by TChris

Ever eager to grab more power while evading judicial scrutiny, the Bush administration wants to give the FBI the power to subpoena business and financial records without satisfying a judge that the records are likely to reveal evidence of a crime. Federal investigators would avoid judicial review of document seizures by declaring that the records are needed in a terrorism investigation. The proposal is consistent with the administration's philosophy: utter the word terrorism and, while everyone ducks, suspend the Constitution.

The proposal, part of a broader plan to extend antiterrorism powers under the USA Patriot Act, was concluded in recent days by Republican leaders on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence in consultation with the Bush administration, Congressional officials said.

The folks who brought us the Patriot Act assure us that the proposed side-stepping of judicial review is nothing to worry about. In fact, they can't think of a "coherent argument" against it. Here's one:

The Justice Department passed new p0rnography rules today--shifting the burden of proof to the producer of the material. The producers will have to establish that those depicted in photos and films are adults.

....producers who violate the new requirements would be subject to prison terms of up to five years on the first offense and up to 10 years for subsequent offenses.....producers must keep detailed records that verify the identity and age of each individual depicted.

The regulations also expand the definition of "producer" to include those who publish on the Internet. All of the new rules are intended to implement the Child Protection and Obscenity Enforcement Act, enacted in 2003.

The DEA has been conducting a war on doctors who prescribe pain medication. Last month, Libertarian Blogger and Cato Policy Analyst Radley Balko wrote a column about it, Bush Should Feel Doctors' Pain. It got picked up by several newspapers, including a small one in York, PA>

DEA Administrator Karen Tandy took the time to write the York, PA paper criticizing Radley's column.

Radley now fisks Tandy's letter, point by point, finding it rife with errors and misrepresentations.

by TChris

With the possible exception of Rush Limbaugh, drug addicts tend to be excoriated by the right. In the end, addicts aren't demons who deserved to be vilified; they're humans, with human failings. And, as this story demonstrates, with human strengths, as well.

A homeless man who did odd jobs for a local restaurateur was stabbed to death as he defended her against a knife-wielding intruder, authorities said.

Kelcy Ruiz, 32, was mourned as a hero for coming to the aid of Melida Murillo during an attack Monday at her Colombian restaurant, Mama Leonor. Ruiz, described by relatives as a crack cocaine addict who lived mainly on Miami's downtown streets, did occasional work for Murillo in exchange for food.

As a Miami police detective pointed out, Ruiz was "a forgotten member of society" who "acted better than most people who are not homeless." Let this be a lesson to those (including members of Congress) who believe that rehabilitation and redemption are impossible goals, and that individuals lose their value to society once they commit a drug crime.

by TChris

Gov. Jeb Bush has no problem spending the money of Florida's taxpayers to incarcerate sex offenders for a mandatory minimum term of 25 years. Nor did he mind spending money to intervene in the Schiavo case, or in his failed effort to prevent a girl from exercising her right to have an abortion.

But when it comes to doing something helpful, something that is likely to prevent crime while serving a public need, Jeb doesn't want to cough up the bucks.

Gov. Jeb Bush is said to be considering vetoing the $2.8 million for Orange County's Central Receiving Center. That's a terrible idea.

The CRC takes in mentally ill adults who are going through a life-threatening crisis and gives them a few days' inpatient treatment to get them stable and medicated. It gets so little state funding that many who need the center instead languish in jail cells or hospital corridors, sometimes for days.

Leaving people who are desperate for mental health treatment to wander the street is inexcusable.

The Washington Examiner, in an editorial, points out another unfortunate consequence of the war on drugs: doctors are getting skittish about prescribing pain medication for patients in chronic pain, for fear of being prosecuted.

As Pain Relief Network President Siobhan Reynolds said, "Ninety-eight percent of doctors won't touch [chronic pain patients] with a 10-foot pole."

Dr. William Hurwitz was sentenced to 25 years in prison last month, following a trial at which the Government labeled him "no better than a crack dealer," although there was no evidence that he profited from his prescriptions.

by TChris

This was written by a member of the Rhode Island Parole Board to describe his struggle to balance the horrific stories he hears from crime victims and the sincere appraisals of failed lives he hears from offenders who may deserve a second chance.

So, how do I administer justice? I believe that justice can’t be shaped by simplistic formulas. Rather, justice happens when real human beings sort through a jumble of laws, rules, conflicting stories, and plain old instinct.

While made in the context of parole decisions, his comments are an effective refutation to those who think "one size fits all" sentencing proposals have something to do with justice.

by TChris

Crime lab scientists shouldn't feel pressured to produce results that favor the prosecution. They're paid by the government, but they aren't law enforcement officers or prosecutors. Their duty is to seek the truth, not to spin it.

Too often, crime lab scientists view themselves as working for the prosecution, not as working for justice. An independent audit of the Virginia crime lab released yesterday was so critical of the lab's handling of DNA evidence that Gov. Mark Warner has ordered a review of the lab's testing in 150 cases.

Among the auditors' eight recommendations, all of which were accepted by Mr. Warner, were that the governor restrict the work of the lab's chief DNA scientist, Jeffrey Ban; review 40 cases that Mr. Ban has handled in recent years, along with a sample totaling 110 additional cases; and develop procedures to insulate the lab from any outside political pressures.

Among other cases, the lab twice botched the DNA testing in the prosecution of Earl Washington Jr., a man who was nearly executed for a crime he probably didn't commit. Peter Neufeld, co-director of the Innocence Project and one of Washington's lawyers, correctly argues that Washington's case "raises very serious questions about the legitimacy of the capital justice system." It also raises questions about the legitimacy of less serious convictions that depend on crime lab evidence.

by TChris

Another person -- this one in Phoenix -- has died after being shot with a Taser. TalkLeft's prior coverage of the controversy surrounding police reliance on Tasers is collected here.

An ongoing Arizona Republic investigation has found that at least 109 people have died in the United States and Canada following police Taser strikes since 1999.

by TChris

A Poughkeepsie judge, George Marlow, reminded listeners during a Law Day speech that "the jury system is our best hope for justice most often and our best protection against tyranny." He also spoke out against proposals to limit both the questioning of potential jurors and the exercise peremptory challenges (the ability to strike prospective jurors who seem to a lawyer to be potentially unfair).

"What could ever be more critical to a fair trial than a nonpolitical, impartial, patient, fair and decent jury of free women and men?" Marlow said. "A jury may be picked by the smartest, most prepared lawyers on this planet. But if there are a few wolves in sheep's clothing seated in that box and the lawyers aren't given the leeway to ferret them out ... no amount of competent lawyering can ever prevent the oncoming train of injustice these wolves may be driving."

Plan Colombia has failed, according to the New York Times. Jacob Sullen at Reason notes:

Five years and $3 billion into the most aggressive counternarcotics operation ever here, American and Colombian officials say they have eradicated a record-breaking million acres of coca plants, yet cocaine remains as available as ever on American streets, perhaps more so.

Drug War Rant comments:

This is five times as much as the federal government spends on the arts. Now you may disagree with arts funding, and you may not like all the art that comes from arts funding, but arts funding at least doesn't destroy the rainforest, increase international violence and terrorism, spread poison on poor farmers' crops with nothing to show for it -- at least with the arts funding you can get a pretty good symphony and some excellent arts in the schools now and then.

Further evidence the war on cocaine supply has failed to affect demand or use: today's Denver Post article, Cocaine Demons Stalk Aspen.

Meet 81-year old Betty Hiatt. She smokes pot.

She is, at 81, both a medical train wreck and a miracle, surviving cancer, Crohn's disease and the onset of Parkinson's. Each morning Hiatt takes more than a dozen pills. But first.... Peering through owlish glasses, Hiatt fires up a cannabis cigarette with a wood-stem match. She inhales. The little apartment — a cozy place of knickknacks and needlepoint — takes on the odor of a rock concert.

"It's like any other medicine for me," Hiatt says, blowing out a cumulus of unmistakable fragrance. "But I don't know that I'd be alive without it."

The Supreme Court's decision on state medical marijuana laws is due any day. Raich v. Ashcroft will decide whether federal laws prohibiting all marijuana use can be used to charge those who take the drug for medical reasons in states with laws that allow such use.