NORTHWEST
East Oregonian
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Thursday, May 23, 2019
Measure 11 reform, other criminal justice bills move forward
Senate vote, where the bill
was championed by sena-
tors Jackie Winters, R-Sa-
lem, and Floyd Prozanski,
D-Eugene, an opposition
mounted.
The Oregon District
Attorneys Association lob-
bied against it, as did Ore-
gon Crime Victims United.
Some argued that the bill
would be retroactive, releas-
ing criminals like Kip Kin-
kel, who killed his parents
and then two students in
a shooting at Springfield’s
Thurston High School in
1998.
The architects of the bill
reject that idea, pointing to
a line in the bill that says
the law would apply “to sen-
tences imposed on or after
Jan. 1, 2020.” Non-partisan
legislative attorneys have
backed up that reading of
the bill.
The opposition has
backed off of that claim, but
is still pushing full force,
saying this is about the
Kip Kinkel of tomorrow,
who won’t be adequately
punished if Measure 11 is
reformed.
Crime Victims United
released a video featuring
the brother of one of Kin-
kel’s victims. Reports have
also surfaced about rob-
ocalls providing similar
information. Both tell the
public to call House Major-
ity Leader Jennifer William-
son, D-Portland, to voice
Criminal justice
policies are the
theme of the week
at the Oregon
Legislature
Winters
By AUBREY WIEBER
Oregon Capital Bureau
Prozanski
niles are more susceptible to
making poor decisions.
Senate Bill 1008 is the
product of a work group
looking to fix what many
now feel is an injustice in
our court system. Polling
from the Oregon chapter of
the American Civil Liber-
ties Union found that 88%
of Oregonians support the
reform. The ACLU is one of
the bill’s biggest backers.
The reform would allow
a judge to decide whether
the offender should be
tried in juvenile or adult
court. For those sentenced
as adults, they would get a
“second look” hearing half-
way through their sentences
to evaluate how much they
have been reformed as well
as a review before a youth
with a long sentence is tran-
sitioned to adult prison.
Finally, it would not allow
youths to be sentenced to
life without parole.
The bill moved relatively
quickly in the first half of
the session, passing out of
the Senate in mid-April
with the 20 votes needed
to amend a voter-approved
measure. Quickly after the
A Senate-approved Mea-
sure 11 reform bill passed
out of a House committee
Tuesday, signaling the stars
have aligned to pass one of
the most significant changes
to Oregon’s criminal justice
system in decades.
Senate Bill 1008 would
stop juveniles charged with
violent crimes from auto-
matically being treated as a
Measure 11 offender. Mea-
sure 11 was passed over-
whelmingly by voters in
1994, and imposes manda-
tory minimum prison sen-
tences for violent crimes.
Under the law, juveniles 15
and older are automatically
treated as adults, meaning
they are tried in adult courts
and receive the same sen-
tences as their older peers.
But advocates of crimi-
nal justice reform point to
a better scientific under-
standing of brain develop-
ment that has come to light
in the past couple decades.
It shows that the parts of our
brains that control impulse
continue to develop until
about 25, meaning juve-
Forecast for Pendleton Area
TODAY
FRIDAY
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SUNDAY
MONDAY
Partly sunny and
warmer
Mostly cloudy and
not as warm
Cloudy
Some sun with a
passing shower
Clouds and sun,
showers around
opposition. Williamson is a
leader of the bill and chairs
the House Judiciary com-
mittee that just passed it.
“I think it’s really unfor-
tunate that people continue
to vilify people like Kip,
and use him as a boogey
man” to undermine these
policies, said Bobbin Singh,
executive director of Oregon
Justice Resource Center.
Singh’s organization has
worked for the past year to
reform what he calls “bad
policy.” In that time, he
has seen a swath of bipar-
tisan support, including
Republicans like Winters
as well as so-called tough
on crime groups like Right
on Crime. Even the Koch
network, well-known right-
wing political donors, has
lobbied in favor of the bill.
Within the state, more than
30 retired judges have sup-
ported it, as has the Oregon
Youth Authority and some
district attorneys. However,
the Oregon District Attor-
neys Association remains
the biggest opponent of the
policy.
“I think there is a lot of
misinformation about the
bill, which is being prof-
fered by the opposition,”
Singh said.
On Tuesday, Rep. Mike
McLane, R-Powell Butte,
introduced an amendment
on their behalf that would
water down the reforms. It
would also refer the bill to
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Hermiston
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Forecasts and graphics provided by AccuWeather, Inc. ©2019
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Death penalty changes
SB 1008 comes in a
week where criminal jus-
tice reform seems very
much in vogue. On Tuesday
morning, Senate Bill 10131,
which would limit the defi-
nition of aggravated murder,
passed the Senate. It would
also disallow considering
“future dangerousness” as a
factor in imposing the death
penalty.
The bill was introduced
by Prozanski, who said the
original idea of the death
penalty in Oregon was for
reform, not for vindictive
justice.
Prozanski said the U.S.
Supreme Court has said
there is no conclusive evi-
dence to show the death
penalty is a deterrent. He
said since 1984, 60% of Ore-
gon’s death penalty cases
have been reversed, mostly
to instead impose life with-
out parole.
He also made a fis-
cal argument: The average
death penalty case costs $1.4
million while non-death
penalty murder cases cost
an average of $335,000.
The bill is not retroac-
tive and now moves to the
House.
Marijuana conviction
changes
The persistent message
put out by advocates for
1008 and 1013 is that it’s
not retroactive, the entire
point of Senate Bill 420 is
to vacate old sentences. The
bill from Sen. Lew Freder-
ick, D-Portland, would set
aside marijuana convictions
imposed before the state
legalized pot.
Frederick insists the
name of the bill, the same
as a marijuana holiday, is
purely coincidental.
Tens of thousands of
Oregonians — Frederick
estimated 75,000 — have
possession of marijuana
convictions on their record.
This can stop them from
getting a job or housing, he
testified.
The proposal looks to
clean up a 2015 policy that
went for the same effect,
allowing people to get their
records expunged. How-
ever, it turns out that’s a
costly and time-consuming
process.
This bill directs the Ore-
gon Department of Justice
to seek out those convic-
tions and set them aside.
However, many drug pos-
session
charges
don’t
clearly lay out which drug
the offender possessed,
making the ability to esti-
mate how many marijuana
charges there are in the
state a difficult task.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee
signs sanctuary state law
Associated Press
PENDLETON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
voters.
The bill ended up pass-
ing 6-5. Williamson’s office
said they believe it has the
40 votes needed to pass the
House.
SEATTLE — State and
local authorities will now be
restricted from asking about
people’s immigration sta-
tus, adding to a West Coast
wall of states with so-called
sanctuary policies.
Gov. Jay Inslee signed
a measure Tuesday imple-
menting the new rules. They
put Washington among only
a handful of states, includ-
ing California and Oregon,
to have enacted statewide
sanctuary policies and rank
among the strongest state-
wide mandates in the nation.
Police officers in Wash-
ington won’t be able to
inquire about immigration
status except in limited cir-
cumstances, and the state
attorney general will draw
up rules for courthouses,
hospitals and other state
government facilities aimed
at limiting their use as
places where federal immi-
gration agents look for peo-
ple in the country illegally.
“Our state agencies are
not immigration enforce-
ment agencies,” said Ins-
lee, a Democrat who is also
running for president. “We
will not be complicit in the
Trump
administration’s
depraved efforts to break
up hard-working immigrant
and refugee families.”
A 2017 executive order
from Inslee imposed sim-
ilar requirements but only
on state agencies, a move
advocates said fell short.
Tuesday’s bill expands the
rules to include all local law
enforcement.
That’s
significant
because most police inter-
actions tend to occur at the
city and county level, rather
than with state troopers, and
because local police have
long been targets for coop-
eration requests from fed-
eral immigration authori-
ties, generating the majority
of deportations, said Lena
Graber, an attorney with the
Immigrant Legal Resource
Center, a nonprofit that
tracks sanctuary policies.
Tuesday’s bill, Graber
said, gives Washington, “the
strongest and most compre-
hensive state law on sanctu-
ary in the country.”
Under the bill, local law
enforcement agencies are
prohibited from asking
about immigration status or
place of birth unless directly
connected to a criminal
investigation, and both local
jails and state prisons are
prohibited from comply-
ing with voluntary “immi-
gration holds” requested by
federal authorities, or from
notifying federal authorities
when an immigrant is about
to be released from their
custody.
Local and state author-
ities are also prohibited
from sharing immigration
information about people in
custody with immigration
authorities, except under a
valid court order or where
required by law.
Graber said five other
states have seen state
laws, executive orders or
rules used to create pro-
tections against coordina-
tion between local and fed-
eral law enforcement on
non-criminal immigration
investigations: Illinois, Con-
necticut, Rhode Island, New
Jersey, and Vermont.
NATIONAL EXTREMES
Yesterday’s National Extremes: (for the 48 contiguous states)
High 100° in Zapata, Texas Low 16° in Bridgeport, Calif.
NATIONAL WEATHER TODAY
Environmental groups oppose plan
to kill ravens to save grouse in Oregon
PORTLAND (AP) —
Environmental advocates
in Oregon have criticized a
state plan to kill more than
1,000 ravens to help save the
greater sage grouse, officials
said.
The Oregon Department
of Fish and Wildlife applied
for permits in 2018 to kill up
to 500 ravens per year over a
three-year period to reduce
the number preying upon
greater sage grouse eggs,
The Oregonian/OregonLive
reported Tuesday.
The strategy of putting
poisoned chicken eggs in
bait boxes in Baker County
is flawed, environmentalists
said.
Environmental groups
including Oregon Wild, The
Humane Society and the
Center for Biological Diver-
sity oppose the plan.
The strategy is part of
“an unfortunate pattern of
wildlife agencies scape-
goating one wildlife species
for the decline of another”
without addressing pri-
mary causes of decline, said
Bob Sallinger, conserva-
tion director at the Portland
Audubon Society.
Population
estimates
show the sage grouse has
declined by 30% across its
native range, which includes
11 western states and parts
of Canada. In Oregon where
ravens are targeted, the
grouse population has fallen
by 75% since 2005.
Environmentalists said
many more poisoned eggs
need to be distributed than
the number of ravens tar-
geted, creating the potential
to kill other species.
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