Light sentences for convicts unacceptable

I read your Sept. 29 story about home invasions and the light, almost humorous, sentences Mr. Straight and Mr. Blogett received. Being one of their victims, I was amazed — no, dumbfounded — on the outcome.

After I was awoken with a loaded gun to my temple, hog-tied and had a hood put over my head, I was poked with a barbecue fork and hit with a baseball bat several times. All of my prescription medicine and valuable possessions were stolen from me. I was assured that these dangerous felons would be caught and taken off our streets for a long, long time.

Now knowing that they will be out robbing and terrorizing other taxpaying Valley families, and maybe even getting revenge on those of us who tried to put them in jail, after getting out in just a few years makes me sick to my stomach. Where is the justice in that?

One can conclude that our officers in the Valley have forgotten how to do their jobs. Oh, they can work on getting revenue from us good citizens by pulling us over and writing tickets until we lose our licenses from point accumulation, and then put us in jail for driving to work.

Yes, they are real good at traffic cases, overwhelmingly good at finding some reason to pull over anyone deemed interesting. The court is overloaded with those money-making cases, but as for criminal cases, which do not bring in any revenue, they seem to have lost interest in them.

There simply is not any money in doing those, and (officials) have forgotten how to do them. I thought policing was to protect the people and to investigate the crimes. You know, catch the bad guys, not to make good folks bad with harassing traffic stops issuing trumped up offenses so we’ll cop to at least one of them and put more money into their coffers.

They have forgotten how to be policemen, how to beat the turf, so to speak. You do not get any criminal information by pulling over grandma with the kids in the back. How does stopping an 80-year-old man for going too slow solve open theft cases?

Why, when a cop sees a mom and daughter with a flat tire, does he give her a ticket for not pulling over far enough instead of offering aid? Or when a dad and son slide off the road into a ditch, why give the dad a Breathalyzer test when no alcohol was seen nor smelled instead of offering a hand?

Who is in charge here? Why is the taxpayer’s police force — yes, our police force — a messed up? Why are they so one-sided in their jobs? We do not pay police just to arrest traffic offenders, but that is where the money is at. There is no money in catching real criminals; all the money is in traffic. When did the police force turn into revenue-makers instead of crime-fighters?

We, the victims, should not have to investigate our own cases, and then get in trouble for doing so. Come on, please do your jobs.

And why is the district attorney’s office so afraid of taking a case to trial? Have they lost all confidence in themselves and their staff? Have they brokered so many deals that they have forgotten how the court system works?

Put pride back in your jobs, even if you have to press the state for more money, more investigators. Get the crime lab on your good side, get people to work together. Do whatever it takes to fight crime again — or maybe we need to put someone else in office who can and will do the job.

With all the resources at hand here in the Valley, I am sure there is a person who could turn things around and make at least Palmer a better place to take the family without being harassed by police or thieves.

Doug Olson is a resident of Palmer.