THE DEATH OF ALLEN BROUSSARD

Editor - I'm appalled that the Jaxon Van Derbeken's front page story
implies that the best answer to persistent petty offenders is to kill them.

In addition to rationalizing the murder of a citizen who apparently
never hurt anyone physically, the "editorial" for longer prison
sentences masquerading as a news story, contains little more than a
series of unchallenged quotes from prosecutors about how hard it is
to get petty criminals sent to state prison. Given that our state
prisons now contain nearly 180,000 people, and are under court order
as unconstitutionally overcrowded and mismanaged, it is hard to see
how sending more drug addicted petty criminals there would help anything.

There is another way. End the senseless, brutal, and totally
ineffective 40-year-old "war on drugs." With a legal but robustly
regulated market the Allen Broussard's of this world would have less
need for breaking into automobiles and more chance of getting help
with there addictions.

Jonathan Simon

Professor of Law

U. C. Berkeley, School of Law

Berkeley