LOS ANGELES, Aug. 17 (UPI) -- A Los Angeles judge has ordered the release of a California prisoner who was serving a lengthy sentence for trying to break into a soup kitchen 13 years ago.
Gregory Taylor drew the sentence under the state's three-strikes law which Judge Peter Espinoza said often brings "disproportionate" sentences, The New York Times reported Tuesday.
He was homeless and sleeping at a church in downtown Los Angeles in 1997 when he tried to pry open the doors of a soup kitchen because he was hungry.
Because of two previous robbery convictions, Taylor was sentenced to 25 years to life under the three-strikes law.
Taylor, 48, is one of 14 California inmates who have been re-sentenced since students working on the Three Strikes Project at Stanford Law School began reviewing cases.
Taylor's case has been frequently cited by opponents as an example of the kind of heavy-handed sentencing such a law can lead to.
