INCREASINGLY MILITARIZED 'DRUG WAR' HAS SKEWED POLICE PRIORITIES

In early March, the Michigan State Police and Michigan's
multijurisdictional drug teams participated in "Operation Byrne
Blitz," a statewide drug sweep that led to 223 arrests and the
seizure of more than 460 pounds of marijuana.

It was publicized as part of a national effort to interrupt drug
trafficking. Personally, I believe it was part of a sensationalistic
media ploy, meant to scare citizens and prevent Congress from cutting
the federal Byrne grant money - federal money used to fight our
U.S.-style war on drugs.

Several weeks ago, the state attorneys general banded together to
paint a horrific picture of societal pandemonium if these funds
aren't restored. As "Operation Byrne Blitz" proved, there are
criminals on the loose. How much safer is your community because of
these busts?

On March 3, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch published an investigative
report authored by Joe Mahr, "Being elusive is easy - Fugitives can
run and need not hide." The report details the abject failure of law
enforcement to search for and incarcerate federal fugitives.

From the report:

. More than one third of felony warrants are not entered into a
national database routinely checked by police across the nation.

. Few fugitives are hunted, and most states do not screen for
criminal warrants before issuing a new license.

. When fugitives are found in other states, authorities routinely
refuse to pick them up, including those wanted for violent crimes.

. Among these missing felons include 40 percent of Michigan's rape warrants.

Yes, you read that correctly. Forty percent of Michigan's rape
warrants aren't even entered into the database. How safe do you feel now?

Here's the real kicker: The primary reason for lack of pursuit (of
felony fugitives) is stretched budget and staffing shortages.

Excuse me? We don't have the money or people to follow up on 40
percent of Michigan's rape warrants, but somehow the investigators of
"Operation Byrne Blitz" had enough of both to coordinate a statewide
sting and carry it out in a spectacular show of force?

According to Dave Doddridge, former Los Angeles Police Department
narcotics officer and a speaker for Law Enforcement Against
Prohibition, "In 1991, Washington suddenly began offering lots of
protective armor and equipment. We gladly took it, now looking more
like military than police, and little realized that we were becoming
addicted to our own kind of dope - image and prestige. In their mad
dash to prosecute the war on drugs, Washington was sponsoring SWAT
teams all across the land with the stipulation that, the more dope
you seize, the more M-16s and armored personnel carriers you get."

Doddridge says there are now more than 1,700 SWAT teams across
America, many with nothing to do but serve drug warrants. With little
to do, they are now unleashed on American citizens in situations
foreign in years past. On Jan. 4 of this year, one of these SWAT
teams shot and killed 26-year-old Tarika Wilson, in front of her six
children, while serving a drug warrant for her boyfriend. In fact,
according to a Cato policy paper "Overkill: The Rise of Paramilitary
Police Raids," authored by Radley Balko, "these increasingly frequent
raids, 40,000 per year by one estimate, are needlessly subjecting
nonviolent drug offenders, bystanders and wrongly targeted civilians
to the terror of having their homes invaded while they're sleeping,
usually by teams of heavily armed paramilitary units dressed not as
police officers but as soldiers."

We should all be asking these questions of our sheriff's department:
What's the ratio of narcotics officers compared to those assigned to
the warrant squad - and what hours do they work? How about the sex
crimes squad? Or the child abuse squad? How about homicide? What are
the budgets for these units? What is the budget for the narcotics unit?

It is easily proven that non-violent drug offenses account for a
significant number of occupied jail beds in the U.S. And it's costing
us ridiculous amounts of money to investigate, prosecute and
incarcerate them. Currently we have about 2.3 million in custody.
Why? Why are non-violent drug offenders filling our prisons -
building prisons is the fastest growing industry in the country -
while the criminals who are a serious threat to society are left to
mingle among us? Allowed to continue raping, robbing and killing?

To me the answer is simple, because I'd rather have my sheriff's
department chasing psychopathic felons than pot dealers: Refocus our
priorities. Shift the funds, manpower and time so you can simply
enter the names of rapists into the databases. Then, check the darn
thing before you issue a driver's license, and when you find a wanted
felon - put him in the jail cell. How hard can that be?

Obviously, it's much harder than arresting potheads.