Politics on the Hudson

   Gov. David Paterson did a ceremonial signing today in Queens today of a bill that reduces sentences for non-violent drug offenders. The legislation, which was passed as part of the 2009-10 state budget early this month, gives judges total discretion to divert non-violent addicts to drug treatment, and it expands the state’s treatment programs.

    “This is a proud day for me and so many of my colleagues who have fought for so long to overhaul the drug laws and restore judicial discretion in narcotics cases,” Paterson said at Elmcor Youth and Adult Activities Inc., a state Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services-funded drug-treatment center. “For years, thousands of New Yorkers have spoken out against the Rockefeller Drug Laws.”

   The Rockefeller-era drug laws set up mandatory sentencing for non-violent criminals convicted of drug offenses. There were some changes made to the laws in recent years, but advocates said they were not enough. Besides providing judges more authority over offenders, the new law provides opportunities for additional relief to offenders who were sent to prison under the old statutes. Drug offenders who are not addicted but who sell drugs will be sent to prison under the laws. The law also creates new crimes to ensure that adults who sell drugs to children are appropriately required to serve time in State prison.

   Sen. Ruth Hassell-Thompson, D-Mount Vernon, said the new law  creates a “balanced approach to drug addiction and crime.”

   “We are now shifting resources to treat addiction as a medical problem. By diverting addicts to drug-treatment courts, we believe we can get people off drugs and thereby reduce the demand for them,” she said in a statement.

   Assemblyman Greg Ball, R-Patterson, Putnam County, criticized a component of the new law that allows illegal immigrants who are drug offenders and face the “severe collateral consequences” of deportation to get substance-abuse treatment and not prison.

   “Last year we were able to pass some long-overdue common-sense legislation that called for the deportation of illegal aliens who are convicted of crimes,” he said in a statement. “Yet, that work is being unraveled with this dangerous provision…Regardless of one’s feeling on our nation’s illegal immigration problem, this simply doesn’t make sense.

Anthony Papa, who spent 12 years in prison under the Rockefeller-era drug laws, said he was grateful to see “meaningful reform. 

   “Now, it’s time to embrace the changes and set free those who have been imprisoned under harsh and unjust mandatory sentencing, allowing those who are eligible for judicial relief to be reunited with their families and start productive lives as citizens of New York,” communications specialist with the Drug Policy Alliance in New York City.

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