NO CLEAR ANSWERS IN THIS SKIRMISH OF DRUG WAR

Noel Reeves, who will be 34 later this month, did not finish high
school. He had a hardscrabble childhood on the city's South Side.

He had a hardscrabble young adulthood, too. He had a number of failed
relationships with women - two children resulted from those
relationships - and a string of low-paying, temporary jobs. Three
times he was busted on marijuana charges. It wasn't until last year
that he got a job with benefits - health care, a retirement plan, all
the accouterments of the middle class. By then, he also was married.
Along with his mother, he and his wife bought a modest home in High
Ridge.

Now he's back in prison. Should he be? As is the case so often in
these little skirmishes in the war on drugs, clear answers are elusive.

Reeves first got in trouble in 1997. He was stopped for a traffic
violation. Police found 10 ounces of marijuana in the car. He pleaded
guilty of possession with intent to distribute. He was sentenced to
three months in jail.

Two years later, he was one of 20 people indicted in a federal case.
The feds alleged that over a period of time, the conspirators had
brought more than 1,700 pounds of pot and more than 11 pounds of coke
to St. Louis from Tucson, Ariz. Reeves was in the second batch to be
indicted, and he was down the list, considered a lower-level link in
the conspiracy. Still, the feds alleged that he had been a courier at
least once, and that he had distributed at least 200 pounds of
marijuana. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 37 months in prison
and five years supervised release.

Was he, in fact, a big-time dope dealer? His mother shook her head and
rolled her eyes. No, he was always just scraping by, she said. He'd do
whatever kind of work he could get - he did quite a bit of roofing -
and he'd repair cars. He never had much money.

He got out of prison in October 2001. He worked here and there, and he
stayed out of trouble. In September 2003, his probation officer called
and said he wanted to see him. Reeves and his girlfriend - now his
wife - went to the probation office. There were two city police
detectives waiting. They said that they had information that there
were drugs at his house. Reeves said that he was staying in an
apartment with his girlfriend and another woman was staying at the
house. At any rate, the police searched the house and found about 12
ounces of pot. The police claimed that Reeves admitted that some of
the pot was his.

Once again, he pleaded guilty of possession with intent to distribute.
He was sentenced to seven years. He went to prison in October 2004 and
was released in July 2006.

Finally, he seemed to turn his life around. He and his wife and their
baby moved to High Ridge, and along with his mom, who is a general
manager at a Steak 'n Shake restaurant, the couple entered into a
lease-to-buy arrangement for a house. Reeves got a job at a factory.
"It's a great job," his wife said. "It's a place people stay." Reeves
got custody of his oldest child, who is now 14. Everything seemed to
be coming together.

But what about that five years of supervised release from the feds?
The clock had started ticking when he got out of federal prison in
October 2001. In October 2006, two days before the five years would be
up, the feds moved to revoke his supervised release because of his
2003 arrest.

Reeves and his family hired attorney Joel Schwartz. "Had this been my
case back in 2003, I would have taken care of the federal situation,
and then pleaded guilty to the state case. That way, it could all have
run concurrent," he said. (The state can run sentences concurrent with
federal time, but the federal court does not run its sentences
concurrent with state time. The adage is, a whale can decide to
swallow a fish, but a fish can't decide to swallow a whale.)

In December, Reeves appeared in front of U.S. District Chief Judge
Carol Jackson. Schwartz argued for leniency. Even though the lawyer in
2003 didn't take care of the federal problem, the feds should have
moved to revoke Reeves' supervised release, Schwartz argued. This case
fell between the cracks, he said.

Reeves' state probation officer wrote a letter to the court saying
that Reeves was working and that his progress "has been highly
satisfactory so far."

Assistant U.S. Attorney Antoinette Decker, who had prosecuted the 1999
case, represented the government. Did her office ask for jail time?
"We did not take a position," she said.

He's already gone to prison for this case, Schwartz argued.

Jackson sentenced Reeves to one year and a day. In a sense, that was a
break. A person can only get credit for good time if his sentence is
more than a year.

Jackson declined to discuss the case with me.