IS WAR ON RAVES AN ATTACK ON DRUGS OR FREEDOM?

NEW ORLEANS -- Dawn was approaching when the outlaw wizard stepped center
stage at the State Palace Theatre to survey his electronic wonderland.
Laser lights strafed the grand old chandeliers overhead and deafening
machine music rattled the opera boxes. The floor was packed with young,
sweaty dancers.

"Great crowd," J. Donnie Estopinal said. And then, with a boyish smile, he
added: "I wonder which ones are the cops?"

The 32-year-old hefted a chugging smoke machine and aimed it toward the
audience of more than 3,300. If there were any undercover drug agents in
the Canal Street theater -- and there almost certainly were -- Estopinal
was suddenly gone, vanished in a billowing white cloud. It was a rare
moment of low visibility for the rave promoter whose parties have been the
center of a federal war on raves.

The newest front in that government campaign is a Senate bill that has wide
support on Capitol Hill. That's the RAVE Act, which stands for Reducing
America's Vulnerability to Ecstasy.

The act would tweak a 16-year-old federal drug law, originally crafted to
prosecute owners of crack houses, by expanding its definition of a site
devoted to drug enterprise to include one-time events and outdoor
gatherings. Its model has been the case of United States of America vs.
Estopinal.

"I still can't believe it sometimes, when I think of what's happened,"
Estopinal said. "They told me these federal drug laws were going to put me
in prison for 20 years. But not for buying drugs, not for selling drugs,
not for using drugs. They never said I did any of that. They said I put on
raves."

Estopinal said his only knowledge of drugs at his raves is the "same common
sense knowledge that tells me there's drugs at concerts and clubs
everywhere." The government case against Estopinal fizzled and charges
against him were eventually dropped, but the campaign has sent a chill
through not only the electronic dance world, but also the ranks of civil
liberty advocates.

"The State Palace case was the opening battle and it's absolutely critical
in understanding the RAVE Act, which now appears to be a priority in Senate
with a very frightening prospect of passing," said Graham Boyd, an attorney
with the ACLU Drug Policy Litigation Project. "What's extraordinary here is
the government recasting of the drug laws to take an activity that has
never been considered criminal before and then criminalize it."

"Basically," the attorney said, "we're talking about putting on a party."

Not so, says Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., who introduced the RAVE Act and has
taken a prominent role in Senate hearings over the past two years regarding
ecstasy and other club drugs.

"Promoters who sponsor events where people can dance in a safe, drug- free
environment have nothing to fear from my bill," Biden said. "My legislation
is aimed at the promoters who seek to profit from knowingly putting their
customers at risk. . . . Quite frankly, I don't care what type of music is
playing or what the venue is. What I do care about is ... promoters who
turn their events into drug dens."

While the RAVE Act and the prosecution of Estopinal are matters of law, a
core question of the debate is cultural and generational: Are raves about
music or drugs?

Opponents of the RAVE Act say the law could be stretched to go after
concert promoters who book reggae artists and sell marijuana-themed T-
shirts, or venues that host jam bands in the Grateful Dead tradition and
sell black-light posters.

In 1986, the Crack House Laws were created to help police fight the
anonymous churn of cocaine houses. Dealers arrested in the morning were
replaced by afternoon, so the law made it a felony to knowingly house and
profit a drug enterprise.

In New Orleans in January 2001, a federal grand jury was asked: Are rave
promoters really all that different from the property owners who collect
cash for letting drug dealers set up shop under their roof? The answer came
in an indictment against Estopinal and the owners of the State Palace.

At the raves, throbbing electronic music and pulsing psychedelic lights
create sensory overload. And, of course, there are drugs.

The effects of ecstasy include a euphoria, increased sensuality and a
buzzing intensification of the senses -- all of which are stoked by the
rave atmosphere. But ecstasy and other club drugs such as ketamine and GHB
can also be hazardous for ravers who dance in crowded, broiling rooms for
marathon parties. Body temperatures soar, hydration dips, kidneys can fail
and seizures can set in.

When authorities came after Estopinal and the owners of the venue, Robert
and Brian Brunet, they pointed to a parade of limp youngsters taken to
local hospitals. When he introduced the legislation, Biden cited Drug
Enforcement Administration estimates that 400 teens attending State Palace
raves had overdosed over a two-year period, a total hotly contested by
Estopinal. There is no debate, however, that in 1998, a 17-year-old girl
who had been at a State Palace rave died of drug-related causes.

In the months leading up to the grand jury, DEA undercover agents reported
that they bought 13 grams of ecstasy at eight State Palace raves. The
government would argue that Estopinal and the Brunet brothers knew dealers
were active at the raves and sold items -- such as glow sticks, baby
pacifiers, mentholated inhalers -- associated with club drug culture.

The government did win a plea bargain, but it was a muted victory. All
charges against Estopinal and the Brunets as individuals were dropped.
Instead the corporation that owned the State Palace entered a guilty plea
on the crack house law, accepted a $100,000 fine and agreed to a ban on
items such as glow sticks.

The $100,000 fine has never been collected, Boyd said, and an ACLU suit on
behalf of State Palace patrons and artists negated the ban on rave items.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Al Winters, who handled the State Palace case, said
Thursday that he could not comment on the case. He did offer one insight:
"Once we executed search warrants at the State Palace theater, the
overdoses in the local hospitals went from 12 every time they had a rave to
none. None. That's why we got into the case. It was to try to stop the
overdoses, and so far we're successful."