Decent article,Ivy.

Odd that not once in the article are the "Rockefeller Drug Laws" mentioned in article by a professor at C.U.N.Y. Those were the laws imposing MANDATORY minimum sentences on drug possession and trafficking convictions. Since the heroin...later cocaine...later crack eras...the laws have surely swelled the state prisons with the guilty and those who might be innocent but strike plea bargains for fear of long sentence.

Criminals are criminals and nobody here will ever read me defending criminal acts. Poor people do have a disadvantage in the legal system though and are more likely to cop out and serve time for the same type of charge as a person on higher end of socio economic ladder.

Not mentioning the NY and other state mandatory sentences for possession is a GLARING omission. State prisons have locked up people to the point of overcrowding for possession. In fact, several states including your state UTAH, have scaled back these mand. min. laws and changed laws reducing what were once felonies to misdemeanors. Again, this is happening in different parts of the country....so not a simple side versus side issue.