COLVILLE, WA--The 500,000-plus prisoners in America's drug gulag inhabit an isolated, subterranean world, whether literally underground, like the federal ADX maximum-security prison in Florence, CO, or behind the walls in remote rural towns. The deeper they are in--serving mandatory minimums like 11 years and three months, 19 years and seven months, 24 years with a five-year "tag"--the further they are cut off from normal life. [continues 987 words]
BOGOTA -- In low spirits because of a mounting guerrilla threat and allegations of vote buying, Colombians yesterday chose new representatives to Congress - the institution widely considered the country's most corrupt. President Ernesto Samper's scandal rocked Liberal Party, whose entrenched political machinery gave it a significant edge, was expected to maintain its majority in both houses of the national legislature, where the party now controls nearly 60 percent of the seats in each chamber. However, opposition candidates were among the top finishers in the nationwide races for the 102-seat Senate, according to early returns. [continues 560 words]
Courts: The ruling by a Minnesota judge will finally expose the industry's 'skeletons to the American public,' a state official says. St. Paul, Minn.- A judge ordered cigarette makers Saturday to release about 39,000 more internal documents, including some that the plaintiffs in Minnesota's tobacco trial call the most significant to emerge in the case. Ramsey County District Judge Kenneth Fitzpatrick wrote that the industry, which had already released 33 million pages in the case, falsely asserted attorney-client privilege to keep the documents private. [continues 240 words]
Victoria's police commissioner, Mr Neil Comrie, has admitted the fight against drugs has failed and is set to introduce a radical statewide plan to keep drug users out of courts. Mr Comrie said the usual hard-line police approach to drug users had not worked and "we have got to look at new ways" to tackle the problem. These included a coordinated national effort to curb trafficking in high-purity heroin that was killing scores of people nationally each week. [continues 600 words]
Port authority spends bust money on vehicles, gym gear, and a desk It's been hailed as an effective weapon in the drug war: Seize the cash, cars, and boats of drug dealers and give the proceeds to local police to help stop drug trafficking. But at the Toledo-Lucas County Port Authority, it hasn't always worked out that way. Federal drug-fund money has been used by port officials to buy a $26,500 sport utility vehicle for the director of Toledo Express Airport, $20,000 in exercise equipment to outfit a gym for airport police, and a $2,226 desk for the downtown office of the president of the port authority. [continues 1379 words]
A little over a week ago, an amazing thing happened online. A "first installment" of millions of pages of internal tobacco industry documents hit the World Wide Web on an industry-created Web site. More than 30 million pages of industry documents have been collected by the state of Minnesota and that state's Blue Cross and Blue Shield in their landmark lawsuit against the tobacco industry. The companies agreed to make the documents public, in the biggest way. These days, that means online. Anyone with a computer, a modem and the right software could peek into 60 years of history behind what must be America's most controversial industry -- a capability no other mass medium can practicably offer. [continues 1193 words]
In a bid to win support for sweeping tobacco legislation, the major cigarette producers have showered lawmakers with record campaign contributions, even as some old allies are swearing off tobacco money. Tobacco interested pumped $4.5 million into the coffers of federal candidates and national political parties in 1997, an industry record for a non-election year. An analysis done for the New York Times by the Campaign Study Group, a research company in Springfield, Va., shows that the industry began stepping up its contributions in 1995 and 1996, with accelerated donations continuing into last year, the most recent for which federal elections records are available. [continues 311 words]
