Drug War Chronicle #638 - June 25, 2010

Editorial: Thoughts on a Drug Lord's Demise (or, Folly's Continuation)

David Borden, Executive Director

Jamaica is often rhapsodized by Americans, who celebrate and imitate its Caribbean culture. But goings-on there rarely grab our attention. This year proved a sad exception, when efforts by the US government to bring drug lord Christopher "Dudus" Coke to trial, and cooperation with this by the long reluctant Jamaican government, sparked a wave of violence that rocked the island nation's capital of Kingston.

This week Coke turned himself in. His attorney read a statement from him at an extradition hearing. He was flown to the US on a private plane. And assuming there are no surprises, that's that.

That's that for Christopher Coke, that is. For the drug trade in which he achieved prominence, it is mostly business as usual. There may be some jockeying for power or turf, maybe some fighting. If the campaign to get Dudus Coke is part of a larger targeting of trafficking, there could even be a shift of routes to some other region. But as many past efforts over decades have consistently shown, the drugs will continue to flow.

The sad fact is that the fall of any one drug lord is just the latest stage in a repeating cycle. Drug traffickers, or producers, choose a region to use as transit for their drug shipments or for growing the crops and producing the drugs, based on profitability and feasibility, like any other business, and set up shop. Eventually it gets the attention of the government, who focus law enforcement resources on that region to try and stop it. Eventually the enforcers succeed, not in stopping the drugs, but in making it more expensive to do business in that particular part of the world than in other places. So the traffickers shift to one or more of those other places, and it all repeats. The UN's annual drug report, released this week, found this once again, in the form of coca production shifting from Colombia to Peru, having moved there from Peru and Bolivia years before.

This is all harmful enough on its own, but the fall of Christopher Coke demonstrates a particularly poisonous version of it. In this version, the drug lord or organization does not have an incentive to relocate -- a Jamaican drug lord would presumably lose out to someone located elsewhere -- and when a government, usually under US pressure decides to take them one, decides to fight. This time it meant the deaths of nearly a hundred Jamaicans. In Colombia during the Pablo Escobar days, hundreds lost their lives to direct cartel assassination. And it is in the tens of thousands already in Mexico, since President Calderon's escalation of the drug war began 3 1/2 years ago.

The solution to the violence, disorder, and instability of the drug trade lies not in more of this defeatist cycle, but in legalization, replacing the illegal trade with a legal trade that plays by society's rules. In the meanwhile, governments have two choices. They can go the Calderon route, or the more recent Jamaican route, and suffer the violence, maybe achieving some short term change, but not reducing the drug trade. Or, they can quietly tolerate an "ordinary" level of crime, still not reduce the illicit trade, but not see their people slaughtered wholesale in the fighting. The idea of tolerating any level of crime is not politically correct to talk about, but it's the approach that usually gets taken, around the world and here in the US too. It's only when zealots in the drug bureaucracies or political offices decide to push somewhere, that the authorities there ramp it up, and then it really gets nasty.

Those zealots need to drop the zealotry and be real, because the power they have does too much harm, in places whose peoples don't want it. But since on some level they have a point -- tolerating crime is not the ideal system -- we should start undoing prohibition now, so future bureaucrats and politicians won't have to make those distasteful choices. It's too late for the dozens of Jamaican victims of the drug war, or the thousands of Mexicans or countless others. But the sunken costs from past follies do not justify the violent consequences of folly's continuation.

Let's be smart -- let's pull the plug on the drug war now.

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Feature: UN, Western Nations Complicit in Drug Offender Executions, Report Says

With the United Nations' International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking set for tomorrow, the timing couldn't be better for a new report from the International Harm Reduction Association (IHRA) decrying the complicity of Western governments and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) in international drug control efforts that result in the execution of drug offenders.

Take what happened in China on global anti-drug day 2008 as a case in point. As has been its wont in the past, the Chinese government used the occasion to execute numerous drug offenders, including Han Yongwan, a regional trafficker who had been arrested by police in Laos and later extradited to China. Han had been arrested thanks to the East Asian Border Liaison Office program, initiated by UNODC in 1993, and chiefly funded by the United Kingdom (24%), the United States (24%), Japan (24%), and Australia (10%). Other funders included the European Commission (3%), Sweden (3%), Canada (2%), and UNAIDS (5%).

Although the European Commission and nearly all of the donor nations reject the death penalty, the funding of programs like the East Asian Border Liaison Office means that those governments and organizations are complicit, if inadvertently, in the application of the death penalty to drug offenders, the IHRA found in a report issued this week, Complicity or Abolition? The Death Penalty and International Support for Drug Enforcement.

The report's findings are worth repeating:

• The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the European Commission and individual European governments are all actively involved in funding and/or delivering technical assistance, legislative support and financial aid intended to strengthen domestic drug enforcement activities in states that retain the death penalty for drug offences.

• Such funding, training and capacity-building activities -- if successful -- result in increased convictions of persons on drug charges and the potential for increased death sentences and executions.
• Specific executions and death sentences can be linked to drug enforcement activities funded by European governments and/or the European Commission and implemented through UNODC.
• Donor states, the European Commission and UNODC may therefore be complicit in executions for drug offenses in violation of international human rights law and contrary to their own abolitionist policies and UN General Assembly resolutions calling for a moratorium on the death penalty for all offenses.
• The risk of further human rights abuses connected to drug enforcement projects, and the complicity of donors and implementing agencies in such abuses, is clear and must be addressed.

In a report issued last month, the IHRA found that 58 countries still adhere to the death penalty and 32 of them have on the books the death penalty for drug offenses. But those countries don't all apply the death penalty with the same enthusiasm. IHRA identified six "retentionist" countries that have especially egregious records when it come to the death penalty for drug offenses: China (thousands of cases a year), Iran (10,000 drug traffickers executed since 1979), Malaysia (70 drug death sentences in the last two years), Saudi Arabia (at least 62 drug offenders executed in 2007 and 2008), Vietnam (at least 109 people sentenced to death for drug offenses between 2007 and 2009), and Singapore (more than 400 people executed, most for drug offenses since 1991).

All of them are the recipients or beneficiaries of anti-drug spending by the UNODC, the European Community and individual member countries, Japan, and the United States. That means donor organizations and countries are flouting UN human rights law, which states that the death penalty should be applied only for the "most serious offenses." Neither the UNODC nor the UN rapporteur on executions and the death penalty considers drug offenses to be among the "most serious offenses."

If developed countries are to continue funding anti-drug law enforcement efforts in countries that apply the death penalty to drug offenses, IHRA recommended:

• In keeping with Resolution 2007/2274(INI) of the European Parliament, the European Commission should develop guidelines governing international funding for country level and regional drug enforcement activities to ensure such programs do not result in human rights violations, including the application of the death penalty.

• The abolition of the death penalty for drug-related offenses, or at the very least evidence of an ongoing and committed moratorium on executions, should be made a pre-condition of financial assistance, technical assistance and capacity-building and other support for drug enforcement.
• A formal and transparent process for conducting human rights impact assessments as an element of project design, implementation and evaluation should be developed and included as part of all drug enforcement activities.
• International guidelines on human rights and drug control should be developed to guide national responses and the design and implementation of drug enforcement projects.

"Many people around the world would be shocked to know that their governments are funding programs that are leading people indirectly to death by hanging and firing squads," said Rick Lines, deputy director of IHRA and coauthor of the report. While agencies and countries were not intentionally funding programs that led to people facing the death penalty, it is "a fact" that such executions are happening, he said.

Rebecca Schleifer, advocacy director of Human Rights Watch, told the Guardian newspaper that while the UNODC has "taken steps in the right direction" by acknowledging the human rights implications of its programs, its drug enforcement activities, as well as those of other countries and organizations, "put them at risk of supporting increased death sentences and executions in some countries."

There was an urgent need for political leaders in the US and Britain to rethink their "disastrous' war on drugs' policy and tacit support for regimes that continue executing people for relatively minor offenses," said Sebatian Saville, director of the British drug policy and human rights group Release.

Even the UNODC welcomed the report. A spokesman told the Guardian it raised "legitimate concerns" about how global drug prohibition enforcement "may indirectly result in increased convictions and the possible application of the death penalty." The spokesman added that UNODC had taken "concrete steps" to include human rights assessments as part of "all drug enforcement activities."

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Feature: Arizona Medical Marijuana Initiative Looking Good This November

Come November 2, there could be two more medical marijuana states, as voters in both South Dakota and Arizona go to the polls to vote on medical marijuana initiatives. Last week, we surveyed the state of play in South Dakota. This week, we turn our attention to Arizona.

While Arizona's political class has been caught up in the wild and woolly politics of immigration, the Arizona Medical Marijuana Policy Project (AMMPP) at the beginning of this month quietly qualified its initiative for the November ballot after turning in more than 252,000 voter signatures in March.

Under the initiative, known as the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act, patients suffering from a specified list of diseases or conditions (cancer, glaucoma, HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis C, multiple sclerosis, Chrohn's disease, Alzheimers, wasting syndrome, severe and chronic pain, severe nausea, seizures, severe muscle spasms) or "any other conditions or its treatment added by the Department [of Health]" could use marijuana upon a doctor's recommendation. Patients or designated caregivers could possess up to 2 1/2 ounces of usable marijuana.

The initiative envisions a system of state-registered, nonprofit dispensaries that could grow, process, sell, and transport medical marijuana and be remunerated for costs incurred in the process. In most cases, patients or their caregivers would not be allowed to grow their own medicine. Instead, unless they live more than 25 miles from the nearest dispensary, they would have to purchase their medicine at a dispensary. Patients and their caregivers outside that range would be allowed to grow up to 12 plants.

A little more than four months out from Election Day, the Arizona initiative appears to be well positioned for victory. "It's looking good, very good," said AMMPP spokesman Andrew Myers. "Arizona has shown overwhelming support for medical marijuana in the past, and our polling numbers are similar," he said.

"The polling we've seen is very encouraging, and there's been some opposition, but it doesn't seem very organized," said Mike Meno, communications director for the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP). "We're hopeful that Arizona can join the list of states that have effective medical marijuana laws."

Both Meno and Myers cited a February 2009 opinion poll on the topic. That poll showed that 65% of Arizonans supported medical marijuana.

Arizonans have also twice voted to approve medical marijuana, in 1996 and again in 1998. In 1996, the initiative passed, only to be rejected by the state legislature, which placed it on the ballot two years later in order to give voters a chance to rectify their mistake. But the voters again approved medical marijuana, only to find out later that the measure was unworkable because the initiative mandated that physicians prescribe -- not recommend -- medical marijuana. That meant that doctors who wanted their patients to use marijuana would run up against the DEA, which controls doctors' ability to prescribe controlled substances.

In 2002, voters rejected a decriminalization initiative that had, as Myers put it, "a wacky medical component." Under that measure, the state Department of Public Safety would have had to distribute seized marijuana for free to medical marijuana patients.

"This is the first time we've had a complete, workable medical marijuana proposal in the state," said Myers.

What the campaign will look like this fall depends on what the opposition -- if any -- does, said both Meno and Myers. Meno said that MPP has invested more than $500,000 in cash and in-kind contributions to qualify the measure for the ballot, and while he declined to comment on MPP's plans in the state for the next few months, he did say that MPP was ready to spend what it takes to get over the top. "We are fully confident that enough will be spent over the next four months to ensure that we are celebrating a victory on November 2," he said.

"What our campaign is going to look like will be dictated by what our opposition is," said Myers, a Phoenix-based political consultant. "We're not going to spend millions of dollars on a campaign where there isn't any organized opposition, and we haven't seen anyone willing to spend money on the other side. As it stands right now, there is a good chance this won't be an expensive campaign. We're leading by 30 points with no opposition."

The only opposition that has so far emerged is Stop the Pot, a web site put up by Max Fose, a former Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) political operative, now a political consultant looking for opportunities to cash in on anti-marijuana sentiment -- if it emerges. That web site has been largely inactive since it first went up a few weeks ago. Fose did not respond to Chronicle requests for an interview.

"I know Max personally," said Myers. "He's a political consultant here and he's trying to drum up some business. He's hoping that if some outside group comes in, he'll be in a position to form a committee to get some of those dollars."

One of the unique -- and controversial -- properties of the Arizona initiative is that does not allow patients or their caregivers to grow their own pot. The only exception is if patients are more than 25 miles away from a dispensary. "We wanted to design a system that served the needs of typical patients," explained Myers. "We started from the assumption that about 95% of patients who will be receiving recommendations are going to want to use dispensaries. Growing your own product or finding a competent caregiver can be very difficult."

But there was another reason for limiting patient grows, said Myers. "Arizona is a state with a very dense population -- most of the state's population is in Phoenix and Tucson -- and there was concern about large numbers of people doing urban cultivation. That was a major law enforcement concern, but this halo around dispensaries restricts urban growing, and it has the added benefit of providing a market for the dispensaries. In essence, the more patients a nonprofit dispensary has, the lower the price. We wanted to have a situation where dispensaries are available, like California, but where patients don't have to pay black market prices."

That reasoning wasn't real popular with some local activists. "We're not 100% happy with the language, but we helped get signatures and we will support it," said Mary Mackenzie, founder of the Tucson-based AZ4NORML, a local NORML affiliate. "We want it legal here for somebody," she exclaimed.

"We don't like that 25-mile perimeter thing, but we're hoping that at least here in Tucson, if police catch a patient growing, they will leave him alone," said Mackenzie. "And there aren't enough eligible conditions. Once we win, we are going to have to go back and start adding conditions. We'll be working with the legislature, the Department of Health, and law enforcement down the road to make changes to make this a better law," she said.

Myers admitted that the no-grow provision was not liked by some elements of the marijuana community, but said it was aimed at protecting likely patients. "We've caught a lot of flak from activists, but most patients don't go to NORML meetings," he said. "We're thinking about a middle-aged woman diagnosed with breast cancer whose oncologist suggests medical marijuana. We wanted a program that would be accessible for people like that."

All of the hysteria about Mexican drug cartels on the border may end up playing into the initiative's hands, said Myers. "We have a really good argument to make that medical patients in Arizona are forced into a really terrible choice: Either continuing to suffer without their medicine, or go the black market. Since most of the marijuana in Arizona comes from Mexico, buying black market marijuana means you are financing violent criminals. Legitimate medical marijuana patients should not have to feel they are inadvertently providing funding to violent criminals as they seek relief. Passing this initiative takes the money out of the hands of criminals and puts it in the hands of nonprofit dispensaries that will serve the community."

Is there anyone in Arizona who wants to argue that it's better to hurt patients than to hurt the cartels? If so, the campaign is chomping at the bit to get into that argument. Come November 2, Arizona looks very likely indeed to join the ranks of the medical marijuana states.

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Pain Management: Kansas Doctor, Wife Convicted in Controversial Prescribing Case

In a case that illustrates the hazards physicians face when fulfilling their duty to relieve patients' pain, a federal jury yesterday found Kansas pain management physician Dr. Stephen Schneider and his nurse wife Linda guilty of conspiring to profit from illegally prescribing pain relief medications to patients, dozens of whom died.

The couple had been charged in a 34-count indictment with illegally dispensing drugs, health care fraud, and money laundering. Jurors found them guilty of a conspiracy linked -- however tenuously -- to some 68 deaths. Prosecutors portrayed the couple as money-hungry pill pushers who not only wrote prescriptions for those in severe pain but also for drug abusers who faked their symptoms.

"The evidence in this case of patients suffering from overdose and death points to the fact that when prescription pain killers are unlawfully prescribed, they can be as dangerous as illegal drugs," US Attorney Lanny Welch said in a statement.

Attorneys for the Schneiders and pain relief advocates had a different take. "We are absolutely shocked," Dr. Schneider's attorney Lawrence Williamson said outside the courthouse. "These two people are totally innocent of these charges." Saying it was "a sad day for our justice system today," Williamson added that an appeal was planned. "Dr. Schneider was practicing medicine -- he wasn't being a drug dealer," Williamson said.

Both husband and wife were found guilty on five counts of illegally writing prescriptions and 11 counts of health care fraud. They also faced 17 money laundering counts. Stephen Schneider was found guilty of two of them and Linda Schneider was found guilty of 15 of them.

The couple was taken into custody after the verdicts were read. They face mandatory minimum sentences of 20 years on the most serious counts and could be sentenced to life in prison. The judge in the case has not yet decided whether to go ahead with seizing their assets.

Siobhan Reynolds, head of the patient and doctor advocacy group the Pain Relief Network, which had championed the Schneiders' cause, was also present for the verdict. "The crisis in pain treatment is going to deepen even further," Reynolds said outside the courtroom. "People are going to have trouble getting care because doctors are afraid this is going to happen to them."

Schneider had testified that he was only trying to help patients in pain and that he had been deceived by some of them. He also said he had never meant to hurt or defraud anyone.

Defense attorneys for the pair had argued that the government was meddling in doctor-patient relationships and that the government had overinflated the deaths attributable to Schneider's prescribing by including patients who committed suicide, patients who took illegal drugs, patients he had never seen or had treated months before their deaths, and patients who died while the couple was in jail.

Federal authorities have prosecuted hundreds of pain management physicians in the last decade, throwing what advocates say is a pall over pain management and deepening what they say is a crisis in chronic pain treatment. Now, the Schneiders and the patients they will not be able to help are the latest martyrs in the battle for chronic pain treatment.

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Marijuana: California Decriminalization Bill Headed for Assembly Floor Vote

Possession of less than an ounce of marijuana is already quasi-decriminalized under a decades-old state law, but now, a bill that would complete that process has passed the state Senate and on Tuesday was approved by the Assembly Public Safety Committee. The bill will now go for an Assembly floor vote and, if passed, will then head for the governor's desk.

Under current law, people caught with an ounce of less of pot are charged with a misdemeanor, even though they are subject to a fine of no more than $100. The bill, SB 1449, would maintain the maximum $100 fine, but would downgrade the offense from a misdemeanor to a civil infraction.

The bill was introduced by Sen. Mark Leno (D-San Francisco), and passed the committee on a 4-1 vote with no discussion.

Similar measures have been introduced at various points over the years and have passed the Senate three times, only to fail in the Assembly. This time around, sponsors are hopeful that, given the cost savings in the bill (no court costs), the state's ongoing budget crisis, and the support of prosecutors and the court system, the Assembly will finally approve the measure.

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Latin America: Mexico Drug War Update

by Bernd Debusmann, Jr.

Mexican drug trafficking organizations make billions each year smuggling drugs into the United States, profiting enormously from the prohibitionist drug policies of the US government. Since Mexican president Felipe Calderon took office in December 2006 and called the armed forces into the fight against the so-called cartels, prohibition-related violence has killed an estimated 23,000 people, with a death toll of nearly 8,000 in 2009 and over 5,000 so far in 2010. The increasing militarization of the drug war and the arrest of dozens of high-profile drug traffickers have failed to stem the flow of drugs -- or the violence -- whatsoever. The Merida initiative, which provides $1.4 billion over three years for the US to assist the Mexican government with training, equipment and intelligence, has so far failed to make a difference. Here are a few of the latest developments in Mexico's drug war:

Thursday, June 17

Just across the border from Rio Grande, Texas, eight gunmen were killed after opening fire on an army patrol near an artificial lake bed. Three soldiers were killed in the incident. In an unrelated incident, another suspected cartel gunman was shot dead by the army in Reynosa, Tamaulipas.

Saturday, June 19
In Chihuahua, gunmen killed the mayor of a small town near Ciudad Juarez. Manuel Lara, 48, the mayor of Guadalupe Distrito Bravo, was killed by unidentified gunmen at his home. The area around Ciudad Juarez has been increasingly dragged into the bloody turf war between the Sinaloa and Juarez Cartels for control of the Chihuahua drug trafficking corridor.

Sunday, June 20

In Ciudad Juarez, 12 people were killed in various armed incidents throughout the city. Over 1,300 murders have occurred in Ciudad Juarez in 2010, including some 200 in June. Ciudad Juarez has some 1.5 million residents. For comparison's sake, in New York City (with a population of some 8.5 million), 471 people were murdered in 2009. Over 2,500 were killed during the same time period in Ciudad Juarez.

Monday, June 21

In Durango, ten men were killed in various incidents. Among the dead were six charred bodies that were found near the municipality of Santiago Papasquiaro. In Gomez Palacio, two men, including the son of a high-ranking local official, were shot dead by gunmen. In the city of Chihuahua, two men were shot dead after a group of six was shot at. In Veracruz, the decapitated bodies of two provincial officials were discovered.

Tuesday, June 22

According to the Fund for Peace/Foreign Policy Magazine, Mexico has risen two places in the index of failed states. Mexico is now #96 out of 177 countries which make up the list. In 2009, Mexico was #98. The lower the number, the more dysfunctional the country.

In Nogales, Arizona, police say they have received credible intelligence that members of an unspecified cartel may attempt to harm officers. According to the Nogales PD, the threat comes after a 400-pound marijuana bust was made by two officers on horseback.

Thursday, June 24

In the municipality of Guadalupe, near Monterrey, three gunmen were killed and 18 were captured during a clash with the army. Additionally, three vehicles and 1,200 kilos of marijuana were seized.

In Durango, eight "narco-camps" were raided and seized by elements of the army. Additionally, in Sonora, a state police investigator and another person were killed after being ambushed in a mountain town.

In Ciudad Juarez, seven people were killed, including three members of CIPOL, the police intelligence service. Another policeman was found dead and rolled up in a rug in Guasave, Sinaloa, a known stronghold for drug traffickers.

Total Body Count for the Week: 241
Total Body Count for the Year: 5,451

Read the last Mexico Drug War Update here.

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Law Enforcement: This Week's Corrupt Cops Stories

A Virginia sheriff is under investigation for dipping into asset forfeiture funds, a Dallas-area narc's credibility is under question, a small-town Missouri cop gets caught buying coke to replace coke he pilfered, and, of course, two more jail or prison guards get busted. Let's get to it:

In Chesapeake, Virginia, the Middlesex County sheriff is under investigation for embezzlement. Last week, investigators filed search warrants for two bank accounts, one a personal account for Sheriff Guy Abbott; the other, the sheriff's asset forfeiture account. Investigators said they found evidence to support allegations of embezzlement and misuse of county and state funds. No charges have yet been filed.

In Garland, Texas, a Dallas County judge last Friday threw out two drug indictments after coworkers challenged the credibility of former Garland narcotics Detective Dennis Morrow. Two co-workers and a police supervisor testified that Morrow lied in police reports to strengthen his cases and that the lies were part of a pattern of behavior by Morrow.

In Winfield, Missouri, a Winfield police officer fired last month was charged June 17 with evidence tampering and theft of evidence for stealing cocaine and marijuana from the department's evidence room. Former officer Bud Chrum's career unraveled last month when he and his brother were arrested as they attempted to buy cocaine to replace some of what Chrum had stolen from the department. During the arrest, police seized two evidence envelopes from Chrum's vehicle. According to court documents, the evidence bags were supposed to contain a black pipe and marijuana and cocaine. At the police chief's request, the Missouri Highway Patrol is now investigating departmental evidence-handling policies and procedures.

In Atlanta, a Fulton county sheriff's deputy was arrested Wednesday for allegedly bringing marijuana into the Fulton County Jail to sell to inmates. Deputy Raheim Lowery, 30, was arrested when caught with pot as he arrived for work on the night shift. He is charged with possession of marijuana with intent to distribute and crossing the guard lines of a jail with prohibited items. He is now an inmate in the jail and will be fired Friday, the sheriff's office said. He was a probationary employee hired in December.

In La Tuna, Texas, a guard at the Federal Corrections Institution there was arrested June 16, accused of smuggling heroin into the facility. Guard Randy Smith, 28, went down in a sting after agreeing to smuggle an ounce of smack into the prison in exchange for $5,000. He was arrested after taking money and heroin from an undercover federal agent.

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The Border: Obama Seeks $600 Million in Emergency Funds for Heightened Security

The Obama administration asked Congress Tuesday to allocate $600 million in emergency funds to enhance security on the US-Mexico border. The move comes as the administration is under boisterous attack by "secure the border" advocates who seek to shunt aside comprehensive immigration reform in favor of merely walling us off from our neighbors.

The funding would finance the hiring of another 1,000 Border Patrol agents, another 160 Immigration and Custom Enforcement agents, extra Border Patrol canine teams, and the purchase of two unmanned drones to overfly the border. It would also provide funding for extra FBI task forces, DEA agents, prosecutors, and immigration judges.

The federal law enforcement presence on the border is already at record levels. The Border Patrol has doubled in size since 2004 and now fields some 20,000 agents. The emergency funding request would allow for another 5% increase in their numbers.

President Obama said the budget request "responds to urgent and essential needs" in a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) asking that the request be considered an emergency. "These amendments would support efforts to secure the Southwest border and enhance federal border protection, law enforcement and counter-narcotics activities," Obama wrote.

Last month, the administration announced it was sending 1,200 National Guard troops to the border and that he would seek $500 million in emergency funding. This week's funding request covers that and adds an additional $100 million taken from other Homeland Security programs.

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Prosecution: Kentucky Supreme Court Rules Pregnant Women Cannot Be Criminalized for Drug Use

Women who take illegal drugs while pregnant cannot be charged with child endangerment crimes for doing so, the Kentucky Supreme Court ruled last Friday. The court held that such prosecutions are unlawful under the state's Maternal Health Act of 1992, which expressly forbids charging women with a crime if they drink or do drugs during pregnancy.

The case is Cochran v. Kentucky, in which Casey County prosecutors charged Ina Cochran with first-degree wanton endangerment after she gave birth to a child who tested positive for cocaine in 2005. Cochran's attorney moved to have the charges dismissed, and a Casey Circuit Court judge agreed, but prosecutors appealed to the state Court of Appeals, which held that the charges could be allowed.

The state Supreme Court overturned the Court of Appeals ruling, arguing that the appeals court had erred both because its decision was intolerably vague and because the Kentucky legislature had expressly held that pregnant women were not to be prosecuted for drug use. "It is the legislature, not the judiciary, that has the power to designate what is a crime," the opinion said.

In passing the Maternal Health Act of 1992, the legislature explicitly stated that "punitive actions taken against pregnant alcohol or substance abusers would create additional problems, including discouraging these individuals from seeking the essential prenatal care."

The high court cited a similar earlier case it had decided, and that quotation is worth repeating:

"The mother was a drug addict. But, for that matter, she could have been a pregnant alcoholic, causing fetal alcohol syndrome; or she could have been addicted to self abuse by smoking, or by abusing prescription painkillers, or over-the-counter medicine; or for that matter she could have been addicted to downhill skiing or some other sport creating serious risk of prenatal injury, risk which the mother wantonly disregarded as a matter of self-indulgence. What if a pregnant woman drives over the speed limit, or as a matter of vanity doesn't wear the prescription lenses she knows she needs to see the dangers of the road?

"The defense asks where do we draw the line on self-abuse by a pregnant woman that wantonly exposes to risk her unborn baby? The Commonwealth replies that the General Assembly probably intended to draw the line at conduct that qualifies as criminal, and then leave it to the prosecutor to decide when such conduct should be prosecuted as child abuse in addition to the crime actually committed.

"However, it is inflicting intentional or wanton injury upon the child that makes the conduct criminal under the child abuse statutes, not the criminality of the conduct per se. The Commonwealth's approach would exclude alcohol abuse, however devastating to the baby in the womb, unless the Commonwealth could prove an act of drunk driving; but it is the mother's alcoholism, not the act of driving that causes the fetal alcohol syndrome. The 'case-by-case' approach suggested by the Commonwealth is so arbitrary that, if the criminal child abuse statutes are construed to support it, the statutes transgress reasonably identifiable limits; they lack fair notice and violate constitutional due process limits against statutory vagueness."

Somebody ought to tell them in South Carolina, where the courts have upheld the prosecution and imprisonment of pregnant women who used drugs.

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Europe: Amsterdam to Experiment With New Kinds of Cannabis Cafes

Under a plan announced over the weekend, the city of Amsterdam is to experiment with different rules for cannabis coffee shops. While the city under Mayor Job Cohen has moved to shut down some shops in the past, Cohen is considered a friend of the Dutch experiment in marijuana sales and consumption.

The move is a measure aimed at dampening criticism that the coffee shops are a public nuisance. Foes complain that customers hang out outside the coffee shops, thus somehow threatening their quality of life.

Under the plan, the city will experiment by trying new types of coffee shops. One would offer pot or hash that must be consumed on premises; the other would offer to-go sales only, providing a place where marijuana can be bought, but not used.

The plan will not go into effect until problems surrounding coffee shops are first documented in detail. Since that hasn't happened yet, any changes will start next year at the earliest.

The move comes amidst a broad campaign by coffee shop opponents to lower their number and restrict access to Dutch citizens only.

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Latin America: Peru Ousts Colombia as World's Largest Coca Producer, UNODC Says

Peru has regained its traditional role as the world's leading producer of coca leaf, the raw material for cocaine, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). UNODC noted the shift in its World Drug Report 2010, released this week.

Peru now accounts for 45% of the global coca crop, compared to 39% for Colombia and 15% for Bolivia. This marks the first time since 1997 that Peru has eclipsed Colombia as the world's largest producer. Unlike Peru and Bolivia, Colombia had not traditionally been a coca producer, but that changed in the 1980s as Colombian drug trafficking groups began encouraging the planting of the crop at home.

UNODC cited a steady decline in production in Colombia over the past few years for the shift and argued that it showed the Colombian government's US-backed anti-drug policies were working. Coca cultivation declined by 16% in Colombia last year, according to the UNODC, marking a decline of 58% since production peaked a decade ago.

"The drug control policies adopted by the Colombian government over the past few years -- combining security and development -- are paying off," said UNODC executive director Antonio Maria Costa.

The Colombian government, too, joined in lauding itself. "This success is thanks to the democratic security policy and its integral approach to the fight against drugs, including manual eradication and aerial spraying of coca crops," it said in a statement. "The sustained efforts of the Colombian authorities have led to a significant reduction in the global supply of cocaine," it added.

Not so fast, buckaroo. Global cocaine production was down only an estimated 5%, according to the UNODC. And, it noted: "It appears that, despite radical changes within countries, total cocaine output has been fairly stable over the last decade."

And in a classic example of the balloon effect, the decline in coca and cocaine production in Columbia has been matched by steady increases in Peru. Coca cultivation there has increased by 55% over the past decade, UNODC said. Coca production in Bolivia has been relatively stable, the report found.

Dr. Arlene Tickner of the University of the Andes in Bogota told the BBC that, rather than being a success, Plan Colombia had only pushed production beyond Colombia's borders. "As a drug policy, I think it has been a relative failure," she said. "If we look at the Andean region as a whole what we see is not only that coca crops are basically the same size as the year 2000 but also that the potential cocaine production from those crops is the same as well."

The Peruvian government took issue with the UNODC, with Foreign Minister Jose Garcia Belaunde telling reporters Wednesday that UNODC figures did not jibe with either US DEA or Peruvian estimates. That is true, but the UNODC is comparing its figures to previous UNODC figures, not those of the DEA or the Peruvians.

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Weekly: This Week in History

June 28, 1776: The first draft of the Declaration of Independence is written -- on Dutch hemp paper. A second draft, the version released on July 4, is also written on hemp paper. The final draft is copied from the second draft onto animal parchment.

June 30, 1906: Congress passes the "Pure Food and Drug Act."

July 1, 1930: The Porter Act establishes the Federal Bureau of Narcotics (FBN), an agency independent of the Department of the Treasury's Prohibition Unit and consequently unaffected by the passage of the Twenty-First Amendment. Harry J. Anslinger is named acting commissioner, a position he remains in for the next thirty years.

June 26, 1936: The Convention for the Suppression of the Illicit Traffic in Dangerous Drugs is signed in Geneva.

June 29, 1938: The Christian Century reports, "in some districts inhabited by Latino Americans, Filipinos, Spaniards, and Negroes, half the crimes are attributed to the marijuana craze."

July 1, 1973: The Drug Enforcement Administration is established by President Nixon, intended to be a "super-agency" capable of handling all aspects of the drug problem. DEA consolidates agents from BNDD, Customs, the CIA, and ODALE, and is headed by Myles Ambrose.

June 27, 1991: The Supreme Court upholds, in a 5-4 decision, a Michigan statute imposing a mandatory sentence of life without possibility of parole for anyone convicted of possession of more than 650 grams (about 1.5 pounds) of cocaine.

July 1, 1998: DEA Chief Thomas Constantine is quoted, "[In] my era everybody smoked and everybody drank and there was no drug use."

June 26, 2001: China marks a UN international anti-drug day by holding rallies where piles of narcotics are burned and 60 people are executed for drug offenses. Chinese authorities execute hundreds of people since April in a crime crackdown labeled "Strike Hard" that allowed for speeded up trials and broader use of the death penalty. [The macabre ritual was repeated each year subsequently, but lack of reports of it suggest it may have ceased as a result of the nation's recent scaleback in executions.]

June 27, 2001: A Newsday article titled "Census: War on Drugs Hits Blacks," reports: Black men make up less than 3 percent of Connecticut's population but account for 47 percent of inmates in prisons, jails and halfway houses, 2000 census figures show.

July 1, 2001: Portugal introduces Europe's most liberal drug policy to date with the implementation of new laws establishing no criminal penalties for using and possessing small amounts of not only cannabis but also hard drugs such as cocaine, heroin and amphetamines.

June 27, 2002: In Board of Education of Independent School District No. 92 of Pottawatomie County v. Earls, the Supreme Court decides 6-3 to uphold the most sweeping drug-testing policy yet to come before the Court -- a testing requirement for any public school student seeking to take part in any extracurricular activity, the near-equivalent of a universal testing policy.

June 25, 2003: The Superior Administrative Court of Cundinamarca, Colombia orders a stop to the spraying of glyphosate herbicides until the government complies with the environmental management plan for the eradication program and mandates a series of studies to protect public health and the environment.

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Weekly: Blogging @ the Speakeasy

Along with our weekly in-depth Chronicle reporting, DRCNet also provides daily content in the way of blogging in the Stop the Drug War Speakeasy -- huge numbers of people have been reading it recently -- as well as Latest News links (upper right-hand corner of most web pages), event listings (lower right-hand corner) and other info. Check out DRCNet every day to stay on top of the drug reform game! Check out the Speakeasy main page at http://stopthedrugwar.org/speakeasy.

Since last issue:

Scott Morgan writes: "John Stossel Debates Drug Laws with Sean Hannity," "Sarah Palin and the Marijuana Legalization Debate," "Supporting Harsh Drug Laws is Political Suicide in NY," "Ethan Nadelmann Destroys Bill O'Reilly in Drug War Debate," "Radley Balko Discusses Botched Drug Raids on FOX," "Government-Sponsored Murder in the Name of Prohibition," "Police Kill Grandmother's Dog in Botched Drug Raid," "Reminder: Marijuana Already Exists."

Phil Smith posts early copies of Drug War Chronicle articles.

David Guard posts numerous press releases, action alerts and other organizational announcements in the In the Trenches blog.

Again, http://stopthedrugwar.org/speakeasy is the online place to stay in the loop for the fight to stop the war on drugs. Thanks for reading, and please join us on the comment boards.

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Students: Intern at StoptheDrugWar.org (DRCNet) and Help Stop the Drug War!

Want to help end the "war on drugs," while earning college credit too? Apply for a StoptheDrugWar.org (DRCNet) internship and you could come join the team and help us fight the fight!

StoptheDrugWar has a strong record of providing substantive work experience to our interns -- you won't spend the summer doing filing or running errands, you will play an integral role in one or more of our exciting programs. Options for work you can do with us include coalition outreach as part of the campaign to rein in the use of SWAT teams, to expand our work to repeal the drug provision of the Higher Education Act to encompass other bad drug laws like the similar provisions in welfare and public housing law; blogosphere/web outreach; media research and outreach; web site work (research, writing, technical); possibly other areas. If you are chosen for an internship, we will strive to match your interests and abilities to whichever area is the best fit for you.

While our internships are unpaid, we will reimburse you for metro fare, and DRCNet is a fun and rewarding place to work. To apply, please send your resume to David Guard at [email protected], and feel free to contact us at (202) 293-8340. We hope to hear from you! Check out our web site at http://stopthedrugwar.org to learn more about our organization.

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Appeal: 2010 is Important in Drug Policy -- And So Are You

Dear friend of drug policy reform:

I am writing today to ask you to step up for drug policy reform. 2010 is a critical year in drug policy, with great opportunities for changing minds, laws, and lives:

• Polls show an approaching majority supporting marijuana legalization -- California with an initiative this November is at 56%.
• The horrific violence in Mexico is making opinion leaders consider total drug legalization more seriously too.
• More good drug policy reform legislation -- lowering crack sentences, allowing needle exchange funding, unblocking DC's medical marijuana law -- has come out of Congress the past year than in decades.

There is a long, hard road still ahead, but things are definitely moving our way. Like every nonprofit, our funding has been affected by the troubled state of the economy, and we need your help. Can we count on your support in this important year? Please make a generous donation to StoptheDrugWar.org (DRCNet) today!

The support of our generous members has been part of a winning combination that saw us draw nearly two million annual visitors to our web site last year -- the most yet! -- and which saw opinion leaders in the blogosphere using our work on a regular basis. (See links about this below.) StoptheDrugWar.org, thanks to you, is the #1 source for news, information and activism promoting sensible drug law reform and an end to prohibition worldwide. The more we do at StoptheDrugWar.org, the faster the reform movement will grow and the sooner that minds, laws and lives will change.

Your support counts now more than ever -- please join our 2010 "Changing Minds, Changing Laws, Changing Lives" campaign by donating to StoptheDrugWar.org today.

I would like to send you some free gifts to show our appreciation. For a contribution of $30 or more, choose either the important new DVD, 10 Rules for Dealing with Police, or its classic predecessor, Busted: The Citizen's Guide to Surviving Police Encounters -- or choose either of our popular StoptheDrugWar.org t-shirts -- "alcohol prohibition/drug prohibition" or "consequences of prohibition." For a gift of $55 or more, you get to pick any two... for a gift of $80 or more, pick any three... for a gift of $100 or more you can get all four! (Want to substitute? No problem. Choose any item from our inventory of books, videos and StoptheDrugWar.org items.)

By joining today, you will make an immediate impact by helping StoptheDrugWar.org:

• Reach millions of people per year.
• Influence the discussion on major blogosphere sites.
• Fuel the legalization debate with weekly features like our Mexico Drug War Update.
• And continue to build a successful movement through our web site, newsletter and organizing activities as we've been doing for years.

We are truly seeing more good things happen than ever before -- and the road ahead while challenging is also promising. Please donate to StoptheDrugWar.org today - with your help, we can win this.

Sincerely,

David Borden
Executive Director, StoptheDrugWar.org (DRCNet)

P.S. Prohibition does not work -- and more and more people know it. Now is the perfect time to galvanize support for the cause. Please send in your donation and get your thank-you gifts today! Thank you for your support.

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