The sandbox has only been in existence since the early part of 2004, so 3 years in the sandbox at this point would be impossible since it has only existed for 20 or 22 months. It is possible you might not have been ranking prior to the sandbox, and from what I understand it is possible to trigger the sandbox at anytime, so maybe that is where the 3 years comes from.
In any case, there are certain triggers for starting and ending the sandbox, the problem is only Google knows what the triggers are. Webzcas, what were you doing that got you out of the sandbox in 9 months? Some theories I have that might help is achieving a DMOZ listing, buying a Yahoo Directory listing, and registering your domain for at least 5 years. Did you do any or all of those?
As for the Javascript re-directs, that goes explicitly against Google’s webmaster guidelines and they are taking steps to ban sites that use those types of tactics. Just read Matt Cutts blog for more evidence of this. It may take awhile for Google to catch it, and possible they never would, but it is still a risk if you are in it for the long run.