Word: stiffer
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Just this month, for instance, New York began to apply its new "anti-john" law, imposing stiffer penalties for prostitutes' clients (johns) who in the past usually got off with the equivalent of a traffic ticket. Early hauls have included a 69-year-old man from New Jersey, let off in deference to his age. Other offenders will not get off so lightly. For patronizing a prostitute under age 11, the term can run as high as seven years...
...Crimson Harriers have their work cut out for them. Traditionally the class of the Northeast and often a national title contender, Providence is the stiffer of the two opponents. UMass is also a tough squad, though more along the lines of Northeastern, the Herd's first victim of the season...
...realities are more complicated than the rhetoric. Stiffer jail terms, without parole, would mean building a lot more jails. The people who call for tough retribution would be among the first to howl against the taxes that would be needed to finance new prisons and expanded courts. It would be self-defeating to turn into a society of police and wardens in order to restore confidence in the law's consequences. But confusion of judicial purpose, with lapses into wistful incompetence and the sociological sigh, is just as destructive to public morale. Within civilized limits, speed and certainty...
Many states lack the resources to protect witnesses. John Kaplan, a Stanford Law School professor, suggests another alternative: speedier trials and stiffer bail. "The longer the delay, the more likely the witness will be intimidated. Our lenient bail practices have not helped," says Kaplan, noting that they put the accused back on the street, where he can seek out his accusers. Some district attorneys have proposed a starkly realistic solution: compulsory pretrial depositions, which roughly means getting a witness's testimony quickly on the record. That way, Boston Special Assistant D.A. Thomas Dwyer explains, "if the witness is murdered...
...however, the justification for plea bargaining as a necessary evil is being questioned. Most observers agree that certain overburdened urban jurisdictions would grind to a halt without it. But in two fair-sized cities, Portland, Ore., and New Orleans, district attorneys claim that they have been able to get stiffer sentences without backlogging the court docket by cutting down on plea bargaining. According to New Orleans District Attorney Harry Connick, when he limited plea bargaining, the city's criminal court judges complained that "they would have to spend a lot of time on the bench trying cases. My feeling...