SENTENCE INEQUITIES NEED SOME ATTENTION

On Dec. 10, the U.S. Supreme Court gave judges some discretion in
sentencing for crack cocaine offenses.

One day later, the U.S. Sentencing Commission, intending to narrow
the stark disparity between sentences for crack versus powder
cocaine, revised sentencing guidelines to make them retroactive.

Why should anyone care about a bunch of drug users -- crack users at
that -- who might receive two years off their sentences?

It matters because of the racial inequities in our system. Crack
cocaine can be sold in small and rather cheap quantities and
therefore is preferred by the lower-income, usually minority, population.

Powder cocaine, the same drug but in a different form, is hard to
sell in very small quantities, is more expensive and is preferred by
the middle and upper-class population, more often white.

It takes the possession of 500 grams of powder cocaine (picture more
than two cups) to earn a five-year prison sentence. It takes only 5
grams of crack cocaine (picture half a teaspoon) to earn a five-year sentence.

Therefore, it is much easier for crack cocaine users to be sentenced
to five years in prison. In fact, 85 percent of all federal prisoners
in custody for crack cocaine are African American, and the
overwhelming majority are there for the nonviolent offense of simple
drug possession.

Because of the war on drugs, the United States incarcerates 4,800
black males per 100,000 of our population. In South Africa during
apartheid, only 850 black males per 100,000 were incarcerated. The
war on drugs is a racist policy. It is also a failed policy.

I do not make these claims lightly. As a former law enforcement
officer, narcotics detective and DEA task force member, I see from my
experience that current policy simply mirrors our past failed policy
of alcohol prohibition, with all its same death, disease, crime and corruption.

We need to treat drug use and abuse as a social and health issue,
just as we do with our two most dangerous drugs, alcohol and tobacco.
We need to legalize and then strictly regulate all drugs, which would
put modern-day Al Capones out of business. We need to end this racist
policy of mandatory minimum sentences, which saddles our judges with
these sentencing disparities.

And then let us stop incarcerating our young people with sentences
that are more damaging than the use of the drug itself.