Don't blame DOC for Clemmons' early release

BY Chris Sullivan  on May 18, 2012 @ 8:06 am (Updated: 10:38 am - 5/18/12 )

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Pierce County prosecutor Mark Lindquist wanted LaTanya Clemmons sentenced to 10 years for her role after her brother murdered four Lakewood police officers.

LaTanya Clemmons, 37, helped the getaway driver Darcus Allen avoid arrest. She was sentenced to five years.

Lindquist believes in time off for good behavior, but a 50 percent reduction makes no sense to him. "A sentence of five years ought to be five years or something close to that," he said. "I understand giving some time off for good behavior, but 50 percent off is absurd."

Before you turn your outrage toward the Department of Corrections for allowing this to happen, you must realize the DOC's hands are tied.

It's state law: The legislature passed a bill in 2003 that upped the amount of time a criminal could take off for good behavior. It increased from 33 percent to 50 percent.

Democratic State Senator Jim Hargrove was the prime sponsor of the bill. Speaking on the Senate floor then, Senator Hargrove told those gathered, "I think the way this bill is put-together now a typical reduction in sentence for one of these minor offenders would be two-to-three months, hardly significant from a public safety point of view."

The bill also cut the amount of good time a violent or sex offender could get, and the reason the Legislature decided to take this up was over money. Lawmakers were looking for ways to trim corrections costs.

"I think what we've done here," Senator Hargrove said in 2003, "is we have taken an opportunity to look at saving a little bit of money but also I think in balance increasing public safety for the people of the state."

Republican Senator Val Stevens also supported the bill during the 2003. "I believe that even if we didn't have this budget-crunch time that this would be the proper way to re-arrange the way that we are sending people to prison and the way that we are letting them come out of prison."

Because LaTanya Clemmons had no record and followed all the rules in prison, she will get out in July after just 2 and a half years of her five-year sentence.

The time off provision went away July 1, 2010 under the law that passed in 2003. Clemmons squeezed-in just before that deadline. She was sentenced just 13 days before.

Chris Sullivan, KIRO Radio Reporter
Chris loves the rush of covering breaking news and works hard to try to make sense of it all while telling stories about real people in extraordinary circumstances.
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Comments (3)


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  • Sean wrote...
    That's not quite right.
    May 18, 2012 12:31 pm
    She helped a guy who helped a cop killer. Not defending that at all -- very bad decision -- but when you can drive drunk and KILL someone else by your own hand, and get 2-3-4 years in prison (or less, realistically), she does not deserve ten years for what she did -- with no previous record, etc. Maybe 1-2 years and lots of probation time. And you're a classless moron if you really think that race has any bearing on a person's morals. Like yeah, WHITE people wouldn't love getting out of jail early too.... What intelligence!
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  • 770 Sports Fan wrote...
    What do you expect? The state is run by Democrats
    May 18, 2012 2:06 pm
    Democratic State Senator Jim Hargrove was the prime sponsor of the bill and with out enough Republicans to even debate these stupid laws why would anyone expect any thing different? - Sean, She knew what they did and chose to she chose to join them in there escape that means she was a part of the murders and she should have got at least 10 years without early release. While I agree that it's totally inexcusable to allow vehicular homicide to be reduced to Negligent Driving if alcohol is involved. But change that law don't dumb down the others.
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  • murr wrote...
    ohhh ya here we go ?????????????
    May 18, 2012 6:14 pm
    Not really one persons fault, just the system, cant really put a finger on one thing or person that could cause this action. bla bla bla . STOP
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