St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Wesley Bell told Washington University law students on Tuesday, “If you look at the facts, being ‘tough on crime’ is empty rhetoric.”
“Violent offenders, where there is a clear victim – yes, of course, we are going to hold them accountable. But there are many people who wind up in the criminal justice system who don’t belong in jail or prison.”
Bell cited as examples people with mental health or substance abuse issues “who have no victim of their behavior except themselves.”
Rather than seek prison time for such defendants, on a case by case basis, Bell could recommend that they enter one of the 21st Circuit’s Alternate Courts or the Prosecutor-led Diversion Program that he introduced after he was elected in 2018.
Bell provided data as to why progressive rather than traditional prosecution is actually “tougher on crime” with many of these defendants.
“The recidivism rate for our Diversion Program is 8%,” Bell said, “which means that 92% of the people we offer a chance to avoid a conviction and to stay out of prison never commit another crime.”
By contrast, he said, the recidivism rate for people released by Missouri prisons is around 45%. “And many of those individuals go on to commit worse crimes than what sent them to prison in the first place,” Bell said.
Bell also explained why seeking the death penalty, which he has not done and said he will not do, is not actually “tougher on crime.”
“Most people sentenced to death are, in fact, never executed,” Bell said. “These cases – rightly – receive the most scrutiny and are most likely to get tied up in endless appeals or even overturned and sent back to the trial court. Imagine the victims’ families being told, years later, that the case has to be retried and they have to relive and go through this all over again.”
His experience, meeting with the families of murder victims, is that they want closure. “Which you typically have right away when a defendant is sentenced to life without possibility of parole,” Bell said, “while death penalty cases can drag on for literally decades.”
Bell pointed out further that there is no positive correlation between districts where the death penalty is charged and those with low homicide rates. In fact, the opposite is the trend – districts where the death penalty is charged tend to have higher homicide rates than those where the death penalty is not charged. “So, clearly, the death penalty has no deterrent effect,” Bell said.
Bell was the guest of Dr. Kimberly Norwood, who holds an endowed chair at the law school. She introduced him by describing how varied his career has been. He served as a public defender and municipal judge, operated a private law practice, and taught criminal justice in college before he was elected prosecutor. Bell explained his career arc.
“For years, based on my experiences of criminal justice growing up, many of the folks I saw were on the business end of the criminal justice system. I wanted to ensure everyone received a fair trial,” Bell said.
“Then, I thought the biggest impact to help people was to be a judge. But, as a judge, I learned that most cases are worked out before they get to you. It was then that I realized that the prosecutor has the ability to make the biggest difference.”
