Because prosecutors may not charge the enhancement as often as possible, the law increased neither the likelihood that serious offenders would be imprisoned nor sentence lengths for those imprisoned. However, sentence severity may have increased for defendants against whom the law was imposed. Moreover, the law allows plea bargaining, to more often secure guilty pleas, thus ensuring that serious offenders are sentenced to prison, and freeing prosecutors to devote resources to cases where lengthy, time-consuming trials are unavoidable. In assessing the success or failure of the new law, the issue becomes whether the criminal justice system should, at times, be able to circumvent the law's restrictions to ensure substantive justice. Laws are not mechanically applied, but interpreted and selectively implemented. Tabular data and 10 footnotes.