The American Civil Liberties Union announced Monday that it would join in the lawsuit filed against the Utah County Sheriff by a Salt Lake City-based rave promoter whose party was busted on Aug. 20.

The ACLU's Margaret Plane said the sheriff's decision to raid the event with 90 officers, automatic weapons, dogs and a helicopter raises concerns about the First Amendment rights of those in attendance.

Law enforcement has singled out the often clandestine, DJ-driven dance parties as events with the singular intent of distributing and using illegal narcotics. Plane said that view is a generalization that is not fair to those who attend the shows with no intent of breaking the law.

[continues 270 words]

Why Did Utah Police This Summer Storm A Harmless And Legal Rave With Guns And Dogs, Terrorizing Partygoers? You Don't See Them Busting Down The Gates At Nascar Races Or Concerts By Crosby, Stills And Nash.

Close to midnight on a Saturday evening late this summer, a police helicopter crested over a ridge in a desert canyon near Salt Lake City, descended into a low hover over a private ranch, and lit up the area with floodlights. Below, about 1,000 young people were dancing to electronic music at a legal, long-planned rave. They had no idea the police in the sky were armed to teeth and had them surrounded.

[continues 2568 words]

To the editor:

I'm writing about: "Drug task force celebrates accomplishments on T-shirt" (9-07-05).

Drug task forces are just government bureaucracies. And like all government bureaucracies -- guaranteed to expand. Why? Because heads of the bureaucracies get paid in direct proportion to how many employees work under them, not according to how well they perform their mission.

Throwing more and more money at our drug problem is not the answer. We have been doing this for more than 35 years. The net results are that illegal drugs are just as available today as they were in 1969. The only thing that changes is the name of the evil drug du jour.

[continues 165 words]

Looking for a way to pat themselves on the back, members of the Cache-Rich Drug Task Force decided the easiest way would be to wear their accomplishments on their back.

Logan City Police Officer Jeff Simmons recently was promoted to sergeant in the department's patrol division, and with the change in duties, left behind his job as a task force agent. As sort of a going-away present, the task force created a T-shirt that lists 100 search warrants the group served from April 2004 to August 2005.

[continues 185 words]

Kicking The Addiction: The High Number Of Narcotics Cases Points To The Need For Special Drug Courts

Drug-related crimes top the list of those most often prosecuted in Utah.

They accounted for the largest group of felony charges filed in fiscal 2005 - - as well as the top two misdemeanor filing categories. Not far behind: forgery, theft and protective order violations.

Members of the Utah Judicial Council, which sets policy for the state courts, heard the statistics as part of a recent budget planning session.

[continues 357 words]

CEDAR CITY - Forest Service officials are turning to the grass roots - hikers, hunters, passers-by - to help root out, well, grass. You know, the illegal kind. Pot. Dope. Weed.

Yes, marijuana increasingly is springing up in remote areas throughout the West, including Utah, and federal officers are seeking public help in eliminating the illegal plants from public land.

"A large grow was reported by a citizen last year on the Pine Valley Ranger District [of the Dixie National Forest] just north of St. George," says Special Agent Charlie Vaughn, criminal investigator for the Dixie, Fishlake and Manti-La Sal national forests in southern and central Utah.

[continues 351 words]

OGDEN -- Some 75 recovering alcoholics and substance abusers took over the bowery at Lorin Farr Park Saturday evening for the 4th annual Ogden Drug Court Alumni Picnic.

About 200 family members and friends joined the gathering with the alumni group, one of the stronger components of the 2nd District Court alternative program for drug abusers.

When the first alumni group of drug court graduates gathered about 41/2 years ago to form the alumni committee, their number was about five.

Typically it takes a year to get through the intensive therapies and testing of drug court to reach alumni status.

[continues 375 words]

Convicted marijuana users in Cache County are seeing little time, if any, in jail, and rarely go to prison unless their use of marijuana leads them to harder drugs.

However, local statistics conflict with a report released today by the Washington, D.C.-based Justice Policy Institute, which says the United States today is spending 300 times more on drug control than it did 35 years ago and, partially as a result, there are more people serving time in the U.S. for marijuana-related charges than the total inmate population of eight European Union countries.

[continues 355 words]

Unless people were there Saturday night, participating in the "rave" party in Spanish Fork canyon, it would be hard for them to draw conclusions as to whether police used excessive force when they busted things up, as party organizers are alleging.

But there can be no question as to whether the health of party goers was endangered by illegal drugs that were circulating, and there can be little question that the event's organizers were sloppy and ill-organized.

Communities worldwide are dealing with the rave phenomenon, which has been en vogue for several years now. Organizers of this event apparently had a permit from the health department and had medical personnel on-hand, but they had not obtained a necessary permit from the Utah County Commission, which is what led police to be suspicious. Police who raided the party found the usual lineup of illegal drugs, ranging from Ecstasy and cocaine to alcohol.

[continues 314 words]

State Seeks 'Do Not Resuscitate' Order; Preemie's Mom Was Shot To Death

A girl born minutes after her mother was shot to death has tested positive for three types of narcotics, is suffering from brain injuries and is on life support, according to state lawyers.

The lawyers, speaking in a child-welfare hearing Tuesday, asked for a "do not resuscitate" order for the girl, whom medical staff reportedly call "Janie."

Third District Judge Elizabeth Lindsley said she would have to review Janie's medical status before ruling on the state's request and asked the lawyers for a formal written motion.

[continues 584 words]

Firsthand accounts conflict so starkly that one might wonder whether law enforcement busted two separate events last weekend in Spanish Fork Canyon. Yet the Diamond Fork-area location is among few details confirmed by both the roughly 300 partygoers and about 90 law enforcement personnel who dispelled them at 11:30 p.m. Saturday.

Uprock Records of Salt Lake City promoted the event as an "album-release party" on fliers and Internet sites like www.utrave.org. In addition to live performances by DJ Craze of Miami and Spor from the United Kingdom, the party featured typical highlights like a laser light show, barbecue, oxygen bar and glow sticks.

[continues 703 words]

Utah County: Sheriff Defends The Actions, Denies Wrongdoing

Partygoers at a rave in Spanish Fork Canyon that was busted by police Saturday night say officers used brutal and excessive force to clear the crowd.

As many as 90 police officers from several agencies, including SWAT members and major crimes investigators, stormed the DJ-driven dance party around 11:30 p.m. dressed in full SWAT gear and holding automatic weapons.

A helicopter announced the police presence as it crested a nearby hill and began shining a spotlight on the outdoor dance area, said 19-year-old Scott Benton of Logan.

[continues 670 words]

Party's Over: 90 Officers From Several Agencies Cite 60 At The Event, Which Had More Than 400 People In Attendance

About 60 people were arrested Saturday night when police officers busted an illegal rave in Spanish Fork Canyon.

Those arrested were cited on a variety of charges including the possession of illegal narcotics, weapons violations, DUI, illegal consumption of alcohol by a minor, disorderly conduct, assaulting a police officer and drug distribution.

The youngest of those cited was 15 years old, said Utah County Sheriff's Sgt. Dan Gilbert.

[continues 460 words]

'Soft On Drugs' Charge Is Absurd

Nobody wants their daughter taking meth. Nobody wants their son shooting heroin. Not because those behaviors are illegal - though they are and almost certainly always will be - but because that junk kills people. But no parent protects her children by denying that drug abuse exists. Even the most bellicose of the drug warriors will tell you that. And when the anti-drug crusaders condemn such reasonable and realistic efforts as the Harm Reduction Project as somehow being soft on drugs, then it is the drug warriors who are in deep and harmful denial. Harm Reduction advocates know better than anyone that drugs kill people. In many cases it is their own children who have died, or who have come much closer to death than any parent wants to imagine.

[continues 282 words]

Meth, Sex Are Often A Dangerous Mixture

At the height of his methamphetamine-induced psychosis, Josh Pace found himself wandering through a Salt Lake City cemetery following signs to a funeral.

He was sure the funeral he was looking for was his own.

The psychosis, along with paranoia, compulsion and restlessness, are all classic repercussions of a long-term, high-dose methamphetamine addiction - effects that new reports show are including HIV infection at an alarming rate.

Pace was infected with HIV through unprotected sex with a man while high on crystal meth in June 2002.

[continues 864 words]

It's encouraging to see the Bush administration acknowledge that methamphetamine use is a problem. Until Thursday the federal government has largely ignored the ravages of this deadly, fiercely addictive and swiftly spreading scourge.

Still, the soft jab outlined by Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, drug czar John Walters and Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt is mostly window-dressing.

Instead of cracking down on meth producers, smugglers and users, the White House is offering a toothless proposal to spend $1 million for anti-meth ads and $16.2 million over three years for treatment grants and to establish an educational Web site. Nothing for law enforcement, whose federal funds have been cut by hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

[continues 278 words]

Speaking Out: The Bush Administration's Handling Of The Methamphetamine Problem Is Criticized

Common Ground: Police And Social Workers Agree More Money Is Needed To Fight The Drug Problem

It was an odd scene Friday at the downtown Salt Lake City Hilton: Folks who provide free sterilized needles to drug users schmoozing with law enforcement officers.

Often perceived to be on different sides of the prevention fence, social workers and cops came together to explore new strategies for combating America's methamphetamine problem.

[continues 548 words]

The war on drugs has been an "absolute unmitigated failure - a disaster in this country." Strong words spoken by Salt Lake City's Mayor Rocky Anderson during a panel discussion Friday night at the Harm Reduction Conference. In the two hours following Anderson's opening remarks, civic and community leaders from around the country echoed his sentiments, calling for greater outreach, education and prevention for drug abuse. "We want to prevent, when we can, the abuse of all substances and for those who choose to use, reduce the harm," Anderson said. The second part of his quote, the notion which, in some form, accepts drug use and looks to minimize its risks, is what the Harm Reduction Conference is all about.

[continues 237 words]

Motel Shooting: The Killing Most Likely Was Drug-Related, Police Say; Doctors Save The Child With A Caesarean Section

Trouble had long followed Darla Marie Woundedhead and her children.

She lost custody of three of her kids, at least two of whom were born with drugs in their system.

Woundedhead, 30, who was due to give birth again in two months, was killed Thursday when someone fired a shotgun through a Salt Lake City motel room doorway.

Struck in the upper abdomen and chest, Woundedhead died a short time later at LDS Hospital. Doctors performed an emergency Caesarean section operation to remove the child, a girl, who remained in critical condition late Thursday at the hospital.

[continues 724 words]

When It Comes To Drug Testing, City Garbage-Truck Drivers Are Held To A Higher Standard Than Cops

How would you feel about forcing cops to piss in a cup? Secure in knowing the flatfoot frisking you in the park won't be tempted to filch your dubage? Anxious in the realization that officers tasked to serve and protect are drawn from your own booze-and-drug-scourged ranks?

With both considerations in mind, Salt Lake City Police Chief Rick Dinse wants his boys and girls in blue subjected to random drug and alcohol testing.

[continues 959 words]