Title: Convict freed early is again charged in burglaries - State allowed repeat offender into program
Author: James Walsh; Staff Writer
Date: March 16, 2000
Section: NEWS
Page: 01B
Edina police detective Eric Kleinberg looked at a recent string of burglaries in Edina and south Minneapolis - how the homes were entered, how the thief stole only jewelry and furs and ignored stereos and televisions - and one person came to mind.
Mark T. Seaborn.
But it couldn't have been Seaborn, Kleinberg assumed. He was convicted last April of possessing stolen property and was supposed to be in prison serving a sentence of three years and eight months as a career criminal. "We thought it must be a copycat," Kleinberg said.
It was no copycat, authorities now say.
Seaborn was released from the state Department of Corrections' Challenge Incarceration Program in December, nearly two years before his expected release date. Authorities found Seaborn, 32, his girlfriend and about $30,000 worth of stolen items in their apartment last week.
Both were charged this week with receiving stolen property. Seaborn appeared Wednesday in Hennepin County District Court.
All of which has County Attorney Amy Klobuchar fuming. She said she wonders what she has to do to keep a chronic offender behind bars.
"An early release on a case like this undermines our efforts to ensure real and meaningful consequences for repeat and career property offenders," she said. "This is someone who's made a career of ripping people off."
The Challenge Incarceration Program, which accepted Seaborn last July, allows nonviolent offenders to shorten their prison time in exchange for six months of boot camp and a year of supervised release. If they violate the program, they could serve their full prison sentence.
State Corrections Commissioner Sheryl Ramstad Hvass said Wednesday that she now requires county attorneys and judges to be notified before an offender is admitted to the challenge program. That would allow prosecutors and judges to alert corrections officials to concerns about particular offenders.
The trouble is, the policy wasn't in effect when Seaborn was deemed eligible for the program last summer. And prosecutors weren't told that he had gotten out of prison until police brought the new case to them this week.
Kleinberg began investigating the latest burglaries in February and realized that Seaborn had been released after checking the Department of Corrections Web site. The detective found out that Seaborn was living with his girlfriend, June E. Scroggins, 30, in Minneapolis.
Police, knowing that Seaborn had a previous girlfriend pawn stolen items in earlier cases, started checking pawnshops. They found some of the stolen items, allegedly pawned by Scroggins.
On March 10, the manager at the Cash-N-Pawn on E. Lake Street in Minneapolis told police that Seaborn had just been in the store attempting to pawn a bracelet with at least seven carats of diamonds. The manager had refused to accept it, suspecting that it was stolen. On March 11, police arrested the couple.
In all, Kleinberg said, Seaborn is suspected of being involved in at least five burglaries, netting property worth as much as $200,000.
"The items that he was stealing represent not only large financial wealth, but extremely intimate wealth. These were gifts, heirlooms. Very valuable parts of people's lives were violated," Kleinberg said. "His burglaries struck right into people's hearts."
It's a pain that no one should have experienced, Klobuchar said; Seaborn should have been in prison.
What really stings, she said, was that officials used Seaborn's conviction last year as an example of their crackdown on career property criminals. They worked hard for a longer sentence because of Seaborn's impact - he already had six felony convictions, she said.
A Star Tribune series of reports last summer showed that thousands of Minnesota offenders, many low-level or property offenders, continually commit new crimes with little consequence in the form of prison or jail time. Klobuchar said officials will just have to keep trying.
"We can do nothing, except that the next time it comes around, we will again seek an upward departure [from sentencing guidelines]," she said. "And we will specifically notify the Department of Corrections that this is not the type of person to be released early."
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Tackling communication
Ramstad Hvass said the department is trying to communicate better with county officials about offenders who are considered for early release. Since last spring, officials said, the department has called counties before putting offenders on work release. It started making the same kinds of calls a month ago for offenders who are eligible for the challenge program.
"I have every confidence that under our new procedure, this guy would have been brought to my attention, and the results would have been very different," Ramstad Hvass said.
Klobuchar said she hopes so.
"We believe that in the end, logic will triumph," she said.
PHOTO
Author: James Walsh; Staff Writer
Section: NEWS
Page: 01B
Copyright (c) 2000, 2001 Star Tribune: Newspaper of the Twin Cities
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