Criminal Justice Reform Urged

Former Gov. Russell W. Peterson announced Tuesday the formation of a new activist group that will focus on reform of Delaware's criminal-justice system.

Stand Up for What's Right and Just will push to change the state's mandatory sentencing laws and create effective drug-treatment programs in jails, said Peterson, who will serve as the group's honorary chairman.

"Today, we the people of Delaware are guilty of tolerating a criminal-justice system and a deprivation of the poor that perpetuate crime," Peterson told more than 200 people at the group's kickoff rally at the Riverfront Arts Center in Wilmington.

"This is a serious, immoral offense that threatens our way of life," Peterson said.  "It calls for a major, urgent effort to save Delaware's soul."

The group already has 200 members, Peterson said.

The group also has an immediate political initiative on which it can focus.  Sen. Liane Sorenson, R-Hockessin, has introduced a bill that limits some minimum mandatory sentences and ends all such sentences in Delaware two years after they are enacted into law unless the Legislature renews them.

"I'm hoping we can get grassroots community support to get the bill out of committee," Sorenson told the crowd.

The group's founding members include two former governors --the other is Gov. Dale E. Wolf-- former Attorney General Charles M. Oberly III and Public Defender Lawrence M. Sullivan.

Its executive director is Thomas P. Eichler, a former state Cabinet secretary and regional administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.