A years-long, largely bi-partisan effort to reform the criminal justice system in the U.S., the world’s preeminent jailer, is being undermined by Jeff Sessions. On Friday, the attorney general issued a memo directing federal prosecutors to “charge and pursue the most serious, readily provable offense,” with the “goal of achieving just and consistent results in federal cases.”

Sessions’ memo, issued after weeks of harsh-on-crime rhetoric, effectively reverses a 2013 memo issued by then-attorney general Eric Holder, which directed prosecutors to take a case-by-case approach, and to seek the toughest sentences only for violent offenders. The memo returns the Justice Department to a sentencing approach similar to the one taken by the George W. Bush Administration.

“This is a key part of President Trump’s promise to keep America safe,” Sessions said on Friday, after releasing the short memo to the public. “We know that drugs and crime go hand in hand,” he said. “Drug trafficking is an inherently violent business.” Sessions, who spent the height of the 1980s crack epidemic as a prosecutor, added U.S. attorneys “deserve to be un-handcuffed and not micromanaged from Washington.”

According to the Coalition for Public Safety, an organization that partners with both progressive and conservative groups to push criminal justice reform, there are upwards of two million people incarcerated in the U.S., a 500 percent increase over the past 30 years. One quarter of the world’s entire prisoner population is in the U.S. In a statement in response to Sessions’ memo, the group’s president Steve Hawkins, along with U.S. Justice Action Network’s Holly Harris, said:

Research has shown, time and again, that lengthy prison terms for lower-level offenders do not increase public safety. Federal prosecutors have a responsibility to enforce the law firmly, but need the flexibility to do so in ways that will best serve their communities and protect public safety. That’s why we have and continue to support congressional efforts to reform sentencing.

“Locking up people who don’t pose a threat to public safety is a waste of taxpayer money and law enforcement resources, and it doesn’t deter crime,” they added. Congress failed to pass a bipartisan reform bill last year, despite widespread support, and now, with the Justice Department’s shift in tone and official policy, a federal effort is less likely. States, even Republican bastions with high prison populations, are now leading the charge to reform how non-violent drug offenders are punished and treated.

While there are some Republicans who oppose a more lenient approach to incarceration, many prominent Republican senators–and activists like the Koch brothers–back reform. Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT), a prominent conservative advocate for criminal justice reform, wrote on Twitter on Friday: “To be tough on crime we have to be smart on crime. That is why criminal justice reform is a conservative issue”

Sessions’ memo does allow for “circumstances in which good judgement would lead a prosecutor to conclude that a strict application” of the new policy is “not warranted.” Holder, who was the attorney general from 2009 to 2015, responded to Sessions’ directive in a statement. “This absurd reversal is driven by voices who have not only been discredited but until now have been relegated to the fringes of this debate,” he said.

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Uber leadership is scrambling to react this week to the sexual harassment allegations of former employee Susan J. Fowler, whose blog post on her experience at Uber has gone viral. Fowler describes how she was repeatedly sexually harassed and discriminated against yet every time she made a report to her managers or to human resources, she was dismissed. Fowler’s story throws a spotlight on sexism in an industry that loves to paint itself as forward thinking and inclusive, and her experience was not an isolated case–as Fowler’s blog gained traction, women from a range of companies began sharing their experiences with sexual harassment in the tech world.

Uber’s reputation already took a hit this winter when #deleteUber began to trend after Uber failed to condemn the Trump Administration’s immigration ban and continued sending cars to airports during a tax driver protest. After Fowler’s blog post, the deleting trend is back in full force. With rival Lyft picking up some of the client base that was once so loyal to Uber, the company’s reputation–and financial success–could begin to crumble.

Uber CEO Travis Kalanick has stated that he was disturbed and shocked by Fowler’s experience and within a matter of hours had hired former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to conduct a review of sexual harassment claims at the company. This will be Holder’s second venture into creating a more inclusive Silicon Valley brand. After Airbnb received widespread complaints of discrimination from hosts, Holder and Laura Murphy, former head of the ACLU, were hired to craft an anti-discrimination policy for the company. Airbnb now has hosts accept its anti-discrimination rules before they can become part of the Airbnb community, and while there have been arguments that the rules are not actually effective and that they don’t go far enough, the new rules were at least a step in the right direction. Holder has always been a staunch advocate for civil rights and was fully committed to women’s rights during his tenure as attorney general–but is he truly being asked to overhaul Uber’s culture or simply being brought on for publicity reasons?

There are doubts that Holder’s team will be able to defeat sexism in an industry where women are rarely given a seat at the table within a nation where sexual harassment has gone unpunished for decades and where the sitting president has bragged about assaulting women. Uber, like most companies across Silicon Valley and around the world, prioritizes results over respect for women in the workplace. Multiple interviews from current and former Uber employees have revealed that the work environment can be very hostile but that no one reports it out of fear of retaliation.

Now that Fowler’s case has shone a spotlight on a reality that we often ignore, Uber has at least taken steps to acknowledge the problem immediately, both by hiring Holder and by issuing a message that acknowledges Fowler’s case when users try to delete the app. However, over the coming weeks as media attention shifts, Uber may have minimal incentives to improve its sexual harassment policies. Uber is still an exciting company for any young developer to work at, and while Fowler’s case may give female programmers and engineers pause, there is little reason to think that many male candidates will choose not to work at Uber because of Fowler’s story.

The most effective boycott would be taking #deleteUber a step further–don’t work for Uber. If Uber takes a hit in its hiring pool, that is when it will truly feel the pressure to reform. It is the responsibility of young, qualified candidates who are working in Silicon Valley to turn down offers at companies that subscribe to a toxic work environment that devalues female voices. Holder will be working to create new policies and investigate past offenses, but his investigation will be futile if we continue to ignore the results and sign up for Uber just the same.

Jillian Sequeira

Jillian Sequeira was a member of the College of William and Mary Class of 2016, with a double major in Government and Italian. When she’s not blogging, she’s photographing graffiti around the world and worshiping at the altar of Elon Musk and all things Tesla. Contact Jillian at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com

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A prosecutor is “an administrator of justice” whose duties are “to seek justice, not merely to convict.” According to the American Bar Association,

It is an important function of the prosecutor to seek to reform and improve the administration of criminal justice. When inadequacies or injustices in the substantive or procedural law come to the prosecutor’s attention, he or she should stimulate efforts for remedial action.

Chances to combat these injustices often occur in the strong role of prosecutorial discretion in determining someone’s prison sentence. Many argue that prosecutorial discretion is such an enormous responsibility that prosecutors have the power to be strong social justice advocates. Many others, however, suggest that prosecutorial discretion leads to tremendous racial disparities in sentencing. So the question is: Is it possible for prosecutors to be social justice advocates? Or is the criminal justice system overall too big for prosecutors to make any social justice-oriented, system-wide changes from within?

In Defense of Prosecution?

In her Brennan Center post entitled “Prosecutors Can Play a Role in Ending Mass Incarceration”–which argues exactly that–Lauren-Brooke Eisen, Senior Counsel at the Brennan Center’s Justice Program reminds us of the various roles of prosecutors:

The reality is that prosecutors play a unique and immensely powerful role in the criminal justice system. They decide who gets charged, and most importantly, with what crime, and what plea bargains to accept and reject. Sentencing recommendations from prosecutors carry immense weight with judges.

Largely due to this prosecutorial discretion, federal courts impose 20 percent longer sentences on Black men than they do on white men who are convicted of committing similar crimes. Courts similarly impose longer sentences on Latino men than they do for white men convicted for similar crimes.

Many interpret these roles as evidence of prosecutorial racism, because prosecutors determine the course of such huge pieces of defendant’s cases. The immense racial disparities in charging, plea bargaining, and sentencing are all directly traceable to prosecutors’ structurally informed choices. However, Eisen uses this information to argue that the point at which a prosecutor encounters a defendant’s case is already beyond the point at which interference is needed. Eisen asserts that prosecutors can and should play a role in preventing crimes and recidivism.

This is consistent with both the Brennan Center’s recommendations that it should be the priority of federal prosecutors to reduce incarceration, recidivism, and violence, and with former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder’s shifting priorities for law enforcement. Calling for a “Smart on Crime” approach, Holder has stated:

Of course, as we refine our approach and reject the ineffective practice of calling for stringent sentences against those convicted of low-level, nonviolent crimes, we also need to refine the metrics we use to measure success; to evaluate the steps we’re taking; and to assess the effectiveness of new criminal justice priorities.  In the Smart on Crime era, it’s no longer adequate – or appropriate – to rely on outdated models that prize only enforcement, as quantified by numbers of prosecutions, convictions, and lengthy sentences, rather than taking a holistic view.

Prosecutors wishing to pursue such a holistic approach may learn about doing so by exploring resources such as those provided by the Vera Institute of Justice’s Prosecution and Racial Justice Program.

Prosecutors and Restorative Justice

When writing of the extremely large roles prosecutors play in determining the course of the lives of people accused of crimes, activist and scholar Angela Davis argues that:

Whether or not prosecutors intentionally or unconsciously discriminate against defendants of color in the charging and plea-bargaining processes, their decisions–even the race-neutral ones–may cause or exacerbate racial disparities. Their tremendous power and discretion is often exercised in ways that produce unintended and undesirable consequences. However, that same power and discretion can be used to remedy the problem.

Some of these remedies may include ensuring that alternatives to incarceration are widely available across the country. One way that prosecutors can provide alternatives to incarceration for people convicted of committing crimes is through restorative justice processes. Restorative justice is defined by the National Council on Crime and Delinquency as:

Restorative justice offers alternatives to our traditional juvenile and criminal justice systems and harsh school discipline processes. Rather than focusing on punishment, restorative justice seeks to repair the harm done. At its best, through face-to-face dialogue, restorative justice results in consensus-based plans that meet victim-identified needs in the wake of a crime. This can take many forms, most notably conferencing models, victim-offender dialogue, and circle processes. In applications with youth, it can prevent both contact with the juvenile justice system and school expulsions and suspensions. Restorative justice also holds the potential for victims and their families to have a direct voice in determining just outcomes, and reestablishes the role of the community in supporting all parties affected by crime. Several restorative models have been shown to reduce recidivism and, when embraced as a larger-scale solution to wrongdoing, can minimize the social and fiscal costs of crime.

By utilizing prosecutorial discretion to refer people convicted of crimes to restorative processes instead of being incarcerated, prosecutors can avoid contributing to mass incarceration and can avoid inflicting the devastating collateral consequences of incarceration. Restorative justice alternatives are currently being used successfully in piecemeal initiatives across the country in schools to avoid suspensions and expulsions that contribute to the school-to-prison pipeline. However, many criticize practitioners and advocates of  restorative justice for staying within the overall criminal justice system because restorative justice works within the system and assumes that there are equal conditions to “restore,” it arguably ignores the fundamental injustices that shape mass incarceration to begin with. Therefore, prosecutors who attempt to advance social justice ends with restorative justice alternatives to incarceration may make positive differences in individual people’s cases, but have an arguably limited impact on mass incarceration as a whole.

#PlotTwist: Changing Who Gets Prosecuted

Along these same lines, some prosecutors may also attempt to advance social justice goals through the prosecution of corporations that are exploiting human labor, perpetuating abuses, and damaging the environment. Critics of these approaches argue that this kind of prosecution is not holistic: it addresses individuals and individual corporations, not the systems that facilitate the abuses in the first place.

Similarly, it is possible for prosecutors to specialize in criminal and civil cases against cops who discriminate and violently abuse their power. Certainly, many social justice advocates actively demand more prosecution of cops. Much of the recent #BlackLivesMatter uprisings recently have been focusing on the fact that prosecutors don’t tend to charge cops who beat and/or murder people of color.

However, many criticize these attempts, too, because they exist only within an already racialized system, thereby reinforcing the power of the criminal justice system that created mass incarceration to begin with. When social justice advocates–or prosecutors–try to use the criminal justice system for social justice aims, they are implying that the criminal justice system does, in fact, deliver justice, when many believe that it does not.

As the prison abolitionist blog Prison Culture published in a post in the wake of George Zimmerman murdering Trayvon Martin in 2012, prosecuting cops or vigilantes who target people of color in the name of “justice” serves to reinforce people’s beliefs that they should turn to the criminal justice system for solutions:

I think that making the main focus of our activism with respect to Trayvon’s killing the prosecution of George Zimmerman is short-sighted. Additionally, it does nothing to address the root causes of racism and oppression which were surely the fuel for this murder. For black people, our history on issues of crime, law, order, and punishment is complex and usually conflicting. In this moment, I question why we as black people who know that there is no “justice” in the legal system are expending the majority of our energy demanding “justice” from said system. How are we going to find “justice” in the prosecution of Zimmerman? The answer is quite simply that we will not.

Attorney and author Paul Butler generalizes this frustration to the role of prosecutors in general. In a forum at NYU in 2009 (see video above), Butler disagreed with moderator Anthony Barkow about the potential role of prosecutors in serving social justice ends:

Butler contended that with racial profiling by police and mandatory sentences for many drug crimes, prosecutors have little power to fight these problems from the inside. To answer the question at the center of the debate, the efforts of good people would be wasted as prosecutors, in Butler’s view. Barkow, however, said that attorneys, even when they are not the lead prosecutor, can and do make discretionary decisions that allow them to work within the law to have influential voices in cases. ‘Supervisors will often defer, extensively in my experience, to the line prosecutors,’ Barkow said. ‘So the line prosecutors making all these discretionary decisions are really kind of driving the bus most of the time…Butler’s overarching position on how good people can and should behave in regards to our system of justice was quite clear, provocative, and sobering.’ He maintained that the way to fight social and racial injustice was not to be a part of the institutions that help to further it. ‘The determination of who goes to criminal court in chains…should not depend so much on race and class,’ Butler said in conclusion. ‘As long as it does, we need people who believe in social justice and racial justice to stand up, to be strong, and to refuse to be complicit.’

So, Can Prosecutors be Social Justice Advocates?

While injustices in the overall criminal justice system make it hard or even impossible for prosecutors to be social justice advocates from within the system, there may be piecemeal, individual roles for prosecutors to play toward incrementally achieving some social justice goals amid broader injustices in the criminal justice system.

Resources

American Bar Association: Prosecution Function

Open Society Foundation: Racial Disparity in Sentencing

Leadership Conference: Race and Prosecutorial Discretion

Brennan Center for Justice: Federal Prosecution for the 21st Century

American Civil Liberties Union: Words From Prison: The Collateral Consequences of Incarceration

Race, Racism, and the Law: Prosecutors as the Most Powerful Actor in the Criminal Justice System

Brennan Center for Justice: Prosecutors Can Play Role in Ending Mass Incarceration

School Book: Alternatives to Suspension: Inside a ‘Restorative Justice’ High School

Partnership for Safety and Justice: Restorative and Transformative Justice: A Comparison

Nation: Why It’s Impossible to Indict a Cop

Prison Culture: Trayvon Martin and Black People for the Carceral State

Crunk Feminist Collective: Trayvon Martin and Prison Abolition

New York University Law: Butler and Barkow Discuss the Role of Prosecutors in Social and Racial Justice

Jennifer Polish

Jennifer Polish is an English PhD student at the CUNY Graduate Center in NYC, where she studies non/human animals and the racialization of dis/ability in young adult literature. When she’s not yelling at the computer because Netflix is loading too slowly, she is editing her novel, doing activist-y things, running, or giving the computer a break and yelling at books instead. Contact Jennifer at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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After a lot of speculation and scrutiny, the Comcast/Time Warner Cable deal is officially dead in the water. The proposed acquisition deal, which would have brought 30 million customers into the folds of a single company, had raised concerns for many about the potential of a monopoly. Now, however, those concerns are no longer relevant, as both companies have announced that they won’t be moving forward with the $45.2 billion deal.

The companies appear to have been scared off after moves by the Justice Department (DOJ) and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Rumors indicated that DOJ wasn’t too happy with the proposed merger–Attorney General Eric Holder was allowing a lawsuit to move forward that could block the merger. The FCC was also leaning toward holding a hearing on it. Usually FCC hearings aren’t a great sign when it comes to these kinds of deals, after all, it was viewed as the proverbial nail in the coffin to the proposed AT&T and T-Mobile merger a few years ago.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler spoke after the companies announced their intentions to abandon the deal, saying:

Today, an online video market is emerging that offers new business models and greater consumer choice. The proposed merger would have posed an unacceptable risk to competition and innovation, including to the ability of online video providers to reach and serve consumers.

Holder also applauded the decision the companies had made not to move forward.

Individuals and advocacy groups alike argued against the merger, claiming that it would hurt consumers. Advocacy group Common Cause’s President Miles Rapoport stated about the end to the merger:

As we saw in February when the FCC adopted strong rules to protect the free flow of information online, citizen voices can still make a difference in our government’s decision making. More than 800,000 Americans told the FCC that the Comcast/Time Warner Cable merger would be bad for competition and innovation; their arguments were well-founded and have now carried the day. This is their victory.

So what’s next for the cable industry? Those in the know have speculated that Time Warner Cable may seek a merger with Charter Communications instead, under the assumption that two smaller companies combining would set off fewer red flags. That seems like a relatively likely outcome. John Malone who heads up the group that owns Charter Communications said last November, “Hell, yes” he’d buy Time Warner Cable if the Comcast deal fell through. If those two were to combine, Charter would become the second largest cable company in the United States–Comcast would still hold the number one seat. Conversely, others are speculating that Time Warner Cable will acquire a smaller company itself. Regardless of whether or not this particular deal has fallen through, we should probably still expect to see mergers between big cable and internet companies.

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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Logic tells us that if two wrongs don’t make a right, then many, many wrongs can’t possibly make any sort of right either. That’s all I could think about when I saw the coverage of the shooting of two police officers in Ferguson, Missouri Wednesday night.

It’s the latest event in a saga that in some ways began this August with the police shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown, and in some ways has been happening for years. It’s sparked conversations on police brutality and militarization, racism, systemic biases against young black men in our society, the justice system, and so much more. But even though those conversations are happening on a national level, what’s happening on the ground isn’t quite as academic or theoretical. It’s real, it’s scary, and honestly, last night’s events show that it probably isn’t going to get better anytime soon.

Ferguson’s police chief Tom Jackson resigned. That was probably inevitable after the release of a pretty damning Department of Justice report that highlighted serious racial biases and constitutional breaks in Ferguson. For a more extensive look at the main takeaways of that report, check out fellow Law Streeter Alexis Evans’ article here.

After Jackson resigned, a rally started at the Ferguson police department. While the protesters were obviously pleased that the head of the Ferguson police department had resigned, they didn’t think it was enough to stem clear instances of racial profiling, bias, and intimidation within the force. Protesters actually advocated for the mayor of Ferguson, James Knowles III, to step down as well. Around midnight, those protests took a turn when gunshots rang out. Witnesses say there were four in all. Two found targets–one in the shoulder of a 41-year-old St. Louis County officer, and another in the face of a 32-year-old officer from the nearby town of Webster Groves. Both were in serious condition, but were recently released from the hospital.

Details of who exactly fired those shots remain a little fuzzy. Police have stated that they came from the cluster of protesters, but the protesters themselves are saying that they came from further away on a nearby hill. Police are saying that they have leads, but other than that, what will happen seems up in the air.

In light of the incident, St. Louis County Police and the Mississippi Highway Patrol are going to be taking over controlling the protests in the hopes that things don’t become more violent.

Many around the country have condemned the actions of the shooter. Attorney General Eric Holder, for example, stated:

This heinous assault on two brave law enforcement officers was inexcusable and repugnant. I condemn violence against any public safety officials in the strongest terms, and the Department of Justice will never accept any threats or violence directed at those who serve and protect our communities. … Such senseless acts of violence threaten the very reforms that nonviolent protesters in Ferguson and around the country have been working towards for the past several months.

Despite the fact that new forces are being brought in, I’m not sure it’s safe to say that issues in Ferguson are going to get any better. This is turmoil that has been stewing for years, and Michael Brown’s death just set it boiling. While the protesters have been mostly peaceful, there are always people who do bad things–people who commit those wrongs that can never add up to a right. Hopefully, real dialogue and reform will start happening soon.

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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In light of recent high profile police killings such as those of 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri last August, Eric Garner in Staten Island, and 12-year-old Tamir Rice in Cleveland, Ohio, a national discussion has developed about the force used by police officers against American citizens. In the most recent development in that discussion, President Obama called for all police shootings to be reported to the federal government so that kind of information is readily available and transparent.

This call comes after Obama’s December 2014 recommendation to establish the “Task Force on 21st Century Policing.” According to the White House,

The task force will examine how to strengthen public trust and foster strong relationships between local law enforcement and the communities that they protect, while also promoting effective crime reduction.

The task force will engage with federal, state, tribal, and local officials; technical advisors; young leaders; and nongovernmental organizations to provide a transparent process to engage with the public.

The task force is chaired by Philadelphia Police Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey and Laurie Robinson, a criminology professor at George Mason University who was formerly an Assistant Attorney General for the DOJ office of Justice Programs.

That task force has now come back to the President with its recommendations–the suggestion that police forces be required to report their shootings is just one of them. This comes after multiple high profile officials had made similar statements about the necessity of recording the incidences of police shootings. Attorney General Eric Holder expressed a similar sentiment in mid January when he stated in a speech,

I’ve heard from a number of people who have called on policymakers to ensure better record-keeping on injuries and deaths that occur at the hands of police. I’ve also spoken with law enforcement leaders — including the leadership of the Fraternal Order of Police — who have urged elected officials to consider strategies for collecting better data on officer fatalities. Today, my response to these legitimate concerns is simple: We need to do both.

FBI head James Comey made similar statements in a speech at Georgetown University a few weeks ago when he stated, “It’s ridiculous that I can’t tell you how many people were shot by the police in this country last week, last year, the last decade – it’s ridiculous.”

There isn’t any information yet about how the reporting of police shootings and force will be handled–whether it will go through the FBI or some other agency is yet to be seen.

This recommendation from the task force comes as that conversation about police shootings continues in the U.S. Last night, a video of a Los Angeles Police Department officer fatally shooting a homeless man went viral.

Here’s the video, although fair warning–it’s pretty brutal and graphic:

Officers claim that it was a struggle over one of the cop’s guns, and it very well may have been, but either way it’s a disturbing video in which deadly force is used very quickly. The conversation about police shootings in the United States is very far from over–a database may be able to be used to help make that conversation even more productive.

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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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.

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Here in the United States we imprison a lot of people. Often we imprison them for a long time, and doing so obviously costs taxpayers a lot of money. So, for a long time, there’s been a conversation in this country over whether it’s productive to lock people up so much. Well, now prisons are trying to answer those questions themselves by using psychological assessments to determine whether or not it’s safe to release prisoners.

In an investigative report, Associated Press reporters found that for years, states have been using secretive psychological examinations to try to determine recidivism rates, in an attempt to figure out which prisoners should be released. The tests can also be used to help determine how the prisoner will be treated in prison.

These examinations vary from state to state, but most include a long series of questions about things like family background, education, income, and history. Each answer is given a score, although it’s unclear exactly what the parameters for scoring are. Then, those scores are tallied, and the assessment is used for a variety of things. If this seems vague, that’s because, well, it is very vague. Not only do these evaluations differ from state to state, but sometimes they differ within the state or jurisdiction. They don’t necessarily weight answers the same way–an offender could score differently on different tests, which is exactly what happened to Milton Thomas, an Arkansas inmate. But, most importantly, they’re basically kept secret. Some states never release the results.

There are also a lot of questions over whether the assessments are actually reliable. They do rely heavily on the offenders’ answers to the questions. If an inmate is lying, or does not remember something correctly, his scores could be different. Prisons don’t always check out the answers to make sure that they’re correct.

Furthermore, there are concerns that the tests unfairly discriminate against those offenders who come from lower income backgrounds or have attained lower levels of education than their peers.

There have, unsurprisingly, been incidents where the test results were “wrong,” and someone who was released because of his score ended up committing a new crime. One of the more prominent ones was Darren Vann, a sex offender released in Texas. His assessment labeled him as “low risk to reoffend,” but then a year later he confessed to killing seven women.

There have been some moves to reform these surveys. The Justice Department has been aiding and funding states in developing policies and tests; however, the tests aren’t currently used at the federal level, and there have been statements made by Attorney General Eric Holder that indicate that the use of such tests stands counter to DOJ policies. In August he stated,

Criminal sentences must be based on the facts, the law, the actual crimes committed, the circumstances surrounding each individual case, and the defendant’s history of criminal conduct. They should not be based on unchangeable factors that a person cannot control, or on the possibility of a future crime that has not taken place.

It’s definitely a good thing that prisons are trying to determine whether or not it makes sense to keep prisoners in for longer–we really do incarcerate a scarily large chunk of the population. That being said, there are clearly some big issues with the tests being used, and the total lack of transparency may mean there are even more issues that we don’t even know about yet. These tests may be a step in the right direction, but that doesn’t make them the right step.

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 number of prisoners under federal jurisdiction decreased for the first time since 1980, according to a recent report from the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Attorney General Eric Holder praised the new statistics Tuesday and announced that an even larger decline, as many as 10,000 prisoners, is projected to come over the next two years. Holder’s speech, a keynote address to the New York University School of Law, took place just two days before he announced his resignation, highlighting one of the largest achievements during his tenure as the nation’s top prosecutor.

According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, there were roughly 1,900 fewer federal prisoners at year end in 2013 than there were at the same point in 2012. However, this drop was offset by an increase in the number of inmates in state prisons, which had roughly 6,300 more prisoners in 2013 than the previous year. A total of 28 states saw population increases in state prisons, which led to the first net increase in the total U.S. inmate population (federal and state) since its peak in 2009.

The chart below shows the trends for both state and federal prisons over the last 35 years.

Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners in 2013 Report

The U.S. prison population went from roughly 307,000 in 1978 to more than 1.5 million in 2013, an increase greater than 400 percent. Many attribute this dramatic growth to the “tough on crime” policies that dominated criminal justice legislation from the mid-1980s to the early-2000s.

Smart on Crime

The recent statistics come just over a year after Attorney General Eric Holder announced his Smart on Crime Initiative, which aims to increase sentencing fairness and offer alternatives to incarceration for nonviolent criminals. The initiative gained significant momentum earlier this year when the U.S. Sentencing Commission voted to reduce mandatory sentencing guidelines for drug crimes in April. Shortly after that, the commission made the new guidelines retroactive, allowing as many as 50,000 prisoners to have their sentences reduced starting in 2015.

“This is nothing less than historic,” Holder said of the federal prisoner decrease on Tuesday in a keynote address at the Brennan Center for Justice. In his speech, he emphasized the new Smart on Crime policies and argued that they are starting to have some measurable effects.

In addition to last year’s decline, Holder said that the number of federal inmates is projected to drop by roughly 2,000 in the next year and by nearly 10,000 by the end of 2016, according to internal numbers from the Bureau of Prisons.

The consequences of this decline are significant for several reasons. Recent studies have argued that decreasing the prison population will not cause significant increases in crime rates.

“High incarceration rates and longer-than-necessary prison terms have not played a significant role in materially improving public safety, reducing crime, or strengthening communities.”

-Attorney General Eric Holder

Reducing the prison population is seen as a civil rights issue, as sentencing for drug crimes is widely seen as unfair to minorities. Reform advocates like the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA) often cite the disproportionate amount of minorities who are arrested for drug crimes. According to the DPA:

Although rates of drug use and selling are comparable across racial lines, people of color are far more likely to be stopped, searched, arrested, prosecuted, convicted and incarcerated for drug law violations than are whites.

Arrest disparities combined with troubling recidivism statistics may indicate that long prison sentences are not always the best solution for nonviolent criminals. However, not everyone is in favor of decreasing the number of inmates, as some continue to argue that high incarceration rates were an important factor to America’s falling crime rates.

The high incarceration rate has also created a significant economic burden for the federal and state governments. According to a report from the Congressional Research Service, the cost per inmate in federal prisons was $29,291 in 2013, an increase of over 35 percent since 2000. In 2010 alone, the United States spent nearly $80 billion on incarceration in federal and state prisons.

The economic and civil rights issues connected to growth in the prison population have created bipartisan support for reform. Senators Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) cosponsored the Smarter Sentencing Act of 2014, which aims to reduce the influence of mandatory minimums in the sentencing process. The bill, which a recent report from the Congressional Budget Office said could save more than $4 billion, would give judges more discretion in the sentencing process, allowing them to decide penalties on a case-by-case basis.

While the future of sentencing reform and the size of the prison population are not yet certain, supporters like Attorney General Holder proudly claim that change is coming:

Clearly, criminal justice reform is an idea whose time has come. And thanks to a robust and growing national consensus… we are bringing about a paradigm shift, and witnessing a historic sea change, in the way our nation approaches these issues.

Kevin Rizzo

Kevin Rizzo is the Crime in America Editor at Law Street Media. An Ohio Native, the George Washington University graduate is a founding member of the company. Contact Kevin at krizzo@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Hey y’all!

We’ve all seen the news coverage about the Michael Brown shooting in Ferguson, Missouri. Not just the shooting, but also the aftermath that has turned a tiny town into a rioting disaster. Just in case you didn’t hear, Michael Brown was a young black man who was shot several times and killed on August 9 by a white police officer. But did you hear about the young man in Utah who was also shot and killed by a police officer? No? I’m not surprised. Twenty-year-old Dillon Taylor was shot to death by a black police officer two days after Michael Brown.

Where is the outcry filled with blinding rage in Utah that has filled the streets of Ferguson? Why have there been no reports of Dillon Taylor’s death, except a few small pieces found here and there on random news sites? No mention on CNN, MSNBC, or any well known 24-hour news station.

Dillon Taylor, described as white and Hispanic, was shot right outside of a 7-11 on August 11 by a black police officer. I hate to quote Rush Limbaugh because I’m not a huge fan of his, but he said it best on his radio show: “In the current climate in the United States, a black person can never be the oppressor, and a white person can never be a victim.” Truer words have never been spoken. I realize that history has shown that white people oppressed blacks and other races. But the same has happened to whites, obviously not in the same way and not as widely remembered, but everyone has been oppressed in some way at some point in history. Why is the life of this young black man more important the life of a young white and Hispanic man?

The biggest point I want to make is that both of these young men should have the same amount of coverage, but they don’t and it is all based on race double standards. If you take a step back and look at the context of both of these shootings you would realize that there is no real difference except the color of their skin and that of the police officers. When will people stop and think about the bigger picture, not everything should be about color. It is about right and wrong. And for that matter we don’t even know who is right and wrong until all of the facts are released and the police officers who did the shootings have been investigated.

—

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 [DonkeyHotey 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 Race Double Standards – It’s the American Way 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.

—

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.

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