A criminal justice system is an essential institution in every country as it helps the public to maintain law and order. People expect the criminal justice system to play its fundamental role by applying the law to separate the innocent from the guilty who may cause harm to the public. There is also an expectation that the law enforcers should be fair and rehabilitate the guilty people to become essential people in the community. The nature of the hopes that the society has for criminal justice system leads to the creation of alternative policies that aim at improving or criticizing the existing policies. The increased rates of drug crimes in the United States resulted in the formulation of the minimum sentence in the 1980s that focused fighting the war against drugs in the country (.Pound, 2018). The consequences of the law were unfavorable forcing policymakers to formulate Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy as an alternative to address the problems associated with the minimum sentence. This paper explores the development of Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy focusing on the factors that contributed to the formation of the policy and its importance.
Development of Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy
Cocaine and federal sentencing policy require a need for the Congress to change the sentences prescribed for crack cocaine offences. This policy connects to the Anti Drug Abuse Act enacted in the year 1986 by the Congress that created a significant difference between the crack and powder cocaine. This reform prescribed significantly harsh punishment for people found guilty of possessing crack cocaine. This policy became severe in the year 1988 when the Congress prescribed a 5 and ten years mandatory sentence for any individual found guilty of possessing 5 grams of cracked cocaine.
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Cocaine and federal sentencing policy call for a need of changes some of the reforms made in 1986 to form the anti-drug act more lenient to citizens. For instance, the policy calls for a need of raising the amount of cocaine that leads to the five and ten tears mandatory minimum sentence to create room for focusing on more serious crimes such as murder and theft as well targeting people found in possession of large quantity of cocaine. The policy also calls for a need of the Congress reform to reduce the gap between the punishments prescribed found in possession of powder and cracked cocaine.
Factors that led to the development of Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy
Reduce prison overcrowding
The policy was developed in an attempt to respond to the mandatory minimum sentencing policy that led to prison overcrowding. In the year 1986, the Congress enacted a plan that called for a need of prescribing minimum compulsory sentence for people who possessed cocaine as a way of saving the public from the rising epidemic deaths of cocaine (Bjerk, 2017). The law expanded in the following years to include cases of murder, rape, and theft which resulted in an ever low and offenders who committed a first-time crime to take long periods in prisons. Consequently, the minimum mandatory sentence significantly contributed to overcrowding in prisons in the United States. According to Bjerk, (2017 by the year 2007, the prisoners in the United States increased from 200, 000 to approximately 1,520, 000 causing an economic burden of taking care of the offenders.
Eliminate sentencing disparities
The minimum mandatory policy enacted during the fight against drug abuse Act resulted in significant sentence gaps between the people found with powder and crack cocaine. The plan required that possession of 5 grams guaranteed a five-year sentence famously known as 100:1 ratio (Shannon, 2015). This difference appeared to be too large and created discrimination among the drug dealers. The disparity resulted in discrimination in the criminal justice system because majorities of more than three-quarter of offenders associated with possession of crack cocaine were black Americans.
Importance of cocaine and federal sentencing policy
Reduce discrimination in the criminal justice system
Cocaine and Federal sentencing policy will be essential in the criminal justice because reducing the gap between the powder and crack cocaine would reduce the level of discrimination experienced in the criminal justice system (Shannon, 2015). Different treatment of these offences resulted in the creation of unfair treatment of offenders because it appeared to be too harsh to the minority group. The discrimination is revealed through the 82% of black Americans who were detained for possession of cracked cocaine despite the establishment that only 66% had cocaine (Shannon, 2015). Reducing the gap between the mandatory minimum sentence between powder and crack cocaine would reduce the sentencing gap between African Americas and Native Americans.
Reduce prison overcrowding
Increasing the minimum quantity that subjected an individual to minimum mandatory would reduce the number of drug offenders in prisons. The 5 grams amount of cocaine prescribed for people who possessed cocaine appeared to be too small thus becoming a contributing factor to the prison overcrowding in the United States (Bjerk, 2017). The federal cocaine policy seeks to increase this quantity to ensure that the war against drugs focused on the significant offenders but not the small traders thus leading to declining in the number of prisoners thus reducing expenditures that the state incurs in taking care for prisoners.
Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy developed as an alternative for minimum mandatory sentence policy established under the Anti-Drug Abuse Act in 1986. The strategy originated in an objective of reducing prison overcrowding responsible for putting the country under economic pressure of caring for prisoners. The plan also developed due to the rising quest of reducing the gap between powder and crack cocaine offenders that led to racial injustice in the criminal system. The plan plays an essential role in reducing prison overcrowding as well as reducing discrimination in the criminal justice system.
References
Bjerk, D. (2017). Mandatory Minimum Policy Reform and the Sentencing of Crack Cocaine Defendants: An Analysis of the Fair Sentencing Act. Journal of Empirical Legal Studies , 14 (2), 370-396.
Pound, R. (2018). Criminal justice in America . Routledge.
Shannon, C. (2015). The Smarter Sentencing Act: Achieving Fairness through Financially Responsible Federal Sentencing Policies, 48 J. Marshall L. Rev. 911 (2015). The John Marshall Law Review , 48 (3), 9.
