Yesterday was the day the sky fell and anarchy began...or was it

I’ve talked about in November about mandatory drug sentencing minimums and how much I despise them. I just wanted to give you all this update.

Yesterday was the day the Justice Department has been warning about. When our country’s jails and prisons start opening their doors releasing up to 20,000 hardened drug criminals into back into our presently pure and perfect society.

There will be soooooooo many savages people released all at once. And these just aren’t any people; these are ex-offenders who have shown that they are repeat wrong-doers without the possibility in many cases of any kind of transition or re-entry program to bring them from prison back to the streets. I mean, these are like…super duper wrong-doers.

A nightmare scenario if there was ever one, right?

That's the nightmare but the reality is far less terrifying. According to the U.S. Sentencing Commission, of those 20,000, only 1,600 are immediately eligible to apply for early release. And most of them are not career criminals. To give you some perspective, CNN is reporting that there were a grand total of four inmates released on Monday.

If that didn't make you feel a bit better, then maybe this will. Judges have a great deal of discretion to decide what the term “release” really means. They can also impose intermediate protections as well or refer someone to a halfway house or to home confinement for some period of time.

So, in conclusion, I suppose what I’m saying is if you were concerned about needing to clutch your purse tighter because of these people being released, fear not. Besides, it’s probably your sex offending, identity stealing, blow snorting neighbor you need to worry about anyway.

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