TAKE ACTION: Add Your Organization to a Sign-on Letter in Support of the Democracy Restoration Act

Dear Friends:

The Sentencing Project is engaged with Senator Russ Feingold and Representative John Conyers on legislation to restore federal voting rights to individuals with felony convictions who are not incarcerated. The Democracy Restoration Act will be introduced in the coming weeks and we hope to have strong support from members of Congress. We are writing to ask for your organization's support in this effort. Please review this sign-on letter (http://sentencingproject.org/userfiles/file/fd_DRASignOnLetter.pdf) and consider adding your organization to the chorus of advocates seeking a more inclusive democracy.

The deadline to include your organization on the letter to Congress is July 1. Please email staff@sentencingproject.org to join.

National: Department of Justice Makes Available State-specific Tools on Rights Restoration

The Department of Justice Civil Rights Division has posted on its Web site a comprehensive guide for individuals across the country to learn how to regain their voting rights, if eligible. The guide provides links for each state that point directly to the state's disenfranchisement laws and restoration procedures.

Alabama: Inmates Prepare for Municipal Election

Rev. Kenneth Glasgow and The Ordinary People's Society are registering voters in city and county jails to vote in the upcoming municipal election, the Dothan Eagle reported. Persons in prison or jail in Alabama may vote if not convicted of crimes of moral turpitude. In 2006, 90 inmates in city and county jails statewide voted. In 2007, 300 voted, and in 2008, 2,500 inmates voted, including individuals in state prison, the article states.
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Help The Sentencing Project continue to bring you news and updates on disenfranchisement! Make a contribution today.

Contact Information -- e-mail: zhughes@sentencingproject.org, web: http://www.sentencingproject.org.

You Can Make a Difference

Dear friends,

Right now the DC Council is considering wasting time and money on criminalizing a substance called khat.

Khat has effects similar to a cup of coffee. Tell them that criminalizing khat is wasteful and unnecessary!

Email the DC Council

What if you woke up one morning and suddenly your daily cup of coffee was illegal?

It probably sounds like a joke, but don't be too sure.

Even as the rest of the country is beginning to rethink its drug policies, DC is considering a bill that would take the drug war to an even more ridiculous extreme.

Right now, the DC council is considering pouring countless hours and your tax-payer dollars into banning a substance that has effects similar to a cup of coffee.

For thousands of years, East African communities have carried on the custom of chewing or making tea with a plant called khat. There is no good reason for the Council to single out this one community by banning a harmless plant that comes from their home country.

This ban is a mistake, but today you can do something to stop it: Write to the DC Council today and urge them to stop the prohibition of khat.

This ban is up for a discussion on June 30, so your letter now could make all the difference.

In just a few minutes, you can help defend our local communities from needless harassment and discrimination. Thank you for joining us in this fight!

Sincerely,

Naomi Long
Director, DC Metro Project
Drug Policy Alliance Network

PRESS RELEASE
Antwerpen, 26 June 2009

Today, the European Commission will announce the European Action on Drugs, asking citizens to join efforts to fight drugs. So far only the Foundation for a Drug Free Europe linked with the Scientology Church has reacted positively.

The European Coalition for Just and Effective Drug Policy calls upon the European Union to take genuine action on drugs, namely to end drug prohibition.

A "European Action on Drugs"

Announcing its "European Action on Drugs", the European Commission is inviting European citizens to take "practical and creative initiatives that positively influence drug-related behaviour in European society".

Before taking this invitation seriously, there is something that European citizens should know.

Since 1991, when negotiations developed a common European Union policy comcerning drugs, the role that "civil society" should play in this policy has always been stressed - on paper.

In practice, Member States Governments and the European Commission have never taken this commitment seriously.

1. A sincere involvement of citizens in the development and implementation of drug policy has been sabotaged even before it ever could come into place.

Since 1993 civil society organisations have proposed the European Union to set up mechanisms to enable the involvement and participation of users of illicit substances, NGOs, the voluntary sector and the general public in discussing drug-related issues. Nothing has ever happened with those proposals.

In July 2007, the European Commission issued a call for proposals for NGOs to be included in a "Civil Society Forum on Drugs". In this forum 26 organizations were selected by the European Commission and invited to an annual meeting (of 1,5 days) to analyse and recommend on the impact of drug policy in the European Union. Sadly, the reports of this meeting are filtered by the European Commission, so no critical comments are being published.

During the 2009 session of this Forum in March, the European Commission presented the idea of creating a European Alliance on Drugs, with the aim of obtaining "a large number of commitments of organisations, companies and individual citizens who would support a common effort to raise concern on the risks related to drugs”, and formulate their own initiative that the Commission would then endorse by publishing it on a website or giving resources.

The proposal was almost unanimously rejected at this Forum. Of all participants to the CSF only one, the Foundation For a Drug Free Europe, reacted positively on the idea. This organisation is linked to the Scientology Church, which is currently being prosecuted in France and Belgium, and which is known for having radical moral positions concerning drugs.

2. The data on drug use in the European Union indicate that drug prohibition is a failure

According to the European Monitoring Centre on Drugs and Drug Addiction, cannabis consumption in the Netherlands, where this substance is legally available to adults, is lower than in several EU countries (like France and the United Kingdom among others), where cannabis is totally prohibited. This indication proves that the theory that prohibition helps to reduce the level of use is wrong.

In March 2009, the European Union published an evaluation report on the results of global drug policy for the period 1998 to 2007. The evaluation did not find any evidence that the global drug problem had been reduced. On the contrary, in the past ten years, prices have fallen, and drugs have become easier to obtain, also for young people.

3. The EMCDDA estimates the drug-related public expenditure in Europe to be around 40 billion euro a year (that is 60 euro for every EU citizen, children included).

Those funds are being spent in order to stop people in the EU from using illegal drugs. However, since drugs were declared illegal, production and consumption have increased, and an enormous black market has been created for goods that could be produced legal- and safely. The United Nations has estimated the value of this market at more than 400 billion USD, or 6 percent of global trade.

Most problems related to drug use are not caused by the drugs themselves, but by the fact that they are produced and distributed in an unlawful and uncontrolled environment.

What does this mean?

It means that the European Commission is asking citizens to cooperate with a policy that in reality promotes crime and increases health risks.

Drug prohibition increases the profitability of the product. It has an adverse effect on public health, as it makes any real control of production, distribution and consumption of these products impossible. It undermines serious efforts to reduce harm related to drug use or to prevent misuse. In the current repressive climate, it is impossible to communicate openly about the issue.

In short, drug prohibition is a failed policy.

Instead, under a regime of legal but controlled drug production and distribution to adults the health and safety conditions surrounding the use of these substances could be improved considerably.

Encod calls upon the European Union to take genuine action on drugs that would effectively be supported by the greater proportion of civil society organisations that are involved in the drug issue.

At the next UN meeting on drug policies in Vienna in March 2010, European Union Member States should propose to remove the obstacles in the UN conventions to starting experiments with the legal regulation of the drug market that are not based on total prohibition. Thus several European countries could set in motion a process that will replace a costly, failed and counter-productive policy with a rational and human approach.

Thank you very much for your attention.

Sincerely yours, on behalf of Encod

Marisa Felicissimo, Belgium
Antonio Escobar, Spain
Joep Oomen, Belgium
Frederick Polak, The Netherlands
Jorge Roque, Portugal
--

EUROPEAN COALITION FOR JUST AND EFFECTIVE DRUG POLICIES
Lange Lozanastraat 14 – 2018 Antwerpen - Belgium
Tel. + 32 (0)3 293 0886 / Mob. + 32 (0)495 122644
E-mail: office@encod.org / www.encod.org

Help teach the world's drug czar that drug prohibition is the exact opposite of drug control.

Dear friends, WATCH:
LEAP Media Director Tom Angell Puts the U.S. Drug Czar on the Spot

Forward this Message to a Friend!
On page 1 of the just-released World Drug Report 2009, the world's Drug Czar, Antonio Maria Costa, admits that the public is increasingly aware the "war on drugs" isn't working.

But outrageously, even while acknowledging the unintended consequences of the current policy, like the rise in international organized crime, the infiltration of our financial institutes and the waste of scarce resources, the report continues to defend prohibition, claiming that it is an effective drug "control" policy. After 100 years of international prohibition, starting with opium in 1909, "Czar" Costa is calling for more of the same. Page after page, the report struggles to find a measure of success for the greatest policy failure the world has ever known.

Clearly, Mr. Costa, head of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, doesn't understand that prohibition is the opposite of drug control.  The preface - on page 1 - attempts to refute the arguments of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP) and others who know that the solution is to legalize and regulate drugs.

Costa needs to know what legalization really means and we need your help to educate him.

Please visit http://www.DrugWarDebate.com to contact Mr. Costa.  A sample letter that you can edit (if you want) has been provided, so you can let the "czar" know that people calling for the legalization of drugs are endorsing more effective "control" over drugs than we have now, not less.

We can't do it without your help!

Sincerely,

Peter Christ
Vice-Director, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition
Retired Police Captain

P.S. The fact that our opponents are so prominently attacking us at the very beginning of their report is a real sign of how far our movement has come in such a short time, especially since last year's report didn't even mention legalization at all! 

P.P.S. If you'd like to help support this work, your generous donation is tax deductible and can be made at http://www.CopsSayLegalizeDrugs.com/give

121 Mystic Ave. Suites 8&9
Medford, MA 01255
(781) 393-6985 info@leap.cc

The Unvarnished Truth From the Drug Truth Network

Cultural Baggage for 06/24/09, 29:00 Dr. Moises Naim, editor of Foreign Policy magazine & Norm Stamper, former Seattle police chief and speaker for Law Enforcement Against Prohibition + "Interesting Man"III & Abolitionist MomentLINK: http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/?q=node/2473
Transcript: http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/?q=node/2473#comments

Programs produced at Pacifica Radio Station KPFT in Houston, 90.1 FM. You can Listen Live Online at www.kpft.org
- Century of Lies, SUN, 8 PM ET, 7 PM CT, 6 PM MT & 5 PM PT: NEXT: Peter Moskos, Author, LEAP Speaker
- Cultural Baggage WED, 12:30 PM ET, 11:30 CT, 10:30 MT & 9:30 AM PT: NEXT: Jamie Fellner, Human Rights Watch

Hundreds of our programs are available online at www.drugtruth.net, www.audioport.org We have potcasts, transcripts, searchability, CMS, XML, sorts by guest name and by organization. We provide the "unvarnished truth about the drug war" to scores of broadcast affiliates in the US, Canada and Australia! We now feature TRANSCRIPTS of most of our programs again!

Check out our latest videos via www.youtube.com/fdbecker Please become part of the solution, visit our website: www.endprohibition.org for links to the best of reform. "Prohibition is evil." - Reverend Dean Becker, DTN Producer, 713-849-6869, www.drugtruth.net

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 6/25/09
CONTACT: (212) 549-2666; media@aclu.org

U.S. Supreme Court Declares Strip Search Of 13-Year-Old Student Unconstitutional

Ruling In ACLU Case Is Vindication of Students' Constitutional Rights

WASHINGTON - The U.S. Supreme Court today ruled that school officials violated the constitutional rights of a 13-year-old Arizona girl when they strip searched her based on a classmate's uncorroborated accusation that she previously possessed ibuprofen. The American Civil Liberties Union represents April Redding, the plaintiff in the lawsuit, whose daughter, Savana Redding, was strip searched by Safford Middle School officials six years ago.

"We are pleased that the Supreme Court recognized that school officials had no reason to strip search Savana Redding and that the decision to do so was unconstitutional," said Adam Wolf, an attorney with the ACLU who argued the case before the Court. "Today's ruling affirms that schools are not constitutional dead zones. While we are disappointed with the Court's conclusion that the law was not clear before today and therefore school officials were not found liable, at least other students will not have to go through what Savana experienced."

Savana Redding, an eighth grade honor roll student at Safford Middle School in Safford, Arizona, was pulled from class on October 8, 2003 by the school's vice principal, Kerry Wilson. Earlier that day, Wilson had discovered prescription-strength ibuprofen - 400 milligram pills equivalent to two over-the-counter ibuprofen pills, such as Advil - in the possession of Redding's classmate. Under questioning and faced with punishment, the classmate claimed that Redding, who had no history of disciplinary problems, had given her the pills.

After escorting Redding to his office, Wilson demanded that she consent to a search of her possessions. Redding agreed, wanting to prove she had nothing to hide. Wilson did not inform Redding of the reason for the search. Joined by a female school administrative assistant, Wilson searched Redding's backpack and found nothing. Instructed by Wilson, the administrative assistant then took Redding to the school nurse's office in order to perform a strip search.

In the school nurse's office, Redding was ordered to strip to her underwear. She was then commanded to pull her bra out and to the side, exposing her breasts, and to pull her underwear out at the crotch, exposing her pelvic area. The strip search failed to uncover any ibuprofen pills.

"The strip search was the most humiliating experience I have ever had,"
said Redding in a sworn affidavit following the incident. "I held my head down so that they could not see that I was about to cry."

The strip search was undertaken based solely on the uncorroborated claims of the classmate facing punishment. No attempt was made to corroborate the classmate's accusations among other students or teachers. No physical evidence suggested that Redding might be in possession of ibuprofen pills or that she was concealing them in her undergarments.

Furthermore, the classmate had not claimed that Redding currently possessed any pills, nor had the classmate given any indication as to where they might be concealed. No attempt was made to contact Redding's parents prior to conducting the strip search.

In response to today's ruling, Redding said, "I wanted to make sure that no other person would have to go through this, so I am pleased by the Court's decision. I'm glad to have helped make students feel safer in school."

The case, Safford Unified School District v. Redding, was appealed from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which found the strip search to be unconstitutional. A six-judge majority of the appeals court further held that, since the strip search was clearly unreasonable, the school official who ordered the search is not entitled to immunity. In today's Supreme Court decision, despite deeming the strip search of Redding unconstitutional, the Court found that the school officials involved are immune from liability. The decision leaves open the possibility, however, that the Safford Unified School district could be held liable.

"Neither the Constitution nor common sense permits school officials to treat a strip search the same as a locker or backpack search," said Steven R. Shapiro, the ACLU's national Legal Director. "Today's ruling eliminates any confusion that school officials may have had about this seemingly obvious point."

The ACLU and ACLU of Arizona were joined in the case by Bruce Macdonald, with the law firm McNamara, Goldsmith, Jackson & Macdonald, and Andrew Petersen, with the firm Humphrey & Petersen.

In addition, a broad constellation of adolescent health experts and privacy rights advocates filed friend-of-the-court briefs in support of Redding, including the National Education Association, National Association of Social Workers (NASW), CATO Institute, Rutherford Institute, Goldwater Institute and Urban Justice Center, among others.

Today's decision is available online at: www.aclu.org/drugpolicy/search/40031lgl20090625.html

The ACLU's brief in the case is available online at: www.aclu.org/scotus/2008term/saffordunifiedschooldistrictv.redding/39160...

Yesterday, we were approached at our movable art display, voter registration and information kiosk in Washington, DC by a policy advisor for a reputable candidate for governor in the state of Georgia. He wants to create a platform for his candidate that will incorporate realistic ideas for prison and re-entry improvements. If you have any ideas for him, please send them to us and we will pass them along. He particularly wants to hear from people who have had experience with the prison system/re-entry process in Georgia. Please email us at staff@prisonsfoundation.org  

"The Safe Streets Arts Foundation, incorporating both the Prisons Foundation and the Victims Foundation, is proud to sponsor the annual From-Prison-to-The-Stage Show at the Kennedy Center and the Prison Art Gallery at 1600 K Street. NW, Suite 501, Washington, DC, three blocks from the White House."

Help Legalize Marijuana in Breckenridge!

Sensible Breckenridge, a local reform group working with Sensible Colorado, recently began gathering signatures to remove criminal penalties for adult marijuana possession under the Breckenridge City Code.

This prestigious group, led by Breckenridge Town Councilman Jeffrey Bergeron and local attorney Sean McAllister, needs YOUR help gathering signatures to qualify the measure for the November 2009 ballot. Signature gathering started last week, and the group must turn in 1000 signatures by July 13 to make the ballot.

In addition to removing criminal penalties for the possession of up to an ounce of marijuana by adults 21 and older, the ordinance would also remove adult paraphernalia penalties.

If you wish to volunteer, please call 970-453-6594 or email sensiblebreckenridge@gmail.com.

To learn more about Sensible Colorado's work, or to donate to this important cause, check out our website at www.sensiblecolorado.org.

The Unvarnished Truth From the Drug Truth Network

Century of Lies for 06/21/09, 29:00 Allan Clear, Exec. Dir. of the Harm Reduction Coalition on what we have wrought & Chris Hermes of Americans for Safe Access on "land mark decision" on medical marijuana + "World's Most Intersting Man" III
LINK: http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/?q=node/2463
TRANSCRIPT: TBD

Cultural Baggage for 06/17/09, 29:00 Casper Leitch, producer and host of Time4Hemp.com, discusses history of his efforts + Bruce Mirken of the Marijuana Policy Project on the legislatures over ride of the governors veto in Rhode Island & more
LINK: http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/?q=node/2462
TRANSCRIPT: http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/?q=node/2462#comments

4:20 Drug War NEWS, 6/22 to 6/28/09 Link at www.drugtruth.net on the right margin - Sun - Mike Gray, chair of CSDP's OpEd in Time Union/Albany NY Sat - Allan Clear, Exec. Dir of Harm Reduction Coaltion Fri - Chris Hermes, spokesman for Americans for Safe Access on landmark decision for medical marijuana Thu - Bruce Mirken of MPP vs. Terrence Farley on CNBC 2/2 Wed - Bruce Mirken of MPP vs. Terrence Farley on CNBC Tue - Vancouver Sun: "SUPPRESSED REPORT RAISES QUESTIONS ABOUT DRUG POLICY"
Mon - Nicholas D. Kristof of the NY Times, is 40 years of drug war enough?

Programs produced at Pacifica Radio Station KPFT in Houston, 90.1 FM. You can Listen Live Online at www.kpft.org
- Century of Lies, SUN, 8 PM ET, 7 PM CT, 6 PM MT & 5 PM PT: NEXT: TBD
- Cultural Baggage WED, 12:30 PM ET, 11:30 CT, 10:30 MT & 9:30 AM PT: NEXT: Moises Naim, Editor Foreign Policy Magazine

Hundreds of our programs are available online at www.drugtruth.net, www.audioport.org We have potcasts, searchability, CMS, XML, sorts by guest name and by organization. We provide the "unvarnished truth about the drug war" to scores of broadcast affiliates in the US, Canada and Australia! We now feature TRANSCRIPTS of most of our programs again!

Check out our latest videos via www.youtube.com/fdbecker Please become part of the solution, visit our website: www.endprohibition.org for links to the best of reform. "Prohibition is evil." - Reverend Dean Becker, DTN Producer, 713-849-6869, www.drugtruth.net

National: Sotomayor on Disenfranchisement

Based on many decisions by U.S. Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor, a New York Times op-ed column states that the judge's decisions have ultimately been "color blind." Making mention of her ruling in Hayden v. Pataki, where Sotomayor concluded that felon disenfranchisement laws are discriminatory and violate the Voting Rights Act, Tom Goldstein, a founder of the Scotusblog Web site, states that her decisions in cases like these "hardly make her an extremist."

The United State's varied practice of disenfranchising individuals with felony offenses is the wrong way to dole out punishment, according to an Atlantic blog. "Crime costs this country an estimated $1.4 trillion annually," the article states. "Unless disenfranchisement helps reduce that number - and the evidence suggests that it does the opposite - then denying prisoners the vote in order to minutely heighten the virtue of the voting pool is a bad trade."
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Help The Sentencing Project continue to bring you news and updates on disenfranchisement! Make a contribution today.

Contact Information -- e-mail: zhughes@sentencingproject.org, web: http://www.sentencingproject.org