Good news in the federal sentencing department. Guideline changes set to take effect November 1 unless Congress acts to ban them include a provision giving judges greater discretion in granting compassionate release for dying prisoners.

A safety-valve provision for compassionate release for the dying is in the original sentencing law but it hasn't been effective.

But advocates for inmates say the way the statute is actually carried out is anything but compassionate. Few terminally ill inmates are approved for release, and the bureaucracy is such that even when people are approved, they often die before they get out. The advocates also contend that prison officials have misconstrued the original intent of Congress and interpreted the grounds for release much too narrowly.

Now, in a departure from the tough sentencing policies that it has legislated for more than two decades, Congress is poised to allow guidelines to go into effect starting Nov. 1 that would give federal judges much greater power to release federal inmates.

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Due to a recruiting shortfall, President Bush has loosened restrictions on "character waivers" allowing military recruiters to sign up those with drug convictions on their records.

But he doesn't want these same kids to go to college and continues to support the Higher Education Act that since 1998, has prevented 200,000 students with drug convictions, including minor marijuana offenses, from obtaining student aid.

Check out the video at Drug War Draft by Students for a Sensible Drug Policy and send a message to Congress which is reconsidering the law.

If you're one of the many who can't get a scholarship because of a drug conviction, SSDP has a link to alternative available scholarships.

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The first results of the Death in Custody Reporting Act are in: 2,002 people died while being arrested in the U.S. between 2003 and 2005.

At least 2,002 people died during their arrests by state and local law enforcement officers from 2003 through 2005, the Justice Department reported yesterday. Of those suspects, officers themselves killed more than half, 80 percent of whom, the officers reported, had threatened or assaulted them with a weapon.

Drug and alcohol intoxication was the second-leading cause of death, accounting for 13 percent of the total, followed by suicide, accidental injuries, and illnesses or other natural causes.

While the number is a small percentage of those arrested, the number of those arrested is a shocker: 40 million people.

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I praised Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in my last post, now I'm criticizing him.

The California courts are weighing challenges to residency restrictions imposed by Jessica's Law and have blocked state parole officers from arresting sex offenders for residency violations.

The Governor doesn't care. He's started a new crackdown of arresting sex offenders.

On Wednesday, the state Supreme Court agreed to block state parole agents from revoking the parole of four sex offenders who are illegally living too close to schools or parks. In a one-paragraph order, the court said it will consider whether Jessica's Law violates the parolees' constitutional rights. The law approved by voters last November prohibits offenders from living within 2,000 feet of a school or park where children gather. The law pertains to sex offender parolees released from prison on or after November 8, 2006.

The ruling applies only to the four offenders who filed suit. So Arnie says he'll continue to pursue the rest:

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First the cheers. San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom has declared the war on drugs a failure.

"If you want to get serious, if you want to reduce crime by 70% in this country overnight, end this war on drugs," he told reporters at City Hall on Thursday. "You want to get serious, seriously serious about crime and violence end this war on drugs."

The mayor maintained local jails are overcrowded with people incarcerated for drug offenses, taking up room that could be used to hold more violent criminal offenders. He said violent criminals with lengthy felony records are being turned loose, too often.

San Francisco Sheriff San Francisco Sheriff Mike Hennessey agrees with him.

Now the jeers. San Francisco is initiating a program of busting the homeless on "quality of life" crimes.

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A pot-smoker is arrested every 38 seconds in America. The newest figures for 2006 show marijuana arrests are at an all-time high. Via NORML:

Police arrested a record 829,625 persons for marijuana violations in 2006, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's annual Uniform Crime Report, released today. This is the largest total number of annual arrests for pot ever recorded by the FBI. Marijuana arrests now comprise nearly 44 percent of all drug arrests in the United States.

89% of those arrested in 2006 were charged only with possession. And, get this:

The total number of marijuana arrests in the U.S. for 2006 far exceeded the total number of arrests in the U.S. for all violent crimes combined, including murder, manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery and aggravated assault.

In the past 15 years, marijuana arrests have increased by 188%. As NORML says,

"This effort is a tremendous waste of criminal justice resources that diverts law enforcement personnel away from focusing on serious and violent crime, including the war on terrorism."

You will read headlines today blaring "Violent Crime is On the Rise." Read the small print.

Justice Department spokesman Brian Roehrkasse.... said the overall crime rate -- combining violent and property crimes -- "was the lowest crime rate measured by the UCR in more than 30 years."

Checking the report's table here, there were a total of 11.5 million violent and property crimes in 2005 and 11.4 million in 2006.

Politicians are going to spin this into a need for new crime bills with tougher punishment. Dems will criticize Republicans for cutting law enforcment funds and Republicans will respond pushing the Bush Adminisration's plan for mandatory minumum sentences for all federal crimes.

We already have severe punishments for violent crime, particularly murder and rape in this country. If property crime is decreasing, there's no need to change the law. Don't get fooled. Here's the report.

Update on Giuliani below:

Big news from the DEA today: A major national steroid lab bust. Results: 143 search warrants, 11.4 million steroid pills seized, 29 people arrested.

The countries that assisted in the 18 month undercover operation: China, Mexico, Canada, Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Sweden and Thailand .

Federal agencies: FBI, Internal Revenue Service, U.S. Immmgration and Customs Enforcement and the National Drug Intelligence Center.

News conferences will be held in San Diego, New York City, Houston, Kansas City and Providence, R.I., which I take it to mean those are the districts where Indictments were brought.

Another inappropriate use of the taser in Florida yesterday, on a student asking a question at a John Kerry forum. Here's what happened.

As two officers take Meyer by the arms, Kerry, D-Mass., can be heard saying, "That's alright, let me answer his question." Audience members applaud, and Meyer struggles for several seconds as up to four officers try to remove him from the room. Meyer screams for help and tries to break away from officers, then is forced to the ground and officers order him to stop resisting.

As Kerry tells the audience he will answer the student's "very important question," Meyer yells at the officers to release him, crying out, "Don't Tase me, bro," just before he is shocked by the Taser. He is then led from the room, screaming, "What did I do?"

Sex offender registration laws provide the illusion of safety while satisfying society's unfortunate urge to continue punishing offenders who have already paid their debt to society, but growing evidence suggests that the laws are actually counterproductive.

Laws requiring widespread public notification of past crimes and restricting where such sex offenders can live have not been shown to reduce the number of new sex crimes, the report says, but rather shun former sex offenders and may be driving them underground.

A new report by Human Rights Watch examines registration laws and their legislative cousins, residency restriction laws. From an HRW summary:

Marcy at Next Hurrah and Looseheadprop at Firedoglake are discussing the invitation to comment on whether plea agreements should be removed from PACER and public access to them denied.

Here's the notice and comments are being accepted until October 26.

I haven’t decided how I feel about removing access to plea agreements yet. As a blogger, I’d like them to stay up. As a defense lawyer, it’s probably better that access be restricted.

But it’s important to note they are only considering limiting access to a single document, a plea agreement. All other pleadings would remain accessible.

Here's an argument for restricting access to them:

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Meet Sargent Binkley, an army vet currently facing twenty-plus years in Santa Clara, CA. His high school buddies are trying to publicize his plight and have set up a website. Here's his sad story.

Sargent Binkley is a high school classmate of ours and West Point graduate who is currently facing twenty-odd years in prison for robbing a Walgreens under California's minimum sentencing laws. He used a gun (unloaded) and robbed the drugstores of only Percocet - no money, harming nobody.

Here's the kicker -- he was addicted to the opiates after smashing his hip while serving abroad in the Army -- the military medical system
kept misdiagnosing him, and feeding him more of the painkillers. Add in some serious PTSD (he guarded mass graves in Bosnia from
desecration at one point) and he spiraled down.

Sargent turned himself in, has been in a rehab program in county jail for over a year and a half while he awaits sentencing, and by all accounts is
doing well. The Santa Clara DA wants to chuck the book at him, and he'll be gone.

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