Don’t look now, but a Southern state is going pro-active!  Rather than end up in a major federal lawsuit over prison conditions, Alabama prison officials AND Alabama politicians are looking at Sensible Sentencing.  Currently, “an Alabamian who has committed a low-level Class C felony — a minor offense like theft of $500 (or many low-level thefts), using a stolen credit card, passing a forged or altered check or simple drug possession — can spend a decade in prison. And if that person has another low-level conviction on his record, he’ll be sentenced as if he committed a Class B felony, subject to a 20-year sentence.  A third felony on his record? The defendant could be behind bars for life as if he had committed a Class A felony such as murder, even if all three felonies were low-level crimes.

http://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/article/20130918/PROGRESS03/309180018/Alabama-Voices-Susan-Watson-clock-running-out-crowded-prisons