News Brief

From a Supreme Court whose rulings too frequently defy both justice and common sense, finally, a decision that embraces both. The high court has unanimously held that a pair of petty drug offenses is not grounds for mandatory deportation of legal immigrants.

A marijuana moon over Miami Beach? How romantic. A decriminalization initiative campaign is underway to make the tourist destination a bit more pot-friendly.

Five officers convicted of criminal offenses, two officers fired, six officers disciplined, one officer resigning to avoid discipline -- that's the toll the killing of Kathryn Johnston in a botched drug raid has taken on the Atlanta Police Department. The department says it's learned its lesson. Let's hope it's true.

Ciudad Juarez passed a grim milestone this week as it marked its one thousandth prohibition-related killing of the year.

Well, we've got another questionable drug raid killing by police, this time in Las Vegas. A 21-year-old black man, Trevon Cole, who smoked a little pot, was about to become a father when Las Vegas police burst through his apartment door. Now, he's dead--shot by a narcotics detective--and not for any good reason that the police have so far provided. Oh, and the cop who shot him seems to have a bad habit of shooting people under questionable circumstances.

Washington is now the second state to adopt a "911 Good Samaritan" laws in a bid to prevent drug overdose fatalities. It's a smart harm reduction move.

Fire bombs. Graffiti attacks. Anonymous anti-medical marijuana flyers handed out to school children. Whether medical marijuana has gone too far is a hot issue in Billings, Montana, and it's simmering all over Big Sky Country as "ganja-preneurs" push the envelope.

Iranian hangmen have been keeping busy in recent weeks as some 30 drug offenders have been executed since May 23. Maybe it's time to ramp up that campaign against the death penalty for drug offenses.

In 2006, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled that people could be prosecuted as drugged drivers based solely on the presence of marijuana metabolites in their bodily fluids. Now, a more liberal Supreme Court has overturned that decision, holding that marijuana metabolites are not controlled substances and the states drugged driving law can thus not be applied to them.

It was judgment day for two crooked cops and a jail guard this week, and another jail guard just found out his judgment day is coming. Meanwhile, new corrupt cop cases showed up at a rate of one a day this week.