Academic

Rockefeller Drug Laws Finally Go

By Laura Appleman

As an editorial in the New York Times points out today, it looks like the horribly punitive Rockefeller Drug Laws, a set of NY sentencing guidelines that harshly punished even the smallest amount of drug possession or sale, may finally be overturned.  Despite widespread dislike of the law in recent times, it still took THIRTY-FIVE years to get rid of them:

The New York Legislature finally seems poised to overturn the infamous Rockefeller drug laws. The impending change comes too late for the tens of thousands of low-level, nonviolent drug offenders who wasted away in prison because of mandatory sentencing policies when they should have been given treatment and leniency. But after years of building support for reform, legislative leaders now have it within their power to make wholesale changes in this profoundly destructive law.

The Rockefeller laws tied the hands of judges by requiring lengthy prison terms even for first-time offenders. Essentially, the law allowed prosecutors to decide who went to jail and for how long. The system, which has been imitated throughout the country, filled the jails to bursting, while doing nothing to curb the drug trade.

As someone who practiced criminal defense in NY before entering academia, I am delighted to see that the NY Legislature *finally* has the balls to overturn these antiquated and unfair sentencing policies.  But the amount of time it took to get political support to do so is shameful. 

Full post as published by The Faculty Lounge on February 09, 2009 (boomark / email).