IV. A Comprehensive Approach
5. Enforcing the Nation's Laws
The correlation between drugs and crime is high. Drug users commit crimes at several times the rate of those who do not use drugs. According to the Department of Justice, as many as 83 percent of incarcerated people are past drug users. More than 51 percent reported substance abuse while committing the offense which led to their conviction. The heavy toll drug use exacts on the United States is most easily measured by the related criminal and medical costs that total over $67 billion. Almost 70 percent of this total is attributable to the cost of crime.
Law-enforcement professionals show supreme dedication and face risks daily to defend citizens against criminal activity. Since 1988, nearly seven hundred officers throughout the country have been killed in the line-of-duty, and over 600,000 officers were assaulted. We owe a debt of gratitude to the men and women who put their lives on the line in defense of our safety.
Our nation is based on the rule of law that ensures the safety and security of all people. Reducing drugs and crime are among the nation's most pressing social problems. Trafficking and use of illicit drugs are inextricably linked to crime and place a tremendous burden on the economic and social conditions of our communities. Drugs divert precious resources that support the quality of life all Americans strive to achieve. They create widespread problems that corrode communities with fear, violence, and corruption, leaving residents afraid to go out of their homes, legitimate businesses to flee, and the quality of life to suffer. The data in Chapter II gives clear indication of the nexus between drugs and crime. Strong law-enforcement policies contribute a great deal to reducing drug abuse and its consequences by:
Reducing demand. By enforcing the laws against drug use, law enforcement reinforces societal disapproval of drug use and discourages potential users from using drugs. Moreover, for many addicts an arrest -- and the resulting threat of imprisonment -- offers a powerful incentive to take treatment seriously.
Disrupting supply. The movement of drugs from the sources of supply to our nation's streets requires sophisticated organizations. When law enforcement detects and dismantles a drug organization, less drugs find their way to our streets. Seizures also reduce availability.
To most effectively use the power of law enforcement, the Strategy promotes coordination, intelligence sharing, better technology, equitable sentencing policies, and a focus on criminal targets that cause the nation the most damage.
Coordination Among Law-Enforcement Agencies
In unity there is strength. The more local, state, and federal law-enforcement agencies and operations reinforce one another, the more they share information and resources, the more they "deconflict" operations, establish priorities, and focus energies across the spectrum of criminal activities, the more effective will be the outcome of separate activities. The trafficking of dangerous drugs is not a local problem but rather national and international in scope. Drug trafficking gangs and organizations do not confine their activity to any specific geographic boundary. Intelligence gathering and dissemination to assist in identifying all levels of criminal trafficking organization is essential for coordination and to prevent duplication of effort. Accordingly, various federal, state, and local agencies have joined forces on national as well as regional levels, to achieve better results.
The federal government provides extensive support to state and local law-enforcement agencies through the Edward Byrne Memorial State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance Program. Grants support multi-jurisdictional task forces, demand-reduction education involving law-enforcement officers, and public and private agencies and non-profit organizations for activities that are directly related to reducing and preventing drug-related crime and violence. Even in the absence of federal participation, state and local law enforcement agencies are encouraged to adopt task force approaches.
Community Oriented Policing
Community Oriented Policing is a philosophy that recognizes that crime problems are best addressed when the police and the community work together to identify and solve problems. Cooperation between civilians and police forces working together within communities across the country have successfully decreased drug-related crime. The Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) program has funded over 92,000 new and redeployed officers to help police the streets and we expect to reach 100,000 officers this year. The COPS program has buttressed community policing anti-drug actions at the street level, including efforts to curtail trafficking in the dangerous drug of methamphetamine. Building on the successful COPS initiative, the President has proposed a new 21st Century Policing Initiative which will continue to help communities to hire, redeploy, and retain police officers; provide the latest crime-fighting technologies; and target funds to engage the entire community in anti-crime measures. The COPS program relies on long-term innovative approaches to community-based problems and reinforces already successful efforts to reduce drug-related crime in our communities.
Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF)
These multi-agency task forces draw on the expertise of federal, state, and local law enforcement and prosecutorial agencies to coordinate investigations and prosecutions of domestic and international drug trafficking organizations, money laundering operations, gangs, and public officials involved in drug trafficking enterprises. The collaboration between law enforcement and U.S. Attorneys as well as the state and local levels of district attorneys and attorneys general plays an integral part in OCDETF's fight against drug traffickers. In 1998, a three-year OCDETF operation in St. Louis culminated in the arrest and federal indictment of a drug-ring leader and thirty-two defendants. These individuals were responsible for trafficking more than 45 kilograms of "black tar" heroin across numerous state lines. Through cooperative efforts and an array of investigative techniques, the entire drug operation was dismantled.
High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas (HIDTA)
HIDTAs are regions with critical drug-trafficking problems that harmfully affect other areas of the United States. These locations are designated by the ONDCP Director in consultation with the Attorney General, heads of drug-control agencies, and governors. There are currently twenty-one HIDTAs. HIDTAs assess regional drug threats, design strategies to address the threats, develop integrated initiatives, and provide federal resources to implement these initiatives. HIDTAs strengthen America's drug-control efforts by forging partnerships among local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies; they facilitate cooperative investigations, intelligence sharing, and joint operations against trafficking organizations. The Department of Defense provides priority support to HIDTAs in the form of National Guard assistance, assignment of intelligence analysts, and technical training. In 1998, new HIDTAs were designated in central Florida (including Orlando and Tampa), the Milwaukee metropolitan area, and the marijuana-growing regions of Kentucky, Tennessee, and West Virginia.
Intelligence/Information Sharing
Intelligence gleaned from the collection, evaluation, analysis, and synthesis of information must be shared in order to reduce cultivation, production, trafficking, and distribution of drugs. Cooperation in sharing and deconflicting strategic and operational intelligence is critical for combating the international and domestic drug problem. Tactical intelligence is time sensitive and crucial to the effective execution of arrests and seizures. Agencies must be able to share relevant information and intelligence across jurisdictional boundaries without risk of compromise to intelligence and the operations that derive from it.
Technology
Technology can play a dramatic role in combating drug-related crime. Law enforcement agencies increase their effectiveness by integrating technology and coordinating their operations. ONDCP's Counterdrug Technology Assessment Center (CTAC) was established by the Counter-Narcotics Technology Act of 1990 (P.L. 101-510). CTAC is the federal government's central drug-control research and development organization and coordinates the activities of twenty federal agencies. CTAC identifies short, medium, and long-term scientific and technological needs of federal, state, and local drug-enforcement agencies -- including surveillance; tracking; electronic support measures; communications; data fusion; and chemical, biological, and radiological detection. CTAC also encourages research in support of prevention and treatment. CTAC's Ten Year Counterdrug Technology Plan and Development Roadmap provides a framework for law-enforcement exploitation of technological advances.
The Prosecution Process
Another vehicle for law-enforcement coordination is the prosecution process. A wide range of federal efforts intersect through the U.S. Attorneys' Offices, which prosecute federal crimes. U.S. Attorneys maintain close collaboration with various federal, state, and local law-enforcement entities in their jurisdictions. This broad perspective allows federal prosecutors to foster greater cooperation within the law-enforcement community. Involving federal prosecutors in the development of cases and strategies improves coordination of counter-drug efforts. At the state and local levels, attorneys general and district attorneys also play critical roles in coordinating law-enforcement actions against drug dealers.
Targeting Gangs and Violence
Initiatives targeting gangs and violent crime have reduced drug trafficking substantially. Gangs are involved in the national distribution of drugs and frequently use automatic weapons. Thirty years ago, only twenty cities reported gang activity. Today, more than seven hundred do. The DEA and FBI lead federal efforts to break up trafficking organizations. The FBI has established 166 Safe Street task forces to address violent crime, most of which is drug-related. In early 1995, DEA launched the MET program as a manifestation of its commitment to assist state and local police agencies combat the problem of drug-related violent crime in their communities. DEA has assigned 24 METs in twenty of its twenty-two divisions, and, at the request of state and local authorities, initiated 193 deployments.The Department of Justice is using the National Gang Tracking Network, a comprehensive computer database that keeps tabs on gangs and gang members operating across state lines. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) targets armed drug traffickers through the Achilles Program, which oversees task forces in jurisdictions where drug-related violence is severe. The ATF also conducts Gang Resistance Education and Training (G.R.E.A.T.) in schools. Since 1992, more than two million children have received G.R.E.A.T. instruction. HIDTAs and OCDETFs also coordinate multi-agency attacks on criminal drug organizations.
Equitable Sentencing Policies
The Administration supports the revision of the 1986 federal law which mandates a minimum five-year prison sentence for anyone possessing either five-hundred grams of powder cocaine or a mere five grams of crack cocaine. This law, which punishes crack cocaine involvement one hundred times more severely than powder cocaine crimes, is problematic for two reasons. First, since crack is more prevalent in black, inner-city neighborhoods, the law has fostered a perception of racial injustice in our criminal justice system. In fact, 90 percent of those convicted on crack cocaine charges are African American. Second, harsher penalties for crack possession over powder have resulted in long incarceration levels for low-level crack dealers instead of a greater focus on the apprehension of middle and large scale movers of powder cocaine.
The Administration recommends that federal sentencing treat crack as ten times worse than powder, not one hundred times worse. Specifically, the amount of powder cocaine required to trigger a five-year mandatory would be reduced from 500 to 250 grams, while the amount of crack cocaine required to trigger the same sentence would increase slightly from 5 grams to 25 grams. This difference would reflect -- without gross exaggeration -- the greater addictive potential of crack (which is smoked) compared to powder (when snorted), the greater violence associated with the trafficking of crack cocaine, and the importance of targeting mid- and higher-level traffickers as opposed to smaller-scale dealers. The Administration also recommends that mandatory minimums be abolished for simple possession of crack. Among all controlled substances, crack is the only one with a federal mandatory minimum sentence for a first offense of simple possession for personal use.
Community support is critical to the success of law enforcement. When people lose confidence in the fairness and logic of the law as has been the case with the 1986 statute, law-enforcement efforts suffer. By revising the inequitable sentencing structure for powder versus crack cocaine, the Administration's intent is to restore overall respect for the law and to foster a more effective division of responsibility between federal, state, and local law enforcement authorities.
