Posted October 27, 2010, “To the Point”
“If you had to be a prisoner in the United States, this is certainly the time. Because of the severe economic downturn in the United States, the government will not be able to keep prisoners incarcerated as long as they have. Sentences will need to be lower, “good time” credit will have to increase and “alternative sentencing” will have to be enacted. “Tough on crime” initiatives will be toned down or completely eliminated and mandatory sentencing will be given a second look.”
David Zapp, October 27, 2010
By Matt Apuzzo, Posted on March 13, 2014, The New York Times
Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. is endorsing a proposal that would reduce prison sentences for dealing drugs, the latest sign of the Obama administration’s retrenchment in the war on drugs.
In January, the United States Sentencing Commission proposed changing federal guidelines to lessen the average sentence for drug dealers by about one year, to 51 months from 62 months. Mr. Holder is scheduled to testify before the commission on Thursday in support of the plan.
With the support of several Republicans in Congress, the attorney general is separately pushing for the elimination of mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent drug crimes. In January, the Justice Department issued a call encouraging low-level criminals serving lengthy sentences on crack cocaine charges to apply for clemency.
Since the late 1970s, the nation’s prison population has ballooned into the world’s largest. About one in every 100 adults is locked up.
In the federal prison system, the one that would be affected by the proposed changes, half of the 215,000 inmates are serving time for drug crimes. Under the changes being considered, the federal prison population would decrease by about 6,550 inmates over the next five years, according to government estimates.
“This overreliance on incarceration is not just financially unsustainable,” Mr. Holder said in remarks prepared for delivery on Thursday. “It comes with human and moral costs that are impossible to calculate.”
About a third of the Justice Department’s budget goes toward the prison system, a fact that has helped Mr. Holder win conservative allies for sentencing changes.
The Sentencing Commission writes the guidelines that judges must consider. It is soliciting comments on the proposed sentencing reductions and will vote, probably in April, on whether to carry them out. Unless Congress voted to reject the proposals, the commission’s changes would go into effect in November.
Until then, the Justice Department said Mr. Holder would tell federal prosecutors not to oppose any sentence that would fall under the more lenient guidelines.
“This straightforward adjustment . . . would help to rein in federal prison spending while focusing limited resources on the most serious threats to public safety.”
Commentary: Happy days are here again. Like they say in money laundering cases: Follow the money. Moral shmoral. It’s about the money. You think they would be talking about this if the government wasn’t financially strapped?
– David Zapp