Crime and time

It’s the oldest saying in law enforcement: Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.

Lately, it seems as if the modern version is: Go ahead and do the crime because you’ll have plenty of time to think about it … at the mall, on the golf course, anywhere but in prison.

Let’s review:

Bobby Green of in Port Neches, who impregnated a female teenage relative after a longstanding relationship, was given 10 years probation last week. His attorney said the girl’s 2003 pregnancy “came as complete surprise to everybody.” Actually, Green, 22, shouldn’t have been all that flabbergasted by the conception since he was, um, having sex with the girl. Fortunately, the fun couple won’t reunite, at least any time soon. The young lady was sentenced to 12 years in prison for putting her secretly born baby in a duffle bag, where it died.

The owner of a bus that exploded and killed 23 nursing home residents during the evacuation from Hurricane Rita was given five years probation this week for mismanaging his fleet. The judge spared James Maples from prison despite scolding him that “it was no way to run a business to endanger … the individuals who are putting trust in a carrier.” At least for the first year of his probation, Maples will spend six months in a halfway house and six months in home confinement. He also was fined $10,000, but he filed for bankruptcy six months before the accident.

In Leander, Texas, a former high school teacher who pleaded guilty to groping a student was sentenced this week to 10 years of probation … and a month in jail! Larry Wallace, 53, also has to pay a $2,500 fine and give up his teaching license. He reportedly told a student in January 2006 that he wanted to have sex with her, touching her breast and grabbing her between her legs in his classroom at Vista Ridge High School. … Can you spell “creep”?

Sure, some cases call for leniency and all that. But if judges and juries gave out more time on the inside, we might have fewer problems on the outside.