Pubdate: Mon, 29 Jan 2001
Source: Washington Post (DC)
Copyright: 2001 The Washington Post Company
Contact:  1150 15th Street Northwest, Washington, DC 20071
Feedback: http://washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/edit/letters/letterform.htm
Website: http://www.washingtonpost.com/
Author: Tracey A. Reeves, Washington Post Staff Writer

FROM PARTING PRESIDENT, A GIFT OF FREEDOM

Pardon Brings New Life to Man Given 20-Year Mandatory Drug Term

Derrick Curry was just 19 and a college student when he was busted for
conspiracy to distribute crack cocaine. Sentenced to almost 20 years
in prison with no chance of parole, his chances at freedom seemed a
remote dream.

But that was before the imprisonment of Curry and others like him
became a cause celebre -- a symbol to many of the overly harsh impact
federal crack laws have had on African Americans.

Now, eight years after entering prison, Derrick Curry is free after an
eleventh-hour pardon by President Bill Clinton before leaving office,
and he's just beginning to get his arms around the vast expanse of
life that is once again his own.

"Right now, this is where I want to be. I feel secure here with my
dad," said Curry, 31, smiling softly as he sat beside Arthur Curry in
the dining room of his father's Upper Marlboro home. "People keep
telling me I have a lot of time to make up for. I'm not trying to make
up for lost time. That's how guys who get out end up back behind bars."

Derrick Curry's return home ends a painful odyssey for Arthur Curry,
who has labored to win his son's release since that October day 11
years ago when Derrick was arrested in an undercover police sting.

"I've prayed for this day," said Arthur Curry, a retired Prince
George's County principal who has made it his mission to help young
black males but struggled to save his own son. "I wasn't for sure, but
I just felt like it was going to come."

At the time of his arrest, Curry was attending Prince George's
Community College and was a former Northwestern High basketball
standout, with dreams of following in the footsteps of his buddy, Len
Bias, the late NCAA star.

You wouldn't have picked him for a guy who would land in jail. He
wanted for little and had the support of two loving parents. His
friends ran the gamut -- from Sharmba Mitchell, the boxing champion
from Laurel, to Brian Tribble, a convicted drug dealer -- but his feet
seemed firmly planted.

But all of that vanished with his arrest.

Convicted by a federal jury, Curry was given a sentence that would
have kept him behind bars until he was 40. It didn't help that he was
a first-time offender who said he'd never used or dealt drugs, or that
the sentencing judge was reluctant to impose such a harsh penalty.
Under federal law adopted in 1988, conviction on possession of five
grams of crack meant a mandatory five-year term, longer for greater
amounts. Derrick Curry was caught with more than 50 grams.

Critics of mandatory-minimum laws note that they are too arbitrary and
allow no room for leniency. Further, they say, such laws unfairly
target black men, who statistics show are more likely to be in
possession of the less costly crack cocaine than are whites, who deal
more often in the powder form for which sentences are not as strict.

As Derrick Curry languished in prison, the chorus of critics grew, and
Arthur Curry made sure that they were aware of his son's case.

"It's absurd," said Julie Stewart, founder of the advocacy group
Families Against Mandatory Minimums, which lobbied on Derrick's
behalf, along with a bevy of area politicians, friends and former
teachers who wrote letters to the U.S. Department of Justice urging
Curry's pardon.

"I remember vividly his sentencing when the judge acknowledged that
Derrick was a minor player, then gave him 20 years," Stewart said. "He
had no choice. It was the law."

It still is. But as the beneficiary of both fervent support and sheer
luck, Curry is free.

A new black sweater and khakis replacing his prison garb, Derrick
Curry sits in his father's pale yellow dining room reflecting on his
life. His father sits beside him, aglow with love and pride.

The younger Curry says he is not bitter, but shocked.

"I still can't believe I'm out," he said with a nervous laugh. "I
mean, I always dreamed of this, but now it's here. I'm out!"

But being out has not been easy. The years have passed, and he has
little to show for them. He knows that he now carries the stigma of
being an ex-con and what that might mean when he applies for a job, or
even asks a woman on a date.

He knows that the odds are against him.

For now, he'll take life one day at a time, get used to the things
that others take for granted.

Like gum.

He couldn't chew it behind bars for security reasons, so he made do by
melting taffy in the microwave. When his father came to pick him up at
the Federal Correctional Institution in Cumberland, Md., last Saturday
after learning of the pardon on the Internet, the first thing Derrick
asked for was gum. Now he's rarely without a stick of Big Red.

"That's all I wanted," he laughed. " I hadn't had any in eight
years."

Back home, his family, including mother Darlene Curry and stepmother
Sandra Curry, were waiting with a seafood dinner of crab legs and
potato salad.

Darlene Curry, a middle school teacher in Suitland, said she is still
pinching herself. "I don't think people understand how being
incarcerated hurts loved ones on the outside," she said.

Or how fast freedom can become a stranger, Derrick Curry would
add.

"The first day I was home, I was sitting by the phone when it rang,"
Curry said, explaining that inmates are prohibited from answering the
phone. "I just looked at it."

It feels odd, too, said Curry, to open the refrigerator whenever he
wants and to sleep in a bed wide enough to roll over in without fear
of falling off.

"I couldn't sleep the first night," he said, laughing. "It was too
comfortable. The mattress was too thick, and the pillows . . . man,
are they fluffy."

At first, he locked himself in his father's home, not entirely ready
to face life on the outside. Then he made a few trips -- to the
grocery store, the Big and Tall men's shop to buy new clothes for his
buffer body.

Then he scored floor seats to a Wizards game, and started shooting
hoops at a local gym.

Aside from his best friend, Sharmba Mitchell, the boxing champion from
Laurel, Curry has avoided contacting buddies from his past to focus on
his future.

"When he called me and told me he was out, I said, "For real! You're
home?' " said Mitchell, reached in Louisiana, where he is training for
a fight. "I was so surprised. I mean, the way he went in was so bad.
They did him wrong, and he had so much potential in basketball. I'm
just happy he's out."

Curry hopes to get back on track to a professional or
semi-professional basketball career. He claims to still have a 43-inch
vertical leap, maintained by hitting the court every day in prison.

But he harbors no grand illusions about his chances at a pro career.
He took courses in prison through Allegany College and is thinking
about reenrolling in college.

If his basketball dreams are dashed, he figures he can build a career
counseling youths -- just like his dad, who is now a professor at
Bowie State.

Arthur Curry watched his son speak, his eyes shimmering.

"In the end, though, I couldn't save my own son," he said. "I saved a
thousand young men. But I couldn't save him."

He reached over and draped his arm around his son's shoulder. Like a
young child, Derrick settled into his father's embrace.
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