The state’s top judge called for a “policy summit” on sentences in South Carolina, citing exploding prison populations nationwide.

“Sentencing in the United States is a national disgrace,” Supreme Court Chief Justice Jean Toal said Wednesday in her annual speech to the S.C. General Assembly.

The state’s corrections director, lawmakers and others greeted the proposal favorably, though they offered different solutions.

From 1970 through 2000, the nation’s prison population increased six-fold, Toal said, noting “this is a huge drain on state and local resources.”

Toal held up North Carolina as a model for sentencing reform. In that state, she said, violent criminals receive longer sentences while nonviolent offenders are serving shorter time.

Toal asked the state’s legislative and executive branches to join her department in studying the issue, though she didn’t offer specific proposals.

“We don’t know the answer now as to how the system is being run because it’s been such a long time since we’ve taken a real hard look at it,” Toal said afterward. “I want to know if there are better ways to sentence and incarcerate than what we are using now.”

S.C. Department of Corrections director Jon Ozmint favors reducing the mandatory time served for offenses that carry at least a 20-year sentence to 75 percent from 85 percent.

That law, adopted in 1996, is known as truth-in-sentencing. It is meant to make sure inmates serve as much of their sentences as possible without parole.

“Truth-in-sentencing has worked,” Ozmint said, though he added it might have gone “too far.”

Reducing the mandatory time to 75 percent would give inmates more incentive to behave behind bars and also would help prevent overcrowding, he said.

The issue will take on even more importance as the population of inmates affected by truth-in-sentencing grows, he said.

About 8,000, or 35 percent, of the state’s 23,000 inmates have been sentenced under truth-in-sentencing laws. That number is expected to grow to 44 percent.

At the current growth rate, the state will likely need more prison space in five years, he said.

Ozmint, the former head of the state grand jury also said mandatory sentences for some drug offenses need to be re-examined.

He pointed out, for example, that there is no difference between the minimum sentence for trafficking 100 grams of cocaine and distributing a “ton” of it.

Lexington County Sheriff James Metts said he generally supports mandatory sentences for serious crimes. But he acknowledged it has contributed to overcrowding at his jail, which was designed to hold 682 inmates but in the past year has accommodated as many as 912.

“A lot of them would plead guilty, but instead, they ask for a jury trial because they have nothing to lose,” he said.

State Sen. Jake Knotts, R-Lexington, a former police officer, said he believes the state should resurrect the sentencing guidelines commission. He was a member of the group, which disbanded a few years ago.

The commission proposed uniform sentence ranges based on the severity of the crime and the defendant’s criminal history.

North Carolina adopted similar guidelines in the mid-1990s. They helped reduce prison populations and saved about $1 billion over a decade, said Tom Ross, former chairman of that state’s sentencing commission.

The goal of “structured sentencing,” he said, is to keep violent criminals behind bars longer while providing alternatives to prison, such as house arrest or substance abuse counseling for nonviolent offenders.

“We didn’t want our system so stuffed with nonviolent offenders that we were paroling violent offenders,” said Ross, a former superior court judge. “What makes sense is to use those resources for your most violent offenders.”

Reach Brundrett at (803) 771-8484 or rbrundrett@thestate.com.