Ending the Cocaine/Crack Disparity

A bill introduced in the U.S. Senate yesterday by Dick Durbin is aiming to end the sentencing disparity between cocaine and crack, an advocacy group says all of pieces are finally in place to make it happen, and Gawker missed the point.

Durbin's bill, the Fair Sentencing Act, was introduced with nine co-sponsors and would increase the amount of crack that triggers a five-year mandatory sentence. Under current law, possession of five grams of crack requires judges to hand down the five-year sentence, while 500 grams of cocaine carries the same penalty. This 100:1 ratio has long been pointed to by reformers as unnecessary, unfair and racially biased. A parallel bill has been introduced in the House.

Families Against Mandatory Minimums immediately released a statement supporting Durbin's legislation -- and asserting that we have the right policy environment for this reform to finally happen this year:

"The picture is now nearly complete – the White House and the Department of Justice have endorsed the complete elimination of the cocaine sentencing disparity, the Sentencing Commission has found the disparity unreasonable, and the House of Representatives and now the Senate have introduced legislation that would equalize crack and powder cocaine penalties," FAMM said in a statement.

This law needs to be changed, and I'm with FAMM in hoping it will happen this year. But all mandatory minimums are destructive and ineffective -- judges should have discretion when handling these cases to divert a drug user to treatment if it seems they can change their lives. Five or ten years in prison isn't a blanket prescription for improvement -- in fact, it is rarely necessary in nonviolent crimes.

Of course, support for drug reform isn't unanimous and this work is always an uphill battle. Disagreement will come from the expected places -- but it sometimes comes from the unexpected as well. Gawker, of all places, suggests that maybe we should have a five-year mandatory minimum for five grams of cocaine. What? If that became law, Gawker wouldn't have anyone to write about, because all of its minor-celebrity targets would be in prison. Gawker blogger Andrew Belonksy writes:

Don't get us wrong, we think the law needs to be balanced, but wouldn't it make more sense to lower the levels of cocaine needed to get a minimum sentence? (Not that we think that's a good idea, either, but still — increasing crack numbers sort of just rewards drug use of all colors.)

Correcting misinformation in public opinion is half the battle with this work. Leave a comment at Gawker today to tell Belonsky just how wrong he got that one.

Photo by Marco Gomes