LAWS ON DRUG SENTENCING INSULT JUSTICE.

As you file your federal income tax returns this month, look at what you
pay and think what you could buy with the $264,000 being spent to
incarcerate Floridian Brenda Valencia, who is serving a mandatory 12-year
federal drug sentence.

At 19, Valencia drove her aunt to a house in Palm Beach, where the aunt
sold seven kilos of cocaine and carried a concealed weapon. The cocaine
purchaser implied that Valencia knew the drug had been in the trunk, so he
could reduce his own sentence. Valencia received a mandatory 10- year
sentence for conspiracy to sell cocaine and an additional two years because
her aunt had a weapon.

Even the judge was appalled by the sentence. "This is the perfect example
of why the minimum mandatory sentences and the sentencing guidelines are
not only absurd, but an insult to justice. This young lady does not need to
be sentenced to 151 months without parole; however, the law is the law, and
we're all bound to obey it. But it's absolutely ridiculous to impose this
sentence in this case, considering the degree of participation that this
defendant had in this crime."

In 1998, it cost taxpayers $1,672,000,000 to incarcerate Valencia and
76,000 others serving mandatory minimum drug sentences. That cost - based
on $22,000 per prisoner per year - has risen since 1986, when Congress
adopted mandatory minimums. Then drug offenders made up 38 percent of the
federal prison population; now it's 60 percent. Fifty-seven percent of the
current population are first-time offenders; 88 percent are non-violent
offenders.

Don't get me wrong. We should punish those seriously involved in the drug
trade, and we'll always have prison costs. But in any justice system, the
punishment should justify the costs, and it should fit the crime. With
mandatory minimum sentences, that doesn't happen. Instead judges, such as
in Valencia's case, are forced to mete out cookie-cutter sentences to each
defendant, regardless of mitigating circumstances.

Fairness also comes into question in comparing federal drug sentences
against those of other federal crimes. In 1997 those serving drug sentences
averaged seven years, crimes of sexual abuse six years, assault three years
and manslaughter 2.5 years.

The only circumstances that can lower a mandatory sentence is snitching on
others. For top-of-the-ladder drug dealers, that's a good deal. But those
on the bottom rung, usually first-time non-violent offenders who have no
one to implicate, end up with long, federally mandated sentences.

Voices opposed to mandatory minimums keep rising. Supreme Court Chief
Justice William Rehnquist, known for his conservative law-and-order
opinions, has called them "a good example of the law of unintended
consequences." Also Opposing them are such diverse groups as the National
Association of Veteran Police Officers, the Federal Courts Study Committee,
the American Bar Association, the American Psychological Association, the
American Civil Liberties Union and each of the federal judicial circuits.

Nonetheless, Congress, ever wary of appearing soft on crime, is considering
a proposal to increase the penalties for those involved with powder
cocaine. Despite already harsh penalties for cocaine, the new law would
mean even longer sentences and more prison beds.

So, 14 years after their adoption, mandatory minimum drug sentences
continue to fill our prisons with low-level, non-violent offenders. Judges
are forced to impose mandatory minimum sentences in nearly all cases. And -
surprise! - we taxpayers keep footing the bill.

Robert Batey, a professor of criminal law at Stetson University College of
law, coordinates the St. Petersburg chapter of Families Against Mandatory
Minimums (FAMM).