When John Gruhl worked Hamilton's drug beat, he knew exactly what was arriving from sunny California via Toronto's free-livin' Rochdale College. "Green frog acid -- I remember that like it was yesterday," says Gruhl, who began 22 years of anti-drug work in 1970. "They'd have all sorts of little tricks like that." In the early '70s, LSD dealers mixed the clear, mind-bending liquid with tea in capsules. Acid-soaked blotter paper sported green frogs, the General Electric logo and window panes. Some gutsy pushers posted notes for buyers on their front doors. [continues 996 words]
Joint Probe Disrupts Cross-Border Trade Of Cold Medication Used To Make Speed TORONTO and WASHINGTON -- Eleven people from Quebec and Ontario are among 65 charged after an 18-month cross-border inquiry into the distribution of a cold medication used to manufacture speed. The investigation, known as Operation Northern Star, is the latest effort to crack down on the pseudoephedrine trade, and its results were announced yesterday by the RCMP in Montreal and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration in Washington. [continues 338 words]
SOUTH KINGSTOWN - Getting caught for possession of one marijuana cigarette is all that it takes to be denied access to federal aid for college tuition under current law, and University of Rhode Island President Robert Carothers and student leaders want that to change. With Carothers' support, the Student Senate passed a resolution calling for House representatives to repeal the drug provision of the Higher Education Act, which prohibits drug offenders from receiving any federal funding for college tuition. "As much as I oppose the use and misuse [of drugs and alcohol], I don't believe we want to penalize those who want to come to college to change their lives," said Carothers at a press conference held at the university last Thursday afternoon to coincide with the National Day of Action to repeal the restriction. [continues 539 words]
About as many men and women now reside in American prisons and jails as there are people in Utah -- a staggering figure when put in context. For the first time, the U.S. prison population hit 2.1 million last year, a trend driven by get-tough sentencing policies that mandate long terms for drug offenders and other criminals. Most of people sentenced to prison or jail serve time that is commensurate with the offenses they have committed. Financial constraints have caused some states to parole prisoners ahead of schedule because the state prison systems can't afford to house them. But others languish in prison under federal minimum mandatory sentences that, in some cases, are a disservice to taxpayers who bankroll these prison stays and the inmates themselves. [continues 305 words]
VIENNA, Austria -- Critics of a U.S.-led global crackdown on illicit drugs declared the policy a failure Tuesday, calling it "the war that America cannot win" and urging a United Nations commission to consider other approaches to the problem. Activists, think tanks and non-governmental organizations asked the U.N. Commission on Narcotic Drugs to examine what they called a disturbing lack of progress midway through a global campaign to curb drug cultivation, trafficking and consumption by 2008. Their harsh assessment came as delegates from 116 countries met in Vienna to review the ambitious anti-drug effort, launched by the U.N. General Assembly in 1998 and loosely modeled after the United States' "war on drugs." [continues 494 words]
With the number of prison inmates in North Carolina on the rise, two programs in Orange County focus on keeping offenders out of jail. In North Carolina, the prison population rose by 5.2 percent last year. Structured sentencing, which went into effect in 1994, might have something to do with the increase, according to court officials. Orange County has two programs that focus on finding alternatives to incarceration -- Sentencing Services and the Community Resource Court. Sentencing Services is a statewide, locally administered program that recommends "more than probation but less than prison" said Joyce Kuhn, director of the Orange County program. [continues 435 words]
VISTA -- A Sheriff's Department anti-drug program for fifth graders will be discontinued at Vista Unified School District campuses next school year, district officials said Tuesday. The department's Drug Abuse Resistance Education program has been a feature at Vista elementary schools since 1990. DARE, as the program is popularly called, eventually will be replaced with a federally-approved program geared to a broader range of elementary-school-aged students, said Gayle Olson, the district's director of student support services. [continues 416 words]
The communities of Kaua'i are calling out for help on fighting the growing, and dangerous, threat of drug dealing and illicit drug use by both local residents and newcomers to the Island. The current issue of Kilauea Light, a newsletter produced by the Kilauea Community Outreach Program, focuses on the drug problem in the Kilauea area, and what is being done about it. Looking back to newsletters produced by the Kilauea Plantation community back in the 1960s and comparing the news of the day then to the news of today, is like comparing light to darkness, even from those issues printed at the height of the 1960s drug revolution. The Kilauea community, and many others on Kaua'i, are up against a big drug problem and need support from many areas. [end]
LIHUE (AP) -- Kauai Mayor Bryan Baptiste said he will ask the U.S. Attorney's Office and the FBI to investigate allegations of corruption in the Kauai Police Department. ''We have a duty to seek the truth for our citizens, and we take these allegations seriously,'' Baptiste said in a statement Saturday. But the Police Department has ''fine men and women'' who are dedicated professionals, he said. Baptiste acted in response to a federal court lawsuit filed last week by police officer Mark Begley against the county, Chief George Freitas, a lieutenant and a man who is not an officer. [continues 216 words]
Considering recent California Supreme Court decisions regarding Proposition 215 one wonders if El Dorado County officials are blind and deaf to the law. To wit, even the legislature cannot overturn or amend a ballot initiative without a 3/4 majority. The California Constitution makes no provision for counties to change a ballot initiative under any circumstances. Proposition 215 does not specify the amount of marijuana a patient or caregiver can grow or possess. Moreover the California Supreme Court has specifically stated that the counties have no right to put limits on medical marijuana use. This means that the El Dorado County six plant limit is unenforceable as a matter of law. [continues 125 words]
Change is dirty word to plenty of folks in Northeastern Pennsylvania and consequently this region continues the long march into decline. Heroin use and its consequent dependency and lifestyle changes plunder the human landscape as much as the coal and rail barons did to the countryside for decades. The arrogance and greed that the parasites of big industry and big business imposed on the region directly affected the psyches of every family that had to survive their abuse. Their legacies still prevent efforts knowledge and enlightenment that might otherwise offer a way out of this self-perpetuating misery. However, everybody resists. Residents of Northeastern Pennsylvania have an enormous enthusiasm for alcohol and drug use that can be directly linked with the decades of abuse foisted on them by crooked politicians and the industries that they were beholden to. [continues 718 words]
