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The420Guy
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Colville Group Says Prison Not The Answer
Friday's presidential pardon of two women from the South led to
cheers in Colville.
That's where the November Coalition, a national nonprofit group
championing drug law reforms, is headquartered.
Founded by executive director Nora Callahan, the coalition gathered
more than 30,000 signatures this year asking President Clinton to
free Kemba Smith and Dorothy Gaines.
It was part of a wide effort -- including help from dogged lawyers --
to have the women pardoned.
Smith, of Richmond, Va., had been sentenced to 24 years in prison.
Gaines, of Mobile, Ala., was serving 19 years and 7 months.
Both were convicted of being accessories to drug crimes. Clinton
agreed to pardon them because they'd received long sentences for
playing minor roles in drug distribution networks.
For Callahan, the pardons were yet another step in what she hopes may
eventually result in an emotional payoff: seeing her brother become a
free man. He is imprisoned in Texas, serving a 27-year, six-month
cocaine conspiracy sentence, she said.
After years working to change drug-sentencing laws -- especially
mandatory federal sentencing rules -- Callahan said it was the calls
from mothers whose sons were in prison that prompted her to begin the
November Coalition. The group has 7,000 members from all over the
country, Callahan said.
"I began to get these calls. Mothers whose children were being
sexually brutalized in prisons and county jails because of a drug
conviction," she said.
Her active work to discredit the country's "war on drugs" has made
her a regular on national talk radio shows and a quoted government
adversary on drug policy in national news magazines.
"If we have doctors telling us that drugs are an addiction and
therefore a problem ... why do we have judges, police and jailers
dispensing the cure?" she said. "It doesn't make sense."
So she is on the front lines of the legalization movement that wants
drugs regulated -- much like alcohol. This, she said, would be more
just than imprisoning users.
It's a tough fight, however.
Drugs have had devastating effects on many American families and
communities. And the country has spent billions of dollars trying to
stem the flow of narcotics across the borders.
Of the 2 million prisoners in the United States, about 500,000 are
serving time for drug convictions.
Few Democrats or Republicans run for office with a drug-law overhaul
campaign plank.
In 1997, Callahan was on the losing side of a state initiative that
would have allowed doctors in Washington to recommend their patients
take certain illegal drugs. Acquiring the drugs would have been up to
the patients.
An initiative legalizing medical marijuana use has since passed in
Washington. However, the Legislature has not ordered hearings or
passed regulations to implement the law.
Besides her brother's prison troubles, Callahan watched her father
die a painful death in 1992. He had bladder cancer, couldn't use
morphine, and would have tried marijuana to numb the pain if it were
legal.
Now, from her office in Colville, Callahan takes solace in any
decision she believes undermines the nation's drug war.
"We have children in trouble, and are we going to build them prison
cells instead of hospital beds?" Callahan asked.
_____________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Kirk Bauer
www.mapinc.org
Newshawk: Cannabis News - marijuana, hemp, and cannabis news
Pubdate: Sun, 24 Dec 2000
Source: Spokesman-Review (WA)
Copyright: 2000 Cowles Publishing Company
Contact: editor@spokesman.com
Address: P.O. Box 2160 Spokane, WA 99210
Fax: (509) 459-5482
Website: The Spokesman-Review | Local News, Business, Entertainment, Sports & Weather for Eastern Washington
Forum: https://cg.zip2.com/spokane/scripts/community.dll?ep=1
Bookmark: The November Coalition: Home Page of the November Coalition
Friday's presidential pardon of two women from the South led to
cheers in Colville.
That's where the November Coalition, a national nonprofit group
championing drug law reforms, is headquartered.
Founded by executive director Nora Callahan, the coalition gathered
more than 30,000 signatures this year asking President Clinton to
free Kemba Smith and Dorothy Gaines.
It was part of a wide effort -- including help from dogged lawyers --
to have the women pardoned.
Smith, of Richmond, Va., had been sentenced to 24 years in prison.
Gaines, of Mobile, Ala., was serving 19 years and 7 months.
Both were convicted of being accessories to drug crimes. Clinton
agreed to pardon them because they'd received long sentences for
playing minor roles in drug distribution networks.
For Callahan, the pardons were yet another step in what she hopes may
eventually result in an emotional payoff: seeing her brother become a
free man. He is imprisoned in Texas, serving a 27-year, six-month
cocaine conspiracy sentence, she said.
After years working to change drug-sentencing laws -- especially
mandatory federal sentencing rules -- Callahan said it was the calls
from mothers whose sons were in prison that prompted her to begin the
November Coalition. The group has 7,000 members from all over the
country, Callahan said.
"I began to get these calls. Mothers whose children were being
sexually brutalized in prisons and county jails because of a drug
conviction," she said.
Her active work to discredit the country's "war on drugs" has made
her a regular on national talk radio shows and a quoted government
adversary on drug policy in national news magazines.
"If we have doctors telling us that drugs are an addiction and
therefore a problem ... why do we have judges, police and jailers
dispensing the cure?" she said. "It doesn't make sense."
So she is on the front lines of the legalization movement that wants
drugs regulated -- much like alcohol. This, she said, would be more
just than imprisoning users.
It's a tough fight, however.
Drugs have had devastating effects on many American families and
communities. And the country has spent billions of dollars trying to
stem the flow of narcotics across the borders.
Of the 2 million prisoners in the United States, about 500,000 are
serving time for drug convictions.
Few Democrats or Republicans run for office with a drug-law overhaul
campaign plank.
In 1997, Callahan was on the losing side of a state initiative that
would have allowed doctors in Washington to recommend their patients
take certain illegal drugs. Acquiring the drugs would have been up to
the patients.
An initiative legalizing medical marijuana use has since passed in
Washington. However, the Legislature has not ordered hearings or
passed regulations to implement the law.
Besides her brother's prison troubles, Callahan watched her father
die a painful death in 1992. He had bladder cancer, couldn't use
morphine, and would have tried marijuana to numb the pain if it were
legal.
Now, from her office in Colville, Callahan takes solace in any
decision she believes undermines the nation's drug war.
"We have children in trouble, and are we going to build them prison
cells instead of hospital beds?" Callahan asked.
_____________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Kirk Bauer
www.mapinc.org
Newshawk: Cannabis News - marijuana, hemp, and cannabis news
Pubdate: Sun, 24 Dec 2000
Source: Spokesman-Review (WA)
Copyright: 2000 Cowles Publishing Company
Contact: editor@spokesman.com
Address: P.O. Box 2160 Spokane, WA 99210
Fax: (509) 459-5482
Website: The Spokesman-Review | Local News, Business, Entertainment, Sports & Weather for Eastern Washington
Forum: https://cg.zip2.com/spokane/scripts/community.dll?ep=1
Bookmark: The November Coalition: Home Page of the November Coalition
