-------------------------------------------------------------------

NORML Weekly News Release (House Republicans Continue Assault
On States' Rights, Medical Marijuana Research - House Judiciary
Okays Resolution Calling Marijuana A 'Dangerous And Addictive Drug';
Canadian Farmers Will Grow Commercial Hemp Plots For First Time In 50 Years,
Health Minister Vows At Agriculture Conference; Nearly Half Of All Americans
Say That Marijuana Is "Hot" In Annual Poll)

From: NORMLFNDTN (NORMLFNDTN@aol.com)
Date: Fri, 6 Mar 1998 11:09:44 EST
Subject: NORML WPR 3/5/97 (II)

A NON-PROFIT LEGAL, RESEARCH, AND EDUCATIONAL ORGANIZATION

THE NORML FOUNDATION
1001 CONNECTICUT AVENUE NW
SUITE 710
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20036
T 202-483-8751 o F 202-483-0057
E-MAIL NORMLFNDTN@AOL.COM
Internet http://www.norml.org

. . . a weekly service for the media on news items related to marijuana
prohibition.

March 5, 1998

House Republicans Continue Assault On States' Rights, Medical Marijuana
Research House Judiciary Okays Resolution Calling Marijuana a "Dangerous
And Addictive Drug"

March 5, 1998, Washington, D.C.: A coalition of Republicans on the
House Judiciary Committee approved a "sense of the House of
Representatives" resolution on Wednesday stating that "marijuana is a
dangerous and addictive drug and should not be legalized for medical
use." House Resolution 372 -- introduced by Crime Subcommittee chair
Bill McCollum (R-Fla.) -- was approved by a voice vote despite efforts by
several Democrats to kill or amend the measure.

"Medical marijuana is a public health issue," said Rep. Jerrold Nadler
(D-N.Y.), who vigorously argued against the bill. "[It] is not part of
the 'War on Drugs.'" Also speaking in opposition to the measure were
Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.), ranking Democrat on the committee, and Reps.
William Delahunt (D-Mass.), Barney Frank (D-Mass.), Zoe Lofgren
(D-Calif.), Martin Meehan (D-Mass.), and Melvin Watt (D-N.C.).

Before passing the resolution, Republicans rejected an amendment offered
by Rep. Conyers that stated "States have the primary responsibility for
protecting the health and safety of their citizens, and the Federal
Government should not interfere with any state's policy (as expressed in
a legislative enactment or referendum) which authorizes persons with AIDS
or cancer to pursue, upon the recommendation of a licensed physician, a
course of treatment for such illness that includes the use of marijuana."

Republicans also rejected an amendment proposed by Rep. Martin Meehan
(D-Mass.) calling on the House of Representatives to "consider this issue
... deserving of further study."

Republicans argued that any lifting of the legal ban prohibiting
marijuana, even for medical purposes, would send mixed and potentially
dangerous messages to the American public about drug use. Rep. McCollum
-- who sponsored legislation to permit the legal use of medical marijuana
in 1981 and 1983 -- further charged that it would be "counterproductive"
for Congress to encourage medical marijuana research or request the Food
and Drug Administration to review the drug's prohibitive status.

"[I] do not want to go on record supporting another study [on medical
marijuana,]" McCollum said. "[Congress] must send a clear message [that]
... marijuana is a highly addictive Schedule I drug ... with no
likelihood of FDA approval." Rep. McCollum also said that he no longer
supports the stance he took in the 1980s when he urged the federal
government to make marijuana legal as a medicine.

"The Republicans on the Judiciary Committee are willing to ignore the
science and deny an effective medication to seriously ill patients in
order to advance their political agenda," charged NORML Executive
Director R. Keith Stroup, Esq. For example, Stroup noted that Rep. James
Rogan (R-Calif.) voted for the resolution despite declaring that he
observed a seriously ill family member successfully use marijuana as a
medicine. Two Democrats who opposed the resolution also gave personal
testimonials of a friend or family member's battle with terminal illness.
One representative also admitted that her friend found therapeutic
relief from marijuana.

"Republicans apparently are not willing to let scientific evidence,
compassion, or common sense get in the way of arresting and jailing
marijuana smokers -- even those who are seriously or terminally ill,"
Stroup said.

The resolution now goes for consideration before the full House.

For more information or a copy of House Res. 372, please contact either
Keith Stroup or Paul Armentano of NORML @ (202) 483-5500.

***

Canadian Farmers Will Grow Commercial Hemp Plots For First Time In 50
Years, Health Minister Vows At Agriculture Conference

March 5, 1998, Toronto, Ontario: Commercial cultivation of industrial
hemp will be legal nationwide early next month, Federal Health Minister
Allan Rock vowed at a recent meeting of the Canadian Federation of
Agriculture. Rock said that he is ready to formally approve regulations
released in December by the Canadian Department of Health (Health Canada)
to permit farmers to engage in wide-scale farming of the crop.

"I'm pleased to report that by the beginning of next month, the
cultivation of industrial hemp will be legal in Canada," he said.

Since 1995, Canada has licensed a limited number of farmers to cultivate
small test plots of industrial hemp for research purposes. The
forthcoming regulations will allow farmers to grow commercial plots of
the crop for the first time in 50 years.

According to a preliminary draft of the regulations published on the
Health Canada website, anyone growing, processing, or exporting hemp will
have to possess a license from the agency. The regulations also mandate
that farmers may not grow the crop within one kilometer of school grounds
or any public place frequented by persons under eighteen years of age.
Industrial hemp must be stored in a locked container or location, and
samples of crop have to be tested at a laboratory to determine THC
content. Health Canada defines industrial hemp as a variety of the
cannabis plant with less than 0.3 percent THC.

Sally Rutherford, Executive Director of the Canadian Federation of
Agriculture, which represents 200,000 farm families nationwide, praised
the upcoming change in federal law.

"[Hemp] provides another commodity that people can produce and there
appears to be a growing market for it," she said. "For people looking
for diversified crops to grow, it is good news."

Senator Lorna Milne -- who has pushed for changing Canada's hemp laws
for several years -- called hemp "an opportunity for Canadian farmers
unmatched in this century."

A spokesman for the health minister said that there will be "minor
adjustments" to the proposed hemp regulations, but would not comment on
what those changes may be.

Presently in the United States, farmers may not grow industrial hemp --
even for research purposes -- it is illegal under federal law. According
to a 1995 United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) "white paper,"
the Drug Enforcement Administration remains "opposed to any consideration
of hemp as a legitimate fiber or pulp product." The report further added
that "legal issues" preclude the USDA from growing test plots of the crop
for scientific purposes.

For more information, please contact either Paul Armentano or Allen St.
Pierre of the NORML Foundation @ (202) 483-8751.

***

Nearly Half Of All Americans Say That Marijuana Is "Hot" In Annual Poll

March 5, 1998, New York, NY: Almost one out of every two Americans say
that marijuana is "in," according to a new Roper Starch survey about what's
hot and what's not. The study involved face to face interviews nationwide
with 2,000 representative adults age 18 or older.

Allen St. Pierre, Executive Director of The NORML Foundation, called the
response "remarkable."

"After 60 years of a blanket prohibition on marijuana, and despite the
existence of a myriad of civil and criminal punishments, the plant still
enjoys wide social approval," he said. "As reform minded organizations
such as The NORML Foundation better educate America about the harm
associated with marijuana prohibition, public attitudes about marijuana
will continue to move from one of dissonance to social change."

Respondents ranked marijuana as one of the nation's thirty hottest items.

Roper Starch Worldwide is one of the nation's largest market research
and consulting firms.

For more information, please contact either Dick Altman of Roper Starch
Worldwide @ (212) 697-2620 or Allen St. Pierre of The NORML Foundation @
(202) 483-8751.

				-END-

MORE THAN 11 MILLION MARIJUANA ARRESTS SINCE 1965...ANOTHER EVERY 49 SECONDS!

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Oregon Medical Marijuana Initiative Criticism (Comments By List Subscriber)

Date: Sat, 7 Mar 1998 02:36:47 EST
Originator: drctalk@drcnet.org
Sender: drctalk@drcnet.org
From: Robert.Goodman@godi.adirondack.fidonet.org (Robert Goodman)
To: Multiple recipients of list 
Subject: OMMI criticism

The Oregon Medical Marijuana Initiative was kindly forwarded by
alive@pacifier.com (Arthur Livermore). I see by it that AMR has
been technically improving their meausres. However, I'd like
someone to pass along these questions to Sandee Burbank:

In the definitions it says:

> (4)..."Designated primary caregiver" does not include the
> person's attending physician.

But then later:

> SECTION 10. No professional licensing board may impose a civil
> penalty or take other disciplinary action against a licensee
> based on the licensee's medical use of marijuana in accordance
> with the provisions of sections 1 to 19 of this Act or actions
> taken by the licensee that are necessary to carry out the
> licensee's role as a designated primary caregiver....

Did somebody goof, or does section 10 refer only to professional
licensees OTHER THAN physicians? That aside, what's the reason
for excluding physicians as potential primary caregivers? It'd
seem to me that if there's anyone voters would allow to grow
medical marijuana, it'd be doctors.

> SECTION 4. (1) Except as provided in sections 5 and 11 of this
> Act, a person engaged in or assisting in the medical use of
> marijuana is excepted from the criminal laws of the state....

Although section 8 has a provision for RETURN of seized property,
I don't see any provision that the marijuana itself not be
subject to seizure under a libel action. For instance, the
pharmacy law of Oregon may make marijuana held by a caregiver
subject to seizure as an "adulterated" drug or some such.
It's even possible that the entire pharmacy law isn't
considered part of the "criminal laws", although it might include
criminal penalties for violations. For instance, New York's
consolidated statutes include a voluminous title whose NAME is
"Criminal Law", but there are many other titles which include
criminal provisions, including those related to pharmacy (which
is under the "Education Law" title because that's where
proffessional licensure provisions are). So if a New York bill
referred to "criminal laws", I couldn't predict whether that'd be
construed as the "Criminal Law" or all laws with criminalizing
clauses.
Farther along this section says:

> (a)The division may deny an application only for the following
> reasons: (i)The applicant did not provide the information
> required pursuant to this section....

and then,

> (c)Any person whose application has been denied may not reapply
> for six months from the date of the denial, unless so
> authorized by the division or a court of competent
> jurisdiction.

I've warned AMR about this one. Someone could make a very
technical violation in the application for the card. The
division would obviously have to deny the application, even
though it says above only "...MAY deny an application ONLY
for..." But then the applicant is SOL for 6 mos. What's the
purpose of this provision? Afraid of harassing paperwork
deluging the division? If so, why not limit the 6 mo. time out
to cases of frivolous applications?

Section 8 includes:

> (2)Any property interest possessed, owned or used in connection
> with the medical use of marijuana or acts incidental to the
> medical use of marijuana that has been seized by state or local
> law enforcement officers shall not be harmed, neglected,
> injured or destroyed while in the possession of any law
> enforcement agency. No such property interest may be forfeited
> under any provision of law providing for the forfeiture of
> property other than as a sentence imposed after conviction of a
> criminal offense. Marijuana and paraphernalia used to
> administer marijuana that was seized by any law enforcement
> officer shall be returned immediately upon a determination by
> the district attorney in whose county the property was seized,
> or his or her designee, that the person from whom the marijuana
> or paraphernalia used to administer marijuana was seized is
> entitled to the protections contained in sections 1 to 19 of
> this Act. Such determination may be evidenced, for example, by
> a decision not to prosecute, the dismissal of charges, or
> acquittal.

Maybe there should also a provision preventing such seizure in
the first place. It may be considered an abuse of authority if
someone carrying med mj and presenting an ID card had material
seized pursuant to the criminal law provisions to which this
initiative is addressed. However, as I indicate above, there may
be OTHER provisions of law (e.g., "adulterated drug" pharmacy
laws) which plausibly authorize such a seizure, even though it be
ultimately fruitless under the provision above. I may be
paranoid about this, but I see the possibility of a revolving
door of marijuana operated by a recalcitrant police agency.

Robert

***

Fidonet: Robert Goodman 1:2625/141
Internet: Robert.Goodman@godi.adirondack.fidonet.org

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Court Widens Police Search Powers ('The Oregonian' Notes US Supreme Court
Wednesday Made A Unanimous And Final Ruling In A 1994 Case
From Boring, Oregon, That Overturns Oregon Judge's Decision
And Expands Rights Of Police Officers - If Armed With A Search Warrant,
They Can Now Kick Down Your Door Without Even Knocking)

Found at oregonlive.com
letters to editor:
letters@news.oregonian.com

The Oregonian
Portland, Oregon
March 5, 1998

Court widens police search powers

In a unanimous ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court
uses a Boring man's case to expand police search
powers

By Ashbel S. Green
of The Oregonian staff

The U.S. Supreme Court used an Oregon case
Wednesday to expand the ability of police officers
armed with a search warrant to kick down a door
without knocking.

In a unanimous ruling, the court overturned an
Oregon judge's decision to exclude from evidence
weapons seized during a 1994 raid of a Boring
man's home.

Under the Fourth Amendment's protection from
unreasonable search and seizure, police officers
armed with a search warrant must announce their
presence and give the occupants a chance to
come to the door. Only after a reasonable amount
of time has passed can officers enter the house by
opening the door or kicking it down.

In recent years, the Supreme Court has adopted
three exceptions under which the police can use
the element of surprise: if announcing their
presence could put officers in danger, lead to the
destruction of evidence or allow a suspect to
escape.

Cutting a finer line, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals said that officers kicking down the door
must meet a heavier burden of proof that their
safety is in danger, for example, than must
officers who open a window and sneak in.

The U.S. Supreme Court now says police don't
need to make that distinction. They can just go in.

Stephen F. Peifer, an assistant U.S. Attorney in
Portland, said the ruling simplified a rule that had
applied to law enforcement across the vast 9th
Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, which stretches
from Arizona to Alaska.

"I can tell you that it's already being well-received
in the law enforcement community because it
applies a simpler rule that can be better
understood and applied," Peifer said. "Prior to
this ruling today, officers were in a quandary as to
what level of proof they needed to have to force
entry when not knocking and announcing."

That distinction had prevented Peifer from
prosecuting Boring resident Hernan Ramirez since
his arrest on weapons charges in 1994.

Federal agents were looking for a fugitive named
Alan Shelby who had escaped from Tillamook
County sheriff's deputies on Nov. 1, 1994.

An informant said he saw someone he thought
was Shelby at Ramirez' home in Boring. The
informant also said that Shelby might have a stash
of guns. Shelby, facing a federal prison sentence,
had threatened that he would "not do federal
time."

Federal agents got a warrant. On the morning of
Nov. 4, agents simultaneously announced their
presence through a bullhorn and broke a window
in the garage.

Ramirez, who was asleep along with his wife and
a child, thought burglars were breaking in. He
grabbed a gun and fired. After realizing that it was
the police, he surrendered.

Federal agents seized the gun. After learning that
Ramirez was an ex-felon, agents arrested him on
an accusation of being an ex-felon in possession
of a handgun.

Shelby was not in the house.

U.S. District Judge Ancer L. Haggerty threw out
the gun as evidence because the search was
improper under the 9th Circuit rule.

The government appealed, but the 9th Circuit
affirmed Haggerty's ruling.

Ramirez' attorney, Michael R. Levine, argued
before the Supreme Court in January that the 9th
Circuit's distinction was well-reasoned.

"What I argued to the court was there's a
difference between coming through an open door
and breaking down the door," Levine said.

Levine argued that the 9th Circuit rule helped
protect the police, who are more likely to get shot
when surprised homeowners think that burglars
are breaking in.

"The whole function of the knock-and-announce
rule is to protect the police as much as it is the
homeowners," Levine said.

The Supreme Court sided with the government,
which argued that police who need to use surprise
for their safety should not have to meet a heavier
burden of proof if the window is latched.

"Whether such 'reasonable suspicion' exists
depends in no way whether police must destroy
property in order to enter," wrote Chief Justice
William Rehnquist.

Ramirez is in federal prison on subsequent drug
charges, Peifer said. No trial date has been set on
the weapons charges.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Court Decision - Narcs Must Return Marijuana
(List Subscriber Posts Text Of Mendocino County, California
Municipal Judge Henry M. Nelson's Court Order Directing The Sheriff
To Return 300 Grams Of Medical Marijuana To A Patient
Protected Under Proposition 215)

Date: Sat, 21 Mar 1998 19:33:58 EST
Originator: medmj@drcnet.org
Sender: medmj@drcnet.org
From: rgivens@sirius.com
To: Multiple recipients of list 
Subject: Court Decision: Narcs Must Return Marijuana

[Sender's note:]

Yo Talkers etc.,

This is an important court decision for every one using medical marijuana
in California. should keep a copy handy in case Reefer Madness enters your
life.

This is the first court decision (I think) forcing a PD to return marijuana
to a patient after a raid.

The case law is all settled here, so any judge should force the narcs to
return your medicine once they become aware of this precedent!

This can save you from some dumb lawyering!
R Givens

***

MENDOCINO COUNTY COORDINATED COURTS
STATE OF CALIFORNIA

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

No. 97-77843
ORDER DISCHARGING EMERGENCY PETITION FOR WRIT OF MANDATE

Plaintiff and Petitioner

vs.

MUNICIPAL COURT, COUNTY OF MENDOCINO
CHRISTOPHER JOSEPH BROWN

Real Party in Interest

This matter came on for hearing this date, Mr. Michael D. O'Reilley
appearing for the petitioner, Ms. Hannah Nelson appearing for the
respondent.

The facts of this case as presented by the parties appearing from the court
file reveals that the Mendocino County District Attorney filed a felony
complaint charging respondent and a co-defendant (who is now deceased) with
three counts of various felony charges involving the cultivation and
possession of marijuana.

On August 1, 1997, the prosecution moved for dismissal of the complaint
which was granted pursuant to Penal Code Section 1385. As represented by
the parties before the court, the dismissal was sought by the prosecution
upon presentation to the District Attorney of a letter from the
respondent's physician stating that because this patient experiences
adverse side effects from normal medication, the use of marijuana as an
analgesic for his back pain is appropriate and recommended. (Exhibit D
attached to the petition).

On December 18, 1997, the magistrate ordered return of the marijuana to the
respondent, and the Attorney General filed in this court an emergency
petition for issuance of a writ of mandate to set aside the magistrate's
order.

Essentially, the State's argument is that possession of marijuana for any
purpose is still a crime under federal law, and that there is no authority
to order the Sheriff to "dispense" this contraband to the public. Further,
the prosecution argues that the amount involved (300 grams and 45 growing
plants) does not meet the test of being an amount reasonably related to the
defendant's medical needs under the standard articulated in People vs.
Trippet. 58 CA4th. 1532

To the extent that Health and Safety Code Section 11382.5 is in conflict
with federal law is not an issue in this proceeding. Federal authorities
historically cede prosecution of small amounts of marijuana to the states.
Furthermore, that issue is not addressed in the Trippet decision which
implicitly recognizes the validity of Health and Safety Code Section
11362.5. This Court is not inclined to render judgment on this petition
that is inconsistent with the decisions of California courts.

As to the issue of whether the amount involved here is reasonably related
to the respondent's medical needs, it is represented that the 45 growing
marijuana plants are now probably dead. The remaining three hundred grams
of harvested marijuana constitutes less than a pound.

The State has made the decision not to prosecute the respondent in
recognition that this amount (and the growing plants) may constitute a
defense under Health and Safety Code Section 11362.5 which is implicitly a
recognition that the amount is reasonably related to this respondent's
medical needs under the standard articulated in Trippet. No evidence has
been presented to this court rebutting that determination, and the amount
involved is not so much that it would compel a different conclusion.
Therefore, this court finds that three hundred grams is reasonably related
to the respondent's medical needs.

The argument that the magistrate's order forces the Sheriff to illegally
dispense marijuana is not well taken. If the State declines to prosecute on
the grounds that the respondent legally possessed the marijuana for medical
reasons, then the marijuana is no longer "contraband" as contemplated by
state law.

Based thereon, this Court finds that the magistrate's order did not exceed
his jurisdiction, and the Petition for Emergency Writ of Mandate is
discharged.

Date 3/5/98 Signed Henry M. Nelson, Judge

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Cannabis And The Cops (Staff Editorial In 'Orange County Register' Says
A Close Reading Of Two Recent California Judicial Rulings
Against Dennis Peron's San Francisco Cannabis Cultivators Club
Shows The Decisions Were Not Black And White - And Highlights Need
For Local Governments To Develop Policies That Make It Possible
For Medical Patients To Acquire Cannabis Or Marijuana Legally,
In Line With State Law)

Date: Thu, 5 Mar 1998 17:13:13 -0800
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
From: Olafur Brentmar 
Subject: MN: US CA: Editorial: Cannabis And The Cops
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: John Black 
Pubdate: Thu, 05 Mar 1998
Source: Orange County Register (CA)
Section:metro
Page: 6
Contact: letters@link.freedom.com

CANNABIS AND THE COPS

An injunction that might or might not wind up closing the Cannabis
Cultivators Club in San Francisco highlights the need for local governments
to develop policies that make it possible for medical patients to acquire
cannabis or marijuana legally, in line with state law.

Two court rulings are relevant here. Last week San Francisco Superior Court
Judge David Garcia issued an injunction against the principals of the San
Francisco club in response to a request filed by state Attorney General Dan
Lungren's office.

Judge Garcia based his injunction on a December 12 ruling by the First
District Court of Appeals that said Prop.215, passed by voters in 1996,
does not overrule other state laws prohibiting possession or sale of
marijuana.

John Gordnier, a state senior assistant attorney general, told reporters
that he expected that all the cannabis clubs in the state would be shut in
wake of the December appellate ruling.

Not so fast. A close reading of both rulings shows that the judicial
decisions were not black-and-white.

The December 12 appellate decision actually affirms the legitimacy of Prop.
215 and suggests guidelines for government and "primary cargivers." Judge
Garcia's injunction reflects an understanding of the fact and actually
offers the club an opportunity to stay in operation. As of Monday, the club
had not closed its doors. The ruling says that Dennis Peron and Beth Moore,
who run the club "are enjoined from selling, furnishing, storing,
administering or giving away marijuana," which sounds unambiguous. But it's
preceded by the statement "except as provided in (2) and (3)."

Paragraph (2) says the two may possess marijuana for personal use if they
have a doctor's recommendation. Paragraph (3) says: "Each of the defendants
may, as to a person with whom he or she has the relationship of a bona fide
primary caregiver ... provide to that person without receiving anything in
return, a quantity of marijuana consistent with the physician's recommended
dosage..."

So as long as they're not actually selling marijuana directly but giving it
away, they apparently can continue operations.

Mr. Peron told us Monday that he believes the club's legal position is
solid. "We're not selling cannabis, and our bookkeeping reflects this," he
told us. "We do charge for the service of acting as designated primary
caregiver to our members."

The December 12 appellate decision does appear to give the club legally
defensible ground.

That decision said, for example, that "the trial court thus concluded ...
that the thousands of persons who patronized respondents' club, who advised
that a physician approved their marijuana use, and who designated
respondents or their Cannabis Buyers Club as their 'primary caregiver'
conferred that status on respondents."

The appellate court further noted that "although the sale and distribution
of marijuana remain as criminal offenses ... bona fide primary caregivers
for ... patients should not be precluded from receiving bona fide
reimbursement for their actual expense of cultivating and furnishing
marijuana for the patient's approved medical treatment."

This is sensible. Prop. 215 did not try to eliminate laws against marijuana
sale and possession, but to create a narrow exception for medical patients
with a doctor's recommendation. It directed the government to facilitate a
safe and affordable way for patients to get this substance. That's
important because otherwise patients will have to rely on the illegal black
market.

A very few local governments have tried to set up such a system. But it
seems that every time someone tries to do it legally, the state attorney
general's office tries to close them. This doesn't seem consistent with
conscientiously trying to carry out the clearly expressed will of the
people.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

The DEA's Pitch For Medical Marijuana (Letter To Editor
Of 'San Francisco Chronicle' Says That, While The Federal Government
Is Doing Everything In Its Power To Deny Medical Marijuana To Sick
And Dying People, Apparently To Send The 'Right Message To Our Children,'
Politicians And The Media Are Guilty
Of A Cultivated Historical And Cultural Amnesia)

Date: Fri, 06 Mar 1998 21:15:01 -0500
To: DrugSense News Service 
From: Richard Lake 
Subject: MN: US CA: PUB LTE: The DEA's Pitch For Medical Marijuana
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Frank S. World
Source: The San Francsisco Chronicle
Pubdate: Friday, 5 March 1998
Contact: chronletters@sfgate.com
Website: http://www.sfgate.com/

`THE DEA'S PITCH FOR MEDICAL MARIJUANA'

Editor -- While the federal government is doing everything in its power to
deny medical marijuana to sick and dying people, apparently to send the
``right message to our children,'' politicians and the media are guilty of
a cultivated historical and cultural amnesia!

The DEA's own law judge, Francis L. Young, concluded in 1988 that
``marijuana, in its natural form, is one of the safest therapeutically
active substances known to man . . . One must reasonably conclude that
there is accepted safety for use of marijuana under medical supervision. To
conlude otherwise, on the record, would be unreasonable, arbitrary, and
capricious.''

The DEA's own judge concluded this. Please, don't contribute to the
hypocrisy, help inform Americans of the facts!

With the creation of the FDA in 1970, marijuana was classified as a
Schedule I drug, meaning it has zero recognized medicinal value. By always
clinging to the Scheduling status, government has kept the public and the
media in the dark.

It is time for Americans to re-evaluate inconsistent and ineffective drug
war strategies, we need to reduce harm, not increase draconian rhetoric!

JOSHUA M. SINOWAY
Santa Cruz

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Four Accused Of Hauling $2 Million In Cocaine ('San Jose Mercury News'
Doesn't Say Why California Highway Patrol Stopped Car On Interstate 5
Near Mount Shasta, Nabbing 55 Pounds Of Cocaine)

Date: Fri, 6 Mar 1998 00:29:33 -0800
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
From: Olafur Brentmar 
Subject: MN: US CA: 4 Accused Of Hauling $2 Million In Cocaine
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Marcus-Mermelstein Family 
Pubdate: Thu, 5 Mar 1998
Source: San Jose Mercury New (CA)
Contact: letters@sjmercury.com

4 ACCUSED OF HAULING $2 MILLION IN COCAINE

California Highway Patrol officers arrested four men suspected of
transporting 55 pounds of cocaine on Interstate 5. Officers found $2
million worth of cocaine after stopping a northbound car Tuesday between
Mount Shasta and Weed in Shasta County. Eugene McGee and Lefelton Trasler,
both 31, and Aaron Wright and Eric Miller, both 26, were arrested on
suspicion of trafficking drugs and possessing drugs with intent to sell.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Anti-Smoking Effort Lags ('San Jose Mercury News' Notes California's Method
Of Using Tobacco Taxes To Insult, Demean And Dehumanize Smokers
Will Soon Yield A Television Commercial Defending State's Unique Prohibition
On Smoking In Bars)

Date: Fri, 6 Mar 1998 00:29:33 -0800
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
From: Olafur Brentmar 
Subject: MN: US CA: Anti-Smoking Effort Lags
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Marcus-Mermelstein Family 
Pubdate: Thu, 5 Mar 1998
Source: San Jose Mercury New (CA)
Contact: letters@sjmercury.com

ANTI-SMOKING EFFORT LAGS

Critics Say 3 New Ads Fall Short Of Promises

LOS ANGELES -- The Wilson administration had to defend an incomplete ad
campaign this week to anti-smoking activists who were disappointed that it
wasn't finished.

``This is the most significant health problem affecting Californians,''
said Alan Henderson, president of the American Cancer Society of
California. ``We have lost headway, and we are not happy about it.''

The administration wants this year's campaign to be better than last
year's, said Jim Stratton, deputy director of prevention services for the
state Department of Health Services.

Those ads included a television commercial with a woman smoking through a
hole in her throat, having lost her larynx to cancer.

``We are working as hard as we can within the confines of this
administration,'' Stratton said at a meeting Tuesday of the state's
anti-smoking oversight committee.

Last year's $22 million campaign was part of a three-year, $67.5 million
plan to draw attention to cigarette addiction and the dangers of secondhand
smoke.

Activists say last year's campaign prompted calls from health officials in
Florida, Michigan and Oregon about borrowing the ads.

Colleen Stevens, who oversees the campaign, showed the committee two new
billboard ads set to go up in a couple of weeks and a TV commercial that is
to begin airing today.

Committee members, mainly appointed by legislators and the governor,
applauded the three new ads but said they fell short of a promise to see
the entire campaign for this year.

Last year's campaign consisted of 16 radio, TV and billboard ads.

``The concern that I have is that the ad campaign has gotten caught in the
bureaucratic treadmill,'' said Stan Glantz, a committee member representing
health care employees and professor of medicine at the University of
California-San Francisco. ``It's been over a year since any new media has
come out, and it looks like it's going to be dragged out.''

The new TV commercial, aimed at garnering support for California's landmark
ban on bar and casino smoking, features a bartender saying he doesn't mind
listening to people's problems but does mind having to inhale secondhand
smoke.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Worker Drug-Testing Bill In Branstad's Hands ('Waterloo Courier'
Says Iowa Governor Terry Branstad Is Expected To Sign Republican Bill
Allowing Businesses To Test Workers Randomly, Without Cause -
Supporter Claims 43 Other States Have Similar Laws)

Date: Thu, 05 Mar 1998 22:25:52 -0500
To: DrugSense News Service 
From: Richard Lake 
Subject: MN: US IA: Worker Drug-Testing Bill In Branstad's Hands
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: "Carl E. Olsen" 
Source: The Waterloo Courier
Author: Eric Stern, Courier Staff Writer
Pubdate: Thu, 05 Mar 1998
Contact: wcfcourier@aol.com
Website: http://wcfcourier.com/

WORKER DRUG-TESTING BILL IN BRANSTAD'S HANDS

DES MOINES - The Iowa House sent the governor a drug testing bill Wednesday
that allows businesses to test their workers randomly.

"It's finally saying we're going to address illegal drugs in the
workplace," said Rep. Steve Sukup, R-Dougherty, who steered the bill
through the 7 1/2-hour debate. "Forty-three other states have random drug
testing laws."

The bill passed 53-46 after minority Democrats argued more than 20
amendments to expand protections for workers.

Majority Republicans revived an effort last year to rewrite the state's
drug testing laws.

Current law mandates an employer can test employees randomly with 30 days'
notice or "probable cause." The business also must pay for treatment
programs.

"We're going to change this bad law," Rep. Jeff Lamberti, R-Ankeny, said.

Last year's push to strip treatment programs from the law failed to muster
votes in the Republican-controlled Senate, but a new version secured the
needed votes because it included one-time employer-paid treatment for
alcohol and illegal drug use. The bill also exempts small businesses from
providing treatment.

The bill also lowers the threshold of testing to "reasonable suspicion"
from probable cause.

"Drug testing is an invasion of an individual's privacy and only a fool
would deny that," said Rep. Phil Wise, D-Keokuk. "Protecting public safety
vs. privacy -- this is a balance that has to be struck very carefully. We
should not err in either direction."

Wise also said courts have ruled public employees not in "safety-sensitive"
jobs cannot be subject to random drug tests, and private employees should
share the same constitutional rights.

One of the more heated moments came when an amendment failed 46-52 to allow
minors to be tested by people of the same sex.

"It does not protect those minors from having an adult of the opposite sex
witness the urine test," said Rep. Keith Weigel, D-New Hampton.

Rep. Bill Dotzler, D-Waterloo, a union activist and machine operator at
Deere & Co., attempted to raise the blood-alcohol minimum for firing an
employee in the bill from .04 to .05.

"You will give the employer the opportunity to fire you if you have a wine
cooler at lunch if you don't weigh 200 pounds," Dotzler said.

But Sukup said: "It looks like we're up for 2 1/2 beers for breakfast with
this amendment ...

"If you are .10, you are legally drunk. This amendment says you can show up
to work and be legally drunk and we'll pay for your treatment."

A proposal also failed to set up a random drug testing program for state
legislators.

"Whatever standards we choose to impose on the State of Iowa, we ought to
be able to impose on ourselves," said Rep. Ed Fallon, D-Des Moines. "What
we're talking about here is sending our workers to the restroom with cup in
hand coming back and subjecting themselves to the humiliation and
embarrassment of being treated as ... guilty."

Gov. Terry Branstad is expected to sign the bill.

(c) The Waterloo Courier 1998

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Drug Test Proposal Sent To Branstad ('Des Moines Register' Version)

Date: Mon, 09 Mar 1998 14:25:43 -0500
From: "R. Lake" 
Subject: MN: US IA: Drug Test Proposal Sent to Branstad
To: DrugSense News Service 
Organization: The Media Awareness Project of DrugSense
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Carl E. Olsen 
Source: The Des Moines Register
Author: Jonathan Roos
Page: Front Page
Pubdate: Thu, 05 Mar 1998
Contact: letters@news.dmreg.com
Webform: http://www.dmregister.com/letter.html
Website: http://www.dmregister.com/

DRUG TEST PROPOSAL SENT TO BRANSTAD

The governor is expected to approve a measure allowing random drug and
alcohol testing.

The Iowa Legislature decided Wednesday to expand the authority of employers
to test workers for drug or alcohol use.

The House, on a 53-46 vote gave final legislative approval to a bill that
would allow random testing of workers and would make other significant
changes in Iowa's 11-year-old workplace drug-testing law.

The measure, one of Gov. Terry Branstad's long-standing priorities, was sent
to the governor for his signature.

Business groups and some of Iowa's largest companies have been trying for
several years to get the Legislature to rewrite a drug-testing law that they
regard as weak. Labor groups, fearing that employees' rights would be
compromised, have resisted wholesale changes.

Supporters of the bill contended Wednesday that employers need greater
authority to root out drug users who could jeopardize the safety of others.

"We're left with a simple choice. We can ignore drug abuse in the workplace
or we can provide the tools to address the situation," said Rep. Steven
Sukup, a Dougherty Republican who guided the bill through House debate.

"This (bill) will put Iowa in step with other states" that have adopted
broader drug-testing laws, Sukup said.

Rep. Jeffrey Lamberti, R-Ankeny, agreed. He said the current law "virtually
guarantees that effective drug-testing can't exist in the workplace."

Critics of the legislation said it would upset the balance between workplace
safety requirements and employees' privacy rights. They said the
legislation would subject workers to humiliating trips to the restroom to
give urine samples, and it could leave them vulnerable to harassment.

Rep. Minnette Doderer, D-Iowa City, called it a "stringent, oppressive,
unnecessary and even stupid bill."

Rep. Michael Cormack of Fort Dodge, the only House Republican who voted
against the bill, said it did not respect individual rights. "It doesn't
matter if rights are being trampled on by big government or by big
business," he said.

Rep. Ed. Fallon, D-Des Moines, said lawmakers should get a taste of their
own medicine and require drug-testing of the Legislature. His proposal was
rejected, however, on a procedural vote.

"What we're talking about here is sending our workers to the restroom, with
cup in hand, and subjecting them to the humiliation and embarrassment as
suspects," Fallon said. "If we're willing to do that to the workers of this
state, we ought to be willing to do it to ourselves."

Members of the House Democratic minority dominated Wednesday's long debate.
They offered a series of amendments to temper some of the drug-testing law
changes pushed by Republicans.

However, all of the amendments were rejected. Leaders of the House
Republican majority said they didn't want to risk having the bill get bogged
down because of changes that might be unacceptable to the Senate.

The drug-testing legislation cleared the Senate last month by a bare
majority of 26 votes.

Elements of this year's bill include:

Permitting random testing of workers for alcohol and illicit drug use.

Lowering the standard for testing an employee outside a random selection
program to a "reasonable suspicion" of drug or alcohol use.

Expanding the authority of employers to test prospective employees.

The bill approved Wednesday applies to workers in the private sector, not
public employees.

One Democrat - Dolores Mertz of Ottosen - joined 52 Republicans in voting
for the measure. Republican Cormack and 45 Democrats were opposed.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Dangerous Drug Raid - Three Detroit Cops Shot, Suspect Killed In Drug Raid -
Three Others Caught ('Detroit News' Front Page Digest Says Shooting Began
As Cops Began Searching Suspects For Weapons)

Date: Thu, 05 Mar 1998 07:50:26 -0800
To: maptalk@mapinc.org, mattalk@islandnet.com
From: Pat Dolan 
Subject: Dangerous Drug Raid 3 Detroit cops shot
Newshawk:Pat Dolan
Source: Detroit News
PubDate: Mar 5 1998	
Subject: Dangerous Drug Raid 3 Detroit cops shot
Section: Front Page
Contact: detnews.com

Thursday, March 5, 1998 Dangerous Drug Raid 3 Detroit cops shot:
Suspect killed in drug raid -- 3 others caught

Three Detroit narcotics officers were shot-one seriously-during a raid
Wednesday at a southwest side locksmith shop police said was a front for a
drug house. The veteran officers were searching three men for weapons and
drugs on the porch of the in the 9100 block of West Fort about 6 p.m. when
one of the men pulled an automatic handgun and started shooting,
investigators said.

Reaction: Families of officers can't stop worrying DETROIT-Detroit
narcotics officer James Tolbert walked away from the Persian Gulf war
unscathed, but in his daily job of fighting the city's war on drugs,
Tolbert almost lost his life. Tolbert was one of three officers shot doing
what dozens of officers do day in and day out making raids on drug houses
and everything else necessary to keep drugs off Detroit streets. -

The neighborhood: Shootings, raids a part of life

Shawn Thomas was not shocked Wednesday by the shoot-out that killed one man
and injured three Detroit narcotics police officers in her southwest
Detroit neighborhood. "Gunshots and drug busts have become a part of our
everyday life," said Thomas, 28. "We're so used to hearing (gunshots) that
we worry when we don't."

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Shootings, Raids A Part Of Life ('Detroit News' Drug War Dispatch
Says Shoot-Out In Southwest Detroit Neighborhood Leaves One Man Dead,
Three 'Narcotics' Police Officers Wounded)

Date: Thu, 05 Mar 1998 21:45:11 -0500
To: DrugSense News Service 
From: Richard Lake 
Subject: MN: US MI: Shootings, Raids A Part Of Life
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Pat Dolan
Source: Detroit News
PubDate: Mar 5 1998	
Section: Front Page
Author: Richard Sheinwald, Associated Press
Contact: letters@detnews.com
Website: http://www.detnews.com/

THE NEIGHBORHOOD: SHOOTINGS, RAIDS A PART OF LIFE

Residents Say They Are Worried About Their Kids And Inaction Of Police

DETROIT -- Shawn Thomas was not shocked Wednesday by the shoot-out that
killed one man and injured three Detroit narcotics police officers in her
southwest Detroit neighborhood.

"Gunshots and drug busts have become a part of our everyday life," said
Thomas, 28. "We're so used to hearing (gunshots) that we worry when we
don't." Thomas lives on Springwells, just blocks from where the shootings
took place. She worries her two young children may one day be caught in a
cross-fire. Thomas said she would move to a better neighborhood "if I could
afford it." "The city has got a bad reputation," she said. "The violence is
making people leave and that's why we have a lot of abandoned houses."

Detroit police are overlooking the southwest side because they don't want
to deal with its problems, she said. "Instead of making all of Detroit
good, they only want to worry about the pretty side," she said. "They need
to go to the worst side and work their way up to the good areas." It's a
feeling shared by Edwardo Guitierrez, a 34-year-old mechanic. "If the cops
aren't killing (kids) on the streets, they're killed by gang members or
drug dealers," he said. "I am a parent and working to clean up the streets
so my two kids can have a violent-free life. They have questions just like
everyone else. I don't have the answers as to why they have to grow up
living this way."

Guitierrez has lived in his southwest Detroit neighborhood for 24 years. He
said he has watched friends, neighbors and strangers gunned down in broad
daylight. "The city does nothing for the kids," he said. "We got nothing
and the city isn't giving us anything. Try explaining to your 7-year-old
why we have to put milk crates up on trees just to play basketball."

Wednesday's shooting was a wake-up call for many southwest Detroit
residents who said they are determined to take back control of their
streets -- a task some fear will take a long time to accomplish.

"People's lives are over because they live in the ghetto," said Juan
Martinez, 24. "It's a never-ending story. You just have to do what you can
to survive. The streets are mean and so is life." William Poma, 44,
remembers growing up on the southwest side when it was safe to play
outside. "When I grew up in this neighborhood, it was very beautiful," he
said. "Now it's bad and has nothing to offer. "It's gotten to the point
where I have to move out. I can't raise my family in a drug and
gang-infested neighborhood. I worry about my son. I don't want him to think
this is how life should be. I never was up with this sort of lifestyle and
I don't think I want my son to be a part of it either."

Copyright 1998, The Detroit News

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Reaction - Families Of Officers Can't Stop Worrying - Spouse Of Injured Cop
Says She Knows Her Husband Loves His Work ('Detroit News' Article About
Three 'Narcotics' Police Wounded During Raid)

Date: Thu, 05 Mar 1998 08:13:48 -0800
To: maptalk@mapinc.org, mattalk@islandnet.com
From: Pat Dolan 
Subject: Families of officers can't stop worrying
Newshawk:Pat Dolan
Subject: Families of officers can't stop worrying
Source: Detroit News
PubDate: Mar 5 1998	
Section: Front Page
Author: Kristin Storey / The Detroit News
Contact: detnews.com

(Note: Again this lends itself to comparison with the Capone era for LTEs pd)

Thursday, March 5, 1998

Reaction: Families of officers can't stop worrying

Spouse of injured cop says she knows her husband loves his work
By Kristin Storey / The Detroit News

DETROIT -- Detroit narcotics officer James Tolbert walked away from the
Persian Gulf war unscathed, but in his daily job of fighting the city's war
on drugs, Tolbert almost lost his life.

Tolbert was one of three officers shot doing what dozens of officers do day
in and day out -- making raids on drug houses and everything else necessary
to keep drugs off Detroit streets. They risk their lives on raids similar
to the one conducted Wednesday. Others go undercover to set up drug
dealers. "They close the doors, they put guns to our heads and we buy the
dope," said Detroit narcotics officer Javier Johnson, who is Tolbert's
cousin.

Soon after the deal ends, more officers arrive to raid the house and arrest
the dealers. Unlike the fantasy world of television, police on the street
face real consequences when something goes wrong.

"People watch TV and (an actor) gets shot but he's back next week filing
papers and nothing is said about the injury," Johnson said. "That's not how
it works in real life." In real life, people like Tolbert and the others
get hurt and their families worry. "I'll probably have a hard time sleeping
tonight," said Johnson, who knows many family members are worried about the
shooting.

Marilyn Stefani's husband, Michael Stefani, was seriously injured in the
shooting. She said worrying is part of life for the families of narcotics
officers, but she knows her husband loves his work. "If he's not doing it
he won't be a whole person," Stefani said. "He had been on hundreds of
raids. He was very cautious. I'm confident Mike did everything right. He
thinks everything out."

Sometimes doing everything right isn't enough, said Johnson, who has been
working narcotics for 10 years. "You get that feeling when things aren't
going to be right," Johnson said. When they don't go right, it shows. "I
saw an officer from (Tolbert's) crew. He is totally and visibly shaken,"
Johnson said.

Johnson knows what the officers were going through. He has seen the
aftermath of fellow officers wounded during drug raids. "Two or three days
later, all the sudden you realize what happened," he said. "It all comes
into focus, and you deal with it." Dealing with it can be talking to other
people or asking for a transfer to another unit. Many officers, however,
keep fighting the drug war. "Everybody's got a fear of something," Johnson
said. "A lot of people fear this. It is something you choose to do."

Copyright 1998, The Detroit News [detnews.com]

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Reno Open To Daley's Anti-Drug Plan ('Associated Press'
Says Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley Pitched To Attorney General Janet Reno
In Washington, DC, On Thursday The Idea Of Sending Special Teams
Of Federal Prosecutors To Key Cities To Crack Down On Money Laundering
By Drug Dealers)

Date: Sun, 08 Mar 1998 20:22:20 -0500
To: DrugSense News Service 
From: Richard Lake 
Subject: MN: US IL: Reno Open to Daley's Anti-Drug Plan
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Marcus-Mermelstein Family 
Source: Associated Press
Pubdate: Thu, 5 Mar 1998

RENO OPEN TO DALEY'S ANTI-DRUG PLAN

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley pitched to Attorney
General Janet Reno on Thursday the idea of sending special teams of federal
prosecutors to key cities to crack down on money laundering by drug dealers.

Reno was intrigued by the suggestion -- which Daley said he had been
floating unsuccessfully to attorneys general and other anti-drug officials
since 1980 -- and began looking into whether it could be done even as Daley
left their meeting, a senior Justice Department official said.

``She is basically on it,'' said the official, who spoke on condition of
anonymity. ``We're acting now.''

State and local governments can fight street-level drug dealing, but a
large-scale federal effort with more authority and resources is needed to
target higher-level dealers and their ability to turn drug profits into
legitimate assets, Daley told a Justice Department news conference.

``We got the dealers,'' he said. ``But where does the money go? Are there
lawyers, are there bankers, are there business people behind the money
laundering operations?''

Daley envisions a pilot program modeled on the 1960s strike forces
established by then-Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy to combat organized
crime. They answered to Washington instead of local U.S. attorneys,
operating only out of a few cities with major mob presences while working
with local law enforcement and federal agencies.

``If you trail the money you will have an impact on the drug problem,''
Daley said.

To bolster his argument, the mayor cited a recent U.S. Conference of Mayors
survey of 15 jurisdictions that showed state and local agencies prosecute
by far the most drug cases. In the Chicago area, there were about 36,700
drug prosecutions in the state and local courts, compared with 65 in
federal courts.

Only two or three of those 65 federal cases involved money laundering
charges, Daley said.

The Justice Department official said it is difficult to compare local drug
cases to the labor-intensive federal prosecutions.

Department action on Daley's proposal will depend on the congressional
approval needed and how it might affect the department's budget, the
official indicated.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Turn In Your Neighbors? (List Subscriber Posts URL For Chicago Cops
Who Want You To Do Their Work For Them Busting Marijuana Sellers
And Other 'Drug Traffickers' - You Know What To Do)

Date: Thu, 5 Mar 1998 10:41:18 -0800 (PST)
From: Turmoil 
To: hemp-talk@hemp.net
Subject: HT: turn in your neighbors?
Sender: owner-hemp-talk@hemp.net

man this web page is kinda scary indeed...

http://www.ci.chi.il.us/CommunityPolicing/forms/Narcotics.html

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Reinventing American Tobacco Policy - Sounding The Medical Community's Voice
(Explicitly Utopian Editorial By Former US Surgeon General C. Everett Koop
And Others In 'Journal Of The American Medical Association' Notes Tobacco Use
Is Ultimate Underlying Cause Of Nearly One In Every Five Deaths
In United States Year After Year - But Seems To Want To Increase That Rate
By Urging Fellow Physicians To Lobby Congress For Prohibitionist Policies
Disguised As Regulation Of Tobacco Industry)

Date: Thu, 5 Mar 1998 17:13:13 -0800
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
From: Olafur Brentmar 
Subject: MN: JAMA: Editorial: Reinventing American Tobacco Policy: Sounding
the Medical Community's Voice
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Pubdate: Thu, 5 Mar 1998
Source: JAMA Vol. 279, No 7

Editorials

REINVENTING AMERICAN TOBACCO POLICY: SOUNDING THE MEDICAL COMMUNITY'S VOICE

1998 may be the most important moment in the history of the tobacco wars, a
moment when America chooses between a path toward social repair or one
toward irrevocable public loss. Winston Churchill said, "Americans can be
counted upon to do the right thing-after trying everything else." This
year, Americans may finally do the right thing. After years of growing
public and professional awareness of the addictiveness of nicotine of the
health effects of tobacco, and of the tobacco industry's extensive efforts
to target young children, federal laws may be enacted to seriously weaken
the grip of the industry on the public and on the nation's health.
Conversely, there is the risk that the tobacco industry could further
entrench its ability to stand outside the ordinary rules of commerce in
society.

In large measure the outcome depends on the strength of the voice and
message from the medical and public health professions. We must ensure that
protection of the public's health prevails as the foremost issue and
becomes the ultimate decision force.

Surely there is not a physician who is unaware that the tobacco industry
has increased its power and profits by securing a host of special
exceptions to the ordinary rules that regulate business practices. Surely
there cannot be a physician who believes that it is professionally ethical
or socially responsible to be silent as Congress begins to consider how the
tobacco industry should do business in the future. It is time to volunteer,
to learn, and to speak out.

What is achieveable by Congressional action has expanded significantly.
Policies once thought undoable are now possible. In part, this is because
of recent and growing disclosure of past tobacco industry misconduct and
mendacity. In part, this is also because of the extensive work behind
closed doors between the tobacco industry and state attorneys general over
Medicaid expenses for tobacco-caused illnesses(often referred to as 'the
settlement". For whatever r reason, the time has come to break the tobacco
industry's long-standing strangle hold on the major institutions of
political power in the United States; Now Congress, not the tobacco
industry, will determine how this country will clear with tobacco into the
next century.

But although "the settlement" helped move the public policy

clebate d hole it should be-to the US Congress-it is only a private
agreement constructed by lawyers. It has no legislative legitimacy. It is a
wish list of the parties involved. And it is too low a goal for the
nation's health.

Can a few hundred billion dollars of tobacco money be used to initiate
public health efforts? Of course. If the tobacco industry prevails in
Congress, will this money be sufficient and just compensation? Of course
not. Even if grossly insufficient, will funds become available? Perhaps,
but the tobacco industry is not known for living up to its promises. Why is
the tobacco industry so eager to be responsible for distributing funds?
Perhaps because such a mechanism bypasses Congressional authority and makes
recipients dependent on the tobacco industry no less than tobacco
advertising r revemles and philanthropy have done in a host of enterprises.

For years, the tobacco industry has marketed products that it knew caused
serious disease and death. Yet, it intentionally hid this truth from the
public, earl iecl out a deceitful campaign designed to undermine the
public's appreciation of these risks and marketed its addictive products to
children. The industry long ago knew that nicotine was addictive, but kept
its findings secret and consistently denied the fact, even as overwhelming
evidence to the contrary eventually emerged.

By these actions, the tobacco makers have shown themselves to be a rogue
industry, unwilling to abide by ordinary ethical business rules and social
standards. Other businesses operate differently. For example, design
defects in a motor vehicle are unintentional; when they are discovered,
steps are taken to correct them. Nevertheless, such manufacturers are held
liable for these mistakes.

By contrast, the tobacco industry has intentionally designed and marketed
addictive, lethal products and deliberately hidden their well-known risks.
These actions are morally r reprehensible. Yet, the tobacco makers have the
shamelessness to ask to be excused from om liability for their informed and
deliberate actions. How would we respond if the makers of cars knew their
gas tanks would explode and their brakes were defective, had hidden these
flaws, marketed these vehicles, lied when caught, and then made a similar
request? To allow any industry to continue such acts without restriction,
indeed weakening or cutting the impediments of oversight and restraint that
exist, would be irresponsible in the extreme.

No other industry even begins to approach the tobacco industry's ability to
market a product of such mass lethality. No other product so massively and
effectively injures and kills people as does tobacco, especially
cigarettes. Moreover, the industry does so while reaping huge profits by
shifting tobacco related health, social, and environmental costs onto the
public's shoulders.

Incredibly, even though some in the tobacco industry have now acknowledged
some smoking-related health consequences and addictive properties, they
have offered no apology and have the audacity to deny wrongdoing. Even
worse, manufacturers have launched the greatest lobbying campaign ever
known, tens of millions of dollars just in 1997, in an attempt to receive
from Congress pardons for all its past and future liability. Some of its
audacious requests would require making exceptions to the fundamental
rights of due process for individuals, while others would override state
and community rights.

The tobacco industry is doing so in part because it is fearful that damning
evidence will be disclosed in trials.2 It is willing to pay any price to
prevent internal industry documents from surfacing. Thus, besides its
Congressional lobbying, the tobacco industry agreed to pay $14.7 billion to
settle the attorneys general suits with Mississippi and Florida, and $15.3
billion with Texas in part because it cannot bear to have its true behavior
see the light of day before it secures protection from Congress. If the
whole truth were known (and much more may come out during the Minnesota
court case), we believe members of Congress would have to distance
themselves completely from the industry.

Yet, even as public condemnation of the tobacco industry becomes louder and
as the public becomes better informed, the industry is continuing with
business as usual. It claims that it does not w ant children to smoke and
then promotes advertising that appeals primarily to children. It says that
it is prepared to live with meaningful government oversight and then fights
every local initiative and every tough public health proposal. To keep
going, it hires lawyers, advertising agencies and lobbyists at enormous
cost and increases campaign contributions w ith an intent to maintain its
influence v ith state legislatures and Congress.

But Congress is now aware of choices that were not once so apparent.
Political leaders from both parties have called for strong action and have
introduced far-reaching legislative proposals. However, is the voice of
reason being heard against the loud blare of tobacco industry propaganda?
How can we ensure that the tobacco industry does not, with its effective,
time-proven lobbying effort, undermine effective, comprehensive legislation?

In the final analysis, it is the medical and public health community that
must take responsibility for keeping the focus on the public's. We must
clearly define issues so that both the public and members of Congress
understand them and are moved to take the socially responsible course of
action. For example, in December 1997, the House of Delegates of the
American Medical Association (AMA) adopted policies that enable its
leaders to more effectively engage in the legislative development process
calling for strong, effective national legislation without kow-towing to
the tobacco companies or acquiescing to their demands for legal protection.
Such steps give voice to all AMA members and distinguish the organization.
Although such steps are essential and commendable, they alone are
insufficient.

This spring Congress will finally begin to take a serious look at
comprehensive tobacco control legislation. We believe each physician has a
responsibility to seize this moment in history and to use every means at
his or her disposal to convince members of Congress to enact meaningful
tobacco legislation.

Tobacco use is the ultimate underlying cause of nearly 1 of every 5 deaths
in the United States year after year. Our voices should scream with outrage
against the fundamental unfairness of the legislative loopholes and special
privileges that have allowed the tobacco industry to become the gargantuan,
extraordinarily proftable business that it is. It has done so only by
discounting horrendous public health losses. We must be persistent in our
demand for socially responsible Congressional action.

The medical profession and public once reluctantly accepted as fact that
half of smokers will die of a smoking-related disease because clinicians
could not do much to help smokers quit, avoid relapse, or never start. That
attitude is fading away as scientifically sound smoking cessation methods
are increasingly integrated into clinical practice.4 Likewise, it was once
accepted that the Congress would not act without the acquiescence of the
tobacco industry. But that attitude should also fade as the facts about the
industry become increasingly known through the exposure of previously
secret documents. The Congress need not feel that it has to make any more
concessions to this rogue industry.

Major issues that each physician should know well, teach, and advocate include:

* The protection of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) authority to
regulate all areas of nicotine and other constituents and ingredients in
tobacco.

The FDA should have the authority to increase its tobacco research and
scientific communication authority, have greater scope of its regulatory
authority as evidence suggests, ancl have adequate funds to implement all
its various regulatory, enforcement, public education, and research
activities.

* The protection of children and youths from wanting and using tobacco.

Federal statutes should include measures such as strong and effective
warning labels on products; substantial penalties for distributing to
youth; increased public education; effective school policies; research
including behavioral research on underage tobacco use and countermeasures;
an effective system of excise taxes, fines, enforcement methods; and
funding for organizations that protect children and youth from tobacco.

* The funding of sound programs, established scientifically, are used to
help nicotine-dependent individuals quit, be they adults or minors.4,5

Such programs should include meclical financing systems, professional and
public education, and behavioral ancl cessation research. Programs should
be funded by the tobacco inclustry, but not by means that the tobacco
industry could influence.

* The refinement and expansion of the regulation of environmental tobacco
smoke.

Provisions shoulcl include policies and funds for establishing and
enforcing smoke-free public and U-ol k environments, public education, and
risk assessment research.

* The protection of the justice system by disclosure to the public of
evidence of past tobacco inclustry misdeeds, such as the recent revelation
of the planned marketing to children.

This should include preventing the tobacco inclustry from receiving
protection against past, present, or future wrongdoing and the funding of
systems to investigate misdeeds and deliver justice.

* The prevention of federal law from overriding stronger and/or more
diverse state and community regulations.

Federal law designed to protect public health should always be a floor that
state and local governments can and to and strengthen.

* The establishment of groundwork for much better accountability and
broader control of the tobacco industry in the future, ie, international
issues, protection of tobacco farmers and farmland, and the like.

Historically, state and local laws have been as effective as, if not more
so than, federal statutes. Thus, legislation should include specific
statements that ensure that state and local laws that strengthen public
health are not vaguely supported in large print and
specifically destroyed in small print. Federal public health legislation
must be expressed in terms that establish a minimum level of protection
above which states and communities are able and encouraged to do much more
and to innovate where federal laws are silent.

Basically, the tobacco industry seeks 3 fundamental refuges. First, it
seeks to protect itself from accountability for past, present, and future
wrongdoing. Second, it seeks to diminish or weaken individual and group
access to the fundamental right of due process. Third, it seeks to limit
federal agencies from having oversight and regulatory authority. It also
seeks, through 'the settlement," to obtain a measure of social
respectability-to be seen as a responsible member of the business world
rather than a group of Corporate renegades that operate outside the bounds
of social norms. The extent that the tobacco industry has gone to secure
special privilege and protect itself, individually and collectively, from
liability from past and future health effects from tobacco use has raised a
red fag in the public health community. With such a glaring difference
between what is right and wrong for the public, Congress should have little
difficulty in choosing a course that contains no deals and no trades. We
support tobacco legislation by Congress, but are opposed to granting any
concessions to the tobacco industry

C Everett Koop, MD

David C. Kessler, MD

Geolge N. Lundberg, MD

1. Todd JS, Rennie D, McAfee RE, et al. The Brown and Williamson
documents: where do we go from here? JAMA 1995;274: 256-258

2. Brandt AM, Richmond JB, Settling short on tobacco:let the trials
the trials begin JAMA 1997;278:1028.

3. McGinnis JM, Foege WH, Actual causes 0f death in the th United
States. JAMA 1993;270:2207-2212.

4. Cromwell J, Bartosch WJ, Fiore MC, HasseIblad V, Baker T.
Cost-effectiveness of the Clinical Practice Recommendations in the
AHCPR Guideline for Smoking Cessation. JAJI.1997;278:1759-1766

5. The Smoking Cessation Clinical Practice Guideline Panel and Staff.
The Agency for Health Care Policy and Research Smoking Cessation
Clinical Ptactice Guideline. JAMA 1996;275:1270-1280

-------------------------------------------------------------------

By Default, Jails Become Mental Institutions (Lengthy 'New York Times'
Article About The Almost 200,000 People Behind Bars - More Than One In 10
Of The Total - Who Are Known To Suffer From Schizophrenia, Manic Depression
Or Major Depression, The Three Most Severe Mental Illnesses -
Jails Are Increasingly Used To Warehouse Them - Advocates For Mentally Ill
Say The Clock Is Being Turned Back To The 19th Century, When It Was Common
In The United States To Confine People With Mental Illness In Jails)

Date: Fri, 06 Mar 1998 22:12:44 -0500
To: DrugSense News Service 
From: Richard Lake 
Subject: MN: US: NYT: By Default, Jails Become Mental Institutions
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Marcus-Mermelstein Family 
Source: New York Times
Author: Fox Butterfield
Contact: letters@nytimes.com
Website: http://www.nytimes.com/
Pubdate: Thu, 5 Mar 1998
Editor's note: Chad Thevenot of the Criminal Justice Policy Foundation also
sent this item in. At first glance, it appeared to be off topic, and
perhaps it is. But the use of the criminal justice system as shown in this
article, as the treatment for mental problems, is no different than it's
use to treat the problems, real or otherwise, of drug use. - Richard

BY DEFAULT, JAILS BECOME MENTAL INSTITUTIONS

In This Article
THE JAIL: Faulting System In Los Angeles
THE DELINQUENT: Young, Mentally Ill And Bound for Jail
THE ASYLUM: Well-Meaning Plan To Close Hospitals

LOS ANGELES -- Michael H. had not had a shave or haircut in months when he
was found one recent morning sleeping on the floor of St. Paul's Episcopal
Church in suburban Lancaster, next to empty cans of tuna and soup from the
church pantry.

There was little to suggest that he had once been a prosperous college
graduate with a wife and two children -- until he developed schizophrenia,
lost his job and, without insurance, could no longer afford the drugs
needed to control his mental illness.

Charged with illegal entry and burglary, Michael H. was taken to the Los
Angeles County Jail. The jail, by default, is the nation's largest mental
institution. On an average day, it holds 1,500 to 1,700 inmates who are
severely mentally ill, most of them detained on minor charges, essentially
for being public nuisances.

The situation in the jail, scathingly criticized as unconstitutional by the
United States Justice Department last fall, is the most visible evidence
that jails and prisons have become the nation's new mental hospitals.

On any day, almost 200,000 people behind bars -- more than 1 in 10 of the
total -- are known to suffer from schizophrenia, manic depression or major
depression, the three most severe mental illnesses. The rate is four times
that in the general population. And there is evidence, particularly with
juveniles, that the numbers in jail are growing.

Some of these people have committed serious, violent crimes. But many more
are homeless people like Michael H., charged with minor crimes that are
byproducts of their illnesses. Others are picked up with no charges at all,
in what police call mercy arrests, simply for acting strange.

They include adults like Helen Rose Akanni, a woman with paranoid
schizophrenia who was mistakenly charged with drunken driving and held for
a week before a psychiatrist saw her. They include teen-agers like Jason
E., a manic-depressive whose violence gives his father the choice of having
him jailed or endangering his family.

"Part of mental illness in America now is that you are going to get
arrested," said Laurie M. Flynn, executive director of the National
Alliance for the Mentally Ill, an advocacy group of relatives and friends
of people with mental disorders.

What experts call the criminalization of the mentally ill has grown as an
issue as the nation's inmate population has exploded and as corrections
officials and families of the emotionally disturbed have become alarmed by
the problems posed by having the mentally ill behind bars.

But the trend began in the 1960s, with the mass closings of public mental
hospitals. At the time, new antipsychotic drugs made medicating patients in
the community seem a humane alternative to long-term hospitalization.
States also seized the chance to slash hospital budgets. From a high of
559,000 in 1955, the number of patients in state institutions dropped to
69,000 in 1995.

But the drugs work only when they are taken -- and when they work, patients
are tempted to stop, because of the unpleasant side effects. As states
lagged in opening a promised network of clinics and halfway houses to
monitor patients, obtaining treatment became harder. Health insurers
restricted coverage, for-profit hospitals turned away the psychotic, and
new laws made it more difficult to commit disturbed people. Thousands began
to fall through the cracks.

Coincidentally, with voters willing to spend freely to fight rising crime
rates, states were building more jails and prisons. Jails became the only
institutions left open to the mentally ill 24 hours a day.

Homelessness was the most public sign of the problem. But for growing
numbers of people, the price of mental illness was arrest.

Ms. Akanni, for example, became upset when she could not find her
2-year-old daughter; the girl had fallen asleep under a bed. To calm
herself, Ms. Akanni went for a drive, but she got in an accident. When she
gave her name as the Lord God Almighty, an officer arrested her for drunken
driving. A week passed before a psychiatrist saw her and she was able to
explain that she had a 2-year-old at home, alone.

When Ms. Akanni was released, she was arrested again, for abandoning her
child. The girl had survived by eating garbage.

"The inmates we see in jail today are the same people I used to see in
psychiatric hospitals," said Dr. Eugene Kunzman, the former medical
director of the mental health program at the Los Angeles jail.

In many states, so many public hospitals have closed, or the laws
regulating admission to hospitals have been made so tight, that sometimes
the only way to get care is to be arrested. Resources are especially scarce
for juveniles.

In Dallas, social workers advised Jason E.'s family to have him jailed to
get treatment. He had assaulted both parents and his brother, and hospitals
were too expensive or refused him because he was violent. Jason's father
rejected the advice and kept him at home -- only to be warned he could be
charged with endangering his other son.

"It's tragic," said Judge Hal Gaither of the Dallas County Juvenile Court.
"If you are a young person and mentally ill, you have to get arrested to
receive treatment."

Though some people do benefit from regular medication while in jail, others
suffer as the stress deepens their depression, intensifies delusions or
leads to a psychotic break. Suicide is a risk: 95 percent of those who
commit suicide in jail or prison have a diagnosed mental disorder, a study
in the American Journal of Psychiatry found.

Locking up the mentally ill also has high costs for the nation's crowded
prisons and jails.

Because judges are often reluctant to grant bail to the mentally ill, and
because they need special treatment, they tend to stay in jail much longer
than other inmates.

On Rikers Island, New York City's jail, where 15 percent of new inmates
have serious mental disorders, the average stay for all inmates is 42 days,
but it is 215 days for the mentally ill, said Dr. Arthur Lynch, the
official in the New York City Health and Hospitals Corp. who oversees
treatment in the jail.

Jails and prisons often find themselves unprepared to deal with the
mentally ill. Guards may not know, for example, how to respond to disturbed
inmates who simply are not capable of standing in an orderly line for
meals; a common result is that the inmates are put in solitary confinement.

"We are doing the best we can, but it is definitely frustrating for the
officers," said Gayle Ray, the county sheriff for Nashville, where 142
inmates on antipsychotic medication -- 8.6 percent of her jail system's
1,630 inmates -- are housed on one floor of the Criminal Justice Center.
"Jails were not designed to be mental hospitals, and what's happening is a
real passing of the buck to another part of the system."

Advocates for the mentally ill say the clock is being turned back to the
19th century, when it was common in the United States to confine people
with mental illness in jails. Mental hospitals, or asylums, grew out of a
crusade in the 1840s by Dorothea Dix, the Boston reformer, who warned that
"insane persons" were being confined in "cages, closets, cellars, stalls,
pens: chained, naked, beaten with rods and lashed into obedience."

"Criminalization," said Dr. E. Fuller Torrey, a leading researcher of
schizophrenia in Washington, D.C., "has been both a personal disaster for
the mentally ill, and an institutional disaster for the criminal justice
system."

THE JAIL: Faulting System In Los Angeles

In Los Angeles, an average of 1,000 new offenders a day are brought to the
county jail system, seven separate jails spread across 4,000 square miles
housing a total of 22,000 inmates. It is a logistical nightmare.

When the Justice Department investigated the jail last year, this was the
screening procedure it found: On entering, each prisoner was issued a sheet
and towel and was shown an informational video. Among other questions, the
video asked new arrivals to tell jailers if they had a mental health problem.

Many of the sickest new arrivals did not, because they were in denial.
Others did not respond because they had been to the jail before. They knew
that if they did, they would be issued yellow jumpsuits, which made them
easy targets for guards or other inmates. They might be locked 23 hours a
day in dirty isolation cells. And any medication they had would be
confiscated until a jail psychiatrist saw them -- which could take weeks.

"Unconstitutional conditions exist at the Los Angeles County Jail," the
report by the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division concluded,
"including a deliberate indifference to the inmates' serious mental health
needs."

The study, prompted by relatives of people who had been jailed, was the
first federal review of the predicament of the mentally ill in jail. It
produced a case study of the forces that draw the mentally ill into jails,
and of the problems that they pose for jails and that jails pose for them.

"The problem I see is that the whole concept of treatment of the mentally
ill in jail is an oxymoron," said David Myer, who directs the Los Angeles
Mental Health Department's programs in the jail. "Jail is a horrible place.
It isn't good for people who are well. For someone who is mentally ill, it
is terrible."

The troubles begin with the fact that the county jail is a jail, not a
hospital. It is run by the sheriff's department to keep discipline among
its large population and to process inmates for court.

In addition, most deputies have little training in dealing with the
emotionally disturbed, said Anita Dunsay, a recently retired clinical
psychologist who worked in the jail. "The deputies tend to be fresh
graduates of the sheriff's academy, and baby-sitting isn't what they joined
up for, so they easily get angry at the mentally ill," she said.

One result, the Justice Department charged, was that even though l,700
inmates a day got some form of treatment, many more had mental illnesses
that were going undetected. This was particularly true of those who were
quietly depressed or had personality or anxiety disorders, illnesses for
which California law does not mandate care.

The report also charged that record-keeping was so haphazard that some
mentally ill inmates were lost in the system, while many illnesses were
misdiagnosed and patients were given the wrong medication.

On a tour of the Central Jail three months after the report's release,
mentally ill inmates in yellow jumpsuits could be seen meeting with a
psychiatrist on a steel bench in a busy corridor. A stench from the jail's
blocked sewer caused people to cover their noses and mouths. Cells reserved
for the mentally ill were so crowded that some men had to sleep on the
floor. Some babbled; others complained they could not sleep because of rats
in their quarters.

The physical conditions improved dramatically in January, when the
sheriff's department, under threat of a Justice Department lawsuit, moved
most of the mentally disturbed inmates to the county's new Twin Towers
jail. There, inmates are housed in clean, modern, one- and two-man cells.

The screening process was also updated: deputies now directly ask new
arrivals if they are on medication. Already the number identifying
themselves as mentally ill has increased, and Myer said he expected it
would eventually climb by 50 percent.

"The moral of the story," Myer said, "is that if you want to get something
done you need to bring the power of the federal government in and threaten
to take over your jail."

But even as the Los Angeles jail moves toward, in effect, creating its own
mental hospital, there are still problems inherent in dealing with the
mentally ill in any jail. Inmates, said Kunzman, the former medical
director, are seldom in jail long enough to stabilize them on the right
medication, to offer them adequate therapy or to plan for their care after
release.

And so far the changes at the Los Angeles County Jail affect mainly
physical conditions, not treatment, said Marianne Baptista, an
administrator at Step Up on Second, a mental health agency in Santa Monica
whose caseworkers often search the jail for missing clients. "On our end,
nothing's changed," she said.

Her agency's clients still often disappear into the jail after being
arrested, without any notification to the clinic. "More often than not,
once in jail, their medications are taken away from them or they are given
something different, and then their symptoms come out again," she said.
"Being in jail may make them more crazy."

That cycle can cause long-term physical damage, said Kay Redfield Jamison,
a professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. "Every
relapse you have increases the odds that your brain is being damaged and
that you will have another relapse faster, just like with heart attacks,"
she said.

Without the state hospitals, experts say, a revolving door has been
created, in which many mentally ill people cycle from clinics to
homelessness to jail.

In Los Angeles, more than 70 percent of the severely mentall ill homeless
have been arrested at least once, according to a report prepared for the
Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors by Carla Jacobs, a board member of
the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill.

Many mentally ill people do manage to get treatment and do not end up in
jail, of course, especially those with higher incomes. But the magnitude of
the problem is suggested by a survey by the National Alliance for the
Mentally Ill of families with a seriously mentally ill member; 40 percent
of the ill individuals had been arrested.

On an average day, said Linda A. Teplin, a professor of psychiatry at
Northwestern University Medical School, 9 percent of men and 18.5 percent
of women in local jails -- about 56,000 people -- are severely mentally
ill. An estimated 10 percent of all inmates in state and federal prisons, ,
or 122,000 people, are severely mentally ill, said Allen J. Beck of the
Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics.

And about 20 percent of juveniles in criminal justice facilities, or 20,000
people, are that ill, said Joseph Cocozza, director of the GAINS Center, a
research organization in Delmar, N.Y.

It was Professor Teplin's research that first demonstrated that the
mentally ill are arrested much more often than people in the general
population. But the problem, she said, is not police callousness. "The
police arrest the mentally ill because they have no other alternative," she
said.

She recalled riding with the police in a Midwestern city one night when
they received a call about a crazy man on a bus. The man, named Charlie,
was both schizophrenic and a drunk. They took him to a detoxification
center, where he fell asleep. But the detox center recognized him and
insisted he was crazy, not drunk, so the police drove him to a hospital.

At the hospital the doctors also knew Charlie. Regarding him as difficult,
they said he was an alcoholic to avoid admitting him.

Finally, the police arrested Charlie, Professor Teplin said. It was a cold
night and they did not want him to freeze to death. He was charged with
disorderly conduct.

THE DELINQUENT: Young, Mentally Ill And Bound for Jail

The 16-year-old girl suffered from delusions and hallucinations. The
diagnosis was "psychotic, not otherwise specified." Her father was in
prison for sexually abusing her sister. Her mother was an alcoholic. Not
surprisingly, the girl began skipping school. She got pregnant. She
assaulted her mother.

Before most state hospitals were closed, the girl would probably have been
committed to a state psychiatric hospital. But in Texas, where she lives,
the juvenile court declared her a delinquent and sent her to the state's
juvenile justice agency, the Texas Youth Commission. The commission sent
her to its Corsicana Residential Treatment Center for seriously emotionally
disturbed youths.

The girl personifies the problems facing many young people with mental
disorders, said Linda Reyes, a psychologist and assistant deputy executive
director of the TYC. "Unless you are wealthy and can afford private
doctors, you have to get arrested to get treatment," she said.

Even so, the commission is limited in what it can do. The girl refuses to
take antipsychotic medication, and because Corsicana is not a hospital, its
staff cannot make her take it. She is not making progress -- she walks
around naked and urinates on the floor -- but by law, when her term
expires, she must be released.

Incarcerating mentally ill adolescents is "tragic and absurd," Dr. Reyes
said. "The system we have created is totally ineffective. It doesn't
rehabilitate the kids. And it doesn't even take care of public safety,
because when she is sent home, she will just get picked up again."

Of the 4,791 juveniles in the Texas agency's custody, 22 percent suffer
from schizophrenia, manic depression or major depression. The national
figure is similar: an estimated 20 percent of incarcerated juveniles are
seriously emotionally disturbed.

When other psychiatric disorders are included, the percentages rise
sharply. A recent survey by the California Youth Authority found that 35
percent of boys in its custody and 73 percent of girls need treatment, said
its director, Francisco Alarcon.

One reason for the higher percentage of young people with mental illness in
jail, specialists say, is that many states have cut budgets for adolescent
psychiatric hospitals even more than those for adults.

"I had a 15-year-old girl who was hallucinating and psychotic," said Cathy
Brock, a supervisor at the Letot Center in Dallas for runaway children.
"And a staff member from Mental Health and Mental Retardation agreed she
needed hospitalization. But then she said they were over budget for the
year -- so couldn't I find an offense that would get her arrested, like an
assault?"

The Dallas County Juvenile Department has as large a budget for psychiatric
hospitalization, $6.6 million this year, as the county's mental health
department.

As a result, Ms. Brock said, "When I have a kid who is severely mentally
ill and has been arrested, and the family has no resources, I will do
everything I can to make sure that kid gets adjudicated." But urging judges
and families to convict children, she said, "presents all kinds of ethical
binds.".

Another reason these young people are incarcerated disproportionately is
that they act out their illnesses more than adults, usually in aggressive
and impulsive ways that can get them arrested, said the president of the
National Mental Health Association, Michael Faenza.

There is evidence that the number of disturbed young people being arrested
is increasing. At Corsicana, Dr. Reyes said, the proportion of juveniles on
antipsychotic drugs has doubled to 80 percent since 1990.

But it is unclear whether this trend indicates more mental illness, or
reflects tougher sentencing laws that are driving greater numbers of all
young people behind bars.

Torrey, the schizophrenia expert, said he does not believe that social
conditions, like the breakdown of the family and bad parenting, cause young
people to become mentally ill. "What we are seeing," he said, "is the
breakdown of the public mental health system."

THE ASYLUM: Well-Meaning Plan To Close Hospitals

For a growing number of the mentally ill, it has come to this, said Dr.
Michael Pawel, executive director of the August Aichhorn Center for
emotionally disturbed juvenile offenders in Manhattan: "Jail has become the
place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in."

As thousands of the mentally ill end up behind bars, no one has estimated
the cost of shifting so many of the mentally ill from one kind of
institution, hospitals, to another, jails and prisons. At New York state's
rate of $30,000 a year per inmate, the annual cost to prisons alone would
be $3.7 billion, not counting the extra expenses of treating the mentally ill.

But because of the price exacted on the mentally ill themselves, some
therapists and mental health advocates are reconsidering what they did in
helping to close state hospitals.

"I was not wrong that antipsychotic medications were good," said Dr.
Richard Lamb, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Southern
California School of Medicine. Lamb worked in a state hospital in the 1960s
and was among those pushing for treating people outside hospitals. "But I
was wrong about discharging so many people with severe problems."

Part of the premise, he recalled, was that governments would build places
in communities where discharged patients could continue to take their drugs
and get therapy. But, largely for economic reasons, this was never done.

Now, Lamb said he realizes, "Some people just need more structured care."

Thinking over what seemed at the time like a wonderful reform, he likened
himself to the British colonel in "The Bridge Over the River Kwai." The
colonel built a bridge for his Japanese captors because the idea was so
magnificent. "What have I done?" he asked himself.

Copyright 1998 The New York Times Company

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A Boulevard Leads To Drugs And Death (Op-Ed In 'New York Times'
Notes Open Air Drug Dealers Are Still Hanging Out In Newark, New Jersey,
Waiting For Suburban 'Junkies' In Cars - Prohibitionists Can't Abrogate
Laws Of Supply And Demand But Won't Even Consider Regulatory Reforms
That Would Eliminate Neighbors' Problems)

Date: Thu, 05 Mar 1998 22:06:40 -0500
To: DrugSense News Service 
From: Richard Lake 
Subject: MN: US NJ: NYT: Commentary: A Boulevard Leads to Drugs and Death
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: "Dick Evans" 
Pubdate: Thu, 5 Mar 1998
Source: New York Times (NY)
Author: Evelyn Nieves
Contact: letters@nytimes.com
Website: http://www.nytimes.com/

COMMENTARY: A BOULEVARD LEADS TO DRUGS AND DEATH

NEWARK, N.J. -- After all that's happened, the petty drug dealers are still
hanging out on West Runyon Street and Irvine Turner Boulevard, waiting for
the suburban junkies.

On Wednesday afternoon, two stood in front of the deli across from the
Belmont-Runyon Elementary School as children played double Dutch and tag
behind a 6-foot chain link fence.

Two more, in identical Green Bay Packers jackets, stationed themselves
halfway down the block. They were leaning against a "No Loitering:
Violators will be Prosecuted" sign in the window of Rodriguez Supermarket.
When a police car passed, they didn't bother to pretend not to notice. They
looked at the cruiser and cracked up, doubling over and covering their
mouths with their hands.

Everything was supposed to change after last March, when 8-year-old Terrell
James was hit by a speeding car as he crossed Irvine Turner Boulevard on
his way to Belmont-Runyon's playground.

The accident focused attention on several longstanding problems. The
hit-and-run driver, Daniel Tonkovich, 18, was one of the neighborhood's
many unwelcome out-of-towners. He had come to Newark from the shore town of
Toms River, for the same reason as so many other visitors -- to buy drugs.
Then, like the others, he was zooming home, yards away from the Interstate
78 access ramp, when he ran into Terrell.

Citizens, who had complained for years that the school was practically on
the Route 78 ramp, demanded that the school be relocated, that the ramp be
widened, that the drug dealers be swept off the streets. Officials agreed.
The state Department of Transportation allocated $10 million toward a new
school building and a study of plans for a wider ramp. The Newark police
set up roadblocks to trip up speeding drivers and stepped up drug sweeps.
Meanwhile, Tonkovich, according to his family, became a changed man. Jolted
by Terrell's death, he swore to come clean. He entered a rehabilitation
program and wrote a pamphlet on teen-age drug use full of passages like
this one: "Never in my strangest nightmares did I ever think this would
happen to my family or myself. It's a very hard thing to deal with, knowing
that an 8-year-old child lost his life because of me. If I am convicted of
all the charges brought against me I could spend a very long time in
prison. Don't think that it can't happen again. It can and it will." Those
last words sound almost prophetic. Despite all the promises and plans, it
seems as if Terrell's death has changed very little. E.J. Miranda, a
spokesman for the Newark schools, said that plans to relocate the
Belmont-Runyon School are proceeding. This week, a committee of city,
school and community leaders is to look at architects' proposals for a
building scheduled to open in September 1999.

Meanwhile, the school is still open. The children still play in the yard.
The cars still plow through Irvine Turner Boulevard -- on Wednesday, the
average speed seemed to be about 20 miles greater than the 30 mile-per-hour
limit -- on their way to the Route 78 ramp.

And, of course, the drug dealers still wait for their customers, who must
still be buying. Otherwise, there would be no reason for the sellers to
risk the police heat and the neighborhood's boiling resentment. On
Wednesday, the two dealers at the corner of Irvine Turner Boulevard and
West Runyon Street made no secret of their purpose. It was about 55
degrees, but they were wearing bulky down coats (the better to stash their
goods) and wool ski caps (to obscure their looks). They smiled broadly and
gave two thumbs up to a reporter circling the block, maybe thinking this
was a potential customer.

Residents interviewed said there are not as many street-level dealers as
there used to be. But no one wanted to be quoted about the situation. "Now
is not the time to be talking," said an elderly woman who didn't want her
name printed. "At first, everyone was so shocked by the little boy's death.
Now, things are almost like they used to be. The drugs -- they're winning."
Heroin certainly beat Tonkovich to the finish. On Sunday afternoon, just
two weeks before he was to stand trial for aggravated manslaughter in
Terrell's death, he was found dead of an overdose in his parents' home, a
needle by his side. He had been battling the addiction, but his family and
friends still could not believe the drugs won. Not when he had been working
out a plea deal with prosecutors, and he and his girlfriend were expecting
their first child.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

'New York Review Of Books' March 5 (List Subscriber Gives URL For Magazine,
Recommends Keeping Eye Out For Review Of Three Books On Blacks
In The Criminal Justice System, Including 'Search And Destroy -
African-American Males In The Criminal Justice System,' By Jerome Miller)

Subj: NY Review of Books March 5
From: Peter Webster 
Date: Tue, 10 Mar 1998 14:55:00 +0000

In the NY Review of Books March 5 there is a review of three books on
Blacks in the Criminal Justice System that should be read by activists, one
of the books reviewed is Jerome Miller's important *Search and Destroy:
African-American Males in the Criminal Justice System*. The review is
titled "Justice for Blacks?" by Nicholas Lemann, unfortunately it is not
yet available at the website of the NYRev but probably will be in weeks to
come when the new issue is online. The NYRev website is excellent, btw, and
has online most articles and reviews back to '94 with plans to put the
entire archives online in the future. The URL is

http://www.nybooks.com/nyrev/

Peter Webster
email: vignes@monaco.mc

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Mexico Drug Certification Eyed ('Associated Press' Says Two Republicans
In US House Of Representatives, Clay Shaw And John Mica, Both Of Florida,
Have Introduced Bill To Reverse Clinton Administration's Certification
Of Mexico As An Ally In War On Some Drugs)

Date: Thu, 05 Mar 1998 22:10:16 -0500
To: DrugSense News Service 
From: Richard Lake 
Subject: MN: US: Mexico Drug Certification Eyed
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Reply-To: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Kevin Zeese 
Source: Associate Press
Pubdate: Thu, 05 Mar 1998

MEXICO DRUG CERTIFICATION EYED

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Clinton made a mistake in certifying Mexico as
a fully cooperative ally in the war against illegal drug trafficking, two
House Republicans say.

Now Reps. Clay Shaw and John Mica, both of Florida, have introduced a bill
to reverse that decision.

``For the president to call Mexico a 'partner' in the war on drugs is
outrageous,'' Shaw said Wednesday. ``A significant amount of the drugs on
our streets and in our neighborhoods continues to come from Mexico. We must
take this step to show the Mexican government that we take anti-drug
efforts with dead seriousness.''

The bill was announced a day after Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and
Sen. Paul Coverdell, R-Ga., introduced a similar bill in the Senate.

``While Mexico has made some limited progress, there remain gaping holes in
its counternarcotics effort,'' Feinstein said Tuesday.

The annual certification process regularly offends officials in Mexico, who
call it an insult that infringes on their sovereignty.

The president must decide each year by March 1 whether to certify Mexico
and other nations as cooperating partners in efforts to stop the production
or shipment of cocaine, heroin, marijuana and other drugs from their
countries. Foreign governments that are not certified face the loss of U.S.
aid.

Congress has 30 days to decide whether to reverse the president's decision.
Both bills would allow the president to waive sanctions against Mexico
despite decertification, however.

A spokesman for the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy
said the bills are likely to fail -- as they have previously. The United
States stands to gain more through continued cooperation, said spokesman
Bob Weiner.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Re - Marijuana Flap Gets Pot Boiling At WHO (Letter To Editor
Of Toronto's 'Globe And Mail' Says WHO And Its Sister UN Organization,
The International Narcotics Control Board, Appear To Have No Interest
In Engaging In A Balanced Debate About Cannabis)

Date: Thu, 5 Mar 1998 12:00:31 -0500
From: Carey Ker 
Subject: PUB: Cannabis Tizzy
To: mattalk@islandnet.com
Priority: Normal
Delivery-Receipt-To: Carey Ker 
Newshawk: carey.ker@utoronto.ca
Pubdate: Thursday, March 05, 1998
Source: Globe and Mail, Page A18
Contact: letters@globeandmail.ca
Website: http://www.globeandmail.ca/

Re: Marijuana flap gets pot boiling at WHO (March 3)

It is understandable that the World Health Organization is
in a tizzy at the suggestion that it suppressed a report
showing cannabis comparing more favorably than legal
drugs such as nicotine and alcohol. WHO and its sister
International Narcotics Control Board appear to have no
interest in engaging in a balanced debate about cannabis.

The INCB's 1997 annual report states that public incitement
by the media to consume illicit drugs, can arise from
showing "illicit use in a favourable light." It declares
that Governments need to assess whether "freedom of
expression cannot remain unrestricted when it conflicts with
other essential values and rights."

It seems that the INCB and WHO regard favorable
reportage about illicit drugs as public incitement to
consume them.

One wonders what kind of media blitz the WHO would have
engaged in had cannabis been found to be more harmful
than alcohol.

Carey Ker, Toronto

-------------------------------------------------------------------

1998 Global Days Against The Drug War! June 6, 7, 8
(International Demonstration Includes Public Rallies And Related Events
In New York, San Francisco, Amsterdam, Tel Aviv, Dallas, Stockholm, Brussels,
Colville, Tallinn, Eugene, Texoma, London, Bonn, Sidney, Wellington, Paris,
Ilmenau, Washington)

Date: Thu, 5 Mar 1998 09:29:48 EST
Reply-To: hbego@knoware.nl
Originator: drctalk@drcnet.org
Sender: drctalk@drcnet.org
From: Harry Bego (hbego@knoware.nl)
To: Multiple recipients of list 
Subject: UPDATE: The Days against the Drug War: 20 events!

***

PLEASE DISTRIBUTE BY EMAIL AND FAX

***

The 1998 Global Days against the Drug War!

June 6, 7, 8

Events in New York, San Francisco, Amsterdam, Tel Aviv, Dallas, Stockholm,
Brussels, Colville, Tallinn, Eugene, Texoma, London, Bonn, Sidney,
Wellington, Paris, Ilmenau, Washington, ...

Join the Coalition!

As you probably know, the United Nations will hold the first-ever
Special Session of the General Assembly on Drugs, from June 8th
to June 10th 1998 in New York.

This session was originally conceived as a critical examination
of worldwide anti-drug policy. The focus of this session has
now been narrowed. According to the new guidelines, only the
expansion of existing policies will be open for discussion. The
United Nations aims to escalate current drug repression tactics
in a catastrophic quest towards a 'drug free' society. In terms
of crime, economic and financial damage, and social and personal
harm, this policy is turning into a worldwide crisis!

It is of great importance that alternative proposals are heard
at the onset of this UN session. A clear statement must be made
that what is needed is not escalated repression, but reform
policies aimed at reducing the damage currently done.

To this aim, a number of organisations have recently united to
form the "Global Coalition for Alternatives to the Drug War".
They have written a declaration that will be published widely.
You can join the coalition by co-signing the declaration; see
the contact info below.

Members of this coalition are also invited to participate in the
"1998 Global Days against the Drug War", which are held Saturday
June 6th, Sunday June 7th, and Monday June 8th. This international
event will feature discussion forums, seminars, publications,
press conferences, demonstrations, street parties, concerts, and
other types of events, in many places at the same time. At this
moment (March 4th), 20 events are being planned! A 'grand finale'
is planned to take place in New York on Monday 8th.

You can help make the 1998 Global Days against the Drug War
a success! Make sure your city is part of this event. If you
are a member of a group or organisation that can help, contact
us. Otherwise, you can join one or more of the participating
groups and organisations, or set up your own group. See
the contact info below.

Early spring of 1998 we will issue press releases with the names
of all the groups and organisations that have joined the coalition.
Groups and organisations are invited to plan their own version
of the 1998 Global Days against the Drug War, under their own
identity and name. Note however that participation in the coali-
tion does not itself imply endorsement of the individual events
taking place.

Organisations wishing to join the coalition can send mail to
alliance@legalize.org. Individual activists please visit the
web site at http://www.legalize.org.

The Global Coalition for Alternatives to the Drug War
currently consists of:

The Drug Reform Coordination Network (DRCNet), the National Organi-
sation for Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML), Coordinamento Radicale
Antiprohibizionista (CORA), the November Coalition, the Campaign for
Equity-Restorative Justice (CERJ), the Transnational Radical Party
(TRP), Common Sense for Drug Policy, the Legalize! Initiative, the
Media Awareness Project (MAP), American Society for Action on Pain
(ASAP), Compassionate Care Alliance, the Campaign for the Restoration
and Regulation of Hemp (CRRH), HANF! Magazine, and more than
20 other organisations.

Participate in the Global Days against the Drug War !

June 6, 7, 8

http://www.legalize.org.
e-mail: alliance@legalize.org

***

PLEASE DISTRIBUTE BY EMAIL AND FAX

***

Subject: LEGALIZE! UPDATE: The Global Coalition & the Global Days !

News Update of the Legalize! Initiative

March 5, 1998

For latest info, visit our web site www.legalize.org or send mail to
legalize-info@legalize.org. You can contact us at alliance@legalize.org.

***

Dear drug policy reformer!

This is the next in a series of updates to keep you informed about
the planning of the 1998 Global Days against the Drug War, which will
be held on Saturday June 6th, Sunday June 7th, and Monday June 8th,
at the start of the UN General Assembly Special Session on Drugs
(UNGASS), which takes place in New York, June 8th, 9th and 10th.
For more information see http://www.legalize.org.

CONTENTS

1. 20 EVENTS PLANNED SO FAR!
Some information about the coming June events.

2. THE COALITION: OVER 30 MEMBER ORGANISATIONS
Many organisations have recently joined!

3. THE DECLARATION
Organisations can join the coalition by signing it.

4. AGAIN: THE CALL FOR PARTICIPATION
Send it out to promote the Global Days!

***

1. 20 EVENTS PLANNED SO FAR!

In the previous news update (issued Feb 11th) we reported about
events in New York, San Francisco, Amsterdam, Tel Aviv, Dallas,
Stockholm, Brussels, Colville (Wa), Tallinn (Estonia), Eugene (Or)
and Texoma (Okla). In the mean time, we have received information
about events being planned in several other places, a.o. Bonn,
London, Paris, Washington, the four main New Zealand cities,
Ilmenau (Germany), and Sidney (Australia). Some of these are
still in the first planning stages. The following information was
supplied by Jenetzky, HANF! chief editor:

Bonn, Monday, June 8th: "1.000 Argumente"

HANF! Magazine organises a mail campaign. Our readers write letters
with arguments to our gouvernment, and we will take them to Kohl's.
The campaign will be called "1.000 Argumente", starts with the April
issue and will bring a lot of mail to the federal gouvernment,
altogether supplied to Bonn on Monday, June 8th.

Information: J. Jenetzky, jj@hanf.org.

Julia Carter, coordinator of Legalize! California, wrote:

A significant Drug Peace Rally is currently being planned for San
Francisco during the Global Days against the Drug War. It is
tentatively scheduled for the afternoon of Saturday, June 6th and
the Civic Center Plaza has been reserved for the occasion.

Ideas and offers of volunteer help for this important event are
warmly encouraged!

Julia
Legalize! Initiative CA and Drug Peace Rally Coordinator
Voice Mail (415) 971-3573
julia@anon.nymserver.com

This came in two days ago, from Susan McGuckin of Sidney, Australia:

The New South Wales Users & AIDS Association, a drug users group
based in Sydney, is considering an event.
Susan McGuckin, Information Officer, NUAA, PO Box 822, Sidney,
Australia. Phone: #61-2-93693455 e-mail: nuaa@wr.com.au

The plans for a London event are in the conceptual phase ...; anyone
who's interested in organisation, contact Transform director Danny
Kushlick at dannykushlick@compuserve.com or on 0117 939 8052.
A meeting is scheduled for March 23d.

For information about these and other events, see our web pages.
Of course we encourage you to consider planning similar events!
Events do not necessarly have to be big - a small rally, an
anti-prohibition party, a forum discussion, it is up to you what
form and size your participation will take ... Contact fellow
anti-prohibitionists, local drug reform organisations, clubs, etc.,
get together and see what you can do. And inform us, of course!

2. THE GLOBAL COALITION FOR ALTERNATIVES TO THE DRUG WAR!

As you know, we are setting up a coalition of reform organisations,
which will issue declarations, and the members of which will support
the Global Days against the Drug War. The coalition currently
consists of over 30 organisations:

Drug Reform Coordination Network (DRCNet), National Organisation for
Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML), Transnational Radical Party (TRP),
November Coalition, Coordinamento Radicale Antiproibizionista (CORA),
Media Awareness Project (MAP), Campaign for the Restoration and
Regulation of Hemp (CRRH), Common Sense for Drug Policy (CSDP),
Transform, Campaign for Equity-Restorative Justice (CERJ), "Kne Bossem",
the NPO for Changing Israeli Drug Laws, the American Society for Action
on Pain (ASAP), The Dutch Drug Policy Foundation, Compassionate Care
Alliance, Swedish Cannabis Association (SCA), The Association for
Emancipatory Drug Policy (DEBED), Auto Support des Usagers de Drogues
(ASUD), Orange County Hemp Council (OCHC), The Legalize! Initiative,
Instituto de Documentaci Investigaci del Cannabis (IDIC), Green
Prisoners Release, Kansas State Lobbyists for Cannabis Law Reform,
Oregonians for Personal Privacy (OPP), Drug Users Rights Forum (DURF),
Drug Policy Reform Group of St. Paul, Legalise Cannabis!, the
Recreational Drugs Committee, New South Wales Users & AIDS Association,
HANF! Magazine, El Cogollo, Revista Cann1bica, HighLife, HempWorld.

See http://www.legalize.org/events/ for information about these
organisations.

To make your organisation join the coalition write to:
alliance@legalize.org.

3. THE DECLARATION

Organisations can join the coalition by signing the
following declaration:

***

The Global Coalition for Alternatives to the Drug War

Declaration

We, the undersigned, having recognized the
extraordinary damage being caused by the Drug War,
join together in a call for wide-ranging and honest
international and intranational discussion about the
effectiveness and consequences of current, force-based
drug policies. Furthermore, we call upon our
governments and fellow citizens to begin the process of
the exploration of alternative solutions to the issues that
these policies are claimed to address. This process
should include, but not be limited to, a revision of the
United Nations conventions and other international
treaties which inhibit nations from adopting such
alternatives.

We believe that in an atmosphere of honest and rational
examination, effective policies can be found which are
based not upon force, repression, prohibition, coercive
government action and the use of violence, but upon the
universal principles of human rights, freedom, justice,
equality under the law, the dignity of the individual,
the health of people and communities, and the sovereignty
of nations.

It should be noted that this coalition represents a
very broad range of political and social viewpoints,
and a wide variety of issue-interests. The heterogeneity
of the signatories to this coalition is evidence of
both the intellectual strength of our position and
the breadth of the destruction being wrought by
current policies. For despite our differences, we stand
together in the knowledge that a policy which mandates
a continuous state of war, in the absence of a true
acknowledgement and assessment of the consequences
and excesses of that war, is objectively flawed. And
that such a policy is in direct contradiction to the
mission and the ideals of the United Nations, and of the
peoples of the earth.

No society, whether local or global, can long endure
under a perpetual state of war. Nor do we choose to
leave as a legacy to our children, and to future
generations, the disastrous results of such a policy.
It is time to find alternatives.

The Global Coalition for Alternatives to the Drug War.

***

4. AGAIN: THE CALL FOR PARTICIPATION
Send out this updated version to promote the Global Days!

***

PLEASE DISTRIBUTE BY EMAIL AND FAX

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Majority Of Young Have Taken Drugs ('Irish Independent' Notes Survey
Carried Out For National Youth Council Of Ireland Found Just Over Half
Had Tried Illegal Drugs, And 45 Percent Said Some Drugs Should Be Legalised,
Especially Cannabis)

Date: Thu, 05 Mar 1998 21:12:26 -0500
To: DrugSense News Service 
From: Richard Lake 
Subject: MN: Ireland: Majority Of Young Have Taken Drugs
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Zosimos 
Pubdate: Thu, 05 Mar 1998
Source: The Irish Independent
Contact: independent.letters@independent.ie

MAJORITY OF YOUNG HAVE TAKEN DRUGS

CURIOSITY and the influence of friends are the main reasons why just over
half of our young people have tried illegal drugs.

Only one in eight mentioned boredom as the reason for trying drugs when
questioned in a survey carried out for the National Youth Council of
Ireland (NYCI).

Nearly half (45pc) said some drugs especially cannabis should be legalised
but 43pc disagreed while 12pc didn't know.

Seven out of 10 believed the Government was not adequately tackling the
drugs problem and only 7pc thought it was. Education and prevention should
get greater priority.

Other key findings from the survey of 1,400 young people:

* Unemployment was the key concern.

* A quarter of 15 to 24-year-olds were in part-time work.

* 40pc said spirituality was not important in their lives.

* 89pc are or had been a member of a youth organisation.

* 39pc said the education system was not suited to the labour market.

NYCI president Jillian Hassett said the survey was the most detailed and
comprehensive on Ireland's youth to date.

It should help organisations and institutions that dealt with young people,
she added.

VOTER APATHY

"The most important influence on young people today is their own friends.
It is the first place young people would turn to in a crisis, for advice on
sexual matters and it is the top influence on young people's body image,
coming ahead of fashion and the media," Ms Hassett said.

If an election were held tomorrow 79pc of registered voters said they would
vote while the remainder said they would not.

The NYCI said the fact that over a fifth of young voters were so apathetic
about the electoral system at such an early age was worrying.

The most popular political group was Fianna Fail (23pc), followed by Fine
Gael (13pc), Labour (12pc), Green Party (10 pc), PDs (5pc), Democratic Left
and Sinn Fein (both 3pc) and others (2pc).

Don't knows accounted for 29pc of the total sample of 1,400 young people,
North and South.

Fine Gael and the Green Party were more popular with young men than young
women. Labour and the PDs are more popular with young women.

Denis Naughton, Fine Gael spokesperson on youth affairs, said the survey
had clearly shown the Government's inability to tackle the growing drug
problem in both urban and rural Ireland.

"It is obvious that the increased seizure of illegal drugs by the gardai is
failing to combat the problem and that increased resources must concentrate
on education and preventative measures to reduce the demand for illegal
substances," he said.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Young People Concerned About Jobs And Drugs (Lengthier 'Irish Times' Account
Of Survey Commissioned By National Youth Council Of Ireland
Says 'Over Half Of Those Questioned Said They Have Taken Illegal Drugs' -
'Drugs' Number One Concern Of 23 Percent, Compared To 46 Percent
Who Think It's Jobs)

Date: Thu, 5 Mar 1998 17:13:13 -0800
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
From: Olafur Brentmar 
Subject: MN: Ireland: Young People Concerned About Jobs And Drugs
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Zosimos 
Pubdate: Thu, 05 Mar 1998
Source: Irish Times (Ireland)
Author: Christine Newman
Contact: lettersed@irish-times.ie
Mail: 11-15 D'Olier St, Dublin 2, Ireland
Fax: ++ 353 1 671 9407

YOUNG PEOPLE CONCERNED ABOUT JOBS AND DRUGS

Unemployment is the number one concern of Ireland's youth, a comprehensive
new survey shows. Over half of those questioned said they have taken
illegal drugs. The young people expressed dissatisfaction with the
Government for failing to tackle the drugs problem adequately. Fianna Fail
is the most popular political party.

They are tolerant in their attitude towards refugees or asylum-seekers, who
they believe should be allowed to stay in the country. And they consider
travellers are the group most discriminated against in Irish society.

Their top television programmes are Friends, ER and The Simpsons. Their
favourite newspaper is The Irish Times followed by the Irish Independent
and the Sun.

The survey was commissioned by the National Youth Council of Ireland and
carried out in January 1998 by a market research company among 1,400 people
between the ages of 15 and 24, North and South. The respondents were
stopped at random in the street at 64 centres and asked a series of 48
questions.

The president of the NYCI, Ms Jillian Hassett, said at a press conference
that it was the most detailed and comprehensive survey ever undertaken
among young people.

"The Government and those in power need to look at these facts and ensure
that they are taken into account in all policies in all areas," she said.

The results show that more than one third - 39 per cent - are dissatisfied
with the education system although 61 per cent think "their
education/training is suited to the present demands of the labour market."

In spite of the Celtic Tiger, unemployment is the number one concern, at 46
per cent, ahead of drugs, 23 per cent; Northern Ireland, 11 per cent;
crime, 12 per cent and environment, 4 per cent. Twenty four per cent were
in part-time employment.

On drugs, 69 per cent believe that the Government is not tackling the
problem adequately, and consider education and prevention are the best
approach.

Of those who have taken drugs, 32 per cent said they never use them any
more, 12 per cent use them once or more a week, 22 percent take them once
or twice a month and 34 per cent three or four times a year.

There is an urban-rural divide on the issue of legalisation. Urban young
people marginally favour drugs legalisation: 47 per cent say yes, 41 per
cent no.

Rural young people are marginally against by 46 per cent to 41 per cent. Of
those in favour of legalisation, 97 per cent said cannabis should be
legalised.

While 60 per cent expressed the view that spirituality is important in
their lives, only 30 per cent participate regularly in organised religion,
and 43 per cent sometimes.

Fianna Fail was the most popular political party, at 23 per cent. Seventy
nine per cent said they would vote if an election were held in the morning.

"This is in contrast to the numbers who actually vote, making a case to
have elections held during weekends when young people can actually vote,"
the NYCI commented.

Eighty nine per cent are or have been members of a youth organisation,
sports club or voluntary association.

A big difference between the attitudes of males and females is on equality.
Of the young women, 68 per cent believe that equality of opportunity
between men and women does not exist, whereas 52 per cent of young men
believe that there is equality of opportunity.

Eighty three per cent said they are very satisfied with their body image.
The most popular art forms are music, video, cinema and reading novels.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Ballymun Anti-Drugs Activists Praised ('Irish Times'
Says Members Of 18 Drugs Block Watches In North Dublin
Who Have Set Up Watches To Prevent Illegal-Drug Dealing
Were Presented With Commendation Certificates Yesterday By Garda)

Date: Fri, 6 Mar 1998 00:29:33 -0800
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
From: Olafur Brentmar 
Subject: MN: Ireland: Ballymun Anti-Drugs Activists Praised
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Zosimos 
Pubdate: Thu, 05 Mar 1998
Source: Irish Times (Ireland)
Author: Catherine Cleary
Contact: lettersed@irish-times.ie
Mail: 11-15 D'Olier St, Dublin 2, Ireland
Fax: ++ 353 1 671 9407

BALLYMUN ANTI-DRUGS ACTIVISTS PRAISED

Drugs with a value of around £500,000 have been seized in the Ballymun area
of north Dublin in the last 18 months. The seizures are the result of an
increased Garda presence and better co-operation with communities,
according to Chief Supt James Murphy of Santry Garda station. The total
includes one large seizure of cannabis worth around £200,000.

Members of 18 drugs block watches, groups of people who have set up watches
to prevent drug dealing in the Ballymun blocks, were presented with
certificates yesterday.

Chief Supt Murphy told the group, "You the people have been there day and
night patrolling the area. We ourselves cannot do the work without your
involvement."

Ms Marie Cooper from the Shangan Road community council read a letter from
an addict thanking the drugs watch workers for getting her off drugs. "She
says she doesn't know where she would be today if I hadn't interfered."

Ms Cooper said there had been more than 1,000 people involved in marches
when the community started to act on the drug problem. Ms Marcella Givens,
also from the community council, said people in the area had "lost faith"
before the marches began because drug dealers were not being evicted.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Police Arrest Drug-Smuggling Mules ('Reuters' Says Greek Police
Have Arrested 12 Trained Mules Carrying About Two Tonnes Of Cannabis
Near The Border With Albania)

Resent-Date: Thu, 5 Mar 1998 17:47:17 -0800 (PST)
Old-Return-Path: 
Date: Thu, 05 Mar 1998 18:49:25 -0700
Subject: Mules arrested
From: "Debbie Harper3" 
To: mattalk 

Newshawk: Deb Harper

Source: Calgary Herald March 5, 1998 ( A6 )
http://www.southam.com/calgaryherald/

(Reuters)

ATHENS

Police arrest drug-smuggling mules

Greek police arrested 12 mules carrying about two tonnes of cannabis near
the border with Albania on Wednesday and were holding them pending
investigation, police said.

"The mules are trained to follow mountain paths from Albania into Greece," a
police officer at the northern Greek town of Kastoria said.

Drug smugglers have used mules to bring narcotics from Albania across
Greece's northern border before but it has usually been one animal.

"This time we had a big group. We really don't know what to do with them,"
he said. A group of collaborators believed to be waiting for the mules at a
Greek village about four kilometres from the border fled when they saw the
police.

"We have made no arrests, other than the mules," the officer said.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

[End]