Pubdate: Thu, 09 May 2002 Source: Daily Herald (IL) Copyright: 2002 The Daily Herald Company Contact: http://www.dailyherald.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/107 Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/rehab.htm (Treatment) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/prison.htm (Incarceration) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin) HURT DEALERS, BUT GET HELP TO USERS If there is anyone who benefits from yet another person becoming a drug user it is the dealer who takes dollars for something that ruins or takes lives. Laws that prescribe penalties for such destructive conduct have to be tough enough to both mete out appropriate justice and hopefully serve as a deterrent to drug dealing. The Illinois General Assembly has taken a strong step in this direction. Currently, heroin dealers can evade more serious jail time by limiting the amount of the drug they have in their possession at one time. Legislation passed Tuesday by the Illinois Senate closes that loophole by making felony possession of 1 to 15 grams of heroin punishable by up to 15 years in prison. The bill that was sponsored in the Senate by Sen. David Sullivan, a Park Ridge Republican, already has been approved by the House. There is no debating the destructiveness of heroin use, which is increasing at an alarming rate in the suburbs. Merchants of misery have to be dealt with severely. This bill is aimed at those who possess drugs not to use them, but with the specific intent of selling them. But even if every dealer is thrown in jail, it doesn't solve the problem of peer pressure to take drugs. It doesn't cure addiction and its awful consequences - crime, economic ruin and families torn asunder. It also is evident that toughening penalties - the linchpin of this nation's strategy for abating drug abuse - has not effectively reduced demand. It has, though, put a strain on state budgets, including Illinois', that are now badly out of balance. Indeed, a recent study by the nonprofit organization Justice Policy Institute revealed that "today it is costing states, counties and the federal government nearly $40 billion to imprison approximately two million state and local inmates, up from $5 billion in combined prison and jail expenditures in 1978. Twenty-four billion of that was spent on the incarceration of nonviolent offenders." These include drug offenders. Effective treatment programs, such as drug courts that give drug abusers a chance to avoid incarceration by making a commitment to get clean, need more policy and funding attention. Admittedly, that is tough to do in today's budget-crisis atmosphere. But treatment and drug education simply have to be given a higher priority. There is no disputing drug dealers have to get the kind of attention from lawmakers that is found in the recent action taken by the Illinois General Assembly. But the human wreckage dealers leave behind as they pack for prison has to be repaired, too, if there is to be substantial progress in getting a handle on a drug abuse problem that is far from being brought under control. - --- MAP posted-by: Ariel