A week or so ago our county judge, Mr. Hall, announced personnel layoffs because of a money shortage in county funds. He did say things may improve though before year's end.

Seventy-eight marijuana plants were pulled from two plots on Tuesday, July 26. If you read the whole article and not just the headlines, you were either shocked or amused. Not the fact that 78 plants were confiscated but what it took to complete this large eradication of this evil menace.

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Not Welcome: Some Libraries Reject Books On Drug Reform

You can give a drug book to a library, but you can't make the library shelve it.

Headquartered in Fayetteville, the Drug Policy Education Group, which hopes to liberalize Arkansass drug laws, has donated more than $8,000 worth of books, videos, booklets and article reprints to 48 public and college libraries across the state since 2002. DPEG has just completed a survey to determine whether the donated materials are placed on the libraries shelves. Materials not shelved are commonly sold at library book sales at extremely low prices, which is not only a waste of our resources, but also does not accomplish our goal of making these materials available to the general public, a DPEG report on the survey said.

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Zephyrhills, Fla. -- When I visited Richard Paey here, it quickly became clear that he posed no menace to society in his new home, a high

security Florida state prison near Tampa, where he was serving a 25- year sentence. The fences, topped with razor wire, were more than enough to keep him from escaping because Mr. Paey relies on a wheelchair to get around.

Mr. Paey, who is 46, suffers from multiple sclerosis and chronic pain from an automobile accident two decades ago. It damaged his spinal cord and left him with sharp pains in his legs that got worse after a botched operation. One night he woke up convinced that the room was on fire.

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Glenda has had to have four teeth pulled over the six months that she has been in the White County Detention Center, and she lost several others prior to her incarceration. She said her teeth are brittle, "like chicken bones," and several have broken off while she was eating.

Glenda, who asked that her last name would not be disclosed, suffers from "meth mouth," a dental problem caused by long-term use of methamphetamine. Running rampant in American jails, "meth mouth" carries a hidden cost not only to the users of meth but also to the taxpayers, who often have to pay for the dental care of inmates.

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Officials Of Clark County's Drug Court Recently Presented Diplomas To The Program's First Two Graduates.

Drug Court is a program that allows persons who are charged with drug-related offenses to complete a year-long program as an alternative to incarceration. If the program is successfully completed, the offense is erased from the person's record.

Drug Court is a division of the Arkansas Department of Community Corrections' division of probation and parole.

Although the program has been in various locations around the state for five years, Clark County's program only began a year ago.

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In 1998, Rep. Mark Souder, R-Indiana, authored an amendment to the Higher Education Act delaying or denying financial aid eligibility to any individual convicted of a state or federal drug offense. As it stands, the amendment enforces a policy in which drug possession convictions result in ineligibility for one year for a first offense, two years for second offense and indefinitely for a third; drug sale convictions warrant ineligibility for two years on a first offense and indefinitely for a second offense. Ineligibility applies to all forms of federal financial aid, including grants, student loans and work-study.

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Associated Student Government passed a resolution Tuesday that will allow the organization, along with several other institutions, to lobby Congress with to repeal an amendment made to the Higher Education Act of 1965, which currently denies students with past drug offenses financial assistance.

Resolution 41 states that Congress passed an amendment in 1998 authored by Rep. Mark Souder that denies federal financial aid to any student with a drug conviction.

"Judges already have the discretion, on a case-by-case basis, to remove the student's eligibility for federal funding," said Sen. Jason Polk, author and sponsor of Resolution 41. "The provisions of the [legislation] are unfair, discriminatory, and counterproductive."

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Once again, this page feels obligated to revisit the sacred boundaries that separate church and state. As we have argued before, religious beliefs have no place in the structuring or maintenance of state and federal laws.

Legal foundations must have absolutely no affiliation with any religious backing, regardless of whether those beliefs represent a majority. Likewise, laws should not interfere with religious practices, despite arguments that some aspects might be considered dangerous or against government interests.

Federal law requires a governmental group to present a "compelling interest" before attempting any religious constraints on another group, but officials may manipulate a situation, giving them the upper hand when forced to present that interest.

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A man who was facing up to 40 years in prison for drug charges only two years ago is now leading a normal, happy life with his wife and daughter, thanks to a new area judicial program.

Josh Renfroe, 24, the first graduate of the 5th Judicial District Drug Court, made a Pope County courtroom a place of celebration instead of tragedy Tuesday when his friends, family and the Drug Court staff came to congratulate him for completing the program.

Renfroe was arrested in October 2003 for possession of methamphetamine with intent to deliver, a Class Y felony punishable by 10-40 years or life in prison. However, looking back, he said getting caught was the best thing that ever happened to him.

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COPS BUST KID'S BIRTHDAY PARTY FOR DOPE

Children Cry As Pregnant Woman Arrested

LITTLE ROCK -- Police on a drug raid burst into a suburban home during a child's birthday party, startling children who had not yet eaten their cake.

Amid wails from children and a few parents, officers arrested a pregnant woman and accused her of selling marijuana from the house, which had been under surveillance for weeks.

Shannon Hills Police Chief Richard Friend, who led the raid, found parents about to light candles on a cake adorned with green and white cartoon characters and a big "2" on top.

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LITTLE ROCK, Ark. -- Police on a drug raid burst into a home during a toddler's birthday party, startling children who were getting ready to eat cake.

Amid wails from children and a few parents -- and a phone ringing incessantly with prospective drug buyers -- officers arrested a pregnant woman and accused her of selling marijuana from the house.

Police did not know the party was going on when they decided to make the bust Friday evening.

"The first thing I saw was the birthday table and cake, so I yelled for everyone to put away their guns," Shannon Hills Police Chief Richard Friend, who led the raid, said Tuesday. "You could see they had a nightmare-come-true. Everyone just froze and looked at me. The parents started crying, and then the kids started crying."

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LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - Police on a drug raid burst into a home during a toddler's birthday party, startling children who were getting ready to eat their cake when the gun-toting officers crashed the party.

Amid wails from children and a few parents - and a phone ringing incessantly with prospective drug buyers - officers arrested a pregnant woman and accused her of selling marijuana from the house.

Shannon Hills Police Chief Richard Friend, who led the raid, found parents about to light candles on a cake adorned with green and white cartoon characters and a big "2" on top.

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Ark. Seeks To Cut Labs' Numbers By Regulating A Key Ingredient

LITTLE ROCK - Among issues under debate at the Arkansas Capitol this legislative session, none have included drama like the fight to rid the state of methamphetamine.

From tales of young children with their throats and stomachs permanently scarred by drinking sulfuric acid used in meth labs, to stories of toddlers addicted to the drug because it entered their systems under their fingernails while crawling on meth-contaminated floors, stories of the drug's devastation fill committee hearings.

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State police are investigating threats against the lives of two 16th Judicial Drug Task Force officers, and a circuit judge may have been targeted as well, the Sun-Times has learned.

"Approximately two months ago, various law enforcement representatives, both state and local, working in the Fulton County area, began receiving information concerning the threats being made against DTF Officers Scott Russell and Brian Sanderson," said Lieutenant Bill Beach with the Arkansas State Police. "The threats were in retaliation for several methamphetamine related arrests."

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BENTONVILLE - A Benton County man wants deputies to return items supposedly seized from him when he was arrested for growing marijuana in his home.

Larry James Yale filed a motion earlier this month seeking the return of guns, money, medication and other items that were seized by deputies.

Yale was arrested June 19, 2003, after authorities received a tip that he was supposedly growing marijuana at his home in the Avoca area, according to documents related to Yale's arrest. Yale, 57, supposedly had an indoor marijuana-growing operation and had smaller plants outside his residence, the documents state.

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For years, Lt. John Speer fought the silence of gangs. Speer, commander of the gang unit for the Wichita Police Department, dealt with people who looked the other way when gang violence struck their neighborhood. He had seen witnesses to killings forget everything but their own name.

They became blind to the flash of gunfire, deaf to the slang of drug dealings, and dumb to police questions about what had happened on the streets outside their homes.

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For three decades now, the "get tough" posture has distorted America's response to the problem of violent crime and other so-called street crime offenses, particularly drug use and drug trafficking. As a result, since the 1970s, the number of inmates in the nation's jails and prisons has ballooned from about 330,000 to 2.1 million today. Some boast that this "lock-em-up" approach has produced the lower crime rates of recent years - while ignoring the turmoil that soaring expenditures for prison construction and the housing of a growing prison population has created for state-funded social programs. Others reject the claim that the get-tough approach has been beneficial, asserting that demographic developments, increased crime prevention and the impact of the 1990s economic prosperity have by far been more important. As the former mayor of a big city - New Orleans - who led a coalition of police and civic leaders and community organizations in taking a significant "bite" out of crime during the 1990s, I share the latter view. Recently, three studies, one from the federal government, and two by private think tanks, have underscored the problems produced by America's obsession with incarceration.

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Attorney General Mike Beebe says he will propose at least 10 ideas for the legislative session that begins next month, including a measure meant to limit access to a key ingredient in methamphetamine.

Beebe's legislative package will also cover a number of other topics, including changes in the state's tobacco settlement with cigarette makers, punishment for those who fail to report the death or abuse of adults in nursing homes, and advertising aimed at immigrants.

Other bills may be in the works but Beebe declined to discuss additional legislation, saying he wasn't sure if it would be proposed or not.

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MOUNTAIN HOME -- When state auditors recommended that the Baxter County sheriff's office assign one officer to administer funds for undercover drug purchases, Sgt. Curtis Sinor seemed the natural choice, his boss said this week. "We trusted him so much," Baxter County Sheriff Joe Edmonds said. "That's the reason he was the one overseeing the money."

That made it all the more stunning when Sinor admitted to taking $8,357.54 from the accounts he managed for the sheriff's office and the 14 th Judicial District Drug Task Force, Edmonds said.

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Prevention is prevention no matter what. Whether a person is preventing heart attacks or substance abuse, prevention works off some basic principles. It is even referred to in federal jargon as a science.

First, you must understand that prevention is a process. It takes time for prevention to work and it is an ongoing effort. It would be nice if I could, as a preventionist, just wave a magic wand and cure all people of a craving for drugs. Law enforcement would love to be able to round up a few bad guys and stop all drug dealing. Doctors would gladly prescribe one pill that a person would take at age 20 and be sure that the person would never have a heart attack in this life. But it doesn't work that way.

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