U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer denounced mandatory minimum sentences yesterday during a talk in Boston.

Mandatory minimum sentences passed by Congress are "bad policy" because they are unfair in some cases, Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer said Sunday. Breyer, who was a member of the U.S. Sentencing Commission in the 1980s, said there must be flexibility in sentencing to make room for exceptional cases.

In a speech to about 550 people at the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum, Breyer said Congress had passed statutes with "no room for flexibility on the downside." "That is not a helpful thing to do," he said. "It's not going to advance the cause of law enforcement in my opinion, and it's going to set back the cause of fairness in sentencing."

Justice Kennedy criticized mandatory minimums at the ABA meeting in August. Breyer says Chief Justice Rehnquist "and others" shares his view.