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Project Exile was a federal program started in Richmond, Virginia in 1997. Project Exile shifted the prosecution of illegal technical gun possession offenses to federal court, where they carried a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in federal prison under the federal Gun Control Act of 1968, rather than in state court. Note that federal law (18 U.S.C. sec. 922 & 924) provides for a penalty of ten years in federal prison for being a "prohibited person" i.e. a convicted felon in possession of a firearm, as well as for falsifying information in order to obtain one, or furnishing a gun to a convicted felon. The program has since been copied by several other cities, sometimes under other names. In Atlanta, for example, the program was known as FACE 5 (Firearms in Atlanta Can Equal 5 years in federal prison). ==Origin and implementation== The program was designed to address the gang violence which had plagued Richmond. At the time of its inception, the level of murders and shootings had regularly increased each year, with Richmond's murder-per-capita rates being one of the highest five for the country. In 1997, 140 people were murdered, 122 of them with firearms.〔(United States House of Representatives House Judiciary Committee: "PROJECT EXILE AND VIRGINIA EXILE - SOLUTIONS FOR THE GUN PROBLEM WHICH WORK" ) 2000〕 There was strong community support for federal intervention, the African American community was being devastated by the violence (80% of all the homicide victims in Richmond were African-American) and half of the victims had no prior criminal record, the result of the poor marksmanship of drug dealers often wildly shooting at targets of opportunity leading to the death of innocent bystanders.〔 The belief was that the threat of a stiff federal sentence with no parole would deter criminals from carrying guns and relegating murder to planned rather than spontaneous events. Project Exile was named for the idea that if the police catch a criminal in Richmond with a gun in a crime, the criminal has forfeited his right to remain in this community, the criminal will face immediate federal prosecution and stiff mandatory federal prison sentences (often five years), and will be "exiled" to federal prison for five years.〔 In 1997, the program was implemented in conjunction with an extensive public outreach and media campaign to educate citizens about lengthy Federal prison sentences for gun crimes and to maximize deterrence. The message An Illegal Gun Gets You Five Years in Federal Prison was placed on 15 billboards, a fully painted city bus carried the message changing routes every day, TV commercials, Metro Richmond traffic reports, over a million supermarket bags were also used to advertise Project Exile.〔 In the 2001, after the launch of a similar state program named Virginia Exile, Project Exile evolved from a federal only program to a larger cooperative effort with state and local authorities meeting bimonthly to review ongoing arrests to determine in which venue to bring the case so as to ensure the maximum possible penalty.〔(Wall Street Journal: "Going After Crimes -- and Guns, Richmond, Va., Cleans Up Its Streets By Severely Punishing Any Firearms Offense" By GARY FIELDS ) August 5, 2008〕 The marketing and community outreach efforts have been toned down.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Project Exile」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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