Pubdate: Tue, 19 Apr 2005
Source: Hartford Courant (CT)
Copyright: 2005 The Hartford Courant
Contact:  http://www.ctnow.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/183
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?199 (Mandatory Minimum Sentencing)

BRING CRACK PENALTIES INTO LINE

GREATER HARTFORD - After a year's delay, the General Assembly seems
on its way to correcting a longstanding inequity that has
unnecessarily contributed to jail crowding.

By a vote of 24 to 13, the Judiciary Committee last week approved an
amendment to last year's law to reduce prison crowding. The change
ends the disparity in sentencing for possession of crack cocaine and
powdered cocaine.

Current law specifies that a person arrested for selling or possessing
a half gram of crack, a refined form of cocaine, faces the same
mandatory minimum sentence of five to 20 years in jail and a maximum
life term as someone who sells or possesses an ounce of pure cocaine.
A half gram of crack, which in Hartford sells for about $15, is 1/56th
of an ounce of cocaine. Cocaine sells for about $800 an ounce.

Under the amendment, a person would have to possess an ounce of crack
to trigger the same penalty as applies for having an ounce of cocaine.

Although few if any defendants are ever convicted under the current
crack statute, prosecutors use its tough penalties to intimidate
scores of street addicts - people who really should be in treatment
centers and mental hospitals - to plead to reduced charges that carry
a minimum mandatory sentence of three years of jail time. The practice
contributes appreciably to prison crowding.

Legal and academic experts, including Chief State's Attorney
Christopher Morano, have for about a decade advocated equalizing the
sentence. But last year, lawmakers killed the amendment for fear of
appearing soft on crime.

This year, fortified with research and a grassroots lobbying effort by
Hartford-based Create Change and The Alliance of Connecticut,
legislators on the committee approved the bill overwhelmingly.

The full legislature and Gov. M. Jodi Rell should follow suit.
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MAP posted-by: Derek