PROSECUTIONS UP, SENTENCES DOWN FOR DRUG CRIMES

WASHINGTON -- Convicted federal drug offenders are spending less time behind
bars, but more of them are being prosecuted, according to a new study of
judicial records.

The shorter sentences, over a 1992-98 time span including most of the
Clinton administration, suggest that federal judges and prosecutors are
finding ways around tough minimum sentences mandated by Congress to crack
down on drug traffickers.

To some experts, the findings also suggest that federal agents are
increasingly nailing ``small fry'' drug offenders rather than the kingpins
whom federal agencies are uniquely suited to pursue.

The study, by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a government
performance analysis center in Washington that is associated with Syracuse
University, found that the average federal drug sentence dropped about 20
percent from 1992 to 1998.

The Justice Department did not dispute the figures. ``We have been aware of
this trend for several years,'' said spokesman John Russell.

For the Drug Enforcement Administration, which brings most drug cases to
federal courts, the average sentence dropped to 75 months in 1998 from 94
months in 1992.

Nationally, the number of federal drug prosecutions rose to a record high of
21,571 in 1998, up 16 percent from 1992.

The DEA and the U.S. Customs Service, the second-biggest narcotics
enforcement agency, remain strongly focused on marijuana. In 1998, their
convictions involving marijuana totaled 34 percent of all their drug cases,
compared with 28 percent for powder cocaine and 17 percent for crack
cocaine.

The marijuana quantities are large, however. To rate a five-year mandatory
federal drug sentence, a trafficker would have to be dealing more than 100
kilograms of marijuana, compared with 500 grams of cocaine.