News Brief

A proposed draconian new drug law in the southwestern African nation of Namibia is running into intense opposition at public hearings this week. Some people think 20 years in prison for possessing a joint is too much.

North Dakota's Agriculture Commissioner signed the first two licenses for farmers to grow hemp on Monday, but they must still win approval from the DEA. Don't hold your breath.

Despite the meth mania rampant in the media and among law enforcement and politicians, official numbers show meth use levels stagnant in recent years and beginning to decline in 2005.

Narcotics officers in Jacksonville, Florida, shot and killed two men in separate incidents during undercover drug operations in late January. Both men were black, neither was a drug dealer, and calls for an investigation are increasing.

Britain's Conservative Party has joined the call to license Afghan opium. The move comes just days after the British Medical Association called for it to be converted into diamorphine (heroin) for use by the National Health Service.

Louisiana's "heroin lifers" got no relief from the state Supreme Court last week when it ruled a 2001 law cutting sentences did not apply retroactively. But they still have one more avenue of redress.

This week, we have a prison guard busted for smuggling drugs OUT of a jail, along with more typical drug-smuggling guard cases, a teenage military policeman in trouble, a retirement age former cop busted, and another Nashville police officer found guilty of drug corruption charges.

The UC Berkeley student senate Wednesday night passed a measure that will provide $400 scholarships for students denied federal aid under the Higher Education Act's drug provision because they were convicted on drug charges.

Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan has called for stimulant maintenance trials for more than 700 hard-core methamphetamine and cocaine users as part of a broad plan to improve the quality of life in the city before the 2010 Winter Olympics.

More SWAT team madness -- this time, Indiana cops doing a small-time drug raid manage to inflict serious burns on their man when they fired a flash-bang grenade into his home -- business as usual, according to their leader.