Don’t Tinker With New York’s Drug Laws States D.A. Brown

Don’t Tinker With New York’s Drug Laws States D.A. Brown

By Richard A. Brown

The following is a transcript of Brown’s remarks to Queens city, state, and federal legislators at the District Attorney’s annual legislative breakfast earlier this month.

We have got to think long and hard before we begin to tinker with our drug laws. Vigorous enforcement of drug laws has played a very significant role in the dramatic reduction of crime—particularly violent crime—in our city. Drug dealing is big business and drug dealers use violence to protect their turf, intimidate witnesses, rob one another and punish those who threaten their livelihood. Having come so far and having reduced violent crime in our communities so dramatically, it would be a serious mistake to take away from law enforcement the Rockefeller Drug Laws, the tools that have enabled us to make our streets safer.

Those who seek reform would have us believe that our prisons are filled with small-time drug offenders who are locked up for 15 years or more. But that is just not the case.

Most drug offenders are in prison today not because they possessed a small amount of drugs and have been swept up by the Rockefeller Drug Laws, but because they repeatedly sold drugs to make money or possessed large quantities of drugs intended for distribution to local communities, or because they have prior convictions for violent felonies.

Some 67 percent of drug felons in state prison today are second felony offenders and 86 percent of drug felons are in state prison not for a mere possession of drugs but for sale or intent to sell drugs. In those cases where a drug offender’s crimes are genuinely tied to a substance abuse problem those offenders are diverted into treatment under the District Attorney’s DTAP and drug court programs.

To the extent that Governor George Pataki has expressed a willingness to allow the courts through the appellate process to review those rare cases in which first offenders are serving life sentences for possession only, prosecutors are supportive. But to go beyond that—to dismantle our drug and second felony offender laws which have been so successful in lowering the level of violence in our society—would be a serious mistake.

Index crimes declined 10.7 percent in Queens North last year and 7.29 percent in Queens South. Crimes in all of the major categories went down, especially violent crime. Homicides declined from 121 in 1999 to 112, in spite of the deaths of five Wendy’s workers who lost their lives so tragically in Flushing last May.

The year 2000 figures represent an unbelievable drop from 1992, my first full year as district attorney, when there were 357 homicides in the county. That is a 68 percent decline in homicides over the past eight years. And there have been similar declines in other categories as well, including a 75.3 percent drop from the 50,000 cars reported stolen in 1990. I think it is fair to say that we have now become a much safer county in which to live and work.

Many of these dramatic reductions can be attributed to the New York Police Department’s enhanced crime control strategies and to the District Attorney’s Office’s prosecutorial and investigative techniques, including obtaining convictions and long sentences for career criminals and violent predators.

My office also cited dramatic reductions in crime in the areas of auto crime, domestic violence, criminal activity in and around the airports, and economic crimes.

Richard A. Brown, a former judge, is District Attorney of Queens County. He was appointed by Robert M. Carney, District Attorney of Schnectady County and president of the New York State District Attorneys Association, to chair a committee of prosecutors to coordinate the association’s response to any proposed changes in the drug laws of New York state.