You state that if drugs are re-legalized and regulated anytime soon, it'd be a surprise. You may be correct, but I believe the tide has turned and more people are beginning to realize prohibition and the resulting black markets are a much greater detriment to society than drugs themselves. My hope is that by the time my five-year-old is in high school that the drug dealers will be gone. I may be overly optimistic, but we need the media's help to counter all the prohibitionist propaganda that is spewed by those with a vested interest in maintaining the status quo (like the police and prison industry), so thank you for publishing another of Kirk Muse's excellent letters. David Lane Santa Cruz, Calif. (The topic deserves debate.) [end]
Gangs, Drugs Fuel Slayings When it comes to youth crime, the media and public devote most of their attention and outrage to the minors who steal vehicles. A disturbing trend that has emerged in recent years worsened in 2007 and went almost unnoticed. Winnipeg police and RCMP charged at least 30 youths with murder or manslaughter compared with 18 in 2006. That leaves experts wondering how some between the ages of 12 and 17 have become so violent and developed such a disregard for human life. [continues 731 words]
Too bad Manitobans are wasting money policing the self medicating habits of citizens rather than spending that money on schools or hospitals. The 23-year-old Morden woman recently arrested and charged with trafficking will likely cost us upwards of $50,000 to prosecute, more if she goes to jail, not to mention the lost productivity any individual with a criminal record thereafter contributes to the economy. All that in the name of saving people from themselves. There is nothing conservative or compassionate about criminalizing people for their vices. There can be no doubt drug prohibition has the same dynamics as did alcohol prohibitions of the past. [continues 265 words]
Re: Students Learn Drug Lesson, Dec. 11 As a federal medical marijuana licence holder who is also married to one, I deeply resent this policy. Drug use is a health issue, and we should have nurses instructing kids about them, not cops. Sending in a cop to talk to kids about drugs is like sending in a priest to teach them about sex; "Just don't do it, mister, or you'll be in big trouble." Especially the notoriously dishonest RCMP! [continues 306 words]
It's not the type of job you'll find listed in the classifieds. But that hasn't stopped a handful of Manitobans from trading in their life "experience" for an opportunity to work undercover as secret police agents. Scotty "Taz" Robertson is the latest to find employment. The 49-year-old career biker groupie has spent the past year infiltrating Hells Angels activities in a sting operation dubbed Project Drill. The result was 18 arrests last week for a string of crimes including drug and weapons trafficking, and even conspiracy to commit murder. Many of the alleged offences were caught on wiretap and through video surveillance made possible by Robertson. [continues 935 words]
A new study offering evidence that hepatitis C could spread through crack-pipe sharing is being lauded by a Winnipeg program that distributes free pipes in the hopes of cutting down on shared use. "It is actually very interesting," said Winnipeg Regional Health Authority's medical officer of health, Dr. Margaret Fast, of the University of Victoria study. The university examined drug paraphernalia used by more than 50 crack cocaine users in Toronto last year. The virus was found on one of 22 pipes whose owners tested antibody positive. [continues 344 words]
I'm sure RCMP Const. Dave Higgs means well (Students Learn Drug Lesson, Dec. 11, 2007). However one substance on the list he talked extensively about was out of place, if truth be told. Cannabis (marijuana) is a plant, not a drug, and it is safer than alcohol especially compared to whiskey, less addictive than coffee and hasn't killed one person in over 5,000 years of documented use while cigarettes kill over 1,000 North Americans daily. In fact, the most dangerous side effect of cannabis is being caged for using it by RCMP Const. Dave Higgs. [continues 53 words]
Local police are preparing themselves to better deal with drugs in Morden. Two officers recently completed a three week drug investigative techniques course at the Canadian Police College in Ottawa. Cst. Sean Aune and Cst. Sean O'Brien received training in various aspects of drug investigations from recognizing various drugs to search warrants and developing information sources. The course involved both classroom instruction as well as practical experience where they took to the streets to put some of their new knowledge to use, noted police chief Brad Neduzak. [continues 143 words]
Project Drill Leads To Big Seizures, Arrest Of Gang's Local President THE Hells Angels have been penetrated by a police informant for the second time in as many years -- a sign the province's most-feared gang is also the most vulnerable to law enforcement. The work of the secret agent, plus phone wiretaps and undercover surveillance, saw the gang's newly elected president Dale "Deli" Donovan hauled away from the gang's Scotia Street clubhouse early Wednesday morning. The year-long investigation, dubbed Project Drill, also saw 18 other gang members and associates charged with multiple offences, including three people in Thompson with conspiracy to commit murder. [continues 715 words]
Re: Legalize drugs, Letters, Dec. 10. I must make a comment to your editorial comment following the common sense letter by writer Amber Mapes. After Mapes recommended Canada ending its war on drugs and not following the in the footsteps of the failed efforts in the U.S., you followed up with the comment: "It's not a new idea, but one that'll likely not see the light of day." It has indeed seen the light of day. The Prohibition of alcohol was ended for many of the same failures plaguing the War On Drugs. Why not take away the policy that is the cartels' cash cow... their golden egg laying goose and cook it instead? Prohibition is a policy doomed to fail. Allan Erickson Eugene, Ore. (You're comparing apples and oranges.) [end]
Imagine if we had no "drug-related crime." Imagine if our overall crime rate was a small fraction of our current crime rate. We once had such a situation here in the United States. Prior to the passage of the Harrison Narcotics Act of 1914, the term "drug-related crime" didn't exist. And drug lords, drug cartels or even drug dealers as we know them today, didn't exist either. Back then, all types of recreational drugs were legally sold to anybody with no questions asked, for pennies per dose in grocery stores and pharmacies. [continues 88 words]
Yesterday, La Verendrye School students learned a whole lot about illegal drugs. Their instructor, RCMP Const. Dave Higgs, talked to a room filled with Grade 7 and 8 students in an information session on common street drugs. Amongst the "oohs" and "aahs" and the occasional exclamation from the kids, Higgs went through some of the illegal drugs Portage RCMP encounter most often in Portage la Prairie. "Dave (Higgs) was kind enough to come and share some information about drug awareness. We feel the best prevention method is education, and we encourage our students to be smart and make good choices," said teacher Blair Hordeski. "We try to give kids the tool to make good choices." [continues 316 words]
Re: New breed of criminal disturbs, Gordon Macfarlane, Dec. 3. Gordon MacFarlane may be convinced minimum sentencing is the way to reduce violent crime, but this is not the case. All we need to do is look at the overcrowded prisons in America for proof punishment is not a deterrent. The threat of harsher and longer sentences will not prevent young people from becoming involved with gangs and organized crime in the first place. We've been trying to get "tough on crime" for years with different versions of the same ineffective method, and as a result, violence and organized crime flourishes. [continues 147 words]
THE province is taking a second run at gang members and other supposed criminals who make money off their crimes. In March 2004, the province gave the police authority to seize homes, cars, cash and other property owned by gang members or obtained by individuals in the process of breaking the law. But in the 3.5 years since then, the Criminal Property Forfeiture Act hasn't resulted in a single cent being recovered. Mainly, Chomiak has said, it's because the cops are too busy worrying about catching the bad guys and putting them behind bars, rather than trying to find out what property they own. [continues 161 words]
Police Believe House Targeted in Ongoing Battle Over Drug Trade CITY police believe a deadly Mountain Avenue house fire early Tuesday - -- a fire police allege was intentionally set -- was part of an ongoing gang war over the drug trade in the city's North End. But police stressed the 14-year-old boy killed in the blaze was not the intended target and that the youth's own gang affiliation had nothing to do with the fire. "The house was the target," Const. Nick Paulet said. "The youth was not." [continues 634 words]
Andrews Street Kids Learning Healthy Habits For the preschoolers at Andrews Street Family Centre it may just seem like fun and games, but little do they know that the latest activity to arrive in their classroom is creating a group of "drug-proofed" kids. My Amazing Body and the Body Safety Game are two board games created by Jennifer Hagedorn, the centre's drug strategy co-ordinator. Their purpose is to educate young children about how their bodies work internally, and to provide a basic understanding that certain things are healthy and others are unhealthy. [continues 442 words]
RE: Prison system needs overhaul, Nov. 23 With the Tories' new anti-drug legislation about to pass, Canadian prisons are about to get a huge influx of young men. Rather than stop the causes of addictions and crime (by building schools and affordable housing), the Tories would rather deal with the effects of crime by building more jails and filling them with Canadians, most of them under the age of thirty. I am sure that will help tidy up this mess. Russell Barth Federal Medical Marijuana License Holder Patients Against Ignorance and Discrimination on Cannabis (PAIDOC) Ottawa [end]
Marc Zienkiewicz got an arrow splitting bull's-eye (Prison system needs overhaul, Nov. 23) exposing the U.S. prison woes in light of Canada's wish to create mandatory minimum sentences. It's time for credible drug law reform, time to replace ignorant prison-fast leaders and time to completely re-legalize the relatively safe God-given plant cannabis. Even Canada's 2002 Senate Committee on Illegal Drugs unanimously recommended to regulate cannabis the same way as alcohol. Stan White Dillon, Colorado [end]
Re: Prison system needs overhaul, Nov. 23 If long prison sentences deterred illicit drug use, Canada's southern neighbor would be a "drug-free" America. That's not the case. The drug war has done little other than give the former Land of the Free the highest incarceration rate in the world. It's worth noting that tobacco use has declined considerably in recent years. Public education efforts are paying off. Apparently, mandatory minimum sentences, civil asset forfeiture, random drug testing and racial profiling are not necessarily the most cost-effective means of discouraging unhealthy choices. Drug abuse is bad, but the drug war is worse. Robert Sharpe Policy Analyst Common Sense for Drug Policy Washington, DC [end]
On the heels of the Conservative government's announced plan to apply certain firmness to the justice realm, including a go-directly-to-jail card for those who deal serious drugs near schools, the Canadian Press published a piece about Canada's incarceration rates. A piece likely to inflame critics from the hug-a-thug crowd and those who subscribe to an anything-but-jail philosophy. The CP story stated the number of people behind bars rose in 2005-06 (to 35,110) for the first time in a decade. It wisely noted though that the rise was driven in part by increasing numbers who are held in remand for longer times -- a sometimes-concocted defence ploy that actually works to reduce the real time served by a guilty inmate. [continues 438 words]
Inside Manitoba
