News Brief

The new national drug strategy is out and it looks very much like the old national drug strategy, retaining the seemingly eternal 60:40 split between law enforcement and interdiction on one hand and treatment and prevention on the other.

It's taken ever so long, but it now looks like dispensaries will soon be operating in New Jersey and Washington, DC. Meanwhile, the battles over medical marijuana continue across the country.

A drug raid gone bad has left a New Hampshire police chief dead, four other members of a drug task force wounded, and, early Friday morning, the suspect still holed up in his home with a woman, surrounded by a SWAT team.

Missouri has the most extreme crack vs. powder cocaine sentencing disparity in the nation, but a bill that passed the House Thursday would reduce it. The bill still has to get through the Senate.

The federal offensive against dispensaries in California and Colorado continues, even as more state legislatures take up medical marijuana.

Police in Washington state must first obtain a search warrant to search a vehicle for evidence of the crime for which they have already arrested the driver, the state Supreme Court ruled last week.

More pain pill peddling, plus a pervy DARE officer, and a Hawaii cop with a medical marijuana card who was allegedly up to more than maintaining his own health.

The Dutch government appears to be moving toward banning khat, which is used almost exclusively by the country's Somali immigrant community, but the move is being increasingly criticized.

A Denver man is dead of an apparent overdose after scuffling with police and a Kentucky man was shot and killed by police after fleeing from a meth lab. Those are the 20th and 21st drug war deaths of 2012.

An attempt to take down a small-time crack dealer in Jacksonville has left one man dead after allegedly refusing to drop his weapon after police ordered him to do so.