As the state legislative session concludes, criminal justice reform has been at the top of Albany's legislative agenda.

The Assembly Majority has proposed comprehensive legislation, the Criminal Justice Reform Act, to require determinate sentences and the elimination of parole for first time violent felony offenders.

We strongly believe in reforms such as this to truly enhance public safety. Our proposal does more to protect the public than simply eliminating parole. We also go a long way toward ensuring that when offenders are released from prison, after serving their full sentences, they do not repeat their crimes. To do less would leave us with a criminal justice system that is nothing more than a "holding pattern" that lets hardened violent criminals return to our communities -- and victimize us again.

According to the State Department of Correctional Services, of the more than 26,000 State prison inmates released from prison in 1993, an astounding 43 percent returned to prison within just three years. These offenders were back in prison for committing new crimes or violating the provisions of their post-release supervision.

A recent landmark study of the United States prison population by the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University found that fully 80 percent of the nation's prison inmates had violated drug or alcohol laws, had been high when they committed their crimes, stolen to support their habit, had a history of drug or alcohol abuse, or exhibited a combination of these factors. The study concluded that the more crimes these offenders had committed, the more likely it was that those crimes were directly linked to substance abuse.

Facts like these point to an inescapable conclusion: if we simply lock criminals up longer, but do nothing to force them to change their behavior, they will continue to victimize us. We in the Assembly Majority believe that we must do better. And we are working to deliver a better justice system for all New Yorkers.

We believe that an end to parole must be combined with an end to lax post-release supervision after offenders have served their prison sentence, a requirement that prison inmates change their behavior, and an all-out assault on the substance abuse which plays such a key role in violent crime.

The need for criminal justice reform has been given special urgency this year by one case which has come to symbolize the failings of our criminal justice system and the urgent need for change: the murder in November of 1997 of Jenna Grieshaber, a vibrant young nursing student. Jenna Grieshaber was allegedly killed in her Albany home by a violent career criminal who had been granted early release.

The quest for change by Jenna Grieshaber's parents has focused on all of the elements contained in the Assembly's comprehensive proposal. Those proposals, taken together, would enact real change.

Ending parole for violent felons, ending lax post-release supervision, mounting a full-frontal assault on drug-related crime, ending idle time for prison inmates --this comprhensive package, the Criminal Justice Reform Act, would make New York's streets, homes, and communities safer. The Assembly's comprehensive plan should be enacted by the legislature this year.

Joseph R. Lentol, Chair

Assembly Codes Committee