by TChris

It's time to change three-strikes laws, and voters know it.

According to a new poll released Thursday, 76 percent of likely voters said they were inclined to support a November ballot initiative that would soften the three-strikes law that Californians overwhelmingly passed a decade ago. Just 14 percent of respondents were opposed, the Field Poll reported.

The initiative would require that the third strike be a violent felony, so that petty theft or drug possession wouldn't trigger a 25 year minimum sentence. It's a good start -- incremental improvement is better than none at all -- but true justice requires that judges tailor sentences to the offender in light of the facts of the case. Any three-strikes law, as any other law that requires a mandatory minimum sentence, prevents a judge from showing mercy and compassion when it is due. A better reform would be abolition of three-strikes sentencing altogether.