EL PASO - It was not long after Gov. Rick Perry's remarks that states should enact their own marijuana laws that social media sites began wondering if the theory of relativity was a sham or whether Pink Floyd's estranged founder would finally rejoin the band. "Don't be surprised when gravity partially reverses itself so people can fly and doctors finally find a cure for death," Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, a group seeking change in American drug policies, posted on Facebook in response to Mr. Perry's comments at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Mr. Perry spoke on a panel on incarceration, where he reiterated his support for Texas' drug courts, which were created in 2001 and are an alternative to prison for drug-related convictions. [continues 934 words]
The high walls of Alexander Estates, an affluent development nestled near this border city's country club and golf course, were supposed to keep the narcotics world at bay. But when federal agents raided the stately home of a downtown perfume salesman in January, it reinforced a notion that is feared by Texas leaders: The drug war spillover from Mexico is much broader than shootouts and kidnappings -- it is cloaked in the seemingly routine business transactions of the border economy. Neighbors stood, mouths agape, as federal agents seized loads of cash from the home of Vikram Datta, a polite family man who acquaintances said was so concerned with the quality of Laredo schools that he moved his teenage daughters back to their native New York. Federal agents leveled an accusation that shocked other residents: that Datta, 51, was a major player in the Black Market Peso Exchange, a decades-old system of laundering drug money and reinvesting it back into the economy. [continues 1383 words]
