Change is good, and Louisiana has a historic opportunity to atone for its past sins and express its commitment to progress by fixing the policies that have held the state in the cultural, political and economic quagmires of the past.

Theoretically, punishment of an offender should try to achieve at least one of the following objectives:

Rehabilitation: re-socialization of the offender toward more socially acceptable behavior.

Incapacitation: removal of the offender from the community to reduce the threat of crime.

Retribution: repayment of damages.

Deterrence: discouraging the public from criminal behavior through effective punishment of offenders.
Louisiana's modern day criminal justice system and penal statutes were born of attitudes and beliefs that have roots deep in the soil of Jim Crow policy and subsequent political compromises. The laws still read a lot like the 18th century Black Codes, only the current codes have substituted names and titles.

The attitudes, mentality and prejudices of the framers of these laws are still working to the disadvantage of Black people and lower income whites. Although most of the men who designed Louisiana's criminal justice system are dead and gone, they live on through their legislation. This is the root of institutional racism.

The Louisiana judicial system is unique in the United States as it is the only state in America that does not follow common law. This state's justice system is modeled behind a system of jurisprudence administered during the Roman Empire, particularly as set forth in the compilation of Justian and his successor, as distinguished from the common law of England and the cannon.

During one era not that long ago a person could be lynched for a violation as small as whistling at a white woman. Some of the framers of Louisiana law believed it was justice to incarcerate men for years as sugarcane slaves for "crimes" as small as vagrancy. It takes only a little amount of hate mixed with a little elected office and the ability to write a bill and voila: systematic re-enslavement of any offender caught in the trap. Most of the legislators who objected to such heavy handed sentences were effectively silenced by the votes of the majority, who still held on to attitudes of confederate privilege.

Last month the Washington, D.C., based Pew Center's Public Safety Project released its findings from a recent study that 1 out of every 99.1 adults in the U.S. is in jail or prison. Whether we make the comparisons per capita or in raw numbers, the U.S., with 2,319,258 citizens locked up, incarcerates more than any other nation. The numbers do not look good because the system and policies are no good. They are bad because they are rooted in immoral principles designed to hurt instead of heal.

Here in Louisiana we incarcerate more of our citizens per capita than the so-called fundamentalists in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and Pakistan. More of our men, women and children are behind bars than those of Cuba, Russia, South Africa or even China. Our racial disproportionality in sentencing practices has not been seen since the system of apartheid era South Africa.

Even after the 1997 Clinton administration's "Truth In Sentencing Act," monies have dried up. Louisiana still has tens of thousands of inmates serving 85 percent of an average 60-year sentence. That is 51 calendar years.

Men and women are serving natural life sentences - which amounts to death by incarceration - for credit card fraud. (See Mustapha Muhammad vs. State of Louisiana.) We have more first time offenders serving life without parole per capita than any other state. Mandatory sentencing laws have tied the hands of state and federal judges so they cannot by decree of law exercise judicial discretion to distinguish between the low risk offender and the truly dangerous predator.

For example: Let us suppose a 25-year-old school teacher with no prior criminal history is being abused by her husband or boyfriend and as the abuse continues she becomes so psychologically overwhelmed with fear and desperation, she actually gets a gun, shoots and kills him.

The crime just described is second degree murder and if properly charged and convicted, a judge is not allowed to take mitigating factors into consideration. First, she acted from fear and desperation caused by the boyfriend's abuse. And secondly, she is not inherently evil. Therefore the judge receiving a guilty as charged verdict in this case must sentence her to death by incarceration or what Louisiana calls a life sentence.

These types of sentencing laws can be expected in uncivilized third world tribunals or dictatorships; however, this is the United States of America and the year is 2008, not 1808. Victims' rights advocates would have us believe that justice can be administered from an attitude of vengeful retaliation; I am here to declare that justice demands assignment of merited rewards or punishment.

Justice embodies the spirit and quality of being righteous, impartial and fair. Justice calls for the creation of laws that conform to truth, reason and logic. Louisiana's mandatory sentencing laws are prejudiced - and prejudice means to pre-judge.

We cannot afford to allow our laws to be molded from the attitudes of vengeance and administer punishment for the purpose of inflicting pain and suffering. Louisiana's laws must be placed on the foundation of honesty, justice, dignity, equality and mercy.

Louisiana needs a "five for one" good time act to provide a positive incentive towards the rehabilitation of violent offenders whose average sentence statewide is 60 years. We also need parole eligibility for people serving life sentences. A law that provides an opportunity to evaluate the rehabilitation of offenders is not being soft on crime; it is being civilized and displaying common sense.

How can we in the 21st century with all of our miraculous technological advancements believe that a person who commits a crime at 15 years of age should be sentenced to serve out the balance of his or her natural life in prison for a bad choice? How many of you are the same person, mentally and emotionally, as you were at the age of 17, 20 - or 28 for that matter?

Louisiana spends only $3,000 per child a year for education but you are willing to spend approximately $30,000 a year per inmate to incarcerate him or her forever. Can anybody say "voodoo economics"? This is actually a real shame.

Louisiana is falling apart at the seams trying to recover from the devastation of two major hurricanes and state resources are squandered, housing men that have been locked away so long they have forgotten what they did. The price tags for these misguided policies are bankrupting the state, proving even fiscally that substituting vengeance for justice is wrong.

As I stated in the beginning, there is a purpose for punishment: That purpose is about correcting behavior and insuring public safety, not satisfying personal prejudices and perpetuating institutional racism. Change is good. Louisiana must institute a modern criminal justice system, employing a possibility for mercy and forgiveness and do away with the laws and policies born of the old attitudes that we all acknowledge are the current foundation of the system.

Curtis Ray Davis II is incarcerated at the Louisiana State Prison at Angola. To learn more about him and how you can aid in overturning his wrongful conviction, email April Davis at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or write to Curtis Ray Davis, 320151, Oak 3, Louisiana State Prison, Angola, LA 70712.

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