Joliet Prison (image via Wikimedia)
Illinois Blacks More Likely to Get Prison for Drugs
Now, here's a shocker: An Illinois study finds that blacks are five times more likely to be sent to prison for drug possession than whites.
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Denver City Council Makes Compromise on Zoning Issues for Medical Marjiuana Growing Facilities
Denver City Council members reached a tentative compromise over what to do with medical marijuana growing facilities that aren't located where they're supposed to be. The compromise allows the facilities to remain in place for two years, after which they will have to go to a public hearing to decide whether they can stay.
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Drug-Sniffing Dog Performance Massively Affected by Handlers' Beliefs
A new study by researchers at UC Davis has found that drug-sniffing dog/handler teams' performance is affected by human handlers' beliefs, possibly in response to subtle, unintentional handler cues. The study found that detection-dog/handler teams erroneously 'alerted,' or identified a scent, when there was no scent present more than 200 times-particularly when the handler believed that there was scent present.
In The Trenches
2011: Fighting Hard for Our Rights!
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Event
54th Session of the Commission on Narcotic Drugs
The Economic and Social Council established the Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) in 1946 as the central policy-making body of the United Nations in drug related matters. The Commission enables Member States to analyse the global drug situation, provide follow-up to the twentieth special session of the General Assembly on the world drug problem and to take measures at the global level within its scope of action. It also monitors the implementation of the three international drug control conventions and is empowered to consider all matters pertaining to the aim of the conventions, including the scheduling of substances to be brought under international control.
For more information, see http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/commissions/CND/session/54.html
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Georgia Governor Pushing More Alternative Programs for Non-Violent Drug Offenders
Gov. Nathan Deal says he's moving ahead to reduce Georgia's prison population by diverting non-violent drug offenders to other programs. A 2009 national report said drug prohibition related crimes were listed as the primary offense for about 17 percent of Georgia's prisoners. Deal has made it clear he's not interested in springing repeat or violent offenders. But locking up non-violent offenders wastes their lives, strains the state's budget and depletes its work force, he said.
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Obama Opposes Drug Legalization, But Hasn't Explained Why
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Having already commented on what I liked about Obama's comments on Thursday, I think it's equally important to take a look at what was missing. By acknowledging legalization as an "entirely legitimate topic for debate," the President has elevated the conversation still further into the realm of mainstream political acceptance, but with that comes a heightened obligation for our political leaders to clearly articulate and defend their positions. Obama's polite, predictable response leaves unanswered most of the defining questions in the drug policy debate and ultimately fails to address the concerns that make this issue a top priority for a large segment of the American public.
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Medical Marijuana Proponent Files Ethics Complaint Against Iowa Representative
A Des Moines man filed an ethics complaint against a state legislator who admitted he lied about having hemorrhoids and depression to obtain a medical marijuana recommendation in California last year. Mike Pesce said he brought the complaint against Rep. Clel Baudler, R-Greenfield, because the representative said he knowingly provided false information to obtain a California medical marijuana card as a way to demonstrate why a similar program should not be adopted in Iowa.
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Canadian Patients Ask Ottawa to Fix Flawed Medical Marijuana Program
A group of medical marijuana patients traveled to Parliament Hill to draw attention to the government's "wildly dysfunctional and onerous medical marijuana regulations" and the effects they are having on sick Canadians. "Ten years ago, we put in place a government program, a legal government program, that would allow sick patients to have access to a medicine that worked for them," said Member of Parliament Dr. Carolyn Bennett. "We now are seeing a perfect storm of administrative delays that have these patients with a licence waiting four to six months till the point that it expires â and then they are criminalized because they don't have a licence because the government's backlogs and lack of resources have put them there."
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Bill to Restrict Medical Marijuana in Montana Draws Fire
A proposal to make it harder for people to get medical marijuana cards for severe and chronic pain drew plenty of opposition and little support at a hearing. Senate Bill 170, by Senate Majority Leader Jeff Essmann, R-Billings, would require a panel of three physicians experienced in pain management to review and ultimately decide whether to approve or reject another doctor's recommendation that a patient be authorized to use medical marijuana for severe and chronic pain. The lone supporter of SB170 was Mark Long, representing the Montana Narcotics Officers Association.
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Czech Police Want to Use Seized Marijuana for Treatment
Czech policemen have proposed that the seized marijuana be used for medical purposes -- for instance, for the treatment of patients with multiple sclerosis and Parkinson's disease. The Justice Ministry does not oppose the idea. "It is certainly logical," Justice Minister Jiri Pospisil (senior government Civic Democrats, ODS)) said.
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Berkeley Exports Its Cannabis Expertise
In a sign of the growing professionalization of the medical cannabis industry, Mark Rhoades and Ali Kashani, the owners of the Berkeley development company Citycentric Investments, have teamed up with Debby Goldsberry, a founder of the Berkeley Patients Group, to open a number of medical marijuana facilities around the East Bay. Goldsberry, Rhoades, and Kashani represent a new breed of medical marijuana entrepreneurs: people expert in land use policy, non-profit work, and running cannabis collectives. Itâs a set of services that is growing in demand as more states adopt medical marijuana laws and as more people try to navigate the byzantine laws permitting medical marijuana in California.
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Republican Lawmakers Shifting Tough-On-Crime Stance As State Budget Problems Multiply
In no state is the philosophical U-turn more abrupt than in Oklahoma, where last year the Legislature was barreling in the opposite direction. New Republican Speaker of the House Kris Steele is expected to unveil a package of proposals that would divert thousands of nonviolent lawbreakers from the prison system and ramp up paroles. Similar crash prison reductions are going on from coast to coast. Michigan has shuttered 20 correctional facilities and slashed spending by nearly 7 percent. South Carolina expects to reduce its inmate numbers by 8 percent by putting drug dealers, burglars and hot check writers into community programs instead of behind bars.
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Australia: Ecstasy Emerges As Secret Choice of Middle Age
Publicity about people being caught with party drugs usually concentrates on those in their teens and 20s. So when the Austalian Labor aide Matthew Chesher, 44, was charged with possessing one ecstasy tablet last week, the lid was lifted on a quite different phenomenon: the growing number of middle-aged ecstasy users. The generation that championed the drug in the '80s and '90s is getting older.
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Commission: Illinois Minorities More Likely to Face Prison for Drug Crimes Than White Offenders
A state commission says minority offenders in Illinois are far more likely to go to prison for minor drug crimes than whites are. Blacks, for instance, served time in 19 percent of low-level drug cases, while only 4 percent of white offenders were imprisoned.
Chronicle
International Anti-Drugs Day drug burn, Tehran
Iran in Drug Offender Execution Frenzy
Iran is already one of the world's leading death penalty countries, but it has been hanging drug offenders at a record pace so far this year.
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Arizona Releases New Draft Rules for Medical Marijuana Program
A new set of draft rules for Arizona's medical marijuana program were published on the state Department of Health Services' website. The rules cover everything from applying for a patient or caregiver registered identification card, to revocation of identification cards, to dispensary information, including the application process.
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Former Senior China Anti-Drug Official Gets Death Penalty for Drug Trafficking
A court handed down the death penalty to the former deputy head of anti-narcotics efforts in China's most populous metropolis, Chongqing. Luo Li had been collaborating with drug dealers in Chongqing since 2005 and took 1.2 million yuan ($233,038) in bribes to turn a blind eye to the activities of two of them, the official Xinhua news agency said, citing a court statement.
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Did Armenian Ex-President Levon Ter-Petrosyan Profit by Iranian Drug Trafficking?
Wikileaks has published new documents about the correspondence of the US Embassy in Baku (BAKU 000917). This time the documents were published in Norway's Aftenposten and are about the Azerbaijani statements on drug trafficking through Armenian and the NKR territory.
Chronicle
mephedrone ad (image via Wikimedia)
Schumer Wants to Ban Synthetic "Bath Salts" Drugs
Confronted with a new synthetic stimulant drug, a US senator reflexively reaches for the ban button.