Drug War Chronicle

Minneapolis has become the largest US city without a drug squad after the chief axed it as part of an effort to reduce a $5 million budget gap.

Indonesia has a new drug law, but it looks pretty much like business as usual for Southeast Asia, home of some of the world's harshest drug laws.

The State Department and President Obama have issued the annual, congressionally-mandated list of countries not complying with US drug war objectives. The only countries listed as not in compliance are three with which the US has chilly relations, while countries like Afghanistan and Pakistan, elements of whose governments are deeply implicated in the drug trade, get a pass.

More fun for the Philly narcs, a New Jersey ICE employee goes down, and a Brooklyn drug squad supervisor gets off easy.

The number of marijuana arrests last year declined for the first time since 2002, the FBI said in its Uniform Crime Report this week. The overall number of drug arrests also fell slightly. The down-tick seems to be the result not of enlightened policing, but of law enforcement agencies feeling the budgetary pinch.

San Diego may be a gleaming, coastal California city, but when it comes to medical marijuana, it's more like Fresno-by-the-Sea. The latest round of dispensary raids has patients and advocates fuming and looking for ways to extract political revenge and gain a little justice.

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