Friday, November 20th, 2009 at 3:59 pm | By: Amanda
Thank you for contacting me regarding our nation’s criminal justice system. I appreciate hearing from you, and I welcome the chance to respond. As a former prosecutor, I fought to appropriately punish those who violated our laws. The fact is, however, that more than seven million Americans are currently under criminal justice supervision, and many of these offenders are guilty of only nonviolent drug crimes. The rate of incarcerated drug offenders has soared by 1200% since 1980. Too many of these former offenders reenter our communities without the substance abuse treatment and basic life skills needed to contribute to society, and two-thirds are rearrested for a felony or serious misdemeanor within three years of their release. This pace is unsustainable; it is destroying our communities and wasting taxpayer dollars. We need to create a judicial system that provides equal and fair verdicts, as well as a humane incarnation and reentry system that truly emphasizes the rehabilitation of those who will be released.
Last year Congress passed, and the President signed into law, the Second Chance Act. This law created programs that combine intensive parole supervision with job training, substance abuse treatment, and other support services to help high-risk offenders become productive citizens. Now we need to follow through by funding the Second Chance Act’s programs and ensuring they are properly implemented.
The Second Chance Act was an important step in the right direction, but more reform is needed. That is why I am cosponsoring the National Criminal Justice Commission Act of 2009 (S.714). This legislation would create and authorize a commission to conduct a top-to-bottom review of our nation’s criminal justice system and offer concrete recommendations for reform. S.714 has been referred to the Committee on Judiciary. White I do not serve on this committee, I will bear your comments in mind should it be considered by the Senate.
Again, thank you for sharing your concerns with me. It is a privilege to represent you. Please do not hesitate to contact me in the future regarding other matters of interest or concern.
Wednesday, November 18th, 2009 at 4:57 pm | By: Missippi Hippy
(METRO VANCOUVER) B.C.’s Prince of Pot has been granted bail and could temporarily be released from jail as early as today as he continues to await extradition to the U.S. to plead guilty to selling marijuana seeds.
Marc Emery has been held at the North Surrey Pre-Trial Centre in Port Coquitlam since turning himself over to authorities on Sept. 28.
He has promised to surrender to U.S. custody within 72 hours after an extradition order is signed, which could happen as soon as Dec. 1, which is the final day for submissions.
Friday, November 6th, 2009 at 10:52 am | By: Radical Russ
(Denver Post) Leo Cisneros was sentenced to 15 years in prison today for selling marijuana out of his family’s Denver apartment, nearly two months after a jury found him not guilty of child abuse resulting in the death of his daughter, Auralia.
Cisneros, 31, was convicted of possession with intent to distribute marijuana and having a gun while dealing drugs.
Three men tried to force themselves into the Cisneros family home the night Auralia was killed and they exchanged gunfire with Leo Cisneros. Auralia was shot in the face in the crossfire.
The intruders — Trivi Trujillo, Joshua Rojas and Juvencio Hernandez — all pleaded guilty in the case and are serving between 16 and 24 years in prison.
I’m not saying it’s a good idea to deal a pound of weed per week out of your apartment when your little girl is living there. What I’m saying is that it is unjust to sentence a man who was selling a non-toxic substance to willing customers to one year less than a man who violates the sanctity of your home, guns blazing, and kills your child.
Of course, I’ve always had a problem with how we sentence pre-meditated violence in our country compared to other crimes. To me, there is no greater crime than assaulting or killing another human being. There should certainly be some temperance when we’re talking about spontaneous or emotional violence, but when someone coldly plans to physically harm another person, I’ve got a “one strike and you’re out” policy.
For example, take Bernie Madoff. A really rich guy suckers some other really rich people into throwing away more money than I’ll ever see on a too-good-to-be-true Ponzi scheme. The really rich people who were snookered lost a lot, but it’s not like you’re going to see Kyra Sedgwick and Kevin Bacon standing with a “Will Act for Food” sign at a freeway onramp anytime soon. And it’s not as if once this was all revealed, Bernie Madoff was going to be able to pull it off again. But for the sake of preserving society and punishing Madoff, he’s sentenced to 150 years and will never see the light of day again.
But if Bernie Madoff were just Bernie the Child Molester or Bernie the Rapist or Bernie the Murderer, depending on the circumstances he would likely be out of prison in three-to-six years. We have mandatory minimum sentences for people who sell drugs to other people who willingly buy them, but no such mandates for people who rape, assault, and kill innocent others. We have jails and prisons that are at 200% capacity, being ordered by federal courts to release tens of thousands of prisoners, but they can’t release the non-violent drug offenders because of the mandatory minimums, so thieves and violent offenders must be set free.
Thursday, October 29th, 2009 at 2:06 pm | By: Radical Russ
(San Jose Mercury News) OKLAHOMA CITY—In a case highlighted by advocates seeking to reform Oklahoma’s drug laws, the state on Wednesday sought to revoke the parole of a man sentenced to decades in prison for growing marijuana that he says was used to treat his arthritis pain.
William Joseph Foster, 51, initially was sentenced in Tulsa County to 93 years in prison after authorities uncovered a pot growing operation in the basement of his Tulsa home in 1995. A state appeals court later reduced that term to 20 years in prison, and he was released on parole in 2001.
During Wednesday’s parole revocation hearing, the Department of Corrections argued before an administrative law judge that Foster violated the terms of his parole while living in California by using and growing marijuana in that state and failing to follow his parole officer’s directions.
Foster maintains he was released from supervision by a parole officer in California overseeing his case, and he claims he refused to sign the paperwork on the advice of an attorney because it would have extended his parole by four years.
“We’re spending all this time, effort and money on one man when our prisons are already full,” said Norma Sapp, director of the Oklahoma chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. “I bet we could send six kids to college on what we’ve spent to keep Will in prison.”
Let’s see if I can follow the logic here:
Oklahoma catches Will Foster growing medical marijuana for his arthritis and sentences him to 93 years, so they can keep fellow Oklahomans safe from, uh, er, a guy smoking a joint to ease his pain.
Oklahoma paroles the guy and allows him to leave the state and serve his parole in California, where he can legally smoke a joint to ease his pain.
California looks at the guy and says, “This is no criminal,” and ends his parole, allowing the guy to live his life and legally smoke a joint to ease his pain.
Oklahoma gets very upset at California, because if he’d stayed in Oklahoma, he’d still be on parole and be unable to smoke a joint to ease his pain.
Oklahoma fights to extradite him, put him in a cell, and are now working to revoke his parole so he can serve the rest of his 20-year-sentence, so they can protect Oklahomans from a guy smoking a joint to ease his pain 1,500 miles away in a place where medical marijuana is legal.
Marijuana: the drug so deadly powerful that its private legal medical use can endanger people from two time zones away.
Wednesday, October 28th, 2009 at 7:11 pm | By: Radical Russ
(ABC News) Convicted con man Bernard Madoff, who slept on luxury linens and dined at the finest restaurants, is now sleeping in the lower bunk of a two man cell in a federal prison, with a 21-year-old convicted drug dealer for a roommate and a child molester cooking his pizza, according to a new victims’ lawsuit filed by the lone outsider to visit him behind bars.
Which one of these three people do you think we could save some money on incarcerating?
A man who ripped people off for hundreds of millions of dollars of investments;
A man who sexually abused children;
A man who sold drugs to willing customers.
I don’t know what drugs the 21-year-old was selling and who he was selling to, but it is ridiculous to think he belongs in the same cell as Bernie Madoff.
Madoff should feel comfortable among the former drug dealers given his long association with office messengers who provided him and his wife Ruth with large amounts of marijuana over the years, according to accounts by former employee in a new book by ABC’s Brian Ross, “The Madoff Chronicles.”
As the former Madoff staffers told Ross, Bernie liked to let off steam.
“Especially in the early days, a messenger known in the office as Little Rick would be dispatched to Harlem to bring back marijuana for Bernie and others in the office.”
Well, I don’t know if you feel comfortable with a street drug dealer just because you had an in-house drug courier, but whatever. All I know is that tokers like Bernie and Ruth Madoff give the rest of us a bad name.
Tuesday, October 6th, 2009 at 5:56 pm | By: Radical Russ
Three Sheboygan County men have been charged with felony marijuana possession after being busted while camping in a state wildlife refuge this summer, according to a criminal complaint.
Charges were filed Friday against Patrick J. Wymbs, Brian L. Paarmann and David H. Paarmann based on marijuana discovered Aug. 28 by a Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources warden, the complaint said. All three have prior marijuana convictions, making the possession offense a felony with a maximum penalty of 18 months in prison.
The Paarmanns — who also had pipes — were charged with misdemeanor possession of drug paraphernalia, and all three men were cited for camping in an unauthorized area. Brian Paarmann was cited for starting a fire in an unauthorized area.
These guys didn’t do the smartest thing, possessing pot and pipes while camping and burning illegally. Steinborn’s Rule says only break one law at a time. Now they will be considered felons and possibly do a year and a half of hard time just because they were unlucky or dumb enough to get caught with pot more than once.
So, what egregious offense did these three men commit that is so deserving of the Wisconsin tax payer dollars it will cost to keep them incarcerated for eighteen months, not to mention the court and prosecutorial and perhaps public defender time?
Five men were at the site, and three had marijuana in their pockets. Wymbs, 29, had 4.3 grams; Brian Paarmann, 43, had 9.6 grams; and David Paarmann, 38, had 0.5 grams.
The average cost to the state of incarcerating an inmate for one year in a state facility in fiscal year 2002 was approximately $25,985.
Three guys, eighteen months, that’s $116,932.50, isn’t it? Then let’s consider the eighteen months these men won’t be contributing anything in payroll or sales taxes to Wisconsin. Perhaps their wives and kids have to get state assistance from Wisconsin when these mens’ income are interrupted. Maybe these mens’ Wisconsin employers also have to recruit, hire, and train people to replace them.
But at least for Wisconsin’s six figure investment, it will be slightly more difficult, but not impossible, for them to get some marijuana to smoke in prison. And then when they get out and can’t get decent work because they’re felons, maybe they can earn a little money dealing weed…
Monday, September 21st, 2009 at 8:55 pm | By: Radical Russ
Show 004: Three special episodes live from NORML National Conference!
NORML’s new talk radio program, NORML SHOW LIVE, will be streaming for three days at the 2009 NORML National Conference, “Yes We Cannabis”, live from the Grand Hyatt Hotel in San Francisco. These special three-hour episodes will be available at live.norml.org at the following special times and archived for download later just fifteen minutes after broadcast:
Thursday, September 24
11:00am – 2:00pm Pacific Time
Friday, September 25
11:00am – 2:00pm Pacific Time
Saturday, September 26
3:00pm – 6:00pm Pacific Time
The show will be hosted by “Radical” Russ Belville, but with very limited commercial interruption and the occasional narration. After the shows broadcast remotely in the difficult wireless environment of Portland’s Kelley Point Park and the noisy backstage of the Boston Freedom Rally, Russ is excited to present an indoor event that will take its audio directly from the conference PA system.
Tuesday, September 8th, 2009 at 5:07 pm | By: Radical Russ
(LA Times) According to the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice (CJCJ), the arrest rate for all offenses in California sank by 40% from 1990 to 2008, with arrests for rape and murder falling by more than 60% each. Drug possession arrests for everything but marijuana collectively fell by nearly 30% in the same period. Meanwhile, arrests for marijuana possession have skyrocketed — up 127%. This rise in marijuana arrests is the ultimate outlier.
California made a major step toward decriminalizing low-level pot possession in 1975, when it made possession of less than an ounce a misdemeanor punishable with a fine and no jail time. That didn’t stop law enforcement from arresting more than 74,000 people last year — the highest number since the 1975 law took effect. More than 80% of those arrests were for misdemeanor possession, the lowest-level offense.
Not surprisingly, given the way drug laws are traditionally enforced in this country, the burden has fallen disproportionately on people of color, and on young black men in particular. According to the CJCJ, half of California’s marijuana possession arrestees were nonwhite in 1990 and 28% were under age 20. Last year, 62% were nonwhite and 42% were under age 20. Marijuana possession arrests of youth of color rose from about 3,100 in 1990 to about 16,300 in 2008 — an arrest surge 300% greater than the rate of population growth in that group.
Even more disturbing, African Americans account for an even higher portion of all marijuana felony arrests. Blacks make up less than 7% of the state population but 22% of people arrested for all marijuana offenses and 33% of all marijuana felony arrests. More African Americans are arrested in California for marijuana felonies than are whites, even though whites are six times more represented in the state population.
The overrepresentation of African Americans is not explained by use rates. According to the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, the percentage of African Americans and whites who use marijuana over any 30-day period are similar. However, for the 18-25 age group — which constitutes a substantial proportion of marijuana arrests — African Americans regularly use marijuana at rates lower than whites (16.5% and 18.4%, respectively), indicating that their overrepresentation may be even more profound.
These statistics would be shocking if one wasn’t aware of the roots of marijuana prohibition. It has always been about harassing and controlling the “undesirable” populations from the moment the first anti-Mexican immigrant pot prohibitions were passed a century ago in El Paso. The term “marihuana” itself is Mexican slang, used to give the innocuous-sounding hemp plant a more evil-sounding name. As black jazz musicians popularized marijuana use in the ’20s and ’30s, yellow journalist William Randolph Hearst and first “drug czar” Harry J. Anslinger were quick to leverage racism in their demonization of a plant:
“There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos, and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz, and swing, result from marijuana use. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers, and any others. … Reefer makes darkies think they’re as good as white men.” — Harry J. Anslinger, America’s 1st Drug Czar (FDR – JFK)
“Marihuana is a short cut to the insane asylum. Smoke marihuana cigarettes for a month and what was once your brain will be nothing but a storehouse of horrid specters. Hasheesh makes a murderer who kills for the love of killing out of the mildest mannered man who ever laughed at the idea that any habit could ever get him…. Marihuana influences Negroes to to look at white people in the eye, step on white men’s shadows and look at a white woman twice.” — William Randolph Hearst, Newspaper Tycoon (1936)
Lest you think that kind of talk died out after Martin Luther King and the Civil Rights movement of the ’60s, check out President Nixon’s rationalization for the War on Drugs, first from the Nixon Tapes, and second as explained to Chief of Staff, H. R. Haldeman (from Halderman’s diaries):
“I want a Goddamn strong statement on marijuana, I mean one that just tears the ass out of them. You know, it’s a funny thing, every one of the bastards that are out for legalizing marijuana is Jewish…. You have to face the fact that the whole problem is really the blacks. The key is to devise a system that recognizes this all while not appearing to.” — Richard M. Nixon, Former US President
“Reefer makes darkies think they’re as good as white men.”
Harry J. Anslinger – America’s 1st Drug Czar (FDR – JFK)
REEFER MADNESS: “There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos, and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz, and swing, result from marijuana use. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers, and any others.”
Tuesday, August 25th, 2009 at 2:40 pm | By: Radical Russ
(Drug War Chronicle) Medical marijuana patient Will Foster is en route to prison in Oklahoma after being picked up Friday by Oklahoma law enforcement officials. He had been held at the Sonoma County Jail in Santa Rosa, California, for the past 15 months as he fought bogus marijuana cultivation charges there–he was a registered patient with a legal grow–and, after the California charges were dropped, on a parole violation warrant from the Sooner State.
Foster had been arrested and convicted of growing marijuana in Oklahoma and sentenced to 93 years in prison in the 1990s. After that draconian sentence focused national attention on his case, he was eventually resentenced to 20 years in prison. He later won parole and moved to California, where he served three years on parole and was discharged from parole by California authorities.
That wasn’t good enough for vindictive Oklahoma authorities, who wanted to squeeze more years out of Foster. He refused to sign Oklahoma paperwork requiring him to return there to serve out the remainder of his sentence. He also refused to sign paperback that extended his original service. Oklahoma authorities issued a parole violation warrant, and the governors of both states signed it.
Foster had sought to block extradition by filing a writ of habeas corpus–he had won a similar writ against Oklahoma earlier–but that effort failed on Friday, and Oklahoma authorities were there to whisk him away. Foster is scheduled to be held at the Tulsa County Jail before being assigned to a prison in the Oklahoma gulag.
Drug War Chronicle has an excellent recap of the Foster case if you’re interested. This basically comes down to Oklahoma pursuing Foster out of spite. Foster beat Oklahoma on the original 93 year prison sentence, then beat them when the Oklahoma Supreme Court reduced the sentence to twenty years. He beat Oklahoma when his twenty years were converted to probation and he beat them when he was able to be paroled in California. He beat them once again when California wouldn’t hold him on parole for longer than three years and again as he filed a writ of habeas corpus to beat back extradition to Oklahoma the first time.
Oklahoma is upset that at every turn, they have been unable to punish Will Foster to the extent they find just but everyone else finds cruel and unusual. Will Foster will now be returned to Oklahoma to spend years in a prison, all for the “crime” of growing a 5′x5′ tract of marijuana to use medicinally to treat his degenerative arthritis. Rather than live peacefully with his new family using marijuana to safely treat his ailment under California’s Prop 215, Will Foster gets to live in a cage suffering from his ailment and from the harsh side effects of the legal pharmaceuticals they will give him instead.
This is why I wake up every day dedicated to end adult marijuana prohibition. This barbarism and cruelty must stop!
Tuesday, August 11th, 2009 at 4:01 pm | By: Radical Russ
(IndyBay) As California considers how to reduce prison spending, it has overlooked releasing non-violent marijuana prisoners in favor of car thieves.
Later this month, the legislature will be debating a plan by Gov. Schwarzenegger to reduce $1.2 billion in prison spending as part of the state’s budget deal. Last week, a federal court ordered the state to eliminate 44,000 inmates over the next two years to reduce overcrowding.
However, a draft of the Administration’s plan by the Department of Corrections budget office makes no mention of marijuana or other non-violent drug prisoners. Instead, it proposes raising the felony threshold for crimes such as grand theft, writing bad checks and receiving stolen property. This would make it a misdemeanor instead of a felony to steal an automobile valued at less than $2,500.
In contrast, current laws make it a felony to sell a single joint or grow a single marijuana plant. Over the years, the state has repeatedly rejected proposals to reduce marijuana penalties. The Governor has indicated his opposition to Tom Ammiano’s bill AB 390 that would eliminate pot prisoners by legalizing, regulating and taxing marijuana.
The Governor’s message seems to be, “Don’t tax pot, steal a car,” comments Cal NORML director Dale Gieringer.
To help cut prison spending, California NORML is calling on the legislature to reduce penalties for marijuana sales and cultivation from mandatory felonies to optional misdemeanors. “If the state needs to eliminate prisoners, non-violent marijuana crimes are a good place to start,” says Gieringer.
As of December 31, 2008, California had 1,538 marijuana felons in state prison, 15 times as many as in 1980. Another 30,000 prisoners are serving time for non-violent drug offenses, 12,000 of them for simple possession. The Legislative Analyst’s Office estimates that one year of incarceration costs the state an average of $49,000.
Misdemeanors such as assaults, thefts and burglaries will no longer be prosecuted in Contra Costa County because of budget cuts, the county’s top prosecutor said Tuesday.
People who are suspected of misdemeanor drug crimes, break minor traffic laws, shoplift, trespass or commit misdemeanor vandalism will also be in the clear. Those crimes won’t be prosecuted, either.
The changes are needed to help eliminate a $1.9 million budget deficit in the district attorney’s office for this fiscal year. By month’s end, six deputy district attorneys will be laid off, and 11 more will have to be let go by the end of the year, Kochly said.
Isn’t it amazing that even in times of dire economic need, California’s politicians are still more fearful of the threat to public order from non-violent marijuana users and growers than car thieves, stolen goods fencers, check kiters, shoplifters, vandals, trespassers, traffic scofflaws, and people who assault other people?
RevRayGreen: I'll post a pic of me and my son....gimme a minute
Missippi Hippy: Guess what... I'm gonna be a new... ummmmm well, my pet piggie Ganja is in labor and they ain't mine in the same sense. See what your wife [...]
RevRayGreen: days they didn't talk back..or act disrespectful..
RevRayGreen: feel so lucky my son is 18 going 19 and my daughter 16 going on 17..relish the days that can't talk back
Urb Age: Congrats Spof thats awesome. My little Clara is about to hit 20 months. Im not the activist I used to be, but its made me a better man.
Urb Age: Heck I was gonna go up there, but just not feeling well this weekend..Dang it, I hate it when that happens..
RevRayGreen: wishing I was hanging at NORML cafe...
JohnH: Just a quick comment about tokin' and sperm motility....been tokin since age 14 and have 8 kids ranging in age from 30 to 9...(what can I say, I found 2 [...]
slash5city: really ..oprah 35 yr or more in the closet toker ...outed ....o my god !!
SneakerPimp: that would be huge news just imagen the headline
RevRayGreen: maybe Oprah smokes and keeps it on the DL...
SneakerPimp: and good afternoon
mr reuben: I could do without seeing Rob K. on tv. But Bruce and Eithan get a big thumbs up from me.
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