The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit doesn’t have this problem often.  But in an October 15 filing, it sent 18 copies of a petition for rehearing to the U.S. Marshalls Service for disposition, because the petitioner attached cannabinoid samples to each copy.  Appellate litigation for the win.

From the Court’s order:

Appellant Jeffrey Nathan Schirripa submitted to the court 18 copies of his confidential petition for panel rehearing and rehearing en banc. Upon examination, Appellant affixed to each petition what appear to be samples of cannabinoids, which may be controlled substances possessed or mailed in violation of federal law.

IT IS ORDERED THAT:

The Clerk of Court is directed to transmit these 18 documents to the U.S. Marshals Service for appropriate disposition or alternate action within the purview of the U.S. Department of Justice.

The Court of Federal Claims denied Mr. Schirripa’s demand that the court enjoin the United States from enforcing the Controlled Substance Act, and a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed.  You can find the complete docket for the case here.

Hat tip to University of Missouri School of Law Professor Dennis Crouch who originally tagged this nugget on Patentlyo.  As of this writing, there is no word about whether Schirripa will appeal the case to the high court.

Law Street Media Staff

Law Street Media Staff posts are written by the team at Fastcase and Law Street Media

The post Appellate Litigation Protip: Do Not Attach Drugs to Your Petition appeared first on Law Street.

A Houston judge was suspended from her job on Friday amid accusations that she solicited prostitutes, sexted from the bench, and used her bailiff to buy drugs.

Hillary Green, who has been a judge since 2007, presided over misdemeanors, traffic cases, and civil suits for Harris County Precinct 7. Her lawyer called the decision “frustrating and surprising” in addition to arguing that many of the accusations were already public when Green was reelected with 86 percent of the vote.

She will remain suspended until a civil trial is held to make a final decision, but her lawyer said that trial could be years down the line and another judge is already slated to replace her, according to the Washington Post.

Accusations against Green first arose during her divorce from Houston Controller Ronald C. Green in 2015. It was at that point that Green said his now ex-wife “operates daily with impaired judgment as evidenced by her presiding over cases in which she has ongoing sexual relationships with litigants and witnesses,” according to the Houston Press.

Suspicions rose further when Claude Barnes, who Green admits she had an affair with for many years, came forward with allegations regarding drug use and hiring prostitutes for threesomes.

“The three of us sat,” Barnes said. “We smoked marijuana. We had a couple drinks and then three of us had sex.”

These accusations led the Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct to file its first formal inquiry into the Houston judge’s behavior, an investigation that culminated in a 316-page recommendation to suspend her that was released this year. Executive Director Eric Vinson said that the commission has been investigating Green for almost four years and that in his decade in that role he has never seen a judge contest proceedings this strongly, according to the Houston Press.

The commission took note of Green’s inability to change her behavior over a five-year span and called out Green’s “outright betrayal of the public’s trust” in the report.

Other stories allege Green and Barnes smoked marijuana that was confiscated from a citizen, bought cough syrup from a drug dealer named “lover boy,” and that she texted her bailiff about explicit sexual acts that she would perform with him later.

Green admitted to buying $500 worth of cough syrup and smoking marijuana daily, but denied hiring prostitutes. In addition to smoking weed and drinking the syrup, she and Barnes took ecstasy on multiple occasions, but Green denies paying for it. So, even though she was sentencing people for committing minor drug offenses, Green frequently undertook similar behavior, according to the report’s findings.

Disgusted with her behavior, the commission asked the Texas Supreme Court to suspend Green while officials prepared their case to permanently remove her. The state bar wrote in May:

To this day, Judge Green has apparently made no attempt to reassign the bailiff with whom she actively participated in an inappropriate sexual texting relation and whom she recruited to assist in illegal drug activity. She engaged the services of a peace officer to commit a criminal act, and indeed he was apparently willing to do so. Incredibly, Judge Green sees nothing wrong with the arrangement.

Green and her lawyers countered that the allegations are the result of a bitter divorce and that Ronald Green could have stolen her phone and sent some of those text messages. They also argue that the accusations were improperly filed, creating a bureaucratic legal issue. Still, there is already ample evidence that the judge crossed several lines.

Even if some of the allegations aren’t true, Green has already admitted to multiple acts that would break the Code of Conduct for United States Judges. The code explicitly states that appropriate action must be taken if a judge is impaired by drugs and that judges must maintain professional relationships with their staff.

Though Green’s civil trial is over a year away, she will almost surely not be reinstated from her suspension with the concrete evidence the bar association already has. Green, who was once part of a powerful political marriage with Ronald, has now had a meteoric fall from grace.

Josh Schmidt

Josh Schmidt is an editorial intern and is a native of the Washington D.C Metropolitan area. He is working towards a degree in multi-platform journalism with a minor in history at nearby University of Maryland. Contact Josh at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Houston Judge Suspended for Buying Drugs and Prostitutes, Sexting Her Bailiff appeared first on Law Street.

While the federal government has often struggled to control drug usage, including drugs ingested via snorting like cocaine, it’s not often that officials have to make a call on snorting chocolate powder. But since Legal Lean, an Orlando-based business, recently created a product called Coco Loko, that’s exactly what the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) may need to do.

The name Coco Loko is actually a play on Four Loko, an energy drink and alcohol mix that was banned in 2010 and deemed a public health concern. Coco Loko shares plenty of similarities with its namesake, including the energy drink aspect. The fine, brown cacao powder contains taurine and guarana, which were both identified as dangerous substances in Four Loko. The energy-boosting benefits are another commonality between the two products, Legal Lean founder Nick Anderson said.

Anderson said that snorting the powder creates “almost like an energy-drink feeling, like you’re euphoric but also motivated to get things done.” The effects normally last between 30 minutes and one hour, Anderson told the Washington Post. The product, which hit shelves in June, is being marketed as a drug-free, non-addictive way to get a buzz and an energy boost.

An important distinction for the curious is that cacao powder is the purest, least processed form of chocolate while cocoa powder is the refined powder commonly found in American stores, according to One Green Planet.

Legal Lean and Anderson first became interested in developing the product after learning of the trend that was beginning in Europe. The mixture was popular in European nightclubs, culinary institutions, and even among cyclists, according to Daily Mail. Anderson said that while he was skeptical at first, he tried snorting powder and thought “this is the future right here.”

Soon after, Anderson invested $10,000 to create his own version and spent the next 10 months searching and testing for the right recipe. By June, Anderson had the right mixture and Coco Loko was on the shelves even without approval from the FDA up to this point. One tin of powder, which contains 10 servings, sells for $24.99, according to the Washington Post.

One issue that the FDA faces is that this is uncharted territory; no one really knows the risks of snorting cacao powder, Dr. Andrew Lane, director of the Johns Hopkins Sinus Center told the Washington Post. Lane expanded:

There are a few obvious concerns. First, it’s not clear how much of each ingredient would be absorbed into the nasal mucus membranes. And, well, putting solid material into your nose — you could imagine it getting stuck in there, or the chocolate mixing with your mucus to create a paste that could block your sinuses.

A spokesman for the FDA said the agency would need to “evaluate the product labeling, marketing information, and/or any other information pertaining to the product’s intended use” before making a decision. So, for now, the product can be sold even without FDA approval.

Concerns also circulated that snorting the powder could lead customers to try other drugs, but Lane said he isn’t particularly worried about that. The FDA has not decided if, or how, it will regulate consumption. Since the product is comprised of mostly chocolate, obviously a legal food, the powder may be challenging to federally regulate, according to U.S. News and World Report. 

Sales have increased in recent months according to Alex P. of Exclusive Distributors, which helps spread the product nationwide. “It’s not flying off the shelves or anything, but people are definitely curious,” Alex, who did not release his last name, told the Washington Post. Anderson’s brother, a rapper who goes by Bezz Believe, claims to have helped popularize the product by his own usage and its appearance in his music videos.

For now, snorting the cacao powder is more of a silly niche than the fad that swept Europe over the past year. Its popularity remains minimal, but interest has grown in Houston and Atlanta, according to the New York Post. Now that an American-based product has been introduced into the market, popularity could increase. As popularity increases, more attention will be paid to how (and if) the FDA opts to regulate the product.

Josh Schmidt

Josh Schmidt is an editorial intern and is a native of the Washington D.C Metropolitan area. He is working towards a degree in multi-platform journalism with a minor in history at nearby University of Maryland. Contact Josh at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Will Snorting Cacao Powder Become Popular? The FDA May Need to Decide appeared first on Law Street.

This week, India’s National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) imposed measures that significantly cut the prices of a variety of “essential” drugs, including drugs that treat cancer. These price controls are by no means unprecedented. For decades, the Indian government has worked to keep drug costs low, which has often meant bucking international drug patenting and pricing norms. In doing so India nurtured and developed a massive generic drug industry. While the Indian government must not be admonished for keeping drug costs low, its longstanding obsession with cheap drugs may distract from broader health care accessibility issues.

In 1970, India passed a newly revised Patents Act, which upended the Indian pharmaceutical industry. The act stipulated pharmaceutical patents would only be issued to drugs that exhibited “one or more inventive step(s).” While this language seems relatively innocuous, it totally changed the way in which pharmaceutical corporations conduct business.

Drug patents allow holders to charge high prices because patents ensure market exclusivity for a given period of time. However, in order to maintain market exclusivity, drug companies engage in a practice known as “evergreening.” In most countries, patent laws are such that pharmaceutical companies are able to extend patents and maintain monopolies by making trivial modifications to an already patented product. According to the American Medical Association, these slight alterations allow patent holders to claim they are releasing a new, innovative drug and extend their exclusive rights over said drug “despite the absence of any compelling pharmacologic difference.” In the United States, companies do all sorts of things to “evergreen” drugs including “obtaining additional patents on other aspects of a drug, including its coating, salt moiety, formulation, and method of administration.”

The language in India’s 1970 act is such that companies selling drugs in India would no longer be able to get a patent unless they were offering a new and “inventive” drug. Companies would no longer be able to patent known drugs in an attempt to extend a market monopoly. As a result, a drug that might have enjoyed patent protection elsewhere, would not be protected under Indian patent policy. Soon after this policy shift, India’s generic drug industry exploded, and domestic drug prices plummeted. Before long, India became one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical exporters.

India has made changes to its patent policy over the years, but its generic drug industry continues to operate and thrive under legal conditions set in motion by the 1970 act. Ironically, India’s largest manufacturers are beginning to push back against price-oriented policies that brought them into existence.

While India’s patent polices undermined evergreening practices, price controls were instituted as an additional means of keeping drugs affordable. The creation of a generic drug industry worked to cut costs by undermining market monopolies but, as time went on, India’s most prominent manufacturers of generic drugs were able to brand their products and charge premiums. Price controls were used to ensure these premium prices were not excessive compared to the average cost of other generics.

Whereas India’s patent laws prevent multinational corporations from charging exorbitant prices in monopolized markets, India’s price controls prevent domestic manufacturers of generic drugs from charging more for a drug that bears their brand. Just as multinational corporations argued India’s patent policies stifle innovation, domestic manufacturers arguing that price control affect their ability to operate. In 2012, the government even went as far as suggesting “a future where we will not issue any brand or trade names.”

India’s government should not be criticized for ending price gouging tactics. Multinational corporations should not be able to exclude swaths of people from access to drugs by manipulating patent policy and extending market exclusivity, and cheap generics are crucial in a country where around 78 percent of the population pays for health care out-of-pocket. However, while access to cheap drugs is vital, the government’s health care policy is largely defined by its longstanding obsession with the generic industry and domestic drug prices.

Decades of policies ensuring cheap and readily accessible drugs have helped improve access for many but may have distracted from more holistic attempts at improving health care accessibility. Yet, notwithstanding cheap drug prices, studies have show health care costs are responsible for half of all Indian households falling into poverty. This most recent round of price controls on essential generic drugs came as no surprise, and that might be an issue. India’s pushback to the international patent regime is commendable but cheap drugs should not be treated as the end all be all of health care accessibility.

Callum Cleary

Callum is an editorial intern at Law Street. He is from Portland OR by way of the United Kingdom. He is a senior at American University double majoring in International Studies and Philosophy with a focus on social justice in Latin America. Contact Callum at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post India’s Low Drug Prices: Do They Lead to a Struggle for Health Care Accessibility? appeared first on Law Street.

The Department of Health and Human Services has declared widespread opioid abuse to be a serious public health issue. Officials across the country are searching for ways to combat the epidemic and are increasingly calling for “public health responses, not a war on drugs.” However, reports indicate the Ohio city of Washington Court House has begun charging people who survive opiate overdoses with “inducing panic.” Although city officials claim the new practice is not meant to worsen the conditions of those struggling with opioid addiction, the policy directly opposes the prevailing logic regarding addiction and rehabilitation.

In the past month, police used Naloxone, a drug that reverses the effects of opioids, to revive seven people before charging them with a misdemeanor. In an interview with the city’s local ABC affiliate, Washington Court House officials argued charging overdose survivors “gives [the city] the ability to keep an eye on them, to offer them assistance and to know who has overdosed.” The court summons is meant to ensure the city is able to “follow up” with overdose survivors and show them the city cares and wants to help them, not jail them, the officials said.

Nonetheless, those charged with “inducing panic” could face up to 180 days in prison or a $1,000 fine. Regardless of whether or not Washington Court House attorneys plan on convicting the addicts who have been charged, the move is misguided. The criminal justice system is not equipped to assist drug addicts, and attempting to address addiction by using the system only perpetuates the criminalization of drug addiction and addicts.

The U.S. has a long history of criminalizing drug addicts rather than providing them the medical assistance they require. According to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, those found guilty of drug related offenses constitute 46.4 percent of the prison population. In a 2010 report, the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse estimated 65 percent of the prison population “meet medical criteria for substance abuse or addiction” but only 11 percent receive any kind of treatment for their addiction. Furthermore, the availability of drugs within prison walls is well documented, and relapses are common.

There is an expert consensus that addiction is a medical condition and ought to be treated as such. While officials throughout the nation are recognizing the need for cogent and compassionate public health responses, Washington Court House continues the detrimental criminalization of drug addiction.

Callum Cleary

Callum is an editorial intern at Law Street. He is from Portland OR by way of the United Kingdom. He is a senior at American University double majoring in International Studies and Philosophy with a focus on social justice in Latin America. Contact Callum at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Ohio Town Charges Opioid Overdose Survivors with “Inducing Panic” appeared first on Law Street.

Apparently, someone lost their luggage, and they’re probably pretty upset about it. Bags that washed up on two beaches in Norfolk on England’s east coast turned out to contain almost 800 pounds of cocaine, worth more than $60 million. A member of the public found the drugs, packed in colorful North Face bags.

The National Crime Agency deals with organized crime in the UK, and responded to the find. “This is obviously a substantial seizure of class A drugs and its loss will represent a major blow to the organized criminals involved,” said Matthew Rivers from the NCA border investigation team. He added that the place where the bags showed up was most likely not the intended destination–they were found outside two small towns with a couple of thousand people each, Hopton-on-Sea and Caister-on-Sea. The NCA is working with the coastguard to try to determine where the drugs were supposed to go.

Investigation after £50m cocaine found on Norfolk beaches > https://t.co/ieKU1kGOku pic.twitter.com/GT6PoGYkCW

— Norfolk Police (@NorfolkPolice) February 10, 2017

This is not the first time drugs on the loose ended up on a beach in the British Isles. In October, a torpedo-like device with over $5 million of cocaine inside was found stranded on a beach in Western Ireland and was believed to have been there for weeks or months before anyone noticed. There was another similar incident in 2008. And the biggest cocaine seizure in the UK was water related as well–three tons in 2015, worth over $620 million, found in a ship off the coast of Scotland. That seizure led to the arrest of two Turkish nationals.

Drug trafficking to the United Kingdom is estimated to cost law enforcement £10.7 billion a year, which is about $13.3 billion. The amount of cocaine imported every year is believed to be somewhere between 25-30 tons. And though it’s not very likely that someone will come forward to claim this most recent case of lost drugs, the NCA took the opportunity to have some fun with it.

And you thought your missing luggage was bad… If anyone wants to claim it, we’re keeping it safe for you https://t.co/SVrrG8t30p

— NationalCrimeAgency (@NCA_UK) February 10, 2017

Soon there were a bunch of jokes about the drug find, with some saying they should make a version of the show “Narcos,” and various members of the public suggesting that they could take care of the bags.

@EdmondBeech @NorfolkPolice Somewhere very safe. But the rightful owners can come and collect it anytime

— NationalCrimeAgency (@NCA_UK) February 10, 2017

But the NCA doesn’t take criminal activity lightly.

@EdmondBeech@NorfolkPolice Well not if you aren’t smuggling cocaine into Norfolk or involved in some other serious crime. Are you…?

— NationalCrimeAgency (@NCA_UK) February 10, 2017

Norfolk police urged members of the public to get in touch if they find anything suspicious…or this weird!

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post 800 Pounds of Cocaine Wash up on English Coast appeared first on Law Street.

Researchers have recently seen a sharp increase in babies–particularly babies born in rural areas–with Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome (NAS). This means that the babies are essentially born addicted to the drugs that their mothers used when pregnant. This phenomenon is just yet another depressing side effect of the sharp increase in the number of people addicted to opioids in the United States.

According to the study, which was published online earlier this week in JAMA Pediatrics, the increase of babies born with NAS in rural areas rose dramatically between 2004 and 2013. During that time period in rural areas, the incidences of NAS increased from 1.2 cases per 1,000 hospital births to 7.5 cases per 1,000 hospital births. It’s important to note that cases in cities rose as well, just not as sharply. In cities, there were 1.4 cases per 1,000 hospital births in 2004, and 4.8 cases per 1,000 hospital births in 2013. There was also some variability from state to state. Hawaii saw the lowest rate, at .7 cases per 1,000 births. West Virginia saw the highest, with 33.4 cases per 1,000 births. The researchers did acknowledge that the increase in cases could also come from the fact that there’s increased recognition of the symptoms, and better reporting metrics than there used to be.

But these numbers aren’t that surprising if you’ve paid attention to the nationwide opioid crisis. Rural areas have been particularly hard hit. Dr. Joshua Brown, a researcher at the University of Florida College of Pharmacy in Gainesville, told Business Insider:

Substance abuse is generally higher in rural communities, where an inability to afford or access care as well as the stigma associated with addiction may mean fewer mothers get the help they need to stop using heroin or abusing prescription painkillers during pregnancy.

President Barack Obama has recently taken some action to try to ameliorate the opioid crisis. The 21st Century Cures Act was recently passed by Congress and signed by Obama, and designates a significant amount of money specifically to fighting the opioid epidemic. This could be a boon for rural communities struggling with addiction, but as shown by recent evidence, there’s still a lot of work to be done.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

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On Tuesday, Bernie Sanders’ Twitter account sent out a series of tweets describing the price hike on insulin from pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly and Co. The tweets linked to a Washington Post article that details the increasing prices from the day insulin was discovered in 1921 until today. Sanders’ tweets attacked the drug industry, accusing the companies involved of corporate greed.

A bit of backstory is necessary: the researchers who discovered insulin debated whether to patent it at all since their main purpose was to help humanity. Their discovery made it possible for people to live with a disease that had previously meant a death sentence. Eventually they sold the patent for $3 to the University of Toronto.

Why has the price of Humalog insulin gone up 700% in 20 years? It’s simple. The drug industry’s greed. pic.twitter.com/SUeSbsr2Ka

— Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) November 1, 2016

Sanders’ tweets, which were not signed by him personally but sent out by staff members, caused Eli Lilly’s stock price to drop 2.4 percent. The price of $72.02 per share was the lowest it has been since March 31. Prices soon stabilized again, and Eli Lilly released a statement defending its pricing.

“A permanent solution that gives everyone who uses insulin reasonable access will require leadership and cooperation across many stakeholders, including manufacturers, (pharmacy benefit managers), payers, and policymakers. That’s because the answer itself isn’t simple.”

Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk clearly care more about their profits than their patients. It’s time to end their greed. pic.twitter.com/MqCsHNjzcO

— Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) November 1, 2016

This year marks 75 years after the original patent on insulin expired and three companies in particular have made improvements to insulin that leads to the creation of more patents and garnered the owners billions of dollars. One of those companies is Eli Lilly; its insulin Humalog has gone up in price from $21 in 1996 to $255 today. That’s a 700 percent increase.

But why isn’t competition keeping the prices down? The pharmaceutical industry claims drug improvement raises prices, but experts question this and believe the changes to the drugs are only to cover up for price hikes as well as to create new patents. David Nathan from Harvard Medical School said to the Post:

I don’t think it takes a cynic such as myself to see most of these drugs are being developed to preserve patent protection. The truth is they are marginally different, and the clinical benefits of them over the older drugs have been zero.

Many people can’t even afford to get their insulin. Around six million Americans depend on it, and though many get it through health insurance, there are also many without insurance or in between insurance plans because of different life changes.

In the richest nation in the world, diabetes patients are being forced to decide between eating and paying for the drugs they need. pic.twitter.com/Mnq4NSgiPz

— Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) November 1, 2016

Sanders has targeted the drug industry before and influenced the stock market through his tweets about Ariad Pharmaceuticals’ high prices for a leukemia drug. Hillary Clinton is doing pretty well too–she has tweeted both at the industry in general, causing Nasdaq shares to fall last year, and about the EpiPen by Mylan NV, whose shares fell by 6.2 percent. If these progressive politicians keep it up, maybe things will change after all!

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Insulin Brand’s Stock Plummets After Bernie Sanders Tweets About Price Hikes appeared first on Law Street.

More and more people are now mixing heroin and other street drugs with an extremely potent drug normally used for tranquilizing elephants. The drug, carfentanil, is reportedly 10,000 times stronger than morphine and 100 times stronger than fentanyl. At least 19 deaths have been linked to this lethal cocktail in the Detroit area only since July, according to the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services. What’s even worse is that the drug has no antidote. District Judge Linda B. Davis told the Detroit Free Press to Detroit Free Press:

This is really scary. We know there have been some instances in Port Huron and New Haven where this has been suspected […] It makes it more deadly than heroin already is… This is really deadly. It is devastating communities.

Carfentanil was first created in 1974 for veterinary use and has not been approved for human use. As it is sometimes sold in pill form, users face great risk of accidental overdose. And the effects start only minutes after taking it–disorientation, coughing, sedation, respiratory distress, or cardiac arrest and death. “This stuff is so deadly, you could die before you can get high,” said Lloyd Jackson, spokesman for the Wayne County medical examiner’s office.

The Associated Press found that it is particularly easy to buy carfentanil online from producers in China, even though the U.S. government is urging the country to blacklist the drug. Over there, it is legal and out in the open, though its qualities have been compared to nerve gas. A Chinese worker at a lab that makes carfentanil told the AP that she thinks it should be controlled in China, but that there are so many labs and so much of the product, that she doesn’t know how the government could ever control it.

Apart from tranquilizing animals, it has also been studied for use as a chemical weapon by the U.S., U.K., Russia, China, and a few other countries. The drug’s potency can be demonstrated by the time when Chechen rebels held over 800 people hostage at a theater in Moscow in 2002. Russian forces used a related drug, fentanyl, to get the rebels to surrender by spraying it into the theater. It worked–but the effects also killed 120 of the hostages.

“Countries that we are concerned about were interested in using it for offensive purposes. We are also concerned that groups like ISIS could order it commercially,” said Andrew Weber, former assistant secretary of defense for nuclear, chemical and biological defense programs, to the AP.

According to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the amount of fentanyl seized by authorities has increased from 8.1 pounds in 2014 to 295 pounds only from July 2016 until today. But DEA officials have said that they have experienced an unexpectedly high level of cooperation rate from Chinese officials in their efforts to stop the production and smuggling of carfentanil, noting that both countries are looking at it very closely.

“Shining sunlight on this black market activity should encourage Chinese authorities to shut it down,” Weber told the AP.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post 19 Dead In Michigan From Mixing Drugs With Elephant Tranquilizer appeared first on Law Street.

Festivals and fraternities–the life source of the average college-bound American teenager–hounded the first family as Malia Obama challenged the roles of acceptable teenage behavior.

President Barack Obama’s 18-year-old daughter graduated from the prestigious Sidwell Friends School earlier this year and unexpectedly decided to take a gap year before attending Harvard. In recent months, Malia’s achievements have been overshadowed by a slew of leaks depicting the recent graduate playing beer pong and smoking at festivals.

In July, Malia skipped the Democratic National Convention to enjoy numerous artists and setlists at the Lollapalooza music festival in Chicago. Concert-goers photographed and filmed Malia dancing against the tide of crowds–her secret service in tow. Unfortunately, the extra security couldn’t stop the national spotlight from pointing directly at the teen, after cameras caught her allegedly smoking pot and twerking during the concert lineup.

Radar Online released the viral snapshot and in minutes, numerous online outlets exploded criticizing the partying teen’s behavior.

Twitter users strongly opposed online outlets overanalyzing Malia’s actions, and the children of politicians followed suit by showing support. Meghan McCain, daughter of U.S. Sen. John McCain, lashed out against the media for its portrayal of the teen with a tweet reading: “leave Malia Obama alone!”

.@connortryan @PageSix leave Malia Obama alone!

— Meghan McCain (@MeghanMcCain) August 10, 2016

If Malia was in fact smoking marijuana, her behavior wouldn’t be atypical. In fact, one in every 17 college students is smoking marijuana on a daily or near-daily basis, defined as use on 20 or more occasions in the prior 30 days, according to a 2015 study from the University of Michigan.

“It’s clear that for the past seven or eight years there has been an increase in marijuana use among the nation’s college students,” said Lloyd Johnston, the principal investigator of the study.

Malia’s alleged marijuana use isn’t the only thing she’s been criticized for. She once again made headlines after a snapchat depicting her playing beer pong at a party in Maryland on August 23 surfaced. The picture released by the Daily Mail shows Malia surrounded by a patriotic table covered in red, white, and blue confetti and a sprawl of Bud Light and Miller Lights cans. The infamous red solo cup was also fully present.

The president’s daughter helps contribute to the number of students her age who drink underage. A Villanova study shows, nationally, about 80 percent of college students consume alcohol. 

This is not the first time presidential kids and the children of candidates have made headlines due to their antics–from Bristol Palin’s teenage pregnancy out of wedlock to George W. Bush’s 19-year-old twins Barbara and Jenna underage drinking in Texas–and it surely won’t be the last.

The White House has opted to remain silent in the wake of the media firestorm surrounding Malia. The eldest Obama daughter, however, subtly responded to her critics at Philadelphia’s Labor Day weekend Made In America Music Festival. Malia was caught sporting a Harvard cap and a tee with the befitting hand-written words “Smoking Kills” scrawled across.

Bryan White

Bryan is an editorial intern at Law Street Media from Stratford, NJ. He is a sophomore at American University, pursuing a Bachelor’s degree in Broadcast Journalism. When he is not reading up on the news, you can find him curled up with an iced chai and a good book. Contact Bryan at BWhite@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Malia Obama: A Wallflower Under Public Scrutiny appeared first on Law Street.

The number of suspected drug criminals that have been killed by police in the Philippines since President Rodrigo Duterte took office seven weeks ago is believed to be as high as 1,800 people, according to Philippine National Police Chief Ronald Dela Rosa. Local politicians, the United States, and the U.N. have started voicing concern about human rights violations as the country ramps up its fight against drugs. In response to recent criticism, Duterte lashed out at his critics and even suggested that the Philippines may leave the U.N. in the future.

At a Senate hearing on Monday, Dela Rosa said that police had killed 712 drug dealers and users since July 1. He also mentioned that they are investigating 1,067 other drug-related killings, but did not elaborate further. According to Reuters, two U.N. human rights experts recently urged the Philippines to stop the extrajudicial killings of suspected drug dealers that have escalated dramatically lately.

Late Sunday night, President Duterte held a press conference, in which he threatened to fire everyone in the government who had been appointed to his or her position by a previous president. At the press conference, he said the police did not carry out the extrajudicial killings. He also said, responding to critics at the U.N., “I will prove to the world that you are a very stupid expert.” In his speech, he asked people to not only think about how many drug dealers were killed but to also take into account how many innocent lives that are lost to drugs.

President Duterte even threatened to pull out of the U.N. saying, “I do not want to insult you. But maybe we’ll just have to decide to separate from the United Nations.” He went on to say that the Philippines might instead start a new international organization with China and several African nations.

Duterte continued to criticize the U.N. for not stopping the war in Syria:

You know, United Nations, if you can say one bad thing about me, I can give you 10 [about you]. I tell you, you are an inutile [useless]. Because if you are really true to your mandate, you could have stopped all these wars and killing.

The United States is normally a close ally to the Philippines but has expressed concerns similar to the United Nations in light of the recent deaths. The Philippines’ foreign minister, Perfecto Yasay, said on Monday that the President’s words had been no more than an expression of a strong disappointment with the U.N. “We are committed to the U.N. despite our numerous frustrations and disappointments with the international agency,” Yasay said. He added that Duterte has promised to respect human rights and that it is irresponsible for the U.N. to “jump to conclusions.”

But Senator Leila de Lima, a fierce critic of Duterte, is also concerned; she began a two-day inquiry on Monday, questioning police about the many killings. “I am disturbed that we have killings left and right as breakfast every morning,” she said. She also expressed her fear that the president’s war on drugs could be an excuse for law enforcement to kill with impunity.

On Sunday night, Duterte did not seem to worry about effects of his statements. When asked about his comments he said, “What is… repercussions? I don’t give a shit to them.”

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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The scene at the border of Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant and Bushwick neighborhoods Tuesday afternoon looked like something out of AMC’s “The Walking Dead.” Dozens of people  were slumped over in the streets, while some were staggering and bracing themselves against buildings–unable to stand up straight. The bizarre behavior was the result of a mass overdose on K2, also known as synthetic marijuana or spice, at the corner of Broadway and Myrtle–the epicenter of the drug’s epidemic was dubbed “Zombieland” by residents and cops.

33 people hospitalized after calls about mass K2 overdose in Brooklyn: NYPD https://t.co/BUxMuVKOU5 via @NBCNewYork pic.twitter.com/psIO3zHPC3

— NBC News (@NBCNews) July 13, 2016

According to the New York Times, a spokesman for the Fire Department said eight people were taken from the Stockton Street area to Woodhull Medical Center suffering from “altered mental states,” lethargy and respiratory issues around 9:40 AM. Others were found in the surrounding area.

UPDATE: 33 people overdose on K2 in BedStuy Tues.; many seen collapsed on sidewalk https://t.co/MwNfe3PA8T pic.twitter.com/LiehXm5Kib

— Aidan Gardiner (@AidanGardiner) July 13, 2016

After the initial call, more and more people began to surface in the intersection exhibiting erratic behavior. Some were confrontational, fighting police, while others appeared to be paralyzed by the drug’s effects.

Brian Arthur, 38, streamed the scene live on Facebook. Warning, the video contains some vulgar language.

K2 has quickly grown in popularity because not only is it addictive and offers a high similar to marijuana, but it’s cheap–costing as little as $1 a joint. But it isn’t a new drug.

Spice consumption was popular first in the U.K. in 2004, and then later became prevalent in the U.S. in 2008. It can be extremely dangerous because it  is technically made of synthetic cannabinoids, or chemicals designed to mimic the effect of THC on the brain, and users can never be certain which chemicals they are actually getting in any given dose.

Smoking the drug can lead to slew of adverse side effects, which include: kidney failure, arrested heart rate, high blood pressure, loss of consciousness, violent behavior, nausea, vomiting, tremors, seizures, hallucinations, paranoia, agitation, anxiety, and even death, according to the state Department of Health.

New York, like many other cities, has banned the manufacture and sale of K2, but authorities have failed to crack a dent in the growing epidemic. Many convenience stores and bodegas have been caught selling the drug, but lackluster punishments have had a minimal effect on stopping the practice. Individual clerks caught selling face only a fine of up to $500 and 15 days in jail.

New York’s mass overdose Tuesday cast a necessary spotlight on K2–which has been linked to recent surges in hospitalizations and calls to poison control centers–but it’s clear NYC authorities are struggling to clean up the drug hotspot.

Alexis Evans

Alexis Evans is an Assistant Editor at Law Street and a Buckeye State native. She has a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism and a minor in Business from Ohio University. Contact Alexis at aevans@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Pfizer’s announcement on Friday that it will enforce the distribution restriction of its drugs that are used in lethal cocktails makes it the last FDA-approved pharmaceutical company to do so. Which means states that still carry out executions are forced to go underground to find drugs, or go back to very outdated options.

Pfizer stated:

Pfizer makes its products solely to enhance and save the lives of the patients we serve. We strongly object to the use of any of our products in the lethal injection process for capital punishment.

We are committed to ensuring that our products remain available and accessible to the medical professionals and patients who rely upon them every day. We have implemented a comprehensive strategy and enhanced restricted distribution protocols for a select group of products to help combat their unauthorized use for capital punishment.

Pfizer is the second largest pharmaceutical company in the world, and its stance on the issue is important. However, it’s hard to know exactly how big of an impact it will have on the actual business of executions because of the secrecy surrounding the process. There are 32 states still using death penalty, and of those, a majority are not open about their drug sources because of fear of  violent actions from execution opponents.

As Law Street has reported earlier, the lethal injection crisis has been going on for a few years. This is due to drug manufacturers’ refusal to provide drugs for this purpose, and export restrictions from European nations, where capital punishment is no longer in use. This has led to the use of drugs that could cause unnecessary suffering, or drugs from compounding pharmacies, resulting in some drawn-out and seemingly painful deaths. To not have to break the law to carry out executions, some states have actually turned to old-fashioned options such as the firing squad, electric chairs, or even gas chamber as possible solutions. Others have just delayed executions again and again, waiting to find the right drugs.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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What if heroin overdoses were not classified as accidents, but as homicides?

That is what one Pennsylvania coroner is starting to do.

According to Penn Live, in Lycoming County, Pennsylvania, coroner Charles E. Kiessling wants to call the issue like it is. Rather than have the death be classified as either a suicide or accidental, labeling heroin overdose deaths as homicides holds the drug dealers accountable for their actions.

“If you are selling heroin to someone and they die, isn’t that homicide?” he said to Penn Live. He added that ruling the deaths as accidental downplays the true severity of the situation.

This issue has garnered both positive and negative comments. Some argue that this will become a slippery slope where car dealers are blamed for car accidents. However, as explained in Penn Live, a coroner’s report is not legal finding, therefore a death being classified a homicide on the report does not mean in the eyes of law enforcement it will immediately be taken that way.

This same argument has been presented in previous years regarding fast food chains and obesity. In one 2002 case against McDonald’s, two teenagers blamed the fast food chain for their obesity, arguing that they were not provided with the necessary nutritional information. Lawyers for McDonald’s made the case that it was really a case of a lack of individual responsibility.

A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention handbook states that a death should be designated a homicide if it is from “… a volitional act committed by another person to cause fear, harm, or death. Intent to cause death is a common element but is not required for classification as homicide.”

The second part of their definition is crucial because in these cases of heroin overdoses, there may not be explicit intent to kill.

The coroner’s decision comes as heroin related deaths are increasing across the state, along with a personal connection after he said he pronounced a friend’s son dead from heroin, according to Penn Live.

“This hit me very personally,” Kiessling said to Penn Live. “I don’t care if I offend people. Drug dealers are murderers and belong in state prison.”

A hole in the slippery slope argument, though, comes when opponents argue that then a doctor would need to be charged with homicide if one of their patients overdosed on prescription medicine. However, unlike drug dealers, doctors have licenses and their medicines are administered in methodical and specific amounts, making it more difficult for patients to overdose accidentally. When it comes to drugs, the buyer may not even know what chemicals are in the drugs and this unknown lends itself to issues.

With that being said, is it really plausible to call all drug dealers “murderers?” The same language can be used as was used by McDonald’s lawyers: it is the individual’s choice to consume certain foods or drugs, meaning that drug dealers shouldn’t be held liable for what happens to their consumers.

With any overdose, the situation is very sensitive, and the classification of the death could mean different implications for not only police but also for the families of the victims.

Julia Bryant

Julia Bryant is an Editorial Senior Fellow at Law Street from Howard County, Maryland. She is a junior at the University of Maryland, College Park, pursuing a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism and Economics. You can contact Julia at JBryant@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Mayor Svante Myrick of Ithaca, New York has proposed the United States’ first supervised heroin injection facility. This is a bold move in the current struggle to fight the serious heroin problem in many of America’s cities and towns.

Ithaca, New York is home to Cornell University and Ithaca College, and has a population a little over 30,000. Yet despite that relatively small population, it has a relatively big heroin problem. In one three-week span in 2014, the city saw three fatal overdoses and 13 non-fatal overdoses. Those incidences prompted city officials to look into new ways to deal with the problem–it has become clear to many that the traditional “tough on crime” approach isn’t really working to stem rising heroin use in the U.S.

A supervised heroin facility would allow addicts to use the drug while being supervised by nurses, and they would be free from arrest. The logic behind the idea is that it will prevent deaths via overdose, stem the spread of disease through sharing used needles, and help heroin addicts be funneled into programs that will help treat their addiction and deal with other health issues. This approach treats heroin addiction as a public health issue rather than a crime. This approach has been taken in parts of Canada, Europe, and Australia–but it would the first time a city in the U.S. has tried it.

While normally the proposal would have to go through the state legislature, Myrick is hoping to bypass that process if the state health department declares the heroin problem in New York a public health crisis.

The supervised heroin injection facility is just one part of a larger plan that Ithaca is releasing in an attempt to combat drug use. Entitled “The Ithaca Plan: A Public Health and Safety Approach to Drugs and Drug Policy,” it contains a four-pillared approach of treatment, harm reduction, public safety and prevention.

Myrick seemingly realizes that there’s going to be a lot of pushback to the plan, but he told The Ithaca Journal’s Kelsey O’Connor:

I think it makes sense. What we’re proposing is different, and different is scary. And you don’t want to seem like you’re condoning drug use. So I think even people who oppose this are opposing this with good intentions. They want people to get healthy and they don’t want people using drugs, and neither do I. The only thing I can say to people who oppose it, it’s not enough to be angry about the problem if all you’re going to do is what you did before. If you keep seeing the same problems and proposing the same solutions, then you’ll never make progress. So it’s not enough to get angry, you’ve got to get smart, and you’ve got to be willing to try.

There’s still a lot up in the air about whether the plan will move forward, but the comprehensive proposal and innovative (for the U.S., at least) ideas being considered in Ithaca are a step in what will hopefully be the right direction.

Read More: Perverse Incentives: Are Needle Exchanges Good Policy?

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Early in the morning on January 8, the notorious cartel leader Joaquin Guzman, also known as El Chapo, was captured, yet again, by Mexican authorities following a heated gun battle at his hideout. While Guzman’s story has a number of interesting subplots, including his multiple previous escapes and an interview with Sean Penn, it also points to something: the ongoing war on drugs taking place with its epicenter in Mexico. However, this has not always been the state of things, as South America, particularly Colombia, was once home to the heart of drug trafficking and its most infamous leader Pablo Escobar. But the recent arrest highlights how that center has moved north and, not coincidently, much closer to the U.S. border. Read on to see how the heart of the drug trade has shifted in recent years, what impact that has had in Mexico, the role of the United States, and if capturing El Chapo really makes any difference in the larger war on drugs.

It Started in South America Now it’s Here

To understand the importance of capturing someone like El Chapo, or even the Mexican drug trafficking industry in general, it is necessary to travel one step backward to Colombia. The Colombian drug trade really took off in the 1970s when marijuana traffickers began trading in cocaine because of increased American demand for the drug. Trafficking cocaine was considerably more profitable than marijuana and the growth in profits caused a dramatic increase in the scale of smuggling.

The amount of money in this industry led to the formation of two incredibly powerful competing cartels, the Medellin and the Cali Cartels. The Medellin Cartel, known for its ruthlessness and use of violence, was epitomized by its leader, the notorious Pablo Escobar. The Cali cartel, on the other hand, was much more inconspicuous, reinvesting profits in legitimate businesses and using bribery instead of violence to get its way. The competition between these two groups turned violent, eventually involving the Colombian government and even the United States.

In the 1990s, these two groups were finally undone by concerted efforts between the local Colombian government and U.S. advisors that led to their leaders being either imprisoned or killed. Since their peak, these empires have fragmented, as smaller groups took control over various parts of the cocaine-producing process. While the violence in Colombia has decreased, though not disappeared altogether, the dominant player in the drug trafficking world has shifted to Mexico.

Going North

Mexico had originally been the final corridor through which Colombian cocaine passed before entering the United States. Before Mexico, cocaine had been smuggled through the Caribbean to cities like Miami. Ultimately, though, those routes were shut down by the United States. During the peak years of operation in Colombia, Mexico was little more than a path into the United States. However, this began to change with the demise of the Cali and Medellin cartels, coupled with continued American pressure and aid packages to help the Colombian government fight the local drug trade. Due to fragmentation and weakening Colombian cartels, the center of the drug trade shifted north in Mexico. Mexico served as a natural hub due to its earlier involvement in distributing the drugs produced in Colombia.

While the Mexican cartels came to dominate the illegal drug trade, their rise preceded the actual demise of their Colombian brethren. Much of the history of modern cartels in Mexico can be traced back to one man, Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo. Gallardo was responsible for creating and maintaining the smuggling routes between Mexico and the United States. When he was arrested, his network splintered into several parts, laying the groundwork for many of the cartel divisions that exist today. The first major successor was the AFO or Tijuana/Arellano Felix organization. However, its status was usurped by the Sinaloa Cartel under El Chapo’s control.

The Sinaloa Cartel is believed to control between 40 and 60 percent of the drug trade in Mexico with that translating into annual profits of up to $3 billion, but it is only one of nine that currently dominate Mexico. The activities of these cartels have also expanded as they are now involved in other criminal activities such as kidnapping, extortion, theft, human trafficking, as well as smuggling new drugs to the United States.

The rise of the Mexican cartels can be attributed to other factors aside from the demise of the Colombian groups. One such factor was the role of the Mexican government. During the important period of their ascendancy, the cartels were largely left alone by the Mexican government, which was controlled by the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) for 71 years. When the PRI’s grip on power finally loosened, the alliance with the cartels also shredded.

The growth of the Mexican cartels may also have been the result of economic problems in the United States. Stagflation in the United States led to higher interest rates on loans, which Mexico could not pay. In order to avert an economic crisis, several international institutions stepped in to bail Mexico out, which shifted the government’s focus from its economy to repaying debt. As a result of aggressive policies directed toward Mexican workers and because of the deleterious effects of the NAFTA treaty, there was a dramatic loss of jobs and a shift to a more urban population.

In this new setting, there were few opportunities available, making positions with drug cartels one of the few lucrative options along with growing the crops like poppy, which is used to create the drugs themselves. According to farmers interviewed by the Guardian, growing poppy is the only way for them to guarantee a “cash income.” An increase in the availability of firearms and other weapons smuggled south from the United States only added to the violence and chaos. The video below depicts the history of the Mexican drug trade:

Impact on Mexico

These endless wars for control between cartels in Mexico have taken a significant toll on the country. Between 2007 and 2014, for example, 164,000 people were killed in America’s southern neighbor. While not all those murders are drug-related, some estimates suggest 34 to 55 percent of homicides involve the drug war, a rate that is still incredibly high.

Aside from the number of deaths, all of the violence has influenced the Mexican people’s trust in the government as a whole. That lack of faith may be well founded as the weaknesses of the judicial and police forces are widely known. When the PRI was the single ruling party, it had effectively served as patrons to the drug cartels where an understanding was essentially worked out between the two. When the PRI lost its grip on power, this de-facto alliance between the government and the cartels also splintered. Without centralized consent, individuals at all levels of government as well as in the judiciary and police became susceptible to bribes from the various cartels.  In fact, many were often presented with the choice of either going along with the cartels in exchange for money or being harmed if they resisted. The corruption and subsequent lack of trust in authorities have gotten so bad that some citizens are forming militias of their own to combat the cartels.

Role of the United States

In addition to the impact that the U.S. economy has in terms of job opportunities, particularly since the passage of NAFTA, the United States has had a major impact on the drug trade in two other ways. First are the U.S. efforts to curb the supply of drugs, which were organized as part of the overall war on drugs. While the United States has had a variety of drug laws on the books, it was not until after the 1960s that the government took direct aim at eliminating illicit substances. In 1971, President Nixon formally launched a “war on drugs,” taking an aggressive stance implementing laws like mandatory minimum sentencing and labeling marijuana as a Schedule I drug, which made it equivalent to substances like heroin in the eyes of the law.

This emphasis on drug laws only intensified under President Reagan, whose persistence in prosecuting drug crimes led to a large increase in the prison population. During Reagan’s presidency, Congress also passed the Anti-Drug Abuse Act in 1986, which forced countries receiving U.S. aid to adhere to its drug laws or lose their assistance packages. These policies more or less continued for decades, often with more and more money being set aside to increase enforcement. Only in recent years has President Barack Obama offered much of a change as he has overseen modifications in sentencing and the perception of medical marijuana laws.

This focus on supply extends beyond the U.S. border as well. First, in Colombia, the United States repeatedly put pressure on the Colombian government to fight the drug traffickers. With these efforts still ineffective and with violence mounting, the United States again poured money into the country, helping to finance needed reforms in the Colombian security forces and for other things like crop eradication. In Mexico, a similar approach followed as a series of presidents, beginning in the 1980s, took on much more combative roles against the cartels with the approval and support of the United States. The United States helped support an armed forces overhaul to combat the traffickers and root out corruption within the Mexican armed forces, which had begun to permeate as a result of low wages. In Mexico, successive governments even went so far as to send the military into cartel-dominated cities and engage in assaults. While Presidents Zedillo, Fox, and Calderon sent in troops and met with some immediate success, in the long term it led to mass army defections, greater awareness of the reach of the drug economy, and ultimately other cartels filling the void where government forces were successful.

Since the inception of the drug war, the United States has spent an estimated $1 trillion. Primarily what the United States has to show for this is a number of unintended consequences such as the highest incarceration rates in the world. Another is one of the highest rates of HIV/AIDs of any Western nation fueled, in part, by the use of dirty syringes among drug users.

The problem is that for all its efforts to eliminate supply, the United States has done much less about demand, its other contribution to the drug trade. In fact, the United States is widely regarded as the number one market in the world for illegal drugs. To address demand instead of concentrating on supply, the United States could shift more of its focus to programs that educate or offer rehabilitation to drug users, which have been shown to be effective in small scale efforts.  Certain states have begun to decriminalize or legalize marijuana, a step which will certainly reduce the number of inmates and may also reduce levels of drug-related violence. Yet there is no single way to outright reduce the demand for drugs and some view decriminalization as actually fueling the problem. The following video provides an overview of the resources invested into the United Stats’ war on drugs:

The Importance of Capturing El Chapo

Considering all of the resources and efforts put in place, it is important to consider how much of an impact El Chapo’s arrest will actually have. Unfortunately, it looks like the answer is not much, if any at all. In fact, even El Chapo himself weighed in on his arrest’s effects on the drug trade, telling Sean Penn in an interview, “the day I don’t exist, it’s not going to decrease in any way at all.” El Chapo’s point is clearly illustrated through the number of drug seizures at the border. While exact amounts fluctuate, nearly 700,000 more pounds of marijuana were seized in 2011 than in 2005. The amount of heroin and amphetamines seized has also gone up as well.

The following video details El Chapo’s most recent capture:

His most recent arrest was actually his third; the first two times he escaped from maximum security prisons in stylish fashions, which is one of the reasons that U.S. authorities want Mexico to extradite him. Regardless of where he is ultimately held, since his first arrest in 1993 the drug trade has not suffered when he or any other cartel leader was captured or killed, nor has it suffered from the growth in seizures.

In fact, one of the major points of collaboration between Mexican and U.S. authorities has been on targeting, capturing, or killing of the kingpins of these cartels. While these operations have been successful in apprehending individuals, what they really result in is the further fragmentation of the drug trade. While some may argue that detaining top leaders and fragmenting the centralized drug trade is a mark of success, evidence suggests this is not so.

Conclusion

Aside from relocating the hub of the drug trade to Mexico, the war on drugs has had several other unintended consequences such as high civilian deaths, persistently high rates of HIV infection, and massive levels of incarceration to name a few. While the United States has had some success targeting suppliers and traffickers, it has been unable to reduce demand domestically.

Those involved in Mexico faced a similar conundrum. Not only do citizens in Mexico not trust their government, many of them have become dependent on the drug trade and shutting it down could actually hurt the economic prospects of many citizens.

While El Chapo’s most recent capture has the potential to provide the government with some credibility, it still may not mean much. Even if he is prevented from escaping again or running his old empire from jail, someone will likely take his place. That is because the drug trade does not rely on individuals but on demand and profits. Until these issues are addressed and Mexican citizens have legitimate alternatives to joining cartels, it does not matter how many cartel leaders are arrested, the situation will remain the same.

Resources

CNN: ‘Mission Accomplished’: Mexican President Says ‘El Chapo’ Caught

Frontline: The Colombian Cartels

Borderland Beat: The Story of Drug Trafficking in Latin America

Congressional Research Service: Mexico: Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking Organizations

Jacobin: How the Cartels Were Born

Frontline: The Staggering Death Toll of Mexico’s Drug War

Council on Foreign Relations: Mexico’s Drug War

Drug Policy Alliance: A Brief History of the Drug War

Matador Network: 10 Facts About America’s War On Drugs That Will Shock You

The Washington Post: Latin American Leaders Assail U.S. Drug ‘Market’

The Huffington Post: Why The Capture of ‘El Chapo’ Guzman Won’t Stop His Cartel

The Guardian: Mexican Farmers Turn to Opium Poppies to Meet Surge in US Heroin Demand

CIR: Drug Seizures Along the U.S.-Mexico Border

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Finding El Chapo: What his Arrest Means for Mexico and the Drug Trade appeared first on Law Street.

It doesn’t matter what you’re watching–it’s almost impossible to get through a TV program without seeing at least a few ads for prescription drugs. But is the constant barrage of drug ads a good thing? The American Medical Association (AMA) has decided no, and is calling for a ban on direct-to-consumer ads for prescription drugs.

At the 2015 Interim Meeting, hundreds of AMA delegates voted for the ban. There were a few different motivations cited for why the AMA called for the ban, including the fact that the constant exposure to ads push more expensive treatments and inflate the cost of certain drugs. The U.S. is somewhat unique when it comes to allowing direct-to-consumer ads; currently Australia is the only other nation that allows the practice.

In a statement released yesterday, the AMA further explained the main motivations for its decision. AMA Board Chair-elect Patrice A. Harris, M.D., M.A stated:

Today’s vote in support of an advertising ban reflects concerns among physicians about the negative impact of commercially-driven promotions, and the role that marketing costs play in fueling escalating drug prices. Direct-to-consumer advertising also inflates demand for new and more expensive drugs, even when these drugs may not be appropriate.

[…]

Physicians strive to provide the best possible care to their patients, but increases in drug prices can impact the ability of physicians to offer their patients the best drug treatments. Patient care can be compromised and delayed when prescription drugs are unaffordable and subject to coverage limitations by the patient’s health plan. In a worst-case scenario, patients forego necessary treatments when drugs are too expensive.

This decision by the AMA is actually a departure from its traditional policies, which supported direct-to-consumer drug ads as long as they were informational and accurate. But an uptick of the ads in recent years appear to have swayed the AMA away from that acceptance. Approximately $4.5 billion was spent to direct-advertise drugs to consumers in 2014 alone, an increase of about 20 percent from 2013. As a result of these ads, many drugs are easily recognized by the general public–Viagra, Cialis, Humira, Lyrica, and Eliquis rank as the most advertised drugs of 2014. In fact, these ads have become so ubiquitous, predictable, and common that they’ve even sparked plenty of parodies: 

The fact that the AMA has removed its support for direct-to-consumer drug ads doesn’t really mean much right now, but the organization is planning on reviewing its options in the next few weeks to determine how it will go about advocating for a ban. So, we may see a whole lot less “talk to your doctor ads” in coming years–and it’s easy to imagine that will be a good thing.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

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The 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro may not include Russia, after a World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) commission has determined that Russian athletes used illegal substances. The release of the commission’s report has led to speculation that the Russian Federation will be banned from the next Olympic games in 2016.

An independent commission convened by the WADA concluded that Russia undertook a program of state-sponsored doping for its athletes at the 2012 summer Olympics in London, as well as other international athletic events, like the Chicago Marathon. The inquiry took 10 months, and was created after a German radio station aired a piece that accused Russia of state-sponsored doping. The radio piece featured admissions from athletes, coaches, and others, and claimed that the government had helped to cover up test results that would have excluded Russian athletes from various events.

The report claims that coaches, athletes, trainers, doctors, and the lab in Moscow that is responsible for testing Russian athletes’ samples were all involved. The report mostly focused on track-and-field athletes–a group responsible for a large number of the inquiries. According to a New York Times description of the report:

It detailed payments to conceal doping tests and arrangements by which athletes were made aware of when they would be tested, in violation of code which dictates they be spontaneous, and also the destruction of samples.

The report also said that members of Russian law enforcement agencies were present in the Moscow lab and involved in the efforts to interfere with the integrity of the samples, creating ‘an atmostphere of intimidation’ on lab processes and staff members.

The findings also criticized Russia for a “deeply rooted culture of cheating at all levels” and said that the Russian athletes who competed despite doping essentially sabotaged the 2012 Summer Olympic games because they shouldn’t have been allowed to compete in the first place. Russian athletes won 24 gold medals in those games.

Richard W. Pound, who was a co-author of the report and a member of the commission, stated that the commission’s recommendation is that the Russian Federation is suspended from bringing athletes to the 2016 Summer Games in Rio. The report also recommends that five of the athletes and coaches implicated be banned from their sports for life.

However, whether or not we’ll be seeing Russia at the 2016 games will be left up to the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF). In light of the allegations from the WADA report, the president of the IAAF, Seb Coe, said:

We need time to properly digest and understand the detailed findings included in the report. However, I have urged the Council to start the process of considering sanctions against All-Russia Athletic Federation (ARAF).

This step has not been taken lightly. Our athletes, partners and fans have my total assurance that where there are failures in our governance or our anti-doping programmes we will fix them.

We will do whatever it takes to protect the clean athletes and rebuild trust in our sport. The IAAF will continue to offer the police authorities our full cooperation into their ongoing investigation.

While Russia’s absence from the 2016 Olympic Games would surely be missed, and could affect viewership and ratings, if a suspension is what it takes for the country to crack down on doping, that may be the path the IAAF chooses.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Will Russia be Excluded from the 2016 Olympic Games? appeared first on Law Street.

Ireland is taking a radical approach to dealing with drugs. The nation plans on decriminalizing small amounts of marijuana, heroin, and cocaine in what’s being called a “radical cultural shift.”

Ireland’s approach comes from a public health angle; Aodhán Ó Ríordáin, the Minister in charge of the National Drugs Strategy stated:

Too often those with drug problems suffer from stigma, due to a lack of understanding or public education about the nature of addiction. This stigma can be compounded for those who end up with a criminal record due to possession of drugs for their own use. Addiction is not a choice, it’s a healthcare issue. This is why I believe it is imperative that we approach our drug problem in a more compassionate and sensitive way.

In addition to decriminalizing the drugs, Ireland will set up supervised injection facilities, where users are monitored by medical professionals. The aim there is to keep users from consuming drugs on the street, where they can be a harm to themselves and others, for example, by using dirty syringes that could spread disease.

Ireland isn’t the first country to take this approach. Portugal undertook similar steps in 2001, when it decriminalized all drugs, and emphasized the need for public health spending and efforts. Since then, the rates of drug use among both young people and adults have been dropping.

The logic behind this approach is simple–if the illegality and stigma of possessing drugs are minimized, people will be more likely to get help. A study by the Cato Institute after Portugal took similar steps found that the biggest deterrent to addicts coming forward to receive treatment was the fear of arrest. Additionally, eliminating the costly burden of prosecuting and incarcerating individuals frees up that money to be used for rehabilitation efforts.

While the possession of drugs will be decriminalized, it will still be against the law to sell, distribute, or profit from drugs. This measure aims to only help those who have fallen victim to the disease of addiction. Ó Ríordáin further explained:

Above all the mode must be person-centred and involve an integrated approach to treatment and rehabilitation based on a continuum of care with clearly defined referral pathways.

It’s become almost overwhelmingly clear that a tough-on-drugs approach doesn’t necessarily work–the United States alone provides a depressing case study to that effect. If Ireland sees successful results along the lines of Portugal, other countries may follow suit.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Radical Cultural Shift: Ireland to Decriminalize Certain Drugs appeared first on Law Street.

It’s the weekend, so time to check out Law Street’s weird arrests of the week. Give a look at the slideshow below:

Don’t Drink and Fly

Image courtesy of Bernal Saborio via Flickr

Jeff Rubin, 27, from Oregon, was arrested after he urinated on other passengers during a flight. He was, unsurprisingly, intoxicated and arrested upon arrival.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Weird Arrests of the Week appeared first on Law Street.

It’s the end of the week, which means its time to relax and reflect on all the stupid things people have done this week. Specifically, some fantastically odd arrests. Check out the slideshow below:

An Unexpected Getaway Car

Image courtesy of Eric Eggertson via Flickr

A still-unidentified woman was arrested after shoplifting at a Rochester, New York mall. But it was her transportation to and from the mall that makes the arrest newsworthy. She took a limo to the mall, allegedly stole about $300 in merchandise, then called the limo to come pick her up again. Police picked her up too.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Weird Arrests of the Week appeared first on Law Street.

Fast food restaurants are many people’s go-to place for a quick and inexpensive meal. Despite widespread concerns about the healthiness of the food they serve, these franchises still receive an enormous amount of customers daily. But recent news has just exposed a few fast food restaurants and have shown us that some may be giving out more than just food–particularly a couple recent cases of drugs being produced or found in different establishments.

Early Tuesday morning around 4:42 AM, Cedar Rapid’s police received a call about suspicious activity going on outside a Taco Bell. When the officers arrived they found two men standing outside, one of whom was a Taco Bell employee. Police then called the restaurant’s manager to the scene and went inside with him to check it out. To their surprise, they found materials identified as equipment for the production of methamphetamine in the utility area.

@tacobell do you have meth infused queso? Asking for a friend….. https://t.co/lO0gVEiI6o

— Patrick O’Leary (@ughsoawkward) August 5, 2015

The parking lot was taped off Tuesday morning while officers examined the materials, and it is still unclear if meth was actually cooked inside the restaurant. The two men were identified as 31-year-old Christopher Adam Matous and 56-year-old Kent Jerome Duby. Matous faces charges of conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine, possession of a controlled substance, and possession of sodium hydroxide and petroleum distillates. Two of the charges are felonies. Duby faces a felony charge of conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine. Taco Bell stated,

We understand that two people, one an employee, entered our franchisee’s restaurant illegally, allegedly possessing suspicious items. Both we and our franchisee find this completely unacceptable. Our franchisee has been cooperating with Cedar Rapids Police to investigate this isolated incident. Although the suspicious items found in the restaurant were not used in the kitchen, the employee has been terminated and our franchisee is considering pressing criminal charges. The restaurant will reopen after it has been sanitized and inspected by the Health Department.

The Taco Bell will have to remove any traces of hazardous chemicals from the building and then the health department must perform an inspection before the restaurant is allowed to re-open. Police don’t think that customers or employees at this Taco Bell were ever in danger, but are still investigating the situation. This is not the first time in recent history that a fast food restaurant has had an incident involving drugs. Just last week on July 29, a lawsuit was filed against an In-N-Out Burger in Los Angeles, California when a customer, Fred Maldonado, became sick after drinking a milkshake that allegedly contained two methamphetamine capsules. Maldonado visited In-N-Out during March of 2014 and ordered a burger and milkshake. It wasn’t until the next morning that he noticed two capsules wrapped in a napkin at the bottom of his cup. He then returned to the restaurant and complained to the manager who only apologized and offered him a free burger.

A California Man Is Suing In-n-Out Burger After Allegedly Finding Meth In Drink -NBC pic.twitter.com/lG0FuaNFDD

— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) August 2, 2015

The suit Maldonado filed states, “Plaintiff did not initially know what the two capsules were, but later testing revealed that they were methamphetamine and that it appeared that they may have been illicitly manufactured.” Maldonado also claims that he suffered severe nausea and mental distress after drinking the milkshake. Maldonado filed the lawsuit in the Los Angeles Superior Court, alleging negligence and strict liability. In-N-Out has denied the charges and stated:

At In-N-Out Burger, we have always served the freshest, highest quality burgers, fries, and drinks and customer safety is one of our highest priorities.

In-N-Out Burger executive vice president Arnie Wensinger told City News Service.

We will vigorously defend these baseless claims. Due to the fact that this matter involves ongoing litigation, we will unfortunately not be able to comment any further.

To have drugs around or being manufactured where people eat is completely unacceptable–both the Taco Bell and In-N-Out Burger cases are very concerning. Careless actions like this can can put customers like Maldonado in serious danger. Even though they appear to  be isolated incidents, restaurants need to pay close attention to their employees and what’s happening inside their buildings.

Taelor Bentley

Taelor is a member of the Hampton University Class of 2017 and was a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Taelor at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Drugs on the Side? Fast Food Restaurants Under Fire for Possible Drug Violations appeared first on Law Street.

It may be the dog days of summer, but that hasn’t stopped some people from getting in trouble in really stupid ways. Check out the weird arrests of the week below:

Desperate for a Smoking Buddy

Courtesy of Frank via Flickr

A man in Cadillac, Michigan, received a rude awakening when a man broke into his apartment and threatened him at knifepoint. However this wasn’t a normal break in–the man who broke in demanded that the homeowner smoke weed with him at that very moment. He was quickly apprehended by police.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Weird Arrests of the Week appeared first on Law Street.

The influx of heroin is typically seen as a local or regional problem, but the issue may finally be taking its rightful place on the national stage in the upcoming presidential election. Both Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton have faced questions about the growing heroin problem, and Clinton recently vowed to make it a campaign issue. Now, there are a growing number of policies developing across the country to attempt to address the problem.

The number of heroin-related deaths has grown rapidly in recent years. According to the Center for Disease Control, the rate of drug poisoning deaths involving heroin nearly quadrupled from 2000 to 2013, with most of that growth occurring after 2010.  Of the 4.2 million Americans who have tried heroin, approximately 23 percent will become addicted. In 2013, the number of deaths related to drug overdose was 43,982, exceeding traffic fatalities. That year, heroin accounted for approximately 19 percent of all drug overdose deaths, taking the lives of 8,257 people. This chart shows the rapid growth in heroin deaths that has occurred in recent years.

Because of the recent increase in supply and decline in cost, heroin is becoming one of the most popular drugs on the market. In 2007, there were approximately 373,000 heroin users in the United States, but by 2012 that number had  grown to 669,000, an 80 percent increase.

Heroin is also becoming easier to use. Production improvements have increased the purity of heroin sold on the street, which allows it to be snorted and smoked as well as injected.  In the past, injection was the most common method because at lower purity levels that was the only way to receive an instant high.

The drug has become especially popular among white middle class males. In a study done by the National Center for Health Statistics, white males between the ages of 18-44 have become the largest demographic affected by  heroin, with an overdose rate of 7 per 100,000. The overdose rate for men is also four times higher than it is for women.

“Accidental Overdose” is a serious problem for heroin users, but the overdose process is more complicated than it may seem. Users build up a tolerance to the pleasurable effects of the drug faster than they do the physical effects. As a result, users need to take more of the drug to reach the same high, but in the process their respiratory systems can’t catch up and their breathing slows. Many people who die from an overdose simply stop breathing. Naloxone, a drug carried by many first responders, can speed up breathing and can help save someone who has overdosed, but that requires another person to be present to administer Naloxone or call for help.

Jack Stein, the director of the Office of Science Policy and Communications at the National Institute on Drug Abuse told National Geographic, “Literally every time someone injects heroin they are taking a risk of an overdose.” This is because addicts have no way of knowing what they are actually buying off the street. It could be pure heroin, or heroin cut with other powerful substances.

Last summer the White House held a summit on the Opioid Epidemic focusing on finding ways to encourage states to pass Good Samaritan Laws and increase the availability of Naloxone to first responders. As of July 2, 30 states and the District of Columbia have passed Good Samaritan Laws, which allow bystanders to respond in an overdose situation without fear of repercussions. Additionally,  42 states and D.C. have amended their laws making it easier for medical professionals to access Naloxone. Because of these changes, 188 community-based overdose prevention programs now distribute Naloxone.

While progress is being made toward reducing the large number of overdoses from heroin and other opioids, government agencies must do more to crack down on the sale and trafficking of these drugs, and the 2016 candidates need to continue to advocate for change. Legislation is finally starting to catch up with the epidemic, but several states still lag behind. Naloxone is cheap and has a shelf life of 2-3 years, but it can only be lifesaving if it is readily accessible. While efforts to save people from overdosing are important, lawmakers must also work to restrict the spread of heroin, which has already taken root in many places across the country.

Jennie Burger

Jennie Burger is a member of the University of Oklahoma Class of 2016 and a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Jennie at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post As Overdose Numbers Rise, is Heroin the New Killer? appeared first on Law Street.

Okay. I can’t believe I am about to say this. I don’t care if someone takes your $5 but does not give you your weed, you just cannot call the cops to complain about being stiffed. If you do, you will get in trouble. And if my admittedly limited knowledge of pot prices is accurate, you will get in trouble over some very poor quality marijuana.

(Before I continue with this story, I have a confession to make. Whenever I do not have a good story lined up for the week, I just Google ‘weird legal stories Florida.’ It never disappoints. Now back to this week’s weird Florida story … )

Courtesy of Giphy.

I’ve Been Robbed!

Daneshia Heller, a 19-year-old Florida resident, had an emergency. She had just been robbed. When she went over to a man’s house to buy some pot, she had expected to receive said pot in exchange for the $5 she had given him.

Unfortunately, the man allegedly took the money but didn’t give anything back. Heller did what any irrational person would do. She called 911.

“He got my money, and I want my drugs. Can you send an officer?” she asked the operator.

A Wish Come True

You know how if you find a genie and you make a wish it is going to come true in a way you never expected? Like how in the Geico commercial a million bucks gets granted as a million male deer (aka bucks)?

Courtesy of Giphy.

Well think of this 911 operator as Heller’s genie in a bottle. Heller was granted her wish: a cop did come to the scene of the alleged crime. Only, the cop didn’t arrive for precisely the reason Heller had wanted him.

You see, drugs are illegal in Florida, both in buying and selling. Which means if you call up and admit you are trying to buy some, especially if you dial 911 to do it, you will probably get in a little trouble yourself.

Taking Some Flakka

If this had been the only thing to happen, though, then maybe this story would not have been so bad. However, when the cops arrived, they saw an angry Heller talking to herself. This aroused their suspicion.

When they checked her person, they found a white substance in one of her pockets. As it turned out, it was Flakka, a psychosis-inducing drug.

The Legal Consequences

After the substance was found, Heller was taken into custody and charged with the following:

• Drug possession
• Misusing the 911 system
• Violating parole from an earlier, unrelated charge

Moral of the Story

As with any good story, there are a few key takeaways:

1. Don’t be a tattletale (especially don’t tattle on your potential drug dealer);
2. Don’t call 911 unless it is actually an emergency;
3. If you call the cops about a theft, make sure you hide your drugs before they get there; and,
4. Just don’t do drugs in general.

This may all seem like a lot to ask, but I promise you they are all good ideas if you do not want to get arrested and be talked about here.

Ashley Shaw

Ashley Shaw is an Alabama native and current New Jersey resident. A graduate of both Kennesaw State University and Thomas Goode Jones School of Law, she spends her free time reading, writing, boxing, horseback riding, playing trivia, flying helicopters, playing sports, and a whole lot else. So maybe she has too much spare time. Contact Ashley at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Woman Calls 911 When She Doesn’t Get Her Drugs, Gets Arrested appeared first on Law Street.

The connection between prostitution, drug use, and crime has long been known, but a new horrifying story coming out of a small town in Ohio raises many concerns about how deep this connection is. Chillicothe, Ohio, a city afflicted by drugs, poverty, and unemployment, is now filled with citizens who are concerned for their safety after six women have disappeared in a little over a year.

Charlotte Trego, a mother of two, was the first to go missing about a year ago after being evicted by her roommate. She was not seen alive after. That same day Tameka Lynch, a mother of three and a friend of Trego, went missing as well. Next came Wanda Lemons who was last seen by her mother. A friend of Lemons told Chillicothe police she had talked about going with a truck driver to Texas where Lemons had family but has not heard from her since. Two months later Shasta Himelrick’s body was found floating in the Scioto River outside of Chillicothe. Himelrick was pregnant when she went missing on Christmas Day after promising to return to her grandmother’s house. In the same vein, Tiffany Sayre also went missing after promising her return. She was doing business at a local motel and told her friend that she would come back shortly but never made it. Lastly Timberly Claytor, a woman who was actually never reported missing, was found dead after she was shot in the head three times.

Four of the women have been found dead and officials are still working to locate Lemons and Trego. Each seemed to have a history of drug use, prostitution, and had connections to the same social circle. There also appeared to be a pattern of the bodies being dumped along waterways outside the city leaving officials to wonder if there is a serial killer involved. Staff Lt. Mike Preston of the Ross County Sheriff’s Department told The Washington Post:

I don’t want to come out and say ‘yes, we have a serial killer,’ but it’s a small community that we live in … and the number of females who have come up missing, and then the bodies that we’ve found, that’s quite a bit for our community.

Authorities have made one arrest so far involving the death of Timberly Claytor. Jason A. McCrary, 36, of Chillicothe, was convicted of unlawful sexual conduct with a minor more than ten years ago. He has not been charged with Claytor’s murder because investigators are waiting for results of DNA collected in a vehicle seized during a search warrant of McCrary’s home before filing charges. He still remains in the Ross County Jail on a charge that he failed to register his address as a sex offender. Authorities are still working hard to find information on the rest of the women despite the lack of leads that they have. Chillicothe Police Chief Keith Washburn said:

We’ve checked land, air and water for any signs of (the women). But the problem is you’re trying to find a needle in a haystack unless you have the information. The information we have is running dry on some of these cases.

Washburn said prostitution in the Chillicothe area appears to be driven by a need for quick money to purchase drugs. Lieutenant Preston acknowledged that the city is battling a heroin problem and there have been frequent arrests as a result. This leaves me to wonder what the town has done to stop this constant drug battle, and if that could have had an impact on these disturbing disappearances. This has to be a terrifying time for Chillicothe. With so few answers and arrests made, people are in fear for their lives. It is sad to see that a city once known as Ohio’s capital is now known as a city of such tragic events. Police have to crack down on finding information about these deaths and also curtail the drug and prostitution businesses to keep people safe before this tragedy continues.

Taelor Bentley

Taelor is a member of the Hampton University Class of 2017 and was a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Taelor at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Drugs and Missing Women: The Sad State of Chillicothe, Ohio appeared first on Law Street.

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is now worrying about how it will handle the newest influx of drugs on Baltimore streets. Following the death of Freddie Gray, some Baltimore citizens rioted the streets, attempting to loot as many stores as possible. Over thirty pharmacies and clinics were targeted during that time, and enough doses of Oxycodone, Suboxone, Morphine, Fentanyl and other drugs were taken to keep the city’s drug users high for a year.

In a city with a large population of heroin addicts, this increase of drugs on the street may add to the problems police and city officials face in dealing with the rise of shootings and murders. With more than 175,000 doses of opiates and other prescription drugs stolen, law enforcement officials believe the new flow of prescription pills will breed new addicts and more violence. They also believe that many of those addicts will turn to cheaper heroin once the prescription drugs dry up. 

In response to the city’s plea for help, the Drug Enforcement Administration and other federal agencies are seeking to prosecute the leaders of gang and drug dealing organizations.

Gary Tuggle, former Assistant Special Agent in Charge of DEA Baltimore District and former Baltimore cop, led the DEA’s efforts in Baltimore in drawing up a list of potential suspects. The DEA is currently circulating photos of about 60 people they believe to have looted these drugs.

Tuggle recalls his time as a police officer and how the drug market has changed since that time:

The street purity of heroin was 2-5%. Today we are seeing purity levels up to 80-85% and then some cases, a kilo of heroin would cost $140-160,000. Today you can get it for between $65 and $70,000 so you see the economics of it when you have a level of supply and level of demand that uses that inventory its literally bringing the cost down and purity levels up.

According the DEA, the influx of drugs on the streets has created a series of turf wars between gangs and independent drug dealers who are competing for territory. Tuggle says:

In some cases you have the gangs taxing other gangs or independent drug dealers. Other times, gangs feel their territory is being threatened, which leads to a disruption in the balance of power and that’s only going to lead to violence.

Police say it is the violence inflicted by the influx of drugs that is partially responsible for the large spike of murders in May.

DEA agents claim to know which areas of town are best for heroin or other drugs. They identified specifically the Sandtown area of Baltimore as having an active heroin market, and the Lexington Market downtown as a location where a circulation of prescription opiates have recently developed. Those most affected by the drug dealing are victims of drug users who come from all over the city. Tuggle stated:

At the end of the day these communities have very, very decent people, hardworking people who want to work and educate their families and support their families […] But a lot of these people dealing in these neighborhoods are not from these neighborhoods. Some of them have nice homes in the suburbs or they live in high rise apartment sin downtown Baltimore. So they come into these communities to take advantage of these communities.

Police believe prescription drugs to be at least partially responsible for Baltimore’s deadliest month in decades–there were 43 murders in the month of May alone. Police are currently working to arrest potential suspects responsible for the recent violent streak, but do not believe the problem will be solved quickly. 

With a limited number of buyers on the street, drug dealers are competing for every dollar and creating turf wars. These turf wars are primarily between gangs and independent drug dealers; these groups are more likely to settle disputes with violence leading to that spike in shootings and murders.

“We’re talking about people. These are not numbers. These are human beings who’ve lost their lives in the streets of Baltimore,” said Police Commissioner Anthony Batts.

So, what does this mean for the residents of Baltimore? Even though the city has had a long history of drug abuse, it seems to recently be getting worse. Now community members that may not be associated with drugs are suddenly right in the middle of a turf war because the dealers have no concern for the lives they are putting at risk. You would think it would be easy to just encourage community members to reach out to police officers when they see suspicious activity, but with the tensions between police officers and minority communities, that’s a completely different battle. With these new drugs on the streets of Baltimore, it seems like they are in for a year of heartache unless the Baltimore Police Department can do something to change it.

Angel Idowu

Angel Idowu is a member of the Beloit College Class of 2016 and was a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Angel at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Prescription Drug Influx Doesn’t Bode Well for Baltimore appeared first on Law Street.

Given the amount of security guards and surveillance cameras located in prisons there shouldn’t be inmates doing drugs or dying from drug-related causes. But in California prisons, that’s exactly what’s happening. The Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is spending $8 million this year on drug-detecting scanners and new drug-sniffing dogs. Officers have also conducted strip searches on visitors suspected of carrying drugs. These new procedures were born out of the shocking revelation that inmates in California prisons are dying from drug overdoses at three times the national rate. But is increased scrutiny of visitors really the best course of action?

Officials have hopes that these new methods will lead to a decrease in the death rate. But despite officers’ opinions that the efforts are discouraging drug smuggling, reports show that might not be the case, and that instead these policies just create problems for visitors. There have been more than 6,000 scans on visitors and employees at eleven different prisons and no drugs were found. Mohamed Shehk, an Oakland-based spokesman for Critical Resistance, stated, “The statistics — $8 million, 6,000 scans and nothing to show for it — show that these are intended to intimidate and criminalize people who are going to see their loved ones inside.”

More than 150 California inmates have died due to drug overdoses since 2006, with a high of 24 deaths in 2013. Sharing needles, which often leads to the spread of Hepatitis C infections, killed 69 inmates in 2013 alone. Corrections Secretary Jeffrey Beard is determined to change this high rate and is modeling California’s new procedures after those that were successful in the Pennsylvania Corrections Department, which he led for a decade. Pennsylvania’s annual rate of drug or alcohol deaths per 100,000 inmates is one, while California’s is eight per 100,000 inmates.

But while officers may feel like these new methods are helping, many visitors disagree and have begun to criticize them, especially the strip searches. “It’s a humiliating process, that can be easily used to humiliate and demean people, and was only for visitors, often women,” said Democratic Senator Loni Hancock. Tania Gamboa, a visitor at Kern Valley State Prison in California, was visiting her brother when an ion scan machine tested her positive for exposure to heroin. She felt humiliated after she was required to strip naked in front of two female correctional officers and squat to demonstrate that she was not concealing drugs. “It doesn’t make sense for me, knowing that I don’t do all that and I got detected for it,” Gamboa said. The big problem is that these procedures are beginning to make visitors feel like suspects.

Along with the strip search complaints, there have also been complaints about the dog searches. Wayne Conrad, the department’s statewide canine program coordinator, resigned last fall after the correctional facility decided to use dogs to search humans. Conrad explained his problem with the procedures, saying that there’s potential for false positives that could lead to lawsuits.

In order to mitigate those concerns, there are changes being made to the breeds of dogs used to search visitors. German shepherds in California prisons have been effective at finding hidden drugs. But as a result of these complaints, the department is now turning to less intimidating and more approachable dogs such as Labrador Retrievers–“fluffy, friendly dogs,” Northern California canine program coordinator Sgt. Brian Pyle called them. While this is an understandable move, it doesn’t change the fact that the dogs are searching these visitors can be read as upsetting or demeaning in some cases.

Concerned lawmakers that oversee state prisons included language in the California budget plan passed this week that would put an end to the searches and require an evaluation of the department’s other efforts. Correctional facilities do not want drugs brought into prisons that could lead to inmates deaths, but visitors do not want to feel embarrassed or humiliated as they are being searched. Officials are going to have to find an effective way to lower the death rates of the inmates and stop drug smuggling with procedures that do not leave the visitors feeling violated.

Taelor Bentley

Taelor is a member of the Hampton University Class of 2017 and was a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Taelor at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post How Do We Solve the Drug Overdose Problem in California Prisons? appeared first on Law Street.

Starting in late April 2015, the Taliban launched its annual Spring offensive in Afghanistan. Since that time, the government has fought back and launched its own counteroffensive, which has continued throughout the month of May and into June. After more than a decade and major American military intervention, the Taliban remains active and strong within Afghanistan and neighboring regions. Read on to learn about the group’s origins, the impact of the American war, and the Taliban’s role in Afghanistan’s future.

The Origins of the Taliban

As the oft-told story goes, the Taliban emerged as one of the many competing groups among the Mujahideen fighting against the Soviets in Afghanistan in the late 1970s through 1980s. The group and many others that would make up the Mujahideen were supplied, equipped, and financed in part by large contributions from the United States and Pakistan, which shares a close tribal relation to the Taliban.

The group came to prominence beginning in 1994, succeeding the ouster of Soviet forces. Following the scramble for control, the Taliban, a predominantly Pashtun group, began taking over large swaths of territory. The motivation behind the group centered on a strict interpretation of Sharia law and Sunni Islam. In 1995 they captured their first province, Herat, bordering Iran. By 1998 they had conquered 90 percent of the entire country and were effectively in charge.  The video below details the origins of the Taliban.

Help From Abroad

While the Taliban enjoyed a seemingly meteoric rise from obscure Mujahideen group to the rulers of an entire country, it was not without substantial help–inadvertent or overt–from outside sources. This assistance begins with the United States.

As touched on briefly, the U.S. initially started supporting the Taliban and similar groups in the 1980s in an effort to defeat the Soviets in Afghanistan. This assistance was far from benign, in fact several Mujahideen members actually visited the White House and met with then-President Ronald Reagan. The relationship continued openly until as late as 1997, when members of the Taliban came to Texas to discuss building an oil pipeline in Afghanistan with an American oil company. This even while the Taliban had been suspected of hiding Osama Bin Laden as early as 1996.

Even after the war in Afghanistan started and dragged on, the U.S. was still allegedly funding the Taliban inadvertently. Up to a billion dollars a year in funding ear-marked for the Afghan government, was believed to be funneled directly to the Taliban.

While the United States has directly and indirectly funded the Taliban, Saudi Arabia has been more direct. The Taliban themselves are widely suspected of emerging from holy seminaries paid for by the Saudis, which cultivated the ideals of strict Sunni Islam. However, their support has not stopped there.

Along with other gulf countries, including the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, Saudi Arabia remains the largest funder of terrorist groups, including the Taliban. These funds are not usually given out directly. Instead, they are channeled through a false corporation that may request support to build more schools, for example. The Taliban and other groups can also raise money from these countries through kidnappings and extortion.

However, the Taliban’s strongest supporter is likely Pakistan, which shares the closest kinship bonds with members of the Taliban. The Pashtun is a tribe whose members live in an area that straddles the northern borders of Pakistan and Afghanistan. Many of the early members were also educated in Pakistani schools known as Madrassas.

Pakistan’s relationship with the Taliban did not end there. Like the U.S., Pakistan funded the Taliban in their efforts against the Soviets in the 1980s; however, the Pakistanis’ efforts continued after the Americans left, as Pakistan’s Inter-Service Intelligence agency (ISI) continued to train members of the Taliban throughout the 1990s up until the American invasion in 2001.

In 2007, after being driven out of Afghanistan, the Taliban set up an organization in Waziristan, Pakistan and proclaimed itself an Islamic state. From this base the Taliban, which is still being supported by aspects of Pakistan’s ISI, has launched numerous attacks, assassinations, and kidnappings into Afghanistan.

The U.S. War in Afghanistan

Despite the Taliban coming to power essentially as a result of fighting one superpower, this did not prevent the other from going after them either. Following the terrorist attacks of 9/11, then-President George W. Bush gave the Taliban an ultimatum to either hand over Al-Qaeda and Osama Bin Laden or be attacked. The Taliban refused and U.S. forces were in the country in less than a month. Less than two months after that, the Taliban was defeated and pushed out of Afghanistan. Despite this victory, both Bin Laden and the leader of the Taliban, Mullah Omar, were able to escape to Pakistan.

Following the overthrow of the Taliban, the focus of the U.S. and its allies shifted to nationbuilding and keeping the remnants of the Taliban at bay. The Taliban however, would not be so quickly dismissed and began a resurgence starting in 2005. The Taliban traded in their old tactics of facing the U.S. in conventional battles for guerilla tactics–particularly suicide bombs–which had been effective in Iraq. The group also resorted to the opium trade for funding. Afghanistan would eventually reach a point where it was supplying 90 percent of the world’s opium.

The renewed and increased violence led to another major policy shift: the surge. The surge was a large additional deployment of U.S. troops to Afghanistan. Newly appointed general Stanley McChrystal requested the troop increase out of fear that at current levels the war may be lost outright. Following this in 2010, Afghan President Hamid Karzai began to publicly float the idea of meeting with Taliban leaders for the first time. While the U.S. initially condemned his actions, by the following year and in the aftermath of the assassination of Osama Bin Laden, the Obama Administration announced it was open to talks.

Along with attempts at negotiating with the Taliban, the U.S. and its allies also began shifting greater responsibility and power to their Afghan counterparts. The U.S. and NATO also planned to pull out all troops by the end of 2014. However, following continued violence, uncertain safety situations, and attacks on NATO troops by allied Afghan soldiers, NATO agreed to keep as many as 13,000 soldiers in the country as part of a new bilateral security agreement signed by Afghan President Ashraf Ghani. The war officially concluded in 2014, making it the longest war in American history.  The video below details the latest war in Afghanistan.

The Future of the Taliban in Afghanistan

So what is the Taliban’s position today? While as of 2014 they maintained direct control of only four of the 373 districts in the country, their reach is much greater. For example, in a 2013 assessment by Afghan security forces, 40 percent of the country was considered to be at a raised or high danger level. Furthermore, while Pakistan has paid lip service, the Taliban still have a strong base in the neighboring country. The group has also benefited from record poppy harvests and other illegal financing operations such as mining.

Partners in power?

Negotiations of varying degrees have been attempted beginning as early as 2010. President Ashraf Ghani seems especially eager to bring the Taliban to the table, as his first two official visits were to Pakistan where the Taliban is strong and China, who has sponsored such talks. The two sides finally met in May and while nothing was agreed upon, just meeting was a step in a positive direction. However, for more meaningful action to be taken it may require removing all foreign fighters from Afghanistan as the Taliban has articulated.  The video below presents a desire by the Afghan president to talk with the Taliban.

The question now is how likely the Taliban is to actually come to the negotiating table in a meaningful way? The Taliban currently have an entrenched position and are reaping the windfall from record opium sales. It is very possible that the group will simply wait out the withdrawal of all foreign combat troops and then reignite the conflict with a government that has been repeatedly unable to answer to the task.

Conclusion

You reap what you sow. This is an old saying that essentially means your actions will have consequences, whether good or bad. For the United States, it used the Mujahideen in its fight against the Soviets in the 1980s then left them to themselves for much of the next two decades; however, 9/11 revealed what can happen as a result of benign neglect.

While the attacks were not orchestrated by Afghanistan, they were planned by the insidious leader of Al Qaeda, Osama Bin Laden, who was allowed to live in Afghanistan by the Taliban and who helped them gain more territory in the country.

Since that fateful day the U.S., its allies, and many average Afghanis have fought with the consequences of earlier decisions. This process has now seemingly come full circle, as the U.S. and its regional partners are advocating for talks with the Taliban and suggesting a role for them in the government. The Taliban, for their part, seemed hesitant to commit and more likely to wait out the complete withdrawal of foreign forces before striking again at what is viewed as a weak government.

Resources

BBC: Who Are the Taliban?

Nazareth College: The History of the Taliban

Global Research: Grisly Peshawar Slaughter-Who Created the Taliban? Who Still Funds Them?

Guardian: WikiLeaks Cables Portray Saudi Arabia as a Cash Machine for Terrorists

Shave Magazine: Pakistan and Taliban: It’s Complicated

Council on Foreign Relations: U.S. War in Afghanistan

Brookings Institution: Blood and Hope in Afghanistan

Council on Foreign Relations: The Taliban in Afghanistan

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post A Resurgent Taliban Complicates Life in Afghanistan appeared first on Law Street.

Flakka, or gravel as it is also known thanks to its composition of small crystals, is a new drug sweeping across the nation. The epidemic originated in South Florida in 2014 and now has been linked to many deaths, arrests, and overdoses throughout the country. The synthetic drug is first produced in China and sometimes Pakistan, before being shipped to the United States. From here, it is sold on the streets for a very low price as compared to other popular drugs with similar reactions, such as cocaine and bath salts, the latter of which infamously caused chaos a few years ago.

Deadly delusions: The drug flakka is growing in popularity http://t.co/HMbbZ7GS5M @DEANEWS pic.twitter.com/5lBVSaY5wo

— WORLD News Group (@WORLD_mag) June 10, 2015

What exactly is flakka? It is usually made from Alpha-PVP, which is a synthetic type of cathinone, a stimulant that is made from the Khat plant. This plant grows in the Middle East and Somalia, and its leaves are often chewed to achieve a slight high. The chemical cathinone can be so strong that it sometimes delivers harsher effects than crystal meth. Flakka is already very dangerous to take alone, but if a user were to take more than a single dose or to combine it with other drugs, then there could be disastrous results. It was also reported that this drug can be extra harmful because it doesn’t always arrive pure, and so it sometimes is laced with other deadly drugs, which would only intensify the effects on the user.

The use of flakka in the United States is strongest in South Florida, where it is believed to have first emerged. South Florida is sometimes known as a haven for drug users given how easy it is to access substances in this area since so many are imported there. Cases involving this powerful drug have also been reported in many other states, such as Ohio, Texas, and Tennessee. Flakka has reportedly led to 27 deaths in the past eight months alone in Broward County, Florida. There also three or four hospitalizations a day in this county because of the drug.

The name is derived from the Spanish term “la flaca,” which is slang for a beautiful, slender woman. Authorities believe that the drug is shipped by boat to South America and then it is brought to Florida through the Caribbean. Given Florida’s extensive coastline, authorities are having extreme difficulty trying to pinpoint where exactly the drug enters the country. Many law enforcement agencies have joined the search for flakka traffickers, dealers, and users.

Flakka can be taken in many different ways, including snorting, ingesting, smoking, injecting, or vaping it using electronic cigarettes. Experts say that the the slightest difference in the amount taken can lead to drastic results. Flakka can induce a wide variety of symptoms on its users, some of which can cause death or severe damage to the body, such as hyperthemia, which is why people often take off their clothes when they are high on the drug. It can also induce paranoia, making users think that they are being chased, or giving them the illusion that they have super strength. Doctors have also stated that it can cause irreparable brain damage or stroke-like symptoms. Some users have even suffered kidney failure and will likely have to be on dialysis for the rest of their lives.

This drug has been linked to a wide variety of odd arrests and brutal incidents throughout the country. NBC Miami has reported many different arrests related to flakka, such as one mom who made headlines for abandoning her one-year-old daughter after smoking it. Multiple instances of people running around naked claiming they were being chased have been reported, or there was the case of one man who tried to have sex with a tree after taking the drug. One man tried to break into a police department because he thought that the mob was after him, while another man was impaled by a fence when he tried to climb over it to get to the police precinct because he thought he was being chased.

This drug has proven to be incredibly dangerous and has taken the country by storm, as it has led to countless overdoses, a plethora of injuries, many bizarre crimes, and numerous deaths. It is cheap to buy compared to other narcotics, although it is so potent that it can induce an extreme level of insanity in its users shortly after being consumed. Educating the public on just how detrimental an effect this drug can have is the top priority of police and drug prevention agencies alike. Police in Florida have even begun dispensing flakka-detection kits to officers, sending drug-detection dogs to mail offices, and also training officers on how to look for signs of mania.

Toni Keddell

Toni Keddell is a member of the University of Maryland Class of 2017 and a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Toni at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Introducing Flakka: The New Cocaine appeared first on Law Street.

A soda, a pack of gum, and some psychoactive drugs might all be available for checkout at typical gas stations across the globe. Head shops, gas stations, and online sites are legally selling drugs that the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime call new psychoactive substances (NPS). Also known as “designer drugs,” “herbal highs,” or “legal high” drugs, NPS have come under increased international scrutiny as variations of these drugs continue to develop and as alarming research on the dangerous health effects of these substances emerges. In light of this, some places, such as Scotland, are beginning to shut down the sale of these substances.

Harminasion, a shop that sells legal high drugs in Aberdeen, Scotland, was forced to close its doors last Wednesday and will remain out of business for the next three months after Aberdeen police and city council members secured a closure order under the Antisocial Behaviour Act of 2004. The shop’s closing is believed to be a Scottish first in an effort to thwart the destructive consequences of NPS.

NPS are defined as “substances of abuse, either in a pure form or a preparation, that are not controlled by the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs or the 1971 Convention on Psychotropic Substances, but which may pose a public health threat.” “New” does not necessarily mean that the drug is a new invention, but rather that the substances have recently become available. These drugs are synthetic, “legal” alternatives to internationally controlled drugs, intended to mimic the effects of illicit drugs. NPS emerge rapidly, making controls for these drugs extremely difficult. The increased use and emerging trade of NPS have created concerns that transnational organized criminal groups could exploit the market for these substances.

One class of new psychoactive substances is synthetic cannabinoids, such as “spice,” which was introduced to the United States around 2009, marketed as potpourri, and labeled “not for human consumption” to avoid FDA regulations. Spice or “K2” is an herbal material infused with dangerous chemicals that imitate the effects of THC, although it is much more potent and can be extremely harmful. Due to the ever-changing concentrations of chemicals used to make synthetic cannabinoids, data on human toxicity related to the use of these drugs remains limited. However, known health-related problems associated with their use include cardiovascular complications, psychological disorders, physiological dependence, hallucinations, paranoid behavior, agitation, anxiety, nausea, vomiting, and seizures. Data has also shown that an increasing number of suicides are also associated with use of synthetic cannabinoid products such as spice.

The Scottish decision to close the Aberdeen shop comes just weeks after the launch of an interactive online video that warns teens of the dangers and risks associated with legal high drugs. The video will be available to every secondary school throughout Scotland. Detective Inspector Michael Miller said of NPS use:

It’s become clear that officers are spending an increasing amount of time dealing with the diverse issues brought on by new psychoactive substances as the trend to take them escalates… It horrifies me that young people willingly take a substance without knowing what it contains or the effects it will have.

Scotland is not the only country in Europe feeling the daunting impact of NPS. The European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction reported an unprecedented increase in the number, type, and availability of new psychoactive substances in Europe over the past five years. The report claims that 101 new psychoactive substances were reported for the first time in 2014. What is truly shocking is the alarming number of seizures–46,730–of new psychoactive substances in 2013 alone. To combat the rapid increase of the drugs, several countries have amended their legislation to control the manufacture, trafficking, possession, sale and use of NPS. However, including a drug on a prohibited or scheduled list is often a lengthy process that requires health risk assessments based on scientific data, (data that is scarce for NPS) and can take several months to approve. For this reason, many governments have resorted to “emergency scheduling” to introduce temporary bans on NPS until the legislative process can be completed. Australia, China, Croatia, Bahrain, Ghana, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom and the United States reported in a UNODC questionnaire on NPS to having used emergency scheduling to temporarily ban NPS. New psychoactive drug information has also begun to appear on national drug surveys due to the growing need to monitor and combat their use.

In the United States, NPS use is on the rise, mimicking the international trend. In 2011, the annual “Monitoring the Future” national survey asked 12^th graders about their drug use; the survey found that synthetic cannabinoids ranked second in annual prevalence only to natural cannabis. Notably, the states with the highest number of calls to U.S. Poison Centers involving synthetic cannabinoids in 2015 are states with harsher cannabis laws. Washington, Oregon, Colorado, and Alaska are the only four U.S. states with legalized recreational cannabis, although they are in different stages of implementation. Those four states combined have had a total of 41 calls to poison centers this year, while Mississippi, a medical marijuana state with decriminalization laws, alone has had over 1,000 calls. In April, New York officials issued a health alert after more than 160 patients over a span of just nine days were admitted to hospitals across the state for adverse reactions to spice. In Mississippi, 97 cases of synthetic marijuana abuse were reported to the Mississippi Poison Control Center over an eight-day span in April. Although the Synthetic Drug Abuse Prevention Act of 2012 banned the synthetic compounds found in NPS, there is obviously still an NPS abuse problem in the states, and we will probably see crackdowns similar to Europe on the rise.

In one German study on NPS, more than three out of five respondents indicated the legal availability of NPS as a major motivation for use. This result speaks to the importance of monitoring and scheduling new variations of NPS, shutting down head shops, gas stations, and websites that sell the drugs, and educating young people that the legality of the drugs does not imply their safety. Closing stores that sell these drugs will attack the infrastructure of NPS propagation and will deter novice NPS users from experimenting with these unsafe substances. Openly condemning the NPS market will also combat the current normalization of NPS use, which the open, “legal” sale of these drugs promotes. While policy reform is important, education is the most powerful tool for change. The U.S., and other locations, should take after Scotland in its efforts to inform young people about the detrimental impacts of new psychoactive substances.

Emily Dalgo

Emily Dalgo is a member of the American University Class of 2017 and a Law Street Media Fellow during the Summer of 2015. Contact Emily at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Legal Doesn’t Mean Safe: The Rise of Synthetic Drugs appeared first on Law Street.

This week’s weird arrests include a few high Canadian teenagers and a particularly devoted boyfriend. Check them out below in the slideshow.

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Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Weird Arrests of the Week appeared first on Law Street.

I spent all of last week in Costa Rica, so I had a lot of catching up to do when I returned. And when I went to check my news feed for weird legal stories to write about here, it did not disappoint. A man shot both an armadillo (or an armadilla, as it is pronounced in the South) and his mother-in-law (I feel as if there is a good mother-in-law joke in there somewhere), and a 70-year-old woman was arrested for smuggling cocaine in her girdle – though for me, the real crime there is that someone still wears a girdle in this day and age.

The Shot Heard Round the Yard

The expression kill two birds with one stone recently took on a whole new meaning. A Georgia man was out shooting armadillos with his pistol. It is, apparently, encouraged in his town to shoot armadillos in general, but pistols are not the gun of choice in such a situation. Why? Because if you shoot an armadillo with a pistol, here is what might happen:

• The bullet ricochets off the animal’s sturdy back;
• The bullet then hits a fence;
• The bullet ricochets off the fence;
• The bullet flies through the back door of your mother-in-law’s mobile home;
• The bullet goes through the recliner where your mother-in-law is sitting; and,
• The bullet finally stops … after hitting your mother-in-law in the back.

The lady in question walked away just fine and is not pressing charges; however, I would not recommend any of you mom-in-law haters out there try this at home. It might not work out so well for you.

Granny’s Got a Drug Cartel

It’s not often that we hear of a story where people are trying to find out what’s inside a 70-year-old woman’s underwear, but recently at JFK airport TSA officials did just that. Olive Fowler is not your average little, old lady. Sure, she wears girdles and granny panties just like everyone else, but her Victoria’s Secret is a little darker than most of the others.

Sweet lil’ Olive was spotted at JFK sweating profusely – wait! As anyone of her generation could tell you, women don’t sweat, they glisten – and avoiding the eyes of cops. So she was taken away for additional screening. The TSA officials found more under her girdle than they had bargained for, in the form of $73,000 worth of cocaine. She was taken away by the authorities and will likely face jail time.

The moral of this story is that you should not judge a book by its cover. Even the dusty ones that look old and boring can be a gold mine (which now gives new meaning to the expression digging for gold).

Ashley Shaw

Ashley Shaw is an Alabama native and current New Jersey resident. A graduate of both Kennesaw State University and Thomas Goode Jones School of Law, she spends her free time reading, writing, boxing, horseback riding, playing trivia, flying helicopters, playing sports, and a whole lot else. So maybe she has too much spare time. Contact Ashley at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Granny Arrested For Smuggling Cocaine in Her Girdle at JFK appeared first on Law Street.

Lawsuits, crime, and drugs ruled the news last week and the most popular articles at Law Street were no exception. The #1 article of the week, from Anneliese Mahoney, detailed the suit over royalties earned by “50 Shades of Gray” won by a woman in Texas; #2, also from Mahoney, covers the explosive news out of Chicago that there is a secret ‘black site’ where Americans are held outside of the justice system; and #3, from Alexis Evans, is the story from Wesleyan University where nearly a dozen students were hospitalized in apparent Molly overdoses. ICYMI, here is the Best of the Week from Law Street.

#1 Texas Woman Wins Big “50 Shades of Grey” Royalties Lawsuit

It seems like one of the most popular topics of conversation these days is the movie version of the erotic novel sensation “Fifty Shades of Grey.” (Spoiler alert: It’s really bad. I went hoping to make fun of it and have a few laughs, and it was too awful to even laugh at.) But one woman may be laughing soon–laughing all the way to the bank, that is. An Arlington, Texas woman named Jennifer Lynn Pedroza just won a major “Fifty Shades” related lawsuit. Read full article here.

#2 Chicago “Black Site” Allegations Yet Another Example of Police Brutality

News of a secret detention facility in Chicago broke this week and it’s sparking horror and outrage across the country. This “black site,” revealed by the Guardian, is a nightmare image straight out of a post-apocalyptic movie. People are “arrested” and taken to this site, which is inside a warehouse in Chicago’s Homan Square. Then they are subjected to inhumane treatment. They aren’t afforded the rights that the U.S. Constitution promises all of us. Read full article here.

#3 Mass Molly Overdose Hospitalized 11 Wesleyan Students

Connecticut’s Wesleyan University was flooded with sirens Sunday night as almost a dozen students were rushed to hospitals after reportedly overdosing on the party drug commonly known as Molly, or MDMA. The exact number of alleged victims varies, with police reporting that 11 students were hospitalized for the drug, while Wesleyan University President Michael S. Roth reported the figure as ten students and two visitors in a letter sent to students Monday morning. Read full article here.

Chelsey D. Goff

Chelsey D. Goff was formerly Chief People Officer at Law Street. She is a Granite State Native who holds a Master of Public Policy in Urban Policy from the George Washington University. She’s passionate about social justice issues, politics — especially those in First in the Nation New Hampshire — and all things Bravo. Contact Chelsey at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post ICYMI: Best of the Week appeared first on Law Street.

Heroin addiction is a scary reality for many Americans. It’s often an ongoing roller coaster involving several rehab stints, withdrawal, and lifelong addiction struggles. And it’s unfortunately becoming a more common phenomenon. Today, the drug is no longer an outlier compared to its competitors.  It has been identified by some as the new drug of the upper-middle class. Is this a fair assessment? Here are the facts.

What is heroin?

Heroin received its name from the “hero-like,” invincible effect the drug provides its user. It is also called by other names on the street including: H, Junk, Smack, Big H, Hell Dust, and countless others. Additives can change the color from white (pure heroin) to rose gray, brown, or black. Heroin can be laced with a variety of poisons and/or other drugs. It is injected, smoked, and snorted.

What is the science behind heroin?

From a scientific perspective:

Heroin is an opiate made from the chemical morphine, which is extracted from the dried latex of the opium poppy. Morphine is extracted from the opium latex, and these chemicals are used to make opiates, such as heroin, diamorphine and methadone. Heroin is the 3,6-diacetyl derivative of morphine (hence diacetylmorphine) and is synthesised from it by acetylation.

So what does that mean? Essentially, heroin is an opiate–a drug created from opium that sedates, tranquilizes, and/or depresses the body. It’s similar to a common base in a variety of pain killers–morphine. Opium comes from the cultivation of poppy seeds.

Effects of Heroin                                                     

Heroin users report several effects that differ based on the individual. Heroin can cause a temporary state of euphoria, safety, warmth, and sexual arousal. It can also create a sense of disconnect from other people, causing a dreamlike state and/or sense of floating. It is a depressant, rather than stimulant like cocaine, and it can be used as a self-medicated pain reliever.

Adversely, users can immediately experience vomiting, coughing, constipation, hypothermia, severe itching, and inability to orgasm. Long-term effects include rotten teeth, cold sweats, weakening of the immune system, respiratory illnesses, depression, loss of appetite, insomnia, and tuberculosis. Although this is not a direct effect, the sharing of needles from intravenous injection can often lead to AIDS, Hepatitis C, and other fatal infections.

After the effects wear off, users will start to feel extreme withdrawal symptoms if another dose is not administered. The symptoms of withdrawal can include “restlessness, aches and pains in the bones, diarrhea, vomiting, and severe discomfort.”

How do Americans get heroin?

Afghanistan is the “world’s largest exporter,” producing over 80 percent of the world’s opium. According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the Afghan poppy cultivation and opium industry amassed $3 billion in 2013, a 50 percent increase from 2012.

Overall, Mexico is the largest drug supplier to the United States. Specifically, Mexico produces Black Tar Heroin, one of the “most dangerous and addictive forms of heroin to date.” This variety looks more similar to hash than powder and can cause sclerosis and severe bacterial infections.

Colombia is the second largest Latin American supplier to the United States. Colombian cartels historically distribute from New York City and are in “full control of the heroin market in the Eastern United States.”

The “Golden Triangle” includes the countries of Burma, Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand. Before the escalation of the Afghan opium market, these southeastern Asian countries reigned over the world’s opium production.

Is it true that middle class heroin use is on the rise?

The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published a study in 2014 about the changing demographics of heroin users in the last 50 years. Over 2,800 people entering treatment programs participated in self-surveys and extensive interviews.

The results do seem to indicate that heroin is transitioning to the middle class. It is leaving the big cities and becoming more mainstream in the suburbs. Of course, there has been heroin drug use in suburbia before; however, now there is a marked increase.

In the 1960s, the average heroin user was a young man (average age of 16.5) living in a large urban area. Eighty percent of these men’s first experiences with an opioid was heroine. Today, the average heroin user is either a male or female in their twenties (average age of 23). Now, 75.2 percent of these users live in non-urban areas and 75 percent first experienced an opioid through prescription drugs. Almost 90 percent of first-time heroin users in the last ten years were white.

In New York City, doctors and drug counselors report a significant increase in professionals and college students with heroin addictions, while emergency rooms also report an increase in opiate overdoses. In Washington D.C., there has been a 55 percent increase in overdoses since 2010.

Why Heroin?

With all this information readily available through school systems and the internet, why is the educated, middle class turning to heroin? Factors may include increases in depression, exposure to painkillers, and acceptance. The perception of the heroin junkie has changed. A user can snort heroin (bypassing the track marks from injection) and go undetected by those around. It can be a clandestine affair–an appealing notion if the user does want to keep their drug use secret.

Anxiety disorders are the largest mental illness in the United States today, affecting more than 40 million Americans. In a country that loves to self-medicate, heroin offers a false yet accessible reprieve from anxiety and depression.

Prescription drug users also move to heroin. Prescription drugs are expensive and only legally last for the prescribed amount of time. To name a few, these gateway prescriptions drugs come in the forms of hydrocodone (Vicodin), fentanyl (Duragesic), and oxycodone (OxyContin). From 1999-2008, prescription narcotic sales increased 300 percent in the United States. Unlike these expensive prescriptions, a bag with approximately a quarter-sized amount of heroin can be sold for $10 off the streets. The transition isn’t hard to imagine, especially when the desired effects are similar.

Case Study: Understanding Suburban Heroin Use

Young upper-middle class adults are generally perceived as being granted every opportunity and foundation for success. Parents can afford a comfortable lifestyle and access to decent education for their children. So the question continues: why are so many from this walk of life turning to heroin? Through the funding of the Reed Hruby Heroin Prevention Project, the Illinois Consortium on Drug Policy conducted a report Understanding Suburban Heroin Use, to “demonstrate the nuanced nature of risk and protective factors among the heroin interviewees.” A risk factor puts a person in danger of using heroin, while a protective factor reduces the chance of use.

The overriding connection among the interviewees is the “experienced degree of detachment between parent and child and the overall lack of communication.” Contrary to common stereotypes, verbal, physical, and/or earlier drug abuse wasn’t vital in providing a pathway to heroin. A large portion of the answers, proved in these case studies, seem to be the previous emotional health of the users.

Example One

Interviewee one is a 31-year-old male who transitioned from pills to heroin. He is described as athletic, articulate, and candid. He was raised in an upper-middle class Chicago suburb. Although his family was close and intact, he experienced a sense of loneliness. His parents practiced a more hands-off approach to parenting that made him feel like an adult at an early age. His parents didn’t drink or abuse drugs during his childhood. His brother was diagnosed with ADHD, while he was not, although he experienced “restlessness.”

He was caught smoking marijuana at age 14 by his father, quit for a couple months, then resumed. His parents assumed he remained clean because he received good grades and they liked his group of friends. At age 17, he chose to work rather than attend college after graduating high school a semester early. He was earning almost as much income as his father. At 17, he tried his first opioid with a friend whose medical condition allowed easy access to OxyContin. When the prescription ran dry, they turned to heroine. He rationalized the transition thinking if he could handle OxyContin, he could handle heroin. Six months later, he was using approximately $100 worth of heroin daily and eventually moved to violent and illegal actions to sustain his supply. He admitted:

Heroin gave me something. It made me feel the best I have ever felt…Maybe I think love was missing. Like, love. I think. I that, uh, because I always felt like alone. Like even though I had good family, I always felt alone. Different.

Example Two

Interviewee two is a 27-year-old female from the western suburbs of Illinois. She is described as attractive, cheerful, and helpful. She was raised in an educated, wealthy family. She was a cheerleader in high school and earned good grades. There aren’t any psychological or substance abuse problems in her family. She felt disconnected from her siblings as they were much older and felt distant from her parents, as well. Her parents often “bickered” but never had big fights. When she confided in her mother as a child that she might be depressed, her mother seemingly brushed it off.

She started smoking pot in junior high at age 15. Although social, her group of friends was not part of the most popular crowd. This was a constant concern. She maintained a B average and continued with sports, while starting to smoke marijuana every day. An after-school job paid for this habit. When her parents found drug paraphernalia in her room, they didn’t probe the situation and just sent her to her room. Searching for a personal connection, she started dating an older boy. She connected with his parents in a way she could not with her own. During senior year, they both started using cocaine, which became a daily habit. She eventually transitioned to heroin, because as she put it in an answer to one question:

Heroin made me feel real mellow like I had not a care in the world. I had a lot of “what am I doing with my life” and physical pain that I was covering up.

After losing her job, she pawned her belongings with a variety of her parents’ things, and stole from others. She refrained from turning to prostitution, although she heard of other girls going down that road. She finally sought out help after witnessing her boyfriend get pistol-whipped and robbed during a drug exchange.

What does this tell us about heroin use?

There are similarities and differences to all of the case studies in this project. In these two examples, the users come from seemingly sturdy homes and backgrounds. The stereotypes of drug users aren’t present in these cases; however, they both felt distant from the people around them at an early age in life. They also wanted to avoid internal and external pressures. This glimpse into the lives of users offers some potential answers to the question of why relatively well educated, middleclass Americans may turn to heroin.

Fighting Back

In March 2014, the United States Department of Justice and the Attorney General Eric Holder vowed to take action against the “urgent public health crisis” of heroin and prescription opiates. Holder claimed that between 2006-2010, there was a 45 percent increase in heroin overdoses. To start, Holder pushed law enforcement agencies to carry the “overdose-reversal drug” Naloxone and urged the public to watch the educational documentary “The Opiate Effect.” Holder also outlined the DEA plan as follows:

Since 2011, DEA has opened more than 4,500 investigations related to heroin. They’re on track to open many more. And as a result of these aggressive enforcement efforts, the amount of heroin seized along America’s southwest border increased by more than 320 percent between 2008 and 2013…enforcement alone won’t solve the problem. That’s why we are enlisting a variety of partners – including doctors, educators, community leaders, and police officials – to increase our support for education, prevention, and treatment.

Conclusion

Heroin has seen a migration to the middle class. But what can we do to stop it? Many of these new users are already educated on the adverse effects of heroin and know the bottom line. A fear of health concerns isn’t enough. We need to stop it at the source, whether it is gateway prescription drugs or emotional health. Substance abuse is a disease to be cured, not the label of a criminal. The Affordable Care Act and Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act aim to expand behavioral health coverage for 62.5 million people by 2020. Every addict, regardless of demographics, should have the ability and necessary tools to recover.

Resources

Primary

U.S. Justice Department: Attorney General Holder, Calling Rise in Heroin Overdoses ‘Urgent Public Health Crisis,’ Vows Mix of Enforcement, Treatment

JAMA Psychiatry Releases: Demographics of Heroin Users Change in Past 50 Years

Reed Hruby Heroin Prevention Project: Understanding Suburban Heroin Use

Additional

About Health: What Heroin Effects Feel Like

Anxiety and Depression Association of America: Facts & Statistics

The New York Times: The Middle Class Rediscovers Heroin

Original Network of Resources on Heroin: Heroin By Area of Origin

RT: America’s $7.6 Billion War on Afghan Drugs Fails, Opium Production Peaks

Tech Times: Study Profiles New American Heroin Addicts

Foundation For a Drug Free World: The Truth about Heroin

WTOP: Heroin Use Rises in D.C. Among Middle, Upper Class

Jessica McLaughlin

Jessica McLaughlin is a graduate of the University of Maryland with a degree in English Literature and Spanish. She works in the publishing industry and recently moved back to the DC area after living in NYC. Contact Jessica at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Heroin: The New Drug of the Middle Class? appeared first on Law Street.

As Romeo said, “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” True, Shakespeare, true. However, I am going to pose an argument to you some 400-plus years too late. A rose by any other name might smell as sweet, but it might not smell as realistic, plausible, or common. Like when I wrote last week about how Nutella is not a legit name in France unless you are actually a jar of the chocolaty spread. But the same is also true in cases when you try to change your name–say, for example, to have a bunch of fake prescriptions filled–where you might actually want to think twice when picking your new nomenclature. Because I can tell you what might be in a name: a charge for defrauding the government.

Now, I would like to say up front that most of this story is not very funny or amusing because it did lead to a lot of deaths. The tainted steroids discussed in this story allegedly led to the Meningitis outbreak a couple of years ago, where many people died or were sickened; however, this post is focusing on the alleged idiots who got caught, thank goodness, in part by being idiots. (Also, this paragraph is the last time I am going to use the word alleged, so please just insert it throughout the rest of this alleged story.)

A Framingham, Massachusetts pharmacy was linked with giving out bulk fake prescriptions under false names. The cofounder had a good plan on how not to get caught, and wrote it up in an email for the employees. In it, he said, “All names must resemble ‘real’ names… no obviously false names!” Good advice, I say.

So, here are just some of the names that the employees decided were real and not at all false:

• Jennifer Lopez;
• Filet O’Fish;
• Baby Jesus;
• Harry Potter;
• Coco Puff;
• Alec Baldwin;
• Bud Weiser; and
• Samuel Adams.

Courtesy of Giphy.

All of these are clearly real names, as I have heard of every single one of them. (Even Samuel Adams, who is not just a beer but actually a real person and not just in this story. And also, this is not the first time I have had to take the time to explain this as American History classes are apparently not doing their jobs!) So, it is quite shocking that our government caught them when they use such good pseudonyms, right?

Despite how well disguised these fake prescription recipients’ names were, last December, 14 employees were arrested under the charge of defrauding the government, and apparently their names had a part in leading to their arrests.

Courtesy of GIFSoup.

So, kids, the message here is that names are more important than Shakespeare claims. That which we call Chester Cheeto by any other name might make it less obvious that what we are doing is illegal.

Ashley Shaw

Ashley Shaw is an Alabama native and current New Jersey resident. A graduate of both Kennesaw State University and Thomas Goode Jones School of Law, she spends her free time reading, writing, boxing, horseback riding, playing trivia, flying helicopters, playing sports, and a whole lot else. So maybe she has too much spare time. Contact Ashley at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Coco Puff and Sam Adams Charged With Defrauding the Government appeared first on Law Street.

The civil rights movement in America attempted to end segregation and racial discrimination of black Americans and secure federal protections of their rights. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 seemingly sealed the deal, prohibiting discrimination based on race. In spite of that, there is an argument to be made that racial discrimination is still a persistent problem in the United States. One important facet of the discussion is centered around the “war on drugs” and the so-called “tough on crime” policy approach that the United States has adopted since the 1970s. Racially disproportionate drug arrests have resulted in mass incarceration and prompted civil rights concerns. Read on to learn more about current drug policy and its implications in relation to civil rights.

History of Inequality in U.S. Drug Policy

Throughout history there have been many instances in which unequal treatment of various minority groups was evident in American drug laws. The first anti-drug law dates back to 1875, when smoking opium was penalized in San Francisco, primarily, it is believed, to stigmatize Chinese immigrants. In 1914 the Harrison Narcotics Act expanded the powers of the federal government, and concurrently the media portrayed black Americans as the primary users of cocaine, one such narcotic. Later, multiple reports by the media tied Mexican immigrants, who were entering the country for agricultural jobs, to marijuana-related violence. The result of that particular stereotype was the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937.

Congress created its first mandatory minimum sentencing law in 1952, the Boggs Act, which required a minimum sentence of two to ten years for first-time marijuana possession. But the most notorious mandatory minimum drug laws were enacted in New York under Nelson Rockefeller, who was the governor at the time. That mandatory sentence threshold was raised to a minimum of 15 years and a maximum of life in prison. The “Rockefeller Drug Laws” were enacted in 1973, signifying the beginning of a long-standing “tough on crime” policy in the United States.

The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 was the culmination of the “war on drugs,” requiring identical penalties (a five-year minimum sentence) for five grams of crack cocaine and 500 grams of powder cocaine. As crack cocaine was cheap, it dominated poor black communities, while more affluent, usually white communities, used the more expensive powder cocaine.

 Are the U.S. Drug Policies changing?

Under the Obama Administration, the ratio of crack to powder cocaine was significantly reduced when the Fair Sentencing Act was signed into law in August 2010. The current administration also acknowledged that the previous laws were discriminatory and disproportionately impacted communities of color.

State laws are also slowly changing, with California at the forefront of the movement. A new law, “Proposition 47,” enacted in 2014, reduces simple drug possession from a felony to a misdemeanor.

Politicians are also starting to speak up, calling for the end of “War on Drugs.” Outgoing Attorney General,Eric Holder is one of the most vociferous proponents of reducing mass incarceration and re-integrating formerly incarcerated individuals back into society.

In addition, legalization of marijuana is a hot topic everywhere in the United States. More and more states have legalized the drug for either recreational or medical use, prompting the idea of country-wide legalization and regulation in the future. The New York Times editorial board and President Barack Obama have spoken out in support of the legalization movement.

It’s plausible that American drug policy is undergoing a transition from prohibition and harsh sanctions toward regulation and rehabilitation practices. But it can still be characterized as a punitive system, highly centered on deterrence through long and harsh sentencing practices. There are also many concerns that the current drug policies are still racist in practice. People of color are disproportionally imprisoned for drug offenses, often creating vicious circles of poverty and crime.

What are the main concerns with the current U.S. Drug Policy?

Our drug policy enforcers are part of the judicial system, and there are many concerns that the judicial system treats members of minority populations more harshly than their counterparts. For example, black men are stopped and frisked at disproportionately higher rates than members of other communities. In 2011 the number of stops of young black men in New York City topped the city’s entire population of young black men: 168,126 stops compared to a population of just 158,406 young black men. In the same year, 52.9 percent of the people stopped and frisked were black, 33.7 percent were Latino, and only 9.3 percent were white. The stop and frisk racial landscape didn’t change much in 2014: 54 percent of those who were stopped and frisked were black, 27 percent were Latinos, and 12 percent were white. African Americans are also stopped more frequently when driving or entering the country.

Critics of the drug policy worry that black Americans are also more likely to be arrested. The rate of arrests for black Americans is 2.5 times higher than white Americans. At the same time, even though the black and white population use marijuana at roughly the same rates, black Americans are four times more likely to be arrested for drug offenses. Watch the video below to learn more about racial disparities in marijuana-related arrests.

Finally, black users are more often convicted and incarcerated for drug felonies. In 2009, 50.5 percent of the state prisoners convicted on drug offenses were African Americans, 17 percent were Latinos, and 30.1 percent were whites. Black men and women were also sent to prison on drug charges at 11.8 and 4.8 times the rate of their white counterparts, respectively.

Critics of our current polices point out that as a result of such discriminatory treatment, black Americans enter the prison system at a higher rate, stay there longer, and are more likely to go back there again. The harsh penal sanctions for drug offenses result in mass incarceration of individuals of color. Black Americans convicted of drug offenses constitute 53.3 percent of those admitted to state prisons. Watch the video below to learn more about mass incarceration in the United States.

Who thinks the current drug laws aren’t discriminatory?

There is another point of view that claims that the notion of differential treatment according to race is non-existent. Those who subscribe to that school of thought argue that African Americans simply commit more drug-related offenses. This argument posits that the police and criminal justice system are not biased toward minorities. It further asserts that the reason why disproportionately more black Americans end up in the criminal justice system has to do with relative crime rates, not racial bias. Some conservative voices hold the same view, citing that African Americans simply commit more crimes, especially those involving drugs. The video below shows Bill O’Reilly, a FOX News commentator, speaking in support of this point of view.

So, is U.S. Drug Policy a Civil Rights Issue?

What is a “Civil Rights Issue”?

Civil rights are centered on the notion of discrimination. A civil rights issue arises when an individual or group has been discriminated against on the basis of its race, sex, religion, age, physical limitation, or orientation. Civil rights issues are often discussed in the realm of employment or housing discrimination. Such spheres can be considered traditional civil rights battlegrounds.

The criminal justice system has been long overlooked when discussing civil rights violations. Only relatively recently did the ACLU and other civil and human rights groups begin to acknowledge that sentencing practices for drug offenses and the overall treatment of minorities in the criminal justice system is a civil rights issue.

How does the U.S. Drug Policy relate to Civil Rights?

Those who argue that the U.S. Drug Policy is a civil rights issue focus on the particular emphasis in drug laws that are not equal in their intent or enforcement. The majority of drug crimes are not committed by minorities, but the prison system is disproportionally filled with African Americans and Latinos.

The public has long associated poor communities of color with drugs and crime, a notion that was long perpetuated by the media. More minority arrests and convictions for drug offenses result in the belief that certain parts of the population use more drugs and commit more crime. It opens up a discussion on racial dynamics in American society and the impact of structural racism.

In this realm, many argue that the current drug policy can be considered a civil rights issue as it discriminates against communities of color in the criminal justice system by disproportionately targeting open drug markets in poor neighborhoods and failing to recognize the same dynamics in more affluent areas.

Conclusion

The current drug policy of the United States Government is centered on tough sanctions and long sentencing practices. It often ignores the fact that drug use is a public heath issue, locking up individuals for simple possession of certain drugs. At the same time, the enforcement of the current drug laws is disproportionately focused on communities of color, resulting in the mass incarceration of minorities. Thus, numerous civil and human rights groups consider U.S. drug policy a civil rights issue. But not everybody supports this point of view. The counter argument refuses a civil rights interpretation of the issue, claiming that minorities simply commit more drug-related offenses. No matter who is right or wrong, the current drug policy needs serious fixing.

Resources

Primary

The White House: Civil Rights

Additional

New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration at the Age of Colorblindness

Foreign Policy in Focus: U.S. Drug Policy

Huffington Post: More Nails in the Drug War Coffin: Top Stories of 2014

Sentencing Project: Incarcerated Parents and their Children

Human Rights Watch: Race, Drugs, and Law Enforcement in the United States Bureau of Justice Statistics: Special Report. Civil Rights Complaints in U.S. District Courts, 1990-2006.

NYCLU: Stop and Frisk Data

ACLU: Driving While Black: Racial Profiling On Our Nation’s Highways

ACLU: Border Patrol Stops

Anti-Defamation League: Privilege, Discrimination, and Racial Disparities in the Criminal Justice System

Sentencing Project: Drug Policy

Human Rights Watch: Race and Drugs

New Century Foundation: The Color of Crime. Race, Crime and Justice in America

Center For Constitutional Rights: Floyd, et al, v. City of New York, et al.

The New York Times: An Editorial Series on Marijuana Legalization

Huffington Post: Obama: Marijuana No More Dangerous Than Alcohol

Legal Information Institute: Equal Protection

Leadership Conference: Justice On Trial: Racial Disparities in the American Criminal Justice System

NYCLU Briefing 2011: Stop and Frisk

Valeriya Metla

Valeriya Metla is a young professional, passionate about international relations, immigration issues, and social and criminal justice. She holds two Bachelor Degrees in regional studies and international criminal justice. Contact Valeriya at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post U.S. Drug Policy: Civil Rights Issue or Fair Enforcement? appeared first on Law Street.

It may have been the first full week of 2015, but that doesn’t mean that our criminals are any more normal than they were in 2014. Read on to see the top five weirdest, funniest, and downright bizarre arrests of this week.

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Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Weird Arrests of the Week appeared first on Law Street.

Happy New Year! Get ready for a full day of listening to your friends, family, and every D-lister on the morning shows drone on and on about their 2015 resolutions. Diets, new jobs, and all the usual suspects will make the rounds no matter who you talk to, but here are some resolutions celebrities and politicians should be making if they were really being honest with themselves.

Rep. Michael Grimm

Start paying taxes; stop threatening to throw reporters off balconies.

Courtesy of Giphy.com.

Sony Co-Chair Amy Pascal

Leave racially insensitive comments to unfiltered grandparents during the holidays and not in emails to colleagues.

Latest Sony email hack shows Scott Rudin and Amy Pascal making racist jokes about Obama http://t.co/RrNLdhplvR

— NY Daily News Gossip (@NYDNgossip) December 11, 2014

Justin Bieber

Start the Justin Bieber “Center for Kids Who Can’t Give Depositions Good and Wanna Learn to Do Other Stuff Good Too.” Also, avoid Interpol.  

President Obama

Figure out a way to differentiate the Baltimore Ravens roster from the Freaks and Geeks cast.

Courtesy of Giphy.com.

Kim Kardashian

Learn how the internet works; determine whether or not it’s actually “breakable.”

The 10 most popular stories of the year on http://t.co/M1Ru3U4Ixe http://t.co/SQUr0yv8JQ pic.twitter.com/OwzDevBv0Y — PAPER Magazine (@papermagazine) December 31, 2014

Zooey Deschanel

Don’t break any more horses.

Courtesy of Giphy.com.

Sen. Ted Cruz

Stop practicing puppy dog face in mirror. Face is beginning to get stuck that way.

Courtesy of Twitchy.com.

Taylor Swift

Bring back surprised face–people seem to miss it.

Courtesy of Giphy.com.

Shonda Rhimes

Take over ABC, rename Shondaland. Make sure all programming includes strong female lead with some flaws, an emotional kiss scene, and an improbable natural catasrophe.

Courtesy of Giphy.com.

Charlie Crist

Track down promised campaign donation from the United Fan Makers of America.

Hon. John Dingell

Keep being awesome.

Proud Michigan resident & dear friend @grahamdavis got a bulldog today and named it Dingell. I see no similarities. pic.twitter.com/aqKwGwMM9Y

— Rep. John Dingell (@john_dingell) October 19, 2014

Mama June Shannon

Take a break from dating.

Courtesy of Giphy.com.

Former Rep. Trey Radel

Stop throwing stones from glass house.

Ya give him a breathalyzer test every-time he votes…duh http://t.co/lX5ojfqnqu — starchy (@me_starchy) December 31, 2014

What other resolutions do you think they should make? Let us know in the comments.

Chelsey D. Goff

Chelsey D. Goff was formerly Chief People Officer at Law Street. She is a Granite State Native who holds a Master of Public Policy in Urban Policy from the George Washington University. She’s passionate about social justice issues, politics — especially those in First in the Nation New Hampshire — and all things Bravo. Contact Chelsey at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post New Year’s Resolutions Celebs & Politicians Should Make for 2015 appeared first on Law Street.

It’s been a truly whirlwind few years for marijuana legalization. In 2012, voters in Washington and Colorado voted to legalize marijuana use in those states. Others continue to decriminalize marijuana and allow its use for medical purposes. Today Oregon, Alaska, and the District of Columbia will vote on whether or not to legalize marijuana. How do these laws stack up? Check out the infographic below, based on information from Measure 91 in Oregon, Ballot Measure 2 in Alaska, and Ballot Initiative 71 in DC.

Oregon, Alaska, and the District of Columbia aren’t the only places considering marijuana legalization today. The cities of Lewistown and South Portland, Maine, are going to vote on whether or not to legalize it — Portland, Maine has already made it legal for adults to own less than an ounce of the substance. In addition, votes continue on legalizing medical marijuana. If the initiative currently up for a vote in Florida passes, it would make the Sunshine State the twenty-fourth to legalize marijuana, as well as the first southern state.

Regardless of how these particular measures do, there’s a good chance that we’ll see more states starting to legalize marijuana in the very near future. The national opinion on marijuana has changed rapidly. Polls fluctuate, but the amount of Americans who believe legalizing marijuana would be in the best interest of the nation hovers around 50 percent. In addition, most Americans don’t think that jail time should be served for small amounts of marijuana, which is now very much a “soft” drug; it doesn’t receive the same kind of punishment as more addictive and harmful drugs.

The progress in Alaska, Oregon, and the District of Columbia might not mean that we suddenly see a large wave of marijuana legalization across the country — it will still be illegal under federal law. But it will be interesting to see if any other states join Colorado and Washington this year.

Editor’s note: The infographic in this article was updated November 5, 2014 to reflect each vote’s outcome.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post States to Watch Today: Marijuana Laws On the Ballot in Oregon, Alaska, DC appeared first on Law Street.

Congratulations on surviving another Halloween, everyone! While recovering from your big night, you might as drag out the holiday a bit more and freak yourself out a little with all the weird things that people have gotten themselves arrested for this week. Check out the top five weird arrests from this week.

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Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Top 5 Weird Arrests of the Week appeared first on Law Street.

Missed out on some of the most interesting news last week? Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered. From satirical gateway drugs to a city overrun by clowns, last week was certainly one for the books. Writer Anneliese Mahoney took the top two spots with her reporting on police who struck out in their drug searches but came out with a handful of okra and some frisbee equipment, as well as a look t the city of Wasco, California, which may or may not be crawling in clowns; Alexandra Badalamenti write the number three post of the week on Hershey’s lawsuit against the maker of Hashees, a curiously similarly named weed edible. ICYMI, here is Law Street’s Best of the Week.

#1 Frisbees and Okra: The New Gateway Drugs

The national attitude towards pot has been evolving for some time now. Marijuana has now officially been decriminalized in a number of states, and even legalized in two: Oregon and Washington. But even as our national view towards marijuana changes, our misperceptions don’t necessarily follow suit. This split has led to a couple funny stories making the national news this week. One directly relates to those aforementioned stereotypes. A video in Ankeny, Iowa has been making its rounds on the internet. In it, a police officer tries to search a driver’s car, because apparently, people who play disc golf also smoke weed. (Read full article here)

#2 What’s the Deal With the Clown Problem in Wasco, California

If you’re a member of the Wasco California Police Department, you’ve had an interesting week. Wasco, near Bakersfield, has been all over the news for an interesting problem it’s having. But is it actually a problem, or a weird hoax turned viral? Google it and you’ll see a bunch of headlines about crazy clowns terrorizing the town and stalking people. (Read full article here)

#3 Hershey’s Settles Trademark Suit With Hashees Marijuana Edibles Maker

The Hershey Company has settled a lawsuit and simultaneously protected millions of little children across the country from becoming future cannabis users. The maker of the legendary chocolate Kiss, Peppermint Patty, and (my personal favorite) Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup settled a suit against marijuana candy manufacturer TinctureBelle LLC. Filed this summer, the suit was in response to TinctureBelle’s “medicated gourmet edibles,” many of which boast names allegedly mimicking those of the Hershey Company’s treats. (Read full article here)

Chelsey D. Goff

Chelsey D. Goff was formerly Chief People Officer at Law Street. She is a Granite State Native who holds a Master of Public Policy in Urban Policy from the George Washington University. She’s passionate about social justice issues, politics — especially those in First in the Nation New Hampshire — and all things Bravo. Contact Chelsey at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post ICYMI: Best of the Week appeared first on Law Street.

Electronic Dance Music (“EDM”) is here and it has taken the United States by storm. The popularity of EDM shows, combined with their mind-numbing music and effervescent visual superiority has transformed ordinary concert goers into multi-day event attendees. Lately however, much of EDM’s glitz and glamour has been tarnished by young adults held firmly in its clutches. The music is one thing: everyone loves a good beat, some vocals, and beautiful people to enjoy it with. It’s when the beat doesn’t stop and the shows become more about the drugs inherent to them that one wonders whether EDM shows are promoting drug use. Read on and decide for yourself.

What is EDM?

Electronic Dance Music or “EDM” is a music genre that evolved around the sound-system scene. The underground movement transformed from hip-hop crazed fans to other genres such as house, trance, and dub step. Originally, the scene started in warehouses, but quickly spread to massive productions and stadiums filled to the brim for the entertainment needs of 300,000 plus fans. However, the scene itself seems so much more. It’s a lifestyle, similar to the sex, drugs, and rock and roll of the 80s.

As the internet expanded so did the potential of this newly popularized genre. Part of EDM’s growth is attributed to the inner workings of social media, allowing DJs to post music and have others listen to and comment on it. Moreover, with word-of-mouth marketing outdated (at least in the music popularity sense), fans keep to apps such as Pandora and SoundCloud. SoundCloud, for example, allows users to listen to multi-day festival sets (multi-hour mixes) from their favorite DJs. Although fans listen to these mixes, this makes no sense to old-school rockers like Tom Petty. In a recent interview by USA Today, this is what he had to say about EDM festivals:

“Watch people play records? That’s stupid. You couldn’t pay me to go. I’m not oversimplifying it,” he seethed. “That’s what’s going on. I don’t think it would be any fun without the drugs. It’s a drug party.” 

Maybe Petty is right, but his subjective views would be harshly rebutted by some of house music’s longtime fans. Fans — especially old-timers in the dance music industry — may characterize his opinion as hypocritical, considering that he criticized the genre by equating the style to drug use. Instead, Forbes Magazine described EDM as the following:

“As for live performances, electronic dance music artists perform live by deejaying, playing their own songs and, again, the songs of other artists, at a range of events held at stadiums or clubs around the world. They are not playing an instrument or singing a song, but instead controlling the crowd’s emotions through expert song selection and sound mixing.” Forbes

To most EDM observers, Petty’s opinion is probably antithetical and Forbes’ is accurate. Although the lifestyle may be a stretch into the imaginative, perhaps getting dressed up to go to a club or festival has a cultural feel to it. Is it really any different than the way attendees dressed and partied at Woodstock? Doesn’t our culture encourage lavish outfits with a dash of creativity? Denouncing creative passion seems unfair, which is why evaluating EDM’s transformation is critical.

When did EDM become popular?

EDM shows sprung to popularity over the last five years. But society has witnessed changes in music tastes over the decades. In the 1980s and 90s, dance clubs like Twilo and Limelight lit up NYC streets. The underground scene was alive, creating its own sub-culture of “Club-Kids,” forever eternalized in the movie Party Monster. Throughout the 90s the scene dissolved, but starting in early 2009, there was a sudden re-emergence of the flashing lights, thumping bass, and of course, flamboyant outfits. But where did this come from? Did the music ever really die out? Maybe it was a long overdue awakening.

In 2009, David Guetta catapulted to fame by releasing tracks like “When Love Takes Over” and “Sexy Bitch.” Although he was relatively unknown to the majority of EDM enthusiasts, his presence took underground music and launched it onto the national stage. Electronic music, a favorite of fans all over Europe, suddenly swept through the States. Asked about the roots and influence his music has had on the States, Guetta said,

“I’ve created a bridge between European electronic culture and urban American culture, and I’ve worked with established brands. So media has given us a chance, an opportunity that I never had before.”

For once, artists no longer needed to compete against each other because Hip-Hop and Techno finally started to both co-exist and merge. In addition to the music, which was uncharacteristically played on HOT 97 Hip-Hop radio stations, television shows vied for the opportunity to capitalize on the music’s popularity. The end-result: shows like “Jersey Shore” captivated young audiences, teaching them the proper way to fist pump, tan, and do their laundry.

European music culture is largely accredited with the emergence of Techno and EDM in the United States. However, many fans don’t appreciate the roots of the music they listen to, considering that ingrained in the soul music of Chicago in the 1980s lay the humble beginnings of EDM’s underground culture. Except thirty years ago, a Deejay wasn’t someone with a laptop, but rather someone who sifted through dusty boxes of oldies and mixed songs using turntables in the back of restaurants.

After announcing his retirement in 2012, superstar underground/resident DJ Danny Tenaglia explained the modern phenomena as compared to the 70s gospel and deep house from which his inspirations flowed. When asked about the grand venues and music that have revolutionized today’s dance scene, he was honest.

“[Some DJs] make so much money selling out nightclubs,” Tenaglia says, referring to the scene’s current stars. “But I’m sure [they realize] the immaturity factor and the silliness of some of these melodies. It’s so preschool; it’s like listening to Sesame Street!”

In Tenaglia’s heyday, successful DJs needed rhythm, soul, and timing. Unlike today, they couldn’t syncopate sounds with the push of a button. It wasn’t uncommon for DJs to dance in the crowd and make small talk with their fans. Moreover, the crowds weren’t little kids on drugs. Drugs existed, but they were secondary to an underground culture of misfits and alternative folk. Today, it seems the music has taken a backseat to the drugs involved in EDM concerts. How did this happen? Is this just a modern spin-off? Or is this a culture, a newly-minted version of a dying fad?

Is EDM for real?

The younger generation may be changing the meaning of Dance Music in EDM. Directors Dan Cutforth and Jane Lipsitz are on the forefront of understanding the why and how factors of EDM in their new documentary “Under the Electric Sky,” which showcases the “community” feeling of EDM culture. One of the six subjects the documentary, Jose, a wheelchair-bound young man, accredits the success of EDM to this community. He treats these festivals as therapy for his terminal condition.

“If people could just treat each other the way they treat each other at EDC … the world would be a much better place.”

The majority of people would agree with his assertion. Most people want to feel part of a community because isolation has its own social stigmas. Regardless, drug use at music concerts is nothing new. However, these days it seems like the old dog has learned a few new tricks, and playing with “Molly” is one of them. Sebastian Ingrosso, long-time DJ/producer and original member of Swedish House Mafia, addressed the surge in EDM drug-related injuries.

“It’s a terrible thing that kids need to take drugs to enjoy something. I enjoy music without any kind of substance and I wish that all other people could do the same, because when you’re sober and you get high on the music you can really feel it and get what’s going on.”

From a professional standpoint, Ingrosso may have hit the issue on its head, and he’s not the only one. In fact, more vocal proponents like DJ/Producer Kaskade, use internet outlets like blogs to advocate social responsibility among EDM festival attendees.

“It’s important to take a step back and realize the importance of life. Like, hey we’re all here to have a good time. Let’s do it in a way that’s smart so we don’t have to have these conversations.”

---

Who or what is Molly?

According to the Week, Molly is methylenedioxymethamphetamine, but it is commonly known as MDMA — the active ingredient in the party drug Ecstasy. Specifically:

“Whereas Ecstasy is frequently combined with other, potentially more dangerous drugs — including speed, ketamine, or even LSD — Molly is a fairly recent rebranding effort that is said to contain pure MDMA. Molly is often ingested in a powder of crystal form, and is available illegally for $30 to $50 a dose.” The Week

Molly boosts serotonin in a user’s brain, neuroepinephrine, and dopamine, allowing a user to feel elevated moods and feelings of empathy. In fact, the drug produces heightened emotions and perceptions. According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, the drug boosts:

Serotonin and triggers the release of the hormones oxytocin and vasopressin, which play important roles in love, trust, sexual arousal, and other social experiences. This may account for the characteristic feelings of emotional closeness and empathy produced by the drug; studies in both rats and humans have shown that MDMA raises the levels of these hormones.

Although a single dose is relatively non-fatal, many users “stack” more than a single dose in an evening in order to reignite Molly’s earlier effects. As one user told The New York Times, “It makes you really happy. It’s very loose. You just get very turned on — not even sexually, but you just feel really upbeat and want to dance or whatever.” Michael C. Gerald, explored Molly’s effects in The Drug Book. He described Molly as a stimulant that, “produces euphoria and physical energy, increasing feelings of empathy and intimacy with partners” that makes users feel as if “all is right in the world.”

After nonstop frenetic dancing for hours in hot, crowded surroundings, some participants experience hyperthermia, a dangerous rise in body temperature that can cause kidney and liver failure. Drinking excessive volumes of water, coupled with dehydration due to sweating, can cause a steep drop in blood sodium levels, potentially resulting in confusion, delirium, and convulsions. The Drug Book.

That’s right. Even Molly, inherently known for its good effects, can have serious consequences. MDMA boosts one’s internal temperature, interfering with the body’s self-regulation of temperature. In turn, this can lead to hypothermia, cardiac arrhythmia, muscle breakdown, and renal failure. The more serious consequences include brain damage, and in some cases death. But why has the Millennial sub-culture become so involved with the drug? Only exploring its use at festivals can give a genuine answer to this question.

Why do people take Molly at festivals?

EDM shows are the perfect playground for experiencing both Molly’s visual and emotional perceptive enhancements. Festivals are fashioned for Molly users. Big-Screen animations, thundering sound systems, and thousands of people, provide both the visual and emotional stimulations for enjoying the drug.

In fact, using Molly has transcended across all age groups, even inciting interest in adults in their thirties and forties. “Typically in the past we’d see rave kids, but now we’re seeing more people into their 30s and 40s experimenting with it,” said Dr. Glatter. “MDMA use has increased dramatically. It’s really a global phenomenon now.”

The problem is these festivals are heating up the debate as to whether they promote drug use. In 2011, “hospitals across the country reported more than 22,000 MDMA-related emergency-room visits, which according to the Drug Abuse Warning Network, is a 120 percent increase from 2004.” This spike has led to public scrutiny regarding the efforts festival management implemented to combat the rampant use of drugs at their shows.

What has EDM management done to combat drug use at their shows?

If the DJs producing and playing the music are opposed to “kids” using drugs for their musical enjoyment, then what have festivals done to account for these concerns? Last year two fans died after overdosing on Molly at New York’s Electric Zoo Festival despite having 70 emergency medical technicians, 15 paramedics, five ER nurses, two physicians, and numerous other medical personnel on hand at Randall’s Island. According to Rolling Stone, “during a press conference after the tragedy, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg praised promoter Made Event for putting in ‘as good procedures as we could think of.'” In response to and after heavy public opposition, the third day of the festival was cancelled. This year, festival-goers were required to watch this two minute video before gaining admission into the Zoo.

It seems American health concerns have taken cues from their U.K. counterparts, where BBC reported only 27 out of an estimated 500,000 Molly users died last year. This isn’t to suggest that the number isn’t high, but only to display the concerted effort by festival management and attendees alike. This proactive approach is demonstrated by Electric Daisy Carnival’s website, which provides guidelines on health and wellness detailing everything from medical stations, to water intake suggestions, to buddy system traveling. The formula seems simple: take care of each other and we will continue hosting EDM events. Providing this ultimatum and instituting these changes supports that festival management has finally recognized the dangerous concoction of drugs and the kids taking them that attend their shows.

Conclusion

Whether or not canceling the final day of a multi-day festival or creating the aforementioned PSA video helped combat the drug-related deaths at this summer’s events is debateable. After beefing up security and teaming with local officials to search bags for contraband, there were no deaths to report at Electric Zoo this past summer. Maybe festival goers finally got the message. Either that, or a few too many Mollies threatened a $6.2 billion dollar market, forcing the hand of festival management to play safe or bite the bullet.

Resources

Rolling Stone: Drugs, Death, and Dance Music

Billboard: EDM Biz Worth $6.2bn (report)

ElectricDaisyCarnival: Tickets

National Institute on Drug Abuse: Drug Facts: MDMA

Forbes: Is Electric Dance Music the Ticket to Reach Millennials?

Evangelos Siozios

Evangelos Siozios is a student at New York Law School focusing on family law and real estate transactions. He is a 2012 Baruch Honors College Graduate whose interests include writing, exercising, and solving TV mysteries. Contact Evangelos at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post EDM Stands for Electric Dance Music, Not Eating Dem Mollies appeared first on Law Street.

Hey y’all!

Last July a young woman named  Lacey Weld from Tennessee was sentenced to 12 years in prison plus five years of supervised release after being captured on video spending 40 minutes inside of a methamphetamine manufacturing plant by an undercover police officer back in July. Did I mention she was in the last few weeks of her pregnancy at the time? Federal Judge Thomas Varlan determined that “enhanced sentencing” guidelines regarding harm to a child justified six years of the total sentence.

I’ll admit, I had never heard of the enhanced sentencing guidelines so to hear this story was pretty shocking and honestly I have mixed feelings about the whole situation.

A gaggle of reproductive-rights-organizations have taken it upon themselves to call on one-foot-out-the-door Attorney General Eric Holder to come out and publicly condemn Weld’s sentence. I’m curious as to why any of these organizations would want him to do such a thing? His reputation isn’t the best and no matter what he does or says it will not change the facts or the sentencing. In an interview with Vice, Weld’s attorney John Eldridge said that “laws intended to prevent ‘substantial risk of harm to life of a minor or an incompetent’ do not mention harm against a fetus.”

This is where things get sticky. Shouldn’t women be held responsible for their actions even if they are pregnant and especially if they are knowingly doing harm to themselves and their unborn child? Yes, you can argue that abortion would fall under that umbrella point of view, but if a woman has made the conscious decision to give birth to her child and either put it up for adoption or raise it herself, she should be held responsible for her actions.

This case has some serious grey areas and Weld’s lawyers are doing a damn good job of finding ways to interpret the laws in order to benefit her. That’s what lawyers are paid to do. But Weld needs to take a good, hard look in the mirror before she gets out and takes on the responsibility of raising that child. It may be a while but at some point it will be her responsibility again.

Some jurisdictions allow pregnant inmates to raise babies they give birth to in jail for several years before giving them to family members on the outside. This is best exemplified by the Argentinian movie Leonera (Lion’s Den) in which a woman who is convicted of murder finds out she is pregnant and is placed in a special ward of the prison where she is able to give birth and raise her baby for several years before giving him to a family member. It is an interesting concept and it almost seems like a good idea until I realize that our tax dollars would be supporting not only an inmate but also her child. The film in particular explores the pain and struggle of raising a child behind the walls of a prison and the importance of the bond between mother and child.

Lynn Paltrow, executive director of the National Advocates for Pregnant Women, says that  “this case tells women who are pregnant and cannot overcome their addiction is, really, to get an abortion.” I do not believe that is what this case is telling any woman. The point of punishing a person for her crime is to deter her from doing it again and to make an example out of her. Perhaps there is a girl out there who has a drug problem and just found out she is pregnant. By reading this article and she might realize that if she gets caught doing something illegal and harming her unborn child that she has chosen to keep she might be better off focusing on getting clean and taking care of herself and the baby.

Weld missed that opportunity. Not only did she take that away from herself and her child but she has also done irreparable damage. Even breathing in the fumes through a shirt at a meth lab can do damage to a fetus. According to the Department of Justice there is video footage of Lacey not only working in the meth lab but also smoking the drug. Weld told the court back in July that she wanted to “apologize for all the harm and wrongdoing (she has) done to (her) children. He could have died, and (she) just pray(s) and thank(s) God that (her) sister has him and he’s OK.”  Why is Weld just now realizing that she did something wrong and why is she merely apologizing? Shouldn’t she have been more aware of what she was doing before she got caught?

The baby did test positive for opioids and methamphetamine. I think Lacey got the time she deserved and I don’t think that it was wrong for the judge in the case to “enhance” her sentencing because she actually, knowingly did harm to her baby. If you are willing to do the crime, you should be willing to do the time.

I wish Weld all of the luck in the world and hope that she can kick her habit, but I also hope that her little baby has a fighting chance.

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Allison Dawson (@AllyD528) Born in Germany, raised in Mississippi and Texas. Graduate of Texas Tech University and Arizona State University. Currently dedicating her life to studying for the LSAT. Twitter junkie. Conservative.

Featured image courtesy of [Daniel Lobo via Flickr]

Allison Dawson

Allison Dawson was born in Germany and raised in Mississippi and Texas. A graduate of Texas Tech University and Arizona State University, she’s currently dedicating her life to studying for the LSAT. Twitter junkie. Conservative. Get in touch with Allison at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Woman Gets Six Extra Years in Jail Due to Pregnancy appeared first on Law Street.

If you are going to a pharmacy for a particular drug, you’re often offered a choice — do you want the name brand or the cheaper generic? Generics have long been lauded for their ability to provide the same benefits to patients while also offering a less hefty price tag; however, recently generics have been getting more expensive, and people are wondering why. Congress announced this week that it’s going to launch an investigation into why the price of generic drugs is rising.

When a drug company develops a particular drug, it gets to hold the patent for approximately twenty years (some nations or jurisdictions give protections for a bit longer). During that period, that company is the only one that can produce that particular drug. After the patent expires, however, other companies can make a “generic” version of the drug.

There are certain regulations created by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to make sure that the generic drugs are able to be distributed. The FDA requires that a generic drug has the same active ingredients as the one that it is imitating, but not necessarily the same inactive ingredients (such as coloring). A generic has to perform the same function as the name brand, and it must of course meet the same health and safety standards.

Generic drugs tend to be less expensive than the name brands — and given the high cost of American health care, offer great and affordable options for consumers. However, it seems like the cost of these drugs is increasing. For example, the patent for Ambien, a popular sleep aid, recently expired. Now it’s a lot easier to get a generic version of Ambien for a cheaper price, and more people are able to get the product they need.

A study completed in August discovered that some generic prices have been dropping, while others have been rising almost exponentially. According to the Wall Street Journal:

The prices paid by pharmacies more than doubled for one out of 11 generics. And in a few cases – notably, the tetracycline antibiotic and the captopril blood pressure pill – the cost increases not only exceeded 1,000%, but topped 17,000%…. Yes, 17,000%.

Doctors have reported how troubling this kind of price increase can be in certain generic drugs for the patients who rely on them. Some patients who are on fixed incomes, such as those on Medicaid, may not be able to pay for the non-covered costs of the drugs if prices skyrocket that much. They may try to skip their prescriptions in an attempt to make ends meet. Not only is this obviously problematic for the patients themselves, but it also leads to more emergency room visits and a less healthy society in general.

That brings us to the investigation that Congress is evidently undertaking to try to figure out why exactly these generic prices are climbing so sharply and how to reverse the trend. The analysis is being pushed by Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Representative Elijah Cummings of Maryland. We can all say a lot about the inadequacies of Congress, but this is a good move on its part. It’s really important that we get the prices of generics under control, because price increases like this are almost always passed directly to the consumer. With as many healthcare problems as we have, this is an issue that needs to be nipped in the bud as soon as possible.

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Anneliese Mahoney (@AMahoney8672) is Lead Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Chris Potter/Stockmonkeys.com via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Congress to Investigate Rising Generic Drug Costs appeared first on Law Street.

A few years ago, a woman named Sondra Prince (now Sondra Arquiett) made a startling discovery. Someone was impersonating her with a fake Facebook account that included her name, identity, and pictures. She started looking into it, and the impersonator was the last person you’d guess — the U.S. Government. Specifically, the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA).

Arquiett had been arrested and questioned about her involvement in a drug ring that a former boyfriend was a part of. She had helped him a little bit, but based on her involvement, her willingness to accept a plea deal, and the circumstances of the case, she was just put on probation. However, throughout the course of the investigation, her cell phone was seized. The phone had a number of her personal pictures on it.

Somehow this led to U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration Special Agent Timothy Sinnegan using those pictures to create a completely fabricated Facebook profile that included Arquiett’s name.

These weren’t necessarily run-of-the-mill pictures, either. Many were simple shots, but some included her posing on the hood of a car, and one in either a bathing suit or a bra and underwear. There was also a shot of her holding her child and niece — an invasion of their privacy as well. These were shots that she may not have wanted online, especially if she was applying to jobs or had family on the site.

Then there was what Sinnegan actually did with the account. He used in an effort to contact and communicate with a wanted fugitive, as well as with other members of the Facebook community. Arquiett only found out about the profile because a friend contacted her asking about something “she” had put up on it.

Arquiett has now sued Sinnegan, and the DEA, for both violating her privacy as well as putting her in danger. That seems pretty accurate given that the people that they were using her profile to contact were criminals who could have reacted badly toward her if they discovered what was really going on.

The DEA’s defense was, essentially, that because those photos were in evidence at one point that they are allowed to use them. The government stated:

Defendants admit that Plaintiff did not give express permission for the use of photographs contained on her phone on an undercover Facebook page, but state the Plaintiff implicitly consented by granting access to the information stored in her cell phone and by consenting to the use of that information to aid in an ongoing criminal investigations [sic]

There are a lot of scary implications in that argument, and while the status of Arquiett’s case appears to still be up in the air, the page is now down thanks to Facebook, who does not allow the impersonation of people on its network.

The government’s argument is kind of ridiculous. Nate Cardoza, an attorney at the Electric Frontier Foundation pointed out:

If I’m cooperating with law enforcement, and law enforcement says, ‘Can I search your phone?’ and I hand it over to them, my expectation is that they will search the phone for evidence of a crime, not that they will take things that are not evidence off my phone and use it in another context.

Cardoza’s dead on. There are scary implications here. Arquiett’s ability to lead a private life without being scared of retaliation from the people whom the government tricked into thinking were communicating with her shouldn’t be stripped just because she was an accomplice to a completely separate crime.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The DEA Stole a Woman’s ID for a Facebook Account, Now It’s in Court appeared first on Law Street.

Hey y’all!

The Berkley City Council in California has unanimously approved an ordinance requiring pot dispensaries donate 2 percent of their product to “patients” making under $32,000 a year. A single person is eligible for this “welfare weed” if they make $32,000 or under, but if that person has a family, the family income has to be $46,000 or under. This ordinance will go into effect in August 2015, but I imagine there will be some pushback over the next year about whether this should actually go into effect or not. I mean really, allowing free weed to those already on welfare? We all might as well quit our jobs or take on low-paying jobs and wait for our handouts. This is getting a little bit ridiculous. How many people in Berkley actually need free weed!?!

There are only three licensed dispensaries in the Berkley city limits and one of those dispensaries, House of Compassion, claims they already had:

[A] program in place that allocated a pound of marijuana for giveaway each week. The pound is broken up into 3.5-gram parcels and distributed on Mondays to anyone who can prove that they are on welfare (using an EBT card or other form of proof) and have been certified to use medical marijuana.

So why the need to create an ordinance if one location already has this program and there are only three dispensaries in the city? I don’t feel right about the reasoning behind this ordinance or the idea that marijuana should be free to anyone. And to be honest, I don’t think it should be legalized.

I don’t believe that every medical marijuana cardholder is someone who is genuinely sick or needing it for medicinal purposes. Back in 2011, the top three reasons physicians gave for recommending medical marijuana were “back/spine/neck pain” at 31 percent, “sleep disorders” at 16 percent and “anxiety/depression” at 13 percent. That is a total of 60 percent. SIXTY PERCENT! Now, I understand that many of these patients probably went through a very frustrating period of trial and error with other medical remedies, like pills, and nothing worked. But realistically how many of these “patients” were telling the truth? I understand, for the most part, the benefits of medical marijuana for some, but not everyone that has an ailment. I get the need for medical marijuana for people diagnosed with cancer or HIV/AIDS–those are diseases that can really take a toll on your body. But the “I need pot because I’m depressed” thing doesn’t sit well with me. Anyone can claim they are depressed or anxious or have certain levels of pain when in reality they don’t. Symptoms can be faked and I know people who have done so, which is why I am so cynical about the whole thing.

My biggest issue with the Berkley City Council is that they basically have said that if you need pot and are on welfare you might as well get it for free. They are allowing the lazy to be even lazier.

In Texas, the Texas Senate passed a bill last year that approved drug testing of welfare applicants so I can’t imagine the ideals of the Berkley City Council will breach the Texas boarder anytime soon. Which is great. Legalizing marijuana is probably one of the most reckless things a state can do. I love the fact that the Texas Senate allows for drug testing and if someone fails that drug test three times, no more welfare for them! “Taxpayer money should not be used to subsidize someone’s drug habit,” read a statement made by Texas State Sen. Jane Nelson, (R-Flower Mound.) I could not agree more!

I’ve seen the functioning pothead who will smoke a blunt everyday but still be able to go to work and act like a contributing member of society. I’ve seen the pothead who will sit at home, smoke out of their glass pipe in front of the computer and play mindless video games all day long, contributing nothing to their own lives or to society. I also recently had a friend tell me that she wished her husband would stop smoking pot but she recognizes that if he doesn’t smoke his four or five blunts throughout the day he turns into a completely different person, so she accepts his decision to smoke weed everyday, all day long. Dependence. Addiction. Altered mood. These are things that marijuana does to a person and it isn’t something that we should condone.

Marijuana’s second hand smoke is said to be very dangerous to children and pregnant women. Obviously there isn’t a whole lot of testing that has been done on the subject because of the dangers but there have been a few and the results appear to be compelling. According to studies, just like any other illicit drug, marijuana and secondhand marijuana smoke can cause premature labor, low birth weights and even neurological damage. There are people reckless enough out there that will disregard warnings and expose their loved ones to the second hand effects of marijuana. This short, but very interesting and to the point, article really brings to light what can happen to young children that are exposed to it in the womb or through second hand smoke.

Now I am not a believer in the “marijuana is a gateway drug to other drugs” idea–I think it is completely inaccurate–but I do think that allowing our country to accept an illegal drug like marijuana simply opens the door to other illegal drugs like opiates. At one point opiates were used like Tylenol is today. We should not revert back to the days of not knowing just to appease the drug users of the world; drugs are illegal for a reason. They do more harm than good.

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Allison Dawson (@AllyD528) Born in Germany, raised in Mississippi and Texas. Graduate of Texas Tech University and Arizona State University. Currently dedicating her life to studying for the LSAT. Twitter junkie. Conservative.

Featured Image Courtesy of [Ian Sane via Flickr]

Allison Dawson

Allison Dawson was born in Germany and raised in Mississippi and Texas. A graduate of Texas Tech University and Arizona State University, she’s currently dedicating her life to studying for the LSAT. Twitter junkie. Conservative. Get in touch with Allison at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Welfare Weed – Let the Lazy Be Lazier appeared first on Law Street.

In Arizona, if you are within 75 miles of the Mexican border, you might just come across a “temporary” border control checkpoint. The goal of these checkpoints is to help control drug trafficking and stop illegal immigration. But the legality of these checkpoints, and what the Border Patrol agents are actually allowed to do is far from clear. The American Civil Liberties Union has now filed an administrative complaint with the Department of Homeland Security on behalf of 15 individuals who claim that their constitutional rights have been violated at checkpoints in Arizona.

Of the individuals involved in the ACLU complaint, the majority say they were never asked about their identity, the supposed purpose of the checkpoints. Some of the complainants claim they were held for over half an hour for not giving the Border Patrol officer consent to search their cars. Other complaints include a gun being pulled on a individual, and the Border Patrol agents attempting to take someone’s cell phone. If these allegations are true, they most likely violate the existing laws on checkpoints.

The highest court of the land has only ruled on interior checkpoints once, almost forty years ago, in United States v. Martinez-Fuerte. Amado Martinez-Fuerte was transporting two illegal immigrants when he was stopped at a fixed interior checkpoint in Southern California. When asked, the two illegal immigrants admitted to their status. Martinez-Fuerte reacted by suing, saying that the checkpoint violated his Fourth Amendment right to not be subject to unreasonable searches. SCOTUS ruled that his rights were not violated, because if there is a reasonable collective suspicion, then individuals can be searched in the interest of public safety. The court stated that Border Patrol agents could briefly question and ask people for identification, without individual suspicion, if they’re at reasonably located checkpoints. The court did not give the Border Patrol the right to search vehicles or occupants without probable cause. The question in Arizona today is if the Border Patrol is abiding by this ruling.

It seems like this administrative complaint may lead to a new look at our laws. These checkpoints have expanded their focus to include more work in drug control, instead of just looking for illegal immigrants. This is problematic because Martinez-Fuerte only serves as a precedent for checkpoints searching for illegal immigrants. Currently at checkpoints, vehicles are examined by drug-sniffing dogs. In Illinois v. Caballes, the Supreme Court ruled that a drug-sniffing dogs could be used during a routine traffic stop, but no court has explicitly ruled that they can be used at Border Patrol checkpoints.

Furthermore, in 2000, the Supreme Court ruled that using these checkpoints for general law enforcement acts violates the Fourth Amendment. James Duff Lyall, the attorney who filed the complaint stated:

The restrictions in the Martinez-Fuerte ruling don’t mean that agents have to turn a blind eye to obvious evidence of drugs or crime, but if you have cases where people are not even being asked about residency status, it raises serious questions about the legitimacy of these checkpoints.

In 1976, the Supreme Court made the Martinez-Fuerte ruling because they felt that in an area with a high number of illegal immigrants, it was not unreasonable to have ID checkpoints on major roads. Using that logic as precedent, I think that it could be argued that due to the large amount of narcotics crossing the border, it is not unreasonable to have cars drive through a checkpoint where drug-sniffing dogs are present. However, there’s no legal basis for that argument yet, and this is not an excuse for the unreasonable searches that the ACLU is alleging are taking place. If the point of these checkpoints is to find drugs, a car should only have to stop for a few moments while the dog sniffs, and then be allowed to move on. Anything beyond that, or a simple examination of a person’s ID, is a violation of the Fourth Amendment. The Border Patrol in Arizona needs to realize this if they want to keep operating their checkpoints.

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Matt DeWilde (@matt_dewilde25) is a member of the American University class of 2016 majoring in politics and considering going to law school. He loves writing about politics, reading, watching Netflix, and long walks on the beach. Contact Matt at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Ken & Sharon Lotts via Flickr]

Matt DeWilde

Matt DeWilde is a member of the American University class of 2016 majoring in politics and considering going to law school. He loves writing about politics, reading, watching Netflix, and long walks on the beach. Contact Matt at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Interior Checkpoints in Arizona Draw Complaints appeared first on Law Street.

The amount of prison time doled out by courts to perpetrators of non-violent, drug crimes are often excessively severe, sometimes more than 100 years in prison. In one particular case, a man was sentenced to a lifetime behind bars for possessing a bag with traces of cocaine. In another case, a man with no prior record is now serving a 25-year prison term for selling his pain pills to an undercover informant. These two individuals are just a few of the many serving years in prison due to harsh mandatory sentencing laws.

Keeping non violent criminals incarcerated for decades leads to overcrowded conditions and billions of taxpayer dollars. The mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses have led to prisons vastly exceeding their maximum capacity. The United States has seen a 500 percent increase in the number of inmates in federal custody over the last 30 years.

The goal of these harsh laws is to deter would-be criminals from committing crimes when they realize that they could spend for the rest of their lives behind bars. This plan sounds good in theory, but has failed in practice. Hosting them is not cheap; it costs around $50,000 to keep one person in prison for one year in California alone. Although America has only five percent of the world’s population, it hosts 25 percent of the world’s prison inmates.

The issue of overcrowded prisons is alarmingly prominent in the United States, as other countries have adopted more effective means of dealing with individuals who commit minor offenses. For example, in 2001, Portugal became the first European country to abolish all criminal penalties for personal drug possession, and since then many countries around the world have followed suit. Drug users in Portugal are also provided with therapy rather than prison sentences. Research commissioned by the Cato Institute found that in the five years after the start of decriminalization, illegal drug use by teenagers declined, the rate of HIV infections transmitted via drug use dropped, deaths related to hard drugs were cut by more than half, and the number of people seeking treatment for drug addiction doubled.

Finally, the United States has realized the gravity of the situation and decided to take action. Recently, Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin and Senator Mike Lee introduced the Smarter Sentencing Act to reduce the number of harsh drug sentencing policies in the United States. Essentially, the goal of the Smarter Sentencing Act is to reserve the use of federal resources for the offenders of the most serious crimes. Lawmakers supporting this bill hope that it will cause judges to use less harsh punishments such as community service or drug therapy. Making these changes could save taxpayers billions in the first years of enactment alone.

Specifically, the Smarter Sentencing Act would amend the federal criminal code so that defendants without prior record who did not commit a violent crime receive a less severe sentence. The bill also aims to reduce the chance that prisons reach their maximum capacities and lower prison housing costs.

How would the Smarter Sentencing Act impact current laws?

Under current guidelines, a first-time drug offense involving at least 10 but not more than 20 grams of methamphetamine has a recommended sentence range of 27-33 months. Under the new guidelines, the same quantity of methamphetamine would have a sentence range for a first-time offense of 21-27 months.

Attorney General Eric Holder is urging lawmakers to fast track a solution to this problem, stating that “this over-reliance on incarceration is not just financially unsustainable. It comes with human and moral costs that are impossible to calculate.”

Because Democrats and Republicans agree that the extreme sentencing problem is a serious one, prospects are good that this bill has a chance for success. Both parties more or less concede that there is a problem when looking at the prison system in the United States. Former Vice Presidential Candidate Paul Ryan is one of the prominent conservatives expressing his support for reform of current mandatory minimum sentencing laws.

I think we had a trend in America for a long time on mandatory minimums where we took away discretion from judges. I think there’s an appreciation that that approach has some collateral damage—that that approach is missing in many ways…I think there is a new appreciation that we need to give judges more discretion in these areas.

-Paul Ryan

The push to pass the Smarter Sentencing Act is gaining momentum, as almost a year has passed since its introduction in the House in October 2013. Hopefully, with continued support for this legislation, it will soon become law and alleviate the growing problems associated with extreme mandatory minimum drug sentences.

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Marisa Mostek (@MarisaJ44) loves globetrotting and writing, so she is living the dream by writing while living abroad in Japan and working as an English teacher. Marisa received her undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado in Boulder and a certificate in journalism from UCLA. Contact Marisa at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured Image Courtesy of [Barnellbe via Wikimedia]

Marisa Mostek

Marisa Mostek loves globetrotting and writing, so she is living the dream by writing while living abroad in Japan and working as an English teacher. Marisa received her undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado in Boulder and a certificate in journalism from UCLA. Contact Marisa at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Are We Nearing the End of Failed Mandatory Minimum Sentences? appeared first on Law Street.

Washington and Colorado approved voter referendums in November 2012 to become the first states in the nation to allow recreational marijuana sales; however, the states have taken different regulatory paths. Colorado started selling recreational marijuana on January 1, 2014, while Washington’s first legal stores opened on July 8, 2014. Regulators in Washington have frequently been in contact with those in Colorado to smooth the implementation process. The infographic below shows a quick breakdown of the two states’ policies, and if you’d like to learn more about what’s going on with these rules read on to the in-depth analysis below.

Who is allowed to buy marijuana?

Colorado and Washington both regulate marijuana similarly to alcohol. Only those aged 21 and older can buy recreational weed. Walk into a store, show your ID, and you can make a purchase. Customers are limited to buying or possessing only one ounce of marijuana at a time. Rarely would anyone buy a full ounce — more commonly marijuana is sold as an eighth of an ounce. Should you need more than an ounce, however, you would not be prohibited from making multiple trips to the store in the same day.

In Colorado, buyers from out of state are limited to buying only one-quarter of an ounce at one time, while there is no restriction on purchases by out-of-state visitors in Washington. Marijuana bought in the state must then be consumed in the state. In Colorado, you can share marijuana with others as long as you don’t receive any cash. In Washington, any purchase of marijuana must be for personal consumption. In both states marijuana transactions often have to be made in cash, since credit cards cannot be used due to federal banking regulations; however, state banks in Colorado moved to set up more local credit unions and issue debit cards that can be used for marijuana purchases.

How much does marijuana cost?

In Colorado, shops opened January 1, 2014 and were met with high demand. Initially 136 shops acquired licenses from Colorado’s Marijuana Enforcement Division, but the state has set no official cap on the number of licenses it will issue. The city of Denver, however, has a two-year moratorium on new marijuana businesses. Many other cities, such as Colorado Springs, banned recreational marijuana shops altogether. In the first days of sale, prices for high-quality marijuana rose to more than $300 per ounce. NPR reports that over the weekend of July 4, 2014, prices at a large chain hovered around $85 an ounce. Other estimates show the price per gram in Colorado typically averages $16 to $20.

In Washington, initial sales are likely to lead to product shortages and higher prices. Marijuana can only be purchased in retail shops licensed by the state; however, only 24 shops were licensed for the first day of sales, so owners may initially be inclined to ration. The state set a cap of 334 licenses to be distributed in accordance with population. The Washington State Liquor Control Board still has thousands of applications to sift through. Like Colorado, many municipalities in Washington banned recreational sales of marijuana. In Seattle, with a population of 652,000 and likely the hottest market, only one shop will be open on the first day of sales. Vancouver has two shops and Spokane has three. Growers of marijuana only received their licenses in March, meaning that there has not been enough time to grow a substantial amount of marijuana. Store owners indicate they want to sell for roughly $12 per gram, but the cost per gram could rise to as much as $25. Medical marijuana dispensaries in the state average between $10 and $15 per gram. Watch for more information on the marijuana shortage below:

How much is the state making off sales?

In both states, recreational marijuana is heavily taxed. Colorado buyers face a 15 percent excise tax, 10 percent special sales tax, and a 2.9 percent standard sales tax. Various localities then add additional taxes. Colorado’s amendment dictates that the first $40 million in taxes raised annually by marijuana sales must go toward the state’s public schools. According to USA Today, Colorado collected more than $24 million in marijuana fees and taxes through April 2014. In the fiscal year beginning July 2014, the state expects to make $98 million from marijuana. Tourism also increased, likely in part due to the marijuana law — 2013-2014 was the state’s best ski season to date. Watch an overview of Colorado’s marijuana industry below:

In Washington, an excise tax of 25 percent is levied at three different points in the sale process: from grower to processor, processor to retailer, and retailer to customer. According to USA Today, Washington is expected to collect $190 million from fees and taxes over the next four years.

What restrictions do marijuana shops face?

The two states regulate shops a little differently. Both only allow sales between 8:00am and midnight, and any marijuana sold in the state must be grown in the state. Initially in Colorado, any business wanting to sell recreational marijuana already had to be an existing medical marijuana dispensary. Vendors must be residents of Colorado and undergo a background check. They must apply through the Colorado Department of Revenue’s Marijuana Enforcement Division and typically have to apply for a local license as well. Beginning October 1, 2014, new recreational facilities will be able to apply for licenses. Medical marijuana dispensaries pay a $500 application fee to get a recreational license, while new businesses face a $5,000 application fee. Annual licensing fees can range from $3,750 to $14,000. Colorado also allows companies to vertically integrate by growing, processing, and selling as a single company. Additionally, individuals are allowed to grow up to six plants for personal use.

In contrast, Washington gave medical marijuana dispensaries no edge in the application process over new businesses. The medical marijuana industry was unregulated, so the state created regulations from scratch, including protocol-testing, child-resistant packaging, and shop security systems. Vendors must be residents of the state and are subject to a background check. The law separates producers, growers, and retailers. Businesses face a $250 application fee for a license and a $1,000 annual renewal fee. The state also limits overall marijuana growing to 200 million square feet. Washington does not allow individuals to grow plants themselves.

Are edibles available?

One of the most high-profile issues Colorado faces is how to regulate marijuana edibles, which are often seen as a hassle-free way to consume marijuana. Yet several severe cases illustrated potential dangers of edibles. On March 11, 2014, a college student from Wyoming jumped from a balcony to his death after eating a potent marijuana cookie. In another case, Richard Kirk suffered severe hallucinations after allegedly taking painkillers and eating marijuana-infused candy. The hallucinations led him to shoot and kill his wife. New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd recently chronicled her experience with marijuana edibles to further heighten awareness of the issue. Colorado is aiming to make buyers aware of portion size and THC content, but is still experiencing difficulty regulating edibles and keeping them from the hands of unsuspecting children. The video below explores Colorado’s problems with edibles:

So far Washington has not approved any edible products. Edibles must first be tested and approved, so there will be a bit of a wait before they hit the Washington market.

Are there other regulations?

Smoking Areas

Both states ban smoking in public places, including in marijuana shops. The bans are enforced similar to open-container laws. In Washington, consuming in public means a fairly light $27 fine. Things can get trickier for tourists trying to find a place to consume. Only 25 percent of hotel rooms in Washington are designated as smoking, and it is unclear if hotels will permit smoking marijuana.

Driving

Driving under the influence of marijuana is illegal in both states. Anyone driving with more than five nanograms of THC per milliliter can be issued a DUI. Tests for THC are not as easy as a breathalyzer, especially since THC can linger in the body long after an initial high. If a driver was suspected of being high, an officer would likely have to drive the individual to the hospital for a blood test to get conclusive results. In Colorado, marijuana was involved in 12.5 percent of DUIs occurring in the first five months of 2014, a statistic that the state has only just begun tracking. Watch a video about DUIs below:

Other Issues

Despite the legality of recreational marijuana in these states, questions linger. Employers can still fire employees for showing up high or for testing positive, even though marijuana is legal. An in-depth look at the issue can be found here. States are also wary of consumers who may go to a number of stores to buy a small amount of marijuana at each and then sell it on the black market. The Justice Department is continuing to work on legal guidance for banks on how to deal with local retail marijuana sales. Despite these issues, the sale of marijuana has been a large success in Colorado, with voters now favoring the law by a 22-point margin after witnessing relatively smooth implementation. Should kinks in these laws be worked out, more states will look to Colorado and Washington when implementing marijuana laws of their own. Colorado has increased its regulation of marijuana since the law was first implemented and has not experienced serious consequences. More regulation of edibles in the future will likely lead other states to follow marijuana policies similar to those of Colorado and Washington.

Resources

Primary

Washington Liquor Control Board:  Fact Sheet

Additional

Time: Everything You Need to Know About Buying Legal Weed

Time: Colorado Kids are Accidentally Ingesting Pot

NPR: Washington State to Start Recreational Pot Sales

The New York Times: Still-Divided Washington Prepares for Start of Recreational Marijuana

Mercury News: Marijuana Legalization in Colorado

USA Today: With Legal Marijuana, Washington Joins Exclusive Club

CNN: 10 Things to Know About Nation’s First Recreational Shops

Denver Post: Colorado Voters Approve New Taxes on Recreational Marijuana

USA Today: Colorado, Washington Differ in Legalizing Marijuana

Brookings: Legal Marijuana: Comparing Washington and Colorado

The New York Times: Don’t Harsh Our Mellow, Dude

New York Magazine: Washington Starts Selling Legal Weed: What You Need to Know

The New York Times: Sales of Recreational Marijuana Begin in Washington State

Denver Post: A Colorado Marijuana Guide: 64 Answers to Commonly Asked Questions

Denver Post: Colorado Recreational Marijuana Industry Begins

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Alexandra Stembaugh is a senior at the University of Notre Dame studying Economics and English. She plans to go on to law school in the future. Her interests include economic policy, criminal justice, and political dramas. Contact Alexandra at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

Alexandra Stembaugh

Alexandra Stembaugh graduated from the University of Notre Dame studying Economics and English. She plans to go on to law school in the future. Her interests include economic policy, criminal justice, and political dramas. Contact Alexandra at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Legal Marijuana Laws: Colorado v. Washington appeared first on Law Street.

Fewer burglars and robbers lurk in the streets of Colorado, and not because of a Batman-style, crime-fighting vigilante. After Colorado’s legalization of recreational marijuana, skeptics believed the rate of crime would elevate if not skyrocket; however, the opposite appears to be true. Since January 2014, when recreational marijuana sales began, robberies and burglaries have decreased in Colorado.

Although a causal link between legalized recreational marijuana and the decrease in crime cannot be determined, the correlation remains. Other factors such as weather and the economy most likely influenced the lower crime rate. One of the main reasons it is important to observe these rates is that they can act as a crystal ball for other states hoping to follow Colorado’s lead. As the first state to legalize recreational marijuana, it became a guinea pig for demonstrating the effects of this legislation.

Many lawmakers and analysts predicted that the legalization of marijuana would lead to increased crime rates. For example, prior to its legalization Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey made the case that robbers would prey on marijuana businesses and their customers because they carry lots of cash and pot. This is because they are unable to open bank accounts and therefore need to keep their income in cash.

None of these fears have panned out, at least not yet.

Have we forgotten about Washington, the other state in which citizens voted to allow the purchase and use of recreational marijuana? Has the new law in the Evergreen state (potential for plenty of jokes there, along with the Mile-High city of Denver) mirrored a decrease in crime as well? The simple answer is no, because despite its new legal standing, not one Washingtonian has purchased a joint nor lone bud of Mary Jane.

For more than a year, the sale and use of recreational marijuana in Washington has been legal under Initiative 502; however, Washington residents still wait with bated breath to purchase recreational pot. Colorado residents have spoken: they voted to get high legally, and now they can. Perhaps the encouraging statistics demonstrating its decrease in crime will finally cause Washington lawmakers to speed up the enactment their law.

Why the difference between the two states? Whereas Colorado simply opened up the state’s existing medical cannabis system to recreational customers, the initiative passed in Washington required that the recreational pot business start from scratch. Although marijuana is legal to possess, there’s no way to acquire it until the state issues licenses for what the state calls its “seed-to-sale” system. Currently, this system does not exist. Would-be marijuana sellers filled out and handed in applications to acquire these licenses last November. The Washington State Liquor Control Board, the legal authority in charge of distributing these licenses, has not handed out a single one.

If and when the aspiring pot shop owners finally do get their licenses, they still must go through the tedious process of securing business permits from local authorities who are often against legal pot. Good luck to them.

If they decide to take a page from Colorado’s legislative notebook, Washington may be able to get the sale of legal marijuana up and running. Sometimes it is hard for lawmakers to move past the fear that naturally comes with enacting a new law, especially when they are the first to do so. The lower crime rate in Colorado since the legalization of marijuana should hopefully put them at ease.

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Marisa Mostek (@MarisaJ44) loves globetrotting and writing, so she is living the dream by writing while living abroad in Japan and working as an English teacher. Marisa received her undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado in Boulder and a certificate in journalism from UCLA. Contact Marisa at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured Image Courtesy of [United States Fish and Wildlife Service via Wikipedia]

Marisa Mostek

Marisa Mostek loves globetrotting and writing, so she is living the dream by writing while living abroad in Japan and working as an English teacher. Marisa received her undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado in Boulder and a certificate in journalism from UCLA. Contact Marisa at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Colorado Crime Down Since Pot Legalization; is Washington to Follow? appeared first on Law Street.

In a last minute stay, Justice Samuel Alito ordered the immediate halt to a Missouri man’s execution. Russell Bucklew, who was convicted of murder, kidnapping, and rape in 1996, was scheduled to be executed Wednesday evening, but his attorneys had successfully appealed to delay the execution on the grounds that the intended drug cocktail can create the same complications as the one used on an Oklahoma death row inmate earlier this month. That execution caused massive controversy after the inmate ended up seizing and having a heart attack instead of the usual quick death.

The Supreme Court usually keeps its nose out of execution cases, which makes Alito’s action very rare. Opponents of the drug mixtures that are currently used on death row inmates may herald this as a victory. Traditional drugs that used to execute inmates are in short supply, forcing prisons to resort to mixing drugs together from companies that are not very anxious to reveal their sources. In a Georgia, the state Supreme Court ruled against a death row inmate suing to find out where his killer drugs were coming from. With that information, the inmate’s lawyers argued, they can then proceed with investigations into whether the drugs being supplied would constitute cruel and unusual punishment; however, the Georgia Supreme Court decided 5-2 that protection from harassment for the pharmaceutical company was more important than the right to know where drugs came from.

With Alito’s stay, capital punishment is set to become the next legal debate on the national stage. As capital punishment continues, there is greater outcry as to why it is acceptable to use shady drugs supplied by anonymous pharmaceutical companies. After all, isn’t it cruel and unusual that inmates are not being told where their killer drugs are coming from? Maybe the Supreme Court can decide.

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Dennis Futoryan (@dfutoryan) is an undergrad with an eye on a bright future in the federal government. Living in New York, he seeks to understand how to solve the problematic issues plaguing Gothamites, as well as educating the youngest generations on the most important issues of the day.

Featured image courtesy of [Ken Piorkowski via Wiipedia].

Dennis Futoryan

Dennis Futoryan is a 23-year old New York Law School student who has his sights set on constitutional and public interest law. Whenever he gets a chance to breathe from his law school work, Dennis can be found scouring social media and examining current events to educate others about what’s going on in our world. Contact Dennis at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post SCOTUS Steps Up Amid Execution Controversy appeared first on Law Street.

During the summer and fall of 2013, a drug called “Molly” started to make headlines. As a 20-something, I’d of course heard about it before, but in recent months, the term has become mainstream. In a stretch of a few weeks last summer, four deaths were blamed on overdoses of Molly, which is just the common name for MDMA.

Molly, or MDMA, is what is classified as a “designer drug,” meaning that it’s a drug not naturally occurring or produced, like marijuana. Instead, a designer drug is initially created in a lab, by experimenting on existing drugs or compounds.

Designer drugs are notoriously difficult to regulate and make illegal, simply because of chemistry. There are essentially limitless combinations of drugs that can be synthesized. Anytime a substance is specifically banned, it’s pretty easy to make a variant of that substance, or discover a new substance altogether. 

A man named Dr. David Caldicott founded a group called WENDINOS, an acronym for “Welsh Emerging Drugs & Identification of Novel Substances Project,” which catalogs and tests new drugs. There’s a similar organization in Australia, also founded by Caldicott and called, ACTINOS. There may be similar organizations in the United States, but if so, I was not able to find any. Most regulation and cataloging seems to come from the US government.

Caldicott described the problem with the evolution of designer drugs, stating, “I compare the phenomenon of illicit drug use to influenza. During the course of a year influenza changes slightly, which is why you get a new jab every year. But every 10 to 15 years we see a major shift.”

The other interesting thing about these designer drugs is that they’re often legal…at least for a short period of time. They can be developed much more quickly than laws can be passed to regulate them. The law does eventually catch up, to be sure, but it’s usually at least a few months or a year after the drug has seen some moderate use.

There’s also something to be said for the use of the internet in this, for lack of a better description, grey market. The internet has proliferated this market in two ways. First, it allows chemists and other designer drug marketers to share their information, experiments, tips, and successes. Once a chemical formula has been derived, it can be shared and made by anyone who has the same equipment.

The internet also allows substances to be sold on a virtual, unregulated international market. Mike Power, an investigative journalist with Medium, wrote a powerful piece about his experience with this market. He described how he was able to order a substance that wasn’t necessarily illegal in the UK from a Chinese chemical manufacturer. He gave a rather flimsy excuse for why he needed the chemicals, in fact, scientifically speaking, the excuse was blatantly false. But the Chinese company didn’t look into his reasoning, and a few weeks later sent him the chemically synthesized compound in powder form. If Power was a drug dealer, as opposed to a journalist, he could turn around and sell that drug for a big profit. And the entire thing would probably be legal.

What’s especially concerning about this whole thing is that we have no idea what these synthesized drugs could do in the long term. We know the long term effects of marijuana, cocaine, and any other mainstream drug. We even have some handle on the long term effects of abusing prescription drugs, such as Vicodin. But when these compounds are being created and changed out so quickly, there’s no real telling what they can do.

That’s incredibly scary. Many of the Molly-caused deaths this year are believed to be because of impure substances mixed in with the drugs. When you consider the willingness of young people to take Molly from their friends or from dealers without any certification of what they are putting in their body, it’s terrifying to imagine what these unregulated new drugs could do. But what can be done? As Power put it, “And here lies the problem. We can ban drugs. But we can’t ban chemistry, and we can’t ban medical research.”

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Anneliese Mahoney (@AMahoney8672) is Lead Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Derek Gavey via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Scary Side of Designer Drugs appeared first on Law Street.

The Human Rights Watch is an independent organization dedicated to protecting human rights domestically and around the globe. This week, they have released an extensive 126-page report called “An Offer You Can’t Refuse: How US Federal Prosecutors Force Drug Defendants to Plead Guilty.”

The argument focuses on the issue of mandatory minimums—certain crimes in which convictions automatically require a minimum punishment, such as a given amount of years in prison. One example of a mandatory minimum is the three-strikes law, which requires that if an individual is found guilty of a third felony charge, they have a mandated harsher sentence. Mandatory minimums are especially controversial in drug cases—there are certain types of drugs like painkillers and hard drugs that mandate harsh sentences.

Supporters argue that certain crimes deserve uniformly appropriate punishments. After all, we’ve all seen what happens when judges are allowed sole discretion in deciding punishments—the recent case of Stacey Dean Rambold, who was given only a 31-day sentence for raping an underage girl. Critics of the law argue that it does not allow the accused to be charged on a more appropriate case-by-case basis. They also argue that it leads to a countless number of unfair convictions and sentences, such as these examples. Ninety-seven percent choose to plead guilty.

Another issue with mandatory minimums is that they only refer to types of drugs and amounts, not the actual job of the person being charged. For example, a kid who is working as a courier can be charged with selling large quantities of drugs, instead of the actual drug dealer facing charges.

The report released by the Human Rights Watch details how these mandatory minimum requirements in drug cases are being manipulated. Prosecutors give defendants the choice: either go to trial, and if convicted, face harsh mandatory minimums, or plead guilty to a lower sentence than the mandatory minimum. According to this report, they also threaten to add charges to the crimes, such as prior drug convictions, or if they had a weapon at the time they were arrested.

Given that some of these mandatory minimums can be a life sentence, this offer is incredibly enticing.

The Human Rights Watch report looked at a number of cases in which defendants pled not guilty, and the results were devastating. For example, a woman named Sandra Avery, who was characterized as a small-time drug dealer, was offered a sentence of 10 years for possessing 50 grams of crack cocaine with intent to sell. She turned it down, and instead chose to go to trial. She is now serving life in prison without parole.

The HRW report calls this a “trial penalty.” They explain that a trial is a right within the United States, but that for those who have been forced to plead guilty for fear of an unreasonable sentence, that right has been taken away. The relevant statistics that the HRW gathered are convincing—as noted in the report, “the average sentence for federal drug offenders who pled guilty was five years, four months; for those convicted after trial, the average sentence was sixteen years.”

This report will most likely add to a growing sentiment that mandatory minimums need to be revisited. After all, Attorney General Eric Holder has made his feelings on them clear—he has stated that the laws need to change. Hopefully, this report will continue that discussion, and changes will be made to ensure that everyone does receive the due process of law.

[Human Rights Watch]

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Anneliese Mahoney (@AMahoney8672) is Lead Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Tori Rector via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post How U.S. Prosecutors Force Drug Defendants to Plead Guilty appeared first on Law Street.

Recently, Johnson & Johnson had a $2.2 billion settlement, rendering it the third highest pharmaceutical fraud settlement made with the United States government. Will this trend continue, or will Johnson & Johnson learn from their mistakes as well as those of their predecessors?

Although consultant pharmacists purported to provide “independent recommendations based on their clinical judgment, Johnson & Johnson viewed the pharmacists as an ‘extension of [J&J’s] sales force,” the Justice Department claimed. That, more or less, is what Johnson & Johnson was sued for; drug-makers are legally only allowed to promote their product for cures in the way that the FDA has approved of them.

In a class action case, Johnson & Johnson was said to have wrongfully marketed their drugs created to treat schizophrenia, Risperdal and Invega, as dementia medication for elderly patients. Furthermore, the company allegedly lied about Risperdal’s side effects and withheld information that the medication led to diabetes. Although legally settling, the company still denied the allegations. Claiming innocence, Johnson & Johnson stated, “the settlement of the civil allegations is not an admission of any liability or wrongdoing, and the company expressly denies the government’s civil allegations.” In defending their drug, they claimed Risperdal to be “safe and effective for its approved indications”, and “an important treatment option for people with serious mental illness.”

Sure, the government has cracked down on Johnson & Johnson, and now the company is paying $2.2 billion, but does that actually mean anything? Johnson & Johnson has a net worth of $65.03 billion. In preparation for this case, the company set aside money to pay their penalties, rendering the fine insignificant for a company of great wealth and success.

So, will anything change from this settlement? Michael Ullmann, Vice President and General Counsel of Johnson & Johnson reflected, “today we reached closure on complex legal matters spanning almost a decade. This resolution [which] allows us to move forward and continue to focus on delivering innovative solutions that improve and enhance the health and well-being of patients around the world.”

I speculate that the government will tighten the reigns and harshly proctor the company, as well as extend this strict scrutiny to others drug-providers. But as a result of the simple nature of medications, being that they were released to the public shortly after their creation, and the system of pharmaceutical representatives, a heavily corrupted system, long term changes or consequential changes seem extremely unlikely to occur.

Shedding light on the impact of this case, Attorney General Eric Holder said “every time pharmaceutical companies engage in this type of conduct, they corrupt medical decisions by healthcare providers, jeopardize the public health, and take money out of taxpayers’ pockets.” Pharmaceutical representation is a capitalist system that encourages sales people to push drugs onto doctors, hospitals, and nursing homes which economically resonates, and yet morally conflicts with our way of conducting business. People become less important than businesses, as finances dictate our capitalist ways. C’est la vie. Being third in the country sounds significant, but the ranking, like China’s GDP, its just an arbitrary number in this case, meaningless.

[NPR] [NYTimes] [CNN] [J&J]

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Featured image courtesy of [DraconianRain via Flickr]

Vasudha Sadana

The post Our Everyday Drug Dealer appeared first on Law Street.

I have made known how I feel about Toronto Mayor Rob Ford.  The cliff notes version is that I think he is a joke.  My colleague Annaliese wrote a pretty funny sendup of him as well.  He has been discussed ad nauseum in the media as of late, mainly for being a mess of a politician and human being.

A few hundred miles away, a different city has been talking about a different politician. Rep. Radel is a freshman congressman in the U.S. House of Representatives and represents Florida’s 19th Congressional District.  In October, he was arrested for purchasing three-and-a-half grams of cocaine from an undercover police officer. This activity, of course, is frowned upon.

Rep. Trey Radel, courtesy of U.S. Government (Office of Congressman Trey Radel) via Flickr.

Ok, I have to be honest.  I did not bat an eye when I read about Radel and his nose candy purchase.  Person in a position of power decides that, in their free time, they want to play Tony Montana; also, today ends in “Y.”  Next controversy?

I got to thinking why I was so incensed about Mayor Ford, and so indifferent regarding Rep. Radel.  Here are my findings:

Their positions

Trey Radel is in his first term as a U.S. Representative. He was sworn in ten months ago, and is at the bottom of the Congressional totem pole.  In addition, there are literally 434 other people who do  the exact same job as Rep. Radel. There is enough of a buffer that a coke binge would not stop the wheels of legislation.  However Radel’s arrest has drawn the ire of many because he recently voted to drug test recipients of public monies like food stamps and welfare (the gall!). His reasoning: if you receive government money as a public benefit, you cannot do drugs. If you receive government money as a result of a job that you are doing, drugs are okay.

Rob Ford, on the other hand, is the executive of Toronto. You know, Toronto, the largest city in Canada.  Imagine the uproar if the mayor of a city like New York said that he was really drunk when he smoked crack?  Bloomberg would never. New York would also have de Blasio’s head.  It would not fly in any major American city: not Los Angeles, not Boston, not Washington, D.C.—oh wait.  Nevermind. Additionally, a mayorship inherently has more immediate power than a member of Congress could have from their job, and the duties of a mayor’s job has a more direct effect on constituents.

Their Images

Trey Radel is a 37-year old Floridian and former news anchor. The guys is good looking. Unfortunately, that helps.  Look, this is not the first time looks have been advantageous to a politician.  He is a favorite of the tea party, hip enough to tweet, and has a young family. Finally, cocaine has a different social connotation than crack. This dates back to the Reagan Administration and the war on drugs.  Drugs are still drugs, of course, but cocaine is more widely accepted as recreational or social.

Rob Ford, on the other hand, looks like a cartoon character.  He has been a public figure long enough to have many televised gaffes that have since been turned into .gifs many times over.  Additionally, crack is embarrassing. When Whitney Houston was accused of crack cocaine use, she explicitly stated that she made too much money to ever smoke crack cocaine.  The Chapelle Show’s Tyrone Biggums character was a hilariously accurate rendering of how most people imagine users of crack cocaine. To imagine the mayor of Toronto smoking crack, then, is particularly jarring.

Rob Ford, courtesy of Shaun Merritt via Flickr.

Their Reactions

Almost a month after his arrest, Radel’s office released statements that seemed to follow the tried and true “politician in trouble” response.  He acknowledged that he had a problem and wanted to take a leave of absence from the House of Representatives.  He mentioned that he’d let himself, his family, and his constituents down. His actions immediately after the arrest made it seem like he thought that the incident would remain under the radar.  This hypothesis is bolstered by the fact that, according to reports, he did not tell senior Congressional officials until recently. In the days since the widespread dissemination of his arrest details, Radel has vowed to seek treatment for his addictions.

Rob Ford’s reaction was atypical, to say the least.  He took Bill Clinton’s “definition of ‘is’ is” and ran it sixty yards to a touchdown in the game of “most ridiculous political excuses”.  You’ll recall that the Mayor said that he never lied, but instead was asked the incorrect question, which subsequently elicited an improper response.  Had the obviously inept reporter simply asked if he’d ever smoked crack, well then the answer would have been a resounding yes.  Duh.  Why? Because it’s the truth.  THE TRUTH.  Not habitually, and not voluntarily- he was just blackout drunk.  This nonsensical response is what one would expect from a crackhead.  With Ford, the jokes right themselves.

The Aftermath

What it comes down to is the potential for redemption. In America, we love a good comeback.  This is Radel’s first public slip up, and if he is smart it will be the last.  In addition, he is not the first member of Congress to be in this position. He can make a successful political comeback, and if he plays his cards right could even run for higher office.  Oh America, you truly are the land of dreams!

Ford, on the other hand, is in uncharted territory.  His behavior since the admission of smoking crack has gotten worse, believe it or not.  I mean, the man tried to tackle someone during a vote of no confidence of the Toronto legislature. He has taken the ultimate step towards irreverence and signed on for a reality television show. There is really nowhere for him to go but down- let’s just hope he puts the pipe down.

[Washington Post] [Post] [CNN]

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Featured image courtesy of [F l a n k e r via Wikipedia]

Peter Davidson II

Peter Davidson is a recent law school graduate who rants about news & politics and raves over the ups & downs of FUNemployment in the current legal economy. Contact Peter at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post A Tale of Two Politicians appeared first on Law Street.

The Internet black market is a fascinating place. It relies on security, word of mouth, and above all, anonymity. It has a unique language and its own currency. Bitcoin, allows users to directly transfer a high encrypted “currency” without an intermediary financial institution. It has evolved into an ideal tool for illegal transactions. For more on Bitcoin see: Bitcoin Pro-Con.

Many illegal transactions made through Bitcoin technology were through a site called “Silk Road.”  Silk Road presented itself as an anonymous marketplace and sold mainly illegal drugs, particularly MDMA, ecstasy, LSD, marijuana, prescription drugs, and heroin. On October 2, 2013 Silk Road’s founder and operator Ross Ulbricht, known on the site as “Dread Pirate Roberts,” was arrested. The site was seized and rendered unusable by the FBI.

The importance of Silk Road to the online black marketplace truly cannot be understated. According to Quartz, at some point, 82% of Bitcoin in existence traveled through Silk Road. NPR called it “the Amazon.com of illegal drugs.” Carnegie Mellon student Nicolas Christin wrote a paper in November of 2012 that estimated Silk Road’s revenue at $92,000 per month.

The general public’s reaction to the news that Silk Road had been shutdown last week centered on a question: How in the world did such a site even exist?

It does seem fairly unbelievable. We are reminded every day that what we do online is almost never anonymous. From bad Facebook photos taken at a club on Friday night, to politicians accidentally tweeting inappropriate pictures, our online selves are constantly on display.

Silk Road and other sites on the so-called Deep Web, the websites that not everyone can access, make their livings off the ability to provide anonymity. Silk Road was not accessible through a regular browser, like Chrome, Internet Explorer, or Firefox. Special software called Tor exists, which does its best to hide web browsing and traffic. Every facet of the software minimizes the traces of its users and Silk Road was only available through it. Furthermore, Silk Road itself contained heavy security features, such as password protection and the exclusive use of Bitcoin.

Another question on many average American’s minds must have been: Why should we care if some online drug marketplace gets shut down?

There are a few reasons to care. First, certain drugs have recently become increasingly mainstream. For example, MDMA, sometimes called Molly, has dominated headlines lately. According to the Global Drug Survey, conducted by an independent institute of the same name, in 2012 26.5% of US respondents had tried MDMA in the last 12 months, but in 2013, 60.9% reported having tried the popular club drug. While these surveys are obviously not representative of the United States as a whole, this demonstrates the growing share that MDMA represents in US drug use.

A site like Silk Road has played an important role in this spike. Before the ability to buy online, really the only way to get drugs was to go through an in-person dealer. It’s easy to imagine purchasing drugs online is simpler and safer. It’s also important to note that the drugs purchased through Silk Road are in some ways more verifiable than street drugs. Silk Road allows reviews of sellers, creating a way to warn other users if drugs are anything but pure. In order to be a seller, you must go through an extensive vetting process. Immediately after Silk Road’s closure, a Reddit user tested Silk Road MDMA versus two samples bought on the street. The Silk Road sample was significantly purer than the unverified street-bought samples. I am not, of course, advocating that anyone try MDMA. However, the argument that testable, verifiable MDMA bought online is safer than street MDMA from a dealer is absolutely valid.

Silk Road’s fall will slow the online drug market, but it won’t topple the industry. A similar website called Sheep Marketplace is already taking over some of Silk Road’s market share. Providers will get trickier, sites will get more encrypted, and Deep Web will simply get deeper.

[Quartz]

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Featured image courtesy of [Drug Enforcement Agency via Wikipedia]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

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