Re your Wednesday editorial, "Violence": The South Florida Sun-Sentinel has finally determined that there is gang violence in Palm Beach County. And, lo and behold, it's in Boynton Beach. Oh, wait, what about the rest of the county? There were 92 homicides this year in Palm Beach County, of which 14 were teens. In the past three years, West Palm Beach has seen at least 24 young African- American men being shot. What happened at the Boynton Beach Mall on Christmas Eve was a tragedy. But to say that gang violence is out of control in Boynton Beach is to show a narrow-sighted view of the problem. If gang violence is out of control, it is not just in Boynton Beach. What about the shootings throughout the rest of South Florida? [continues 162 words]
As the article by Christopher Lee outlined, we need to do more to protect our kids from cough-medicine abuse ["Teens Turn to Medicine Cabinets to Get High," Friday]. The Monitoring the Future survey Lee referenced found that that 4.2 percent of eighth-graders, 5.3 percent of 10th-graders and 6.9 percent of 12th-graders have abused cough medicine in some form over the past year. It's time to teach kids - and their parents, who may be unaware of their teen's activities - about the dangers of abusing these otherwise safe medicines. [continues 264 words]
Tough on crime. Who could possibly argue with that? Everyone hates crime. A fair amount of criminals hate crime, hate what crime has done to their lives and hate that they can't seem to get away from a life of crime. The tough-on-crime political platform of the '80s has become an unbeatable ticket into office for scores of candidates. Tough-on-crime must be effective, since nobody has questioned the approach. More criminals are in prison for longer periods of time. Judges no longer have the power of discretion. Inmates are no longer eligible for parole, nor can they enjoy unlimited access to the courts. As a result, inmates are warehoused in violent institutions patiently learning their lessons and feeling the deterrent effect of the tough-on-crime monster. [continues 183 words]
The shooting death of a 23-year-old Lake Worth man at the Boynton Beach Mall on Christmas Eve is a grim reminder that gang violence isn't a problem only for certain neighborhoods and communities. Dozens of shoppers who ran for their lives as the bullets flew know that well-armed young criminals are prepared to settle scores most anywhere and any time - including upscale department stores during the holidays. Boynton Beach police believe a gang feud led Jesse Cesar, 21, to gun down Berno Charlemond. On Tuesday, Cesar, a reputed member of the San Castle Soldiers, was charged with first-degree murder and attempted murder of a police officer; Fregens Daniel, 21, of Boynton Beach also was charged as an accessory. [continues 450 words]
What is wrong with our criminal justice system? The Dec. 19 news item "Drug bust at house" is a perfect example. These convicted felons still prowl our streets instead of being in prison -- three convicted felons arrested again. One was arrested 20 times since 1999 for various serious crimes. Two days prior to his arrest in North Port, he was arrested for resisting an officer. Another felon was arrested 11 times since 1992, including robbery and gun possession violations. The third felon was arrested three times on drug and gun charges with two of the cases still pending in court. A stolen gun was recovered in this raid. Possession of a firearm by a felon is a violation of federal law. Why are these felons roaming our streets instead of doing prison time for their crimes? Our justice system needs a total review to deal with these career criminals. Our civilized society should demand nothing better. Art Grams, Nokomis [end]
Boynton Beach's out-of-control gang violence became a national spectacle this weekend. That's what will happen when a known member of a notorious gang pulls out a gun at a crowded shopping mall, on Christmas Eve no less, and shoots a man dead in front of thousands of holiday shoppers. Not the way an up-and-coming city with grand downtown revival plans wants to raise its profile. No matter how great its revitalization turns out, Boynton Beach will never be the shopping and entertainment destination it aspires to be unless it clamps down on the gang activity it has yet to take seriously enough. The Boynton Beach Mall shooting, reported on national network news, should be the wake-up call the city's leadership needs to get its act together. [continues 246 words]
TAMPA - When thinking of Florida's agribusiness, oranges and strawberries probably come to mind. How about pot? Marijuana is the state's No. 3 cash crop - behind vegetables and citrus - according to estimates released last week by a pro-legalization analyst. While legal crops benefit from the Sunshine State's climate, marijuana cultivation in Florida thrives indoors in the temperature-controlled confines of houses with blacked-out windows, according to the report prepared by analyst Jon Gettman. Police and federal authorities have targeted, and stumbled upon, several major grow houses in the Tampa Bay area this year, including a bust last week. [continues 643 words]
DAYTONA BEACH -- In a move to ensure that sworn personnel -- including Police Chief Mike Chitwood -- are not abusing illegal narcotics, the Police Department will begin random drug tests next month. Starting Jan. 15, three to four officers a week will have to give a urine sample to ensure that they're free of drugs, Deputy Police Chief Ben Walton said. That will include everyone from Chitwood to the newest cop on the beat. It's the first time Daytona Beach has put such a program in place, a police union official said, recalling that in the past, officers were only tested for drugs when a "reasonable suspicion" existed. [continues 621 words]
MIAMI -- A Haitian-American man stripped of his U.S. citizenship after being convicted of federal drug trafficking charges was released to his family Thursday, after U.S. authorities failed to find a country where he could be deported. Lionel Jean-Baptiste, 59, said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials let him know Thursday morning he would be released from the Krome Detention Center, about a week after an administrative review of his case. "I'm feeling happy, I'm with my family. I didn't even think they would release me," he said in a telephone interview from his Miami home. "I couldn't wait to get out." [continues 350 words]
Domestic Dispute Leads To Arrests TAMPA - [redacted] grew cilantro, rosemary, oregano, Italian parsley and three kinds of basil on the porch of his south Tampa rental home. What police say he cultivated in two bedrooms and a hallway could land him in a state prison for up to five years. Tampa police arresting [redacted] on a domestic violence charge Tuesday said they later uncovered 163 marijuana plants growing inside the house at [redacted]. Sgt. Keith O'Connor, who runs a street-level antidrug squad, said Winkleman had timed lights and a watering system for the plants, some of which were 4 feet tall. [continues 389 words]
Riviera Beach - The city is trying to revitalize itself, officials said. The first phase came in 101 suspects on drug charges. After a 45-day multi-agency investigation, police arrested 25 of the suspects Wednesday night. There are 60 warrants for the other suspects and probable cause to arrest the remaining 16 suspects, police said. One was a juvenile; most are Riviera Beach residents, police said. The suspects were videotaped selling illegal drugs to undercover officers. At a news conference Thursday, Chief Clarence Williams praised Operation Peace on Earth. [continues 111 words]
This is in regard to Tonyaa Weathersbee's Dec. 9 column. Former Fernandina Beach Police Chief Jerry Cameron is to be commended for raising awareness of the drug war's collateral damage. Attempts to limit the supply of illegal drugs while demand remains constant only increase the profitability of drug trafficking. For addictive drugs like heroin, a spike in street prices leads desperate addicts to increase criminal activity to feed desperate habits. The drug war doesn't fight crime; it fuels crime. [continues 148 words]
Regarding "Tampa-Based Drug War Takes A Toll On Cocaine" (Metro, 12-13- 06). No matter how much cocaine is seized, it will be replaced. And any drug lords that are arrested will also be replaced; they always are. As long as American's want cocaine and are willing to pay a substantial price for it, somebody will produce it and somebody else will get it to the willing buyers. The law of supply and demand cannot be broken with arrests or seizures. Kirk Muse Mesa, Ariz. [end]
Regarding "Mercy Plea Travels A Painful Road" (Metro, Dec. 19): Dan Ruth often writes about bureaucracy gone wild, so it was natural for him to write about the case of Richard Paey, who is afflicted with multiple sclerosis and chronic pain, and was sentenced to 25 years - no parole allowed - for cutting corners to treat his pain. The prosecutor worked seven years through three trials to send Paey to prison. Most of us blame prosecutorial misconduct, but the real culprit is Chapter 893 of the Florida Statutes, under which Paey was prosecuted. The only way to block such prosecutions - Paey is not the only one - is for Chapter 893 to be declared unconstitutional as cruel and unusual punishment. [continues 52 words]
The News Journal recently reported that a local judge sentenced a 20-year-old man to life imprisonment for marketing cocaine. According to the report, no evidence was provided indicating the man had harmed anyone or was in any other way a threat to society. The only reported charges regarded the marketing of a substance arbitrarily stigmatized and deemed "illegal." I use the word "arbitrarily" with intent, since there is no evidence that cocaine products are more addicting or damaging to individual health and social welfare than many socially acceptable drugs. [continues 489 words]
Department of Corrections Secretary Jim McDonough says that Florida will release 36,000 inmates this year and a third of them will be back in the state's prisons within 36 months. The reason so many reoffend, McDonough says, is that "they're not prepared to live a life without crime." Finding ways of helping them change that pattern was the job of a task force appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush that just submitted its final report and recommendations. Most of the task force's findings and suggestions are obvious - providing inmates with educational opportunities because most enter prison with about a 6th-grade reading level; and offering vocational training and substance abuse treatment because more than half of all inmates enter the system with an addiction problem. But Florida does woefully little to help ex-offenders succeed in a crime- free life after prison. And we reap what we sow, with whopping prison costs, higher crime rates and fewer productive citizens. [continues 380 words]
HAWTHORNE -- A North Carolina woman was arrested after complaining to a Putnam County sheriff's deputy that the crack cocaine she had just purchased wasn't very good, authorities said. Eloise D. Reaves, 50, approached the deputy at a convenience store Friday, telling him that another man had sold her "bad crack" that contained wax and cocaine. She pulled a suspected crack rock out of her mouth and placed it on the deputy's car for inspection, the Palatka Daily News reported. The deputy told Reaves that she would be arrested if the crack tested positive for cocaine. She was charged with possession of cocaine and posted bail. [end]
While Gov. Jeb Bush will be vacating his public housing in just a few days, Richard Paey will still remain a "guest" of the state for the next 23 years, a victim of an egregious miscarriage of justice that would embarrass even the most inept banana republic. Of course, that could change. Leadership might be afoot! Jeb's Clemency Board could vote to issue a pardon. In the waning moments of the Bush Administration something extraordinary could occur: doing the right thing. [continues 682 words]
Two Police Officers Were Demoted in the Department's Efforts to Clean Up the Special Investigations Unit. Two Coral Gables police officers have been demoted for their role in an illegal narcotics burn in the Redland yard of another officer. Lt. Alexander Roffe was demoted to the rank of police officer and Sgt. Alan Matas received a 10-day suspension Tuesday when the city manager's office upheld the recommendations of the police chief. Roffe, who could not be reached for comment, will start as an officer in uniform patrol on Monday, said Police Chief Michael Hammerschmidt. [continues 288 words]
Re: Drug Testing Not Best Method to Stop Usage, Dec. 10 Times Editorial: I have two sons who are both athletes, one with great promise. I strongly oppose drug testing. I am greatly offended that the school would even consider making my boys pee in a cup to prove their innocence. If a teacher or coach ever suspected my sons of using drugs, it would be their moral obligation to tell me, and I would take whatever actions I needed to. It is not the school's job to catch my boys doing drugs or not doing drugs. It is my job. And my job starts with knowing their friends, the parents of their friends, and sending everyone a clear message that drugs and alcohol are unacceptable. I will cut off any friendship that violates my rules and my expectations. And my expectations are no drugs, and no drug testing. Tresa Watson Spring Hill [end]
A mistrial was declared Thursday in a federal lawsuit brought against the Polk County Sheriff's Office by the family of a 22-year-old Lakeland man, Jason Michael Britt, who was killed in a drug raid in 2002. His father, Joel Britt, alleges in the lawsuit that an undercover sheriff's deputy was reckless when he shot and killed Jason Britt during a drug raid. The lawsuit contends Deputy Michael Burdette used excessive force. The Sheriff's Office said Jason Britt threatened Burdette with a baseball bat. The trial, in the courtroom of U.S. District Court Judge James Whittemore, is expected to be rescheduled within the first six months of 2007, according to the Sheriff's Office. [end]
What was once described as the largest single seizure of drug profits in U.S. history is helping to finance what local officials tout as the nation's finest police and fire training operation. Boca Raton's International Center for Leadership and Development is scheduled to open in the spring after the $9 million renovation of a 118,000-square-foot building at 6500 Congress Ave., once a Sony Corp. manufacturing plant. "It will be kind of cool to be training law-enforcement officers with bad-guy dollars," said John J. Sullivan Jr., director of training and professional development for the Boca Raton Police Services Department. [continues 319 words]
Myspace.com and similar networking sites offer absolute freedom to users, who can exchange information and meet others who share their interests -- from books and movies to fetishes and drugs. Cell phones allow users to send each other photographs meant to inform, amuse and enrage, all consequence-free. Not so, actually. That's what two Charlotte County teenagers discovered Tuesday, when each was arrested for crimes allegedly arranged or executed through their use of technology. One was accused of unwittingly setting up a drug deal with an undercover Punta Gorda detective over Myspace. The other allegedly sent some retaliatory photographs to his ex-girlfriend's cell phone, and got charged with transmission of child pornography as a result. [continues 621 words]
We Must Take A Comprehensive Approach To Meet The Needs Of Those Treated, Not Just Add More Beds In recent weeks, newspapers have been filled with news of the Department of Children and Families ("DCF") being sued for not having enough state hospital beds for people charged with a felony and determined to be mentally ill or insane. Florida currently has 1,416 designated forensic beds statewide within six mental health facilities. The waiting list, which now exceeds 300, is comprised of people charged with a felony and determined by the court system to be incompetent because of a mental illness, or are people who are found not guilty by reason of insanity. [continues 719 words]
BROOKSVILLE - There was at least $183,289 in federal funding on the table Tuesday night, and perhaps much more. But a divided Hernando County School Board judged the price of taking that money - asking teenagers to submit to random urine tests for the presence of illegal drugs - was too high. By a 3-2 vote, the board rejected a grant it won in October from the Department of Education's Safe and Drug Free Schools program to carry out the testing. [continues 455 words]
MIAMI - An ex-drug lord has admitted he ran a stolen auto ring from behind prison bars, selling roughly $8 million in vehicles between 1999 and 2005. Lorenzo ''Fat Cat'' Nichols pleaded guilty last week to racketeering charges for his role in the ring, which moved about 250 vehicles from South Florida to buyers in 14 other states. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison. It is to be served after he completes his life sentence for drug trafficking and a 40 year-sentence for the killing of his former parole officer. [continues 115 words]
The sting took eight months and nearly 100 drug purchases - all captured on video - but undercover agents are putting a dent in the open-air drug markets that have dominated the western communities of Belle Glade, Pahokee and South Bay, Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw said. Bradshaw said Tuesday that his office had made 30 arrests following a sweep called Operation Crackdown, and said seven more suspects are being sought. Undercover agents bought small amounts of crack cocaine from dealers in the high-crime areas of those cities, he said. [continues 216 words]
Task Force Has Seized More Than 600 Tons TAMPA - The conviction of Joaquin Mario Valencia-Trujillo has not slowed the pace of Operation Panama Express, the Tampa-based international drug investigation that targets Colombian drug smugglers. In seven years, the multiagency task force has claimed credit for the seizure or destruction at sea of more than 600 tons of cocaine, with a street value of nearly $9 billion, in 173 maritime interdictions. The investigation has led to the arrest of more than 1,250 people, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph K. Ruddy, adding that there has been a higher than 96 percent conviction rate. [continues 905 words]
Milton Friedman foretold the economic ineffectiveness of the "War on Drugs" during its infancy in 1972. The policy is now fully mature with 35 years of development. It is past time to evaluate this policy which is not keeping drugs off of our streets and out of the hands of our children. Drug prohibition attempts the impossible eradication of drugs and drug use. The violence resulting from prohibition creates fear of neighborhoods. I don't fear walking into a liquor store. However, I do fear going where drug dealing is on the street. [continues 220 words]
Finally, the government is giving the panhandlers a helping hand. Oh, the government doesn't know it, but there's a flip side to a plan to make transients stop begging for money in low-income neighborhoods. This might force the beggars to think smart and go where the money is. They can set up shop on Spanish Trail, Scenic Highway and Marcus Pointe. They will reach a much wealthier audience in those areas and no doubt get better handouts from the Mercedes and SUV set. [continues 430 words]
Federally Funded School Screening Of Collier Athletes, Cheerleaders Already Has Gaps In Effectiveness Student athletes and cheerleaders in Collier County will be tested for illicit drug use next year, thanks to $209,662 being funneled our way by the federal government. About 3,000 students will be randomly tested for everything from marijuana to PCP. They are part of a nationwide program that is costing the taxpayers $8.6 million. It sounds good, and, frankly it sends a positive message: We don't want our young people ruining their lives with drugs. [continues 525 words]
Where are Sheriff's Detective Gary Martin's priorities? There were 220 fatal overdoses in Palm Beach County last year, largely because of prescription drug abuse, and Martin claims marijuana is the leading drug problem? In the thousands of years marijuana has been used medicinally and recreationally, the plant has never been shown to cause an overdose death. The same cannot be said of aspirin, much less alcohol or prescription drugs. There is a good reason millions of Americans prefer marijuana to martinis. Pot is easily the least harmful recreational drug, legal or otherwise. Robert Sharpe, Policy Analyst Common Sense for Drug Policy Washington, D.C. [end]
Bradenton's Weak Defense Of 'Waivers' Bradenton officials continue to defend the Police Department's questionable practice of seizing cash and other property from people, without establishing even probable cause that the items might be linked to a crime. This practice generates money for the city, but it erodes civil rights - - and it could eventually cost taxpayers money. Last week, the city responded to a court challenge by 20-year-old Delane Johnson, who surrendered $10,200 to police when they stopped him outside an apartment building this summer. Police asserted the money was tied to drug activity, but Johnson was never convicted of a crime. [continues 280 words]
DELAND -- William Collum knew methamphetamine ruined addicts' lives but was surprised to read the drug also hurt innocent victims -- such as a family that moved into a house where meth was once cooked. The report showed how failure to clean the house properly left the air toxic and sickened the family. A financial crisis, breakup and divorce followed, said Collum, a Stetson University political science major. "It was sad reading about the mother who could no longer touch her family pictures because they were so contaminated," Collum said. [continues 596 words]
Call it the rural cocaine. Georgia's prisons are overflowing. And the inmates fueling the boom aren't those who committed their crimes while heeding the call of crack cocaine, but those who were heeding the call of another seductive substance -crystal methamphetamine. Crank. According to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the Georgia Department of Corrections learned that some 250 to 300 people were being incarcerated each month on crank-related charges. That's five to six times the number of people who were being imprisoned on such charges five years ago. [continues 630 words]
Prosecutors Claimed The Tampa Pharmacist Operated A Cyberspace Drug Mill. He Said He Did No Wrong, But Surrendered $400,000 In Assets The Lawsuit In January 2005, the U.S. Attorney's Office in Tampa sought the forfeiture of 18 vehicles and three pieces of property owned by Kenneth O. Shobola, a Tampa pharmacist. The government claimed the assets were purchased with proceeds from illegal drug transactions. Shobola owned several Internet drug sites and four clinics in Tampa and Kissimmee. The businesses, which had $7.6-million in sales in 2004, employed doctors who prescribed mostly hydrocodone, a narcotic painkiller, to out-of-state patients. [continues 1301 words]
Their Demons Make Them Do It Dec. 3, Robyn Blumner Column Thanks to Robyn Blumner for reminding us of the hypocrisy often associated with those who try to control the personal choices of others or legislate morality. As usual, her analysis was brilliant. Michael D. Knox, Tampa [end]
Remember Alcohol Dec. 3, Letter Life with legalized drugs is bad, but life with prohibition is even worse. The writer could have made his case even stronger by reminding us that national prohibition of alcohol was accompanied by reduced death rates from alcoholism and cirrhosis of the liver (See Dr. Clark Warburton's 1932 book The Economic Results of Prohibition). So what were Americans thinking when they ended national Prohibition? Consider this, from the 1930 resolution of the Women's Organization for National Prohibition Reform: "... National Prohibition, wrong in principle, has been equally disastrous in consequences in the hypocrisy, the corruption, the tragic loss of life and the appalling increase of crime which have attended the abortive attempt to enforce it; in the shocking effect it has had upon the youth of the nation; in the impairment of constitutional guarantees of individual rights; in the weakening of the sense of solidarity between the citizen and the government, which is the only sure basis of a country's strength." Those women knew life was better and safer with legal alcohol than life with illegal alcohol because they'd lived it both ways. They learned that driving a popular drug underground causes more societal damage than it prevents. Priscilla M. Chase, Palm Harbor [end]
Florida's drug trafficking laws were stretched beyond their logical limit when they were applied to Richard Paey, a Pasco County man now serving a 25-year mandatory minimum sentence. Paey suffers from debilitating and chronic pain, and he may have violated the law in order to obtain more pain medication. But Paey was convicted of a crime designed to put away drug kingpins and sentenced accordingly. It is a sentence that should not stand. This sentiment was well articulated in a stinging opinion by Associate Judge James Seals in the 2nd District Court of Appeal case of Paey vs. Florida, in which Paey appealed his sentence as cruel and unusual punishment. Unfortunately, Seals was writing in the dissent. [continues 405 words]
Back in 1990, Jerry Cameron was mighty pleased with himself. That February, the Fernandina Beach police chief and his officers snagged 14 crack dealers during "Operation Habitual Offender." This time, he thought, things would be different because the persistent ones faced being put away. "These guys were actually laughing about getting arrested on past occasions," Cameron told the Times-Union then. "We've even had them say they would not quit selling drugs. But some drug dealers were still laughing. Soon, Cameron would see that drug trade was bigger than a few hustlers. [continues 623 words]
We are very disturbed by the deaths of two students at Florida Atlantic University. These deaths will be attributed, most likely, to drug overdoses, like in so many universities around the country. If these students can get drugs so easily, I would like to know why law enforcement cannot do the same and arrest these drug pushers. Kurt Weil, Delray Beach [end]
A Palm Beach County sheriff's deputy previously accused of leaking information relating to the Port St. Lucie turnpike murder of a family of four was arrested Wednesday on unrelated charges, authorities said. Joseph Archambault, 34, surrendered to his attorney on charges of tampering with evidence and possession of drug paraphernalia. He was released from the Palm Beach County Jail after paying $3,000 bail, sheriff's spokesman Paul Miller said. While searching Archambault's unmarked squad car on two separate dates, supervisors found a red Tic-Tac container -- evidence in a Sheriff's Office case -- and a sipping straw cut down to three inches, court documents show. [continues 326 words]
He's been on 60 Minutes. A New York Times columnist has championed his cause. Even those who prosecuted and convicted Richard Paey sympathize with the wheelchair-bound man serving 25 years for drug trafficking - for obtaining the drugs he needs for his debilitating pain. Count among those sympathizers the 2nd District Court of Appeal. The problem, a majority of the court ruled Wednesday, is that they can't help Paey. They upheld his conviction and sentence by a 2-1 vote, but passed on this advice: Get the governor to commute the sentence. [continues 329 words]
Regarding Mark O'Brien's column, "Just say no to the expensive and ineffectual war on drugs" (Nov. 22), there is a middle ground between drug prohibition and blanket legalization. Switzerland's heroin maintenance trials have been shown to reduce disease, death and crime among chronic users. Providing addicts with standardized doses in a clinical setting eliminates many of the problems associated with heroin use. Heroin maintenance pilot projects are underway in Canada, England, Germany, Spain and the Netherlands. If expanded, prescription heroin maintenance would deprive organized crime of a core client base. This would render illegal heroin trafficking unprofitable, and spare future generations addiction. [continues 124 words]
Fatal overdose cases are becoming more common each year in Palm Beach County, but finding enough specialized detectives to work them can be a challenge, a veteran Palm Beach County investigator said on Tuesday. Instead of unraveling complex crime scenes, violence crime detectives are often left in overdose cases without clear motives but plenty of family members seeking answers, Sheriff's Detective Gary Martin told a conference in Boca Raton. "These cases aren't gratifying to work," said Martin, also a psychotherapist and associate dean for student wellness at Lynn University in Boca Raton. [continues 378 words]
Lena Reeves, a former Polk County Sheriff's Office detention deputy who was arrested in November after allegations that she offered sex and money in exchange for prescription drugs, pleaded no contest to one count of possession of hydrocone, a felony, at her arraignment today. Judge Karla Wright withheld adjudication and sentenced her to three years probation and court costs of $373, and ordered that Reeves be evaluated for any an potential substance abuse problems. Reeves will have to comply with any treatment plan that the evaluator recommends, refrain from using drugs, and be subject to warrantless search and seizure during the probation period. [continues 140 words]
To find new patients, Dr. Freddie Williams, a general practitioner in Panama City in the Florida Panhandle, would send two recruiters, one of whom was a heroin addict, searching for people looking for easy prescription drugs -- and frequently found them in bars. The recruiters were paid in OxyContin prescriptions, and the new "patients" received practically limitless amounts of high potency OxyContin. The OxyContin was not for pain, nor any other medicinal purpose, but simply for abuse. Patients were injecting and snorting it for the heroin-like high it gave. [continues 571 words]
Approximately 3,000 student athletes and cheerleaders in Collier County will be randomly tested for recreational drug use. During a presentation at Barron Collier High School in Naples November 28, U.S. drug czar John Walters and Deputy Secretary of Education, Raymond Simon, announced that $209,662 in Federal grant money has been awarded to the School District for this purpose. Walters and Simon also announced $8.6 million for schools nationwide. According to Walters, however, Florida is the only state that will receive more than one grant award (three in total) and Collier County's is the second-largest grant in the nation. [continues 749 words]
In response to "Methamphetamine abuse affects us all" by Alberto R. Gonzales: President Bush declared Nov. 30 National Methamphetamine Awareness Day. It is a day in which the government establishes the concrete ability to control your life through the hype of a drug epidemic. The war on drugs has created convenient vehicles of looking tough on crime while hiding behind the shield of public safety. But that shield gets worn down when our basic rights are curtailed through its use. On Sept. 30, a new federal law went into effect that forces cold sufferers to jump through ridiculous hoops to purchase what were originally over-the-counter medications. [continues 171 words]
A well-known attorney praised for his years of generosity and skillful legal representation choked back tears Monday as he admitted laundering drug-deal profits to help a convicted trafficker buy a home worth $630,000 in Wellington. Criminal defense attorney John Anthony Garcia was overcome by emotion for several minutes as U.S. District Judge Daniel T.K. Hurley lauded his work representing clients with "skill and dignity," then acknowledged that Monday was "an intensely sad day." Though federal sentencing guidelines call for a prison term of 18 to 24 months, Hurley said that he must hear all the evidence before deciding Garcia's fate. [continues 313 words]
Inside Florida
