POLICE, PROSECUTORS DON'T HAVE SOLE CLAIM ON DRUG CASE FORFEITURE PROCEEDS

If possession is nine-tenths of the law, as the saying goes, then
drug treatment advocates have a lot of work to do before they can lay
their hands on any more of the assets seized in drug raids. If the
jealous reaction of Bristol County District Attorney Paul F. Walsh Jr.
is any guide, we are going to be in for some serious political
battles, complete with doomsday rhetoric, if anyone dares to tamper
with the formula that gives nine-tenths of the money, or even more,
back to law enforcement officials. Massachusetts statutes have set up
an elaborate system for tracking and accounting for the money and
assets seized in drug raids. Accountability is narrowly defined, to
the point where even state lawmakers have trouble determining how much
money is collected and where it goes. State Rep. Antonio F.D. Cabral,
D-New Bedford, has reintroduced legislation that would not only demand
detailed accountings, but would take 20 percent of the assets
forfeited in drug cases and assign it to treatment, education and
community programs such as crime watch.

This, Rep. Cabral says, is to force law enforcement authorities to
put their money where their mouth is on treatment. As the law stands,
after all, up to 10 percent may be spent on treatment and education.
Nothing says that it must.

The district attorney responds by charging that too much public
accountability would tip off sophisticated drug dealers about police
activity -- which, when one thinks of it, is a rationale that we could
apply to the entire law enforcement budget. Mr. Walsh's protest sounds
like something of a stretch.

Mr. Walsh also contends that for Rep. Cabral to try to dip into the
forfeiture money amounts to pitting the police and prosecutors against
the treatment people.

Nobody wants that, of course, but today the treatment people are
virtually shut out. In this case, silence about the forfeiture money
is golden -- for the district attorney. There's no unseemly
confrontation because there's little hope of treatment providers
obtaining a significant amount of the forfeiture money. It's all up to
the good nature of the district attorney, after all. He may use some
of the money, remember.

In fact, the police and prosecutors are squaring off against
treatment providers everywhere one looks, up to and including Congress
and the White House. This is despite the fact that treatment and
prevention has been shown to be a markedly better use of a tax dollar
(or forfeiture dollar) than policing and incarceration, crime rates
and prison populations notwithstanding.

The problem for treatment advocates is that the police and
prosecutors have won the rhetorical battles and thus the lion's share
of the money at every level. For police and prosecutors, being tough
on crime means pursuing crimes that have occurred. When treatment and
education prevent crimes, that is much harder to document and to sell
to voters and legislators.

We must note, however, that for all the declines in crime rates and
increases in prison populations, illicit drug use remains as much of a
scourge at it has always been. If property crimes are down, it might
be in large part because the price of heroin has fallen through the
floor and less money is needed to maintain a habit.

If, in that case, drug use has become less of a criminal problem and
more of a health and community issue, then perhaps Mr. Walsh
inadvertently is making the case for a shift in emphasis to the
current front lines in the "war on drugs."

In any event, it makes us uneasy whenever a public official argues
against more complete disclosure of drug forfeiture money that has,
more than once, been referred to as a police "slush fund." It is also
unhelpful to charge that this money can only be used for its current
purposes (as determined by the district attorney) without public
review and without competition. And while the district attorney is
right to say that treatment needs a line item in the budget, his
insistence would bear greater credibility if he were among the
foremost proponents of such a thing. But he is not.

Drug forfeiture money has clearly become near and dear to the hearts
of police and prosecutors. But Rep. Cabral is right to insist that
that money is rightly the taxpayers', and should be subject to the
same scrutiny as every other taxpayer dollar. Maybe in the end he will
merely have succeeded in demonstrating how treatment programs have
been starved without having a conduit like this to bypass the budget
process. If that is pitting prosecutors against treatment providers,
then so be it.