Smart-on-crime: Keep non-violent drug offenders out of jail

By Terri Burke According to the Houston Chronicle, Houston police miss the good ole days when they could slap a felony charge and lock people away for possession of trace amounts of crack cocaine.  The vice president of the Harris County Deputies' Organization actually advocates throwing drug users behind bars for trace possession because “they” are the type of individuals who commit burglary and robbery. I didn’t realize Minority Report was about Houston.  I must have missed the part of the Constitution that permits police to arrest and jail individuals for crimes they have not yet committed. HPD’s ire centers around a decision made by Harris County District Attorney Pat Lykos in January, 2010 when she decided the county would stop prosecuting trace drug crimes as felonies. The ACLU of Texas applauds her smart-on-crime decision, and hopes she sticks to her principles. Why is this issue so important to Texas? -          Cost: The Criminal Justice Coordinating Council estimates that since this policy has been implemented, there have been 400 fewer inmates in jail on any given day.   At a cost of between $45 and $65 per prisoner per day, this policy saves taxpayers between $6.5 and $9.4 million on an annual basis.  These resources would be better spent on efforts to decrease the occurrences of dangerous crimes that pose a threat to Texas, or to create more drug treatment centers that would help people get back on the right track. -          Public health: To effectively end drug abuse, drug addiction should be treated as a public health issue instead of as a criminal issue. This is a simple fact. Treatment - not incarceration – lowers drug use.  In fact, states with higher rates of drug incarceration actually have higher rates of drug use. Without effective treatment, drug addicts, once released from jail, will likely end up back behind bars. -          Institutional racism: On a national level, African Americans comprise 13 percent of the US population and 14 percent of drug users.  Yet, they make up 56 percent of those incarcerated for drug crimes.  In Texas, 8 out of 9 regional narcotic task forces search African Americans for drugs more often than they search whites –no wonder this racial discrepancy exists. -          Community: Most drug users and addicts are non-violent offenders. And they are real people, with real families and real jobs.    Sending a non-violent parent with a drug problem to jail instead of treatment is detrimental to the family and the community.  More than half the people in Texas prisons are parents and sending first-time and non-violent offenders to jail instead of treatment further harms their children.  Children who have a parent in prison are five times more likely to commit crimes themselves. Some of these children also end up in the foster care system - at an additional expense to the taxpayer.  In addition, people with felony convictions have a much harder time finding work after they have done their jail time, which leads to struggling families and economically depressed communities.  It is better for society as a whole to treat first time and non-violent offenders than to incarcerate them. We couldn’t agree more with State District Judge Michael McSpadden, who advocates for more drug treatment options and giving drug addicts a second chance.  The war on drugs has been an expensive failure and it is past time to change gears. Terri Burke is the executive director of the ACLU of Texas, headquartered in Houston.