News Brief

In a bid to regularize the situation of coca growers, one Peruvian department earlier this year moved to legalize the crop. This week, the country's highest constitutional court overturned that move, saying only the national government can set drug policy.

A Boston cop goes to prison for being muscle for drug dealers, and a Miami-area cop and two prison guards get caught up in a massive Oxycontin and health fraud scandal.

A Lima, Ohio, police sergeant who shot and killed an unarmed woman and wounded her infant son during a SWAT raid was acquitted on all counts this week. He only faced eight months, anyway. But this story isn't over -- relatives have now filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city and the shooter.

Drug user activists handed out brochures called for the legalization of drug use in some of Jakarta's most notorious dope-dealing hot-spots this week. It was the second user demonstration this summer in Indonesia.

Argentina's president last week called for the decriminalization of drug possession, lending her support to a bill introduced last year by her justice minister and giving an implicit nod to a series of recent Argentine court decisions that have rejected punishing drug users.

The Arizona Court of Appeals has rejected a religious defense for marijuana use and possession.

In a victory for California's medical marijuana law, a state appeals court has rejected a challenge to the law from San Diego County. But it isn't over yet. The county said Tuesday it would appeal to the state Supreme Court.

DEA trainers are in Vietnam this month to show Vietnamese how to have a drug war American-style, but the UN's man on the scene doesn't find that particularly helpful.

The National Multiple Sclerosis Society is calling for more research on medical marijuana. While that's only a half-step on the society's part, it's a half-step forward.

Rep. Jose Serrano (D-NY) and 25 cosponsors have filed a bill that would lift the 20-year-old federal ban on funding for needle exchange programs.