishable by a mandatory minimum of at least 30 days in jail, with a maximum sentence of three years in prison. Idahoans serving time for this charge have average prison sentences of 1-1/2 to three years. 2. Bad checks, less than $250: Washington: Gross misdemeanor. Offenders must pay restitution and fines of at least $50. Idaho: Felony, punishable by up to three years in prison plus fines of up to $50,000. Current Idaho offenders have average sentences of 1-1/2 to three years. 3. Possession of a small amount of drugs, such as methamphetamine: Washington: For a first-time offender with no criminal history, the sentence range is zero to 60 days. For a third-time offender, two to six months. Average sentence is 2.1 months. Idaho: Regardless of offender’s history, felony punishable by up to seven years in prison and fine of up to $15,000. Current average prison sentence is two to five years. 4. Drunken driving, third offense: Washington: Gross misdemeanor, with mandatory minimum jail sentence of 90 days and maximum of one year, fine of up to $5,000, two-year license suspension. Idaho: Felony, with mandatory minimum sentence of at least 30 days in jail, and maximum of 5 years in prison, $5,000 fine, mandatory driver’s license suspension of one to five years after imprisonment. Current average prison sentence is 2.3 to 4.6 years. 5. Burglary of an unoccupied home: Washington: For a first-time offender, three to nine months. Current average sentence is 17.2 months. Idaho: Punishable by one to 10 years in prison. Current average sentence is 4 to 6 years. SOURCES: Washington state law, Idaho state law, Washington Sentencing Guidelines Commission, Idaho state prison records, staff research. * Sentences of a year or less generally are served in county jails, those of a year or more are served in state prisons. Staff graphic: Warren Huskey

4. CITYLINE Do you think Idaho has the right approach to crime and prisons? What would make the system work better? We’d like to hear from you. Call Cityline at (208) 765-8811 in Idaho or (509) 458-8800 in Washington. Then press ext. 9865 to reach our prisons comment line. You also can comment by e-mail to stevem@spokesman.com. Include your full name and a daytime phone number. A reporter may contact you for an upcoming article.

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Story by Betsy Z. Russell. Photography by Jesse Tinsley