The States are Banning "Bath Salts"

Some states are starting recognize this enemy of chemical dependency counseling, and apply force. The bans of many different chemicals spotted in the "legal high" bath salts are starting to be banned as usual illegal drugs. You can read the full article below or view this summary...

"It looks like the US is heading down the same road with "Bath Salts" and their ingredients as we have seen with the synthetic cannabinoids- numerous state and local bans, following with eventual federal action.

The DEA list both mephedrone and MDPV as "drugs of concern"

Several states and localities have so far moved to schedule or otherwise ban "Bath Salts" and/or their active ingredients.

North Dakota I believe was the first to ban mephedrone: Substances producing ‘legal highs’ no longer legal in North Dakota

Hawaii was the second: ban of mephedrone mentioned in this post (among others) in the synthetic cannabioids ban thread.

Louisiana recently made sweeping changes, with six substances added as schedule I to the Controlled Substances Act in the state of Louisiana:

Quote:

Six chemicals were added to the list of Schedule I drugs: 3,4-Methylenedioxymethcathinone (Methylone), 3,4-Methyenedioxypyrovalerone (MDPV), 4-Methylmethcathinone (Mephedrone), 4-methoxymethcathinone, 4-Fluoromethcathinone and 3-Fluoromethcathinone. Possession, manufacturing or distribution of the drugs will carry penalties similar to those of heroin, which could mean up to 30 years in prison, said a statement from Jindal’s office.

thread

Further, news stories on legislation in the works in a number of states:

Virginia news story on a proposal to ban mephedrone

west virginia

Quote:

Steps are underway at the state level to ban synthetic cocaine and synthetic marijuana throughout West Virginia. That's after a senate health subcommittee approved legislation Wednesday to outlaw the sale, distribution and possession of synthetic marijuana and synthetic cocaine in West Virginia.. >snip< The subcommittee also recommends the state board of pharmacy be given statutory flexibility to add additional drugs to the list of illegal controlled substances in the future.

sb 63
news story

Huntington WV has banned MDPV / Bath Salts News story

kentucky looking to ban mephedrone and MDPV News Story

Quote:

Spiller says there is a bill in Kentucky legislature to put these drugs on the controlled substance list. Spiller says the*drugs may become illegal in Kentucky this coming year.

Other states off the top of my head that have had a fair bit of coverage related to bath salts and seem likely targets for bans.
Utah, Texas, kansas, missourri, mississippi, new mexico, nevada, oregon, Arizona, north carolina

Looks like Oregon Board of Pharmacy is looking at a ban this spring:

Quote:

Officials at the Oregon Board of Pharmacy said the products have just crossed their radar and they plan on banning them in April. Officials with the state of Washington said they’re also just learning about the products and have nothing in the works to ban them.

News Story

interestingly it seems an unnamed bath salt tested by authorities in texas contained BZP:

Quote:

... But, something officers discovered in one batch they bought and tested, might help make that happen. Benzylpiperazine or BZP is a Category 1, penalty 2 drug, meaning it's in the same category as meth and ecstasy. It was found in a sample of the bath salts. Hobbs says the discovery is a breakthrough of sorts because BZP is already a controlled substance. Officers, however, need to test more samples. In each batch, "the formula may be different every time."

News Story

Stories also mentions:

Quote:

The Jefferson County Sheriff's Office has contacted state legislators from this area urging them to pass a law to make bath salts illegal.

Mississippi

Quote:

Mississippi legislators also are hoping to take swift action to remove the substances from store shelves >snip< Albritton's legislation to outlaw the substances, Senate Bill 2226, would make the ingredients that have no medical purpose Schedule I drugs and anyone caught selling them subject to penalties similar to those for selling heroin and marijuana, said Marshall Fisher, director of the Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics.

News story"

Read more: http://www.drugs-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=152351#ixzz1CTOw8V44

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In Jail for Marijuana Cookies

This article is closely related to another article I saw called, " Third Graders caught smoking Pot "...wait....Third graders?! Now I know that this article isn't extremely relative to chemical dependency counseling, but someone has to recognize the danger children are being put in these days from illegal drugs. These girls that were hospitalized for eating a marijuana cookie their mom left lying around is heartbreaking, not only because their mother is now in jail, but because these children were exposed to drugs. Help change a life with chemical dependency counseling so things like this can come to an end.

"COVINA, Calif. (AP) — Police in California say two children were hospitalized after eating a marijuana cookie they found on a kitchen counter, and their mother was arrested on suspicion of child endangerment.

Covina police Lt. Tim Doonan says the girls, ages 10 and 11, found the chocolate chip cookie in a baggie when they came home from school on Monday.

Doonan tells the San Gabriel Valley Tribune that the girls felt ill, complaining of numbness and pale, clammy skin, and were taken to a hospital, where tests showed traces of marijuana .

Their mother, 33-year-old Veronica Sylvester, remained in jail Wednesday on $100,000 bail.

Doonan says she told detectives she got the cookie from a friend for medical purposes. But Doonan says Sylvester had no prescription for the drug."

Source: http://www.kwch.com/sns-bc-us--potcookiesickenskids,0,434772.story

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Agents Raid Cruise Ship For Illegal Drugs

As little as this article may seem, it can be quite a controversial subject. Chemical dependency counseling and alcoholism help seem to have alot of these. But lets start with what happened. 

A bunch of Federal agents borded and stopped a cruise ship and collected many illegal drugs in the middle of being transported. In my opinion, that was great! But other people dont think so lightly of it. Check the source for more comments. 

"Authorities say federal agents raided a popular music cruise ship for illegal drugs and contraband while docked at Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida - Authorities say federal agents raided a popular music cruise ship for illegal drugs and contraband while docked at Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokeswoman Migdalia Travis told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel that the Jan. 4 raid on the Jam Fest cruise resulted in 15 seizures. Among the drugs collected were: marijuana, LSD, mushrooms, hash oil, Ecstasy, prescription drugs and drug paraphernalia in mostly small quantities.

The Jam Cruise raid occurred right before the MSC Poesia set sail. MSC Cruises did not release any immediate comment."

by Associated Press

Source: http://www.wkrg.com/crime/article/federal-agents-raid-cruise-ship-for-illegal...

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More Floods of "Legal Highs"

Well, at least temporary bans are starting to show up not only in the UK, but also in the United States. Young people need to be aware of the extreme risk and danger of taking "legal highs". Doctors and even an addictions counselor will not be able to tell you the symptoms of these drugs until they are fully examined, making the risk even higher. As the article says, " just because a drug appears as "legal" does not mean it is safe" Chemical dependency counseling, will play its role. 

"At least 40 new "legal high" drugs have flooded into Britain in the past year sparking fears they could lead to a spate of deaths. 

Experts monitoring the appearance of so-called "legal highs" in the UK, claim a new generation of drugs that circumvent the country's laws has been created in China by unscrupulous chemists and then exported to the UK.[/B]

Figures compiled by the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs reveal that 40 new synthetic drugs appeared on sale in the UK during 2010. In the previous year there were 24 new drugs identified. In 2008 there were just 13.

Drug treatment experts said that young people taking the drugs were playing "Russian roulette" with their lives.

It comes after a row last year over the ban on one designer drug called mephedrone, or meow meow, when a leading Government drugs advisor warned the move would cause users to turn to other more dangerous synthetic alternatives.

Often the legal highs are packaged as plant food or bath salts.

The substances, which mimic the effects of illegal substances such as cocaine and ecstasy, have quickly become adopted as recreational party drugs, according to chemists at the ISCD, which was set up to provide information on existing and new drugs to the public and the authorities.

Professor Barry Everitt, a neurobiologist at Cambridge University specialising in addiction and a member of the committee, said: "We are aware of 40 new designer stimulants in the last calendar year. Most of them are being produced by chemists in China and then imported by head shops and dealers in the UK."

Doctors fear that young people taking these new substances are putting themselves at great risk as little is known about what effect they have on the body.

"There is no question they can cause deaths – there have been several deaths associated with mephedrone, but there could also be some long term health effects – they could be carcinogenic, they could cause kidney problems or birth defects.

Among the new substances to have emerged in the UK in the past year is A3A, a powder that is much more powerful than mephedrone whose effects, which include a raised heart beat, panic attacks and psychosis, can last for days.

Another legal drug, Ivory Wave, has been blamed for at least one death, that of chef Michael Bishton, 24, who was found dead in the sea near Bembridge on the Isle of Wight. Experts say Ivory Wave is a generic name for several different compounds and users never know which they are going to get.

Fluoromethcathinone is another stimulant similar to amphetamines that became abundant in the early part of 2010 before it was banned in April.

Dimethylamylamine is a stimulant that was created by tinkering with the chemical structure of the banned substance BZP.

"There is also an assumption that because something is legal, it is also safe. This is not the case. People are playing Russian roulette with the physical and psychological effects of these drugs. The best thing they can do is to understand the risks and not take them in the first place."

Instead ministers will be able to temporarily ban a drug for up to 12 months while the advisory council meets to discuss a permanent ban.

Minister for Crime Prevention James Brokenshire said: "We are committed to tackling emerging new drugs and stopping them gaining a foothold in this country.

"That is why we are introducing temporary banning orders to allow us to take immediate action whilst independent experts assess the harms they pose.

"We are also looking to improve the forensic early warning system so we can better identify new drugs coming into the UK market. This will include developing a co-ordinated UK-wide approach to laboratory testing and analysis of drug seizures, as well as wider test purchasing.

"Just because a drug is advertised as legal does not mean it is either legal or safe."

By Richard Gray
Science Correspondent
Jan 2011

Source:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/journalis...n-Britain.html

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Hard Rock Stepping Up!

This is awesome, Hard Rock Hotel is stepping up security and are instituting "random drug tests" for employees. There have been several articles talking about the hotel's lack of care for the issues it contained. Chemical dependency counseling will also be slightly affected in Vegas because of the changes to be made. The good thing is drugs shouldn't be nearly as much as an issue at Hard Rock now, but we all know the market will migrate. 

"LAS VEGAS - The Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas has agreed topay $650,000 to settle a complaint from state gambling regulators that security guards and VIP hosts sold cocaine and ecstasy to patrons and let them use private nightclub bathrooms for sex and drugs.

The hotel agreed Wednesday to pay the settlement without admitting or denying allegations, avoiding a hearing before Nevada regulators who have the power to revoke the casino’s gambling license. The hotel acknowledged in the Nevada Gaming Control Board settlement that regulators could have proved their case at a regulatory hearing.

Joseph Magliarditi, the hotel’s chief executive, said in a statement that the hotel takes the issues seriously and has made changes to address and resolve them.

“We remain committed to conducting our operations in accordance with all gaming regulatory requirements,” he said.

The complaint does not name the employees, but detailed seven undercover operations in which hosts and security guards sold police officers and state agents ecstasy pills and varying amounts of cocaine,and made promises they could get “anything” desired.

The investigations centered around the now-closed Body English nightclub and Vanity, a nightclub built in the Hard Rock’s newest HRH tower.

The complaint said in one instance in November 2009, an undercover police officer paid $80 to a security guard to let him smoke marijuana in a bathroom, and the guard told him to let him smoke some next time.

The complaint also said undercover agents were able to buy cocaine five times, and a host once brokered the sale of 7.2 grams to an officer in the resort’s parking lot in exchange for a kickback.

The complaint does not name any employees.

In an e-mail, Hard Rock spokeswoman Jessie Pound said all the employees included in the complaint were fired and the hotel instituted a random drug test policy for all workers. The hotel also eliminated its nightlife group and brought in Angel Management Group to manage its nightclub operations, she said.

According to the settlement, the Hard Rock randomly drug tested all 263 security personnel, all 242 nightlife personnel, and all its vice presidents. 
Nearly all, 97.5 percent, were drug free, the settlement said.

The settlement said the hotel has begun using a professional shopper company to keep tabs on its employees’ conduct.

The settlement includes a $500,000 fine and $150,000 to reimburse police and Nevada Gaming Control Board investigators for the cost of the undercover operation. It still must be approved by the Nevada Gaming Commission.

The casino-hotel is owned separately from the restaurant chain with the same name."

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Source: http://www.newsday.com/news/nation/h...aint-1.2578070

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Haunted by "Legal Highs"

Its such a shame that scientists that synthesize drugs for cures and "improving human well being" ,as David Nichols said, are being used to alter peoples minds and feel good. Not only is it avoiding the law, but it is extremely dangerous for untrained chemists to be selling unstable synthesized drugs, deprived from actual scientists, to create "legal highs" that in turn have killed numerous people...chemical dependency counseling will continue to play its part. 

"Highly experimental drugs that haven't been safety-tested could cause untold harm if sold as legal highs in clubs...

Late last year, David Nichols, a chemist at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, received a disturbing email. Sent by a colleague, the message contained a link to a newspaper article on "legal highs", those obscure substances that mimic illegal drugs in every way but their illegal status. To Nichols's dismay, the article named him as being "especially valuable" to entrepreneurs who scoured the scientific literature for compounds to turn into the next street drug.

Nichols has been synthesising and studying drugs for nearly 40 years in the hope of improving human wellbeing and alcoholism help. He has worked on drugs that show promise in treating the symptoms of Parkinson's disease and schizophrenia. But it was his research on other substances, including the psychedelic compounds LSD and mescaline, that drew interest from the purveyors of legal highs.

Writing today in the journal Nature, Nichols says he is haunted by the potential disasters that abuse of his research might bring. His own studies never look at whether a substance is safe to use as a recreational drug, so an underground chemist who exploited his work would be manufacturing and selling a highly experimental drug that has not been tested on humans. "It really disturbs me that [these people] have so little regard for human safety and human life that the scant information we publish is used by them to push ahead and market a product designed for human consumption," he writes.

There is nothing new in Nichols's uneasiness. He realised amateur chemists were keeping an eye on his papers more than a decade ago. His lab was investigating how ecstasy (MDMA or 3,4 methylenedioxymethamphetamine) worked in the brain, because chemicals like it might help in psychotherapy. One compound, called MTA, was similar to MDMA and blocked an enzyme that breaks down serotonin, a feel-good chemical in the brain.

Nichols published three papers on MTA in the mid-1990s. Soon afterwards, and without his knowledge, the substance was manufactured as a recreational drug and sold in tablet form. Some people who took the pills died. The tablets had been sold under the name "flatliners". By 2002, the drug had been linked to six deaths. "It did not help that I knew some of these fatalities were associated with the use of multiple drugs, or had involved very large doses of MTA. I had published information that ultimately led to human death," Nichols writes.

Research papers on psychoactive substances are a gift for street drug entrepreneurs. When mephedrone was made illegal in the UK and across Europe last year, they had a ready supply of other compounds that were simply too new to be banned. The ever-changing list of compounds now sold as legal highs is nearly as mind bending as the drugs that appear on it.

What is a responsible scientist to do? Nichols has decided not to study one very toxic compound, but concedes that the molecules he has reported in journals could still be dangerous at high doses or in combination with other substances. His fear is that a seemingly innocuous substance becomes a hit in the clubs and only later is found to cause serious health problems, such as life-threatening kidney damage.

"That would be a disaster of immense proportions," he writes. "This question, which was never part of my research focus, now haunts me."

Jan 05, 2011

Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/20...ch-legal-highs

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Funding for Marijuana Studying in Adolescents

Thinking of ways to help adolescents avoid addictions have been something people have been trying to find for ages. Chemical dependency counseling has been steadily increasing job wis, but that is because so little people try to prevent the young adults from indulging in the first place!  

"HIV experts at the University of Florida, along with colleagues at the University of South Florida and the University of California, San Diego, have been awarded $4.7 million by the National Institutes of Health to study how the complex interplay between marijuana use and HIV infection can influence the development of neurological disorders in adolescents.

The five-year study will use a multidisciplinary approach that could lead to the identification of novel blood-based biomarkers for tracking how substance abuse alters immune function and the progression of HIV infection in the central nervous system. It may also provide evidence to support behavioral guidelines for HIV-infected youth. 

"Findings from this study could translate into better diagnosis tools and new therapies, or chemical dependency counseling techniques, to improve long-term outcomes for young adults infected with HIV," said principal investigator Maureen Goodenow, Ph.D., the Stephany W. Holloway university chair in AIDS research and professor of pathology, immunology and laboratory medicine in the UF College of Medicine. 

Despite powerful new therapies that have rendered HIV less deadly, movement and cognitive problems, including dementia, are still common among people who are infected. As a result, many infected adolescents may face a lifetime of impaired thinking and behavior. 

The researchers previously found that 30 percent to 40 percent of HIV-infected youth use marijuana, alcohol, cocaine, methamphetamines or other substances, and almost one-third use marijuana every day. 

To tackle that problem, study participants from 16 to 25 years old will be recruited from 15 sites around the country through the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Adolescent Trials Network, of which USF is a member. Four different groups of individuals who reflect a wide cross section of age, gender, ethnic heritage and sexual orientation will be studied: youth who are already taking antiretroviral therapy, others who are untreated because they do not meet department of health treatment guidelines, some receiving treatment earlier than recommended, and a control group of individuals not infected with HIV. 

Overall, the study's findings could give insight into how behavioral choices affect HIV disease progression and risk for transmission in young adults, and yield clues about the best stage at which to start treatment with antiretroviral drugs. 

"The question we're trying to answer," Sleasman said, "is 'how do we best advise these young adults about managing their disease?" "

 
-University of Florida Health Science Center 

Article Date: 05 Jan 2011 

Source:http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/212755.php

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Beyond the Fair Sentencing Act

I think this is great! To many times have we heard the story about an innocent person or teen getting caught in between a tiny drug exchange and having their life go down the drain because of it. Now we can actually decipher between the serious offenses and mistakes. Chemical dependency counseling will play a big roll with these defendants coming out from the bigger convictions. An addictions counselor would also be a good requirement of the newly convicted. 

"This year's historic vote in Congress to scale back the harsh and racially disparate mandatory sentences for federal crack cocaine offenses was a watershed event in the long campaign for a more rational approach to drug policy. 

The Fair Sentencing Act is expected to benefit about 3,000 defendants a year, with an average sentence reduction of twenty-seven months. Defendants convicted of possessing as little as five grams of crack—the weight of two pennies—no longer receive a mandatory five years in prison, and the quantity-based sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine offenses has been significantly reduced. The true value of the new law will be seen, however, only if it helps to open the door to more widespread drug policy reform.

The federal crack reform continues this incremental move toward more rational sentencing policies, but much work remains to be done. Drug courts, for example, have been shown to help divert low-level offenders into treatment rather than prison, but many of them impose strict criteria for admission, often focusing on cases in which prison terms would be unlikely to be imposed even without the program. School-zone drug laws, imposed with the inarguable goal of reducing drug sales to children, often apply as well to drug sales between consenting adults. This has a predictable racial impact, because large portions of densely populated urban areas, disproportionately comprising communities of color, lie within a school zone. In New Jersey, fully 96 percent of such penalties were imposed on African-Americans or Latinos, an outcome that in 2010 persuaded the legislature to restore discretion to judges in such cases.

The first test of the impact of the Fair Sentencing Act will come when the US Sentencing Commission votes on whether to apply the guideline changes retroactively to the thousands of people who committed their crack cocaine offense before the bill was signed. Along with that, the commission's report on mandatory sentencing, due out next year, may help to strengthen the argument about excessive punishments.

Ultimately, the scope of reform can be measured only by our ability to level the playing field in addressing substance abuse. While the war on drugs has been waged for decades, it is actually two very distinct wars. In well-heeled communities substance abuse is treated as a public health problem best addressed by prevention and treatment. In low-income communities of color, it is far more likely to be considered a criminal justice problem, one best addressed with more police, prosecutors and prisons. We have a better model at hand; the challenge is to implement it more broadly and equitably."

Marc Mauer

Source: http://www.thenation.com

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Over Prescribing

This is a very extensive report on the over-prescribing of prescriptions. In many of the cases listed below you can see that 1 of 3 things is happening...

1. People are in dire need of the many prescriptions being made
2. People are Hoarding the prescriptions, or
3. People are selling the drugs

You can decide what you think, but this double edged sword battle is an ongoing major conflict in the chemical dependency counseling world, at the moment. If you want to read the full report scroll to the bottom and follow the Source Link.

"Twice, the patient, a man in his mid-30s, said he lost his prescriptions for Valium and Percocet. Once, he said he was in a car accident that scattered his pills on the road. Another time, he said the medicine he was first prescribed was no good, so he "returned the pills." Another time, his wife called and said their house had been "searched by authorities" and the medicine had gone missing.

Each time, no matter the story, Peter S. Trent or Hampton J. Jackson Jr., doctors at the same orthopedic practice in Oxon Hill, refilled the prescription, according to the Maryland Board of Physicians. Over the course of 21/2 years, the doctors gave the patient 275 prescriptions, mostly for Percocet, a powerful, highly addictive painkiller.

Sometimes they wrote the patient more than one prescription for the drug on the same day. In a single month, they wrote him 11 prescriptions for Percocet, totaling 734 pills.

Jackson and Trent - who maintain that they did nothing wrong - are among a small group of doctors who were the top prescribers of tightly regulated drugs in their state Medicaid programs, according to a Washington Post analysis of state data.

In one case, he noted, a Florida doctor wrote nearly 97,000 prescriptions for mental-health drugs over a 21-month period.

The Post's analysis found not only that certain doctors routinely prescribe some medications far more than their peers, but also that some of them have a long history of sanctions by professional disciplinary boards for unethical and unprofessional behavior, including overprescribing medications to patients who may have been using them to get high instead of well.

The state boards that oversee medical misconduct say overprescribing is a huge problem that they take very seriously.

The top priority is to do "whatever you think is necessary to protect the public," said William Harp, executive director of the Virginia Board of Medicine. "I want us to be very objective and very fair to these doctors and the citizens they treat."

Regulators say they are caught between trying to keep doctors from prescribing drugs unnecessarily and satisfying doctors who say heavy-handed investigations discourage them from prescribing medication that patients need.

Meanwhile, illicit use of prescription medicine has become the nation's "fastest-growing drug problem," according to R. Gil Kerlikowske, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. Between 1999 and 2005, unintentional deaths from prescription drug overdose more than doubled, to more than 22,000, according to a study funded by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, making such overdoses the second-leading cause of unintentional death, after automobile accidents."

By Christian Davenport
Washington Post Staff Writer 
Saturday, January 1, 2011; 9:41 PM

Source:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...0102801_3.html

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Charlotte's Web, Papa, and Addiction?

Seems like random things to connect with chemical dependency counseling, but this story is an inspiring one. It's a great supporter for drug policy activists and gives you a look a how laws have changed for the better, to give people a chance at an alcoholism treatment program.  

"While sitting on the couch with my daughter Eva, watching the movie Charlotte's Web 35 years after reading the book, I realized that in addition to being a great storyteller, the author E.B. White was also a visionary and an activist. Watching the movie as an activist who does media work for the Drug Policy Alliance, I now have a whole new lens to look at Charlotte and her strategy to save her dear friend Wilbur.

Wilber is the cute little pig who finds out from his fellow farm animals that he is going to be killed and eaten, because that is what happens to pigs. Wilbur can't believe that they are going to kill him. Wilbur turns to the wise spider Charlotte and asks if it is true. Charlotte promises Wilbur that she will protect him and that he won't be killed.

How is Charlotte going to protect and save her friend? Charlotte ends up spinning a web that says "Some Pig". The family who owns the farm is blown away by the "message" in the web and calls the neighbors. Soon the town is buzzing. After a couple of months the news wears off and Charlotte again spins a web that says "Terrific." The family calls the local newspaper. The next thing there is a photo of Wilbur under the "Terrific" web on the front page of the paper. The crowds come, the family decides Wilbur is special and Wilbur is saved.

Charlotte (and E.B. White) realized that the only way to save Wilbur's life was to make people care about Wilbur. If someone is nameless, we can kill them, stuff them in a jail cell or do other terrible things to them. If we hear someone's story, hear about their dreams, their histories, their families, it moves us and we care.

While watching Charlotte's Web, I couldn't help but think of my friend and colleague Anthony Papa. Anthony Papa is a New Yorker who was sentenced to 15 years for a first time, non-violent drug offense. Papa's life was ruined when a "friend" convinced him to pass an envelope of 4 ounces of cocaine for which he was to make $500 dollars.

While in prison Papa found his passion for art and became a painter. Papa's greatest piece is a haunting self-portrait of himself where he is looking into a mirror. You look into his eyes and feel the agony and despair from a man who realizes he is going to spend the best years of his life in a cage. Papa's self-portrait ends up showing in the Whitney Museum. Papa (like Charlotte) realizes that the way he is going to free himself is by telling his story and having people see more than just a number.

Papa sits at his typewriter, writes his story and sends it into the local Westchester Journal. Papa then uses this humanizing piece to get other stories and before long there is a major feature in the New York Times. The story builds and builds until Governor Pataki grants him clemency. After spending 12 years in jail, Papa was literally able to paint his way to freedom.

That is only the first half of the inspiring story. When most people get out of jail, they want to put the nightmare behind them and never want think about jail again. Instead, Papa ends up starting a group with activist, comedian Randy Credico called Mothers of the New York Disappeared. They understood (like Charlotte) that to change the way New Yorkers looked at people behind bars, people had to see a whole picture of these people, not only their jail numbers. They organized families of people behind bars. They would organize vigils and actions with family members holding up photos of their loved ones. While the "nameless" were considered drug dealers, they became real people when their families told their stories. These weren't "kingpins" or queenpins"; these were moms and dads, brothers and sisters, who loved their kids and families and were rotting away in jail because they had a substance abuse problem or were desperate to make money and because New York had draconian mandatory minimum sentences under the Rockefeller drug laws.

After years of sharing people's stories, generating moving TV segments and feature stories, New Yorkers changed the way they looked at people behind bars for drug-related offenses. Watching a personal piece about a mom being locked up for 15 years, away from her family, because of a mistake she made or because she has a drug problem moved hearts more than any statistics or policy papers. In 2008, after 35 years, the inhumane, ineffective and racist drug laws were finally reformed.

There is a picture in my office of Anthony Papa giving Governor Paterson a hug at the Rockefeller Reform bill signing. It makes me emotional to think about Anthony Papa's story. Papa spent 12 years in a cage because of one mistake and because of the way our society treats people who use drugs. He lost his family and freedom. He was able to regain his freedom through his art, activism and brains. He then used his freedom to help free some of the people he left behind.

I am moved by Anthony Papa. I think E.B. White would be moved by Anthony Papa's story too.

Tony Newman, AlterNet
January 1, 2011
Source: http://www.alternet.org/story/149364/

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Treatment and Drug Courts

The difference between community based chemical dependency counseling and a court based one are actually very different. Though the drug courts play an important role in the United States you can't help, but wonder about the people that could of recovered without the court and/ or spending time in jail. 

"According to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, about 9 percent of Americans have a chemical dependence and/or need alcoholism help, and less than a quarter of these attend an alcoholism treatment program. Another study estimates that 37 percent of those who do are referred by the criminal justice system. Because of the lack of accessible, community-based resources, many people gain access to the treatment they need only after being arrested.

In recent years, the use of drug courts—court-regulated treatment and supervision programs that serve as alternatives to incarceration for people arrested for a drug-related offense—has increased dramatically. There are now nearly 2,500 across all fifty states. But though they have helped a small percentage of people struggling with addiction, drug courts may be widening rather than shrinking the net of criminal justice control. And they have helped delay the expansion of community-based treatment-on-demand that will best reduce addiction and the harms it causes.

How so? Without drug courts in the mix, some addicts might have received the help they needed without getting involved in the justice system. Before, if a person was arrested for possession, the prosecutors might have dismissed charges, put him in touch with a social worker or issued a warning or referral for a alcoholism treatment program. A clear and growing demand for community treatment might have pushed policy-makers to expand resources. Now well-meaning police, prosecutors and judges send people to drug court, and given the lack of other options, people are often grateful for the opportunity to get treatment.

The real catch, though, is that generally a person must plead guilty to participate, with the conviction reduced or overturned only if he or she is successful. Disobeying court rules or experiencing a relapse—which is a natural part of recovery—can result in jail time. And when people fail drug court, they face traditional sanctions. In this way, participants become vulnerable not just to incarceration but to the pervasive aftereffects of a criminal conviction—which can include difficulty finding employment, being banned from benefits like public housing and food stamps and denied the right to vote. In addition, some drug courts have come under fire for "cherry-picking" participants, misdirecting resources to people who might have succeeded with a less intensive and expensive intervention. Those with felony or violent offenses or records are often excluded, even if they are the ones who would benefit most.

We know that community-based treatment is about nine times more cost-effective than drug courts. A study in Washington State found that drug treatment in the community produces $18.52 in public safety benefits in terms of reduced crime for every dollar spent, whereas treatment in prison produced only $5.88 in benefits, and drug courts less than $2.10 in benefits for every dollar spent.

Expanding people's access to treatment before they become involved in the justice system will help increase public safety, save money and improve people's life outcomes. Shifting the way we think about addressing drug use away from "back end" solutions like drug courts and toward a public health model will have a positive and lasting impact on people, save money in the long run and create a healthier and safer society for all of us. You shouldn't have to get arrested in order to beat an addiction."

Tracy Velázquez

Source: http://www.thenation.com/article/157...ct-drug-courts

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