JOCKO'S LEGACY ASSESSING THE FIRST YEAR OF FALLOUT: HAS IT BEEN WORTH IT?

A year ago, on Dec. 11, 1999, a small downtown bar called Jocko's Rocket
Ship was raided by about two dozen Madison police officers and drug agents
armed with shotguns and semi-automatic rifles. They stormed the bar,
screaming at patrons to hit the floor. Those who didn't comply fast enough
were pushed or knocked down.

"This was the largest show of force this side of Waco," Charles Giesen, an
attorney for Jocko's owner Bob Schuh, remarked shortly afterwards. The raid
followed months of undercover work involving police posing as bar patrons
and in one case, even landing a job as a bartender. It has been followed by
a full year of prosecutions, convictions, investigations, suspensions,
recriminations and legal machinations, with no end in sight.

Currently, the city is embroiled in an open records lawsuit seeking to
block it from releasing the names of Madison firefighters caught up in the
Jocko's dragnet. It's also preparing to launch costly and protracted
disciplinary actions against eight firefighters before the Madison Police
and Fire Commission (PFC). City Attorney Eunice Gibson, only partly in
jest, predicts litigation over the Jocko's affair "will last the rest of
our lives."

Perhaps it's time to take stock of the Jocko's probe, to see what it has
produced and what it has cost. This case, after all, was not thrust on
Madison from some external source. Rather, the city brought this on itself
through the deliberate investment of scarce resources. Has it been worth it?

Ald. Judy Olson, for one, is not so sure. "I think everybody has known for
decades that Jocko's was a place where you can get drugs," she says. "Why
it became an issue in [late 1999] is more of a mystery."

The issue, says Olson, raises questions about the Police Department's
Narcotics and Gang Task Force. While she isn't passing judgment on whether
this is a wise use of city dollars, she feels more information is needed:
"I don't think any of us know what the real costs of that team are and I
wonder if we know what its accomplishments are."

When it comes to the War on Drugs, Olson says the public and their elected
representatives "have been taking a very passive role about something that
affects our community very deeply." She would like, although she admits she
hasn't figured out how, to bring about "a community discussion of our
drug-enforcement policy."

Jocko's is a good place to start.

[dropcap] From the perspective of law enforcement, the Jocko's
investigation was a huge success. Nine people were indicted on federal drug
charges, and all nine were convicted. They received prison sentences
totaling 86 years. That's an average of more than nine years, in a federal
system where people usually serve almost all of their allotted time.

What exactly was their crime? Using cocaine and making it available to
other consenting adults. The defendants were forced into cooperating with
authorities to build cases against each other. They were charged under
conspiracy laws that held them accountable for quantities of cocaine much
larger than what they had any direct role in. And they were sentenced under
draconian guidelines that have resulted in our federal prisons being
stuffed with nonviolent drug offenders.

The ringleader, the most dangerous criminal of the bunch, was owner Schuh,
50, a pathetic drunk and cokehead (his checkered past includes a stint as
Bucky Badger in college) who drew a sentence of 19 years. This includes
seven years for organizing drug sales that Judge John Shabaz imposed even
though the prosecution argued against it.

Likewise, Shabaz rejected requests for leniency in his Oct. 12 sentencing
of Lisa Nolen, a 37-year-old single mother with a 15-month-old son. Defense
attorney Mark Frank noted that Nolen, a college graduate, had quit her job
at the bar, stopped using drugs and took a full-time job long before the
drug raid. Nolen also cooperated fully with the investigation, providing
substantial information.

Shabaz agreed that Nolen was "a bit player" in the dealing and "clearly
less culpable than the other defendants." And he reported being moved by a
letter Nolen had written, saying it might be more effective in deterring
drug dealers than the stiff sentences he's handed out over the years. Then
Judge Shabaz--who a month later plowed ahead with a scheduling conference
while the defendant was having a stroke on his courtroom floor, never once
even inquiring about the man's condition--imposed a sentence stiffer than
the prosecution requested: 70 months in prison.

Nolen's baby will be in grade school by the time she gets out.

[dropcap] Thus we see the true face of the War on Drugs. It is the human
capacity for cruelty--sometimes wearing a badge, sometimes a robe--turned
against people who use the wrong kinds of drugs.

Now that Jocko's "indoor open-air drug market," as prosecutors called it,
has been shut down, does anyone believe it is significantly harder to
obtain illegal drugs in Madison? Of course not. In fact, far greater
inroads against illegal drug use could be achieved for far less expense
simply by making treatment available to people who need it.

Perhaps even more lamentable is the punitive approach being taken by Fire
Chief Debra Amesqua, who wants to fire five firefighters and suspend three
more for alleged drug activity. It took her department many months to
investigate and decide what discipline to impose, and it will take many
more months--maybe years--for the plodding PFC to resolve the charges. And
whatever it decides can (read: probably will) be contested in court. Then
there's the cost. Already, the Fire Department has shelled out more than
$90,000 in salaries to suspended firefighters. The city is preparing to
spend $50,000 on outside attorneys to prosecute the cases, which is a
fraction of what it could end up costing. And for what? So Chief Amesqua
can go around telling people that when it come to drug use, she's just as
mean-spirited and merciless as Judge Shabaz?

It's time for the Madison public--and their elected officials--to stop
being passive spectators to drug-enforcement policies that destroy peoples'
lives for no good reason. We need to set different priorities. And the next
time we have the chance to invest city resources into creating interminable
messes like the Jocko's affair, we ought to just say no.