Drug War

SALISBURY -- Two weeks after police fired 14 shots into a car at a crowded McDonald's parking lot, anger remains palpable in black neighborhoods throughout this growing Eastern Shore city of 20,000.African-American residents say the wounding of two unarmed men who police believed were carrying a large quantity of crack cocaine is just the latest and worst example of an escalating drug war that has unfairly targeted them. Police say one suspect tried to run them down in his car; residents insist that the gunfire was unnecessary.

WASHINGTON -- Two years after it began, an ambitious Bush administration drive to cut the flow of drugs from Latin America has failed to curb cocaine production or significantly affect the price and purity of the drug in U.S. cities, government estimates show.The five-year, $2.2 billion Andean strategy that President Bush plans to reaffirm at a summit with Latin leaders in San Antonio next week has been stymied by a lag between planning and action, drug-lord resilience, the colossal domestic problems plaguing the United States' Latin allies, and corruption and inefficiency in source countries.

Mexico's drug war is entering its fourth year. Its swine flu outbreak began with dozens of deaths and global headlines last spring. This leaves travelers with at least two reasons to study up before booking that Mexico trip. But it doesn't necessarily mean staying home. More than 9,900 people have died in Mexico's drug war from January 2007 to early October 2009, according to the University of San Diego's Trans-Border Institute. Many of the deaths occurred near the U.S. border and far from the resorts and cities that draw thousands of Americans every year.

WASHINGTON -- Teen drug use rose an alarming 105 percent between 1992 and 1995, the government reported yesterday.Experts blamed everyone from parents to the media for decreased vigilance in the drug war since the late 1980s, when aggressive drug-fighting efforts appeared to be pushing usage lower in every segment of American society.The National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, released by the Department of Health and Human Services, also found that:Youth drug use rose 24 percent between 1994 and 1995, and an estimated 10.4 percent of youths ages 12 to 17 used illicit drugs on a monthly basis in 1995.

Baltimore State's Attorney Gregg L. Bernstein on Monday reached out to the black community by answering call-in questions on WOLB's Larry Young Morning Show about his controversial decision to not prosecute the three Baltimore police officers involved in the death of East Baltimore resident Anthony Anderson. On Thursday, Bernstein said his office had determined that Detective Todd A. Strohman used appropriate action when he tackled Anderson during a September drug arrest that resulted in broken ribs and a lacerated spleen, which killed the 46-year-old man. Officers said Anderson was attempting to swallow drugs while walking away from them, which caused Strohman to use a “bear hug” to take him to the ground and preserve evidence.

The window of opportunity to bring down drug trafficking organizations in Central and South America is quickly shrinking. However, despite its recent efforts, the Obama administration still lacks the one thing that we desperately need to win the fight against the cartels: a strategy. While it may seem like an obvious thing to have, the United States surprisingly lacks a comprehensive plan to bring down drug trafficking organizations. The federal government does have some counterdrug strategies, but they are either too broad - like the annual National Drug Control Strategy, which reads more like an "accomplishment report" of past successes rather than a "how to" manual - or too narrowly focused, like the National Southwest Border Counternarcotics Strategy, which addresses, among other things, ways to strengthen security along the border itself.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - Edwin Melendez Primos died from a gunshot wound in his right ear. Alcidez Bauza Rivera, 31, was found with five bullets lodged in his body. And 20-year- old Jose Almazar Correa was killed after a shootout in a small town near here. Their deaths were notable because they were among 16 people killed last month in the same week and for pretty much the same reason: an expanding drug war that has given Puerto Rico the dubious distinction of being one of the bloodiest places in the United States.

If the goal of marijuana prohibition is to subsidize Mexican drug cartels, prohibition is a success ("The nonsense of marijuana busts shown," Nov. 11). The drug war distorts supply and demand dynamics so that big money grows on little trees. There is a reason you don't see drug cartels sneaking into national forests to cultivate tomatoes and cucumbers. They cannot compete with legitimate farmers. If the goal of marijuana prohibition is to deter use, prohibition is a failure. The United States has double the rate of marijuana use as the Netherlands, where marijuana is legally available.

Should juries vote "not guilty" on low-level marijuana charges to send a message about our country's insane marijuana arrest policy? Jury nullification is a constitutional doctrine that allows juries to acquit defendants who are technically guilty but who don't deserve punishment. As Paul Butler wrote recently in The New York Times, juries have the right and power to use jury nullification to protest unjust laws. Mr. Butler points out that nullification was credited with ending our country's disastrous alcohol Prohibition as more and more jurors refused to send their neighbors to jail for a law they didn't believe in. He says we need to do the same with today's marijuana arrests.

The drug war is largely a war on people who smoke marijuana. In 2010, there were 853,839 marijuana arrests in the United States, almost 90 percent of them for simple possession. At a time when state and local governments are laying off police, firefighters and teachers, this country continues to spend enormous public resources criminalizing marijuana, even though the law enforcement model clearly isn't working. The U.S. has higher rates of marijuana use than the Netherlands, where marijuana is legally available.