US Prisoners Sentenced Under Strict Crack Cocaine Laws
Get Relief
At least 12,000 federal prisoners can seek reductions in
their sentences for crack cocaine offenses, after a
ruling Thursday by the US Sentencing Commission. The
stiff sentences, meted out between 1984 and 2010, hit
the black community hard.
By Patrik Jonsson
Christian Science Monitor
June 30, 2011
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2011/0630/US-prisoners-sentenced-under-strict-crack-cocaine-laws-get-relief

Thousands of federal inmates imprisoned under a 1984 law
mandating harsh sentences for crack cocaine violations
are eligible for shorter sentences, the US Sentencing
Commission ruled Thursday.

The ruling affects at least 12,000 federal prisoners -
primarily nonviolent drug offenders and most of them
African-American - though they still have to go before
judicial panels to argue their cases for getting out of
prison early. The average sentence is expected to be
reduced by 37 months.

The decision by the six-member US Sentencing Commission
ends a long fight by advocacy groups and inmates' family
members to dial back sentencing rules for crack-cocaine
offenders. One relative called the news "miraculous."
Congress last August voted to narrow a huge discrepancy
in sentences meted out to people convicted of crack-
related crimes and people convicted of powder-cocaine-
related crimes, in recognition that the harsher
punishments for the former smacked of racial
discrimination. Thursday's ruling made the new
sentencing law retroactive, applying to people convicted
of such crimes before last summer.

The vote by the commission, a bipartisan group of former
judges and prosecutors, was unanimous. It applies to
cases in which there were no aggravating circumstances,
such as gun possession. The ruling follows a pattern
that has been emerging across the US, as policymakers
reconsider stiff prison sentences for low-level,
nonviolent drug offenders.

"Normally when we're talking about reducing sentences,
it's for very small numbers of people in low-visibility
settings, [but] here we're not just talking pardons for
three people, but about huge numbers," says Ron Wright,
a law professor at Wake Forest University. "This is one
more example that our basic attitudes toward how to
punish crimes are different today than they were 10
years ago."

The decision is part of the commission's long-time
effort to "give the fullest remedy" to "a mistake," says
Samford University law professor Deborah Young. When
Congress approved the 2010 Fair Sentencing Act in
August, it dramatically reduced the disparity between
sentences for crack versus powder cocaine violations. A
violation that would land a powder-cocaine offender in
prison for a day would put a crack offender behind bars
for 100 days, under the old law. Now that ratio is 1:18,
but it applies only to new convictions.

The commission had butted heads with Congress over the
sentencing disparity in the 1990s. After Congress took
corrective action last summer for new drug offenders,
the commission took the opportunity to apply that reform
even more broadly.

Eighty-five percent of offenders sentenced under the
1984 crack cocaine sentencing law are African-American
and 5 percent are white. (The African-American
population of the US is about 13 percent.)

The commission made its decision after studying the
effect of a small 2007 modification to crack cocaine
sentencing, which revealed no tangible spikes in repeat-
offending rates for those released early.

US prison officials had warned, in advance of Thursday's
decision, of the possibility that inmates would riot or
stir up trouble if their hopes for an earlier release
were dashed.

Many conservatives in Congress opposed applying the
terms of the 2010 Fair Sentencing Law retroactively. And
in a Supreme Court case last month involving the
possible early release of thousands of California
prisoners, Justice Samuel Alito noted in his dissent
that a crime wave occurred in Philadelphia after the
early release of thousands of Pennsylvania prisoners
several years ago. Many inmates released by California,
Justice Alito wrote, will "undoubtedly be fine physical
specimens who have developed intimidating muscles
pumping iron in the prison gym."

The racial disparity in cocaine-related sentencing
embittered many in the black community and raised fresh
concerns about discrimination in the criminal justice
system. Defenders of harsher punishment for crack
cocaine violations, on the other hand, suggested that
longer sentences for drug offenders contributed to the
steady decline in the US crime rate, which dropped by
half in black communities between 1980 and 2005.

"The crux of the debate is that it's one thing to say,
'Let's do better in the future,' and it's another thing
to say that somebody who was at least theoretically
aware of how harsh the sentences were are now in some
sense getting a windfall," says Doug Berman, a
sentencing expert at Ohio State University. "But I think
a majority of people wouldn't say it's a windfall; it's
just making an injustice less unjust."

Twenty-two states - including California and Ohio - are
considering whether to restructure their sentencing
guidelines to contain skyrocketing incarceration costs,
in part by addressing punishments for low-level,
nonviolent drug crimes.

"People across a wide political spectrum would say that
federal crack cocaine punishments were an abberration
and were out of line with what people normally
considered smart uses of prison money," says Professor
Wright at Wake Forest.

The human impact of the decision came across in
heartfelt statements from commissioners, who ultimately
rejected a compromise offered by Attorney General Eric
Holder to exclude those with prior criminal histories
from retroactive appeal. Commission Chairwoman Patti
Saris, a federal judge, said it was a "historic day for
the commission and for national sentencing policy."

For thousands of families, the decision is the
culmination of years of praying and hoping for mercy.

Stephanie Nodd, who is serving time in a federal prison
in Florida for conspiracy to distribute eight kilos of
crack in the early 1990s, is eligible to have 10 years
taken off her 30-year sentence, which means she could be
freed soon, according to Families Against Mandatory
Minimums, an advocacy group.

Her brother, Dan Nodd, called the commission's ruling "a
blessing, a realization that justice has finally
emerged."

He added in an interview with the Monitor: "I hated that
it took so long and families had to suffer, people whose
mother and father died before they could see their
children come home. But we always kept hope, and we were
hoping one day that this day would come, and without
hope these things are impossible."

___________________________________________

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