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Wednesday, November 26, 2008

GOP Bill Seeks To Expand 3 Strikes

By T.J. Wilham
Journal Staff Writer
       The Bernalillo County sheriff hopes recent cases involving repeat offenders serves as the catalyst that changes the state's "three strikes" law.
    Under the current law, approved in 1994, defendants convicted three times of certain felonies receive a 30-year enhancement — considered a life sentence — to their prison term.
    Those crimes include first- or second-degree murder; a drive-by shooting resulting in great bodily harm; kidnapping resulting in great bodily harm; armed robbery resulting in great bodily harm; and criminal sexual penetration.
    Sheriff Darren White and other Republicans have tried to expand the law since 1997. The new proposal adds 13 crimes to the list, including voluntary manslaughter, first-degree kidnapping and first- or second-degree robbery.
    Two years ago, state Sen. John Ryan and state Rep. Justine Fox-Young, both Republicans, introduced a bill to expand the number of crimes that would fall under the law, using Gerald Archuleta of Albuquerque as an example. Archuleta has been convicted in connection with three separate killings since 1996, but the three strikes law didn't apply to him because he pleaded guilty to charges such as involuntary manslaughter and conspiracy to commit second-degree murder.
    He served 15 years and was released from prison in October 2006. About three months after Ryan and Fox-Young's expanded version of the law died in 2007 on the Senate floor, Archuleta was charged in a triple shooting that wounded a security guard. He pleaded to two lesser felonies in February and received a seven-year sentence.
    Archuleta could be released March 20, 2011 with good-time credit, officials said.
    Ryan announced he would sponsor the bill again Tuesday. White and Ryan used the recent case of five-time convicted killer Clifton Bloomfield to make their point. Prior to killing Tak and Pung Yi in December and Scott Pierce in June, Bloomfield pleaded guilty to his third felony in connection with a home invasion. He was sentenced to a house arrest program.
    Bloomfield had prior felony convictions in Arizona for robbery and assault on a prison guard.