SENTENCING MUST ACCOUNT FOR STARTLING SCIENCE: ADDICTION IS BASED ON SHAPE OF DRUG USER'S BRAIN

A new drug study out of The University of Cambridge in England has some startling conclusions which should directly affect drug sentencing. Scientist found that recreational drug users who do not become addicted have "a brain structure which is significantly different than those who developed cocaine dependence." 

The implication is that those who become addicted to drugs are suffering as much from a flaw in their brains than from a simple lack of will power or from a desire to break the law.

The research was published, Biological Psychiatry; here's an excerpt from their findings:

The scientists discovered that a region in the frontal lobes of the brain, known to be critically implicated in decision-making and self-control, was abnormally bigger in the recreational cocaine users. 

The Cambridge researchers suggest that this abnormal increase in grey matter volume, which they believe predates drug use, might reflect resilience to the effects of cocaine, and even possibly helps these recreational cocaine users to exert self-control and to make advantageous decisions which minimize the risk of them becoming addicted. 

They found that this same region in the frontal lobes of the brain was significantly reduced in size in people with cocaine dependence...They also found that people who use illicit drugs like cocaine exhibit high levels of sensation-seeking personality traits, but only those developing dependence show personality traits of impulsivity and compulsivity.

One of the lynchpins of criminal law is that punishment must be based on acts which were done with the free will of the Defendant. Once someone becomes addicted the focus of the Criminal Justice System should not be on punishment with hard drug laws but on prevention. Yet for a percentage of the population taking drugs becomes an uncontrollable impulse. 
One wonders what would happen to an habitual cocaine addict such as Sigmund Freud who was addicted to cocaine for over twelve years. Had he live here in Tampa Bay, Florida would he have simply been charged with Trafficking in Cocaine while facing years of prison with a minimum mandatory sentence? 
An excellent book, Anatomy of an Addiction tells the harrowing tale of how Sigmund Freud beat his addiction while his best friend a renowned surgeon was ruined from his addiction to cocaine, while both experimented with the drug. 
Now with this new Cambridge scientific study we know that it wasn't mere will power that determined who would beat the addiction, it was biology. Other recent studies have show that genetic triggers prove predisposition to commit crime.
Shouldn't the Criminal Justice System take biological traits leading to addiction into account as sentencing to ensure fairness in Drug Court? Clearwater Criminal Defense Attorneys must persuade Judges that dependence on drugs is not just a lack of will power it's often simply a fact of biology.

OVERALL FLORIDA DRUG DEATHS RISE EVEN AS PRESCRIPTION PAINKILLER DRUG DEATHS DROP

A new Florida Department of Law Enforcement report based on medical examiners' analysis of Florida drug deaths indicates that overall Florida drug deaths have risen even as prescription drug deaths have fallen.  Don't jump the gun in thinking that Florida's Prescription Painkiller Database is responsible for any reduction of prescription drug deaths because as your Clearwater Criminal Defense Lawyer noted a few weeks ago, ten thousand Florida prescription drug deaths have not been sufficient in coaxing Florida doctors and pharmacists to embrace the Drug Database system as doctors continue to unlawfully dispense controlled substances at an alarming rate with only one doctor in twelve using the database. 
The FDLE report notes that alcohol, cocaine and oxycodone were the drugs most often found in bodies of those who died and further notes:

1. The drugs that caused the most deaths were all Benzodiazepines (545 – includes 461 deaths caused by Alprazolam) Oxycodone (607), Methadone (341), Ethyl Alcohol (269), and Cocaine (294).
2. The four drugs where more than 50% of the deaths in which these drugs were found were caused by Heroin (95.0%), Methadone (72.2%), Oxycodone (57.4%) and Fentanyl (57.0%).
3. Heroin continues to be the most lethal drug named in this report. Occurrences of Heroin have increased by 15% and deaths caused by Heroin increased by 23.5% when compared with the last six months of 2010.

Cezanne, Still Life, with Skull

It isn't enough to make needless arrests or further criminalize painkiller drug use by subjecting users to ever harsher drug sentencing laws. Fear of arrest should never keeps users from seeking help with drug addiction. Instead users should be given help and if arrested be given an opportunity to overcome drug addiction while having drug charges reduced with the help of Clearwater Criminal Defense Attorneys by effective representation in the Pinellas County Drug Court. These people need help not harsh minimum mandatory drug sentences. If new legislation is needed, it would be laws that will subject doctors and pharmacists who fail to use the Florida Painkiller Database to penalties for risking lives for profit.

NEW DRUG TEN TIMES STRONGER THAN HYDROCONE (aka VICODIN) WILL SOON INVADE & DESTROY LIVES IN CLEARWATER FLORIDA

Four international pharmaceutical companies are developing drugs that will for the first time make the most addictive ingredient in the drug hydrocodone available in a pure form, making the risk of addiction to Tampa & Pinellas Floridians that much greater, according to a recent article in the British press, which also states that the companies plan to make a pain killer called Zohydro which will be ten times stronger than vicodin. Will there now be ten times more arrests in Clearwater, St. Petersburg & Tampa that a Pinellas Drug Attorney will need to clean up in the arbitrary hope that law enforcement doesn't destroy more lives than the drugs?
Here's an excerpt from the British News Article:

Between 2003 and 2007 in the state of Florida alone, hydrocodone caused 910 deaths and contributed to 1,803 others.......Andrew Kolodny, president of Physicians for Responsible Opioid Prescribing told CBS: 'You've got a person on your product for life, and a doctor's got a patient who's never going to miss an appointment, because if they did and they didn't get their prescription, they would feel very sick...it's a terrific business model..."
Pinellas County has an effective drug court discussed in earlier blog entries with other solutions or decriminalization. The Courts are already overwhelmed with Defendants who are addicted because of misuse and abuse of the drugs being shoveled in their direction by the pharmeceutical companies. 

Haven't the drugs already available to Floridians destroyed enough lives? The companies insist that the patients can be monitored more closely in the future to avoid drug addiction. How? Look at the recent efforts by Floridian law enforcement to clamp down on prescription fraud and Pinellas Pain Doctors who give inappropriate prescriptions even at current lower levels of drug effectiveness. 
Ever harsher drug laws are not the answer. Nor is it the answer for companies to knowingly make these drugs ever more addictive and available. The only priority of the pharmaceutical companies is to make more money.

A painting of a number of pleasantly satisfied Pharmaceutical Reps at a Tampa Bay Conference.

Rembrandt The Anatomy Lesson, 1662

NEW PINELLAS DOMESTIC VIOLENCE COURT FOR ARRESTS, JAIL, COUNSELING & RESTRAINING ORDERS IN CLEARWATER FLORIDA

Local activists against domestic violence and sexual violence will help plan a new special Domestic Violence Pinellas County Court in Clearwater, Florida next year which will not only take in criminal cases but also be able to track and assign immediate injunctions for protection and restraining orders to protect victims. 


Money is also being allocated to 'train' Pinellas Judges to give sentences of jail or probation which includes completing successfully Pinellas Batterer Intervention Programs which entail six month group counseling sessions led by certified facilitators - who one assumes must go to work not only with a thick skin but perhaps shrouded within a suit of armor. 


The mere allegation of abuse should not be sufficient to bring criminal charges tho unfortunately this is not always true, if you've been falsely accused, arrested, charged or investigated it's necessary to contact a Pinellas domestic violence attorney to defend your rights and to conduct a complete investigation of the facts for your criminal defense.
The trend seems to be that every type of crime will one day have its own specialized Court with its own specialist Judge dealing only with the issues resulting from that type of crime. The Pinellas Drug Court has been a success as noted previously in this criminal defense blog and here, but drugs are a victimless crime. 
It's important to keep in mind that every crime even a repugnant or heinous crime such as the arrest for domestic violence must be proven in Florida by a reasonable doubt if the facts are in dispute.


741.28 Domestic violence; definitions.—As used in ss. 741.28-741.31:

(1) “Department” means the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

(2) “Domestic violence” means any assault, aggravated assault, battery, aggravated battery, sexual assault, sexual battery, stalking, aggravated stalking, kidnapping, false imprisonment, or any criminal offense resulting in physical injury or death of one family or household member by another family or household member.

(3) “Family or household member” means spouses, former spouses, persons related by blood or marriage, persons who are presently residing together as if a family or who have resided together in the past as if a family, and persons who are parents of a child in common regardless of whether they have been married. With the exception of persons who have a child in common, the family or household members must be currently residing or have in the past resided together in the same single dwelling unit.

Be careful with that Pitchfork, Fella - or you'll be sent to the Pinellas Domestic Violence Court.

American Gothic by Grant Wood, 1930.

                                                                         

DRUG TESTING & DRUG TREATMENT OR JAIL? IS THE CLEARWATER DRUG COURT A VIABLE OPTION IN PINELLAS COUNTY FLORIDA

To the credit of our local Judges and attorneys, Pinellas County has instituted a reasonably enlightened treatment for some drug offenders (see below for qualifications). It would almost be enough to make even a jaded Clearwater Drug Defense Attorney smile were it not for the fact that the rules for the Drug Court Program allows prosecutors rather than Judges to determine who can be accepted into the program -- wouldn't it make more sense for an impartial Judge to decide who is worthy of the program and to expand the ability of Judges to dismiss or reduce charges where appropriate.

The cooperative effort of a team approach is a hallmark of the Sixth Judicial Circuit Adult Drug Treatment Court in Clearwater Florida, Pinellas County. It is a court-supervised, comprehensive drug treatment court for non-violent defendants, I guess that leaves me out. This is a voluntary program requiring frequent appearances before the Drug Court Judge, substance abuse treatment and frequent, random testing for substance abuse.
1. Successful completion of the Adult Drug Treatment Court plan may result in the dismissal of charges against defendants entering the program through Pre-Trial Intervention (defendants facing a first-time, non-violent, third-degree felony charge and admitted to Drug Court at the sole discretion of the State Attorney).
2. For defendants entering the Drug Court as a condition of probation (post-plea drug court), successful completion may result in adjudication being withheld and/or a reduced length of probation.
3. All participants are required to make frequent court appearance (judicial reviews). Participants will appear before the drug court judge every 30 to 45 days.
4. Drug court is a 24-month program. After completion at least one year, persons who have completed treatment, remained drug free and completed all of their requirements of Pre-Trial Intervention or probation may petition the court for a dismissal of the charges (Pre-Trial Intervention) or early termination of probation (post-plea drug court).
Pinellas County Drug Court
Most Recent Drug Court Stats from Pinellas
Florida State Courts
Drug court a success: research - National - smh.com.au

A recent painting depicts a Pinellas County Prosecutor making impartial decisions on which Defendants will be eligible for Drug Court in Clearwater, Florida. 

Picasso The Absinth Drinker 1901.  What? Can you repeat that?

WHAT CAN FLORIDA LEARN FROM EUROPEAN DRUG DECRIMINALIZATION

In the nineteen-eighties most of the major industrialized countries of the world followed America's lead in declaring war on drugs by harshly increasing sentences for convictions and spending more money on investigations and prosecutions. The result was higher percentages of people in the democracies being sent to prison, sometimes even higher then in the totalitarian countries. 
Minimum Mandatory Drug sentences are especially troubling for Clearwater Trial Attorneys such as myself who have seen the destructive force of the criminal law strike and destroy productive lives.
To the credit of our local judges and attorneys, Pinellas County has instituted an enlightened treatment for those who qualify, which will be described in more detail in a future blog. Adult Drug Court, Clearwater Drug Defense Attorneys 


Yet for Florida Courts in search of justice some answers can be found from Portugal's experience. Portugal, a gateway for drug importation for all of Europe, buckled under European Union pressure to commit a huge percentage of its population to long term prison sentences, then Portugal relented. Recently, the New Yorker wrote about Portugal's solution, it success and its failure...


In 2001, Portuguese leaders, flailing about and desperate for change, took an unlikely gamble: they passed a law that made Portugal the first country to fully decriminalize personal drug use. 
For people caught with no more than a ten-day supply of marijuana, heroin, ecstasy, cocaine, or crystal methamphetamine, there would be no arrests, no prosecutions, no prison sentences. 
Dealers are still sent to prison, or fined, or both, but, for the past decade, Portugal has treated drug abuse solely as a public-health issue. When caught, people are summoned before an administrative body called the Commission for the Dissuasion of Drug Addiction. Each panel consists of three members—usually a lawyer or a judge, a doctor, and a psychologist or a social worker. The commissioners have three options: recommend treatment, levy a small fine, or do nothing. In most respects, the law seems to have worked: serious drug use is down significantly, particularly among young people; the burden on the criminal-justice system has eased; the number of people seeking treatment has grown; and the rates of drug-related deaths and cases of infectious diseases have fallen. 
Yet there is much to debate about the Portuguese approach to drug addiction. Does it help people to quit, or does it transform them into more docile drug addicts, wards of an indulgent state, with little genuine incentive to alter their behavior? By removing the fear of prosecution, does the government actually encourage addicts to seek treatment? In the United States, the misuse of legally sold prescription medications has become a bigger health problem than the sale of narcotics or cocaine. There are questions not only about the best way to address addiction but also about how far any society should go, morally, philosophically, and economically, to placate drug addicts.
Portugal Decriminalized Drugs. What Can the U.S. Learn? : The New Yorker
DEA, Federal Trafficking Penalties
Federal Mandatory Minimum Sentences Drug Chart
Are Mandatory Minimum Drug Sentences Cost-Effective? | RAND
Here's a recent painting of a bright young couple eagerly awaiting their marriage license in Pinellas County, Florida.

Degas' painting (1876) portrays grim Absinthe drinkers in a cafe, imagine how they'll look when they see the bill.