Where does Tom Ridge really stand on crime?

Juvenile Crime is worse under Tom Ridge

According to the Philadelphia Inquirer four part series the week of 9/28/98, juvenile crime is way up. Overall, juvenile crime in Southeastern Pennsylvania is up between 35% and 256%, depending on the region.

Violent crime among girls is up 114%!
Property crime is up 42%!
Among boys, violent crime is up 39%!

The one exception to this trend, property crime, is down a measly 4%.
Suburban and rural drug use is also up, even in Amish areas.
Corruption within the juvenile justice system is rife, according to one whistleblower who claims that rehabilitation money is siphoned off before it benefits the children who need it. Investigation of these allegations will be a high priority for the Luksik administration.

Adult Violent crime

Tom Ridge now claims credit in a TV ad for protecting women against rape. But rape has gone up 4.2% in the past four years! (source: Pennsylvania State Police) Now he's even lying about rape!
Tom Ridge boasts about his "tough crime control" package of 1995. And yet the rates of violent crime have gone up. Perhaps that is because the 1995 package was directed mostly against law-abiding gun owners and not against criminals. Since gun control consistently raises violent crimes against persons (e.g., the Brady Bill led to a 4% increase in rape and other gun crimes) Tom's "package" would be expected to have made things worse, as it has.
What is needed is enforcement of mandatory penalties for crimes committed with a gun. When Boston very publicly began enforcing mandatory sentences for juvenile gun crimes, their juvenile homicide rate went from 75 per year to 0 per year for the next two and one half years. (Criminals do respond to incentives!)

In Pennsylvania, under Tom Ridge, less than 1% of gun criminals are given the "mandatory" sentence prescribed by law. It should be 100%. Peg Luksik will cut the budget of any judge who does not impose mandatory sentences or who habitually plea bargains violent gun crimes. That strategy worked in Boston, and it will work here, too.

Peg Luksik will work to fix the mess by requiring judges to enforce mandatory sentencing, by cutting the budgets of judges who habitually plea-bargain violent crimes, and by taking the corruption out of the juvenile justice system.