I Got Published!

After reading the last Razor Wire, many of you took up the challenge and wrote your hometown and other newspapers. We are sharing with you just some of the recent letters published. The offer still stands.

Are you a prisoner of the war on drugs? If your editorial about the drug war gets published, we will send you a copy of Drug War Facts. Like these letters here, you might find your own writing published a second time in The Razor Wire. We'll be sharing these published letters to inspire more of our readers to take up the pen in the cause of justice. Ready, set; write those letters!

Send original clippings of your recent published letters to the editor to:

I Got Published TNC!
795 South Cedar
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The Anson Record, Wednesday, March 6, 2002

Drug Policy is Doomed to Fail

Yet another president is paying lip service to the nation's drug policy. Mr. Bush's announcement of his plans to cut drug abuse by 25 percent in five years and seek a 10 percent drop in drug abuse in two years will, according to history, fail.

Some drug abuse may be an individual tragedy, but to say that illegal drug use robs men and women of their dignity, character and leads them to lives with no ambition and hope is far from the mark and nothing short of a narrow-minded generalization. What about the men and women who have admitted to drug use and now run this country in some fashion?

This country doesn't need money poured into a black hole policy that gobbles it up and spits out failure. This country needs a new approach. A good place to start is education. We need honesty about which drugs are more dangerous. We need to stop grouping all drugs together and teach children the difference. If adults do not treat marijuana and heroin differently, why be surprised kids don't?

Bush's treatment policy has yet to be seen, but enough of the money is spent for law enforcement to provide a treatment slot for every addict in this country. He makes it sound as though families and religious institutions need to be told to love someone with a drug problem.

This nation's drug policy needs to be led away from politicians and military men and placed in the scientific and medical communities which have made recommendations over the past 30 years, almost all of which were ignored. Pouring money into the present policy will fail.

I am a Federal inmate at the F.P.C. Seymour Johnson in Goldsboro, N.C.

James L. Mooring,Goldsboro

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Tue, 26 Mar 2002, The Capital Times, (WI)

Political Activism, Jocko's Style

By Doug Moe

BOB "Boot" Schuh, erstwhile owner of the erstwhile Jocko's bar, is serving a 19-year drug sentence in a federal prison in Milan, Michigan. Schuh has begun sending out correspondence under the letterhead of The November Coalition, a Washington state-based nonprofit organization that finds nothing at all to admire about the government's war on drugs. "The drug war does not reduce drug use," the group's Web site notes. "Choosing to wage a 'war' on drugs stimulates a violent, underground economy which would collapse if drug prohibition ended."

The November Coalition is made up of drug prisoners, their friends and families. Schuh's March 19 letter-co-signed with another prisoner, Glenn Early-cautions against adoption of a proposed U.S. Senate bill authored by Jeff Sessions of Alabama and Orrin Hatch of Utah, the so-called Drug Sentencing Reform Act. "Real reform of the failed War on Drugs would be the elimination of unreasonably harsh sentences for nonviolent drug offenders," Schuh and Early write.

Thu, 20 Jun 2002, The Capital Times (WI)

'Boot' gets Another Day in Court

By Doug Moe

BOB "BOOT" SCHUH will be back in Madison next week. Currently living in a federal prison in Michigan, Schuh will be here Wednesday for resentencing by U.S. Judge John Shabaz, whose original 19-year sentencing of Schuh - the former Jocko's owner - on drug charges was partially vacated by a federal appellate court last month in Chicago.

The appellate court tossed the portion of Schuh's sentence asserting he had a leadership role in the drug dealing at Jocko's.

Schuh's appellate lawyer, Robert Henak of Milwaukee, said Schuh was very pleased by the ruling. "We both were," Henak said Wednesday. Henak said that federal guidelines dictate Schuh's new sentence at somewhere between 10 and 12 years. "He's also eligible for a 16 percent reduction in sentence each year - after the first year - for good behavior," Henak said. That works out to between 51 and 53 days a year. Along with receiving a revised presentence report, Shabaz on Wednesday will hear arguments from prosecutors and Henak before pronouncing the new sentence. Since his incarceration, Schuh has been active in the November Coalition, an organization devoted to rethinking the wisdom of lengthy prison terms for nonviolent drug offenders.

NEWS-SUN, Hobbs, New Mexico - January, 2002

Inmates' Children Face Big Problems

I consider myself somewhat of an expert on prisons, prisoners and the war on drugs, having been a drug addict since 1972 and a prisoner of the drug war for more than 20 years of my life. I have served time in various state and federal prisons all over the United States and am completely familiar with the realities of drug prohibition and its collateral damage to the community of the United States.

In establishing my credentials, for a prisoner, I am well educated and as a U.S. citizen, I have lived the life of the war on drugs, not just read about it or viewed "snippets" of some of the battles. I have experienced the war as a soldier on the side of traditional American freedom and justice and live with it on a daily basis.

After reading an AP article entitled, "New attention for children of prisoners" in early January, I was certainly grateful to learn that someone has finally awoken to the fact this is a serious problem that needs to be addressed. I certainly believe, from personal observation, that a child raised by a drug addict has a far greater chance of living a productive and law-abiding life over one whose parent or parents have been made a prisoner by the state or government, leaving them an orphan. Should a study of this be done in an honest and factual manner I am certain that the results will support what I have observed over the past 30 years.

When the state or government imprisons the parent(s) of a child, leaving them to whatever meager services offered for orphans, the child will not only suffer the loss of the parent's physical support of life's necessities, but the emotional loss of love and companionship. In most instances, this leads the child to resent, and even hate, the state and government and then manifest these negative emotions into the endless cycle of lawlessness and drug abuse.

While at the same time, a child of a drug addict learns, with the proper guidance that is sometimes available, that drug use only leads to addiction, and they normally learn to avoid the behavior of their parents as a survival technique. The child of a drug addict who lives with the drug addict learns to hate the drug that seems to be harming the parent. The child of the imprisoned drug addict learns to hate the state and government who seem to harm the parent.

If we are not yet able to see the truths of the war on drugs and drug addiction clearly at this time to make the necessary adjustments, such as placing drug addicts and drug-addicted, low-level dealers in treatment in a community setting with their children, then we MUST do whatever is necessary to ensure that their children have the tools, materials and education to survive the incarceration of their parents without being condemned to repeat it.

Ethan E. Roberts, Big Spring, Texas

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Fort Dodge Messenger, June 29, 2002

A Prisoner Responds

After reading the "Where to cut costs" letter from Jeff Simkins, June 19 Messenger, I am compelled to respond. Thinking the state can balance its books by eliminating pay to inmates - many who earn 28 cents per hour - is a ludicrous proposition at best.
Pay for electricity? Inmates pay what amounts to a 12% tax on many commissary items. That's 6% sales tax. Plus 6% 'pay for stay' fee. The 'pay for stay' fee is applied to the electrical appliance purchases as well.

Furthermore, the state skims 5% from money deposited to inmate telephone accounts, then charges a minimum of $2.19 for the first minute of a call. Most 15-minute phone calls cost approximately $5. Profits from phone calls are used to pay for inmate recreation. How dangerous would your job be without inmate recreation?

I agree with you that "Pushing an inmate to go through (drug) treatment as a condition of parole or early release is counter productive." Providing coerced treatment at a time when the needs for voluntary treatment are not being met creates the strange circumstance of someone needing to get arrested to get treatment.

People who are forced into treatment may not actually need it. They may just be people who use drugs in a non-problematic way, but who happened to get arrested. Arrest is not the best way to determine who should get treatment services. Arrest and a felony conviction only serve to further stigmatize an individual who suffers a substance abuse problem.

I have long advocated for the legalization and taxation of drugs currently illegal. This approach in my opinion, would better address any drug abuse problems within our society. It would also free up approximately 2,000 prison beds in the state of Iowa. Each prison bed costs more than $20,000 per bed per year.

Until such measures are implemented, I will be wasting about one million of your tax dollars during the course of my 40-year sentence for marijuana convictions.

Bradley David Aukes - Prisoner of the Drug War

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Richmond Free Press, Sunday, July 14, 2002

Drug War a Failure

This is what America's "drug war" has produced over the last 30 years: 1.5 million prisoners with a budget that has gone from $500 million to more than $30 billion per year since 1970.

It has turned the once relatively safe, united African communities into war zones. Just as America's alcohol prohibition did in the 1920s, today's drug prohibition laws cause more harms to society than the substances themselves.

It's way past time to expose the lies that America has spread about the dangers of drug use.

Kwame D. Binta I, Richmond VA

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Casper Star-Tribune, Sunday, April 28, 2002

Politics make a Federal Case out of it

Ask why more Wyoming Women are Convicted

Jackie Quarterman:Perspective

We constantly read letters and columns bemoaning the fact that young people and others are leaving the state of Wyoming. We also read Dave Freudenthal's ad campaign for governor: "Attention drug pushers-time is running out! Wyoming will have a new governor soon and your days are numbered!"

We, 11 Wyoming women who live in Phoenix Federal Prison Camp, would like to tell the good people of Wyoming what we've learned through our process of conviction and incarceration.

First of all, a very disproportionate number of Wyoming residents are in prison (leave the state not by their own choice), and secondly, Dave Freudenthal can accurately brag about his last "seven and one-half years of locking people up" because he certainly has had a hand in the hugely discrepant number of Wyoming federal prisoners who are locked up for years. Heaven help us if this number continues to rise, as Freudenthal promises. The current statistics already indicate that Wyoming has the most federal prisoners per capita in the United States. Does this mean that Wyoming is the most crime-ridden state? We don't think so.

We've discovered that many of the cases made into federal in Wyoming should not have been federal cases - they should have remained under Wyoming state jurisdiction, where most of us would have received treatment and /or probation, rather than excessive years in prison.

We've also learned that the federal system can convict (much easier) people of conspiracy on hearsay evidence; conspiracy just means being aware of a crime. Over 50 percent of the women in federal prisons are in on "conspiracy," period! We also know that Wyoming has an exceptional number of women prisoners - not just a discrepancy in wages (between women and men). The predominant means of obtaining convictions in the federal system is by paid-for testimony (paid informants usually paid for with freedom or a huge reduction of their own sentence), so it is often the big dealers who testify against the insignificant users or supposed conspirators (all known by the prosecution).

David Burnham contemplated in his book, "Above the Law," why Wyoming was allotted such a disproportionate amount of money for federal prosecutions. He explained in his book that there is no correlation between federal prosecution funds for states and population or crime rate - it's all politics, he says. Of course, to justify huge allotments of federal money, there have to be results (federal cases are easy to create through entrapment, conspiracy and paid informants). We do know that of the 170 women (from all over the United States) at this federal camp, 11 of us are from Wyoming (and we hear three more Wyoming women are on their way here, and we know there are many more Wyoming women other federal prisons). Does this seem strange? That 6.8 percent of this camp are from Wyoming? While Wyoming is only 0.0017 percent of the U.S. population? We know that there have been over 1,400 federal convictions in Wyoming from 1997 until now. (The Wyoming federal court said they had no way of tracking the number of current federal prisoners. Strange?)

At this camp the only other state that comes close to our number is Texas - El Paso, a border town, convicts a number of federal prisoners - but those women, involved in much larger amounts of drugs, receive much small sentences than we Wyoming drug prisoners (two of we 11 are not drug cases).

Of we 11, our years served back-to-back would amount to 68 and one-half years. The cost to the taxpayers to house we 11 nonviolent Wyoming women will be over $1.5 million; much more than that will be spent on our children. That emotional and financial cost will be impossible to calculate. We 11 women have a total of 20 children who have experienced the forced abandonment by their mothers - some of the children have even had to be housed in other states - but all of them are far away from us 9the mothers that love them dearly). All statistics indicate that our children will have a much higher chance of ending up in prison, also. One of our friends teaches kindergarten in Wyoming and says that a few years ago there were eight children in her class who had one or both parents in prison.

We know that even most Wyoming state prisoners are being shipped away to Colorado, Oklahoma and Virginia at great expense - shipped far away from their families. Does this practice even hint of humaneness?

The vast majority of Wyoming federal prisoners are in prison for "drug" crimes, which, simply put, are prohibition crimes. The vast majority are nonviolent, first-time offenders. Yet many murder cases go unsolved in Wyoming. How can this be a legacy to brag about? Is this the kind of legacy that the good people of Wyoming really want?

America already has over 2 million people in prison - more than any country in the world, in the history of the world! Now, Wyoming can claim an exceptional amount of those 2 million (most of which are prohibition criminals).

Freudenthal's campaign should be to reduce the number of Wyoming people locked up and increase treatment for those who need it - not continuing to lock up nonviolent prisoners for countless years. We, who are going to prison in droves, do have family and friends who are witnessing the overload.

P.S. The two white-collar inmates did not sign, knowing their sentences are more than fair and significantly lower than when the word "drug" is there.

Jackie Quarterman is from Sheridan. The column was also signed by Andrea Asch, Velvet Boatman, Teresa Fernandez and Diane Raidall of Casper, Sharon Martinez of Riverton and Marci Kelly of Green River.

How to get a letter published - from Media Awareness Project

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