Drug War Injustice[1]

Overview:

· Erhenhalt on Daley: “a manager of sin” who sought to manage it with in accordance of the limitations of human weakness

· Today, the drug war, an attempt not to control but to eradicate a sin, may be one of the single greatest social injustices in America

A new world of policing may pose a greater threat to public safety than the harm it was designed to combat

· The case of Larry Harper in Albuquerque, N.M.

· In the course of storming an apartment in Fitchburg, MA a SWAT team stun grenade set a couch on fire eventually destroying the entire building and leaving 24 people without a home

· In Boston, a drug raid on the wrong apartment led to the death of a minister, the Rev. Accelyne Williams

· Once established, SWAT teams have been deployed in the course of routine law enforcement—even to keep order during a civic parade in St. Petersburg, FL

· “Crack probably had more impact on the entire criminal justice system than it had on the communities and the drug dealers,” says Dr. Franklin Zimring, director of the Earl Warren Legal Institute at the University of California School of Law. This secondary impact, on police and prisons, may end up being more negative than anything associated with the drug.”

Drug war incarceration have made the U.S. penal system the largest in the world

· There are more people behind bars in the U.S. for drug offenses—about 400,000—than there are in prison for all crimes in England, France, Germany and Japan combined (only 10 years ago, the incarceration rate of in the U.S. was similar to that of other democracies)

· Every 20 seconds, someone in the United States is arrested for a drug violation; every week, on average, a new jail or prison is built

· Even as crime continues a six-year decline, the prison population grows and it will soon pass 2 million; no country has more people behind bars and only one, Russia, has a higher incarceration rate

Imprisoning drug offenders wrecks lives and families

· 3/4 of the 54,000 women jailed for drug crimes have children

· The case of Gloria Van Winkle, a mother of two in the sixth year of a life term for possession of $40 worth of crack cocaine

· The case of Tonya Drake, a mother of four with no criminal record or history of drug use, sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for mailing a package she did no know contained crack cocaine after she was paid $44 by a friend to do so

· The case of Louie Cordell, a 55-year old father of nine with no prior convictions, sentenced to five years for growing marijuana

· Current law enforcement actually focuses on small-fry, not drug “kingpins”: only 5 percent of the people jailed for federal crack offenses were considered high-level dealers

The drug war hits poor blacks in inner cities the hardest

· 1 of every 20 Americans born this year will serve some time in prison, according to a Justice Department study. For blacks, the projection is 1 in 4.

· In 1996, 8.3 percent of black men age 25-29 were inmates, compared to 0.8 percent of whites

· For every black male in college in California, five are in jail

· The odds of going to prison used to be more even, but the system’s treatment of crack cocaine has dramatically thrown off the balance, according to reports by the Sentencing Commission and the Justice Department

· Twice as many whites as blacks use crack cocaine

· In the war on drugs, however, law enforcement has targeted black inner city areas: 90 percent of the people locked up for crack under federal drug laws are black (McCaffrey)

· In state prisons, blacks make up nearly 60 percent of the people serving time on drug offenses, though they are only 12 percent of the general population and 15 percent of regular drug users according to Justice Department figures

· Crack cocaine penalties are far more severe than those for powder cocaine: federal law treats 5 grams of crack like 500 grams of powder; possession of 5 grams of crack cocaine carries a mandatory 5-year term, but possession of 5 grams of powder is a misdemeanor likely to carry no jail time

· The crack hysteria is not justified

Although crack was labeled the world’s most addictive drug, 10 years of national surveys have shown that most people who try crack do not continue to use it

Numerous studies have shown that crack, like powder cocaine, may be less physically addictive than alcohol or tobacco

· For many black communities, the legacy of the drug war is not just violence and high prison rates but a heightened sense that the law does not treat them fairly

In the words of Mattie Compton, a black community leader in Fort Worth, TX, who is deputy chief assistant U.S. attorney for the civil rights division: “We know we’re going to lose people in the poor neighborhoods, but when you see people who are prospects for future leaders going away to jail for so long, you wonder if we really are a community under siege.”

It might be all worth it, but the drug war has failed at its fundamental purpose: it has failed to reduce drug use

· The most recent National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (1997) estimated that about 14 million people used an illegal drug in the last month, a number barely changed since 1988—even as imprisonment rates soared

The drug war has diverted resources from other areas—especially eduation

· In the last decade, spending on prisons has increased by 60 percent and pay for prison guards has doubled, but spending on higher education has not increased at all

· The salary for a starting professor in the California State University system is $41,000. It is $51,000 for a starting prison guard

· Arresting, prosecuting and locking up drug criminals costs $35 billion a year

Even those charged with fighting the war on drugs have come to acknowledge it is a failure

· Four-star General Barry McCaffrey, head of the National Drug Control Policy Office:

“We have a failed policy and it has to be re-evaluated. Otherwise we’re going to bankrupt ourselves. Because we can’t incarcerate our way out of this problem.”

“The current system is bad drug policy and bad law enforcement.”

· It is not an unusual position for those in the tactical squad community to favor legalization of drugs

The political rationale of the war on drugs:

· The war on drugs is sustained by the “Three Rs”: retribution, revenge, and retaliation—and a fourth—reelection

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[1] Based on Egan, Timothy, “The War on Drugs Retreats, Still Taking Prisoners,” New York Times, February 28, 1999 and Egan, Timothy, “Soldiers of the Drug War Remain on Duty,” New York Times, March 1, 1999.