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Sentence Length [or lies from the Heritage Foundation]

In a Heritage Foundation foundation report by Charles Stimson and Andrew Grossman, I learned a very surprising fact: Convicted persons in the United States actually served less time in prison, on average, than the world average and the European average. Among the 35 countries surveyed on this question in 1998, the average time actually served in prison was 32.62 months.…

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Time Served

Perhaps nothing speaks better to our broken justice system than the fact that people–guilty and innocent alike–are held in jail for more than year beforetrial. Lise Olsen reports in the Houston Chronicle: Though the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right to a speedy trial, at least 500 county inmates [out of 11,500] have been locked up for more than a year…

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Crime Prevention Tip

Never leave your bike unlocked. The latest in bike-theft prevention. From Chetumal, Mexico.

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Build a better photo lineup

The traditional “6-pack” is flawed because people will pick the person mostlike the suspect. Showing pictures one-by-one is supposed to change there. Here’s an AP story by Jeff Carlton about the Dallas P.D.

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Ohhhh….

I couldn’t figure out this the whole let-the-terrorist-go thing the Brits did. I think the New York Times may cut to the chase: Colonel Qaddafi made his remarks as British and Scottish officials were doing their best to distance themselves from Mr. Megrahi’s release, which they insisted was decided without any pressure from London by Scotland’s justice secretary, and based…

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Mexico Decriminalizes Drug Possession

The story in the New York Times. The law sets out maximum “personal use” amounts for drugs, also including LSD and methamphetamine. People detained with those quantities will no longer face criminal prosecution; the law goes into effect on Friday. Too bad this won’t stop the narco violence.

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NYC Event, Tuesday August 25.

I’m speaking at my very own neighborhood book store this coming Tuesday, August 25, at 6:30pm. The new paperback edition of my book will be available (I still haven’t seen it). Seaburn Books. 33-18 Broadway, Astoria, Queens, New York. Hope to see you there (or anybody there, for that matter).

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Blue-Light Cameras

I’m generally not a fan of flashing blue light police cameras. I think they’re a waste of money. So in the interest of fairness I should point out that one in Baltimore recently got a shooter convicted. Peter Hermann reports. Not surprisingly, the victim wouldn’t cooperate. In an unrelated case, Hermann talks about a brutal racist attack on a elderly…

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Snitch

The world of CIs is a dirty world indeed. Crazy goings on in the St. Louis PD.