Drugs & Prohibitions

Border Patrol agent who shot Mexican teenager dead will not be charged

"U.S. authorities will not bring charges against a Border Patrol agent in Arizona who shot dead a rock-throwing Mexican teenager two years ago because the fatal injury did not occur in the United States, the Justice Department said on Friday. An unidentified Border Patrol agent shot Ramses Barron, a 17-year-old Mexican citizen, through the border fence in Nogales, Arizona, in the early hours of January 5, 2011. Over the past five years, U.S. border agents have fired into Mexico at least 10 times, killing six Mexicans, according to a report released earlier this year by the Washington Monthly and the Investigative Fund at The Nation Institute." Continue reading →

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In Switzerland, Marijuana Use Helps Keep Prisons Calm and Safe

"A recent study published in the International Journal of Drug Policy estimates that 50 to 80 percent of inmates in Swiss prisons use marijuana. Prison staff told researchers they found marijuana to be a relatively safe drug and that cracking down on consumption would have more negative effects than positive ones. Surveys of detainees and guards revealed similar opinions on marijuana use, with both groups describing the effects of marijuana as analgesic, calming and a way to decrease the traumatic prison experience." Continue reading →

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The impulse to ban

"You don’t have to be a libertarian, or otherwise opposed to large government, to desire proper analysis of a problem and its potential solutions before rushing into a ban. Yet the impulse in the general population is to ban, whether they are on the left or the right. Those of us involved in drug policy reform have seen so clearly first-hand the unmitigated disasters that can come from the rush to ban, and so are less susceptible, perhaps, to that impulse. But we need to help others see that banning is not equal to stopping the problem." Continue reading →

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SWAT-Team Nation: The Militarization of the U.S. Police

"Inside, gallerygoers were looking at art and dancing to a d.j.; outside, on the patio, several young women were goofily belting out the lyrics to 'Hakuna Matata,' from 'The Lion King'. Only then did masked figures with guns storm the crowd, shouting, 'Get on the fucking ground! Get down, get down!' Some forty Detroit police officers dressed in commando gear ordered the gallery attendees to line up on their knees, then took their car keys and confiscated their vehicles, largely on the grounds that the gallery lacked the proper permits for dancing and drinking. More than forty cars were seized, and owners paid around a thousand dollars each to get them back." Continue reading →

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Carnegie Mellon research shows cellphone use may not cause more car crashes

"For almost 20 years, it has been a wide-held belief that talking on a cellphone while driving is dangerous and leads to more accidents. However, new research from Carnegie Mellon University and the London School of Economics and Political Science suggests that talking on a cellphone while driving does not increase crash risk. Additionally, the researchers analyzed the effects of legislation banning cellphone use, enacted in several states, and similarly found that the legislation had no effect on the crash rate." Continue reading →

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Criminal defense lawyers demand access to secret DEA evidence

"Criminal defense lawyers are challenging a U.S. government practice of hiding the tips that led to some drug investigations, information that the lawyers say is essential to fair trials in U.S. courts. The practice of creating an alternate investigative trail to hide how a case began – what federal agents call 'parallel construction' – has never been thoroughly tested in court. Defense lawyers said that by hiding the existence of the information, the government is violating a defendant’s constitutional right to view potentially exculpatory evidence that suggests witness bias, entrapment or innocence." Continue reading →

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De Facto Hash Truce in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley

"The Lebanese government will not attempt to eradicate marijuana fields blooming across the country's Bekaa Valley, Beirut's Daily Star reported Friday. Sources said it was because of the fragile security situation in the area near the border with Syria and because the government had been unable to live up to pledges to provide financial compensation to farmers whose crops were destroyed last year. They are also up against Bekaa Valley marijuana farmers in no mood to see their livelihood messed with. 'In the absence of alternatives, we will break the hands and legs of anyone who dares destroy our crops,' one of the region's biggest growers said." Continue reading →

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Diamond Jeweler Turns Alleged Smuggler as India Gold Prices Rise

"In January, jeweler Vihari Sheth was publicizing a ritzy new line of diamond-encrusted designs. Last week, she was arrested at Mumbai airport with nearly $400,000 of gold jewelry in her underwear and on her person. The 27-year-old has a store in Singapore and is married to a director of Mumbai-based Siyaram Silk Mills Ltd (SIYA), a suit maker that is a household name in the country. Her arrest offers a glimpse into how even the wealthy may be joining small jewelers and organized gangs to skirt new government taxes on bullion imports that have made gold about 9 percent more expensive in Indian stores." Continue reading →

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Gold replaces narcotics as the most valued smuggled item in India

"The Bombay Bullion Association has stated that the tighter import curbs by the government have resulted in a huge gap between supply and demand for the precious metal. This huge gap is being partly filled by the illegal traffickers who buy the gold overseas at a cheaper rate and sells it to domestic jewelers or bullion agents by evading tax. Revenue authorities seized gold worth Rs 598 million during April-June quarter this fiscal, an increase of nearly 365% in comparison with the same quarter last year. Smuggled gold pours into the country mainly from Dubai, Bangkok and Singapore." Continue reading →

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Serial Offender: Miami Fed. Prosecutor Called on Misconduct in Drug Cases

"Dr. Ali Shaygan has nothing to do with Colombian drug trafficking conspiracies, but his case is yet another example of Hoffman's prosecutorial overreach. Shaygan was charged with overprescribing narcotics as part of the federal government's campaign against prescription drug abuse, but later acquitted. After his acquittal, Shaygan won a $600,000 judgment, with the judge in the case finding the prosecutors' conduct in attempting to influence witnesses and deny potentially exculpatory evidence to the defense so 'profoundly disturbing that it raises troubling issues about the integrity of those who wield enormous power over the people they prosecute.'" Continue reading →

Continue ReadingSerial Offender: Miami Fed. Prosecutor Called on Misconduct in Drug Cases