By Maureen Hayden
News and Tribune
JEFFERSONVILLE, Ind. — County sheriffs and prosecutors hope to stall new criminal sentences from taking effect amid worries over costs and criticisms that some of the new punishments are too soft.
Set to start July 1, the sentencing reform law lowers penalties for drug and theft crimes, and increases prison time for sex and violent offenders. The law of more than 400 pages, which passed last April, rewrites the state’s 1977 felony criminal code.
But members of the Indiana Sheriff’s Association say they’re worried that communities won’t get extra money for treatment programs to handle low-level offenders diverted by the law from state prisons.
And prosecutors around the state complain that the reforms go too easy on those who commit certain drug offenses. A sentence for a drug-dealing crime that now carries a standard 10-year prison term could be reduced to two years under the law.
Full story: Indiana law enforcement heads hope to stall new law