I believe there's no one answer. But I think one of the variables that has come into play is the existence of mandatory minimums. When you begin to remove discretion, whether it is at the court level in the sentencing process or at the parole decision level with regard to release, you end up with a focus not on the individual, not on the individual circumstances of the crime itself or the individual characteristics that led that person to that situation; you begin to address and respond to an act rather than an individual.
If you look prior to 1976, as I had indicated in my opening remarks, the average length of time was somewhere around 15 years, which is relatively consistent with what we see in New Zealand, Australia, and western Europe. The bringing into force of the mandatory minimum at that point I think was the key variable in causing us to now be in a situation, almost 25 years later, where we have offenders serving in excess of 28 years, on average, prior to being released.