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The Drug War in Black and White

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Thu, 08 May 2008 15:29:00 EDT

In yesterday's column, based on a recent report from the New York Civil Liberties Union, I noted how racially skewed the Giuliani-Bloomberg anti-pot crusade has been. Two studies published this week highlight the racially disproportionate impact of the war on drugs generally. Between 1980 and 2003, the Sentencing Project reports, the rate of drug arrests rose by 70 percent among whites and 225 percent among blacks. Looking at data for 34 states, Human Rights Watch finds that "a black man is 11.8 times more likely than a white man to be sent to prison on drug charges, and a black woman is 4.8 times more likely than a white woman."

Drug warriors presumably would argue that such disparities reflect blacks' greater propensity to be involved in the illegal drug trade. Human Rights Watch is a bit evasive on that point. "Although whites commit more drug offenses," it says, "African Americans are arrested and imprisoned on drug charges at much higher rates." Or as the group's senior counsel, Jamie Fellner (who wrote the report), puts it, "Most drug offenders are white, but most of the drug offenders sent to prison are black."

It's true that blacks and whites are about equally likely to use illegal drugs. Whites, being the majority, therefore commit "more drug offenses" and account for "most drug offenders." This comparison is directly relevant in evaluating the fairness of New York City's crackdown on pot smokers: As I noted in my column, blacks are much more likely than whites to be arrested for marijuana possession in New York even though they are no more likely to be pot smokers (and therefore, presumably, no more likely to be carrying small quantities of marijuana in public). But comparable drug use rates do not mean that blacks and whites are equally likely to commit the sort of drug offenses for which people tend to go to prison. For a variety of reasons, including a lack of appealing economic alternatives in inner-city neighborhoods, blacks are disproportionately represented among the low-level drug dealers who are most conspicuous and easiest to catch. That's the main reason they're disproportionately represented among drug offenders who get arrested and go to prison.

If, instead of going after street dealers, police raided homes at random throughout the country, the drug offenders (including users) they nabbed would be more representative of the general population. Needless to say, this is not a change in strategy anyone should be advocating for the sake of racial justice. As Fellner says, "The solution is not to imprison more whites but to radically rethink how to deal with drug abuse and low-level drug offenders."

In a 2006 review of Nate Blakeslee's book about the Tulia, Texas, drug bust scandal, I argued that the drug war's racial impact is just one aspect of a broader injustice.

Addendum: Bill Piper of the Drug Policy Alliance points out that a 2000 Human Rights Watch report cited data on the prevalence of drug dealing among blacks vs. whites:

During the period 1991-1993, SAMHSA [the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration] included questions about drug selling in the annual NHSDA [National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, which has since been replaced by the National Survey on Drug Use and Health]. Although the responses are best seen as a rough approximation of drug selling activity, they are nonetheless highly suggestive. On average over the three-year period, blacks were 16 percent of admitted sellers and whites were 82 percent.

So it may well be that whites (currently about 80 percent* of the U.S. population) are just as likely to sell drugs as blacks (about 13 percent of the population) yet much less likely to be caught doing it, perhaps because they are less likely to do it frequently (the survey question asked whether the respondents had sold drugs at all in the previous year), less likely to do it in public, and/or less likely to do it in neighborhoods with a heavy police presence.

[*This figure includes Hispanics who do not identify themselves as black or African American.]

Now Playing at Reason.tv: Mississippi Drug War Blues—The Case of Cory Maye

Thu, 08 May 2008 07:00:00 EDT

...

Tracy Ingle: Another Drug War Outrage

rbalko@reason.com (Radley Balko) — Wed, 07 May 2008 10:45:00 EDT

About a month ago I got a call from a reporter for the Arkansas Times inquiring about my research into paramilitary drug raids. He'd been reporting on a raid in North Little Rock involving a 40-year-old man named Tracy Ingle. When he told me the story over the phone, I was floored, even given all the abuses and mistakes I've reported and read about over the last few years. What makes the case especially egregious is not that the police may have gotten the wrong home, that they shot a man, or that they were covering it up or going silent. We've seen all that before. What's mind-blowing about this one is that they've continued abusing the poor guy, even after it should have been clear for some time now that they made a mistake.

From the outset, it should be noted that Tracy Ingle has had some trouble with the law in the past, though nothing violent, and nothing drug-related. He has had a couple of DWI's, and a citation for failing to appear in court. He apparently also agreed to do some repair work on a friend's car that later turned out to be stolen.

That said, what's happened to him over the last few months is pretty outrageous.

Here's the Arkansas Times piece, which I'd encourage you to read in full. And here's a follow-up interview with North Little Rock Police Chief Danny Bradley about SWAT tactics.

I've since spoken again to the reporter and to Tracy Ingle's sister, Tiffney Forrester, who herself is a former sheriff's deputy. I've also had a chance to review the warrants and return sheets (pdf).

The North Little Rock Police Department wouldn't discuss the case with me.

Here's a quick rundown:

• On January 7, 2008 a paramilitary police unit in North Little Rock, Arkansas conducted a drug raid on Tracy Ingle's home. Ingle says he had fallen asleep for several hours, and was asleep when the raid happened. He awoke when the police took a battering ram to his door. Another team of officers approached form the outside of the house, and shattered the window to his bedroom.

• When he awoke, Ingle says he thought his home was being invaded by armed robbers. He reached for a broken gun, a pretty clear indication that he had no intention of killing anyone, but rather was trying to scare away the intruders. When he grabbed the gun, an officer inside the house fired his weapon. The bullet hit Ingle just above the knee, shattered his thigh bone, and nearly severed his lower leg. When the outside officers heard the shot, they opened up on Ingle, hitting him four more times. According to Ingle's sister, one bullet still rests just above Ingle's heart, and can't be removed.

• Ingle was taken to the hospital, and spent a week-and-a-half in intensive care. He was then removed from intensive care—still in his hospital pajamas—and taken to the North Little Rock police department, where he was questioned for five hours. He was not told he was suspected of a crime, and his family wasn't allowed to speak with him. After the interrogation, he was arrested and transferred to the county jail.

• Ingle spent the next four days in jail. He says he was never given his pain medication or his antibiotics. Though hospital nurses told him to change his bandages and clean his wounds every 4-6 hours, Ingle told the Arkansas Times that jail officials changed them only twice in four days. Ingle's wounds became infected during the time he was in jail.

• Police found no illegal drugs in Ingle's home. They did find a scale, which Ingle's sister tells me was an extra she was given when she worked at a medical testing facility. She used it in her jewelry-making hobby. They also found a bunch of small plastic bags. Again, Ingle's sister says these were part of her business. "I was leaving the country for a while, and I stored a lot of my stuff at his house," she told me. "The scale and bags were mine, and are both common things to have for anyone who makes jewelry." Police also found the broken gun and a broken police scanner.

• From those items, the police charged Ingle with running a drug enterprise. They also charged him with assault, for pointing his broken gun at the police officers who had just barged into his home. The judge set Ingle's bail at $250,000, explaining that it had to be set high because Ingle had engaged in a shootout with police—never mind that Ingle didn't fire a shot. Ingle was able to sell his car to pay a bail bondsman. But with no car, his injuries render him basically immobile. He had to walk two miles on crutches and an infected leg to his hearing last week.

• The police obtained a no-knock warrant for Ingle's home about three weeks prior to the raid. The warrant itself (pdf) reads like boilerplate, with no specific references to Ingle (other than his address), or why he specifically posed a risk to police safety, or of disposing of drugs before coming to answer the door. It mentions no controlled buys. It doesn't even mention an informant. In fact, someone scratched out "crack cocaine" and hand-wrote in "methamphetamine" on the type-written warrant, suggesting a cut, plug, and paste job. The Supreme Court has ruled that police must show case-specific evidence of exigent circumstances in order to be issued a no-knock warrant. The mere fact that it's a drug case isn't enough. The warrant for Ingle's home contains no such specific information.

Many times, information specific to the investigation is contained in the affidavit the investigating officer files for the search warrant, not in the warrant itself. Forrester says she has called the North Little Rock Police Department more than 20 times in an effort to obtain a copy of the affidavits. She says they at first refused to return her phone calls. When she was finally able to speak with a lieutenant, he became angry when she told him she had contacted the media. She then says he told her to "dream on" when she asked for copies of the affidavits.

• According to Forrester, Ingle's neighbor had a direct line of sight into the bedroom, and saw the entire raid. His account initially matched Ingle's. But that changed. "We have a witness, a next door neighbor that saw the entire incident," Forrester told me. "He came forward on his own to give a statement to the family. Police never questioned him until a month or so after the shooting, at my insistence. They kept this neighbor in his home, and questioned him for at least four hours, refusing to let the man's wife come home, of for other people to see him. When the police finished intimidating the man, they told him specifically that 'he did not see what he thought he saw.' The neighbor is now afraid to talk to the media." I have not yet been able to speak with the neighbor.

• Ingle's family was able to put up $1,000 to retain an attorney, but can't afford the extra $6,000 the attorney has asked to represent Ingle. Ingle is therefore still looking for representation. He has no health insurance, and no money to pay for medication, or to continue treatment of his injuries.

• Last week, after the Arkansas Times article appeared, the judge in the case issued a gag order, preventing Ingle and any future attorney he may have from talking to the media about what happened to him. This is puzzling. Before today there had been exactly two articles about this case—not exactly a media circus. It's hard to understand why a gag order was necessary. It's only real purpose is to prevent more people from learning about what's increasingly looking like a railroading. And it's only effect is to lend more support to the possibility that it is, in fact, a cover-up and railroading.

As noted, the police aren't talking. And the prosecutor is now bound by the gag order. Perhaps there's some piece of information damning to Ingle I'm not yet aware of—though it's hard to imagine what that might be.

Barring that, what's happening to Tracy Ingle is pretty outrageous.

UPDATE: The Arkansas Times reports that the gag order request in Ingle's case was withdrawn late yesterday. I don't know that this will make the police or prosecutors any more likely to talk about the case, but if I have time this afternoon, I'll try again to give them a call.

UPDATE II: Several people asked in the comments about donating to Ingle's legal defense. You can now do so directly via PayPal at: http://www.justicefortracy.com.

To Catch a Leaf

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Wed, 07 May 2008 07:00:00 EDT

In 2001, shortly before Michael Bloomberg became a candidate for mayor of New York, an interviewer asked him if he'd ever smoked marijuana. "You bet I did," he said, "and I enjoyed it."

Yet as mayor, Bloomberg has presided over what a recent report from the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) calls a "marijuana arrest crusade," seeking to punish pot smokers for an activity he enjoyed with impunity. This little-noticed crackdown, which began under Rudy Giuliani, has disproportionately affected young black and Hispanic men, engendering resentment, distrust of the police, and disrespect for the law.

While marijuana arrests have risen between two- and three-fold nationwide since 1990, the increase in New York has been much more dramatic. "From 1997 to 2006," sociologist Harry Levine and drug policy activist Deborah Small note in the NYCLU report, "the New York City Police Department arrested and jailed more than 353,000 people simply for possessing small amounts of marijuana. This was eleven times more marijuana arrests than in the previous decade."

Based on their analysis of arrest data and their interviews with police, arrestees, and public defenders, Levine and Small conclude that the pot busts are largely a byproduct of the NYPD's aggressive "stop and frisk" tactics. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that police may briefly detain people they suspect of involvement in criminal activity and, as a precautionary measure, pat them down for weapons. Taking advantage of this Fourth Amendment loophole, New York City police stopped and frisked people more than half a million times in 2006.

In the vast majority of cases, these stops do not result in arrests. But sometimes people are carrying small amounts of marijuana. Since police cannot legally search for drugs without probable cause, Levine and Small found, they typically trick or intimidate people into revealing their pot, at which point they can be arrested.

Such trickery not only exposes the contraband; it changes the nature of the offense. Under state law merely possessing a small amount of marijuana (up to 25 grams, about seven-eighths of an ounce) is a citable offense similar to a traffic violation. But having marijuana "in public view" is a misdemeanor.

The NYPD makes about 35,000 such arrests each year. Although marijuana possession is either the only or the most serious charge in these cases, the arrestees are nevertheless handcuffed and taken to a police station, where they are fingerprinted and photographed, and they usually spend a night in jail, an uncomfortable, degrading, and often frightening experience.

Contrary to what you might expect, Levine and Small found that people arrested for marijuana possession in New York generally are not smoking pot in public. "Before being approached by the police," they note, "most people arrested for misdemeanor marijuana possession...were actually not guilty of what they were charged with."

Why do police waste time and resources manufacturing crimes? Levine and Small note that busting pot smokers is a relatively safe and easy way to pad arrest figures, which creates the illusion of productivity, and generate overtime pay, a practice known as "collars for dollars."

From the collars' perspective, getting arrested for a trivial, victimless offense, which saddles them with criminal records that can impair their ability to obtain an education and make a living, is humiliating and embittering. It is especially rankling because police seem to be targeting poor black and Hispanic men for treatment that would not be tolerated if it were aimed at affluent white New Yorkers.

Survey data indicate that among 18-to-25-year-olds, the age group where the pot busts are concentrated, whites are more likely than blacks or Hispanics to smoke marijuana. Yet Levine and Small found that in New York blacks and Hispanics are, respectively, five and three times as likely to be arrested for marijuana possession.

For pot smokers caught in the NYPD's dragnet, is Bloomberg's position on marijuana—"I enjoyed it; you'd better not"—hard to accept? You bet it is.

Ancient Aztec Ritual Harshed by Narcs

matt.welch@reason.com (Matt Welch) — Tue, 06 May 2008 17:46:00 EDT

Huge drug bust at San Diego State -- a six-month undercover DEA investigation into seven fraternity houses nets 96 arrests (75 of them students), plus "4 pounds of cocaine, 50 pounds of marijuana, 48 hydroponic marijuana plants, 350 ecstasy pills, psilocybin (mushrooms), 30 vials of hash oil, methamphetamine, various illicit prescription drugs, one shotgun, three semi-automatic pistols, three brass knuckles and $60,000 in cash."

This DEA quote caught my eye:

"Our children are our biggest asset and absent a safe, drug-free learning environment, their chances of succeeding are greatly diminished," said Ralph W. Partridge, special agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration in San Diego. "The university police and SDSU administration are to be commended for their swift actions in confronting the drug use problem on campus."

Funny, I thought that cheap access to frat-boy drugs were the whole point of SDSU.... At any rate, if having illegal narcotics in your post-high school learning environment "greatly diminishe[s]" your chances at success, then California has been doomed to failure since what, 1959? Somehow the state, and its college graduates, manage to muddle through.

More seriously, I always wonder what happens to these guys who are arrested in their early 20s for meeting a sliver of the insatiable undergraduate demand for pot-smoking. I was never any dealer, nor much of a user, but I've known and worked with quite a few perfectly successful people who dealt drugs in college. I have also known a couple who were unlucky (and/or careless) enough to get carted off to jail, but those guys I lost track of. (Though through the magic of Google I see one former mushroom-dealing colleague running a successful business in Texas, so hopefully it all turned out well.)

So I leave the question open to the floor: What ever happened to your drug dealing friend or aquaintance who got arrested in or around college? And by what year in our glorious future will the act of purchasing marijuana be a perfectly legal transaction between consenting adults?

They Try to Make Me Go to Rehab

info@reason.com (Damon W. Root) — Tue, 06 May 2008 13:53:00 EDT

Will the troubles of poor Amy Winehouse never cease? First, a leading UK daily releases a video that allegedly shows her smoking crack. Then another calls for the British government to forcibly commit her to drug treatment ("The State's actions could save a great talent"). Now Variety brings word that she won't be recording the theme song for the latest James Bond flick:

Mark Ronson, who produced much of Winehouse's Grammy-winning "Back to Black," said the soul diva is "not ready to record any music."

Ronson said the two started work on the track for the upcoming Bond movie "Quantum of Solace" but it would take "some miracle of science" to finish it, he said in an interview with Sky News.

reason, of course, has long championed the right to use those "miracles of science" that keep landing Winehouse in such trouble. Read all about it here, here, and here.

Drug Raid/Self-Defense Case Brewing in Columbus, Ohio

rbalko@reason.com (Radley Balko) — Sun, 04 May 2008 11:45:00 EDT

Last Thursday night, police in Columbus, Ohio raided what they thought was a crack house. Though initial reports say some illicit drugs were found, the police thus far haven't been forthcoming about what type or how much. It's starting to look like the place was instead a gambling house.

When the police busted in, two men—who now say they thought they were being robbed—fired at the door. Two police officers were wounded. Both are likely to survive. The two men are being charged with attempted murder. The police say they announced twice before battering down the door, but at least one witness not in the house at the time says he only heard an order from one officer for "knockers" to break out the windows.

One of the two men who fired at the officers is a former Ohio State University football player named Derrick Foster. Foster says he was playing dice at the house when he heard a loud bang at the door, then heard someone say the place was being robbed. That's when he fired his gun at the men breaking down the door.

Foster hardly fits the profile of a crazed cop killer. He has no criminal record. He isn't suspected of drug activity. He has a legal concealed carry permit for the gun he used in the raid. He works a $60,000/year job as a code inspector for the city of Columbus. His last performance review described him as "an asset to the Near East Side." The other suspect's record is quite a bit more spotty. Still, if Foster genuinely thought the place was about to be robbed—and I think it's more than reasonable to believe him when he says that he did—it's reasonable that the other man would too, criminal record or no.

One again we have a someone facing serious charges for shooting at police during a volatile, confrontational forced entry raid to serve a drug warrant. Again we have injured cops, and again we have a guy who otherwise would have no motivation to want to harm a police officer. But instead of questioning if it's a wise policy to put an ordinary citizen in the perilous position of having to determine in the heat of the moment if the men breaking in on him are cops or criminal intruders, the state has again decided to prosecute the citizen—for making the kind of error in judgment it rarely prosecutes police for making under similar circumstances. And the raids will undoubtedly continue.

Another Isolated Incident

rbalko@reason.com (Radley Balko) — Sat, 03 May 2008 09:47:00 EDT

As part of a massive operation targeting hydroponic marijuana growers called "Operation D-Day" (noting militaristic about that at all), federal agents in Florida mistakenly raided the home of a Cuban immigrant couple.

"I was frightened for my husband because they threw him on the ground," Llorente's wife said. "I was scared.
Llorente said he was just leaving for work when unmarked cars pulled up, Drug Enforcement Administration agents jumped out, threw him down with guns drawn, handcuffed him, stormed into his home and searched for drugs.
"I asked them why they came to my house, they said a neighbor or somebody called and said I had a hydroponics lab in my house," Llorente said. "Then I asked them if a marijuana plant could grow inside my underwear drawer."
The Llorentes said they don't speak much English – they're immigrants from Cuba. They said one of the reasons they came to the U.S. was to escape oppression from the Cuban police.Isabel Llorente said she never thought this could happen here."Never, because they criticize Cuba so much," she said.
"I've never gone through anything like this."She said what made it especially traumatic was not knowing if the agents were really police or imposters. She said she tried to call 911, but they wouldn't let her.
"What added salt to this injury was after the situation – house is searched, door is broken – they just walked away," the Llorentes' lawyer said. "Like, 'We're the government. We made a mistake.'"

It's worth noting that while police say these tactics are necessary because drug distributors tend to be violent and armed to the teeth, this operation apparently turned up just eight guns from 150 homes.

Sage Advice: Check State Law Before You Order

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Fri, 02 May 2008 13:06:00 EDT

Spurred on by horrific YouTube images of teenagers falling over and giggling, the Salvia divinorum crackdown proceeds apace. The Florida legislature recently approved a ban by a nearly unanimous vote, and the Drug War Chronicle reports that police in North Dakota have made what appears to be the first salvia arrest. Kenneth Rau, a Bismarck bottling plant worker with an interest in altered states of consciousness, is charged with possession of salvia with intent to distribute, a Class B felony, based on eight ounces of leaf he bought on eBay for $32. Rau, who faces up to 10 years in prison, complains that police are falsely portraying him as a dealer. He says he bought the psychedelic herb, which has been used by shamans in Mexico for centuries and is also known as Diviner's Sage, for his own chemically assisted self-exploration. North Dakota's salvia ban, approved last year, took effect on August 1, and Rau says he was unaware of it. "I've never been a drug user, never been arrested," he told the Chronicle. "I started experimenting with this stuff because I thought it was legal. I didn't want to get into trouble, but now they're treating me just like some meth dealer."

My previous posts on the anti-salvia crusade are here and here. The Salvia Divinorum Research and Information Center has a recently updated overview of the plant's legal status in various jurisdictions.

That Lethal British Marijuana

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Thu, 01 May 2008 15:20:00 EDT

In 2004 the British government downgraded marijuana from a Class B to a Class C drug, making simple possession of small quantities a "non-arrestable offense." The current prime minister, Gordon Brown, seems bent on reversing that reform, saying "we really have got to send out a message to young people [that] this is not acceptable." Shortly after taking office, Brown asked the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs to take another look at cannabis policy. Although the council reportedly has recommended that marijuana remain in Class C, Brown is expected to ignore its advice. On Tuesday he said:

I don't think that the previous studies took into account that so much of the cannabis on the streets is now of a lethal quality....I have always been very strongly of the view that cannabis is unacceptable and we have got to send a message.

According to Reuters, "Brown said he was particularly worried about the growing use of skunk cannabis, which he described as 'more lethal.'" There has never been a documented case of death by marijuana overdose. Based on extrapolations from animal studies, the ratio of marijuana's lethal dose to its effective dose is something like 40,000 to 1 (compared to between 10 and 20 to 1 for aspirin and between 4 and 10 to 1 for alcohol). So even if the average THC content of marijuana has increased as dramatically as drug warriors claim (and it hasn't), and even if pot smokers did not adjust their intake accordingly (and they do), there would be no practical effect on marijuana's toxicity. The chance of a lethal overdose remains, for all intents and purposes, zero. And no matter what kind of stoned logic Brown favors, zero is not more than zero.

[Thanks to NORML's Paul Armentano for the tip.]

New York City's 'Marijuana Arrest Crusade'

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:36:00 EDT

In an eye-opening new report for the New York Civil Liberties Union (noted by Radley Balko earlier this morning), sociologist Harry G. Levine and drug policy activist Deborah Small call attention to a "marijuana arrest crusade" in New York City that began under Rudy Giuliani and continues under Michael Bloomberg:

From 1997 to 2006, the New York City Police Department arrested and jailed more than 353,000 people simply for possessing small amounts of marijuana. This was eleven times more marijuana arrests than in the previous decade, and ten times more than in the decade before that.

Marijuana arrests have been rising nationwide since the early 1990s, but the increase in New York City has been much more dramatic. Levine and Small say the surge in arrests is largely a byproduct of an aggressive "stop and frisk" program in which police pat down young men they (supposedly) suspect of criminal activity, ostensibly to make sure they're not carrying weapons. The targets of these pat-downs are disproportionately black and Hispanic, and so are the people arrested for marijuana possession. Between 1997 and 2006, blacks, who represent 26 percent of New York's population, accounted for 52 percent of the marijuana arrests; Hispanics, about the same share of the population, accounted for 31 percent of the arrests; and non-Hispanic whites, about 35 percent of the population, accounted for just 15 percent of the arrests. Yet survey data indicate that, if anything, whites smoke pot at higher rates than blacks and Hispanics.

Although New York State decriminalized possession of small amounts of marijuana (less than seven-eighths of an ounce) in 1977, Levine and Small report, New York City marijuana busts typically result in a trip to the police station, fingerprinting, and a night in jail. Instead of charging people who are carrying a little pot with possession, a citable offense simlar to a traffic violation, police typically accuse them of having marijuana "open to view," a misdemeanor, often after tricking or intimidating them into revealing their stash. In the vast majority of cases, the arrestees are not caught smoking pot in public, and the marijuana charge is the most serious offense.

Levine and Small note several incentives that encourage police to hassle pot smokers:

Narcotics and patrol police, their supervisors, and top commanders in the police department benefit from the marijuana possession arrests. The arrests are comparatively safe, allow officers and their supervisors to accrue overtime pay, and produce arrest numbers that show productivity. When needed, commanders can temporarily shift narcotics police off making the misdemeanor possession arrests and assign them to other duties, which provides considerable flexibility. The marijuana arrests are also the most effective means available for obtaining information (including fingerprints, photographs, and potentially DNA samples) from people never before entered in the criminal justice databases.

For the arrestees, by contrast, getting busted is not only humiliating, expensive, inconvenient, and embittering; it gives them a criminal record that can hamper their educational and employment prospects for the rest of their lives.

Turn On, Tune In, Drop Deap: LSD Inventor Albert Hofmann, RIP

gillespie@reason.com (Nick Gillespie) — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 08:50:00 EDT

The creator of LSD, Albert Hofmann, is dead at the ripe old age of 102 (he's pictured at the right by artist Alex Gray). The man who launched a thousand trips first synthesized the drug in 1938 and then learned of its hallucinatory effects five years later, after accidentally ingesting it.

From the NY Times obit:

[Hofmann] then took LSD hundreds of times, but regarded it as a powerful and potentially dangerous psychotropic drug that demanded respect. More important to him than the pleasures of the psychedelic experience was the drug's value as a revelatory aid for contemplating and understanding what he saw as humanity's oneness with nature. That perception, of union, which came to Dr. Hofmann as almost a religious epiphany while still a child, directed much of his personal and professional life....
Though Dr. Hofmann called LSD "medicine for the soul," by 2006 his hallucinogenic days were long behind him, he said in the interview that year.
"I know LSD; I don't need to take it anymore," he said, adding. "Maybe when I die, like Aldous Huxley."
But he said LSD had not affected his understanding of death. In death, he said, "I go back to where I came from, to where I was before I was born, that's all."

More here.

As someone who has taken LSD, I'd like to say thank you, Dr. Hofmann. As a fan of rock music, I'd like to thank him, too, for indirectly inspiring the greatest couplet set to music ("Things ain't what they used to be/Cary Grant's on LSD").

Far more important, Hofmann's "problem child" (as he wryly dubbed his discovery) has been a major and generally positive influence through many aspects of society, from the obvious (such as mind expansion trips of Timothy Leary and many others) to the less obvious (including the personal computer revolution). Blowing peoples' minds is never an easy thing, and not always a good thing, but Hofmann is an inspiring figure, in large part because he never lost his taste for scientific inquiry and rational analysis while expanding the borderlands of human consciousness.

Update: Spelling of Hofmann's name corrected multiple times.

Belated Hat tip: Pig Mannix.

More Update: Alan Vanneman blogs, "I'd like to thank Dr. Hofman (with irony) for indirectly inspiring the very worst joke I ever heard (courtesy of the unlamented London Lee): 'Did you hear about the hippie who mixed LSD with prune juice? He really took a trip!'"

"You Bet I Did, and I Enjoyed It. And I'll Slap Cuffs on Anyone Who Enjoyed It as Much as I Did."

rbalko@reason.com (Radley Balko) — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 08:26:00 EDT

New York City, home to admitted pot smoker (and pot enjoyer) Mayor Michael Bloomberg leads the world in marijuana arrests: over 370,000 in the last decade for the lowest possible level marijuana offense. More than half were black, despite the fact that just 25 percent of the city is black, and despite the fact that according to survey data, a higher percentage of white people actually use the drug.

The New York City ACLU says the discrepancy comes from the fact that minorities are much more likely than whites to be stopped and frisked. The end result is a much higher percentage of blacks than whites with a pot-related arrest record--and all that comes with that (including the loss of ever getting federal loans to go to college)--even though white people are more likely to actually use the drug.

More here.

Another Isolated Incident

rbalko@reason.com (Radley Balko) — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 08:03:00 EDT

Fish tank, meth lab—whatever.

Brooklyn Park police were looking for a meth lab, but they found a fish tank and the chemicals needed to maintain it.

And a few hours later, when the city sent a contractor to fix the door the police had smashed open Monday afternoon, it was obvious the city was trying to fix a mistake.
It happened while Kathy Adams was sleeping.

"And the next thing I know, a police officer is trying to get me out bed," she said.

And what thorough investigative work precipitated this raid?

Roehl said the drug task force was acting on a tip from a subcontractor for CenterPoint Energy, who had been in the home Friday to install a hot water heater.

"He got hit with a chemical smell that he said made him light headed, feel kind of nauseous," Roehl said.

The smell was vinegar, and maybe pickling lime, which were clearly marked in a bathroom Mr. Adams uses to mix chemicals for his salt water fish tank.

"I said, 'I call it his laboratory for his fish tanks,' " Mrs. Adams said, recalling her conversation with the CenterPoint technician. "I'm looking at the fish tank talking to this guy."

Police say there was no extended investigation, just an interview with the subcontractor.

Still, no one did anything wrong.

"From a cursory view, it doesn't look like our officers did anything wrong," said Capt. Greg Roehl.
[...]
"Everything this person told us turned out to be true, with the exception of what the purpose of the lab was," Roehl said.
[...]
Police say the detective who asked for the search warrant is an 8 ½-year veteran, but he just started working in the drug task force.

CenterPoint energy maintains the home was "unsafe" and it would have "irresponsible" for the subcontractor not to report it.

Drug Policy, from Scratch

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 16:30:00 EDT

The ideal drug policy would apply to the currently illegal intoxicants the same distinctions we routinely apply to alcohol: between children and adults, between use and abuse, between abuse that harms only the user and abuse that harms others.

Selling drugs to minors should remain illegal. But adults should be free to decide for themselves what goes into their bodies, provided they do not violate anyone else's rights in the process.

Read the whole column at LATimes.com.

Criminal Justice Roundup

rbalko@reason.com (Radley Balko) — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 17:03:00 EDT

The bad....

• The Supreme Court unanimously rules that evidence seized during arrests that are illegal under state law can still be used at trial.
• The city of Memphis is seizing the automobiles of suspected Johns. Not convicted, just suspected.
• The Ninth Circuit becomes the second federal appeals court to allow federal agents to snoop around in the laptops of people entering the country, even without probable cause that a crime has been committed.

The good...

• Argentina decriminalizes drug consumption. I'm trying to remember the last time the government of Argentina got anything right.
• Alaska appeals court says it will no longer tolerate "implicitly coercive" searches during traffic stops.
• Virginia's Supreme Court tosses out two drug cases in which police conducted searches without probable cause.

The Long and the Short of Prison Sentences

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 15:07:00 EDT

New York Times legal writer Adam Liptak digs a little deeper into the story of America's astonishingly high incarceration rate and finds that the main explanation is longer sentences, as opposed to more frequent sentences or a higher crime rate:

People who commit nonviolent crimes in the rest of the world are less likely to receive prison time and certainly less likely to receive long sentences. The United States is, for instance, the only advanced country that incarcerates people for minor property crimes like passing bad checks...
Efforts to combat illegal drugs play a major role in explaining long prison sentences in the United States as well. In 1980, there were about 40,000 people in American jails and prisons for drug crimes. These days, there are almost 500,000.
Those figures have drawn contempt from European critics. "The U.S. pursues the war on drugs with an ignorant fanaticism," said [prison researcher Vivien] Stern of King's College....
It is the length of sentences that truly distinguishes American prison policy. Indeed, the mere number of sentences imposed here would not place the United States at the top of the incarceration lists. If lists were compiled based on annual admissions to prison per capita, several European countries would outpace the United States. But American prison stays are much longer, so the total incarceration rate is higher.

Burglars in the United States serve an average of 16 months in prison, according to Mr. Mauer, compared with 5 months in Canada and 7 months in England.

The longer U.S. sentences are due largely to legislators who pass mandatory minimum statutes and judges (frequently elected) who err on the side of severity. Both groups are responding to a perceived public demand for tough-on-crime policies.

While any sentence for nonpredatory "criminals" such as drug offenders is too long, it's less clear whether U.S. penalties for crimes such as burglary and robbery are excessive. As Liptak notes, "there is little question that the high incarceration rate here has helped drive down crime," whether through incapacitation, deterrence, or both. Liptak quotes former federal judge Paul G. Cassell, a conspicuous critic of draconian drug sentences, who writes that "a good case can be made that fewer Americans are now being victimized" as a result of harsher sentences. Cassell says the evidence "should give one pause before too quickly concluding that European sentences are appropriate."

In a column last month, I discussed the Pew Center's recent report on incarceration rates, upon which Liptak draws heavily. Several years ago in reason, I noted criminologist John DiIulio's acknowledgment that the cost-effectiveness of incarceration depends on the system's ability to distinguish between predatory criminals and "drug-only" offenders.

Dealing With Drugs at the L.A. Times

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 11:12:00 EDT

This week I'm debating drug policy with the Heritage Foundation's Charles Stimson in a Los Angeles Times "Dust-Up." Monday's posts dealt with the distinction between decriminalization and legalization, and yesterday's posts addressed the conflict between federal and state governments regarding the medical use of marijuana. Later today there will be an exchange on the subject of politicians' drug use. Thursday's posts will focus on drug-trade-related violence, and on Friday we're supposed to lay out our visions of an ideal drug policy.

Update: Part III is up now.

Self-Refuting Drug Warriors

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 19:02:00 EDT

A new analysis of data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health once again confirms a point I emphasize in my book Saying Yes: The vast majority of illegal drug users do not fit the stereotype of addiction and degradation promoted by the government and the news media. Based on data from the 2004, 20005, and 2006 surveys, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) calculated the percentage of people who became "dependent" on various drugs within two years of trying them. Here are the dependence rates, in ascending order:

Inhalants: 0.9%

Tranquilizers (nonmedical use): 1.2%

Psychedelics: 1.9%

Sedatives (nonmedical use): 2.4%

Painkillers (nonmedical use): 3.1%

Alcohol: 3.2%

Cocaine Powder: 3.7%

Stimulants (nonmedical use): 4.7%

Marijuana: 5.8%

Crack Cocaine: 9.2%

Heroin: 13.4%

In some ways these results track conventional wisdom. Heroin comes out on top, which conforms to traditional thinking if not to more recent scare mongering about crack and methamphetamine, each of which was said to be at least as addictive, if not more so. But even in the case of heroin, a large majority of users were not deemed "dependent," and most (69 percent) had not even used the drug in the previous year. Likewise, crack looks more addictive than cocaine powder, but 76 percent of the people who tried crack were not using it at all a year later, quite a feat with a drug that's said to be instantly addictive. The comparable rate for cocaine powder was 58 percent, which could mean that a) people find it more appealing than crack, b) people find it easier to integrate into their lives because the experience is less intense, or c) people find it more appealing because it's easier to integrate into their lives. I think most people would be surprised to see that "stimulants," which included methamphetamine, rate lower on this addiction scale than heroin, crack, and even marijuana, and that narcotic painkillers, described as overwhelming and irresistible in press coverage of the OxyContin "epidemic," look no more addictive than alcohol.

A few notes of caution:

1. SAMHSA measures drug dependence through questions based on the American Psychiatric Association's diagnostic criteria, which require three or more of seven indicators: 1) tolerance, 2)withdrawal, 3) taking the drug in larger amounts or over a longer period than intended, 4) a persistent desire or unsuccessful efforts to cut back, 5) a lot of time spent getting, using, or recovering from the effects of the drug, 6) disruption of important social occupational, or recreational activities, and 7) persistent use despite serious drug-related physical or psychological problems. To qualify for the label, a patient is supposed to be suffering from a "maladaptive pattern of substance use" that leads to "clinically significant impairment or distress," which is difficult to assess at a distance through a survey. But the major line of criticism I've seen indicates that, if anything, applying the "clinically significant" criterion would generate lower rates of substance dependence.

2. This particular analysis covers just a few years, and serious drug problems may take longer to develop (although that's certainly not the impression left by the government's anti-drug propaganda). Studies covering longer periods, such as the National Comorbidity Survey (which I cite in my book), do find higher addiction rates. But they still indicate that addiction is not a typical result of drug use.

3. It's risky to assume that the addiction rate associated with a substance has to do with its inherent properties, as opposed to the sort of people who like to use it. It seems plausible that people who are attracted to an extreme, notorious practice like heroin injection, for example, are different from people who aren't in ways (tastes, preferences, personality traits, circumstances) that affect their likelihood of using the drug heavily.

[via the Drug War Chronicle]

'That's a Very Serious Marker'

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 13:00:00 EDT

Remember the 13-year-old girl who was strip-searched because her vice principal thought she might be hiding ibuprofen in her underwear? The rationale in that case (to the extent that one can be divined) was that, while you can't actually use ibuprofen tablets to get high, they sorta look like things (hydrocodone, Valium, MDMA, etc.) that you can use to get high. A similar kind of quasi-reasoning was behind the three-day suspension of an 8-year-old boy from Harris Park Elementary School in Westminster, Colorado, for the offense of marker sniffing:

[Eathan] Harris used a black Sharpie marker to color a small area on the sleeve of his sweatshirt. A teacher sent him to the principal when she noticed him smelling the marker and his clothing.

"It smelled good," Harris said. "They told me that's wrong."...
[Principal Chris] Benisch stands by his decision to suspend Harris, saying it sends a clear message about substance abuse.

"This is really, really, seriously dangerous," Benisch said.

In his letter suspending the child, Benisch wrote that smelling the marker fumes could cause the boy to "become intoxicated."

A toxicologist with the Rocky Mountain Poison Control Center says that claim is nearly impossible.

Dr. Eric Lavonas says non-toxic markers like Sharpies, while pungent-smelling, cannot be used to get high.

"I don't know whether it would be possible for a real overachiever to figure out a way to get high off them," Lavonas said. "But in regular use, it's just not something that's going to happen."

"If you went to Costco and bought 50 bags of Sharpies and did something to them, maybe there's a way to get creative and make it happen," Lavonas said.

Adams County School District 50 leaders were unfazed by the poison control center's medical opinion.

"Principals make hundreds of decisions everyday based on our best judgment. And in that time, smelling that marker, I felt like, 'Wow, that's a very serious marker,'" Benisch said.

After all, the kid admits the marker "smelled good," which means he enjoyed sniffing it, which means it chemically stimulated the pleasure center of his brain, which makes its impact biochemically indistinguishable from that of a drug. I assume Harris Park Elementary School also bans flowers, perfumes, and fragrant food.

Have you ever heard of a case like this where school officials apologized and admitted they overreacted? Instead they circle the wagons and insist that their actions, no matter how objectively idiotic, were perfectly justified in the circumstances, what with the grave danger that [fill in the blank] poses to the youth of America. In this respect public school officials resemble the Transportation Security Administration. But at least the TSA has been known to change stupid policies once in a while, even if it doesn't admit how stupid they were to begin with.

[via The Freedom Files]

Lift a Joint to PUMRAA

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 16:45:00 EDT

Presumably because April 20 is a Sunday, Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) today introduced his briefly anticipated marijuana decriminalization bill. Dubbed the Personal Use of Marijuana by Responsible Adults Act of 2008, it would eliminate federal criminal penalties for possession of up to 100 grams (about three and a half ounces) of marijuana and the nonprofit transfer of up to an ounce. This is similar to the change recommended by the Nixon-appointed National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse (a.k.a. the Shafer Commission) 36 years ago. As in the case of online gambling, Frank sounds libertarian on this issue:

To those who say that the government should not be encouraging the smoking of marijuana, my response is that I completely agree. But it is a great mistake to divide all human activity into two categories: those that are criminally prohibited, and those that are encouraged. In a free society, there must be a very considerable zone of activity between those two poles in which people are allowed to make their own choices as long as they are not impinging on the rights, freedom, or property of others. I believe it is important with regard to tobacco, marijuana and alcohol, among other things, that we strictly regulate the age at which people may use these substances. And, enforcement of age restrictions should be firm. But, criminalizing choices that adults make because we think they are unwise ones, when the choices involved have no negative effect on the rights of others, is not appropriate in a free society.

Guess who the lone co-sponsor is.

Behind the Red Door

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 12:21:00 EDT

In the London Times, Steve Boggan describes his experience taking tea with Santo Daime followers in Brazil:

I am deep in the Amazon rainforest, anxiously losing my mind as the world begins to disintegrate. Around me, all sense of distance is wrapping itself up like spatial origami, slowly shrinking until an entire dimension has disappeared. A moment ago, I was surrounded by 200 people dressed in white and singing like angels, but now they occupy the same space as me.
Wherever I look, that is where I am. I can see everything from every angle, all at the same time. In fact, I feel I am everywhere. Outside, in the forest, the thrum of frogs and cicadas drowns out the sound of shrieking monkeys. Below me, the floor is shimmering, vanishing in waves like a spent mirage. Behind, I feel a cold vibration on my neck and sense a growling malevolence. I turn and see a red door, bulging at the hinges. Overcome with dread, I push hard to keep it closed, and all the while I feel a horrible nausea.

The tea in question, ayahuasca, contains the psychedelic dimethyltryptamine (DMT), which is legal for religious use in Brazil but banned in most of the world, including the U.K., where hundreds of Santo Daime adherents meet clandestinely to take their sacrament. The religion also has attracted followers elsewhere in Europe but is legally protected only in the Netherlands. And in the U.S.—maybe. As I reported in my June 2007 reason article about religious use of drugs, Uniao do Vegetal, another Brazilian sect that uses ayahusca, has won relief from government harassment under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Logically speaking, the law also should protect Santo Daime, which has similar beliefs and practices, but the question has not been litigated.

Still, here is one way in which the U.S. is more civilized/enlightened/tolerant (take your pick) than most of Europe. Not only did a tiny, obscure sect win the right to use an otherwise illegal drug through a unanimous Supreme Court interpretation of a statute that passed Congress almost unanimously, but it did so with the support of mainstream religious groups such as the Roman Catholic Church, the Baptists, the Presbyterians, and the National Association of Evangelicals. You can mention this counterexample the next time you hear a Europhilic progressive bemoan our lack of socialized medicine and fondness for guns.

The DEA's Disorganized Thoughts on Organized Crime

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 12:19:00 EDT

The Drug Enforcement Administration's top man in Colorado says the state's lax drug laws have led to an increase in organized crime:

"I think they believe it's a good market and I think the case could be made that it is a good market," said Jeffrey Sweetin, the DEA special agent in charge of Colorado.

Sweetin said it's in part because of Denver's law making marijuana legal in small amounts and a state-wide initiative to legalize medical marijuana.

It's not clear how a law that Denver police have been ignoring, and that it any case applies only to possession of small quantities for personal use, would attract drug traffickers to Colorado. The medical marijuana law, approved by voters in 2000, likewise does not allow distribution, only cultivation and possession of limited amounts by registered patients. Maybe Sweetin is suggesting that Colorado has been flooded by pot dealers because patients authorized by the state to grow and use medical marijuana nevertheless are relying on the black market. That would increase overall demand because without the law those patients would have had to...rely on the black market. Later in the article he suggests that Colorado is not the final destination for all the drugs allegedly entering the state:

"People here think they're so far from the border, they're insulated from it," he said. "They're not insulated from it."
Colorado has long been an ideal location for drug dealers.

"We're really the hub of the western interstate system." Sweetin said. "If you couple that also with we're an airline hub, a major airline hub, we're a bus hub, we're a train hub; it's really the perfect location to trans-ship from."

And the medical marijuana law, coupled with a local decriminalization measure that had no practical effect, somehow has made Colorado's location...more perfect, I guess. Is it too much to expect reporters to challenge drug warriors when they spout nonsense like this? It's not even a matter of questioning current policy—just following up with a question or two that would elucidate what they're claiming. Something sharp and to the point, like "Huh?"

Update: Going beyond "huh?," Colorado Confidential asked the DEA for evidence to support Sweetin's assertion that organized crime/drug trafficking is on the rise in Colorado:

No hard data were cited in the Channel 4 story regarding the reported increase in organized crime, and there was a good reason, according to a drug agency spokesman.
"I don't think there's any numbers I can give," said DEA media representative Mike Turner about the crime connection to legalization efforts. "It's just that the ongoing cases we're seeing I think reflect the fact that that's what's going on."

[Thanks to Mason Tvert for the tip.]

John Walters Just Got an Erection

rbalko@reason.com (Radley Balko) — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 09:07:00 EDT

The United Arab Emirates has figured out how to win the drug war:

A father-of-three who was found with a microscopic speck of cannabis stuck to the bottom of one of his shoes has been sentenced to four years in a Dubai prison.
Keith Brown, a council youth development officer, was travelling through the United Arab Emirates on his way back to England when he was stopped as he walked through Dubai's main airport.
A search by customs officials uncovered a speck of cannabis weighing just 0.003g - so small it would be invisible to the naked eye and weighing less than a grain of sugar - on the tread of one of his shoes.
[...]
One man has even been jailed for possession of three poppy seeds left over from a bread roll he ate at Heathrow Airport. Painkiller codeine is also banned.
If suspicious of a traveller, customs officials can use high-tech equipment to uncover even the slightest trace of drugs.
Mr Brown was detained and arrested in September last year and has been held in a cell with three other men in the city prison ever since.
This week the youth worker, who has two young children and a partner at home in Smethwick, West Midlands, was sentenced to four years in prison.
A 25-year-old Briton who was found with a similar speck in one pocket as he arrived on holiday has been awaiting sentence since November.
Meanwhile a Big Brother TV executive has so far been held without charge for five days after being arrested for possessing the health supplement melatonin.
The authorities claim to have discovered 0.01g of hashish in his luggage.

MORE: Looks like this particular drug offender has since been released.

Burn the Byrne

rbalko@reason.com (Radley Balko) — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 07:00:00 EDT

Last month, police in Kentucky went on a 24-hour drug raid blitz. According to local media accounts, the raids uncovered 23 methamphetamine labs, seized more than 2,400 pounds of marijuana, identified 16 drug-endangered children and arrested 565 people for illegal drug use.

That's quite a day's work.

What inspired the blitz? Complaints from the citizenry? A vicious string of drug-related murders? An outbreak of overdoses?

No, none of that.

It seems that they were concerned that the federal government is about to turn off the funding spigot.

"During 'Operation Byrne Blitz,'" a local television station reported, "state police and highway patrol agencies, local police and sheriff's departments, and drug task forces throughout the country conducted undercover investigations, marijuana eradication efforts and drug interdiction activities. The collaborative effort, named for the federal grant program which funds many of the anti-drug efforts, underscored the impact that cuts to this funding could have on local and statewide drug enforcement."

The federal grant they're referring to, the Byrne Grant, is problematic for a lot of reasons. Chief among them is the way it warps police priorities by tying drug arrests to the federal teat.

The grants are often tied to arrest statistics, which encourage police officers to target low-level drug offenders instead of major dealers and suppliers. The grants often create multi-jurisdictional "drug task forces," which—because their authority extends across several counties—many times aren't directly accountable to anyone.

It was a Byrne-funded task force in Tulia, Texas, for example, that in 1999 arrested and prosecuted 46 people of drug crimes based on the word of an undercover police informant later found to have fabricated evidence.

Another task force wrongfully arrested and prosecuted 28 people in Hearne, Texas the next year, this time based on the word of a criminal police informant. In fact, the situation got so bad in Texas that the state eventually banned multi-jurisdictional drug task forces.

Because most Byrne grants are also tied directly to drug arrests, they encourage local police departments to use their manpower and resources on nonviolent drug offenses instead of more serious crimes like rape, robbery, or murder.

Surprisingly, it was the Republican-led Congress that started phasing out Byrne grants in the 1990s, a trend that has continued through the Bush administration, though they haven't yet been eliminated completely.

It's a good idea.

Even if you happen to be a supporter of the drug war, these grants do little to help fight it, and only serve to make local police departments less accountable and less transparent. Even the White House Office of Management and Budget has been sharply critical of the program.

Unfortunately, Congressional Democrats (and many Republicans) can't resist the easy, positive publicity that comes with a press release announcing the procurement of federal crime-fighting pork for the local police department.

Congress is now discussing bringing back Byrne grants in full force. One leading senate proponent of re-funding the grants is, unfortunately, Democratic presidential frontrunner Barack Obama.

But let's go back to Kentucky.

Kentucky Justice and Public Safety Secretary J. Michael Brown told one local media outlet of the Byrne-grant bltiz, "The impact of our drug task forces can be clearly seen in the success of this one-day blitz. While combining these efforts in a 24-hour period makes a statement, it's important to remember that these types of activities go on every day, and are a critical tool in eradicating illegal use."

That's one way of looking at it.

But here's a different possibility: If police in Kentucky can go out and find 2,400 pounds of marijuana in 24-hours anytime they want, just to make a political statement, that might be a pretty good sign that the grants—and the drug war in general—aren't working.

Radley Balko is a senior editor for reason.