MISGUIDED DRUG LAWS PACK PRISONS, DRAIN CASH

Cynthia Tucker's focus on discriminatory sentencing practices deflects
attention from the root cause of the excessive prison population: misguided
drug laws.

Automobiles and alcohol kill more people every year than illegal drugs. We
accept the use of these legal products as part of a free society. Their
dangerous misuse, where others are involved, is appropriately punished.

Misinformation and scare tactics, rather than rational thinking, create a
cultural bias that leads us to lock up people who consume drugs, whether or
not their use endangers others.

Taxpayers should wake up to the fact that they fund the tuition and room
and board for drug-user inmates to learn the more violent techniques of the
criminal trade from hard-core offenders. Many of these trainees could be
working, taxpaying citizens if it weren't for existing drug laws. As Tucker
points out, the economic costs of this continuing folly are enormous and
weigh disproportionately on the black community.

Lighter and fairer sentencing practices alleviate a symptom but don't
address the disease. Decriminalization with appropriate regulation is
what's needed.

BILL FOGARTY, Alpharetta