Deputy Brad James, a narcotics officer in Spartanburg County, is the guest of honor at a fundraiser held in his name. A bicycle shop called the "Great Escape" serves donated food for $10 dollars a plate. The deputy seems embarrassed by the attention. He wears dark shades to cover an injured eye. He's reluctant to talk to TV cameras covering his event.
"I'm honored that all of these people came out, I really appreciate everything they're doing. Just going through a rough time but we're getting there day by day," James said.
The fundraiser, the media attention, and the sunglasses are because of a traffic stop one month earlier.
Near midnight on November 6, 2011, Deputy James tried to stop a car on Carolina Drive. From there, he said a brief chase ended with a crash on Kimberly Drive. Sheriff Chuck Wright said there was a scuffle before one of the men Deputy James pursued opened fire. James was hit twice, once in the face, and after an extensive search of the area the suspect got away.
But this was no "great escape". Deputies knew exactly who they were looking for. In fact, they'd known him for more than a decade. The man who deputies said shot a deputy had a police record three dozen pages thick with arrests for assault, criminal domestic violence and resisting arrest. He was so familiar to police that in an incident report from July 4th 2003, the responding officer wrote he saw the suspect "who I know on sight from prior arrest".
This suspect, Robert Odell Brown, was about to launch a sheriff, a prosecutor, and a politician into a new movement that would put more people behind bars with longer sentences for a longer list of crimes. Brown's case would put the justice system on trial.
"I'm just sad that my deputy has to suffer from that mental trauma and some physical trauma because our justice system just won't do anything," said Wright. "We're going to have to figure out something because what we're doing now is just not working."
CALL TO ACTION
While deputy James recovered from his injuries his boss, Sheriff Wright, rallied support for new laws that would mean stricter punishments for the man accused of pulling the trigger.
In December, the sheriff appeared at a media event staged by State Senator Shane Martin to add more crimes to the state's list of "most serious offenses". There, standing in an empty courtroom alongside Martin and 7th circuit solicitor Barry Barnette, the sheriff again said his deputy was injured because the laws weren't working.
"The good people of South Carolina absolutely deserve to have this kind of law put into effect. I am not for putting every single person who violates a law in jail forever. But the people who show us that they do not care for human life or care what they do as long as they are doing what satisfies them. These are the people we have to pay attention to," Wright told the assembled reporters.
That law, would add new crimes to the list of those that already trigger stiffer mandatory sentences for certain crimes. The so-called "two strikes/three strikes" bill means someone convited a second time of a "most serious offense" would receive a sentence of life in prison.
"I watch our solicitor on televison. I watch out sheriff on television and its very frustrating. The common theme is that we've got criminals on the street that are violent and they've got rap sheets a mile long and they are still on the streets. so I made contact with both of them. And said what can we do to help from the legislative side. And they said we can amend the two strikes, three strikes law and add some violent crimes," Martin said.
There is certainly political wind at the Senator's back. Spartanburg Rep. Eddie Talon filed a similar bill in the House. Senator Lee Bright pre-filed legislation to add 10 years to the sentence of any repeat felony conviction.
Solictor Barnette said he supports the movement.
"In some cases we had to if we'd had the wall the way Senator Martin is going to introduce it we could have kept these people off the street even earlier. To give us additional weapons in the criminal justice system, if you talk to any law enforcement officer, any legislator, any polilce officers or the public or even any judge, even though they can't typically talk about it they are against these folks. If we can give them the weapons we can use these weapons to get these people off the street much earlier," Barnette said.
THE PRICE OF JUSTICE
While police and politicians ponder new ways to put more people behind bars for longer terms, the prisons themselves are already crowded.
The South Carolina Department of Corrections operates more than two dozen prisons that now hold about 24 thousand inmates. At some institutions, like Leath Correctional in Greenwood, inmates sleep three to a cell. Taxpayers spend $43.73 on each inmate each day they're locked up, that's $13,534 per inmate each year. A new prison for new inmates would cost hundreds of millions.
But if the sheriff, the solicitor and the senator are correct and dangerous criminals are allowed to escape time behind bars, 7 On Your Side decided to find out who the state is keeping locked up.
First, at a statewide level, the majority of those locked up are not there for what the FBI considers violent crime. In fact, the largest convition category is "dangerous drugs". 18% of the state prison population is behind bars for a drug conviction. Another 15% are in prison because of a burglary charge.
A closer analysis of prisoners at two Upstate prisons, Leith (maximum security women's institution) and Perry (maximum security prison for men) revealed what each inmate was sentenced for and how long they were supposed to serve.
Both prisons are packed with the kind of inmates that Sheriff Wright wants behind bars. 47 of the inmates at Leith are convicted of murder. 250 murderers live at Perry. But there are long sentences for lesser offenses as well.
At Leith there are two women serving a decade or more for shoplifting. Other inmates are sentenced for prostitution and indecent exposure. 74 of the inmates at the women's prison are serving sentences for forgery, fraud, or bogus checks. Inmates sentenced to Leith for trafficking cocaine get an average sentence of 25 years, trafficking crack is an average sentence of 30 years.
At Perry the average drug sentence is more than 20 years.
So if politicians like Senator Martin wish to send violent offenders here for longer sentences, what gives? 7 On Your Side asked Senator Martin this question, "If the bill results in more people sent to longer prison terms, would you rather spend the money to buy a new prison or would you consider assigning those who commit non-violent crimes to other punishments?"
Martin responded that he didn't have time for an on-camera interview but sent this response via email :
"My goal is to keep violent, repeat offenders off of the streets and away from our families. Housing them is a core function of government. Your question is beyond the scope of my bill. I look forward to working with you on suggestions to make non-violent offenders into productive, law-abiding, taxpaying citizens!"
INJUSTICE SYSTEM
Sheriff Wright is still angry about the way South Carolina law treats violent offenders. He says the system is tougher on those who commit accidental crimes of inattention than those who have real human victims.
"It seems we're tougher on people that have check frauds," Wright said. "There is a lady that is in the Greenwood jail now, she lives in Spartanburg County. She was sentenced to a good amount of time for fraud, she can't get out of jail, but this Robert Odell Brown can do whatever he chooses to do in life and he's out on the streets in absolutely no time doing the same exact things over and over and over."
In some ways, the same "two strikes, three strikes" law Senator Martin wants to change is responsible for the sheriff's impression. That's because the "two strikes" that trigger a mandatory life sentence not only include murder, rape and kidnapping but also list embezzlement, drug trafficking and bribery.
That means many of what would be considered "violent" crimes like criminal domestic voilence of a high and aggravated nature could carry less time in prison than bribery.
That meant just a 6 year sentence, under the state's Youthful Offenders Act, for Robert Odell Brown for an incident on Veterans Day in 2002.
According to the incident report :
"Upon my (Officer K W Collins) arrival I could hear a loud voice coming from apartment 213-c. At that point I walked up the stairs and observed a black male standing over a female through a window. The black male who I identified as Robert Odell Brown possessed a black in color hand gun in his right hand. Mr. Brown was pointing the hand gun toward the victim's head. I observed Mr. Brown strike (the victim) in the head, and he stated, "I am going to kill you B****".
According to the incident report, after escaping from a second story window during that Veteran's day incident, Brown was later found by four deputies at that same apartment. Police wrote that Brown claimed "I am not going down like that", and charged the deputies. He was subdued with pepper spray and arrested. Other incident reports show at least one other incident police using pepper spray to subdue Brown, in 2002. The sheriff says Brown is a textbook example of the kind of person he's charged with keeping off the streets.
"We have it backwards," the sheriff said, "If you commit a fraud against somebody that knows somebody that knows somebody, you're in jail for a while and you can't get out. Our system as a whole has failed us. We're focused on things. We're focused on money and not victims."
As for Deputy James, he's back at work after nearly two months of recovery. After a multi-state manhunt Robert Odell Brown was arrested in Virginia. He's in the Cherokee County jail awaiting trial. His latest charges include failure to stop for a blue light, resisting arrest with a deadly weapon, attempted murder, first-degree burglary and armed robbery.
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