In Salt Lake City last week, a federal judge reluctantly sentenced a 25-year-old man, Weldon Angelos, to 55 years in prison for selling small bags of marijuana.

The man will be 80 years old when he is released from prison in 2060.

Sound a little harsh?

Consider this: Only two hours before the sentencing, the very same judge sentenced a man convicted of beating a woman to death with a log to 22 years in prison.

The obscene disparity between sentences comes as result of the “mandatory sentencing” laws that launched the minimum sentence for the man’s crime to 55 years because he carried a gun in an ankle holster during the drug deals.

Ironically, in a country that widely promotes the right to carry a gun, this man was penalized despite never having used it, flashed it or made reference to it.

Even the judge who sentenced him spoke ashamedly of the system that will put Angelos behind bars until his 5-and 7-year-old sons are 60 and 62.

These mandatory sentencing laws, while good-intentioned, are an undeniable blemish on our country’s judicial system. In order to be fair, and show faith in our judges and juries, the system must operate under the theory that no two cases are the same. And they aren’t. An infinite number of variables always exist that differentiate each crime from another. There simply is never enough continuity, even when grouped into categories, that would allow the government to encompass them all under one mandatory sentence.

It reduces our legal system to the intricateness of a chart. “What’s the crime? What’s the severity? OK, let’s determine the sentence from this spreadsheet.” It undermines the role of the people we have entrusted to ensure justice since this country’s inception.

“Innocent until proven guilty” – a constitutional mantra, if there ever was one – is drilled into the eardrum of every American. But even the guilty still are American and deserve the justice the 8th Amendment provides as well – “no cruel and unusual punishment.”