What started out as a modest story on the Vanguard has now been featured in stories across the world. Yes you read that correctly. On Monday February 8, 2010, the Vanguard wrote a story called “Yolo County Man Faces Third Strike For Stealing Cheese.”
It will not go down as the most read story on the Vanguard however it is probably by far the most influential. Because the Vanguard ran this story, the Sacramento Bee ran a follow up a few days later. As we reported to you, by Thursday, the Yolo County District Attorney had pulled back the push for three strikes and only asked for 11 years.
They scoffed at prosecutors from Yolo County, which they must think is Podunk, USA.
“Prosecutors in Yolo County, Calif., outside Sacramento, had originally asked for a life sentence under the state’s “three strikes” law, arguing that the man, Robert Preston Ferguson, was a menace to society because of prior burglary convictions.”
The story made The Guardian of London.
“In an era of savage budget cuts to the most basic of public services, does it make sense for a state to spend $50,000-$100,000 a year to lock up a cheese thief for the rest of his natural life?
The obvious answer to that question would be “no.” After all, $100,000 could keep one or two teachers employed; could pay the home-health care costs of disabled low-income Americans; or could keep an after-school programme afloat. And yet, that is precisely what a grandstanding California district attorney’s office earlier this month suggested was an appropriate solution for the problem that is Robert Ferguson: a mentally ill, drug-addicted 53-year-old habitual offender who has cycled in and out of prison for most of his adult life and found himself on the wrong end of a three strikes prosecution for the monstrous crime of stuffing a $3.99 bag of shredded cheese down his underpants and hot-tailing it out of a Nugget supermarket without paying.”
On Monday, Mr. Ferguson, was sentenced to seven years and eight months in part for stealing cheese and also in part, though much less publicized for stealing a woman’s wallet.
Part of the problem that the Yolo County District Attorney’s Office faces is the absurdity of charging the case as a felony to begin with.
As Public Defender Monica Brushia told the Vanguard on Tuesday:
“I would have wanted to see the District Attorneys not to pursue this as a life case,” she said. “People should realize that a minor case like this should be a misdemeanor, not a felony. The only reason this case is a felony is that he has a priors. The system should look at it isolated from other charges, that would help a lot.”
Ms. Brushia went on to point out that while there are many people in prison under the three strikes law who have committed bad crimes, there are also a lot of people just like Mr. Ferguson. These are people who have not committed violent crimes at all. Instead they end up spending the rest of their lives in prison or an exceedingly long amount of time for very minor crimes.
These policies, she said, cost the taxpayers a lot of money both in terms of incarceration and prosecution.
The story has been reprinted, commentated upon, and mocked thousands of times. It has become a face for new criticism for a policy that creates little flexibility during a time when California is facing a fiscal crisis of epic proportions.
The article headline in the Guardian says it all:
“Three strikes and we’re out of cash:
That a California cheese thief ever faced life in prison shows how the absurd ‘three strikes’ rule can waste valuable resources”
Nowhere in the coverage of this mockery is any mention of the Vanguard, but we can all take solace in the fact that you read it here first and in this case, that’s probably good enough.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
Good work, David. You are becoming the “Enquirer” of Yolo County, or our Anderson Cooper “Keeping them Honest.”
Some interesting comments from the NYT’s story:
Technic Ally
Toronto
March 3rd, 2010
7:29 am
Welcome to the Hotel California…
Steven Pine
New York
March 3rd, 2010
7:30 am
I wonder if some fraction of the 50,000 to 100,000 (a year!!) was given as welfare, food stamps, assisted housing, educational training, whether or not the cheese thief will still have stolen the cheese. It is a gross absurdity that anyone would rather spend resources punishing a man instead of using them to help him.
MARK KLEIN, M.D.
OAKLAND, CA
March 3rd, 2010
7:30 am
Some cases like this one are result of closing long term public psychiatric hospitals. In 1967, about a year or two before New York emptied its long term beds I did a summer externship at Brooklyn State Hospital. The patients were well cared for. Obvious to me most of these patients if released would end up homeless, addicted or repeatedly arrested for petty crimes.
Always believed the much tooted 1963 Community Mental Health Act caused more problems than it solved.
P.
NJ
March 3rd, 2010
7:30 am
Gosh, why not just execute him. So much quicker and less expensive.
~~~ rolls eyes ~~~
Ed Pickett
New York
March 3rd, 2010
7:30 am
Perhaps the Yolo County District Attorney’s office should take on the Golden Squid (Goldman Sachs) next.
DJ
Pittsburgh
March 3rd, 2010
7:30 am
Gouda for him!
Robert
Washington, DC
March 3rd, 2010
7:31 am
Australia was once a penal colony. Most Australians today can trace their ancestry back to bread and cheese thives from great Britian!
Hundreds of years have passed and yet we still have NOT learned. We either feed our people while out of prison or we get to both house and feed our people in prison!
The question of right and wrong can NEVER be divorced from the reality of value. For example, cheese = $3.99 whereas 7 years in CA prison = $150K to $200K!!
Is it any wonder that CA is functionally bankrupt!?
NYC
New York
March 3rd, 2010
7:31 am
Insanity. Some of the California schools won’t have an entering freshman class due to budget cuts, but there is enough money to prosecute and jail a mentally-ill cheese thief.
DR IQ
BRATTLEBORO, VT
March 3rd, 2010
7:31 am
Does the state of California operate its own prisons or are they run by for profit contractors?
Ben
Austin
March 3rd, 2010
7:46 am
No wonder the government of California is heading toward bankrupcy. Anyone who believes the costs of 7 years of incarceration is worth incurring to mitigate the risk of someone stealing a $3 bag of cheese is a fool. And it is just as foolish to celebrate that this was not a life sentence. The more of these foolish decions, the faster they bankrupt their prison state.
j walker
colorado
March 3rd, 2010
7:46 am
According to The Economist (Feb. 27), the California Correctional Peace Officers Association, a union of prison guards, sponsored the three-strikes law. I believe in the value of unions, but guaranteeing work for prison guards who make upwards of $70,000 a year (more than $100,000 with overtime) is not the highest use of tax dollars.
Some more interesting comments from the NYT’s story:
mrmystery
Napa, California, USA
March 3rd, 2010
7:47 am
Welcome to the Police State of America….where we throw mentally ill people in jail for 7 years for stealing a pack of cheese. PATHETIC. Having worked in law enforcement for 6 years earlier in my life, I can tell you it is very easy to get three “felony” convictions against a person for non felonious behavior if a DA’s office or a police department wants you behind bars for good. I think it is ludicrous that our legal system has decided to met out “justice” on the basis of a baseball game. Basing our legal punishment system on THREE STRIKES YOUR OUT legal justifications are as ridiculous a notion as one can imagine. Who thinks of this stuff??? Oh yeah…REPUBLICANS. The same people who brought us trickle down economics, the war on drugs and most recently the war on terrorism. This is madness….and it is another glaring reason why this country is in the toilet. We have backslid at least 300 years in the last 20. At this rate, by the time we get to 2030 we will be in the Dark Ages once again.
Pat Saine
Winchester VA
March 3rd, 2010
7:48 am
$50-100K for Tillamook cheese? Too bad California is spending it on retribution rather than rehabilitation. Rehabilitation is the better investment.
V. Ogle
LA
March 3rd, 2010
7:48 am
How about paying for some treatment, medication and assistance to those who find they need to steal and rob in order to either feed their drug addictions or because they are MENTALLY ILL.
Sweeping lifetime sentences do not take into consideration, mitigating circumstances. Get real.
George
Manhattan
March 3rd, 2010
7:57 am
#10
As was recently noted by Associate SC Justice Kennedy in a speech in CA – the three strikes law is unjust. And, as he noted, it is a “sick law” that was proposed and is supported by the correctional officer’s union.
Talk about guaranteeing “full employment”. This union has ensured a steady stream of lifers will come into the CA prisons ensuring their jobs.
Fred
Switzerland
March 3rd, 2010
7:57 am
Middle ages, totally middle ages. Well, no surprise as the three strikes law is ideally suited to maximize profit in a country with private prisons.
I’m also totally amaze by the “what if..” argument of the Sacramento columnist: the guy stole cheese, so he will surely butcher a whole family plus the dog.
carmelx
Portland ME
March 3rd, 2010
7:57 am
Are the planets aligned in a loopy fashion, cause some of the things taking place lately defy logic. Between Jim Bunning and the cheese thief its not hard to see what direction this country is going in. Why do we remain in such a state of idiocy? I can come up with a few reasons, which I choose not to vent here, cause I am still recovering from the fall off my chair after reading this article.
Alison
NYC
March 3rd, 2010
7:58 am
Yesterday, Naomi Campbell, the super model who throws tantrums, slugged a cab driver. Over the years she has thrown phones at maids and physically assaulted more than three people. But she is rich and beautiful, so she gets community service.
How pathetic that we lock up a mentally ill man for stealing cheese. Despite the amount of money spent, he needs to be in a facility that can treat his mental illness, and keep him off the streets in a compassionate manner. He is a sick man with impulse problems, protect society, but treat the man compassionately.
3rd world dude
Somewhere in the Rainforest, Brazil
March 3rd, 2010
8:14 am
geez, i don’t really know what to say, i’m just a dude from the 3rd world. and sorry, i really gotta go now guys, “Terminator 6 – The Cheese Cyborg Assassin” (starring Arnold Shwarzenegger as the Good Terminator and Robert Preston as the Evil Criminal) has just started. cheers!
sallycj
nyc
March 3rd, 2010
8:14 am
Forget the cheese! What about swiping a mom’s wallet while her child is barfing in a store! THAT’s low. But let’s see….any extenuating circs? Oh yes—he’s mentally ill! How is jail supposed to help this very unfortunate (if disgustingly opportunistic) man? For heaven’s sake get him some help already.
Brendan
Boston, MA
March 3rd, 2010
8:14 am
God, what a travesty. Honestly, I don’t even care if he stole a wallet from a mother or medications from an elderly grandmother — no property is worth 10-25 years of a man’s life. He is a non-violent thief with apparent mental issues which hamper his self-control. What if we took the resources for imprisoning him and instead spent even a fraction of that trying to make him a productive citizen (counseling, possible medication, social benefits to get him on his feet)? Well, then we’d live in a humane society, and one that took the 8th amendment seriously. Instead we have the perverse notion that petty criminals (many with mental issues) are beyond rehabilitation and should be deprived of essential liberty and freedom. Sickening.