HIP-HOP SHAKES ROCKEFELLER DRUG LAWS

NEW YORK'S notoriously tough "Rockefeller" drug laws are to be relaxed
after a grassroots campaign led by the rap mogul known as the "Godfather of
hip-hop". State legislators voted on Tuesday to scale back mandatory
sentences under the stringent drug laws passed during the crime wave of the
early 1970s, which could send a person to jail for life for possessing just
4oz of heroin or cocaine.

The reform cut sentences for first-time non-violent offenders from fifteen
years' minimum to eight, with the possibility of more than a year off for
good behaviour. At the same time, the amount of heroin or cocaine required
to make possession a Class A-1 felony is doubled from 4oz to 8oz.

The harsh drug laws -- among the toughest in the United States -- were
introduced by Nelson Rockefeller, the Governor of New York, in 1973-74, as
the state lost control of its inner cities to an epidemic of heroin addiction.

Critics said that the Rockefeller laws threw too many low-level offenders
in jail and hit ethnic minorities disproportionately hard, but Republicans
fought hard over the years to keep the laws in place.

New York's falling crime rate made it politically possible for the state
legislature to take another look. Pressure for reform was particularly
strong among the black community, which has seen generations of small-time
drug dealers sent away for long prison terms.

Leading the charge was the Hip-hop Action Summit, a group created and
chaired by Russell Simmons, the rap impresario whose Def Jam Recordings
helped to launch the careers of artists such as the Beastie Boys, LL Cool
J, Run-DMC and Public Enemy.

Mr Simmons's own older brother, Daniel, and his longtime driver served time
under the Rockefeller laws. "We are very happy and proud of all of the
support and efforts by hip-hop artists and other community activists that
helped to bring about today's agreement to reform the Rockefeller drug
laws," Mr Simmons said. "Of course, we wanted more, but itA's as much as we
could have realistically hoped for and we finally broke the stalemate."

The repeal did not satisfy reformers' demands for judges to have discretion
in sentencing and to be able to send offenders to drug treatment instead of
prison. The change will enable about 400 inmates in jail serving the
harshest Rockefeller sentences to ask the courts to cut their prison time
in line with new guidelines.

David Townsend Jr, a Republican assemblyman from upstate Oneida, mocked the
reforms as a "get-out-of-jail-free card" that will free the "worst of the
worst".