-------------------------------------------------------------------

Chronic Pain Undertreated, Expert Says (According to the Omaha World-Herald,
in Nebraska, Dr. Steven D. Passik, a psychologist who is director of oncology
symptom control research at the Indiana Community Cancer Care Center in
Indianapolis, told an ethics conference Saturday at Creighton University in
Omaha that many Americans with chronic pain don't receive the treatment they
need due to doctors' and patients' unmerited concern that the use of opioid
painkillers would lead to substance abuse, and doctors' worries about legal
problems.)

Date: Mon, 8 Mar 1999 13:45:39 -0800
From: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org (MAPNews)
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
Subject: MN: US NE: Chronic Pain Undertreated, Expert Says
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Reply-To: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Organization: Media Awareness Project http://www.mapinc.org/lists/
Newshawk: General Pulaski
Pubdate: Mon, 08 Mar 1999
Source: Omaha World-Herald (NE)
Copyright: 1999 Omaha World-Herald Company.
Contact: pulse@owh.com
Website: http://www.omaha.com/
Forum: http://chat.omaha.com/

CHRONIC PAIN UNDERTREATED, EXPERT SAYS

Many Americans with chronic pain don't receive the treatment they need
because of "misapplied" fears about addiction, an expert in the field
told an ethics conference Saturday at Creighton University in Omaha.

Those fears include doctors' and patients' concerns that the use of
narcotic painkillers would lead to substance abuse, and doctors'
worries about legal problems, said Dr. Steven D. Passik, a
psychologist who is director of oncology symptom control research at
the Indiana Community Cancer Care Center in Indianapolis.

He said these are major factors in what he described as a "dramatic
undertreatment" of chronic pain.

Passik, whose research has included the palliative care of AIDS and
cancer patients, was one of several speakers to address aspects of
suffering at the Saturday conference, sponsored by Creighton's Center
for Health Policy and Ethics.

Many of the 110 people in attendance from Nebraska and surrounding
states serve on ethics committees at hospitals and other health-care
institutions. Such committees often are involved in drafting or
reviewing their institutions' policies for patient treatment, said
Ruth Purtilo, director of the Center for Health Policy and Ethics.

The fact that ethics committees are discussing such issues is good
news for the general public, said Dr. Robert McQuillan, vice chairman
of the Department of Anesthesiology at the Creighton University School
of Medicine. He also is the medical director of the Pain Control
Center of St. Joseph Regional Health System, and a member of St.
Joseph Hospital's ethics committee.

Most experts agree that patients' pain is undertreated, he said. Yet
the situation continues, in part because of doctors' fears that they
will be disciplined for prescribing such painkilling drugs as morphine
in large-enough dosages and also due to societal fears about narcotics.

McQuillan said medical licensing boards in some states have
aggressively gone after doctors for prescribing such "opioids" for
pain. That has not been the case in Nebraska, he said. Even so,
McQuillan said doctors have told him that they have shied away from
aggressively treating pain because of fear of disciplinary action.

Passik said research, including his own, has shown that the risk of
addiction to painkillers is not nearly as great as it is assumed to
be.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Not Fit to Print? The MMJ: Class Action Hearing (MAP, the Media Awareness
Project, protests the lack of media coverage of developments in the federal
class-action medical-marijuana lawsuit being litigated in Philadelphia by
Lawrence Elliott Hirsch, by posting several news accounts or URLs to news
accounts from alternative online media such as High Times and
marijuananews.com. "Judge Katz himself reacted with surprise when the feds
acknowledged that the IND program's suspension had absolutely nothing to do
with medicine.")

Date: Mon, 8 Mar 1999 07:25:12 -0800
From: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org (MAPNews)
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
Subject: MN: US: Not Fit to Print? The MMJ: Class Action Hearing
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Reply-To: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Organization: Media Awareness Project http://www.mapinc.org/lists/

Newshawk: Richard Lake and Various Newshawks
Pubdate: Mon, 8 Mar 1999
Source: As shown below

Note: The story we thought would be among the top news items for our
readers last week appears to have never made it to print. Though our
newshawks searched hard for it, there is no evidence so far that this story
made the wire services, or even the local press in Philadelphia. Yes, some
local TV coverage was reported. But where was the rest of the media?

Knowing of our reader's interest, we provide the High Times intro story
below, and links to two other on-line summaries as well two pictures of the
participants in this historical event - as a rare exception to our policy
of not carrying web-published only items.

Our friend Richard Cowan provdes these internet articles:

Report From Philadelphia: The Class Action Suit Goes Forward With The
Government on The Defensive - 3 Prominent Lawyers Join Plaintiffs' Team:
http://www.marijuananews.com/report_from_philadelphia.htm

A Legal Overview of the Medical Marijuana Class Action Case - By Michael D.
Cutler, Esq.:

http://www.marijuananews.com/a_legal_overview_of_the_medical_.htm

And Frank S. World has posted on his website these pictures of the patients
at the Liberty Bell:

http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Lobby/7417/images/ac_at_bell.jpg
http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Lobby/7417/images/ac_chairsbell.jpg

***

From High Times News on-line 2 Mar 1998:
Author - Dean Latimer - Special to HT News - Website
http://www.hightimes.com/

Nearly a hundred documented medical patients from around the United States
are convening in Philadelphia this week, many in wheelchairs, to learn
exactly why the federal Department of Justice thinks they all ought to be
in prison.

As plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit against the DoJ, all are
self-admitted "users" of marijuana.

At a hearing on Wednesday, March 3, attorneys for the DoJ are scheduled to
demand that their lawsuit be dismissed out of hand, leaving them open to
criminal prosecution.

"This is not the kind of club you want to be a member of," observes Jeff
Jones, director of the Oakland Cannabis Cooperative, who will be on hand in
Philadelphia. Also present will be Elvy Musikka, a Florida glaucoma patient
who receives legal marijuana through a special federal program, and can
document that it has preserved her eyesight for decades.

Lynnette Shaw, director of the still-functioning Marin Alliance for Medical
Marijuana near San Francisco, will be there, along with Andrea Nagy, whose
Ventura County medical-cannabis co-op near LA was zoned out of existence
last year. Nearly all the plaintiffs have already been dragged repeatedly
into court as defendants, and are standing up for tens of thousands of
other US patients who have to use pot medicinally in secret, in daily
danger of arrest and prosecution. One quadriplegic plaintiff whose
attendance had been expected, Daniel Asbury of Toledo, OH, was busted by US
Customs just last week, over a package of medical-grade cannabis which had
been mailed to his address from Europe.

The "People's Class Action For Freedom From Government Prohibition of
Therapeutic Cannabis", initiated two years ago by Philadelphia
public-interest lawyer Lawrence Hirsch, ( http://www.fairlaw.org/ ) has
already gone much, much further than the Department of Justice is
comfortable with. When Hirsch filed it last July in Philadelphia Federal
District Court, challenging the basic constitutionality of the marijuana
laws and calling for government accommodation of medical-marijuana
patients' needs as a matter of compassion, the DoJ's lawyers curtly
responded, in essence, that only Congress is empowered to change any drug
laws, not the courts.

This routine DoJ argument did not prevail with the Hon. Marvin Katz, 68,
the semi-retired federal judge presiding specially over this case. After
carefully reading the personal medical histories of all 165 plaintiffs,
incorporated in the suit as sworn affidavits, Judge Katz surprised both
sides of the case by emphasizing the government's obligation to exercise
compassion in writing and enforcing the laws - a precedent established in
1970, and cited by Hirsch for the first time in a medical-marijuana context.

After that precedent was established in law, the federal government quickly
initiated a Compassionate Investigative New Drug program (IND) for
medical-marijuana patients, Hirsch argued for the class-action plaintiffs.

Under this program, hundreds of government-processed marijuana cigarettes
were distributed monthly to patients suffering from glaucoma, cancer and
other documented conditions. Although it (somewhat mysteriously) stopped
accepting new patients in 1992, the Compassionate IND program still today
provides eight surviving individuals with medical pot, and protection from
prosecution for possessing it. Responding to this argument in Katz's
courtroom last October, civil attorneys for the DoJ and the DEA simply
claimed that Hirsh's suit "lacks merit and should be dismissed as a matter
of law." To their manifest surprise, reported Hirsch's paralegal, Joan
Bello, Judge Katz asked them to explain exactly why the Compassionate IND
marijuana program had been effectively closed down in 1992. Bello, author
of The Benefits of Medical Marijuana and herself a patient-plaintiff, says
Judge Katz himself reacted with surprise when the feds acknowledged that
the IND program's suspension had absolutely nothing to do with medicine.
"It became clear," the DoJ belatedly responded in a vague brief, "the
potential widespread use of marijuana for 'medical' purposes under the
program... was bad public policy."

Critics of the government's "public policy" toward medicinal cannabis have
long contended that the IND program was closed down simply because too many
AIDS patients were asking to enlist in it, and the feds were averse to
"sending a message" that homosexuals and intravenous drug addicts, however
sick they may be, deserve compassionate exception to punitive drug laws. On
Wednesday, the Department of Justice will be responding to these critics,
and their response will be covered in this space.

***

Source: City Paper (PA)
Copyright: 1999 CP Communications, Inc.
Pubdate: Thu, 4 Mar 1999
Secton: Slant
Contact: editorial@citypaper.net
Webform: http://www.citypaper.net/mail.shtml
FAX: (215) 875-1829
Mail: 123 Chestnut Street, 3rd Floor Philadelphia, PA 19106
Website: http://www.citypaper.net/
Author: Edward Forchion
Note: Edward Forchion is the founder of the Legalize Marijuana Party and
ran an unsuccessful campaign last year for Camden County (NJ) Freeholder.
Also: City Paper is a weekly with a circulation of 109,000 and a readership
of over 342,000 throughout seven counties in the Philadelphia metro area.

END THE WAR

In 1937 Congress outlawed marijuana in the midst of a firestorm of patently
false, often misleading, definitely racist propaganda fed by tabloidlike
hysteria. The cannabis (marijuana) plant which was on the verge of becoming
a multibillion-dollar cash crop instead was banned. Congress hadn't learned
all of its lessons from the alcohol prohibition, and as a consequence,
millions have been arrested and tens of thousands have been imprisoned -
making U.S. marijuana users the largest group of political prisoners in the
world.

In 1970 Congress passed the Controlled Dangerous Substance (CDS) Act of
1970, thus launching the "War on Drugs," which many refer to as the "War on
Citizens."

This war has been an absolute failure. There are far more drug users now
than ever before.

It is easier for kids to get drugs because of the "war." With prohibition,
there is no regulation of drugs, eliminating any quality controls or
distribution guidelines such as age restrictions.

Marijuana was erroneously placed in the CDS Act's "schedule 1"
classification - the same as heroin and cocaine. The act states that a
schedule 1 drug must (1) have little or no medical value in the U.S.; (2)
be addictive; (3) be subject to widespread abuse. If you examine the facts
on marijuana you will know marijuana is not a schedule 1 drug.

Millions use marijuana for therapeutic reasons, and 20 percent of the U.S.
population now live in states where marijuana has been legalized by citizen
referendums. The 1998 UN World Health Organization report states that
marijuana is far less addictive than legal drugs such as caffeine, and is
much safer than drugs like tobacco or alcohol. In the 6,000 years man has
recorded his use of marijuana there has never been one case of death by
marijuana. More people die of aspirin use.

In 1996 the tide began to turn drastically with the medical marijuana
ballot initiatives in Arizona and California. This past Nov. 3, voters in
Arizona again voted to legalize marijuana, as did voters in Alaska, Nevada,
Oregon, Washington, Colorado and the District of Columbia. In Colorado and
D.C., the Republican party was successful in nullifying the election
results, a tactic they have tried in attempting to nullify the elections of
Bill Clinton. In D.C., Congressman Bob Barr (R-GA) slipped into a
congressional budget bill an amendment ordering the barring of the election
results on the D.C. medical marijuana initiative.

Voters opposed to the government's drug policies are now openly being
encouraged to stop avoiding jury duty, by organizations such as The Fully
Informed Jury Association (FIJA, www.fija.org.) Jurors are then encouraged
to acquit citizens accused of "Drug War" offenses. Jurors cannot be
punished for acquitting a defendant. A juror has the right to judge "law as
well as evidence," although most party-picked judges will not allow this.

I myself have been charged with a "Drug War" offense; I'm putting my life
where my mouth is. My choice is that I will be openly encouraging my jury
to take the law into consideration.

Philadelphia lawyer Lawrence Hirsch (www.fairlaw.org) has taken the matter
to the federal court system in the form of a class action federal lawsuit
contending the government's prohibition on marijuana is unconstitutional.

The year 2000 elections may give many the opportunity to oust both
Republicans and Democrats and end the "War." Voters may choose the Reform
Party of Jesse Ventura fame or the Libertarian party in record numbers.

Either way, register to vote.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

The Latest Buzz On Hemp (U.S. News & World Report, in Washington, D.C.,
suggests American farmers are starting to get serious about reforming the
country's ban on industrial hemp production. In North Dakota last year,
wheat, barley, and canola farmers such as David Monson endured floods, heavy
snow, pelting rains, and crop disease while watching neighbors' farms go
bust. In the fall, Monson's profit was a paltry $25 an acre. Meanwhile, 20
miles away, across the border in Canada, Brian McElroy, who had planted his
first hemp crop, earned $225 an acre. Last month, the Virginia legislature
endorsed "controlled, experimental" cultivation of the plant. Similar
pro-hemp action is pending in 11 other state legislatures, including Hawaii
and Vermont. An unlikely hemp proponent, former CIA Director R. James
Woolsey, who represents the North American Industrial Hemp Council, says "If
you want to get rid of marijuana, there's nothing better to do than plant a
lot of industrial hemp." The reason is that hemp pollinates marijuana,
lowering its potency.)

Date: Sun, 14 Mar 1999 16:58:24 -0800
From: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org (MAPNews)
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
Subject: MN: US: The Latest Buzz On Hemp
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Reply-To: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Organization: Media Awareness Project http://www.mapinc.org/lists/
Newshawk: agfuture@kih.net http://www.agrotechfiber.com
Source: U.S. News & World Report
Copyright: 1999 U.S. News & World Report
Pubdate: Mon, 8 Mar 1999
Contact: letters@usnews.com
Webform: http://www.usnews.com/usnews/usinfo/infomain.htm
FAX: (202) 955-2685
Mail: 1050 Thomas Jefferson Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20007-3871
Forum: http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/forum.htm
Website: http://www.usnews.com/
Author: Elise Ackerman

THE LATEST BUZZ ON HEMP

U.S. Farmers Want The Ban On Cultivating The Plant Lifted

Times sure are tough for North Dakota farmers like David Monson. First
there were floods, then heavy snow, pelting rains, and disease that
devastated the crops. Last summer, Monson grimly tended his wheat, barley,
and canola fields in Osnabrock and watched neighboring farms go bust. In
the fall, his profit was a paltry $25 an acre. Meanwhile, 20 miles away,
across the border in Canada, Brian McElroy had cut back on wheat and
planted his first crop of industrial hemp. He earned $225 an acre.

Last year's Canadian hemp harvest was the first since the 1930s, when
antimarijuana movies like Reefer Madness helped ignite a backlash. One
upshot was a crackdown on hemp, marijuana's nonpsychoactive cousin, in
Canada and the United States. Now, despairing U.S. farmers are calling on
the federal government to follow Canada's lead and legalize the crop. They
tout industrial hemp, which contains only negligible amounts of the
mind-altering chemical THC, as lucrative, versatile, and environmentally
friendly. Last month, the Virginia legislature endorsed "controlled,
experimental" cultivation of the plant. Similar pro-hemp action is pending
in 11 other state legislatures, including Hawaii and Vermont.

Pushing product.

Worldwide sales of hemp products are booming. According to Hemptech, a
California consulting company, global hemp sales rose from less than $3
million in 1993 to $75 million in 1997, the latest figures available. Sales
in the United States alone reached $50 million. (Despite the ban on
cultivation, the U.S. government does permit sales of hemp products.)

But Washington has resisted calls to legalize hemp farming. Unless the
president issues an executive order removing hemp from the Drug Enforcement
Administration's controlled-substance list, or the DEA itself takes action,
the states' efforts to scrap the ban ultimately will fail. (President
Clinton has yet to state his official position on the plant, but Hempen
Gold, a cream ale brewed from hemp seeds, was recently served on Air Force
One.)

The Office of National Drug Control Policy insists that permitting hemp
farming would send the wrong message to the public, especially to young
people. "Legalizing hemp production may mean the de facto legalization of
marijuana cultivation," the agency warns in a statement, claiming that
marijuana plants could be hidden in fields of industrial hemp.

But an unlikely hemp proponent, former CIA Director R. James Woolsey, says
the agency is blowing smoke. Not only are densely planted hemp fields
unconducive to marijuana cultivation but, Woolsey maintains, "If you want
to get rid of marijuana, there's nothing better to do than plant a lot of
industrial hemp." The reason is that hemp cross-pollinates with marijuana,
lowering its potency. Woolsey, who represents the North American Industrial
Hemp Council, a lobbying group, emphasizes that he opposes legalizing
marijuana. The bottom line, he says, is that hemp is "extremely useful" in
a wide range of industrial applications.

It's also a plant with a history. In colonial America, industrial hemp was
used to manufacture sails, rope, paper, and cloth. Thomas Jefferson
cultivated hemp. Drafts of the Declaration of Independence were written on
hemp-fiber paper. Modern-day hemp products include cosmetics, carpets,
salad oil, and snacks, as well as construction materials and biodegradable
auto parts. Hemp fibers are used in the trunk and door panels of the
German-manufactured 5 and 7 series BMW, and Ford is studying their
potential for use in radiator grills.

Meanwhile, the U.S. government continues to spend money uprooting hemp.
According to DEA figures, 98 percent of the $7.3 million the government
spent on marijuana eradication programs last year went to kill ditchweed, a
type of industrial hemp that grows wild.

Frustrated North Dakota farmers want to persuade the government to stop
just saying "No" to hemp. This year, Monson, who also serves in the state
legislature, sponsored three pro-hemp bills. Their message: "We in North
Dakota believe this is a legitimate crop that can make us some money, help
the environment, and maybe save some family farms."

-------------------------------------------------------------------

America's Misguided Drug War (An op-ed in the Christian Science Monitor by
Mike Tidwell, author of "In the Shadow of the White House: Drugs death and
redemption on the streets of the nation's capital," says there is no credible
evidence that stringent enforcement of America's prohibition of controlled
substances actually reduces drug use. Indeed, the opposite seems true:
Law-enforcement efforts actually promote illicit drug use. The endless
police raids on crack houses, shooting galleries, and various open-air
markets simply help push drugs block-by-block through the city, guaranteeing
that every D.C. teenager will eventually have a full-blown market on his
street corner. Attacking supply without addressing demand guarantees it will
continue. It's important to be very clear on this point: Our law-enforcement
efforts actually help peddle drugs.)

Date: Sun, 7 Mar 1999 23:10:42 -0800
From: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org (MAPNews)
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
Subject: MN: US: OPED: America's Misguided Drug War
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Reply-To: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Organization: Media Awareness Project http://www.mapinc.org/lists/
Newshawk: General Pulaski
Pubdate: Mon, 08 Mar 1999
Source: Christian Science Monitor (US)
Copyright: 1999 The Christian Science Publishing Society.
Contact: oped@csps.com
Website: http://www.csmonitor.com/
Forum: http://www.csmonitor.com/atcsmonitor/vox/p-vox.html
Author: Mike Tidwell

AMERICA'S MISGUIDED DRUG WAR

Attacking suppliers of drugs without addressing the demand guarantees drug
sales will continue

No credible evidence exists showing that stringent enforcement of US
narcotics laws actually reduces drug use in this country. Indeed, the
opposite seems true: Law-enforcement efforts actually promote illicit drug
use.

That's certainly my observation after 10 years working with homeless drug
addicts in Washington, D.C. The endless police raids on crack houses,
shooting galleries, and various open-air markets simply help push drugs
block-by-block through the city, guaranteeing that every D.C. teenager will
eventually have a full-blown market on his street corner.

The problem is simple: Attacking supply without addressing demand guarantees
that drug markets and drug sales will not cease. They simply move to another
spot momentarily untargeted by police raids. Then they move again.

This phenomenon exacerbates the epidemic, casting a wider net than would
otherwise be cast, reeling into drugs youths who would otherwise stand a
much better chance of staying drug-free.

It's important to be very clear on this point: Our law-enforcement efforts
actually help peddle drugs. Society has become a pusher. It's hard to
conclude otherwise.

Now comes news that we'll soon get more of the same. The Clinton
administration's annual antinarcotics budget, unveiled earlier this month,
calls for roughly $12 billion in spending for law enforcement, interdiction
and other efforts to attack narcotics supply. That's a 30-percent increase
since 1996 and nearly a doubling of such funding over the past decade. This
means more money for more cops and other resources to help facilitate the
spread of crack, heroin, and marijuana through the streets of America's
cities.

Tragically, as in past years, funding to reduce drug demand constitutes
barely a third of the proposed federal narcotics budget. This, while local
spending for treatment in many US cities continues to drop. Washington's
treatment system is in shambles. Between 1993 and 1998, the city's treatment
budget fell from $31.3 million to $19.7 million - a 37-percent drop. Drug
offenders - sentenced to treatment by judges - languish in prison for months
for lack of a bed, and about 1,200 people are on the city's waiting list for
methadone maintenance. Across the United States, treatment programs can
accommodate only about 50 percent of hard-core users.

This, despite the fact that treatment is widely acknowledged to be much
cheaper than narcotics enforcement and interdiction efforts. For example,
for the cost of a single customs department drug surveillance plane - a
reported $47 million - the District could treat all those on its waiting
list and more.

But instead of treating drug addiction as a public health issue, we continue
to criminalize it with endless street raids, sending hundreds of thousands
of nonviolent drug offenders to prison. And incarceration is yet another way
our policies actually promote drug use. Almost half of all inmates at D.C.'s
Lorton prison are nonviolent drug offenders, many of them sentenced under
draconian federal laws requiring a mandatory minimum of five years in jail
for possessing as little as 5 grams of crack - the weight of two pennies.

Any offender who isn't chronically deviant and prone to long-term drug use
before incarceration has his chances ratcheted up significantly during five
years' exposure to the violence and dysfunctions of prison culture.

It's time to end what amounts to state sponsorship of drug use in our
cities. Let's increase and improve treatment and drug education programs as
a first step toward gradual decriminalization and possible legalization.
Holland, to cite an example, has seen no significant increase in marijuana
use since legalizing coffee-house consumption more than 20 years ago. Among
young adolescents, drug use in Holland is actually lower than in the US.

Even with its risks and challenges, legalization seems to offer a better
alternative to the mess we have now, where tax dollars and law-enforcement
techniques police officers use actually encourage young people - however
inadvertently - to use drugs and take that first fateful step toward
addiction.

* Mike Tidwell is the author of 'In the Shadow of the White House: Drugs
death and redemption on the streets of the nation's capital' (Prima
Publishing, 1992). He lives in Takoma Park, Md.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Jailed Colombia Drug Lords Said Preparing For War (According to Reuters,
anonymous Colombian police officials claimed Monday that jailed Colombian
illegal-drug exporters were preparing to launch a domestic campaign of terror
against their possible extradition to the United States and have earmarked
$9.6 million dollars to finance it. The fact that the Columbian police and
military have been carrying out just such a campaign against civilians for
decades isn't mentioned. U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno also exhibited a
little bloodlust in a highly publicized visit to Colombia last week when she
said she would like to see the death penalty imposed in some drug cases tried
before U.S. courts.)

Date: Mon, 8 Mar 1999 16:29:13 -0800
From: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org (MAPNews)
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
Subject: MN: Colombia: Jailed Colombia Drug Lords Said Preparing For War
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Reply-To: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Organization: Media Awareness Project http://www.mapinc.org/lists/
Newshawk: David Hadorn (hadorn@dnai.com)
Pubdate: Mon, 08 Mar 1999
Source: Reuters
Copyright: 1999 Reuters Limited.

JAILED COLOMBIA DRUG LORDS SAID PREPARING FOR WAR

BOGOTA - Jailed Colombian drug lords are preparing to launch
a campaign of terror against their possible extradition to the United
States and have earmarked millions of dollars to finance it, police
sources said Monday.

The drug kingpins had agreed -- after clandestine negotiations
conducted from their cells inside maximum-security prisons -- to pool
resources for the campaign, which could begin immediately, the sources
said.

A fund, comprised of at least $9.6 million, has already been collected
by the jailed traffickers for attacks that would include car bombings
in leading cities and assassination attempts against Colombia's
National Police chief and prosecutor-general, said police sources who
requested anonymity.

The sources declined to say who controlled the fund, or exactly when
it had been created. They also declined to comment on whether brothers
Gilberto and Miguel Rodriguez Orejuelas, the billionaire Cali cartel
cocaine merchants jailed in Bogota since 1995, were suspected of
involvement in organizing the attacks.

But they confirmed the outline of a report in Bogota's leading daily
El Tiempo, which spoke of the terror campaign and so-called ``narco
fund'' for the first time over the weekend.

The newspaper report raised the specter of drug-related violence
similar to what Colombia suffered in the 1980s and early 1990s when
thousands of people -- including three presidential candidates, an
attorney general, judges and a top newspaper editor -- died in attacks
carried out in the name of a shadowy group known as ``The
Extraditables.''

The group was headed by late and notoriously violent Medellin cartel
drug boss Pablo Escobar, whose strongarm tactics prompted lawmakers to
clamp a constitutional ban on extradition in 1991.

That concession came a year after Escobar's hired assassins killed 500
policemen in the northwest city of Medellin alone, collecting $2,000
for every hit.

The ban on extradition was lifted in a politically charged vote by
Colombia's Congress in December 1997, and President Andres Pastrana
has said he would have no qualms about turning over any Colombian
wanted abroad.

The new extradition law was passed but was not retroactive, however,
meaning that it cannot apply to crimes committed prior to December
1997.

In theory, that bars the Rodriguez Orejuelas from having to face
extradition. But they could still be handed over to United States, if
they are found to have continued running their drug empire from inside
Bogota's La Picota prison.

The Cali cartel was once considered the world's biggest criminal drug
syndicate, and the Rodriguez Orejuelas controlled up to 80 percent of
its cocaine, according to U.S. drug experts.

U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno, who fought unsuccessfully to win the
brothers' extradition in 1996, has declined to say whether she will
try again. But she brought the entire extradition issue back to the
forefront, with a high-profile visit to Colombia last week.

Reno also stirred controversy with remarks in an interview in
Colombia's Cambio news magazine, where she said she would like to see
the death penalty imposed in some drug cases tried before U.S. courts.

Judicial officials say at least 14 Colombian traffickers now face
possible extradition to the United States, four of whom could be
handed over to U.S. drug agents within a matter of weeks or even days.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Detective Alleges Mass Corruption By Senior Police (According to the
Examiner, in Ireland, Scotland Yard Detective Chief Superintendent David
Wood, head of CIB 3, the elite anti-corruption squad, told the Sunday
Telegraph in London that corrupt senior officers were passing information to
criminal gangs for sums exceeding £350,000. "The kind of criminals involved
in large-scale drug smuggling don't hesitate to use violence," he said,
without citing a single such incident or explaining why illegal-drug
distributors had passed up so many opportunities.)

Date: Mon, 8 Mar 1999 16:27:00 -0800
From: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org (MAPNews)
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
Subject: MN: Ireland: Detective Alleges Mass Corruption By Senior Police
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Reply-To: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Organization: Media Awareness Project http://www.mapinc.org/lists/
Newshawk: Martin Cooke (mjc1947@cyberclub.iol.ie)
Pubdate: 8 March 1999
Source: Examiner, The (Ireland)
Copyright: Examiner Publications Ltd, 1999
Contact: exam_letters@examiner.ie
Website: http://www.examiner.ie/

DETECTIVE ALLEGES MASS CORRUPTION BY SENIOR POLICE

SENIOR members of the Metropolitan police force have taken cash
payments of more than £350,000 in return for sabotaging undercover
operations, an anti-corruption detective alleged yesterday.

Detective Chief Superintendent David Wood, head of CIB 3, Scotland
Yard's elite anti-corruption squad told the Sunday Telegraph that
corrupt senior officers were passing information onto criminal gangs
for large sums. In the first interview since he became head of the
squad last year, Mr Wood said he knew of cases where the undercover
officers investigating drug gangs had been identified by corrupt colleagues.

He said: ''They are callously putting their colleagues' lives at risk.

"The kind of criminals involved in large-scale drug smuggling don't
hesitate to use violence." And he said the officers involved were at
high levels in the force, tending to be successful detectives who have
worked in special squads within the CID.

He said: ''They are often highly successful and energetic in dealing
with criminals.

''Ninety days out of 100 they will successfully be pursuing
criminals.

''Then on the 100th day, they're taking money from criminals in
exchange for destroying evidence or sabotaging investigations.''

Mr Woods, who has had 25 years experience as a detective and received
14 commendations, said he was committed to rooting out such corruption.

He said: ''Our main priority is to get corrupt officers out of the
force or out of positions where they can do damage.''

He added that it was very difficult to get an officer convicted for
corruption as often, informants could not give evidence at trials.

He said: ''We can move them so they can't do any harm to anyone.

''But the Met still pays their wages and pensions when really, they
should be rotting in prison.''

And he added he believed corruption within the force could pose just
as serious a threat as the recently highlighted problem of racism.

More than 50 police officers are currently suspended on suspicion of
corruption.

The first in a series of trials is expected to begin in October.

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Copy Successful Anti-Drugs Policy (A letter to the editor of the Examiner, in
Ireland, says a proposal to start imprisoning young people who experiment
with soft drugs such as cannabis and ecstasy won't work. One has only to look
at the US, which has the largest proportion of its population behind bars of
any of the developed countries in the world, a sizeable minority, if not a
majority, of them for non-violent drugs offences. And yet drug use continues
to soar in the US. The proposal also ignores the fact that Ireland already
incarcerates a higher percentage of its population than any other EU country.
And the suggestion that Ireland should copy the UK's example ignores the fact
that the UK is the only country in the EU with a higher rate of teenage drug
use than Ireland. The report of the Crime Forum, issued towards the end of
last year,actually suggested we should seriously consider the option of
legalising drugs. At the time, one national newspaper even called for a
public debate on the matter. Nothing has been heard since.)

Date: Mon, 8 Mar 1999 19:45:32 -0800
From: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org (MAPNews)
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
Subject: MN: Ireland: PUB LTE: Copy Successful Anti-Drugs Policy
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Reply-To: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Organization: Media Awareness Project http://www.mapinc.org/lists/
Newshawk: Martin Cooke (mjc1947@cyberclub.iol.ie)
Pubdate: 8 Mar 1999
Source: Examiner, The (Ireland)
Copyright: Examiner Publications Ltd, 1999
Contact: exam_letters@examiner.ie
Website: http://www.examiner.ie/
Section: Letters to the Editor
Author: Martin Cooke

COPY SUCCESSFUL ANTI-DRUGS POLICY

WILLIE O'DEA, TD, thinks that we should start imprisoning young people who
experiment with soft drugs like cannabis and ecstasy (The Examiner, March 2).

He is quoted as saying that "teenagers should be threatened with jail
sentences and criminal records to stop rising recreational drug abuse."

I'm sorry to disappoint Mr O'Dea, but such a tactic will just not work.

He only has to look at the US, which has the largest proportion of its
population behind bars of any of the developed countries in the world, a
sizeable minority, if not a majority, of them for non-violent drugs
offences. And yet drug use continues to soar in the US.

Mr O'Dea accepts that lots of the young people who do experiment with soft
drugs are doing well at school and college. So it would seem that their
recreational drug use is not doing them the harm that many people would
have them believe.

Mr O'Dea suggests that we should copy the UK's example of tackling drug use
by teenagers, ignoring the fact that the UK is the only country in the EU
with a higher rate of teenage drug use than Ireland.

And he blithely ignores the fact that we already incarcerate a higher
percentage of our population than any other EU country. Where does he
expect to find the extra prison spaces that would be needed to put his
ideas into practice?

There is already a perception amongst young people that the so-called war
on drugs is really a war against them, and an attack on their lifestyles.

Mr O'Dea is quoted as saying: "I have no problem borrowing a good idea that
has worked elsewhere."

If this is true, and if he is really concerned about the welfare of our
youth, I would suggest that he would do far better to look at the
Netherlands rather than the UK.

The Netherlands took the bold step of trying to separate hard and soft
drugs over 20 years ago. This included the setting up of the so-called
coffee-shops where small quantities of cannabis can be purchased, and the
treating of addiction to harder drugs, like opiates, as the medical problem
that it really is, rather than a legal one.

As a result, they now have the lowest rate of cannabis use by teenagers in
the developed world, and the highest survival rate of opiate addicts. The
average age of opiate addicts is now approaching 40, because largely due to
the fact that existing addicts are not dying and there are very few new
addicts coming on stream.

I wonder just how many young lives Mr O'Dea would like to see ruined by the
suggestions that he makes?

It seems that all Mr O'Dea is really saying is that, in the case of soft
drugs at least, the only real harm that can come from their use is that you
might finish up in prison or with a criminal record for using them.

Well, of course we could argue that the only reason that that is true is
because the government decided to make the drugs illegal in the first place.

The report of the Crime Forum, issued towards the end of last year,
actually suggested we should seriously consider the option of legalising
drugs. That is really the only way we can bring their use under control.

Indeed, at the time, one national newspaper even called for a public debate
on the matter.

Nothing has been heard of this since.

Instead, we now have a junior government minister suggesting we start
locking up our children.

Martin Cooke, Corcormick, Drumkeerin, Co Leitrim. mcooke2@iol.ie

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Weekly Action Report on Drug Policies, Year 5, No. 9 (A summary of European
and international drug policy news, from CORA, in Italy)

Date: Mon, 08 Mar 1999 16:53:36 +0100
To: CORAFax (cora.belgique@agora.stm.it)
From: CORAFax (cora.belgique@agora.stm.it)
From: "CRRH mailing list" (restore@crrh.org)
Subject: CORAFax #9 (EN)

ANTIPROHIBITIONIST OF THE ENTIRE WORLD ....
Year 5 #9, March 8 1999

***

Weekly Action Report on Drug Policies

Edited by the CORA - Radical Antiprohibitionist Coordination, federated to
- TRP-Transnational Radical Party (NGO, consultive status, I)
- The Global Coalition for Alternatives to the Drug War

***

director: Vincenzo Donvito
All rights reserved

***

http://www.agora.stm.it/coranet
mailto:cora.news@agora.stm.it

***

CORA NEWS

***

ITALY - To maintain internal political balances within the majority the
Senate has approved the depenalisation of minor offences without including
those related to drugs. The D'Alema Government, which is officially anti
prohibitionist, is instead putting an end to any reform hypothesis.

ITALY, PIEDMONT - The local administrator of public health, in answering
the questions posed by the CORA, does not consider that the unevenness
applied by the SERTS in methadone treatments is a negative fact. The CORA
wonders whether the administrator knows or does not know the existing laws
or whether he has just decided to not apply them.

***

NEWS FROM THE WORLD

***

000509 26/02/99
EUROPE / RUSSIA
ADDICTION
CORRIERE DELLA SERA

Brain surgery can cure drug addicts. In S'Petersburg 112 people have
already undergone this new and widely criticised operation. The surgeons
assure that it's just like 'pulling a tooth' and that it has nothing to do
with lobotomy.

***

000516 02/03/99
E.U. / NL
ADDICTION
SUEDDEUTSCHE Z.

In Holland there is an employment agency that finds jobs only for drug
addicts. Top Score employs them for cleaning jobs organizing them in
groups. They are forbidden to take drugs during their work hours, and if
this happens the whole group takes the blame.

***

000517 02/03/99
E.U. / GERMANY
ADDICTION
FRANKFURTER / NEUE ZUERCHER Z. / SUEDDEUTSCHE Z.

The 1998 official report on drugs says that in Germany deaths for drug
consumption have risen by 11,5% in relation to 1997 (for a total of 1674)
and that new consumers have risen by 1,7%. Cannabis is the most used
substance, ecstasy remains stable while tobacco and alcohol consumption are
going up (especially the latter).

***

000518 01/03/99
E.U. / FRANCE
ADDICTION
LE FIGARO

Marie-Crisitne D'Welles's book 'Si on parlait du hashish' has just been
published. The writer has interviewed 28 adolescents and intends to put all
parents on alert: the kids smoke hashish but don't disdain mushrooms, LSD
and ecstasy.

***

000503 25/02/99
E.U. / ITALY
CONSUMERS
IL GIORNALE

The State Council has readmitted into service an exice officer who had been
suspended from service because he was caught smoking a joint duting a
party. The reason is that 'you can't lose your job for a stupid mistake'.

***

000508 01/03/99
AMERICA / VENEZUELA
DISCOVERIES
DER SPIEGEL

Venezuelan researchers have discovered a special fungus that breeds on coca
leafs. It is as small as a grain of sand and is a distant relative of the
'aspergillus' family. It is capable of destroying entire coca plantations
without damaging other plants.

***

000515 28/02/99
AFRICA / MAROCCO
DRUG MAFIA
EL PAIS

Police reports say that hashish traffic is no longer controlled by German,
Spanish and Italian organisations. It is now in the hands of the Moroccans,
aided by famous lawyers.

***

000506 24/02/99
E.U. / SPAIN
INITIATIVE
EL PAIS

The spanish project of controlled distribution of heroin has been
temporarily stopped. The Junta Internacional de Fiscalizacion de
Stupefacientes says it is better to wait and see the results from the OMS
on the experiments in course.

***

000504 25/02/99
E.U. / GB / SWANSEA
JURISPRUDE NCE
SUEDDEUTSCHE Z.

Although Prince Charles is favourable to therapeutic use of cannbis, a
Welsh man has been condemned to a year in prison for having grown it and
used it. It is the only effective pain killer against gout.

***

000505 01/03/99
AMERICA / USA
JUSTICE
HERALD TRIBUNE

In the United States a person is arrested for drug related crimes every 20
minutes and a new prison is built every week. Ten years ago people arrested
for drugs were half the number they are today. The crack phenomen one
xploded in 1980, but since then laws on drugs are still the same. In no
other country in the world are so many people kept in jail and only Russia
spends more money than the USA for the prisons.

***

000514 01/03/99
E.U. / ITALY
JUSTICE
IL SOLE 24 ORE

The ISTAT has published the official figures concerning drug realted
crimes. Every 100 thousand inhabitants in cities of a population above 300
thousand there have been 45 denouciations in 1984, 155 in 1994, 124 in 1996
and 134 in 1997.

***

000507 27/02/99
E.U. / SPAIN
PREVENTION
FRANKFURTER

DHS, the Observatory on drug addiciton, has asked that a more incisive
intervention to prevent all kinds of addiction be financed with the taxes
from alcohol, tobacco and lotteries.

***

000510 27/02/99
E.U. / ITALY
WAR ON DRUGS
LA STAMPA / LA REPUBBLICA

During a congress organised by the UN, Mr. Pino Arlacchi, the UN's delegate
for fighting drugs, has renewed his proposal for an international agreement
to abolish bank secrecy. 'International crime is organised like
multinationals are, while States are isolated'.

***

000511 04/03/99
AMERICA / CUBA
WAR ON DRUGS
L'ESPRESSO

The former Mexican President, Carlos Salinas, is hiding in Cuba. This is
what Cuban authorities declare, without adding anything else to not intrude
on a free citizen's privacy. Salinas is suspected of having made his wealth
through collaboration with the drug cartels. In Cuba drug traffickers are
sentenced to death, while corruptors are protected.

***

000512 26/02/99
AMERICA
WAR ON DRUGS
HERALD TRIBUNE

During a heraing with the Government on the concession of a certificate of
committment in the fight against drugs to be given to Mexico, the Head of
the US Drug Enforcement Administration painted a gloomy portray of the
situation saiyng that Mexican traffickers have created serious security
problems for the USA.

***

000513 27/02/99
AMERICA
WAR ON DRUGS
FINANCIAL TIMES

The annual report by the International Narcotics Control Strategy says that
coca cultivations have diminished in Bolivia and Peru, while they have
risen in Colombia, particularly in the areas controlled by the rebels. And
Mexico continues to be the main route for cocaine towards the United States.

***

000519 08/03/99
AMERICA / BOLIVIA
WAR ON DRUGS
NEWSWEEK

Even though Colombia has recieved a 'certificate' from the USA for its
commitment to fight drugs, the presence of traffickers and coca plantations
is still consistent. US and Colombian agents have arrested 19 members of an
organisation worth 100 million Usd and that controled its trafficking via
Internet.

***

CLIPPINGS

SINGAPORE - Dr. Chee Soon has been arrested for having sent out an email in
support of the Internet conference on drugs. This conference is an
alternative to the official Interpol one that is being held in Rangoon.

ITALY - These are the comments to the exclusion of drug related crimes from
depenalisation of minor offences enacted by the Senate: Green Party: 'We
will distribute marijuana in Parliament'; Forum Droghe: 'A ridiculous
comedy'; Ersilia Salvato (senator of 'Democratici di Sinistra'): 'A present
for the right-wing opposition'.

***

CORAFax 1999

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[End]