three strikes law

…study conducted in 2000, the three-strikes law in California, enacted in 1994 by the legislature and citizen initiative, in its first six years snared over 50,000 “strikers,” each eligible for at least a doubling of their normal sentence, with 5,887 “third strikers” sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.

…described by the phrase “three strikes and you’re out”; i.e., a defendant receives an extended or even a life sentence upon conviction for a third felony. All mandatory sentences, and particularly the “three strikes” laws, have been criticized as being excessively harsh in particular cases, such as sentences of…

Thus, the “three strikes” legislation passed in many U.S. states in the 1990s, which imposed mandatory prison sentences after three convictions, was found to have no effect on crime rates. Even the death penalty, as noted above, appears to do little to reduce murder rates, since most…