Half Ounce of Pot Gets Louisiana Man Twenty Years in Prison, By Bill Quigley

While Colorado and Washington have de-criminalized recreational use of marijuana and twenty states allow use for medical purposes, a Louisiana man was sentenced to twenty years in prison in New Orleans criminal court for possessing 15 grams, .529 of an ounce, of marijuana.

Corey Ladd, 27, had prior drug convictions and was sentenced September 4, 2013 as a “multiple offender to 20 years hard labor at the Department of Corrections.” 

Marijuana use still remains a ticket to jail in most of the country and prohibition is enforced in a highly racially discriminatory manner.  A recent report of the ACLU, “The War on Marijuana in Black and White,” documents millions of arrests for marijuana and shows the “staggeringly disproportionate impact on African Americans.”  

Nationwide, the latest numbers from the FBI report that over 762,000 arrests per year are for marijuana, almost exactly half of all drug arrests. 

Even though blacks and whites use marijuana at similar rates, black people are 3.73 times more likely to be arrested for possession of marijuana than white people.   

For example, Louisiana arrests about 13,000 people per year for marijuana, 60% of them African Americans.  Over 84 percent were for possession only.   While Louisiana’s population is 32 percent black, 60 percent of arrests for marijuana are African American making it the 9th most discriminatory state nationwide.  In Tangipahoa Parish, blacks are 11.8 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana than whites and in St. Landry Parish the rate of black arrests for marijuana is 10.7 times as likely as whites, landing both parishes in the worst 15 in the country.   

In Louisiana, a person can get up to six months in jail for first marijuana conviction, up to five years in prison for the second conviction and up to twenty years in prison for the third.   In fact, the Louisiana Supreme Court recently overturned a sentence of five years as too lenient for a fourth possession of marijuana and ordered the person sentenced to at least 13 years.

Jack Cole of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP) argues that “the “war on drugs” has been, is, and forever will be, a total and abject failure.  This is not a war on drugs, this is a war on people, our own people, our children, our parents, ourselves.” LEAP, which is made up of thousands of current and former members of the law enforcement and criminal justice communities, has been advocating for the de-criminalization of drugs and replacing it with regulation and control since 2002.

Arrests and jail sentences continue even though public opinion has moved against it.  National polling by the Pew Research Center show a majority of people support legalizing the use of marijuana.   Even in Louisiana, a recent poll by Public Policy Polling found more than half support legalization and regulation of marijuana. 

Karen O’Keefe, who lived in New Orleans for years and now works as Director of State Policies at the Marijuana Policy Project, said "A sentence of 20 years in prison for possessing a substance that is safer that alcohol is out of step with Louisiana voters, national trends, and basic fairness and justice.  Limited prison space and prosecutors' time should be spent on violent and serious crime, not on prosecuting and incarcerating people who use a substance that nearly half of all adults have used."

Defense lawyers are appealing the twenty year sentence for Mr. Ladd, but the hundreds of thousands of marijuana arrests continue each year.   This insanity must be stopped.

Bill teaches at Loyola University New Orleans and volunteers with the Center for Constitutional Rights. You can reach Bill at quigley77@gmail.com.

Image above from New Orleans Indymedia.

Leah Chase, Civil Rights Leader, To Receive Award from ACLU of Louisiana

From our friends at the ACLU of Louisiana:
Leah Chase, restauranteur and stalwart of the civil rights movement in Louisiana, will be presented the 35th Annual Ben Smith Award by the ACLU Foundation of Louisiana. This award honors people who have demonstrated a commitment to the advancement of civil liberties in Louisiana. It is named for the late Ben Smith, a founder of the ACLU of Louisiana and a civil rights lawyer who was arrested for his work to end segregation and for participating in mixed-race gatherings.

Chase, best known for her family's restaurant Dooky Chase, is often forgotten for her bravery during the 1960's when simply meeting with someone of another race was a crime in Louisiana. Leah and her husband, Edgar “Dooky” Chase, opened a back room in their restaurant for the use of civil rights workers – and risked both arrest and the loss of their business. During the heyday of segregation, her restaurant was the place of refuge for civil rights workers, and it was one of the only places where blacks and whites were allowed to socialize together.

“Leah Chase is a true beacon of civil liberties in Louisiana and in the United States,” said Marjorie R. Esman, ACLU of Louisiana Executive Director. “We're proud to honor the woman who helped bring Ben Smith's dream of racial equality closer.”

A dinner honoring Leah Chase will be held on February 12, 2011 at the New Orleans Marriott at the Convention Center in New Orleans. The keynote speaker will be National Urban League President and former New Orleans Mayor, Marc Morial.

Information on the dinner in honor of Leah Chase is available at the ACLU of Louisiana website.

One Year After Justice Department Letter, No Changes at Orleans Parish Prison

From our friends at ACLU of Louisiana:

ACLU Urges Sheriff Gusman and Justice Department to Report Progress

One year after the U.S. Department of Justice notified Sheriff Marlin Gusman of multiple Constitutional violations at Orleans Parish Prison, the Sheriff remains silent about what, if any, changes he has made to comply with Justice Department orders. On September 11, 2009, the Justice Department sent Sheriff Gusman a letter, based on an inquiry made at the request of the ACLU, outlining inadequate supervision of staff and of prisoners, inadequate medical screening, unsanitary conditions including overflowing toilets and moldy food service utensils, overcrowding, and improper classification of inmates. Sheriff Gusman was given a deadline of October 30, 2009 to remedy these deficiencies.

“Sheriff Gusman has refused to tell the public what, if anything, he has done to comply with the Justice Department's deadline,” said Marjorie R. Esman, ACLU of Louisiana Executive Director. “While he maintains his secrecy, we know that several people have died in the past year at his prison, which means that problems still remain. The public has the right to know whether Sheriff Gusman is in compliance with orders from the federal government, and he refuses to say.”

While maintaining his silence about the Justice Department inquiry, Sheriff Gusman seeks to build a new jail that would, per capita, be the largest jail in the country with the capacity to house one of 60 New Orleans residents. Esman continued: “We need a new jail, but we know that Sheriff Gusman cannot protect the 3,200 human beings already in his custody. He wants to incarcerate a higher rate of the population than anyone else in the United States, but he won't tell us whether he's still in violation of the Constitution. New Orleans residents have the right to know that their sheriff is obeying the law before shelling out millions of dollars for a new jail.”

Today the ACLU of Louisiana sent a follow-up letter to the Justice Department asking them to update the people of New Orleans on the status of their investigation, and to finally take action to ensure that the elected Sheriff meets his Constitutional obligations. “Enough is enough,” said Esman. “It's been a year, nobody will give the public any information, but we know that deaths continue, and we are entitled to some answers.”

A copy of the ACLU's letter to the Justice Department can be found at this link.

Sheriff Gusman Unveils Plans to Expand Largest per Capita Jail in the US

From Our Friends at the ACLU of Louisiana:

The ACLU of Louisiana calls on the New Orleans City Council to reject Sheriff Marlin Gusman’s plan to expand Orleans Parish Prison (OPP) to 5,832 beds, large enough for 1 bed for every 60 residents. OPP, currently being investigated by the U.S. Department of Justice, is already the largest per capita jail in the nation and the City’s own Planning Commission has recommended a smaller sized jail. The Sheriff’s request is scheduled to be heard by the Council this week.

The request comes on the heels of reports that the Sheriff misled the Mid-City Neighborhood Association (MCNO) during a recent meeting on the size of the proposed jail. In response to questions from Mid-City residents, the Sheriff informed the group that the new jail will have 4,500 beds; however, his filings with the City Planning Commission indicate that he plans to have 5,832 beds.

Additionally, the Sheriff has been unable or unwilling to reveal what types of crimes people in his jail are charged with. “The scary thing is that he can’t even tell us who he is housing in the jail. Public drunkenness? Marijuana possession? He simply won’t tell us or doesn’t know,” said Katie Schwartzmann, Legal Director for the ACLU of Louisiana.

What is known is that from January 2007 until June 2009, on average just 2.24% arrests in New Orleans were for violent felonies.3 86% of arrests were for misdemeanors, municipal, traffic violations, and other arrests. At the same time, roughly a third of the prisoners held at OPP are federal and state prisoners who have already been sentenced and should be held at state or federal facilities.

The size of the new jail would dwarf, per capita, the size of the largest jails in America. For example, compare the ratio of 1 bed for every 60 residents—Orleans Parish 2009 population of 354,850 with a jail with 5,862 beds—to:

“The Sheriff’s effort to increase the size of the jail is a classic power grab by a ‘good ole’ Louisiana politician.” says Marjorie Esman, Executive Director at the ACLU of Louisiana. “Having the largest jail in America has not made the city safer. Instead of helping the Sheriff build something that belongs in a totalitarian state, we hope the City will focus on violent crime and continue to create a pretrial detention policy that releases people who are not a threat to public safety.”