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Congress Reforms Cocaine Convictions
Congress has reformed a law that subjected tens of thousands of black people to long prison terms for crack cocaine convictions while giving far more lenient treatment to mainly white people caught with the powder form of the drug.
The US House of Representatives approved a bill reducing the disparities between mandatory crack and powder cocaine sentences, which will now be sent for President Barack Obama's signature.
The 1986 law decreed that possession of five grams of crack triggered a mandatory minimum five-year prison sentence (Photo: ALAMY) During his presidential campaign, Mr Obama said that the wide gap in sentencing "cannot be justified and should be eliminated".
More than eight in 10 of those convicted for crack offences in 1987 are black, according to Senator Pat Leahy, a top supporter of the bill when it passed earlier in the Senate.
That is "wrong and unfair, and it has needlessly swelled our prisons, wasting precious federal resources," Sen Leahy said after the House had voted.
The measure alters a 1986 law enacted at a time when crack cocaine use was rampant and considered a particularly violent drug.
It decreed that possession of five grams of crack triggered a mandatory minimum five-year prison sentence. The same mandatory sentence applied to a person convicted of trafficking 500 grams of powder cocaine.
The legislation as introduced by its lead author, Democratic Senator Dick Durbin, would have that imbalance from a ratio of 100 to 1 to 1 to 1, but deal-making to ensure its passage resulted in a compromise ratio of 18 to 1.
It also eliminated the five-year mandatory minimum for first-time possession of crack, in a rare instance of Congress repealing a mandatory minimum sentence.
"For Congress to take a step toward saying 'we have made a mistake' and this sentence is too severe ... is really remarkable," said Virginia Sloan, president of the Constitution Project.
The new legislation will apply the five-year term to someone with 28 grams, or an ounce, of crack.
Julie Stewart, president of Families Against Mandatory Minimums, said 28 grams is about what the average crack dealer might carry around.
She said politicians and the US Sentencing Commission have for years acknowledged the unfairness of the system, "but no one wanted to look soft on crime". The legislative change, she said, was "much more about being smart on crime".
Almost 3,000 people a year subjected to the mandatory sentence would be affected by the change. The average sentence in these cases would be reduced from 106 months to 79 months. Some 80 per cent of those convicted of crack cocaine offences are black.
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19 Comments so far
Show AllIt's about damn time. Shows how bad this Congress really is that it took them this long to set right a real miscarriage of justice.
Most people working spend maybe 20 thousand a year, in prison they cost us 50 thousand.
Well, in the old way of thinking they were more valuable to the economy IN JAIL!
But, now they may be realizing, they can't put everybody in jail and still have an economy.
Maybe they want to make room for us.
Maybe we should increase penalties for powder use to the same as crack use and put more uppity white people in jail. Better yet decriminalize and take out the profits to the dealers and cartels, this country's use of cocaine is destroying Latin-America especially beautiful Colombia
I suppose it's a start but come on... What level of mess will be considered a failure in the drug war? Unless, of course, the true purpose is to trash the 4th and 5th amendments, then it's been a beyond expectations success.
I, for the life of me, will never understand why you should be held to a higher level of punishment for having EXACTLY the SAME DRUG in your possession as someone else who has the SAME DRUG in theirs. It is STILL racist BULLSHIT, thank you congress. 18 times more time for the SAME crime? This is horse crap.
Congress, you should STILL be ashamed of yourselves. We all KNOW that your drug war isn't for anyone's health or safety, it's all about power and screwing other people BECAUSE YOU CAN.
This is racist from it's very beginnings, ALL drug laws are. Cocaine was made illegal in 1914 because we had to save the white women from doing it and sleeping with black men. Opium was made illegal so we could protect the white women from doing it and sleeping the Chinese men. Cannabis was originally made illegal so California could kick the Mexicans out of the state. By the time it got to the federal level in 1937, we had to protect the white women again, and it was black men again who were the danger. Laws based on racist attitudes need to be sent to hell where they belong.
Now, it's all a class and profit thing. Paris Hilton can get caught and not do a minute, we get caught in EXACTLY the same way, and we do time. The two tiered JUST US system has GOT TO GO.
Shame on you CONgress. You are once again truly proving that you are indeed the opposite of PROgress.
I grew up in the crack epidemic in the South Bronx and trust me those laws enacted truly helped to curb the crime in our streets. However, crack is no longer a problem or an epidemic therefore, those laws are antiquated. However, at the time those laws truly made sense.
We need real national health care and free treatment programs for those who are abusing drugs or alcohol.
Millions of people in our prisons have primarily a drug and or alcohol problem and rarely get treatment in prison. They often get out and go back to using and get into trouble again.
Legalization of drugs with universal treatment programs would eliminate the criminal commerce and violence and save the money wasted on the endless "war on drugs" as well as the cost of keeping people locked up.
Just imagine if substance abusers could go from being locked up at a cost of $50,000 a year per person into an employed person paying taxes and being part of the economy ? Such a recovery would also lighten the load of enforcing the current laws.
And of course, just imagine the happiness factor when communities become free of the drugs and crime scenario and the users in recovery become part of society once again.
We might even be able to close many of the corporate prisons.
Very well written and true. We have 2 million people in prison at any given time. That is the size of a large city, drug addiction is a medical problem. Now these offenders do cross over to crime, to keep their habit going, but if we addressed the medical part, the crime part would be illiminated.
This prison city keeps allot of Judges, and Lawyers working, and the prison guards are like an army.I don't have any clue of the actual number but I am sure putting these people in jail keeps millions of people working in the criminal system. However these people could be employed in helping and counceling, housing etc. the drug addicts towards a positive outcome, instead of creating an even worse type of criminal.
A look at a pie chart illustrating substance abuse in the US shows most of the abuse being alcohol and prescription drugs, while marijuana, coke, heroin combined make up a sliver of the pie. Hard to say which drug congress is on, but they all are in desperate need of rehab.
Now overturn this ridiculous, fake Drug War --
which is also racist -- and intended to foster a prison
industry agenda --
Not only is it insane to lock people up for using natural
plants - it's even more insane in regard to the brutal
conditions in the prisons which does further harm to these
individuals -- who, btw, are finally released.
Almost a half million prisoners a year are released and
expected to then live in and cope in our society,
communities.
"BEWARE OF THOSE WITH A STRONG URGE TO PUNISH" ---
.
"According to all myth, the female - not the male -- gives life"
This sounds like it will only effect federal drug crime sentencing.
I would imagine that that the percentage of people arrested for possession at the federal, rather than state levels, would be extremely small.
Further it only seems to be addressing possession laws, not trafficking laws, which were more common at the federal level.
You would think people process the crack cocaine into power cocaine therefore reducing the risk.
But, I guess if you are a crack head, you don't think too far into the future.
Does that mean that "Congress" understands that
drugs are, from top to bottom, the only "growth industry"
in the USA?
Does that mean that "Congress" understands that
drugs are, from top to bottom, the only "growth industry"
in the USA?
all illegal drugs should be decriminalized. arbitrary punishment for people who use substances that are not the soup de jour is hypocritical and creates larger social problems.
i agree w/ WJM (11:54), 'Shame on you CONgress. You are once again truly proving that you are indeed the opposite of PROgress.'
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"This is Your Country on Drugs: The Secret History of Getting High in America" - Ryan Grim...
http://yourcountryondrugs.com/reviews.html
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remember to support prop 19 in California, it could be a tipping point.
http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/2010/jul/29/new_california_poll_has_prop_19
"A majority of California voters support Proposition 19, the state's Tax and Regulate Cannabis marijuana legalization initiative, according to a poll released Tuesday by Public Policy Polling. The poll has support at 52%, with 36% opposed and 12% undecided."
...peace...
I am keeping a hopeful eye on prop 19, but won't hold my breath, or my toke, until it passes...
California, though, so who knows? We'll be watching with interest...
voting is such a tenuous exercise...
Yet, once again, another less than brilliant decision from the "mad" house.
Where do we find these morons?
Not all crime is illegal.
What a mess we are in.
And it's getting worse.
Stop the stupid drug wars...there are legal ways to get quite buzzed, so why are some drugs worse than others? Just control the sales of it. Hell, even the greedy pharmaceutical companies should like that; they can manufacture the stuff. Maybe even deadly OD's would go down--at least the ones where the potency of a particular drug is unknown. Additionally, the thrill of doing something illegal will be taken away.
And for nicotine...??