REFORMED DRUG OFFENDERS TO ASK BUSH FOR PARDONS

HOUSTON - Republican presidential front-runner George W. Bush, dogged by
questions about illegal drug use, has admitted that he made "mistakes" in
his youth. Now some reformed drug offenders plan to ask the Texas governor
for a pardon.

Roseanna Ruiz, 43, a twice-convicted drug felon who is now a Houston honor
student and prison drug counselor, and Randall Mason, a Dallas-area
electrician who spent 18 months behind bars for marijuana offenses, will
petition Bush on Monday to review their cases and grant formal pardons,
said G. Alan Robison, executive director of the Drug Policy Forum of Texas.
Robison, a professor of pharmacology at the University of Texas Medical
School in Houston, will submit a letter to Bush asking that he do the same
for thousands of people incarcerated in Texas for similar, nonviolent drug
offenses.

"It's a hell of a thing to have a felony on your record," Robison said
Sunday. "And many of these people are guilty of exactly the same thing you
and I and everybody know Gov. George W. Bush did as a kid, even if he won't
admit it."

Questions about past drug use have hounded Bush, despite his repeated
refusals to discuss the subject. Last month, when pressed he said he had
not used illegal drugs in the past 25 years.

Bush has acknowledged that at one time he drank heavily and that he made
"mistakes" in his youth. No evidence or even credible allegation has been
made that he ever used cocaine or any other illegal drug.

Bush's tough stance against drug offenses has magnified the issue.

In 1994, Bush campaigned against a law that provided automatic probation
for some first-time drug offenders. The Legislature repealed the law in
1995, allowing judges to sentence first-time offenders to as long as two
years in state jail.

And since Bush has been governor, the state's prison drug treatment program
has been reduced to 5,300 beds, fewer than half of the 14,000 envisioned by
former Gov. Ann Richards, the Houston Chronicle reported. A prison
spokesman said the reason was lack of funding by the Legislature.

"Governor Bush believes there must be consequences for breaking the law,"
campaign spokesman Scott McClellan said.

McClellan told the Houston Chronicle Bush would not comment on pardon
requests until the cases were formally presented.

Besides Ms. Ruiz and Mason, family members of some drug offenders now
incarcerated may petition Bush for pardons Monday. Advocates of drug law
changes are planning a vigil outside the Governor's Mansion.

Ms. Ruiz served more than four years in prison in the early 1990s after
convictions for illegal possession of a prescription drug and narcotics
paraphernalia.

Now an honor student at the University of Houston-Downtown, the criminal
justice major counsels inmates at the prison system's Jester 1 Unit at
Richmond and the nearby Carol S. Vance Unit.

With her parole completed and five drug-free years behind her, Ms. Ruiz
believes she deserves a pardon.

"I feel like I've earned it," she told the newspaper. "I've worked real
hard to turn my life around. And I've tried to give those inmates a message
of hope."