Federal Sentencing Guidelines: Crack vs Powder Cocaine

Sentencing guidelines for people convicted of crack cocaine vs powder cocaine have long been viewed as racist. Crack cocaine users, who are mostly Black, have received much harsher sentencing that individuals convicted of using powder cocaine, who are mostly white. That will soon be changing.

WaPo reports:

The U.S. Sentencing Commission voted today to make retroactive its new federal sentencing guidelines for crack cocaine offenses, raising hopes for reduced prison terms among thousands of mostly black federal inmates and defying stiff opposition from the Bush administration.

The seven-member commission voted unanimously to allow about 19,500 federal prison inmates, most of them African American, to seek reductions in their sentences for offenses involving crack cocaine, a relatively cheap and highly addictive form of the drug.

Under the decision, approximately 3,800 prisoners could become eligible for release within a year after retroactivity takes effect March 3. [...]

The commission changed its guidelines effective Nov. 1 to reduce a wide disparity in prison sentences for offenses involving crack and powder cocaine. Under laws passed by Congress in the 1980s, a person convicted in federal court of possessing 500 grams or more of powder cocaine with intent to distribute receives a five-year minimum sentence, but the same sentence is applied to similar offenses involving as little as 5 grams of crack.

The vast majority of defendants convicted of crack possession are black, while most of those convicted of powder cocaine possession are white.

Of course the Bush administration is opposed to this, and we all know why. For the same reason given by Kanye West to a national audience following the Katrina disaster: "George Bush doesn't care about black people."

Here is a quick look at the U.S. Sentencing Commission decision to allow federal inmates convicted of crack cocaine offenses to apply for reduction in their prison terms:

WHO

• Inmates serving sentences for crack cocaine crimes. An estimated 19,500 inmates -- out of more than 36,000 crack cocaine convicts -- could be eligible for reduced sentences.


• Eighty-six percent of federal inmates convicted of crack cocaine crimes are black.

HOW

• An inmate, federal prison officials or a federal judge can start the process. All applications are reviewed by a judge, who has final say on whether to reduce an inmate's sentence.

LIMITS

• A two-year reduction in prison time is the maximum most inmates can expect.

WHEN

• The decision takes effect on March 3, 2008.


• Nearly 10 percent of the eligible inmates could be released on the effective date.


• About 23 percent of the qualified inmates could be released in the next year.


• Almost half the inmates (47.3 percent) could be released by the end of 2010.


• Two of every three eligible inmates could be freed from prison by the end of 2012.

Sources: U.S. Sentencing Commission, Justice Department.