down to three
After the Willingdon location was so soundly trashed by residents who threatened to make it the sole election issue,causing the government to dodge imminent defeat by scrubbing plans for the location,
Criminal Justice
Imprisonment is becoming unaffordable...
Via the Sentencing Law and Policy blog:
The high cost of imprisonment has created openings for sentencing reform. An article on Stateline.org explores recent moves in Texas and Kansas to find alternatives to building more prisons.
It's easy in this issue a lot of the time to feel like things are hopeless, and certainly the pace of change is frustratingly slow. But it's a different debate now, on drugs and on crime in general, than was taking place 13 or so years ago when I first got involved in this. I can't remember the last time I heard a politician talk about how prisoners are being "coddled" and shouldn't have access to exercise rooms -- routine stuff back then -- and while menaces to society like US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales still want more mandatory minimums, it has become noticeably harder for them to get them passed -- Pat Leahy isn't the only reason Gonzales' horrible idea isn't likely to go anywhere. Attitudes are changing, policy will follow suit, but we have to keep working at it to make it happen...
The drug war is for real...
Via EconLog: Official stats from the Dept. of Justice show that the ratio of violent offenders in jail to drug offenders was 2.6:1 in 2003 -- up from 9:1 in 1980.
The drug war is for real. And anyone who doesn't think this is a huge distraction from the fight against real crime doesn't know how to multiply or add...
House Judiciary Committee Passes Second Chance Act
[Courtesy of FedCURE, www.FedCURE.org]
Just a week after the re-introduction of the bill, today members of the House Judiciary Committee passed H.R. 1593, the Second Chance Act of 2007. The bill will now be sent to the House floor for consideration, which sponsors say will take place in mid-April. During the mark-up of the bill, members voted down several amendments that would have jeopardized the bipartisan support for the bill.
The Second Chance Act would authorize a $65 million re-entry grant program administered through the Department of Justice for state and county re-entry initiatives, and a $15 million re-entry program for community and faith-based organizations to deliver mentoring and transitional services. The bill also retains a number of drug treatment provisions that were added to the legislation last session. Last week, the Second Chance Act was reintroduced by Rep. Danny Davis (D-IL) and Chris Cannon (R-UT) and has a growing list of bipartisan co-sponsors. The Senate plans to reintroduce their version of the bill later this week.
For more information on the Second Chance Act click here or contact Sara Paterni at [email protected].
http://www.oregonmeasure11.com/archives/2007/03/28/house-judiciary-committee-passes-second-chance-act/
Tony Serra Letter from Prison Camp
Tony Serra, a prominent defense attorney whose name comes up frequently in drug law reform, writes a revealing critique of the criminal justice system, based on his experiences in federal prison camp in Lompoc, California for tax resistance -- in the '70s and again for a few more months this year. The text of his letter, which was originally published in California Lawyer, was published online at the BreaktheChains.info web site.
Serra writes that while the camp environment, which is low security, on its surface is far more humane than an all-out prison -- "In 1976 inmates, as a generality, felt graced and privileged by their placement in the Camp" -- things have changed for the worse:
Not one prisoner whom I have talked to-and I have talked to hundreds-believes he has been treated fairly by the judicial system. Many young men, who in a past generation would have received probation, have had their youth taken from them-10, 15, 20 years of incarceration, with no parole, no conjugals, no furloughs, no real job training or education. They are harsh and bitter. Their attitude is contagious in prison subculture. Prisoners nowadays uniformly hate the U.S. government. And we sit around and ask why recidivism is on the rise!Read the full letter here.
What Will a Democratic Congress Mean for Drug Reform?
One of the articles I'm working on this week will be called "Drug Reform and the Democratic Congress: What's Really Going to Happen?" I've already talked to a number of inside the beltway drug reform types--the folks who actually work the halls of Congress--and I've got feelers out to more, as well as to the offices of several of the congressional Democrats who will be chairing key committees.
Seven Million -- and Counting
The Bureau of Justice Statistics annual report on use of the criminal justice system has come out, and there is landmark grim news: There are now seven million people under criminal justice control -- in prison or jail, on probation, or or parole -- in the United States.
I am having trouble finding a link to the report -- maybe it's not posted yet -- but Phil will be covering this in Drug War Chronicle tonight. So check back for more details on the bad news...I'm sick and tired of begging my fellow citizens to not throw me in jail...
...because I might smoke something of which they don't approve. Imprisoning people for drug use or possession is a violation of fundamental human rights, and I don't give a rat's ass what the law says. The US government and the governments of all the states are committing massive human rights violations with their drugs policies, and those Good Germans who allow it to continue are complicit.
Pot Politics
It's going to be a lot of pot politics in the Drug War Chronicle this week. With the November elections now little more than a month away, there are developments in both Colorado and Nevada, the two states where measures that would free the weed are on the ballot. In Colorado, SAFER Colorado campaign director Mason Tvert is debating Colorado Attorney General John Suthers today.
A Look Inside Brazil's Drug "Commands"
Brazil, Latin America's largest and most populous nation gets surprisingly little press in the US. The mass media paid some attention back in May, when the country's "commands"--the criminal gangs formed in Brazil's prisons that control the drug trade and act as a de facto government in some of the favelas (ghettos) surrounding Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro--rose up in open rebellion against the Brazilian state. But since then, the silence in the US press has been deafening.