EX-COP: ANTI-DRUG WAR A FAILED POLICY

WATERVILLE -- A retired police captain is touring Maine this month to
call for an end to marijuana prohibition.

Peter Christ, who spent 20 years as a captain on the police force in
suburban Buffalo, N.Y., is a founding member of LEAP -- Law
Enforcement Against Prohibition.

He will be speaking at Colby College tonight at 7 p.m. in Room 122 in
the new Diamond Building on campus.

The title of the lecture is "War on Drugs? Or War on
People?"

The program is sponsored by the Maine Marijuana Policy
Initiative

Christ is a strong advocate of ending drug prohibition in America,
according to promotional material. He is in Maine through April 12.

"After three decades of fueling the U.S. War on Drugs with over a
trillion tax dollars and increasingly punitive policies," Jonathan
Leavitt of the policy initiative said in an e-mail. "Our court system
is choked with ever-increasing prosecutions of nonviolent drug
violations and our quadrupled prison population has made building
prisons this nation's fastest growing industry.

"Drugs are now more potent, more available, and cost even less, then
they did 30 years ago. This scenario must be the very definition of a
failed policy."

Peter Christ (rhymes with wrist) knows about the war on drugs from
several perspectives, according to Leavitt. He retired as a captain
after a 20-year career with the Tonawanda, New York Police Department.
His experiences have shown him the effects of the drug war on the
prison population, the minority community, sentencing issues and the
judiciary.

Christ's discussions blend facts he says show a failed U.S. policy of
a War on Drugs with a Will Rogers type humor and homilies of a
down-home philosopher and the practical approach of a police
administrator, according to the promotional material.

He also is scheduled to speak at the Waterville Rotary Club and at the
University of Maine at Farmington and will be speaking on numerous
radio, television, and local cable shows.