CONNECTICUT'S DRUG WAR IS A BUST

Politicians, Academics and Former Police Press for a More Candid
Discussion About the Costs of Criminalizing Drugs

When Clifford Thornton was two weeks shy of graduating high school in
1963, a Hartford police officer showed up at his grandmother's door
one Sunday morning. The cop asked Thornton to accompany him to a
nearby field. There, inside an abandoned car, was the body of
Thornton's mother, dead of an apparent heroin overdose.

"No words can describe how I felt," says Thornton. "But, as I came to
my senses, one thought resonated: all illegal drugs should be
eradicated from the face of the earth."

As the years passed, though, Thornton noticed that the exact opposite
was occurring in Hartford. That is, as more money and police effort
was funneled to the "war on drugs," more and different drugs were
flooding into Hartford - and more Hartford residents were being sent
off to prison, the disproportionate number "black and brown."

This was not a figment of his imagination. Connecticut currently has
about 17,000 prison inmates with another 50,000 on parole. "Black and
Latino men make up less than 6 percent of the state's population, but
account for 68 percent of the prison population," says Thornton, who
with his wife Margaret founded Efficacy, an organization advocating
for drug-policy reform. "It costs $600 million a year to run the
state prison system. That money could be better spent."

This is not just happening in Connecticut. In 1975, the incarceration
rate in the U.S. was 100 per 100,000 people, a rate that hadn't
changed much in the previous half century. Since 1975, the
incarceration rate has climbed to 700 per 100,000. This dramatic
increase is due to drugs. Since Richard Nixon declared his "war on
drugs," drug arrests have increased 1,100 percent. Eighty percent of
all arrests are drug related; eighty percent of the prison sentences
for "drug offenses" are for possession (read: non-violent users). If
the goal was to reduce use and availability, we have lost the war.
Drugs are more readily available and more dangerous than ever.
Hartford is just one more battlefield in this lost cause, like
Bridgeport, Waterbury, et al.

The final straw for Thornton - who, if anyone should hate drugs
forever, he would be the person - came when a former co-worker was
convicted on a drug conspiracy charge and sentenced to 10 years in
prison. Thornton believes the man was framed and unfairly convicted.
Thornton took early retirement soon thereafter and devoted his life
to this cause.

"This issue has been pushing me for three decades," says Thornton,
the 2006 Green Party gubernatorial candidate who now lives in
Glastonbury. "This has to stop because kids can now get illegal drugs
more easily, and more cheaply, than legal drugs tobacco and alcohol."
For a population of 30,000, Thornton estimates Glastonbury spends
somewhere in the neighborhood of $1.5 million a year for the war on
drugs. "This is the insanity we are dealing with."

Thornton's belief that the drug war in Hartford is a bust now has
some persuasive allies. For one, statistics are on his side. A recent
report prepared by Dr. Robert Painter, under the direction of Central
Connecticut State University's Institute for Municipal and Regional
Policy, bears this out. Despite its unassuming title ("Compilation of
local costs of Connecticut's current drug Policies"), the report
offers a stiff dose of Hartford's daily reality. Painter and his
co-author Dr. Susan Pease, CCSU's Arts and Sciences dean, take a
pragmatic, rather than hysterical view: "It is time to examine the
cost associated with the enforcement of current drug laws to
determine whether the outcome justifies resources expended."

In a word, their answer is "No."

It's not as if Painter's and Pease's conclusions - similar to those
of Thornton's - come as a surprise, but the numbers still boggle the
mind. Using a method developed by Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron,
they determined that the annual cost of the drug war to the Hartford
Police Department is $21,933,814; the cost to state taxpayers to
imprison Hartford's drug arrestees, $14,020,621; probation and parole
for same costs another $10 million, and another $7.5 million goes to
half way and transitional houses. Homicide costs are $34,253,783,
overdose death costs are $25 million. And, finally, the taxes lost
that were not collected from the $42 million in annual drug sales in
Hartford - a conservative estimate in Thornton's view - would have
amounted to more than $8 million.

When asked about Painter's and Pease's report, Nancy Mulroy, a
Hartford Police Department spokesperson, says that the chief had not
seen it and would look it over and perhaps respond. About the "drug
war" itself, Mulroy says, "The word 'war' makes it sound so trite or
outdated. We target drug-driven crime in Hartford and, in particular,
gun possession, by seizing weapons from people we know who have been
involved with violence. We start in the spring trying to get the guns
off the street. But the sources for guns in Hartford are so varying."

Whether or not the current campaigns against drugs in Hartford
constitute a "war," Mulroy points to the weekly crime statistics that
are posted on the Hartford Police Department website
(hartford.gov/police). She says, "We are not going to win any war by
ourselves and any so-called war on drugs will not have to just be won
in Hartford."

Painter, a former Hartford City Council minority leader and director
of surgery at St. Francis Hospital, has witnessed the drug war from a
unique perspective.

"As a surgeon, I did a lot of trauma work and I always worried that
the gunshot victims might be addicts or that someone would burst into
the emergency room to finish the job," says Painter, now retired.
"But it wasn't until I was on the city council that I saw almost
every ill that we talked about was related in some way to the drug
war. Whether it was education, unemployment, housing, you name it."

Because drugs, and the hysteria and ignorance surrounding them, are
so pervasive, Painter convened a national conference at Trinity
College in 2005.

"I got tired of hearing one side say, 'Well, we should just legalize
everything and the problems would go away' and the other side say,
'We need more money, more prisons, lock all druggies up.' Neither is
a profitable position from which to talk about the huge problem of
drugs. Thus, the report for CCSU was my attempt to attack the issue
strictly by the numbers."

Painter's preference is not, he insists, "to get people softened to
the idea of legalizing drugs" but, rather, to offer them as much hard
factual data and informed material so that they can make rational
decisions. The implied message is this: Do we really want to continue
pouring this kind of money into something that is only getting worse?

"We need another plan," Painter says. "Let's look to other countries,
find out where policies have worked. But let's NOT approach this as a
Republican vs. Democrat, liberal vs. conservative thing. It's not one
of those issues. It's destroying our city, state and country."

"This economic report coming from a university helps give the issue
credibility," says Thornton. "Not that it didn't have it before, but
a university's input helps dispel the fear of talking about it. The
law enforcement community also brings credibility."

Thornton points to Joseph Brooks, who spent 30 years with the
Manchester Police Department. Brooks commanded the Tritown Narcotics
Task Force, for Manchester, Vernon and South Windsor. From that
vantage point he saw the impact of the drug war on the communities,
families and the entire social structure.

"We knew we had strong drug traffic in Manchester that wasn't being
addressed," says Brooks. "We were successful at first, arresting 33
people in our first raid. The problem was that those arrested were
our neighbors and friends, solid citizens who believed smoking a
joint was no worse than drinking a can of beer. It was very upsetting
to see them in this predicament."

Then, there was the animosity this generated in the community, where
former friends were now "enemies."

"This anger and bitterness is an important and overlooked part of the
fallout from the drug war," says Brooks. "The police are forced to
implement ill-conceived policies. They're not living up to 'protect
and serve.'"

The long-term effects - or "downstream costs," as Painter and Pease
say - are profound. When someone is sent to jail for drug possession,
chances are that they are a family provider.

"Say they've got two kids," says Brooks. "Who's going to take care of
those kids while they're locked up? They will go on welfare, and we
end up paying for the imprisonment of the wage earner plus the
welfare needed to support the family. How are we gaining from this?"

"Bill Clinton and George Bush both used drugs," says Painter. "Would
their lives have been improved if they'd been caught and given a year
in prison? Well, one out of every six kids in Hartford has a close
relative in prison. We are destroying families."

Brooks is a member of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP), an
organization based in Medford, Mass., comprising members of the law
enforcement and criminal justice networks who believe current drug
policies have failed.

"We have spent more than $1 trillion in the U.S. on this war and are
working on a second trillion now," says Brooks. "Cops all over the
country have been killed in drug raids. When my officers went into
houses on raids, I went with them. We often found guns, which scared
me. Drug dealers were preparing for violence, from other drug
dealers, from buyers and, of course, from the police. That is just a
crazy situation."

Brooks has recounted his experiences in the front lines for hundreds
of audiences.

"What I normally say when I am giving a speech is that it's too bad
that hypocrisy was not currency because if so we would never have a
budget deficit," he says. "The hypocrisy in the federal versus the
state laws regarding medical marijuana is just one example. Fourteen
states have said yes to medical pot but the feds are still busting
state growers."

Brooks believes that the misconceptions about drugs that most members
of the general public have begins with the most familiar one: marijuana.

"It is not a gateway drug, never has been," he says. "Gateway drugs
start long before pot. They start with cigarettes and alcohol and now
we have a pharmaceutical problem. Kids are breaking into medical
cabinets for their parents' Oxycontin and Vicodin."

Brooks is particularly disdainful of elected officials using drugs
for political gain.

"The marijuana bill [the Compassionate Use Act, HB 6715, which would
have allowed medical use of marijuana] was passed by the state house
and senate but vetoed by Gov. Rell, who talked about 'gateway'
drugs," he says. "I will never believe she made that decision from
anything other than a political position. It was not a moral
decision. We in the drug-war arena know that gateway drug talk is B.S."

Painter also sees a misconception about heroin addiction, and the
hysterical fears of a zombie army of junkies roaming the streets.

"The heroin addiction rate in this country is 1.3 percent and has
remained steady for the past century," he says. "We are going to have
heroin addicts no matter what we do. We are going to have alcoholics
and nicotine addicts too and a lot of recreational use of these
drugs. Finding drugs in urine is a violation of parole. We will never
get rid of this scourge by sending people to prison for drugs in
their urine. It's ridiculous. If they rob, OK, send them back. But so
many people are in jail on technicalities, for dirty urine. What have
we gained?"

Talk of the problems with drug sentencing eventually leads to the
subject of prison policy. Brooks likes to cite the TV show "Lock Up"
in which a squad does nothing but go through mail to find out how the
drugs are getting inside the prison.

"If we can't keep drugs out of the most secure places in the country,
how are we going to keep them off the streets? It is just
unrealistic, a fantasy, to think that we can have a drug-free
society," says Brooks, then adds, "The privatization of prisons is
partly to blame. What's the best way to make a profit? By keeping the
prison cells full. What's the best way to fill prison cells? Arrest
and convict non-violent drug offenders, who will quietly serve their time."

LEAP's most controversial point of advocacy is legalization.

"LEAP is arguing for legalization," says Brooks, mincing no words.
"We would like to see all drugs legalized, controlled and medicalized."

Surprisingly, perhaps, Brooks is hearing more support for this from
those most affected by the drug plague: the inner city communities.

LaResse Harvey, for one, is on board with this idea. Policy director
for Hartford-based A Better Way Foundation, Harvey works with
community groups and families for a "sensible shift in drug policy"
throughout the state. After major drug busts - like recent
DEA-collaborative sweeps in Hartford, New Britain and Waterbury - she
hears from 20 or 30 new families whose father, husband or brother
have been removed to a jail cell for possession of drugs. All of this
is, in her view, a colossal waste of resources.

"We need to be proactive instead of reactive," says Harvey, her voice
rising. "We need to transfer these resources into schools. We lost
2,000 teachers in Connecticut in the last year. Rather than have
hundreds of correctional officers paid to babysit adults in jails,
they should be used to implement programs at treatment centers. The
Department of Corrections has failed at its job. It was created to
'correct' adverse behaviors."

Though there are loud voices in the community raised against
legalization or even decriminalization - and the NAACP recently
created an uproar among black church groups by supporting California
Proposition 19, aka the "Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act of
2010" - Harvey has a ready answer.

"When members of the religious community raise protests against drug
reform, all I can do is educate them with the facts," she says. "Look
at the pews inside your own churches. What do you see? A lot of
women, single parents, or mothers and wives whose husbands are
serving time for drugs. They are raising kids without fathers. What
happened to all the men inside the churches? They got caught in the drug wars."

Economic conditions have made people more receptive to the idea,
which further gets Harvey worked up. "People are saying we need to do
something about this because of the economy, but I say no, we need to
do it because it has to be done. We are losing entire generations of
young men."

Brooks cites a successful Swiss program that "medicalized" heroin for
addicts 12 years ago. Clinics were established where addicts could be
examined by doctors and have a stabilizing dose determined for them.
They are given their daily injections with clean needles and under
medical supervision. Brooks says that it has had "amazing results,"
resulting in a 60 percent drop in crime, practically eliminated
overdoses and nearly eradicated the HIV problem.

"A lot of patients went back to their families," he says. "They are
no longer living under bridges or on the street, scrounging for money
to feed their habits. Many went back to work, all because this was
treated as a medical problem. It all comes back to politics and money."

Brooks knows that legalization is a hard sell.

"LEAP is saying that whether you agree or not, we've been there. And
we aren't saying that drug problems are not going to stop if the
drugs are legalized just the way that alcoholism did not stop when
Prohibition ended. Isn't it time after 40 years and $1 trillion that
we look at something more productive?"

Painter would be happy just to have a more open and honest dialogue.

He says, "There is no guarantee that the level of drug-related
violence seen in Mexico won't happen here. Why wait to test that out?
Let's help lawmakers, give them some cover by ratcheting down the
hysteria and rhetoric. Let's help police departments realign their priorities."

Painter would like to see other "small steps" taken now, like
treating drug addicts for their addictions in prison and, if at all
possible, finding somewhere to send addicts for medical treatment for
their habits rather than prison cells.

"Right now, the only treatments available are 12-step programs and
detoxification. You could have been treated for years with methadone
and end up in prison and you will be detoxed from the medicine that
has kept you alive," he says. "Would you take away insulin from a
diabetic? Among the stupid reasons for taking away methadone is that
we want to promote a drug-free ethic in prison, which is crazy, since
80 percent of the inmates are drug users."

Painter sees some openness to these ideas in the legislature and
state agencies.

"There are people inside these agencies [DCF, Mental Health] who are
looking at these things. We need to make some little steps," he says.
"A good start would be to get rid of three-strikes laws all over the
country, which are just stupid."

Thornton is in favor of legalization, but with a disclaimer. His
"Restorative Justice" program (which can be found at the Efficacy
website) states that "Legalization without indemnification is totally
irresponsible. If you legalize drugs and then walk away, it could be
worse. Something has to replace that underground economy in Hartford
and in every other town and city where drugs are sold and money made."

Thornton has a few words for Connecticut's gubernatorial candidates.
He points out that it costs about $100 to produce a pound of heroin;
that pound on the streets of Hartford is worth about $60,000. "My
statement to the candidates is, seeing as how they're talking jobs,
jobs and more jobs, legitimate economic investment can never be more
profitable than prohibition-induced drug trafficking or cultivation."

No matter what the future holds, Thornton will keep the drug-reform
dialogue alive.

"Fear of talking about reforming drug policy promotes intellectual
dishonesty," he says.