MORE EFFECTIVE WAYS TO DISRUPT DRUG DISTRIBUTION

Two years ago, I struck up a conversation with an FBI supervisory agent on
the subject of the tough new money laundering law that Gov. George Pataki
had recently signed. He thought it was a good law, but cautioned that money
laundering investigations are expensive, time consuming and labor
intensive. He was not enthusiastic about them because they require a big
investment to generate a one-time headline.

I share that insight as the Times Union continues to editorialize in favor
of reform of the Rockefeller Drug Laws (Times Union, April 3) and point out
to those who are resisting even the sensible reform proposed by the
governor that the "mules" and penny-ante dealers scooped up and locked up
under those statutes are not the root of the problem of drug crime. They
are not even useful in getting at the brains behind drug distribution
conspiracies -- and all drugs are part of some far-flung conspiracy.

Let me commend to their attention the achievements of the late Sgt. Erin
O'Reilly of the New York City Police Department. Sgt. O'Reilly, who died
untimely at the age of 41 last June, took on and brought down some
long-entrenched drug gangs whose kingpins for years operated brazenly at
known locations while hiding virtually untouchable behind successive
generations of expendable mules. No one ever got caught with a sufficient
quantity of drugs to earn a long prison sentence yet vast quantities were
dealt. So much for your Rockefeller laws.

Sgt. O'Reilly put together a select team of police and prosecutors and
began one of those time-consuming and labor-intensive investigations, not
under the money laundering law, but under conspiracy statutes that had been
used to fight the Mafia -- laws that had long been on the books but never
used against drug traffickers, laws that sentenced the brains behind these
conspiracies to terms comparable to those dealt out under the Rockefeller laws.

My point is that there are smarter and more-effective ways to break up
drug-distribution conspiracies that do not result in sentencing masses of
people to decades of prison time. The debate over sentencing reform should
provide the opportunity for police and prosecutors to explain why they are
not being used more extensively.

TERRY O'NEILL, Albany