Charlie Samuel is the poster child for the kind of thugs classified as "non-violent offenders" despite a history of violent behavior -- the kind of hopeless criminal who would be included in the governor's planned release of 27,000 convicts to reduce prison costs.

Samuel has been arrested on suspicion of murdering 17-year-old Lily Burk, the Los Feliz teenager whose body was found Saturday morning in her Volvo at 5th and Alameda.

Police arrested Samuel nearby 12 hours earlier on drug charges, according the Times' LA Now.

The LA Sheriff's Department Inmate Information website shows Samuel was arrest April 23 on a parole violation, booked at Van Nuys Jail and assigned to a drug treatment program. He was formally released June 24.

LA Now quoted law enforcement officials as describing Samuel as a transient with a history of violent crimes and drug problems.

Los Angeles Assistant Police Chief Earl Paysinger said metro officers detained Samuel, suspecting he had been involved in other criminal activity. The officers canvassed the area, looking for evidence of a possible crime but didn't discover anything out of the ordinary.

This case raises all the right questions about what we're doing freeing criminals who all too often plead out to lesser charges to avoid conviction for violent crimes -- plea bargains that are all too common.

Here's a guy who is living on the streets, doing hard drugs who got paroled and was left unsupervised by probation officers and released without anyone thinking of the possible consequences.

And now Lily Burk is dead because he apparently accosted her while she was running an errand and tried to rob her.

What in God's name are we doing?