Pubdate: Fri, 03 Jan 2003
Source: Wisconsin State Journal (WI)
Copyright: 2003 Madison Newspapers, Inc.
Contact:  http://www.wisconsinstatejournal.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/506
Author: Bruce Rideout
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)

DRUG LAWS CREATE FINANCIAL REWARDS

I am disturbed by several statements in the article about the two men found 
guilty in a drug dealer related murder last December. The first is Judge 
Paul Higginbotham's' admonishment of the two defendants for being black and 
selling cocaine to blacks. From the description of the events, one of the 
defendants owed the victim $9000.00.

Maybe I am mistaken but seems that if you are the one owed money for 
cocaine you sold it. So it seems the judge wanted to make this statement in 
his final remarks but one of the persons who really should have heard it is 
dead.

Also, the failure of prohibition seems lost on him. He chastises the 
defendants about dealing being the only way to make a living. It may be 
news to the kind judge but lots of folks would find making thousands of 
dollars on a drug deal to be a nice way to make lots of money. By anyone of 
any color.

Yet he sits in judgment over the results of over 60 years of prohibition 
and still does not see that it is all about making substances costing 
pennies worth thousands of dollars simply by making them illegal. This is 
the true face of prohibition. Victims, defendants, police, lawyers, and 
judges blindly and sometimes viciously plunging down the abyss of madness 
with no one at the brake. All I can say is how many more is enough before 
we can call a truce?

Bruce Rideout, Madison
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