DRUG CZAR BLASTS NO-JAIL PROPOSAL

State referendum puts treatment before prison for some offenders

White House drug czar Barry McCaffrey has condemned a California referendum
that would keep nonviolent first-time drug offenders out of jail.

McCaffrey - who has publicly opposed mandatory sentencing minimums and
three-strikes laws - told a gathering of 3,000 drug court professionals that
the so-called Campaign for New Drug Policies measure is a "poison pill" that
can destroy effective anti-addiction programs recently initiated throughout
the state.

McCaffrey made his remarks Friday at a conference of the National
Association of Drug Court Professionals in downtown San Francisco. McCaffrey
has publicly championed drug courts, a relatively recent innovation in which
drug offenders are given treatment and counseling options over
incarceration. They can be sentenced to jail if they do not abide by the
rules.

The drug court system began with 12 courts nationwide in 1994. Currently,
there are more than 600 courts in the United States and five foreign
nations. In California, there are 101 drug courts.

The well-funded referendum, to appear on the California ballot in November,
would mandate that people convicted of nonviolent drug offenses, including
those on parole, be sent to treatment facilities instead of jail. Then their
offense could be erased from the record.

McCaffrey said the threat of jail time sometimes is necessary to inspire
hard-core addicts to change their ways.

"If you think you can deal with changing drug addicts without holding them
accountable for their behavior, you don't understand the nature of this
brain disease," he said. "You have to have a reward and a punishment for
people whose chaotic lives are completely out of control."

McCaffrey called for greater coordination between various service agencies -
including Medicaid and drug treatment programs - and drug courts. He also
urged the development of re-entry drug courts to work with prison parolees.

Following his remarks, McCaffrey spoke in an interview against mandatory
minimum sentences for drug offenses and laws that can put drug offenders in
prison for extremely lengthy sentences.

Judges should retain authority to decide sentences in these cases, he said.

"We still have inadequately educated, in my view, state and federal
legislators."

Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Stephen Manley said supporters of
the anti-jail proposition on California's November ballot "suggest ... that
drug courts do not work, that supervision is not necessary."

In fact, he said, drug courts "send addicts back to the community as better
people with jobs. ... We have demonstrated in California that drug courts
work."

He said state legislators who support the drug court system have drafted a
bill to counter the pending ballot measure. It would require the Superior
Court in each county to develop its own drug court, and remove mandatory
minimum sentences for certain drug offenses, he said.

Jeffrey Tauber, a Virginia judge and president of the drug court
organization, said that drug courts represent a radical reform in treating
addicts.

Tauber said a study conducted by Columbia University has demonstrated that
addicts brought before drug courts have much greater chances of recovery
than those simply sent to treatment programs.

"Coercion works," he said. "There's all kinds of coercion."

He said drug courts practice "therapeutic jurisprudence ... It's not about
punishment for the sake of punishment."