In the real world that we live in, not the fantasy world of your political posturing, choices have to be made about who gets locked up for how long and for what crimes. When "law and order" conservatives demand that drug mules get locked up for life, it means that, absent a willingness to spend billions more than we spend today on prisons, criminals like the accused in this case end up on the street. We already spend more on prisons than we do on college. So until you're willing to make that commitment, all the criticism is exploitation of personal tragedy to score political points.