Pubdate: Sun, 07 May 2006
Source: Sampson Independent, The (NC)
Copyright: 2006, The Sampson Independent
Contact:  http://www.clintonnc.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1704
Author: L.E. Brown Jr
Note: Title by newshawk

DRUG-FREE ZONES INEFFECTIVE

It's almost a given that when a non-profit organization does a study 
the aim is to create the perception of a crises, followed by a 
request for more money from taxpayers, funneled first through the 
U.S. Treasury.

Yet sometimes such studies can provide useful information, such as 
one done by the the Drug Policy Alliance and the Justice Policy 
Institute, two non-profit groups that advocate reducing penalties for 
non-violent drug crimes.

The study focused on so-called drug-free school zones, which stiffen 
penalties for drug crimes committed within their boundaries. These 
zones usually extend 1,000 feet in all directions from a school, 
although in some cases they extend three miles.

As with nearly all laws, legislation creating drug-free zones has 
undergone tinkering over the years, most often in the form of 
expanding zones of coverage, to include such places as public 
housing, parks, playgrounds, shopping malls and churches.

At any rate, the study done by the two non-profits concluded that 
drug-free school zones don't discourage drug dealing on school grounds.

In New Jersey, which enacted a drug-free zone law in 1987, arrests 
near schools actually rose from 8,000 in 1993 to 14,000 in 2002, 
according to the state Commission to Review Criminal Sentencing.

Some news reports indicate that legislatures in some states are way 
ahead of the study and are considering laws shrinking the size of the zones.

Perhaps they should be reduced, or eliminated, but strangely it seems 
that the ones advocating for shrinkage are doing so because they see 
drug-free zones as tending to discriminate against minority drug 
dealers, reasoning that drug dealers in cities, who are more likely 
to be minorities, are punished more severely that their suburban and 
rural counterparts.

Drug-free zones are not only fewer and farther apart in the suburbs, 
but typically houses and other establishments are usually farther 
from schools. In cities, drug dealers may be forced to sell in a 
drug-free zone, because there is nowhere else available.

Could the answer be to provide for monitored zones where dealers can 
hawk their wares without fear of penalty?