given our consistently poor crime reduction performance, is it even clear that consistency is a good thing?
From a prominent Oregon District Attorney: 1) Some fear that smart sentencing would displace other purposes (such as punishment). A. Again, to be smarter in sentencing we dont have to abandon all objectives other than crime reduction. Lets be direct here: Crime reduction is usually ignored, sometimes assumed without any more support than mere ideology or guesswork, but almost never responsibly pursued in sentencing. Whenever we do something instead of smart sentencing we are reducing the chances that we will reduce or prevent future criminal conduct by the offender. Our sentences will have a public safety outcome regardless of whether we do our best to achieve crime reduction; any argument to do something else amounts to an argument not to do our best. To that extent, we are complicit in avoidable victimizations. 2) Sentencing based on data and research would interfere with the flow of plea bargains. A. This has at least two components: administrative efficiency and control of plea bar
