There's a new spokesman at the drug czar's office and I'm kinda liking him so far:

Doug Richardson, a spokesman for the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy, said the office is in the process of re-evaluating its policies on marijuana and other drugs.

Richardson said the office under Obama was pursuing a "more comprehensive" approach than the previous administration, with emphasis on prevention and treatment as well as law enforcement.

"We're trying to base stuff on the facts, the evidence and the science," he said, "not some particular prejudice somebody brings to the table." [AP]

Yeah, yeah, I know, it's all a bunch of feel-good political pandering that means little if anything in terms of actual meaningful policy change. But think about the fact that the drug czar's office is now constantly and rather blatantly pandering to people who don't like the drug war. That's the target audience for this kind of language and it's awfully refreshing to finally find them on the defensive.

Really, all this talk about basing everything on science from now on is a rather huge rebuke of the people who ran the office during the Bush Administration. The current ONDCP is going around basically suggesting that our drug policy wasn't based on facts before. To even suggest such a thing raises rather fundamental questions surrounding the legitimacy of every drug war strategy that was employed prior to 2009. Surely, that's not what they mean, but I'd love to hear a reporter follow up on this and ask for examples of non-science-based drug policy for the sake of comparison.

No matter how you interpret it, this sort of rhetoric from the drug czar's office is yet another powerful testament to the progress of our movement. We've made the issue so controversial that the new drug warriors are afraid to be associated with the old ones.

Long-time marijuana legalization activist Dana Beal was one of three men arrested October 1 in Ashland, Nebraska, after they were pulled over in a traffic stop and police seized 150 pounds of marijuana. He and the other two men, Christopher Ryan of Ohio and James Statzer of Michigan, are being held in the Saunders County Jail, with bail set at $500,000 for Beal and $100,000 for Ryan and Statzer.

Beal, an erstwhile Yippie activist from the 1970s and permanent fixture on the counterculture scene, heads the New York City-based organization Cures Not Wars, which advocates for the use of ibogaine as a treatment for drug dependence. But he is more widely known for acting as an information clearing house for the annual legalization rallies held each May in more than 200 cities around the planet known as the Global Marijuana March or Million Marijuana March.

The men were traveling from California, where they had attended the annual conference of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) the previous week. According to local media reports, police stopped the van in which they were riding for "driving erratically," and when the police officer approached the vehicle, he saw "several bags of marijuana in plain view." He then called for assistance, and police then found multiple duffel bags of marijuana, totaling 150 pounds, throughout the vehicle.

Last year, Beal was arrested in Illinois on money-laundering charges after police there seized $150,000 in cash and a small amount of marijuana from his vehicle. The money-laundering charges were later dropped, and Beal pleaded guilty to misdemeanor marijuana possession. The state of Illinois kept the money.

Beal's supporters have begun a fund-raising drive to raise the $50,000 cash bail needed to free him and to pay his legal expenses. See the Free Dana Beal Facebook page, web page, or blog for information on how you can help.

The student union at Oaksterdam University in downtown Oakland was buzzing yesterday afternoon as several dozen people gathered together with Marijuana is Safer authors Paul Armentano of NORML and Mason Tvert of SAFER to celebrate the brand new book's release. (Co-author Steve Fox of MPP was on the East Coast. The book also boasts a foreword by Norm Stamper, the former police chief of Seattle.)

After an hour or so of schmoozing, book selling, and signing, Armentano and Tvert were joined by Oaksterdam's Greg Grimala for an informal discussion about the book, whose thesis--that marijuana is safer than alcohol--is an outgrowth of work originally done by Tvert as he organized college campuses around the issue of inequality in punishments for students got smoking pot as opposing to underage drinking. Armentano, who has been keeping a keen eye on marijuana research for years, supplies much of the hard science.

"The fact that we're even having this discussion is a measure of marijuana's relative harmlessness," Tvert pointed out, adding that he thought the alcohol vs. marijuana comparison was an excellent tactic. "Parents can understand alcohol, and we can make the comparison between it and marijuana. Within that framework, you get them to start thinking about marijuana the same way they think of alcohol. The discussion of alcohol provides a reference point, and that will only further the debate."

Tvert will be hitting the road to promote the book in coming weeks. Armentano said yesterday the book was shipping to bookstores in the East now and would be showing up on the West Coast soon. He also said he had directed that a review copy be sent to StoptheDrugWar.org, so look for a book review here next week. (The Chronicle is on vacation this week.)

Tvert, Armentano, Grimala

Of all the flak that's been stirred up by the recent death of M.J.,the king of pop,the scariest is the dea's searching for doctors that prescribed various pain medications.As a person taking large dos

In case you haven't noticed, we've got a weird bug in the site right now that's mislabeling comments. If you're not registered in the site and you post a comment, your name will be listed as "NoireeAxors NoireeAxors." This is a bug, not a virus or a spam attack. It will be resolved soon. In the meantime, try to ignore it.

We're also having an ongoing problem with spam, which we're doing our best to keep under control. Some spam comments are blatant, but others are more subtle. Sometimes, spam comments include a few relevant sentences, followed by a random spam link. Please ignore these and don't respond to them. I've been deleting them pretty efficiently, but it makes my job harder if readers are posting responses to these disguised spam posts.

Thanks for your patience and participation.

LA Times has the strange story of an LAPD officer raided by his own department. He was apparently innocent of any wrongdoing and the report suggests that he was targeted precisely because he was a good cop who wouldn’t tolerate misconduct from his colleagues.

What a mess. Without knowing all the facts, I'm reluctant to say too much about it, but it's a very interesting report that's worth reading.

Wow, you don't hear a story like this everyday. Oh wait, actually you do. Thanks to the drug war, dramatic incidents of gratuitous police misconduct have become painfully typical:

ST. LOUIS (AP) — Sheriff Raymond M. Martin has been the law for nearly 20 years in a struggling southern Illinois county. But federal prosecutors say he's been breaking it lately by peddling pounds of pot, some seized by his own department, often in uniform and from his patrol vehicle.

Authorities on Monday led away a handcuffed Martin, 46, from his small Shawneetown office after his arrest on federal drug trafficking charges accusing him of supplying a dealer he threatened to kill when that man said he wanted out. The Gallatin County sheriff also allegedly pledged to use his authority to shut down rival drug traffickers.

For 20 years, this creep was the sheriff? Can you even imagine all the filthy things he's done in that time? One of the many reasons the drug war fundamentally will never even begin to work is that you can't even trust the "good guys." I shudder to think how often the federal drug war dollars we pour into regional law enforcement end up accomplishing nothing other than to assist corrupt cops in cornering the local market.

The whole thing is such a colossal joke, it's amazing that anyone would even bother to defend it anymore. Just look at it. How much more fraudulent and corrupt must this thing become before everyone understands what it is?

Cross-posted from Flex Your Rights

This story has been circulating around the web and is generating some media attention as well:



Obviously, this is a deeply troubling example of a worst-case outcome for a citizen who asserted constitutional rights during a police encounter. Given that our mission is to help people understand and assert these rights, we regret that events like this happen as often as they do.

Fortunately, the internet itself has become a useful tool not only for educating the public about their rights, but also for exposing police who violate the constitutional rights of the people they're supposed to protect. Some might say Steven Anderson's experience is an example of how police just do whatever they want. Yet Steven Anderson is exactly the type of brave citizen whose decision to assert his rights could ultimately have a meaningful impact.

It is precisely because too many police officers continue to recklessly disregard the basic rights of innocent people that we must make sure all citizens have the tools to confidently assert their rights if and when they feel compelled to do so. This incident will likely culminate in a high-profile lawsuit that could change the way similar situations are handled in the future. If it weren't for Anderson's decision to flex his rights, there's no question that the officers he encountered would be out there right now abusing other people, instead of being investigated for civil rights violations.

Protecting Yourself at Police Checkpoints

Inside-the-border checkpoints like the one Anderson encountered are dubious in their legality and rely heavily on coercion. Although you are not technically obligated to answer any questions or agree to a search, officers will generally expect you to comply and will usually become aggressive if you don’t cooperate. If you choose to flex your rights in this situation, do so politely and don't be surprised if the situation escalates.

If officers ask to search your vehicle and you refuse, they can legally conduct a dog-sniff of the outside of your vehicle (provided that a dog is present at the scene). If the dog indicates that there is contraband in your vehicle, that creates probable cause for officers to conduct a search. Unfortunately, officers sometimes falsely claim that the dog has detected contraband so that they can perform a search legally. In this situation, state clearly that you don't agree to the search, but do not resist. You can challenge the search later.

If you feel that your rights were violated, don't say anything to the officers. Write everything down as soon as possible and contact an attorney. Click here for more on responding to police misconduct.

Barack Obama is looking at CNN correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta to serve as surgeon general, providing yet more ammunition for those of us who like to constantly point out how bad his choices are when it comes to drug policy.

Here's Gupta's 2006 article "Why I Would Vote No on Pot." The reason? Because "marijuana isn't really very good for you," as though that has anything do with whether or not it makes sense to arrest nearly 1 million American a year for possessing it. The bright side is that Gupta acknowledges "health benefits for some patients." Unfortunately, he then proceeds to complain that most medical marijuana supporters "just want to get stoned legally," as though that justifies supporting laws that hurt legitimate patients.

Hopefully, if Gupta is our next surgeon general, he will come to understand that there is in fact an enormous war on marijuana users in America that harms them in all sorts of ways that aren't really very good for you either.

I’ve been severely remiss in failing thus far to cover the very important Prop. 5 in California. The Nonviolent Offender Rehabilitation Act (NORA) would save billions in incarceration costs by referring many drug offenders into treatment instead of prison. It’s a significant reform and the vested drug war interests are in full-blown panic mode trying to defeat it.

The drug czar is in California right now campaigning against it, and a who’s who of drug war profiteers have assembled a well-funded No on 5 campaign, branding Prop. 5 as "the drug dealer’s bill of rights." So who exactly is funding opposition to this commonsense drug treatment initiative?

DPA director Ethan Nadelmann explains via email:

Last week the powerful prison guards union contributed $1 million to the opposition campaign.  That's on top of hundreds of thousands of dollars from Indian tribes/casinos with close links to law enforcement as well as $100,000 from the California Beer and Beverage Distributors.

Isn’t it obvious what’s going on here? The prison industry lobbies shamelessly to keep as many people in prison as possible. The alcohol industry defends the interests of the criminal justice infrastructure that protects their monopoly on legal intoxication. And yet the drug czar has the audacity to present George Soros’s support for reform as some kind of shady conspiracy. It’s just amazing, it really is.

It’s not even my style to go around accusing our opposition of unscrupulous drug war profiteering at every turn, but what else is there to say about this? It’s right in front of our face. It’s as transparent as it is hypocritical. And it can’t be allowed to succeed.

If you live in California, please vote YES on Prop. 5 and tell everyone you know to do the same.

[Courtesy of the Crack the Disparity Coalition]

Secure Fairness in Crack Cocaine Sentencing -- Join Lobby Day this Spring

Plans are underway for the second national lobby day for crack cocaine sentencing reform in Washington, DC, hosted by the Crack the Disparity Coalition. An exact date has not yet been set but we invite advocates from around the country to attend the Capitol Hill event this spring. As a participant, you will speak with Members of Congress and their staff about the unjust sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine and the need to eliminate it. Training and materials will be provided to you. Look for more details in the December issue of the Crack the Disparity Newsletter.

Home for the Holidays
By Karen Garrison

Karen Garrison is the mother of twin sons sentenced to nearly two decades for a first-time nonviolent crack cocaine offense. Her son Lawrence will soon be released due to the U.S. Sentencing Commission's recent changes to the sentencing guidelines for crack cocaine offenses.

The dream will be a reality for one of my sons who will be home this December. It has been 10 years and Lawrence and Lamont's room has hardly been touched. I covered the beds with heavy plastic. Long ago I gave away their clothes and shoes to shelters and halfway houses, not only because of their weight loss, but clothing goes out of style in a period of ten years. I must now begin to prepare a place for one of my twins, never forgetting that one will remain behind unjust bars. I am buying sheets, towels, and gathering healthy recipes he will enjoy preparing. I will try to purchase new furniture and have already bought the paint for his room. Coming home to those same bunk beds would just make it harder on both of us. Those are the beds he shared with his twin brother Lamont.

Commute Crack Cocaine Sentences in Time for the Holidays
By Jasmine Tyler

This month the Crack the Disparity Coalition launched the "Home for the Holidays" campaign to rally support for individuals serving excessive penalties for crack cocaine offenses who have filed commutation requests with President George W. Bush. The President expressed concern for the crack cocaine sentencing disparity in the early days of his administration. The sentencing disparity "ought to be addressed by making sure the powder-cocaine and the crack-cocaine penalties are the same," he said in 2001. "I don't believe we ought to be discriminatory." Advocates are hoping to capitalize on these sympathies to expedite applications for crack cocaine cases and increase recommendations for clemency.

The campaign is promoting support for clemency applicants seeking relief from the uniquely severe penalties for low-level crack cocaine offenses that subject defendants possessing as little as 5 grams of crack cocaine to a mandatory minimum sentence of five years. A powder cocaine defendant must be convicted of selling 100 times that amount to trigger the same sentence. Since Congress has yet to act to alleviate this disparity, advocates' focus this fall is to ensure that those who are seeking clemency do not go unheard.

Teen Profiles Crack Cocaine Reformer: Pamela Alexander - A Profile in Courage
By Laura S., Cincinatti, OH

This article was reprinted courtesy of TeenInk.com, a nonprofit, national teen magazine, book series, and website devoted entirely to teenage writing and art.

On December 11, 2007, members of the United States Sentencing Commission voted unanimously to make a groundbreaking change in one of their policies. They decided that the disparity between sentences for crack cocaine crimes and those involving powder cocaine was exceedingly unjust and prejudiced. With crack users being predominantly black and powder cocaine users predominantly white, the Sentencing Commission judged the much harsher sentences for crack users to be racially biased at their core. The Commission therefore has allowed thousands currently imprisoned for crack cocaine violations to appeal their sentences before federal judges, in an effort to shorten these sentences where feasible. While this represents a major step toward racial equality and justice, one uncelebrated, independent woman put her career on the line for this same issue - seventeen years ago.

Petition President Bush

Join citizens concerned about the harsh mandatory minimum sentences for low-level crack cocaine offenses by telling President George Bush and Pardon Attorney Ronald Rodgers to expedite and give special consideration to commutation applicants serving excessive sentences for crack cocaine. Sign a petition by clicking here.

Save the Date

September 24-27, 2008: Congressional Black Caucus Foundation 38th Annual Legislative Conference, Washington, D.C.

September 26-September 28, 2008: Critical Resistance 10th Anniversary Celebration and International Conference and Strategy Session, Oakland, CA

October 19-22, 2008: International Community Corrections Association 16th Annual International Research Conference, "Risk, Resilience and Reentry," St. Louis, MO

Spring 2009: Crack the Disparity Lobby Day, Washington, D.C.

Media Attention

Daily Press Editorial on Equalization of Crack and Powder Cocaine

Sun-Sentinel Coverage on Prison Term Reductions for Cocaine Cases

Kansas City Star Coverage on Former Kansas City Royal Baseball Player Willie Mays Aikens

The Crack the Disparity Coalition includes the American Bar Association, American Civil Liberties Union, Break the Chains, Drug Policy Alliance, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, Open Society Policy Center, Restoring Dignity, Inc., Students for Sensible Drug Policy, The Sentencing Project, and United Methodist Church, General Board of Church and Society.

Ten years after the passage of Proposition 215, California Attorney General Jerry Brown has finally clarified that law-enforcement must respect the state’s medical marijuana law:

California Attorney General Jerry Brown issued long-awaited guidelines on medical marijuana today with support from advocates and law enforcement alike. The guidelines direct law enforcement on how to approach encounters with medical marijuana patients and establish a road map for local police policies. However, more significantly, the guidelines provide recommendations for operating medical marijuana dispensaries in accordance with state law.
…

The guidelines firmly establish that as long as patients and caregivers are abiding by local and state laws, they "should be released" from police custody and "the marijuana should not be seized." In the event that medical marijuana is wrongfully seized from a patient or caregiver, and the court orders its return, the guidelines state that police "must return the property." Affirming that California's medical marijuana law is not preempted by federal law, the Attorney General further directs "state and local law enforcement officers [to] not arrest individuals or seize marijuana under federal law" when an individual's conduct is legal under state law. [Americans for Safe Access]

While Prop. 215 has gone a long way towards protecting the medical marijuana community from harassment by state law-enforcement, there have been continuing regional problems such as unjustified confiscation of medicine. The new guidelines should remind police that their duty is to uphold the law, not circumvent it.

Blogger and biomedical research scientist DrugMonkey asks drug war critics to explain declining rates of drug use over the last several years.

…for those of you who insist vociferously that the War on Drugs (considered inclusively with the Just Say No, D.A.R.E, main-stream media reporting, and all that stuff that is frequently rolled into a whole by the legalization crowd) is an abject failure...

for those of you who insist vociferously that you cannot tell teenagers anything about the dangers of recreational drugs and expect them to listen to you...

I would like these data explained to me.

There are many ways to respond to this and I wasn't surprised to find Pete Guither in the comments section with some good points. I guess I'd begin by observing that the existence of a massive often-brutal campaign to end drug use simply doesn't mean that said campaign is responsible when drug use declines. The drug czar has an obnoxious tendency to claim success by comparing current drug use rates to their highest point in history, which isn't exactly helpful.

But if there is one point that I think really illustrates the absurdity of crediting the drug war at large for the reductions in drug use we've seen, it is this: rates of alcohol and tobacco use have fallen in virtual lockstep with these declines in illegal drug use. That happened without any effort to eradicate the manufacturing of those substances, without interdicting the supply, without revoking financial aid for college from those found in possession, without mandatory minimums, drug-sniffing dogs, or student drug testing (which doesn't look for tobacco and utterly sucks at detecting alcohol).

The drug czar has actually gone so far as to imply that the war on illegal drugs somehow reduced alcohol and tobacco use, I guess through some sort of reverse gateway theory that he didn't flesh out for obvious reasons. But even if someone were to buy that argument (at tremendous risk of becoming an idiot), it would still be true that we were able to reduce consumption of our two most harmful drugs without deploying against them any of the costly, destructive and controversial tactics that characterize our modern drug war.

I would like that explained to me.

At StoptheDrugWar.org we work hard to expose and address abusive police practices, particularly the aggressive paramilitary drug raids that too often target the innocent. We watch in horror as lives are destroyed or lost in the name of counterproductive war on drugs law-enforcement tactics and we understand the strong feelings that such discussion generates among our readership.

Nevertheless, I want to make it perfectly clear that this is not the place to post comments that threaten or endorse violence against police. This is the sort of thing I'm talking about:

AMERICANS MUST MAKE IT TO DANGEROUSE TO HAVE THIER HOMES BROKEN INTO BY THESE THUGS TERRIOSTS LIKE THESE MUST BE MEET WITH THE FIRE POWER TO STOP THIS BEHAVIOR OR IT WILL CONTINUE

I hesitate to even dignify this kind of talk with a response, so I'll leave it at this: violence is not a means through which we'll achieve drug policy reform, or any social justice goal, ever. Advocating violence destroys and discredits popular movements. We need not and will not stoop to that level, both because it is morally wrong and tactically suicidal.

I hope everyone, except possibly the person(s) responsible, will understand why it is necessary for me to delete comments like this from the site. I do not enjoy censoring anyone and I will never remove anything simply because I disagree with it, but language like this embarrasses our movement and carries the potential to damage vital relationships if we become associated with it.

I felt it was necessary to bring this up because I've had to remove a few comments recently and I want to be open about that. Moreover, I want to make it clear that any comments which are relevant and do not advocate violence are very welcome and I tremendously appreciate the overwhelming majority of the feedback we receive.

Thanks for reading and understanding.

Update: Our friend has returned with another comment, which in this case I will share instead of delete:

MAYBE YOUR DOG WASENT SHOT BY CRAZY POLICE IN FRONT OF YOUR CHILDREN .MAYBE YOU WERNT HELD TO THE GROUND WITH A SHOT GUN TO YOUR HEAD MAYBE YOUR FAMILY WASENT HELD HOSTAGE BY THESE TERRIOSTS .WHILE THEY RIPPED YOUR HOUSE APART LOOKING FOR A FEW JOINTS .I STAND BY MY RANT .TRY IT AGAIN YOU WILL FEEL THE STING OF MY RIFLE .NO MORE NAZIS WHY DID I SERVE IN VIETNAM JUST TO COME HOME TO BE ROBBED BY SCUM SUCH AS THEM .MAYBE I DONT HAVE THE EDUCATION TO RIGHT SENSABLE .BUT I HAVE ENOUGH SENSE TO KILL MY ENEMIES WHEN ATTACKED IN MY HOME .WTF

Sir, I think we all understand how you feel. And you read the blog so you know that I'm well-versed in the horrible things police do to people in the name of the drug war. But we are here to save lives, not end them. Getting yourself killed in a shootout with police won't bring back your dog and it won't end the drug war. If everyone took your advice, it would make things worse, not better. Maybe you're so angry you don't care. I hope not.

But please, hear me out on one thing: there are police working with us to end the drug war. The folks at Law Enforcement Against Prohibition are doing incredible work and I don't want them coming to our site and reading comments about killing cops. You are welcome to post here anytime, and I don't care if you're a brilliant writer. You can tell us what they did to you. You can tell us about your dog. But please stop telling us to shoot the cops. Please, tone it down just a little. That's all I'm asking.

The Drug Czar proudly announced yesterday that President Bush has signed the Merida initiative, which will spend U.S. tax dollars on Mexico's drug war. Here's a sample of what our money will be spent on:

The soldiers had apparently panicked at the speeding Hummer and attacked it from two sides, killing both the civilians and their own troops in the cross fire.

"These soldiers are idiots. What protection do they give us?" Maldonado asked, staring at the dirt road where the killings had taken place. "They should get out of our communities and back to their barracks."

The debacle in Santiago in Sinaloa state, a stronghold of drug traffickers, is one of a series of blunders by Mexican soldiers waging a bloody campaign against narcotics cartels — a crackdown that the U.S. Congress is looking at supporting with up to $1.6 billion. Since President Felipe Calderon took office in December 2006 and sent out 25,000 troops to take on the mafias, soldiers have killed at least 13 unarmed civilians. In the latest incident this month, soldiers shot dead two men speeding through a checkpoint in Chihuahua state along with another motorist who was unfortunate enough to be driving behind them. The public was also shocked when troops shot dead two women and three children traveling to a funeral in Sinaloa in 2007. [Time]

Amazingly, Drug Czar John Walters boasted yesterday that Mexico's drug war will "protect human rights," even though he personally opposed requiring Mexican authorities to uphold human rights standards.

As frustrating as it is to consider that we're subsidizing the killing of innocent people across Mexico, let's not forget that it's happening here, too.

Since many of you may be skeptical of NYPD when it comes to matters of search and seizure, I'd like to clarify that this is a very good thing:

The New York City Police Department wants suspects to sign a consent form before searching their homes or cars, a move that eliminates the need for a warrant and is meant to provide police a layer of legal protection, Newsday has learned.

The initiative was put in place because consent searches are often challenged at trial - and jurors too often believe the suspect's claim that police never got permission to conduct the search, police sources said.

At the same time, sources said, there has been concern within the NYPD about a handful of cases in which an officer's truthfulness was recently called into question. [Newsday]

Written consent policies are a win-win situation for police and the public. When consent is given in writing, police have an easier time demonstrating in court that consent was given voluntarily. Since evidence seized during a consent search is almost always legally admissible, defendants challenging such evidence must argue that consent was given involuntarily or not at all. As a result, police spend a considerable amount of time in court defending the manner in which consent was obtained. A written form goes a long way towards resolving such conflicts.

For the citizen, written consent provides a quick reminder that permitting searches is optional, while simultaneously creating an added layer of protection in disputes over whether consent was given voluntarily. The form will go a long way towards resolving widespread concerns about police erroneously claiming to have received consent before conducting a search.

Finally, there's an additional important point illustrated here. As Newsday reports, "jurors too often believe the suspect's claim that police never got permission to conduct the search, police sources said." For anyone questioning the viability of refusing consent during a police encounter, this should go a long way towards explaining how asserting 4th Amendment rights can help citizens achieve a more desirable outcome. It serves as a helpful reminder that, even if police violate your rights and search despite your refusal, any evidence they discover can be effectively challenged in court. Obviously, this is a frequent occurrence if NYPD cites such outcomes as a reason for moving towards a written consent policy.

Given the significance of the citizen's decision whether or not to permit police to look through his/her belongings, a written form is just the obvious, common sense approach to establishing whether consent was given.

Update: Pete Guither at DrugWarRant has a good post discussing the NYPD policy and explaining why it is never in the citizen's interest to consent to a police search.

This is creepy:

AKRON, Ohio - A medical examiner must change her autopsy findings to delete any reference that stun guns contributed to the deaths of three people involved in confrontations with law enforcement officers, a judge ruled.

Friday's decision was a victory for Taser International Inc., which had challenged rulings by Summit County Medical Examiner Lisa Kohler, including a case in which five sheriff's deputies are charged in the death a jail inmate who was restrained by the wrists and ankles and hit with pepper spray and a stun gun. [kstar.com]

I can't speak to the specific cases at issue here, but we're hearing more and more about this dubious "excited delirium" diagnosis that's being offered when people die in police custody. Drug use is often a factor, thus we must consider the possibility that tasers, though not typically lethal, may pose heightened risk of fatality when used on people who are under the influence. After all, people who are super wasted are among the most likely recipients of a thorough tasing by police.

I wouldn't want tasers to be erroneously identified as a cause of death, just as I wouldn’t want marijuana use to be, but as fatal outcomes involving these weapons are reported with increasing frequency, it's clear that more research is needed.

In the meantime, scratching these weapons out of autopsy reports sounds to me like the opposite of what we should be doing to address growing concerns about their alleged safety.*

*None of this is intended to disparage the fine people at Taser International, Inc. I'll say or do anything to avoid being sued or tased by those nice folks.

Everyone's talking about the new episode of South Park, which can viewed here. As usual, the show is way over the top, but the social commentary is sharp and on target. I'm not always a big fan, but I quite enjoyed this and you'll see why.

I won't spoil it here, but have at it in the comment section if anyone's interested.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Jenifer Van Nortwick is an intern at StoptheDrugWar.org. Her bio is in our "staff" section at http://stopthedrugwar.org/about/staff

Evidently Carroll County schools feel it is in their best interest to punish student-athletes for having a social life. The examiner.com (http://www.examiner.com/a-1287426~Parents__Drug__alcohol_policy_targets_...) recently published an article that discussed parents’ uproar about the drug policy of schools in Carroll Country, Maryland. It seems that if students are at a party or with a group of friends and there is even the presence of drugs or alcohol, they can expect to be kicked off of their sports teams, even if they never touched drugs or alcohol.

And America deplores communism because it is too controlling and doesn’t let people live their lives the way they see fit? I can’t wait until high schools start to tell students they have to leave the room while their grandmothers take arthritis medicine.

The high school I attended in northern New York also seemed to think this was the best course of action when dealing with illicit drug use and underage drinking. During junior year in high school, at least two winter sports teams had to forfeit most of their season because a hockey party got busted at which approximately three fourths of all the student-athletes were in attendance. I can guarantee everyone who got kicked off was not drinking, let alone smoking. I can see possibly justifying kicking someone off of an athletic squad whose behavior is detrimental to the team, someone who is drunk or high enough to get the cops called to their house perhaps needs a little intervention. But someone who has done absolutely nothing wrong? That’s ludicrous. What happens if every sober person suddenly leaves a party? There are no designated drivers to shuttle intoxicated people home or rush someone suffering from alcohol poisoning or a drug overdose to the emergency room.

Furthermore, what is gained from expelling an innocent kid from their soccer or volleyball team? They did nothing wrong except spend time with their friends. What the school system has done is punished a good kid for being responsible and not taking part in underage drinking and illicit drug use. Some students live for the sports they play – not everyone excels at school, and when something as monumental as that is taken away, the school district is in essence telling them what matters to them is irrelevant and inconsequential.

What happens if sports are their anti-drug?