RETIRED COP ABHORS CORRUPTION CAUSED BY WAR ON DRUGS

As a retired New Jersey state trooper and 12-year undercover
narcotics officer, I never like hearing about yet another bunch of
cops corrupted by the drug war. Each case is just another sad example
of the increase in police and public official corruption that is
directly stimulated by a policy of drug prohibition.

The fact that corruption of law enforcement officials is so extensive
is a direct result of this failed policy steadily escalated at the
federal and state levels since 1970.

The war on drugs has created artificially inflated values for illicit
drugs, making marijuana worth more than gold, heroin more than
uranium, with methamphetamine and cocaine falling somewhere between.
The values can increase by 17,000 percent from where they are grown
or produced to where they are sold.

These obscene profits cause some to kill each other in the streets
and others to entice law enforcement with bribes, backroom deals and
other illegal payoffs in order to protect their corner of the market.

The only way to end this corruption is to remove the profit motive
from selling drugs just like we did with alcohol prohibition. We must
legalize drugs. This is not an endorsement for the use of any drug.
It is simply a realistic acknowledgment that an illegal drug market
cannot compete with a licensed, regulated distribution system. And a
regulated system is far less likely to corrupt police and other
public officials.

Jack A. Cole, Executive director

Law Enforcement Against Prohibition