Pubdate: Wed, 14 Aug 2013
Source: Las Vegas Review-Journal (NV)
Copyright: 2013 Las Vegas Review-Journal
Website: http://www.lvrj.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/233
Page: 6B

HIGH TIME FOR CHANGE

Holder's Drug Enforcement Reforms Overdue

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder finally has made headlines for a
good reason: announcing money-saving, life-saving drug enforcement
reforms the Obama administration should have imposed years ago. In a
Monday speech to American Bar Association members, Mr. Holder laid out
sweeping changes in the way the Justice Department will prosecute
nonviolent drug offenders, ending harsh mandatory minimum sentences to
shrink the country's swelling prison population while making violent
crime and national security concerns higher priorities.

The country's chief law enforcement officer all but admitted the
decades-long war on drugs is a failure.

"Widespread incarceration at the federal, state and local levels is
both ineffective and unsustainable," Mr. Holder said. "It imposes a
significant economic burden - totaling $80 billion in 2010 alone - and
it comes with human and moral costs that are impossible to calculate."

Amen. Draconian drug sentencing hasn't stopped drug use. It has put
ever more harmless people behind bars, enabled the growth of violent
criminal enterprises and turned many communities into police states,
where officers break down doors in the dead of night to bust
small-time dealers and users. Because of the war on drugs, the United
States has the highest incarceration rate in the world, with 25
percent of the planet's prison inmates but just 5 percent of its
population. Since 1980, the nation's federal prison population has
grown by 800 percent. According to the San Jose Mercury News, nearly
50 percent of some 220,000 federal inmates are behind bars for drug
offenses, and 49 percent of drug offenders are serving between five
and 15 years.

Mr. Holder aims to reduce those long sentences by ending the
disclosure of the amount of drugs defendants were caught with,
provided they aren't tied to gangs or other large organizations.
Without that information, judges can't impose minimum sentences of
five or 10 years, which date back to the 1980s. Federal prosecutors
will instead recommend drug treatment and community service programs.

"They now will be charged with offenses for which the accompanying
sentences are better suited to their individual conduct, rather than
excessive prison terms more appropriate for violent criminals or drug
kingpins," Mr. Holder said. "By reserving the most severe penalties
for serious, high-level, or violent drug traffickers, we can better
promote public safety, deterrence and rehabilitation while making our
expenditures smarter and more productive."

The only troubling part of Mr. Holder's plan: As with so many other
Obama administration initiatives, it involves ignoring the law to
achieve a desired end. Although the attorney general enjoys a great
deal of prosecutorial discretion in pursuing administration
priorities, executive power is not unlimited. Mr. Holder should work
with the president, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and
Republican House leaders to repeal federal drug sentencing guidelines.
Legislation already introduced by Sens. Pat Leahy, D-Vt., and Rand
Paul, R-Ky., would give judges the flexibility to impose sentences
below mandatory minimums.

Then Mr. Holder should take additional steps to limit overzealous
prosecutions of nonviolent drug users. First, Mr. Holder should honor
Barack Obama's 2008 campaign promise to cease prosecutions of medical
marijuana users and dispensaries in states that have legalized
prescription use of the drug - Nevada among them. Second, Mr. Holder
should demand significant reforms to asset forfeiture laws that allow
police to seize the wealth and possessions of drug suspects for use as
a slush fund before those suspects are convicted.

It has taken far too long for elected leaders to acknowledge the
suffering that has resulted from our drug policies, including mass
carnage in Chicago and along the Mexican border. Law-and-order
conservatives and timid liberals finally are agreeing with what
libertarians pointed out long ago: Legalization, licensing and
taxation of the drug trade, along with increased treatment, prevention
and educational programs, would be far cheaper and less damaging to
the public. Colorado and Washington state voters said as much last
year when they legalized recreational use of marijuana. Mr. Holder's
plan applies only to federal cases, so state and local officials need
to adopt their own measures to further dial back the drug war.

Mr. Holder's new policy isn't perfect. But it's a darn good start.
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