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Every 25Seconds EVERY 25 SECONDS The Human Toll of Criminalizing Drug Use in the United States H U M A N R I G H T S WATCH Every 25 Seconds The Human Toll of Criminalizing Drug Use in the United States Copyright © 2016 Human Rights Watch All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America ISBN: 978-1-6231-34105 Cover design by Rafael Jimenez Human Rights Watch defends the rights of people worldwide. We scrupulously investigate abuses, expose the facts widely, and pressure those with power to respect rights and secure justice. Human Rights Watch is an independent, international organization that works as part of a vibrant movement to uphold human dignity and advance the cause of human rights for all. Human Rights Watch is an international organization with staff in more than 40 countries, and offices in Amsterdam, Beirut, Berlin, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Goma, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Nairobi, New York, Paris, San Francisco, Sydney, Tokyo, Toronto, Tunis, Washington, DC, and Zurich. For more information, please visit our website: http://www.hrw.org For nearly 100 years, the ACLU has been our nation’s guardian of liberty, working in courts, legislatures, and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties that the Constitution and the laws of the United States guarantee everyone in this country. Whether it’s achieving full equality for lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgender people; establishing new privacy protections for our digital age of widespread government surveillance; ending mass incarceration; or preserving the right to vote or the right to have an abortion; the ACLU takes up the toughest civil liberties cases and issues to defend all people from government abuse and overreach. With more than a million members, activists, and supporters, the ACLU is a nationwide organization that fights tirelessly in all 50 states, Puerto Rico, and Washington, DC to safeguard everyone’s rights. For more information, please visit our website: https://www.aclu.org/ OCTOBER 2016 ISBN: 978-1-6231-34105 Every 25 Seconds The Human Toll of Criminalizing Drug Use in the United States Summary ........................................................................................................................... 1 A National Problem ...................................................................................................................4 Aggressive Policing ............................................................................................................4 Racial Discrimination ......................................................................................................... 5 Small-Scale Drug Use: Prosecutions for Tiny Amounts ............................................................... 7 A System that Coerces Guilty Pleas .......................................................................................... 8 Incarceration for Drug Possession ............................................................................................ 9 Probation, Criminal Justice Debt, and Collateral Consequences ............................................... 10 A Call for Decriminalizationp ................................................................................................... 12 Key Recommendations ......................................................................................................14 Methodology .................................................................................................................... 16 I. The Human Rights Case for Decriminalization ................................................................ 22 II. Background .................................................................................................................. 28 The “War on Drugs” ............................................................................................................... 28 Drug Use in the United States ................................................................................................. 30 State Drug Possession Laws ................................................................................................... 34 III. The Size of the Problem: Arrests for Drug Use Nationwide ............................................ 37 Possession Arrests by the Numbers ........................................................................................ 37 Racial Disparities .................................................................................................................... 43 Incentives for Drug Arrests ...................................................................................................... 50 IV. The Experience of Being Policed .................................................................................. 55 Pretextual Stops and Searches without Consent...................................................................... 55 Feeling Targeted ..................................................................................................................... 59 V. Aggressive Prosecutions .............................................................................................. 63 Going after the Small Stuff ..................................................................................................... 66 Possession Charges in Texas for Fractions of a Gram ........................................................ 66 Paraphernalia Charged as Possession .............................................................................. 71 Medications Made into Felonies ............................................................................................. 74 Charging Distribution in Possession Cases .............................................................................. 78 VI. Pretrial Detention and the False Choice of a Plea Deal .................................................. 82 Pretrial Detention .................................................................................................................. 82 Coerced Guilty Pleas .............................................................................................................. 89 Pleading to Get Out of Jail ................................................................................................. 93 Pleading to Avoid the Trial Penalty ................................................................................... 96 Pleading When Innocent ................................................................................................. 106 VII. Sentencing by the Numbers ...................................................................................... 110 VIII. Living Under a Dark Cloud: Probation and Criminal Justice Debt .............................. 119 Probation ............................................................................................................................. 119 Onerous Conditions ....................................................................................................... 120 Financial Costs ............................................................................................................... 125 Violations and Revocations ............................................................................................ 126 Criminal Justice Debt ............................................................................................................ 128 IX. The Impact of Incarceration and a Criminal Record ..................................................... 132 When People Are Locked Up ................................................................................................. 132 Impact on Family ............................................................................................................ 133 Impact on Health ............................................................................................................ 137 Returning to Nothing ...................................................................................................... 142 When People Are Labeled Drug Offenders and Felons ............................................................ 144 Exclusion from Public Benefits and Rights ...................................................................... 145 Vulnerability to Private Discrimination ............................................................................ 159 X. How Criminalization Undermines Health ...................................................................... 165 Failure to Provide Appropriate Treatment for Drug Dependence ............................................. 167 Obstacles to Emergency Care ................................................................................................ 169 Drug Courts: A Flawed Solution ............................................................................................. 173 The US Drug Court Model ................................................................................................ 175 Human Rights Concerns ................................................................................................. 176 XI. The Way Forward: A Call for Decriminalization ........................................................... 180 Portugal’s Successful Decriminalization of All Drugs ............................................................. 182 US States’ Experiments with Marijuana Decriminalization ..................................................... 184 Recommendations ..........................................................................................................
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