Articles Posted in Drug Offenses

In a unanimous decision, the U.S. Sentencing Commission wants to retroactively reduce the prison sentences of approximately 19,500 federal inmates convicted of crack cocaine charges.

The decision is intended to lighten sentences retroactively for certain crimes related to crack cocaine and narrow the disparity between sentences for cocaine powder and crack cocaine. Crack cocaine was previously thought to be more dangerous. The U.S. sentencing commission recently reduced the sentences for crack cocaine possession, effective November 1. Under the Sentencing Act of 1984, lowering the penalties for a crime is retroactive.

86% o the 19,500 prisoners serving sentences for crack cocaine convictions are black.

Some 3,800 prisoners could be released within one year of the March 3 effective date, which will give prison officials and judges time to handle a number of issues, including public safety. In Massachusetts, 91 inmates convicted of crack cocaine may find their requests for reduced sentences granted. The decision on whether to reduce their sentences will be made by federal judges.

The Bush administration opposes reducing crack cocaine sentences retroactively. Attorney General Michael Mukasey says that changing the standard retroactively for those that were convicted prior to the rule change would disregard any mitigating factors that judges had considered when setting the prison sentences.

New U.S. Sentencing Guidelines for Crack Cocaine Offenders:

• 1st time offenders convicted of possessing at least 5 grams of crack cocaine must serve 51 to 63 months in prison (previously 63 to 78 months).
• 1st time offenders with a minimum of 50 grams of cocaine may serve 97-121 months in prison (previously 121-151 months).

The majority of the 200,000 federal prisoners in the U.S. are drug offenders. Offenses involving cocaine are covered under federal and state laws.

Crack sentences eligible to be cut, Boston.com, December 12, 2007
Panel Says 19,500 Crack Inmates Can Seek Reduced Sentences, CNN.com/AP, December 12, 2007
Sentencing Commission Votes Unanimously to Apply Amendment Retroactively for Crack Cocaine Offenses, USSC.gov, December 11, 2007
U.S. Sentencing Ranges Lowered for Crack Cocaine, NPR.org, November 2, 2007
Related Web Resources:

United States Sentencing Commission

The Sentencing Project
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In Massachusetts, US District Judge Nancy Gertner dismissed drug charges against Earl Dessesaure on the grounds that federal prosecutors conducted a sloppy investigation and a Boston police officer made fabricated statements about the case in court. Gertner called the prosecution “deeply flawed” and said allowing the case to advance would undermine justice.

In 2003, Boston and Quincy police started watching Dessesaure’s apartment in Quincy. They discovered white powder in garbage bags that he would place in a dumpster close to his apartment. Police did not test the white powder that they thought could be heroin.

On February 24, police officers followed Dessesaure and witnessed an exchange that they thought was a drug deal. They arrested Dessesaure and found six plastic bags of heroin in his rectum.

They then seized his keys and entered his residence without a search warrant. At his apartment, they found a gun, more white powder, and paraphernalia to distribute drugs. It was only then that they applied for and got a search warrant. Because police conducted their first search without a warrant, the majority of the evidence became inadmissible in court.

Also, Boston police Officer John Broderick Jr. lied in court when he said that Dessesaure yelled to a crowd during an arrest that someone “call my peeps.” Broderick claimed that the shout out was a code phrase to let someone know that any remaining evidence at his home needed to be destroyed.

Officer Broderick, however, was not at the scene of the arrest. A police officer that was at the scene could not verify Broderick’s claim. Boston Police investigators continue to stand by Broderick and his actions.

In 2004, Gertner ruled that there wasn’t enough evidence for police to conduct a warrantless search of Dessesaure’s apartment. Federal prosecutors appealed the decision and won. Gertner then determined that the Speedy Trial Act was violated when there was no further action.

Her dismissal of the case with prejudice means that prosecutors cannot refile any charges related to the case. Dessesaure has been held without bail for over four years and will likely stay there while prosecutors appeal.

This is the second time that Dessesaure has been set free because the Boston police conducted improper investigations. A Suffolk Superior Court Judge threw out evidence against him in 1998 after determining that another Boston police offer made up a story about an informant. 19 bags of crack cocaine confiscated from his car were thrown out as evidence.

US Judge Dismisses Charges in Drug Case, Boston.com, November 25, 2007
System to Stem Police Perjury Not Implemented, Boston.com, October 24, 2005

Related Web Resources:

Search Warrants: What They Are and When They’re Necessary

Speedy Trial Act of 1974
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Carlos A. Pizarro, one of three former Boston police officers that were arrested in an undercover drug bust last year, pled guilty to federal cocaine charges yesterday. He pled guilty to possession of 100 kg of cocaine with intent to distribute and a second count of cocaine possession with intent to distribute. As part of the plea deal, the government dropped its charge that Pizarro engaged in heroin trafficking.

Pizarro has already spent a year in jail while waiting for his trial. In court yesterday, Pizarro admitted to guarding a shipment of cocaine in 2006 for drug dealers that were actually undercover FBI agents. The other two ex-police officers, Nelson Carrasquillo and Roberto Pulido, continue to maintain their innocence.

The plea deal does not obligate Pizarro to testify against his two former partners. He does, however, have to provide details regarding his own involvement in any crimes. He also has to give up the $17,000 he was given to protect the drug shipment. The government will now recommend that he serve no more than 14 years in prison.

The three former police officers were taken into custody in Miami in July 2006 when they came to a meeting with undercover FBI agents. The agents paid the three men the remaining $36,000 of their $51,000 fee for guarding the shipment while it was transported to Jamaica Plain from Western Massachusetts.

Pulido, dubbed the group’s ringleader, is also accused of identity theft, bringing illegal immigrants into the country, selling steroids, insurance fraud, and guarding parties attended by drug dealers, police officers, and prostitutes at a warehouse in Hyde Park. He had initially been suspended without pay after his arrest related to the undercover drug bust. He was fired in May 2007, however, after he refused to take his yearly drug test.

Pulido has to stay in jail until the case is resolved. Carrasquillo is out on bail.

Here are a few facts about drugs in Massachusetts from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s web site:

• The primary drugs that are abused in Massachusetts are heroin and cocaine.
• MDMA, a club drug, is also widely available in Massachusetts • Other drugs that are readily available in Massachusetts include marijuana, Roxicet, Percocet, and OxyContin
A person can be apprehended for drug-related charges if he or she is found trafficking drugs, distributing drugs, smuggling drugs, manufacturing drugs, laundering money related to drug deals, or drug possession.

Ex-officer admits guilt in drug case, Boston.com, September 11, 2007
Massachusetts 2007: Drugs and Drug Abuse, DEA

Related Web Resources:

Drugs and Crime Facts, US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics

Mandatory Minimum Sentences, Drug Policy Alliance Continue reading

Drug informant Stephen G. Kalil, the Dorchester man whose help led to the arrests of a retired Massachusetts trooper, a state trooper, and two others for collecting drug debts and selling OxyContin, has been arrested.

He was brought into federal court last week on charges that he sold drugs-even while helping authorities put the other four people jail.

In July, Kalil informed investigators that he was going to Florida because he felt safer there after all the exposure he’d received as an informant during the arrests. When he returned to Massachusetts via Logan International Airport in Boston a week ago, however, he went straight to a Federal Express facility where he allegedly dropped off a package filled with drugs. The package was to be delivered to a location on Martha’s Vineyard.

The 49-year-old Dorchester man was also charged with illegal possession of firearms stemming from the seizure of three guns from his home in Dorchester in January.

Kalil has a criminal record for drug dealing, assaults, and larceny and is not allowed to own a gun because he is a convicted felon.

An attorney for Kalil says the fact that he was allowed to be an informant despite the discovery of the firearms earlier in the year shows how the government misuses its informants.

Kalil had been apprehended last November while trying to board a plane to Florida with a large amount of OxyContin pills and more than $20,000 in cash. He told Customs Enforcement agents, US immigration, and Massachusetts State Police that he was an informant against Mark V. Lemieux, the Massachusetts state trooper that he helped get arrested.

The investigation that followed led to Lemieux’s arrest.

Informer is held on drug charges, Boston.com, July 21, 2007
Heroin influx spurs N.E. drug epidemic, Boston.com, October 9, 2003

Related Web Resource:

Drug Policy Forum of Massachusetts
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