NPR SERIES EXAMINES WAR ON DRUGS

The title sounds familiar - "The Forgotten War." So does the focus of
the NPR special that will premiere this week on the network's "All
Things Considered."

Scheduled to run Monday through Friday at 3 p.m. on KVCR-FM (91.9),
the miniseries consist of five features. Each is approximately 10
minutes in length, covering aspects of this country's largely
ineffective battle against drug use.

And, NPR reporter/producer Laura Sullivan agrees, that is hardly a
new topic for radio or television. However, she points out, "This is
a war that has been going on since the '80s and it seemed a good time
to go back and look at what is happening."

Sullivan's involvement in that project can be heard Thursday when the
former San Bernardino Sun intern (1994) is featured in a broadcast
dealing with prisoners returning home after serving lengthy sentences
for drug violations.

Monday's opening program will be hosted by veteran NPR newsman John
Burnett. It studies American efforts to reduce foreign drug
operations - efforts that have resulted in huge costs in dollars and lives.

Juan Forero takes over Tuesday with a report on a six-year
multi-billion dollar plan to slash Colombia's coca crop.

Burnett returns Wednesday in a broadcast that deals with efforts to
cut off drug supplies from foreign countries and to highlight a
successful anti-narcotics program in San Antonio. And Friday he will
be back to profile John P. Wilson, described as "the man behind the
Bush administration's war on drugs."

Sullivan says Burnett started working on the special "about six
months ago." Her assignment required less time, although it had its
dramatic moments.

"My story took a look at people incarcerated in the '90s," she
explains. "They are all coming home now. There are thousands of these
people and they are returning to communities that are collapsing
under the explosion of our drug laws."

Most of her activity centered upon East Oakland where she found 3,000
to 4,000 people coming back each year.

"There are so many they are overwhelming a system that just can't
handle them," Sullivan says. "They are getting no access to
counseling, rehabilitative programs or job training, so the crime
rate is rising. The number of murders increased and many of these
people are going back into prison."

Sullivan says she compiled a large file of interviews with police and
released prisoners for her report and admits to some tense
situations, "especially when you're standing on a corner with drug
activity going on around you while you're talking to someone."

But the really difficult process came after the talking stopped.

"We ended up with 23 hours of tape," Sullivan says. "We started
taking things out and ended up with three hours and finally cut
everything down to 10 minutes."

On the other hand, she claims, that assignment was easier than an
earlier one involving a three-part study of solitary confinement
procedures in California prisons.

That report resulted in a Gracie Award from the American Women in
Radio and Television, an award that will be presented on June 18.

"I went into prison with a producer to interview subjects," Sullivan
says. "That was very difficult. To the prisoners, it looked like I
had an entourage and many were reluctant to talk to me. The drug
story was different. I was interviewing people who had come out of
prison. They felt fewer restraints and were more willing to speak."

Such projects seem almost standard for Sullivan who covered law
enforcement stories for the Baltimore Sun before coming to NPR, has a
report on illegal weapons on a tentative list of upcoming assignments
and once followed a New Orleans police homicide unit on a raid into a
neighborhood ravaged by crime and Hurricane Katrina.

"That was a little tense," she admits. "The police were going in
there with helmets and vests and with their guns drawn. And I was
just going in there. Finally, one of the detectives said, 'Stand
behind me.' I thought that was a very good idea and I did, hoping all
the while that the witnesses they were after were NPR listeners."