Pubdate: Tue, 13 Aug 2013 Source: Chicago Tribune (IL) Copyright: 2013 Chicago Tribune Company Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/IuiAC7IZ Website: http://www.chicagotribune.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/82 Author: Joseph Tanfani, Tribune Washington Bureau Page: 1 DEMS, GOP HAIL NEW POLICY Holder Calls for Easing of Harsh Drug Sentences WASHINGTON - In a sign of growing disenchantment with the war on drugs, Republicans joined Democrats and reform advocates Monday in praising Attorney General Eric Holder's declaration that it is time to rethink get-tough policies that have tied the hands of judges and swelled the populations of federal prisons. The nation's top law enforcement officer, decrying the "moral and human costs" of mass incarceration, said he would instruct federal prosecutors to change the way they charge some drug offenders to avoid triggering mandatory minimum sentencing laws that have significantly boosted prison terms. The federal prison population has exploded, even as populations in state prisons have steadily declined. "The course we are on is far from sustainable," Holder said, speaking to the American Bar Association in San Francisco. "As the so-called war on drugs enters its fifth decade, we need to ask whether it and the approaches that comprise it have been truly effective." Holder said the Justice Department will increase efforts to find alternatives to incarceration and ways to smooth the compassionate release of severely ill prisoners who are no longer a threat to the public. Former prosecutors said the changes probably won't affect a huge number of cases. But advocates for drug policy reform said Holder's statements were long overdue and could reframe the debate about sentencing policy. "It's the first time a U.S. attorney general has spoken so forcefully or offered such a detailed proposal for sentencing reform - and particularly notable that he framed the issue in moral terms," said Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance. Holder is essentially following the lead of states like Georgia, Ohio and Texas, which have reformed sentencing rules, given judges more discretion and steered some offenders into treatment. State prison populations have dropped since 2009, according to Justice Department statistics. Not so in the federal system. There are about 218,950 inmates, an 800 percent increase since 1980. Nearly 47 percent are drug offenders, and prison costs now account for about a third of the Justice Department's budget. Those spiraling costs have helped persuade conservatives to embrace sentencing reform. In March, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., joined with Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., to introduce legislation to expand judges' discretion in federal criminal cases. Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Mike Lee, R-Utah, have introduced a bill that would ease mandatory sentencing rules. "I am encouraged that the president and attorney general agree with me that mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent offenders promote injustice and do not serve public safety," Paul said. The mandatory sentencing policies once had broad support in Congress. In the wake of the cocaine overdose death of basketball star Len Bias in 1986, Democrats and Republicans rushed to outdo each other to support a law that tied the hands of judges and forced mandatory sentences on drug dealers Many federal judges have chafed at the restrictions. In an opinion last year, U.S. District Judge John Gleeson said he was forced to impose a five-year sentence on a street-level dealer. "It was not a just sentence," he wrote, calling on Holder to change the charging guidelines to target drug kingpins, as Congress intended. There were some voices of opposition. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., said sentencing reform is a good idea, but Holder should be working with Congress rather than "selectively enforcing our laws" and overstepping executive power. Holder's policy change instructs federal prosecutors how to write up certain kind of drug cases involving low-level offenders without a weapon. In those cases, Holder told prosecutors not to include the amount of drugs on charging documents if those amounts would trigger the mandatory guidelines. Holder's new policy will affect only defendants without a "significant criminal history," said Matt Kaiser, a Washington-based criminal defense attorney and former federal public defender. "It's not that the change helps nobody," Kaiser said, "but it's so close to nobody that the practical effect is negligible." Christi Parsons contributed. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom