Pubdate: Tue, 16 Feb 2016
Source: New York Times (NY)
Copyright: 2016 The New York Times Company
Contact: http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/lettertoeditor.html
Website: http://www.nytimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/298
Author: Jeremy Haile
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v16/n077/a03.html

CLEMENCY FOR CRACK OFFENSES

To the Editor:

Re "When Addiction Has a White Face" (Op-Ed, Feb. 9):

Ekow N. Yankah writes that we should "learn from our meanest moments" 
in responding to drug addiction as we move forward. But it's not too 
late to repair some of the damage caused by mistakes of the past.

Nearly 6,000 individuals are still serving time in federal prison 
under mandatory crack penalties, adopted by Congress at the height of 
the war on drugs, that punished people convicted of crack offenses 
much more severely than those convicted of powder cocaine. Because of 
racial disparities in law enforcement, more than 80 percent of these 
prisoners are African-American.

Though the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 reduced the unfair disparity 
between crack and powder cocaine, it did not apply retroactively to 
individuals sentenced under the old law. Legislation pending in 
Congress would allow these prisoners to seek a sentence reduction in 
accordance with the lower penalties. But there's no reason they 
should have to wait.

With the stroke of a pen, President Obama could reduce the sentences 
of all those individuals imprisoned under the old, discriminatory 
crack law. Such a bold use of executive clemency would be justifiable 
as a matter of fairness. And it would fulfill the promise that Mr. 
Obama, as a candidate, made at Howard University in 2007 - that on 
the crack cocaine issue, he would be "willing to brave the politics 
and make it right."

JEREMY HAILE

Federal Advocacy Counsel

The Sentencing Project

Washington
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