BILL AIMS TO REDUCE SENTENCES FOR CRACK

COLUMBIA - Heavy sentences for crack cocaine possession and dealing would
be lightened to match penalties for cocaine offenses under a bill adopted
by the Senate on Thursday.

It was part of an intricate compromise on a House truth-in-sentencing bill
that finally won support of black senators who had tried to delay action on
the legislation.

A first offense for possession of less than a gram of crack cocaine is
considered a felony and brings up to five years in prison and a $5,000
fine. The bill the Senate approved lessens that to a misdemeanor with no
more than two years in prison and a $5,000 fine.

"You'd face the same sentence as if you had that same amount of cocaine,"
said Sen. Brad Hutto, D-Orangeburg, who helped broker the compromise.

"What we've done is basically put everything on an equal keel, so there's
not that disparity there," said Sen. Clementa Pinckney, D-Allendale.

About 21 percent of the people in prisons around the state are there for
serious drug offenses, according the Corrections Department. Among black
men and women, more than 27 percent are in prison on "dangerous drug"
offenses, according to the Corrections Department. The agency's spokeswoman
could not immediately say how many of those people are in prison on crack
cocaine convictions.

The change reversed Pinckney's efforts earlier in the week that would have
raised powder cocaine sentences to the same level as crack cocaine.