Monday, July 20, 2009

Another drug war victim Radley Balko covers it: Last week, an undercover New York City police officer participating in a drug buy shot and killed 49-year-old Shem Walker during an altercation at Walker's home in Brooklyn. Police say Walker, described by family and neighbors as an ex-con who had reformed, apparently thought the officer was a drug dealer or a vagrant. When the officer didn't respond to Walker's verbal demand to leave his property, apparently because he was wearing earphones to monitor the drug buy, Walker tried to forcibly remove him from Walker's front stoop. The two got into an altercation. A second undercover officer then joined the fight, at which point the first officer shot and killed Walker. Sigh. 11:41:45 PM | drug policy | Related  | permalink | comment []

Oh yeah, that'll work - throw money at the drug war The United States, apparently unhappy with the meager level of violence in Mexico, is putting up bribe money in an attempt to escalate it. The Department of State offered up to $50 million Monday for information leading to the arrests of 10 top Mexican drug suspects accused of key roles in a violent organization estimated to have sold more than $1 billion worth of drugs in the United States. U.S. Attorney Benton J. Campbell said the reward money and new federal charges were among U.S. efforts to dismantle a powerful drug trafficking organization known as The Company, whose members came from an elite security force called Los Zetas. Remember that the Zetas started out as a group of elite Mexican Army soldiers trained in the U.S. at the School of the Americas by U.S., French and Israeli specialists to be able to take down Mexican cartels. Instead, they became the most dangerous cartel of all. So, unable to take down the cartel that we trained, we're now offering rewards for their capture. $50 million may seem like a lot, but it's worthless if you can't spend it. If you've got the size of organization to protect you if you turn them in, then you're already part of a competing cartel that would stand to gain much more than $50 million with the elimination of the Zetas. If we succeed in taking down the Zetas, will that end the violence? Of course not -- it will just create a leadership vacuum in the cartels resulting in mid-level gangsters fighting it out in the streets in order to grab the brass ring that is the leadership of the multi-billion dollar drug trade. Of course, when the one possible solution to the drug war is not part of your vocabulary -- if it can't even be considered -- then all one can do is flail around trying ever more useless "solutions." A strange game. The only winning move is not to play. 7:18:06 PM | drug policy | Related  | permalink | comment []

Police discover drug deal One of the problems police have in the drug war is that drug transactions are consensual, so nobody generally wants to report them to the police. Police therefore have to get creative to even find out about drug deals. Well, a drug deal went down in Statesville, North Carolina recently and the police were all over it. Oh, yeah, they had the 411 on this one. One itsy, bitsy problem. They forgot to have anyone besides the police involved in the deal. An undercover Iredell County Sheriff's Office deputy recently purchased drugs from undercover Statesville police officers, raising questions about communications between the two agencies. Statesville Police Chief Tom Anderson said undercover officers from his department were working a week-long case when they met with someone interested in selling a small amount of marijuana. The undercover SPD officers met with the individual in the parking lot of a local store to make the deal, Anderson said. [...] After the arrest, investigators from the sheriff's office arrived and confirmed the seller was an undercover deputy and he was released, Anderson said. Good thing they were able to stop that small amount of marijuana they were selling from reaching the streets. 8:40:44 AM | drug policy | Related  | permalink | comment []

The New Drug Task Force is in the House Via Allen St. Pierre at NORML... Yep, a newly formed Drug Task Force has been established in the House of Representatives to fight back against the Obama administration which "seeks to shut the war on drugs down." Wait. What was that again? The Obama administration is shutting down the drug war? In whose fantasy? Well, I guess, it's true in this group's fantasy, led by Rep. John Mica (R-Fla). They are going to see to it that we keep the war going strong. The other members of the task force are Reps. Dan Burton and Mark Souder, R-Ind.; Darrell Issa, R-Calif; Jim Jordan, R-Ohio; Aaron Schock, R-Ill.; and Michael Turner, R-Ohio. Wow, an entire eight out of the 435 Representatives! 12:26:47 AM | drug policy | Related  | permalink | comment []