Pubdate: Tue, 12 Dec 2000
Source: Cape Cod Times (MA)
Copyright: 2000 Cape Cod Times.
Contact:  319 Main St., Hyannis, MA 02601
Fax: (508) 771-3292
Feedback: http://www.capecodonline.com/cctimes/edits/letters.htm
Website: http://www.capecodonline.com/cctimes/
Author: Sean Gonsalves
Note: Sean Gonsalves is a Cape Cod Times staff writer and syndicated 
columinist.
Related: See 'I Am Wrongly Imprisoned For 19 Years' by Dorothy Gaines at
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n540/a04.html
And the call from the clergy at
http://www.cjpf.org/clemency/

CLERGY CALL FOR CLEMENCY

In prison, languishing, but not without hope, is Dorothy Gaines.
Gaines, you may recall, is among the 80,000 or so of our fellow
Americans serving time in federal prison as a drug offender.

Throw in all those convicted of drug law violations in state prisons
and the number of drug offenders incarcerated across these United
States climbs to about 500,000 - a tenfold increase compared to the
number behind bars for drug offenses in 1980.

Gaines was charged with "conspiracy" to possess and distribute crack
cocaine. She was convicted on the testimony of drug dealers who
testified against her to reduce their own prison sentences.

A search of her home had turned up no drugs, money or paraphernalia.
Even state attorneys declined to prosecute her. But, federal
prosecutors - under the mandate of our elected leaders to "get tough
on crime" - decided to pursue the case. Gaines, a widowed mother of
three, entered federal prison on March 10, 1995, to serve a 20-year
sentence!

For a little perspective, it's revealing to note that the number of
people locked up in "the land of the free" for drug offenses exceeds,
by 100,000, the entire prison population of the 12 nations of the
European Union, even though the EU has 100 million more citizens!

"Sometimes our greatest need is not for more laws. It is for more
conscience. Sometimes our greatest hope is not found in reform. It is
found in redemption." Those are the words of the apparent
president-elect George W. Bush, talking specifically about the
"redemption" of prisoners in a July 1999 speech.

Undoubtedly, Bush is aware that many federal drug prisoners are
serving excruciatingly long sentences of 20 years to life, with no
chance of parole, because of 1984 legislation enacted by Congress in
the name of the "war on drugs."

In that "Armies of Compassion" speech, Bush acknowledged, "America has
tripled its prison population in the last 15 years."

Then he proceeded to say that this unprecedented race to incarcerate
"is a necessary and effective role of government - protecting our
communities from predators. But it has left a problem - an estimated
1.3 million children who have one or both parents in prison."

Well, it's true that imprisonment has severe consequences for many
communities. But it's misleading, to put it mildly, to say that
jailing nonviolent drug offenders, the bulk of the prison population,
protects us from "predators."

The average federal prison sentence for drug offenders is longer than
the average federal prison sentence for those convicted of rape,
assault or robbery, according to the U.S. Justice Department. There
are even cases of nonviolent drug offenders serving sentences longer
than those being served by murderers! Gaines is one of the more
well-known examples.

Prisons, Bush said, are "institutions, at their best, (that) treat
people as moral individuals, with responsibilities and duties, not as
wards or clients or dependents or numbers."

Gaines' federal prisoner number is 05609-003. Right now, more than 600
clergy men and women are petitioning President Clinton to treat
low-level, nonviolent offenders convicted under mandatory minimum laws
not as numbers but as children of God.

In fact, they are appealing to Clinton's sense of responsibility and
duty, formally requesting the president exercise his constitutional
power to pardon prisoners during this time of Jubilee.

"We ask you to grant clemency to, and release on supervised parole,
those federal prisoners who have served at least five years for
low-level, nonviolent involvement in drug cases, as defined by the
U.S. Department of Justice," the letter says.

In 1994, according to the Justice Department, "there were 16,316
prisoners who could be considered low-level drug law violators."

On July 7, President Clinton commuted the sentences of five prisoners
serving time for drug offenses. Will he answer this clergy call for
clemency? Would a President Bush? Only with the organized support of
people like you and an army of other decent folk joining the clemency
campaign.

I don't know how history will judge Clinton or Bush. But I do know how
Jesus, and therefore any believer with integrity, judges those
unmerciful to prisoners.

In the book of Matthew, Jesus says: "Then shall the righteous answer
him, saying, Lord, when did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or a
stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison and minister unto you? Then
he shall answer them, saying,  "Truthfully, I say to you: In as much
as you did it to one of the least of these, you did it to me'."

What are you doing?
- ---
MAP posted-by: Richard Lake