Drug cases: overloading federal justice system

USA Today (Society for the Advancement of Education), Dec, 1995

America's obsession with the crackdown on crime is taking its toll on the Federal justice system, maintains Kathleen F. Brickey, James Carr Professor of Criminal Jurisprudence, Washington University. The increasing practice of bringing crime into Federal jurisdiction has overloaded court dockets, overcrowded prisons, overdrawn budgets, and overextended the duties of U.S. judges.

"The Federal system is strained to capacity due, in large part, to the government's war on drugs," she points out. "This war has skewed the Federal criminal justice system at every possible level." In 1995, the Federal prison system will house more than 92,000 offenders. In addition, over 10,500 sentenced Federal offenders will reside in state and local jails.

Brickey cites a 500% rise--in a four-year-period--of felony drug prosecutions in the local District of Columbia courts. In the Western District of Texas, the number of drug defendants increased by 80% in a single year. A report of the Federal Courts Study Committee indicated that such districts with overflowing court dockets are "virtually unable to try civil cases." Brickey notes that "Giving thousands of drug cases priority must be done at the expense of civil justice, which becomes a casualty of the war on drugs."

Stringent laws that include minimum mandatory prison sentences without the possibility of parole are sending these offenders, many of them sentenced for minor drug charges, to already overcrowded prisons. The prospect of plea bargaining offers no relief. Historically, 85-90% of Federal criminal cases are resolved through plea bargains. A drug defendant who faces a lengthy mandatory minimum prison term has little incentive to negotiate a guilty plea, even if acquittal seems unlikely. Consequently, a large percentage of these cases result in jury trials.

Although more than 60 statutes impose mandatory minimum sentences, only a handful are used in practice. Approximately 94% of all mandatory minimum terms are imposed under four statutes: manufacture and distribution of controlled substances, possession of controlled substances, importing or exporting controlled substances, and possessing a firearm during a drug or violent crime.

A recent study of prison populations revealed that 65% of all drug offenders in prison are low-level, first-time offenders. They are serving mandatory minimum terms, are not considered dangerous, and have profiles that indicate they will not be repeat offenders, whether they remain in prison for five years or are released.

The Federal prison system "is the vortex of a self-perpetuating cycle in which an ever increasing number of Federal offenders are placed (and will continue to be placed) in an ever increasing number of Federal, state, and local penal facilities," Brickey cautions. A large number of prisons are under judicial scrutiny because of unconstitutional conditions. For every new person placed in these facilities, someone already there must be turned out. "How many violent offenders might fall into this early release category to make room for the nonviolent offenders?," she asks.

Congress did attempt to address the crime problem in one of the provisions in the 1994 crime bill. Diversionary programs such as rehabilitative treatment, instead of prison, for low-level, nonviolent offenders was prescribed. Yet, the 1995 crime bills are cutting these programs, she says. "Instead, Congress is telling the states, if you want this grant money for prison construction, you have to have truth in sentencing laws that will keep people in for 85% of their term."