Pubdate: Thu, 13 Dec 2007
Source: Free Press, The (Kinston, NC)
Copyright: 2007 Kinston Free Press
Contact:  http://www.kinston.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1732
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?199 (Mandatory Minimum Sentencing)

COURT RESTORES SOME SANITY TO CRACK SENTENCES

The U.S. Supreme Court has taken what should have been an obvious 
step toward more sensible sentencing -- though apparently it hasn't 
been obvious enough for Congress to fix the mistake it made some two 
decades ago. The result is a modest step toward equity in sentencing 
practices. Some two decades ago, in 1986, following the tragic 
cocaine-related death of basketball star Len Bias and in the midst of 
a panic about a crack "epidemic," Congress amended sentencing 
"guidelines" to increase the penalties for crack cocaine as compared 
to the powder version. Possession of 50 grams of crack has long 
carried the same penalty as possession of 5,000 grams of powder cocaine.

Over the years numerous studies have documented that while 
African-Americans and white people use cocaine at about the same rate 
as a percentage of the general population, African-Americans are more 
likely to use the cooked crack type, while white people tended to use 
the powder. On top of the fact that black people tend to be arrested 
in disproportionate numbers for drug possession, then, they ended up 
serving grotesquely long sentences for having the more demonized 
version of cocaine.

The U.S. Sentencing Commission, along with most judges, has been 
aware of this disparity for some time. Recently it amended its 
sentencing guidelines to reduce the crack/powder disparity, though 
not by much. This week, it decided to apply its decision 
retroactively, meaning some 19,000 people serving absurdly long 
sentences will be eligible to appeal their sentences. The Supreme 
Court contributed to returning some common sense to sentencing by 
overturning two appellate court decisions that had overturned two 
sentences imposed by trial judges.

In one case, a judge in Virginia sentenced a Gulf War veteran who 
possessed 56 grams of crack to 15 years instead of the 19-23 years 
the guidelines dictated. In another, an Iowa man who had given up 
selling and using drugs and gotten a college education long before 
the police got the evidence to convict him for his previous drug 
selling got a suspended sentence instead of 30 to 37 years.

By a 7-2 margin (Justices Alito and Thomas dissenting), the high 
court ruled that the trial judges in these cases exercised 
permissible discretion in sentencing.

The Supreme Court and Sentencing Commission have set the stage for a 
modest reduction of the inequity inherent in the crack/powder 
sentencing disparity. However, Congress really should act to 
eliminate it altogether -- or to end the ridiculous war on drugs that 
has created so much more misery.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom