TalkLeft has frequently called attention to the dangers that inhere in police officers' reliance on Tasers. This policy on the deployment of Tasers in Gwinnett County, Georgia is typical in its authorization of Taser deployment "to control a non-compliant subject." The video of this tasering, intended to induce a non-compliant driver to get off her cellphone and exit her vehicle after a traffic stop, should be all that is needed to convince policy-makers that tasering is, in most situations, a needlessly cruel way to control the non-compliant.

In addition to inflicting unnecessary pain, Tasers can be deadly. The Gwinnett County policy accurately refers to the Taser as a "less-lethal" weapon rather than a nonlethal weapon. Residents of Jerseyville, Illinois learned just how lethal the Taser can be following the death by tasering of Roger Holyfield. The police confronted Holyfield as he was walking down the sidewalk carrying a Bible and shouting "I want Jesus." They may have given him his wish.

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Reuters columnist Bernard Debussman has a good column examining the elephant in the room in the debate on the war on drugs:

In 1980, we had 41,000 drug offenders in prison; today we have more than 500,000, an increase of 1,200 percent.” The elephant has ambled out of the bedroom and has become the object of a lively debate on the pros and cons of legalising drugs.

He examines theories as to why the momentum towards marijuana legalization is picking up steam. He also explains why legalization is making sense to so many people right now: [More...]

The New Hampshire Senate passed a medical marijuana bill this week. All but one Democrat voted in favor of compassionate relief for the seriously ill, while all but one Republican voted in favor of continued suffering.

The measure applies only to patients afflicted by certain illnesses, such as cancer, or certain symptoms, such as wasting syndrome. If a doctor prescribes marijuana for such a patient, the individual could obtain a card allowing them to legally possess six plants or 2 ounces.

Law enforcement officials opposed the bill and Gov. John Lynch has concerns about it because patients would have to grow or buy the marijuana, and that would somehow make the enforcement of marijuana laws against non-patients more difficult. The easy solution to that dubious dilemma -- legalizing marijuana -- apparently isn't on the table.

I meant to write about this last week and since I think it deserves wider attention and haven't seen any challenges to it, I'm going to now. Tremble the Devil has done some serious numbers-crunching on the latest Bureau of Justice Statistics claiming that the disparity between the numbers of African-American and caucasian drug offenders in prison has substantially decreased.

A report by The Sentencing Project uses data provided by the Bureau of Justice Statistics [chart here]to come to the cheery conclusion that over the six-year period from 1999-2005 there was a 21.6% drop in African-Americans serving state prison time for drug offenses, while the number of whites increased by 42.6%.

According to Tremble the Devil, the drop is due to a change in the methodology: BJS (The Bureau of Justice Statistics, an arm of DOJ) stopped counting mixed black-white prisoners. They just disappeared from the statistics. In a footnote, BJS acknowledges: [More...]

As I wrote yesterday, the Senate Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing this morning on the need to revise the disparate 100:1 ratio of penalties for crack and powder cocaine. Here is Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer's written testimony.

The Administration believes Congress’s goal should be to completely eliminate the sentencing disparity between crack cocaine and powder cocaine.

Until that change from Congress comes:

However, we recognize that federal courts have the authority to sentence outside the guidelines in crack cases or even to create their own quantity ratio. Our prosecutors will inform courts that they should act within their discretion to fashion a sentence that is consistent with the objectives of 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) and our prosecutors will bring the relevant case-specific facts to the courts’ attention.

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It took the death of a 23 year old woman to convince the Florida legislature to consider a weak response to law enforcement's addiction to (and often loose supervision of) confidential informants, particularly in drug investigations. The Philadelphia Inquirer reminds us of a different deadly outcome in Atlanta that started with an informant's lie.

TalkLeft has often discussed the damage that informants do to individuals and families, to law enforcement agencies, to privacy rights, and to the criminal justice system and the society that depends upon it to operate fairly. The Inquirer reports allegations about Narcotics Officer Jeffrey Cujdik's relationship with an informant in the context of a larger issue of crime policy: law enforcement's nearly unregulated reliance upon police informants.

As to Cujdik: [more ...]

The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing Wednesday on the disparity of the crack/powder cocaine sentencing laws. You will be able to watch it live, online. Sentencing Law and Policy has more here.

The witnesses include Miami Police Chief John Timoney, who will be arguing the stiffer penalties for crack are unjust.

In the "personal story" segment, Cedric Parker will be testifying for FAMM about his sister and the impact of unjust federal crack cocaine sentences on their family.
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The report on 2008 wiretaps has just been released. Of the 1,891 applications, none were denied. Applications dropped by 14% this year. 95% of those granted were for cell phones and portable devices. A whopping 84% were in drug cases. The full report is available here (pdf) and the tables here.

A total of 1,891 applications to federal and state judges for orders authorizing the interception of wire, oral or electronic communications were reported in 2008. No applications were denied. This is a 14 percent decrease in the total of applications reported, compared to 2007. Fewer states—22 states compared to 24 in 2007—reported wiretap activity and the number of applications approved by state judges, 1,505, was down 14 percent from 2007. Federal judges approved 386 applications, down 16 percent from 2007.

The most common form of interceptions sought: Telephones (as opposed to oral (bugs) or solely electronic devices.) They accounted for 97% of the orders. As for cost: [More...]

We knew this was coming but it's still jarring to see and it is the dead wrong approach to combating Mexico's drug problems.

The Pentagon and Homeland Security Department are developing contingency plans to send National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexican border under a $350 million initiative that would expand the U.S. military's role in the war on drugs, according to Obama administration officials.

...The initiative, which was tucked into a supplemental budget request sent to Congress this month, has raised concerns over what some U.S. officials perceive as an effort by the Pentagon to increase its counter-narcotics profile through a large pot of money that comes with few visible requirements.

The White House began briefing House and Senate Committees on the plan this week. I complained last month about the $350 million in the budget for the military's use in the war on drugs here, suggesting the U.S. War on Drugs abroad is getting its own stimulus package. [More...]

The Obama Justice Department, in briefs filed by Bush holdover U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan (the one who prosecuted Tommy Chong and successfully sought a prison term for his shipping drug paraphernalia through the mail, and the one who prosecuted a 56 year old recluse for writing obscenity, and the one who has said Obama should let her stay on the job after his election) has taken the position that your whereabouts, as determined from your cell phone through records kept by your cell phone provider, is not protected by the Fourth Amendment.

There has been a split among federal district courts on this. Most say that before the Government can request cell phone providers to turn over cell site locator records -- which show where you are when on the phone by showing where your phone is when it is turned on -- they must submit an affidavit showing probable cause for the request. That's because unlike a pen register, which only shows numbers dialed from the phone, or a trap and trace, which shows numbers calling the phone, cell site tower records show the location of the the phone when being used. That makes it like a tracking device and people have an expectation of privacy in their whereabouts.

The first case to hit the federal appellate courts on the issue is one from the Western District of Pennsylvania -- thus the involvement of AUSA Mary Beth Buchanan. [More...]

More true colors?

The Justice Department is asking the Supreme Court to overrule Michigan v. Jackson, the 1986 Supreme Court decision that held that if police may not interrogate a defendant after the right to counsel has attached, if the defendant has a lawyer or has requested a lawyer.

[T]he protection offered by the court in Stevens' 1986 opinion is especially important for vulnerable defendants, including the mentally and developmentally disabled, addicts, juveniles and the poor,

This isn't the first time the Justice Department, under President Obama, has sought to limit defendants' rights. [More...]

Today is the National Call-In Day for the "Crack the Disparity" National Month of Advocacy, a month-long coordinated push to eliminate the sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine. Help flood Congress with calls. Call your federal lawmakers today and tell them that it is time to end the sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine.

Tell your elected officials that the current law:

• overstates the relative danger of crack cocaine to powder cocaine;
• contributes to the growth of our prison population, increasing the financial burden on taxpayers;
• disproportionately affects African Americans; and
• uses limited federal resources on low-level street dealers rather than on the major drug traffickers.

Follow this link or visit here to get talking points and contact information for your federal senators and representative.