nightwitch

ALBANY - Gov. Paterson and legislative leaders announced a deal this morning on a drug law overhaul that would divert thousands of offenders from prison to treatment - a move Republicans charged would lead to increased crime.
The agreement - the broadest attack on the strict Rockefeller drug laws since 2004 - would give judges broad discretion to send first-time drug offenders to treatment, a key element of a proposal passed by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan) earlier this month.
Under the compromise with Paterson and Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith (D-Queens), judges would also have the power to send low-level repeat drug offenders to treatment, although mid-level repeat offenders would still have to face some prison time, sources familiar with the talks said.
Defendants eligible for treatment would have to plead guilty to avoid a stint behind bars.
"We are hoping to forever eliminate the regime of the Rockefeller drug laws and replace it with a system that will give addicts the treatment that they need and give those who profiteer off drug trafficking the punishment that they deserve," the Democratic governor said.
The deal includes a provision to allow some 1,500 inmates sentenced under the older laws to apply for lighter sentences - a piece that Republicans and law enforcement officials said amounted to a legal jail break.
"It's still a get-out-of-jail card," said Sen. Martin Golden (R-Brooklyn), in reaction to the deal. "It's still going to impact our communities. It's still going to drive crime up."
Paterson said restrictions added during negotiations would exclude from new sentence hearings any convicts who had pled down from a more serious charge or who had violent histories.
"If they've been in violent trouble, they can't apply," Paterson said, estimating that about 750 inmates would actually qualify for release.
The agreement would toughen sentences for convicts for drug kingpins and dealers who sell drugs to children.
Sen. Eric Schneiderman (D-Manhattan), who sponsored the bill in the Senate, said about $67 million in health care funding from the stimulus package would provide a "down payment" for expanded treatment programs required by the deal.
The bill was sponsored in the Assembly by Assemblyman Jeffrion Aubrey (D-Queens).
Paterson, a longtime time advocate of reforming the 1970s-era drug laws, was arrested while a state senator in 2002 for protesting their existence outside former Gov. George Pataki's office.
The deal would be only the second agreement to be publicly announced from intense closed-door budget talks at the Capitol, in which Gov. Paterson has remained largely out of public sight.
Two weeks ago, the governor announced that he and legislative leaders would use $1.3 billion in stimulus money to eliminate numerous new consumer taxes and nuisance fees he had proposed.

starlon

It's funny the Republicans are saying that this will lead to crime when we all know that prohibition itself causes an eruption of violent crime.

Yotabeater

Republicans=Opposite of What Everybody Else Wants
They will do nothing but continue to fight against the progressive movement that is sweeping the country, that seems to be all they can do is take the other side of whatever argument they are in against Democrats. Anybody who is left in the Right-Wing needs to learn that they don't call the shots anymore. America is tired of their feeble-minded ideologies. Welcome to the 21st century. Finally.