Police seized more than a million Ecstasy pills and arrested 49 people in the Netherlands, Israel and other countries in a sweep carried out by hundreds of officers, Israeli authorities said Tuesday. The police estimate that the drug ring manufactured and distributed tens of tons of narcotics, supplying the drugs to Western Europe, Israel and the United States. There were 25 arrests in Holland, eight in Israel and the remaining 16 in other countries. [continues 5 words]
Robert Downey Jr.'s pleas for a lighter sentence and release from a prison drug treatment center were rejected Tuesday. Judge Lawrence A. Mira called the actor manipulative and said he had already given him several chances to rehabilitate himself. Downey, 34, was sentenced in August to three years in prison for violating probation from a 1996 drug conviction. He admitted during a hearing that he had missed scheduled drug tests. [continues 5 words]
WASHINGTON -- Two men considered leaders of what was once the world's largest illegal drug operation were among 30 people arrested in Colombia on Wednesday in a major sting, U.S. officials said. "It is as if we have removed the CEOs of several major corporations who had joined together in a major conspiracy," Attorney General Janet Reno said at a news conference. The arrests came from a joint investigation by the United States and Colombia, dubbed Operation Millennium. Officials called the arrests the biggest blow to Colombian trafficking since 1995 when arrests splintered the powerful Cali cartel. [continues 546 words]
This is in response to a recent letter, "Three Strikes target wrong crimes." I, too, voted for the Three Strikes law, with the expectation that all, not just a chosen few who committed repeated crimes, would be locked up for an extensive length of time. This would ensure the public's safety by ridding the streets of habitual criminals. I don't regret voting for the Three Strikes. I only wish the appeal system would be limited to the same number. Mary Gatti, Bakersfield [continues 5 words]
BOGOTA, Colombia, Oct. 13 - Thirty-one alleged drug traffickers, including a co-founder of the notorious Medellin cartel and a high-tech smuggling magnate, were arrested today in an international dragnet that officials described as one of the biggest blows ever against the drug trade. Colombia's national police chief, Gen. Rosso Jose Serrano, pledged that the main suspects will be extradited to the United States, a promise that U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno welcomed in Washington. No Colombian national has been extradited to the United States to stand trial since 1991. [continues 767 words]
A coke pusher who crushed a city cop's leg while fleeing a drug bust had two years tacked onto his prison term yesterday. Judge Douglas McDonald said he didn't accept Thavrin Kim's claim it was an accident. The provincial court judge accepted Crown prosecutor Cindy Peters' submission that Kim's cumulative sentence should be five years. Kim, 24, was sentenced to three years in August for trying to sell cocaine to an undercover police officer last June 16. [continues 246 words]
When will Kern and other California counties realize the injustices of the Three Strikes law, as it is applied today? When will the people of California realize the power we have given our judicial system is being terribly abused? Our judges and prosecutors are taking a free hand in choosing who will be sentenced under the Three Strikes law. The Three Strikes law was and is written for the violent offender. Why do we allow the murderer, the child molester or the rapist back out into our society after a short sentence? Yet we will take a minor offender out of our society for a term of 25 to life for petty theft or for a minor drug offense. [continues 135 words]
I am so incensed by the comments of an earlier letter writer that I had to write. How could he know the grief and stress parents, mates and children feel when their loved one goes to prison for 25 years to life for a non-violent felony? To top it off, he would bet that just seeing a loved one habitually appearing in court would be even more stressful. Bull! For one thing families, especially parents, always have hope -- hope that their son or daughter will straighten up and lead productive lives no matter how many times they appear in court. Even if the non-violent offender repeatedly goes to jail, they will usually have them back in their life in one to three years. Many repeat offenders don't grow up until they are 35 or more. [continues 111 words]
Pain triggers the release of a marijuana-like chemical called anandamide deep in the brain that works as a natural pain reliever, report US researchers. The finding ``may have relevance for the treatment of pain, particularly in instances where opiates are ineffective,'' according to a report published in the October 12th issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. For the first time, anandamide levels were measured in rat brains using a sensitive method for detecting cannabinoids (marijuana-like compounds), according to J. Michael Walker and colleagues at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. [continues 164 words]
Pumped and pompadoured in a uniform dripping with embroidery, the figure standing ramrod straight at the door, pen in hand, could have been Warden Duffy, Dan Lungren or Gray Davis. Remembering that Duffy had been called to the big Big House in the sky some time ago and pretty sure that Lungren was working as an altar boy somewhere, I concluded the visitor had to be Davis, the law-and-order chief executive of the state. "Whaddaya think of that?" he snarled, jabbing the pen sharply into my solar plexus. [continues 489 words]
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. When it comes to college, Mom and Dad often pay the bills and Junior has the fun, partying without having to worry about a scolding for staying out too late or drinking too much. Now, Junior may have to start worrying. Congress amended federal confidentiality laws last year to give universities the option of telling parents when students under 21 violate campus codes on drugs or alcohol. Some schools -- including the University of Delaware, Indiana University, Penn State and most colleges in Virginia -- have already put notification policies in place. [continues 616 words]
MELBOURNE---Jim Courier said Tuesday after winning his first-round match at the Australian Open that he believed the biggest drug problem in tennis was not the sort of steroids that were found in Petr Korda's body but the use of endurance-boosting substances like EPO, the substance that was at the heart of the Tour de France scandal last July. "I don't think strength is the answer in tennis," Courier said. "I mean, it's a component for sure, but if brute strength were the answer we would all be weightlifters in the locker room, which is not the case. [continues 418 words]
Republican leaders in the House plan to survey their members today to gauge their support for creating life prison sentences for people who sell methamphetamine to minors. Lawmakers are scheduled to discuss the life imprisonment issue and other proposals during a budget subcommittee meeting today, House Speaker Ron Corbett, R-Cedar Rapids, said Monday. Bipartisan unity in the fight against methamphetamine began to fall apart last week when differences emerged between the plan drafted by lawmakers and Gov. Tom Vilsack's proposal. Vilsack campaigned on the notion that people who sell the highly addictive drug to children should be sent to prison for life, but his plan released last week would have narrowed the scope of the bill. [continues 138 words]
TEHRAN, Iran - Anti-drug agents seized several tons of drugs in eastern and southeastern Iran, the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported Sunday. It said 6,700 pounds of opium, 1,050 pounds of hashish, 110 pounds of morphine and 110 pounds of heroin were seized from drug traffickers in several raids. Agents also confiscated more than 300 pounds of opium in a separate operation in the northwestern city of Salmas, the agency said. IRNA did not say when the drug raids occurred or if any arrests were made. [continues 69 words]
Prozac has changed people's lives and transformed the medical profession's approach to mental health. Elizabeth Wurtzel, author of Prozac Nation and one of the early beneficiaries of the drug, assesses its legacy 10 years after it first became available to her When I woke up this morning - and let's be honest here, it was more like this afternoon - I began my day by swallowing two Prozac capsules. I also took some lithium, the salt substance that was long ago established as an antidote to manic depression and other mood disorders. On top of that I had a pink caplet called Depakote, the brand name for valproic acid, an anti-seizure remedy once prescribed for epilepsy, but now used to combat mood swings. And finally, I chased down the other pills with a blood-pressure medication called atenolol - my 92-year-old grandmother also takes this - to alleviate the Parkinson's-like handshake that I get from taking all these drugs. [continues 1695 words]
Colombian killings raise doubts about help for military SAN PABLO, Colombia -- A spate of massacres by right-wing paramilitary groups in Colombia has posed a new challenge to the Clinton administration's policy of combating the country's rampant drug trade by increasing aid to the Colombian police and military, officials say. Despite concerns about human rights abuses, U.S. assistance to the Colombian army and police has been growing rapidly, in large part to help combat resurgent leftist guerrillas who protect drug traffickers. Colombia supplies 80 percent of the world's cocaine supply and two-thirds of the heroin consumed in the United States. [continues 392 words]
THE gangland assassination of a Dublinman on Wednesday night was the second underworld killing this year, sparking fears of a renewed round of criminal in-fighting. The shooting comes within three weeks of the murder of John Dillon, a 53-year-old small-time Dublin criminal who had previously been involved in armed bank raids. Dillon was shot several times at point-blank range at the door of his home in Finglas. The latest victim, 44-year-old Pascal Boland, was also known to gardai, for bank robberies in the 1980s, and as a drug dealer with a northside Dublin gang. He was shot six times outside his home. [continues 728 words]
Crime: The 16-year-old girl-also an athlete-allegedly committed holdups to feed a $200-a-day habit. Berkley, Mich-A high school honor student and gymnast in this Detroit suburb has been charged with armed robbery and is a suspect in several others, allegedly committed to support a heroin habit. Sarah Plumb, 16, is in a juvenile lockup, awaiting trial as an adult on charges that could land her a life prison sentence. [continues 322 words]
Jan. 28 - A Genesee man who allegedly killed three people in a car accident while high on marijuana will get a reduced sentence today because it's difficult to prove that mood-altering drugs impair drivers, a prosecutor said. Jay Tankersley, 21, of Genesee, was originally charged with three counts of vehicular homicide and one count of vehicular assault in connection with the 1997 accident. But the charge was reduced to one count of negligent homicide, and Tankersley will be offered probation and a maximum of 90 days in jail or two years on work or education release, said Jeff Lindsey, deputy district attorney in the 11th Judicial District. [continues 535 words]
HAVANA -- Cuba, once considered off-limits to drug trafficking, is confronting a noticeable narcotics problem amid signs that the island has become a conduit for multi-ton shipments of cocaine. At first, police in Colombia thought it was an anomaly on Dec. 3 when they seized a 7.2-ton load of cocaine packed in shipping containers and bound for Cuba. But Colombian authorities are now certain that smugglers have utilized Cuba as a major transshipment point for cocaine before. "No one dares to send 7 tons at one blow unless they've tested the route," said a Colombian law enforcement source who spoke on condition of anonymity. [continues 912 words]