Man Could Remain Locked Up for Good Because of Appeal Limits The judge who sentenced Raymond Surratt Jr. to life in prison didn't think he deserved that tough a penalty. His attorneys said it was based on bad math. Even the government lawyers who prosecuted him say the sentence was a mistake. Yet they all also agree Surratt might stay locked up forever. How that came to be is at the heart of arguments to be heard Wednesday when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit takes up Surratt's case, which turns on how many times inmates can appeal a sentence, particularly if the law becomes more lenient after they are sent to prison. [continues 1072 words]
Justice Department Leaving Lower- Level Defendants to States. WASHINGTON - Federal prosecutors are charging fewer defendants with drug crimes as part of an initiative to target more serious and violent offenders, a top Justice Department official said Monday. Deputy Atty. Gen. Sally Yates said newly released statistics showed that federal prosecutors brought nearly 20% fewer drug cases in f iscal year 2015 than they did in fiscal 2012, the year before the Justice Department launched its "Smart on Crime Initiative," which has sought to recalibrate how it uses its resources to combat narcotics crimes. [continues 258 words]
WASHINGTON - Federal prosecutors are pursuing fewer drug cases and filing charges that trigger mandatory minimum sentences less frequently - two indications, Justice Department officials say, that former Attorney General Eric Holder's initiative to reduce the prison population and enforce drug laws more judiciously has been a success. Federal prosecutors brought 6 percent fewer drug cases in fiscal year 2015 than they did in 2014, continuing a steady decline since Holder announced his "Smart on Crime" initiative three years ago, according to Justice Department data released Monday. [continues 224 words]
The state Legislature is set to repeal a 27-year-old law requiring a driver's license suspension for those convicted of drug crimes, such as possession, that have nothing to do with driving. The final vote could come as soon as next week, and Governor Charlie Baker has signaled he will sign the measure. Advocates say the suspensions have been a major impediment for former offenders trying to rebuild their lives. Without a license, it can be difficult to find work, take children to day care, and get to drug-treatment programs. [continues 466 words]
President Obama is expected to grant clemency to another group of drug offenders in the coming weeks, part of his ongoing effort to provide relief to inmates in federal prisons who were sentenced to harsh terms during the nation's war on drugs. The White House will also be holding an event on March 31, called Life after Clemency, that will include former inmates and their attorneys, along with some prison reform advocates. The White House gathering, which is not open to the media, traces one of the president's centerpiece criminal-justice initiatives and will include a discussion on "ways to improve paths to reentry," according to the invitation. [continues 291 words]
On Dec. 5, 2014, San Francisco police were on the corner of Hyde Street and Golden Gate Avenue in the Tenderloin, arresting crack sellers. It was a busy day: Shortly after busting one man for selling a few rocks to an undercover police officer, a cop returned to the scene of the crime to gather data to fill out his report when he witnessed another drug deal in action. The cop busted that seller, who identified himself to police as "a Sureno from the south side," according to court records. Police later found that both sellers had extensive rap sheets for narcotic sales. [continues 953 words]
When it comes to political corruption, serious crime pays in the Ocean County, New Jersey Superior Court. Case in point: Howard Birdsall of Birdsall Services Group, pleaded guilty to corporate misconduct and fraud charges, admitting to making countless illegal political donations to score high-value government contracts. Under the terms of his plea before Judge James Den Uyl, he will get a four year sentence, with likely immediate Intensive Supervision Parole release. Mr. Birdsall might never see a day in prison. [continues 96 words]
Despite Recent Setbacks, Utah Republican Says Legislation Has Traction The co-sponsor of bipartisan legislation to reduce some mandatory minimum drug and gun sentences said Wednesday that he is hopeful Congress can still pass the bill despite recent setbacks. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) said issues have arisen that have slowed the legislation - considered by advocates of sentencing reform to be the most significant in decades. But "I don't believe it's stalled," he said at "Out of Jail, Into Society," a Washington Post Live event about prison reform. [continues 533 words]
Now a Professor, He Writes to Obama About Mandatory 55-Year Term A former federal judge in Utah asked President Obama on Tuesday to "swiftly" give clemency to Weldon Angelos, a man he sentenced to 55 years in prison in connection with selling marijuana. Calling the sentence "one of the most troubling that I ever faced in my five years on the federal bench," Paul G. Cassell, now a professor at the University of Utah's law school, said the mandatory minimum sentence he was required to impose on Angelos was one of the chief reasons he chose to step down as a judge. [continues 761 words]
I'm passing a joint at The Joint and pondering while on pot. Through hazy eyes I watched FoxNews coverage of the armed takeover of a federal building in Oregon, feeling helpless. I've decided to do something about it here in Trenton. I think I'm going to take over the front steps of the Clarkson S. Fisher Federal Building and United States Courthouse located on the next block from The Joint on State Street. Ummm next week or the week after, hum, or when I get off this couch. (In my "Jay and Silent Bob" voice:) Dude... not in solidary with those fools in Oregon, but just the opposite. [continues 1386 words]
EARLIER this month, former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida opened up on a subject he had once chided reporters for asking about: his daughter, Noelle, who, he said, "was addicted to drugs." In a video released by the campaign, Mr. Bush speaks plainly about his daughter's struggle, her time in jail and drug court, and her recovery. "I can look in people's eyes and I know that they've gone through the same thing that Columba and I have," he said, referring to his wife. [continues 874 words]
Regarding the Dec. 29 letter "Who's to blame for a long sentence?": Lawrence J. Leiser of the National Association of Assistant U.S. Attorneys seems to stand alone in bemoaning President Obama's clemency initiative. Public-interest groups and legislators from the most conservative right to the most liberal left have joined in sponsoring and supporting sentencing reform legislation that would offer relief to prisoners, such as my brother, Weldon Angelos, who would serve essentially life sentences for low-level drug crimes. [continues 159 words]
Five Republican presidential contenders this week addressed a New Hampshire forum concerned with a crisis swamping certain regions of the country, including New England: heroin addiction. The candidates spoke passionately, some sharing personal experiences. Jeb Bush spoke of his family's turmoil as his daughter Noelle, now 38 and in recovery, struggled with an addiction to prescription drugs and cocaine. "What I learned was that the pain that you feel when you have a loved one who has addiction challenges and kind of spirals out of control is something that is shared with a whole lot of people," he said. [continues 571 words]
Was the Drug War Imposed on Black America, or Did Black America Demand It? Black Silent Majority: The Rockefeller Drug Laws and the Politics of Punishment, by Michael Javen Fortner, Harvard University Press, 368 pages, $29.95 We Sell Drugs: The Alchemy of US Empire, by Suzanna Reiss, University of California Press, 328 pages, $29.95 In 1973 New York's blue-blood governor, Nelson Rockefeller, declared drug treatment programs a failure and called for a newer, tougher approach, including mandatory life in prison for selling any amount of "hard drugs." Later that year, New York lawmakers enacted legislation that, while slightly more lenient than Rockefeller's initial bill, prescribed harsh punishments for drug crimes, including prison terms of 15 years to life for low-level drug sales and possession. In 1973, the state had fewer than 1,500 prisoners doing time for drugs; by 1999, that figure had ballooned to over 20,000. [continues 2351 words]
A man who was busted for hiding heroin in his prosthetic leg has sparked the latest battle between judges and prosecutors - two powerful factions who are fighting over mandatory minimum sentences. Imran Laltaprasad was convicted of possession with intent to distribute heroin and two counts of possession with intent to distribute cocaine in July. He hid the heroin in his artificial leg. He had been convicted of the same offenses in the past. Under state law, sentencing should have been easy. The mandatory minimum sentence for the crimes is 3 1/2 years. Prosecutors asked for concurrent sentences of 3 1/2 to five years in state prison. [continues 388 words]
At 9:10 a.m. Friday, the intercom blared at the federal prison here as Weldon Angelos walked the track on this sprawling campus of drab gray buildings in California's Central Valley. The booming voice of a prison official called an inmate to the main office. About 25 minutes later, the official came on the intercom again, summoning another prisoner. Angelos knew exactly what was happening. The prisoners had heard a rumor the night before that President Obama might grant early release to certain drug offenders before he left Washington for the holidays. Angelos was excited, anxious. This was it. The lucky inmates on Obama's list were being called inside to take phone calls from their attorneys, who would tell them the good news. [continues 1532 words]
Third Time This Year Obama Has Commuted Terms Under Initiative President Obama commuted the sentences of 95 drug offenders Friday, more than double the number he granted this summer, in an effort to give relief to drug offenders who were harshly sentenced in the nation's war on drugs. It is the third time this year that Obama has used his unique clemency power to release federal drug offenders, whose harsh sentences have contributed to the phenomenon of mass incarceration. The commutations are a centerpiece of the president's effort to make the most significant changes in the nation's criminal justice system in decades. He and former attorney general Eric H. Holder Jr. have spoken passionately about the need to fix what they say is a broken system - one they argue has subjected too many nonviolent inmates to decades behind bars, disproportionately hurting minority communities. [continues 1185 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama on Friday commuted the sentences of 95 prisoners and pardoned two more, part of a broader effort to rethink a criminal justice system that critics say has resulted in overly harsh and expensive sentences for thousands of drug offenders. The commutations, the most Obama has issued at one time, mostly benefit nonviolent drug offenders - many of whom are serving long sentences for cocaine and crack crimes. Obama is also pardoning an Ohio man sentenced to probation in a counterfeiting case and a Virginia woman sentenced to home detention and supervised release in a bank fraud case. [continues 125 words]
GOP Candidates Move to Treatment Vs. Jail, but Racial Impetus Is Seen. More than 40 years after Republican President Richard M. Nixon coined the phrase "war on drugs," many GOP presidential candidates are calling for an end to one of its central tenets - by agreeing with Democrats to treat low-level drug offenders rather than incarcerate them. The Republicans are selective, however, about who is deserving of their compassion. Several GOP presidential contenders have advocated treating the nation's growing heroin epidemic as a health crisis, not a criminal one. But most stop short of advocating the same approach to other drug laws, notably those involving marijuana and crack cocaine, which disproportionately affect African Americans. [continues 1337 words]
Candidates View 'White' Epidemic As Health Issue, Less So for Pot and Crack More than 40 years after Republican President Richard M. Nixon coined the phrase "war on drugs," many GOP presidential candidates are calling for an end to one of its central tenets - by agreeing with Democrats to treat low-level drug offenders rather than incarcerate them. The Republicans are selective, however, about who is deserving of their compassion. Several GOP presidential contenders have advocated treating the nation's growing heroin epidemic as a health crisis, not a criminal one. But most stop short of advocating the same approach to other drug laws, notably those involving marijuana and crack cocaine, which disproportionately affect African Americans. [continues 1344 words]
Now that Congress is within sight of passing the most significant federal sentencing reforms in a generation, it's worth taking a closer look at where the legislation falls short. The main driver of the federal prison population is, by far, the dramatic increase in the time people spend behind bars - specifically, those convicted of drug offenses, who account for nearly half of the nation's 199,000 federal inmates. From 1988 to 2012, the average time served for drug crimes more than doubled in length, according to a new report by the Pew Charitable Trusts. That increase in the length of drug sentences comes at a great expense: an estimated $1.5 billion each year, based on how much it costs to keep a federal inmate behind bars. [continues 483 words]
Hillary Rodham Clinton on Saturday proposed reclassifying marijuana to make it a less dangerous substance and to encourage more research into its medicinal benefits. At a town hall in Orangeburg, S.C., Clinton said marijuana, classified in the most dangerous category ("Schedule I") of the Controlled Substances Act, should be "Schedule II" so it can be experimented with and implemented for medical use. "I do support the use of medical marijuana," she said at the town hall, hosted by journalist Roland Martin and held at Claflin University. [continues 101 words]
As reported by The Washington Post and reprinted in The New Mexican ("Justice Department about to free 6,000 prisoners," Oct. 6), the Justice Department is prepared to release 6,000 prisoners. That started on Oct. 30 and is the largest one-time release by the feds ever. The U.S. Sentencing Commission retroactively reduced the sentence for drug offenses, which precipitated this response. Everyone from Obama, the American Civil Liberties Union to Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina are in support of further reducing the mandatory-minimum sentences that were set for drug offenses during the sweeping "war on drugs" campaign of the 1980s and 1990s. [continues 177 words]
Movement May Do More Harm Than Good PORTLAND, Ore. - When the judge entered the wood-paneled courtroom to begin the sentencing hearing this fall, 19-year-old Morgan Brittain was the only one who didn't stand. She remained seated in her wheelchair in the front row. Brittain looked in many ways like the girl she once was: Nike sneakers with hot pink laces, nails painted maroon and silver. She still had the slender frame of the dancer and runner she was before she overdosed two years ago on a half a gram of heroin she split with a friend. [continues 941 words]
Prosecutors Fear Results of Weakening Mandatory Minimums for Drug Convictions Portland, Ore. - When the judge entered the wood-paneled courtroom to begin the sentencing hearing this fall, 19-year-old Morgan Brittain was the only one who didn't stand. She remained seated in her wheelchair in the front row. Brittain looked in many ways like the girl she once was: Nike sneakers with hot pink laces, nails painted maroon and silver. She still had the slender frame of the dancer and runner she was before she overdosed two years ago on a half a gram of heroin she split with a friend. [continues 2383 words]
Starting next week, federal prison inmates from Alaska facing an average conviction of a decade behind bars for drug offenses will be released early. The sentence reductions resulted from revisions by an independent judicial body; its new policy could mean shorter imprisonment for tens of thousands of inmates nationwide. The U.S. Sentencing Commission lowered the penalties for all future federal drug defendants in April 2014. Several months later, the commission granted those reductions to drug offenders already in prison, but its decision to retroactively apply the changes stipulated that no drug offender could be released until a year after the changes came into effect on Nov. 1, 2014. [continues 808 words]
U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen added his voice Friday to the growing number of officials calling for reforms to end the nation's high rates of incarceration for nonviolent and lower-level drug offenders. In a speech to the criminal justice section of the American Bar Association's fall institute in Washington, Cohen, D-Memphis, also called for the collection of national statistics on the use of deadly force by law enforcement agencies. He said a bill he has introduced called the National Statistics on Deadly Force Transparency Act would give lawmakers and the public "the numbers we need to measure the problem so we can figure out how best to address it." [continues 181 words]
The Senate Judiciary Committee took a major step last Thursday toward reforming overly harsh federal sentencing guidelines with a 15-5 bipartisan vote. It took a long time for federal lawmakers to realize that the "get tough on crime" movement of the 1980s and '90s, while helping push down high crime rates, had regrettable side effects. However, they've finally gotten the message. Imposing tough mandatory minimum sentences is no doubt appropriate for a number of serious offenses, but not for relatively minor, nonviolent drug offenses. [continues 307 words]
Groups Work to End Harsh Sentences for Addicted, Mentally Ill and Non-Violent Offenders WASHINGTON - You would have been hard-pressed to find a police chief in his office in the past few days. Dozens of them were in Washington, lobbying to get more people out of prison. They want to end the mandatory jail terms judges are forced to bestow for what are seen less as criminal acts than cries of desperation. America's prisons are overflowing. The United States has more people in jail than any other country, including some of the harshest, most backward nations. [continues 607 words]
Releasing Nonviolent Drug Offenders Is Only a Start. THE FEDERAL Bureau of Prisons will release 6,000 inmates locked up for non violent drug crime sat the end of the month. If a bi-partisan group of senators gets its way, that will be just the beginning. On Thursday, the group pushed a criminal justice reform bill through the Judiciary Committee that backers say would reduce the federal prison population by tens of thousands. All of this is progress. But even if the bill passes, the number of people in prison in the United States would still be astoundingly high. [continues 408 words]
The president leads the charge to cut the prison population, but mass incarceration isn't the problem. Rising crime is. President Obama paid a media-saturated visit in July to a federal penitentiary in Oklahoma. The cell blocks that he toured had been evacuated in anticipation of his arrival, but after talking to six prescreened inmates he drew some conclusions about the path to prison. "oeThese are young people who made mistakes that aren't that different than the mistakes I made and the mistakes that a lot of you guys made," the president told the waiting journalists. The implication was that anyone who had smoked marijuana and tried cocaine (as Mr. Obama had) could land in a place like the El Reno Federal Correctional Institution. [continues 1851 words]
New Group of Prominent Law Enforcement Leaders Say Too Many Nonviolent Offenders Are in Prison Bipartisan Bill on Sentencing Reform Passes Senate Committee President Obama is on a tour to promote reform and should bring it to California President Barack Obama listens during a community discussion Wednesday in Charleston, W.Va., on the prescription drug and heroin abuse epidemics. Steve Helber The Associated Press By the Editorial Board A critical mass appears to be forming to limit America's prison population growth. [continues 317 words]
You would have been hardpressed to find a police chief in his office in the last few days. Dozens of them were in Washington, D.C., lobbying to get more people out of prison. They want to end the mandatory jail terms judges are forced to bestow for what are seen less as criminal acts than cries of desperation. America's prisons are overflowing. The United States has more people in jail than any other country, including some of the harshest, most backward nations. Democratic and Republican presidential candidates may not agree on much, but they accept one statistic: With less than 5 percent of the world's population, the United States holds about 25 percent of the world's prisoners. For every 100,000 Americans, 716 are jailed - a far, far higher rate than anyplace else. [continues 566 words]
"We need less incarceration, not more, to keep all Americans safe." Criminal justice reform groups have been saying this for years. This time the source is unexpected: More than 130 of the nation's top law-enforcement officials, including big-city police chiefs, sheriffs, prosecutors and attorneys general, have joined the call to end to the harsh, counterproductive practices and policies that have driven America's devastating prison boom, destroyed communities and written off an entire generation of young men of color. [continues 429 words]
Leaders Aim to Cut Incarceration Rates About 100 law enforcement leaders including District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis gathered in the nation's capital Wednesday to announce a joint effort to reduce the number of people being put behind bars. The newly formed Law Enforcement Leaders to Reduce Crime and Incarceration issued a report Wednesday outlining its vision and recommendations, from providing more diversion programs for mental illness and substance abuse to reducing some low-level, nonviolent crimes to misdemeanors. "Unnecessary incarceration exacerbates racial disparities, economic inequality, and hinders economic opportunity in the communities that need it most," the group said in explaining its mission statement. "Today, one in three black men will end up incarcerated. And 60 percent of prisoners reentering society face long-term unemployment." [continues 844 words]
More than 130 police chiefs, prosecutors and sheriffs - including some of the most prominent law enforcement officials in the country - are adding their clout to the movement to reduce the nation's incarceration rate. Asserting that "too many people are behind bars that don't belong there," the officials plan to announce on Wednesday that they have formed a group to push for alternatives to arrests, reducing the number of criminal laws and ending mandatory minimum prison sentences. Members of the group are scheduled to meet Thursday with President Obama. [continues 1068 words]
A Nonviolent Drug Offender Granted Clemency After 2 Decades Behind Bars Adjusts to Life on the Outside DALLAS - The recently released federal prisoner sat down at his sister's dining room table. He pulled out a legal pad and began the letter he had been turning over in his mind for several months: "Dear Mr. President, I am writing you today with the utmost gratitude to personally thank you for granting my petition for clemency on March 31, 2015. Your actions have given me a second chance to start living life normally again and mere words can't express how truly grateful I am for your making this moment possible. The Bible says, 'To whom much is given, much is required,' and I vow to make the most of this unique opportunity that I've been given." [continues 2021 words]
The liberal media has demonized mandatory minimum drug sentences, referring to them as punishment for 'nonviolent' crimes. What about the violence that illegal narcotics have done to a large segment of our population? Comparing the cost of incarcerating drug offenders with the cost of drug damage would be instructive. Mandatory minimum sentences played a major role in reducing the flow of illegal drugs into Florida and the rest of the country. We seem to have lost that bit of history. I spent seven years interviewing federal drug prisoners for intelligence on successful drug smuggling. The information was obtained at little cost. None of these inmates would have cooperated were it not for their attempts to reduce sentences. Charles M . Fuss Jr., St. Pete Beach [end]
In his Oct. 15 op-ed column, "A bipartisan marijuana myth," Charles Lane described the growing bipartisan support for looser drug laws as "the latest political free lunch, served up by politicians who would rather discuss anything except real public policy trade-offs." Over the past decade, numerous states have made very real trade-offs in their approaches to fighting crime. During this period, dozens of red and blue states decided to spend less money incarcerating nonviolent drug offenders and to use the savings on drug treatment and other programs aimed at reducing the likelihood that prisoners would re-offend. In nearly every case, these states were able to cut both their incarceration and their crime rates. [continues 55 words]
Gov. Jerry Brown's veto messages have few parallels in modern politics. At their best, they display a level of erudition and thoughtfulness far beyond most politicians. Now we have another example in Brown's explanation of why he vetoed nine bills that would have added to the complexity of our legal system. "Each of these bills creates a new crime usually by finding a novel way to characterize and criminalize conduct that is already proscribed. This multiplication and particularization of criminal behavior creates increasing complexity without commensurate benefit," the 1964 Yale Law School graduate wrote. He linked the explosion in the number of people California incarcerates to the profusion of new provisions in the state's criminal code. "Before we keep going down this road, I think we should pause and reflect how our system of criminal justice could be made more human, more just and more cost-effective." [continues 351 words]
THE HOUSE AND SENATE: Beacon Hill Roll Call records local representatives' and senators' votes on roll calls from the week of Oct. 5-9. CRIMINALIZE FENTANYL TRAFFICKING (H 3755): The House approved (152-0) and sent to the Senate a bill that would create the crime of trafficking of the drug fentanyl in amounts greater than 10 grams and impose a prison sentence of up to 20 years for those convicted of the crime. Under current law, a person can only be charged with manufacturing, distributing, or possessing fentanyl, but not with trafficking. [continues 163 words]
State governments across the country are finally waking up to the enormous financial and human cost of mass incarceration. In recent years, at least 27 states have rolled back mandatory-minimum laws and other "tough-on-crime" legislation that has turned the United States into the world's biggest jailer. The reason? At a cost that typically runs more than $55,000 a year per inmate, even conservative states are balking at the expense of swollen prison populations. That's one reason the "justice reinvestment" movement is gaining steam. Across the country, activists and lawmakers are pushing for reforms aimed at sending fewer people to prison, redirecting money to address social problems at their source. [continues 388 words]
'Tough on crime' doesn't help: From Lauren-Brooke Eisen, at MSNBC.com. We have been through this before as a nation - during the crack epidemic of the late '80s and early '90s, and the previous heroin crisis of the '70s - and we have valuable lessons to draw upon when approaching today's challenge. One lesson is that the reactionary "tough on crime" rhetoric led us astray. It resulted in policymakers enacting ineffective and overly punitive drug policies, many of which resulted from knee-jerk reactions to media sensationalism of crime or political opportunism. [continues 2329 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - A push to overhaul criminal sentencing is prompting the early release of thousands of federal drug prisoners, including some whom prosecutors once described as threats to society, according to an Associated Press review of court records. About 6,000 inmates are due to be freed from custody in the coming month, the result of changes made last year to guidelines that provide judges with recommended sentences for specific crimes. Federal officials say roughly 40,000 inmates could be eligible for reduced sentences in coming years. [continues 923 words]
It's a rare day when Democrats and Republicans stand shoulder to shoulder in Washington, celebrating a bipartisan agreement on, well, just about anything. Has that ever been clearer than this week when intra-party warfare overshadowed partisan divisions in the House? But on Oct. 1, in the Senate, compromise and bipartisanship took center stage. And the subject of this rare agreement - criminal justice reform - is as substantive as the political bedfellows are surprising. After decades of upping the ante with ever-harsher criminal penalties, liberal and conservative senators endorsed a proposal to reduce mandatory-minimum sentences and to restore discretion for federal judges. [continues 432 words]
WASHINGTON - The federal Bureau of Prisons plans to release 6,000 prisoners at the end of October, implementing a decision last year to slash the number of incarcerated drug offenders by nearly half. Officials said the nationwide releases over four days starting Oct. 30 will be the largest in U.S. history. Last year, in line with a concerted effort by the Obama administration to reduce the number of drug offenders in U.S. prisons, the U.S. Sentencing Commission voted to cut drug sentences by an average of two years, potentially affecting as many as 46,000 out of 100,000 cases. [continues 397 words]
In the Largest Mass Liberation Yet, the Inmates Are to Be Let Out Starting Oct. 30. WASHINGTON - The federal Bureau of Prisons plans to release 6,000 prisoners at the end of October, implementing a decision last year to slash the number of incarcerated drug offenders by nearly half. Officials said the nationwide releases over four days starting Oct. 30 would be the largest in U.S. history. Last year, in line with a concerted effort by the Obama administration to reduce the number of drug offenders in U.S. prisons, the U.S. Sentencing Commission voted to cut drug sentences by an average of two years, potentially affecting as many as 46,000 out of 100,000 cases. [continues 396 words]
WASHINGTON - The Justice Department is preparing to release about 6,000 inmates from federal prisons starting at the end of this month, as part of an effort to ease overcrowding and roll back the penalties given to nonviolent drug dealers in the 1980s and 1990s, federal law enforcement officials said. About a third of the inmates are undocumented immigrants who will be deported. Because many of those inmates were convicted of crimes that are significant legal offenses, President Obama is unlikely to be criticized as sharply for their release by those who have objected to past deportation decisions by the administration. [continues 772 words]
WASHINGTON - The Justice Department is preparing to release roughly 6,000 inmates from federal prisons starting at the end of this month as part of an effort to ease overcrowding and roll back the harsh penalties given to nonviolent drug dealers in the 1980s and '90s, according to federal law enforcement officials. About a third of the inmates are undocumented immigrants who will be deported. Because many of them were convicted of significant legal offenses, President Obama is unlikely to be criticized as sharply for their release by those who have objected to past deportations by the administration. [continues 816 words]
The Inmate Release Is Part of a Big Change in Federal Drug Policy. washington) The Justice Department is set to release about 6,000 inmates early from prison - the largest ever release of federal prisoners-to reduce crowding and provide relief to drug offenders who received harsh sentences in the past three decades. The inmates from federal prisons nationwide will be set free by the department's Bureau of Prisons between Oct. 30 andNov. 2. Most of them will go to halfway houses and home confinement before being put on supervised release. [continues 930 words]
