Drug control law

time, drugs were a serious problem. The government decided it was at this time to take a harsh stance on drugs. From the kingpin to the everyday user people were incarcerated for non-violent charges. "President Richard M. Nixon signed the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) into law in 1970. This statute calls for the regulation of certain drugs and substances. The CSA outlines five "schedules" used to classify drugs based on their medical application and potential for abuse. Schedule 1 drugs are considered

introduced to the drug crack. The ensuing seventeen years have culminated into some of the most turbulent, and crime ridden years in the history of New York City. Crack is the street name for a form of cocaine introduced in the mid-1980s. Crack is smoked, rather then sniffed through the nose, or injected, which are all other ways to use cocaine. Users of the drug inhale the vapors that are given off when the crack is heated (Berger pg.20). Crack cannot burn, and in order to give off the drugs vapors it

Three Strike Laws Mandatory minimums and three strike laws, are they really the answer to the crime problem America has faced for years? Many would say yes, including me, as long as it is for a violent crime such as murder, rape or arson; some feel that even theft, drug trafficking or possession, and burglary are all worthy of the 25-to-life sentence that can be carried under the mandatory minimums for three strike laws. A three-strike law is a law that states that you will be sentenced

illicit drugs but blacks make up majority of the population for drug abuse in prisons of the U.S.? It is a known fact in America that powder and crack cocaine are the same thing but are unequal in sentencing. Living in low income communities, that are majority of color have a greater chance of using crack cocaine oppose to whites using powder cocaine. The sentencing of the two is very extreme and blacks are the people suffering for serving a longer time period than whites for the same drug. During

and unfair plea bargaining. Mandatory minimums are strict sentences that a judge must abide by when determining how much prison time the accused is to receive as punishment. Although the majority of offenses to which mandatory minimums apply to are drug offenses, there are a variety of offenses including immigration, firearms, and fraud that are linked to a minimum sentence. The concept of enacting mandatory minimum sentences to particular offenses has such a great influence on court verdicts that

minorities. One major thing that produced an increase in mass incarceration is the war on drugs. The war on drugs has impacted minorities in a major way. The war on drugs pushed policymakers to structure laws that were targeting underprivileged individual mainly minorities group. In addition, “The deinstitutionalisation of people with mental illnesses, and punitive sentencing policies such as three-strike laws (mandating life imprisonment for third offences of even relatively minor felonies) and

Introduction To legalize or to not legalize drugs, that is the popular question lately. The current repeat visitor to each states legislative sessions is making marijuana legal. Currently in the United States there are twenty states with legal medical marijuana and the District of Columbia. Out of those twenty only Colorado and Washington have also legalized marijuana for recreational use. When it comes to legalizing drugs marijuana appears to be the most popular one being advocated for. However

trial by jury. However, since the 1950’s the fate of nonviolent drug offenders has been shifted to the hands of the partisan prosecution with the expansion of mandatory sentencing. Mandatory minimum sentencing is a system which sets minimum jail sentences for crimes, which not even judges can overturn. In the decades after the 1950s, with the increasing war on drugs, minimum sentencing laws have spread further and further into nonviolent drug related crimes, the effects of which have been almost universally

When America changed the sentencing policies for crimes, primarily drug crimes, in America, the effect this change would have in the poor communities were impossible to imagine. The policies which were changed to get tougher on drug crimes on the federal level followed with mass incarceration in the prison system. This was especially true with young African American males in largely poor communities. So these policies not only created a mass incarceration but also racially targeted certain race

Does selling drugs once warrant a broad, minimum sentence of five years that would be similarly assigned to one who regularly sells drugs? A typical court-ordered sentence for selling drugs is much less than a five-year sentence, but with mandatory minimum sentences, judges are required to sentence those found guilty to a minimum of five years behind bars. The primary problem with mandatory minimum sentences is that they inherently sentence an individual solely based on the type of crime as opposed